“Maximillian—don’t ever, ever tell anyone that the Ancients played it with a ball.”
“All right, I won’t. It’s more fun with goats anyway.”
—
Meanwhile, back in the Capital, Mrs. Morgan was sitting in her office leafing through a sheaf of reports that had just been delivered. Two vast black cats lounged in the corner. They were the very same beasts that had so startled Silo, for Mrs. Morgan kept a pair of pumas as pets. They seemed restless and ill at ease with domesticity, and many of her visitors thought her unwise to so faithfully emulate the ways of the Ancients. Elgarth and the inspector were evidently of this opinion, for they were sitting as far away from the pumas as possible and looking distinctly uneasy. They and Mrs. Morgan all looked ultraclean and freshly scrubbed, but even so there was a faint odor about the room, a ghostly whiff of sewage.
“Aha!” said Mrs. Morgan, laying aside a sheet of paper. “I think this is what we have been looking for. It seems that a government vessel, a cargo raft, has been stolen from the north quay. The watchmen claim to have seen nothing, but the location is suggestive.”
“It’s certainly very close to the Unicorn Tower,” said the inspector.
“Indeed it is! I’m convinced that if we find this raft, we will find the children responsible for the monstrous outrage that took place there. We must dispatch some reliable agents to track them down. The river Rampage will carry them down to Silo Zyco’s old haunts in the Eastern Swamps, and he must be stopped at all costs.”
“They’re bound to catch him soon,” said Elgarth soothingly. “After all, he’s pretty dim.”
Mrs. Morgan frowned. “There I disagree with you,” she said. “I have discovered much in these last few hours, and I think there is more to Silo Zyco than meets the eye.”
“And why is that?” said the inspector.
“Well, first there is his background. He comes from a legendary criminal family, and in my experience such people do not usually seek employment with the Government. And then there is his friendship with the boy who impersonated Maximillian Crow. We now know this is actually one Orlando Bramble, the brother of one of the Government’s most dangerous enemies—Valeria the Violent, the notorious Raider.”
The inspector looked thoughtful. “You suspect, then, that the Raiders are involved in this?”
“I’m sure of it,” said Mrs. Morgan grimly. “So far they have been content to stir trouble on our sea coasts, but now it seems they grow more ambitious. Silo Zyco succeeded in inciting a rebellion in the Wildwoods, in the very heart of Mainland itself. I am convinced he is in league with them. And there is another thing. I have here a report from the guards at the Unicorn Tower. They say that the other children did not speak much to the real Maximillian Crow, but that no sooner had Silo arrived than he sought him out and befriended him. I am convinced he knew his true identity and was trying to recruit him to the cause of the Raiders. I believe there is a plot against us, a dangerous and deep-laid plot, and that Silo Zyco is far more cunning than we supposed. Where is your manservant, Elgarth? We must send him to Division Headquarters with instructions to have wanted posters circulated immediately.”
“I sent him to the hospital to inquire after Superintendent Frisk and Officer Feeton,” said Elgarth.
“I have done so, master, and returned.” Rankly had materialized silently in the doorway.
“And how did you find our unfortunate officers?” asked the inspector.
Rankly looked grave. “Not well, sir. Their lives are not in danger, but the doctors say that the psychological scars will stay with them forever. The trauma was very great.
“But Officer Feeton does not forget his duty. He asked me to give a message to you. He remembers that he overheard Silo Zyco and the little Crow child talking about the gift of the seeing. He would have mentioned it earlier, he says, but the unexpected arrival of the Bramble boy put it out of his mind. Crow told Silo Zyco he could see into the distant past, right back to the time of the Ancients.”
Mrs. Morgan sprang to her feet, her pale face tinged pink with fury. “You see? Maximillian’s powers are even greater than we had supposed! He is the key to rediscovering the secret power of the Ancients, and yet Silo means to deliver him into the hands of the Raiders! Rankly—arrange transport for us immediately! Thank heavens the government fleet awaits us in Parris Port. It seems we must kill two birds with one stone: first put an end to Silo Zyco’s schemes and then commence our eastern expedition. Elgarth—I’ll meet you at the north jetty within the hour. Come, Inspector! We have no time to waste, and I find I must leave the cleanup operation at the Unicorn Tower in your capable hands.”
The inspector looked depressed beyond measure.
—
Elgarth was left alone, and in an extremely bad mood. He suspected that Mrs. Morgan was wrong about Silo’s alliance with the Raiders, and it infuriated him to hear Silo described as some kind of criminal mastermind. He had disliked him from the first, but since his terrible experience in the Unicorn Tower his dislike had deepened into a dark and unyielding hatred. Already the event had become the talk of the Capital, and for some reason the scum of the city found it extremely funny. It could only be a matter of time before the story reached his father, and Elgarth knew that he would not find it in the least amusing but rather a shameful blot on the family name. As he sat brooding a woman’s voice drifted up from the street below: a voice both tuneful and unfeasibly loud, upraised in a rollicking ballad.
Silo Zyco was a seer, the future he could see!
He hated the Division just as much as you or me!
They said he was an anarchist—he was too mad for words,
And filled an Ancient ruin with a tidal wave of—
Her song broke off abruptly, for Elgarth had hurled a potted geranium at her. Seething, he slammed the window shut. Rankly was watching him, the expression on his face unfathomable.
“Well, don’t just stand there!” snapped Elgarth. “Pack my things.”
An enraged bellow came from the street:
His writing’s neat, he has webbed feet, some say he is a psycho,
But if you care for freedom, drink a toast to Silo Zyco!
There followed the musical tinkle of breaking glass, and a turnip came hurtling into the room, thrown by an unseen hand.
That evening the subject of the song steered the raft to a wooded island. A weeping willow grew on its banks, its branches sweeping down into the stream, and when the raft was secured to its trunk it was completely concealed behind a dense green curtain. Then Silo did what he had been longing to do all afternoon: he took off his boots and dived, fully clothed, into the clear pool beneath the willow. All the children on the Island learned to swim at a very early age, and Silo had the added advantage of webbed feet; now he cleaved through the sparkling shallows with the grace of an otter, and as he did so a dark cloud blossomed in his wake as he shed the accumulated grime of weeks. When he finally surfaced, the air around him was rent with shouts and splashes. The other children were following suit.
“Hooray! Bath time!” cried Daisy. “Remember to wash behind your ears, everyone!”
But for the moment they were more interested in water fights and ducking their friends. The river around them turned black for a moment, and all looked considerably cleaner when they emerged, laughing and dripping, fifteen minutes later.
“We need to get a camp organized,” said Ruby. “Look out for a good spot for the fire—somewhere hidden. Some of you get the spuds and bread and sausages. Everyone stick together until we’ve checked the place for zoo animals, and then we can start collecting firewood.”
An hour later a cheerful fire was blazing in the gathering twilight. It was sited in a snug hollow and the trees grew thick about it, shielding its glow from anyone passing on the riverbank. The Bolton brothers had been dispatched to the ends of the island to act as lookouts, and two of the smaller children had been sent after them with supplies of hot sausages. The rest were s
eated around the fire, having just polished off a gargantuan meal of sausage sandwiches and plum cake. Their clothes steamed gently in the heat of the fire, and Daisy had laid potatoes to bake in the embers. Ruby paced back and forth at the edge of the hollow, her bottom lip thrust out, a look of grim determination on her face.
“Time for a council of war,” she said. “Well, we’ve escaped, which is excellent. Nice work, everyone. Special congratulations to Drusilla for her work on the treadmill, and to Silo for handling the raft and getting Frisk off our backs. That was genius, by the way—wish I’d had time to watch. Also to Orlando for lying to the watchmen—that’s a real gift you have there.”
Maximillian, seated beside Silo, muttered dark things.
“Now we have to make plans. How many of you have homes to go back to?”
Only Daisy raised her hand.
“How many of you are orphans?”
Maximillian and Orlando raised their hands. Beside them Silo’s hovered for a moment. His father had been a mystery for fully ten years now, and from what little Silo knew of him it seemed he lived a life of relentless action and adventure. Such a man could die in any number of ways, and very likely had, but Silo was not prepared to abandon hope. Not yet. He clasped his hands firmly in his lap.
“How many of you have parents who’ve been shipped out?” said Ruby, and a forest of hands arose all around the fire.
“Yeah, I thought as much. So right now we need to find help, and that means the Raiders. They’re the only ones brave enough to stand up against the Government. Everyone else moans about them all the time, but they’re too scared to do anything about it. But not the Raiders. They’re always up for a fight. The Government might control the land, but the seas are still up for grabs. And at this rate we’ll reach the coast tomorrow. There’s a town there, a place called Mudville.”
“Is that where the Raiders live?” someone asked hopefully.
“No, and it’s finding them that’s going to be the hard part. They say they operate from a hidden base off Mainland, but no one knows where exactly. Some say it’s in the Northern Isles, some say out west past the Horse Island Straits, but it’s all just guesswork. It could be anywhere. They have a Code of Silence—Raiders only tell other Raiders. What we really need is someone with inside contacts.”
“I might be able to help you there,” said Orlando. “My sister is Valeria the Violent.”
Ruby was impressed. “Straight up? That woman’s the business. She helped Ingall the Unclean attack the outposts on the southern coast last year. They say she left nothing behind her but scorched earth.”
“Doesn’t surprise me,” said Orlando. “She used to do that when it was her turn to do the gardening.”
Daisy spoke up. “The little ones are much too young to fight. We need to find a safe place for them to stay where they’ll be properly fed and treated with kindness.”
“True,” said Ruby. “We’ll have to work on that.”
“I’m up for joining the Raiders,” said Silo, “but I have to go to the Island first, to warn them that the Division is on its way.”
“I’ve been thinking about that,” said Ruby. “I think it’s high time we got our revenge on the Division.”
“I thought the thing with the sewage was pretty good,” said Orlando.
“Yeah, but we can do better. I’ve heard a lot of talk in the Capital about the Division. Apparently the Government’s getting a bit fed up with them. They’ve given them loads of money to dig up ruins and stuff, but they’re not coming up with the goods. They still don’t know what the power of the Ancients was. And from what I heard, if they don’t have a big success soon, they’re in trouble—so I think we should find a way to make sure this eastern expedition’s a complete disaster.”
“How?” said Silo.
“We’re going to have to sleep on that one,” said Ruby. “Are those spuds done yet?”
Within the hour they were back on board the raft. The children were clean, dry, and fed to the bursting point. They had made a cabin of sorts by pushing the crates and barrels into a square and rigging the tarpaulin over it. Ruby was supervising the loading of grass-stuffed sacks to act as mattresses.
“Is everyone aboard? Do a head count, Drusilla.” She watched as Drusilla counted painfully on her fingers, her face knotted with concentration. “On second thought, you do it, Daisy.”
“Thirty-one,” said Daisy, after a brief pause.
“We’ll be on our way, then. Cast off fore and aft.”
Silo turned the steering paddle and the raft glided out into the river. The sky overhead was a deep blue now. A lurid orange sunset flared to the west, and the river ran dark between inky banks.
“See if you can get some sleep, you lot,” said Ruby. “And keep it quiet! It’s such a still night the sound will carry for miles. Orlando and I’ll keep lookout in the bow.”
Daisy herded the children into the makeshift cabin and Silo was left alone at the helm. Or thought he was, until something small and bullet-headed blundered into him in the dark.
“Maximillian? Why don’t you get some sleep?”
“I want to help you, Silo.”
Silo sighed. “All right, then, but sit down. The last thing we need now is you falling overboard. And wrap up in a sack so you don’t get cold.”
And so began their long and eerie journey. It seemed strange to be out on the river at night, with only the stars and the owls for company, and navigating an unknown channel in the dark was nerve-racking work. Silo gazed into the blackness ahead, and occasionally Orlando or Ruby gave him whispered messages:
“Floating tree trunk to your left!”
“White water dead ahead.”
“Another island coming up—I think the main channel’s to the right.”
Once, they startled a family of sleeping swans, which flew off into the night with a great flurry and whir of wings and startled the children in their turn. As the long hours passed they began to scan the banks for signs of life with increasing anxiety. Dawn could not be far off now, and they needed to be clear of Parris Port by daybreak. Finally Orlando came creeping to the helm.
“I think I see lights on the left bank, way downriver—that must be it, surely….”
Silo strained his eyes into the gloom and saw, faintly discernible, a few pinpricks of light. There was a brighter glow on the horizon now, and by the time they drew level with the lights it had thickened into a broad pink band. Silhouetted against it, Silo could clearly see the tumbled roofs of Parris Port, and before them a forest of masts. The Government’s fleet was assembled and meant business. The ships lay silent as the raft ghosted past, but the streets were deserted and the whole town was wrapped in slumber. The Rampage was broader now, and Silo could feel the tug of the tide beneath them and smell a salt tang in the air.
“Well,” said Ruby, yawning mightily, “that’s the hard part done. Time to catch some sleep. Can Drusilla be trusted on the helm?”
“No,” said Silo firmly. “Put the Bolton brothers in charge. Their family are fishermen—or at least they were before they got shipped out. They know a thing or two about boats.”
Silo crawled into the makeshift cabin, towing a sleep-walking Maximillian behind him, and woke them up. Then he stretched out on their still-warm mattress and was asleep within seconds.
He awoke hours later. The cabin was packed with children feasting on jam sandwiches, rain was thrumming on the tarpaulin roof, and Drusilla was poking him in the chest.
“Ruby said to wake you up. We’re lost.”
Dazed with dreams, Silo crawled out on deck. The raft was drifting down a channel between gleaming mud banks. In every direction a flat expanse of marsh spread to the horizon. The wind tugged at his tattered clothes, and the gray skies above him were full of gulls, wheeling and crying above the rain-swept landscape. His long journey had come full circle, and he was back on the Eastern Marshes.
“It’s a delta,” said Basil, the older Bolton brother. �
��Once it got light there was a fair bit of shipping in the main channel, so we took a smaller one to stay out of sight. But there are hundreds of islands, and now we’re lost. You don’t recognize it, do you?” he finished hopefully.
“No.”
“Shhh!” said Ruby. “There’s some kind of creature up ahead—quite a big one. Are you sure there aren’t zoo animals on these marshes, Silo?”
“Yes.” Silo peered into the drizzle. Something hunched and hairy was crawling in the mud. Then he saw, to his delight, that it wore a tattered sack. He was nearing home.
“It’s an eel trapper,” he said. He hailed the figure with the traditional yodeling cry of the Marshlanders, and it rose slowly to its feet, squelching as it did so. They drifted alongside and it revealed itself to be a filthy old man, dripping mud from head to foot. His hair and beard were matted, his eyes were wild, and he was armed with an eel spear. Daisy uttered a small cry of distress, and even Silo was somewhat taken aback. He had been away a long time and had forgotten quite how unusual Marshlanders appeared in the eyes of Uplanders. He was growing worldly and sophisticated, he realized, with a little glow of pride.
Ruby addressed the festering apparition. “Do you know the way to Mudville, please?”
“And why would a bunch of Uplanders be looking for Mudville?” said the old man.
“We’re on an urgent mission. We need to find the Raiders,” said Ruby.
The man stared at her. “There’s always folks who wants to find the Raiders, but the Raiders ain’t the kind of folk who want to be found. You have to know the right kinds of people.”
Orlando stepped forward. “My sister is Valeria the Violent.”
“You say she is, but can your word be trusted?”
There was an awkward silence. The man regarded them all with deep suspicion, then spat a gob of something green into the creek. Daisy winced delicately at Silo’s side.
“The Raiders is friends to the common man,” he said, “but those who comes from the Uplands to look for them is usually government folk.”
Silo and the Rebel Raiders Page 14