Metronome

by Oliver Langmead

  I come to a tangled network of streets. They are filled with people and movement and sound. The crowds here are as much an assortment as the city they inhabit, treading the cobbles of the incline on heavy boots, sandals and even bare feet. I can hear conversations in European languages, and African, and Asian, with accents so varied that I struggle to even recognise English.

  Where the streets open up and become roads, I travel past vehicles as well. Vans and cars rumble past, and so do tuk-tuks, bicycles and horse-drawn carriages. I am reminded of the chaos of the streets of Mumbai; with so many different vehicles the sight becomes confusing and dazzling.

  The compass held loosely in my grip has become useless – almost everyone I pass is a dreamer, and the doors to dreams encrust the streets. The face of the compass is so full of blue needles and red needles and even black needles that I realise that I am about to become lost.

  I turn about at the crossroads, and wonder how I am meant to find March, or anyone, in all this chaos. I need help.

  I catch sight of a small building squatting between two others, as if it is hiding between them. Written in stone above the door of the small building is the word INFORMAYTION. As badly spelt as it might be, I waste no more time in striking across. If someone is offering information then perhaps they will be able to help me find March, at least.

  I push the door open and step through.

  *

  Inside, there is a deep gloom. The oily windows look as if they have not been cleaned in decades. It is a cramped space, made tighter by the amount of literature crammed into every corner. For a moment I believe that I have stumbled upon a kind of tomb for words.

  There is a sound I recognise filling the air. It is the static crackle of the space between radio stations, but amplified. On the other side of the room, I can just about see the thin aerials of dozens of radio sets, sticking out at angles. Every single set is playing static, making so much sound it feels as if I stand before a waterfall.

  I was mistaken about trying to find information here.

  Except, before I turn to leave, I notice that there is a human figure draped over one of the far tables. I wander a little closer, turning scrolls aside with my feet.

  There is a body there, face down on the hard wood.

  The man is obviously dead. Spiders have woven webs across his fallen head. Beside his ears are two ancient-looking radio sets, covered in the same dusty cobwebs, still emanating that obnoxious white noise.

  Yet, as I stare, there is a stirring. With a great heaving the body moves. Webs tear from the table as the man rights himself, blinking with sad and watering eyes, and pulling white strands from his face with weak hands.

  He is wearing a stained white tabard over a rusted chain-mail coat, and he looks like a shabby Arthurian knight. He has a pointed beard, and the skin of his face looks as if it has been pulled down to his chin, giving him a drawn and aged expression. I quickly pop March’s compass into the top pocket of my mackintosh coat to keep it out of sight, just in case.

  When the dusty man finally catches sight of me, his face erupts into a wolfish grin. I am unable to tell if it is a grimace or a genuine sign of joy. ‘Name thyself, welcome stranger!’ he wheezes, barely audible over the radios that surround him. His voice is a strained hiss, and I am struck by the idea that this is no noble knight, but a parody of one.

  ‘I’m William,’ I tell him. ‘William Manderlay. Who are you?’

  With a great cracking of bones, as if his body is a forest in high winds, the dusty knight stands. The last of the cobwebs fall from him. When he bows, I am not certain if it is a mocking gesture or a genuine one. ‘They call me Thyme, for the flavour of my lies,’ he says. His accent feels ancient, given a Shakespearean quality. ‘Seekest thou information?’

  I feel as if I should be backing up, towards the door.

  ‘I’m looking for someone,’ I tell him.

  ‘Thou art lost,’ he tells me. ‘The rumours speak of thee. Thou art the bard come to Babel from the doors.’ I notice a sword at the knight’s side, wrapped in black leather. He leans forward across the table, sending scrolls tumbling. ‘Speak thou hence the cause of thy quest and I shall furnish thee with my aid, Manderlay the Bard.’

  I remain hesitant.

  ‘I need to find a nightmare-hunter called March.’

  Thyme lowers his gaze, looking thoughtful. ‘This realm is not blessed with seasons. The months that plague these lands are flesh and bone. Speak ye of the Sleepwalker?’ The same word that June used. I suppose he must be right.

  ‘March the Sleepwalker, yes.’

  The knight narrows his eyes.

  ‘Seekest thou conflict? Trouble thyself not with the Lord of War, Manderlay the Bard. Must it be the March Soldier? Wouldst thou settle not for the gentle curiosity of May, or the wisdom of October? March burns brightly, yes, but fiercely. There exist tamer Sleepwalkers that might tend to thine ailment.’

  ‘I need to find March,’ I insist.

  Thyme sighs. ‘Justly,’ he says, ‘I shall aid thee. By the fates, thou art in luck. Just as the rumours whisper of thee, they speak of thy Sleepwalker. I shall take thee hence to him.’ The wolfish grin across Thyme’s face has vanished, replaced with a kind of sorrow visible in his dark and sunken eyes. The old knight rounds his table, and I can see that he is wearing metal plate across his legs and feet.

  ‘This way, Manderlay the Bard.’ He heaves open the front door.

  ‘I don’t have any money,’ I tell him. ‘To pay you.’

  At this, Thyme’s pointed grin returns. ‘I shall not accept currency,’ he tells me, ‘but only the presence of thy company. It has been many an age since the others of my kind passed beyond this realm. It has been many an age more since the crowds called for a liar. Mine is a lost art, and I shall be grateful to share it with thee.’ He turns aside, and lets me pass. We stand back out in the busy street.

  ‘You’re a liar?’

  ‘The last liar,’ he says, slowly, sadly, observing the tower. In the light of day Thyme looks like an artefact recovered from some lost tomb. ‘Once, dreams were built of my tales. Quests formed by the skill of my words. But now there are only the whispers and the rumours, and little room for a liar. Dreams are built on dull facts. Mine,’ he repeats, ‘is a lost art. Follow me, Manderlay, and we shall locate thy Sleepwalker.’ Reluctantly I do as I am told, wondering whether I have made a grave mistake.

  *

  Closer to the tower the streets of Babel become a tangle, filled with dozens of improbable sets of stairs and archways, and I am reminded of the paintings of Escher.

  As we approach the tower, the folk we pass begin to look almost fantastic in nature. We stride alongside a set of men with pointed boots, lengthy moustaches, and gilded turbans upon their heads, and we travel through a marketplace filled with ugly vegetables and slabs of meat turning on spits, where everybody calls out to us in languages I do not understand.

  ‘What is this place?’ I ask Thyme, who is leading the way.

  ‘’Tis a market,’ he replies, humourlessly.

  ‘No, I mean the City. The tower.’

  As we move I notice that Thyme is slowly shedding his dust and walking more upright, as if new life is being breathed into him. ‘Babel? Thou art asking the question of a philosopher, and I am no creature of philosophy. Perhaps thou wouldst prefer an artful lie? The philosopher would tell thee that thou seest before thee the heart of dreaming, where the dreams of men come together and reveal their true communal desire – an unfulfilled longing for the divine. But I – ah, I would tell thee that the tower is a mystery waiting to be solved, an artefact from ages past, which men do not understand, but which they continue to build out of some long-lost primal instinct left unsatisfied from the first dreams. Indeed, I meditate often upon the true nature of the tower, for it is my strong belief that to understand the tower would be to understand dreams themselves. Every night, the tower grows taller, and every night, the heavens seem so much further away.
’

  ‘Thanks,’ I say, still mystified.

  Beyond the marketplace, we come to a crossroads, and the tower is revealed fully before us. I find that if I stare up at it for any length of time I am struck by the fear that it will collapse. I glance across at Thyme.

  ‘A crossroads,’ he comments, ‘not only in Babel, but in our quest.’

  I shift my violin case into a more comfortable position over my shoulder. ‘Which way?’

  ‘Ah,’ he says, ‘but this is a question for thee to answer. I shall furnish thee with the choice. One route should take us to thy Sleepwalker safely, but it is a slow route, and there is no guarantee that he shall be at our destination once we reach it. But there lies before us a second route, a perilous alternative which might lead thee to harm shouldst thou tread uncertainly along the path, but which would speed us through to thy quest’s end.’

  ‘Why would the second route be dangerous?’

  Thyme raises a knobbly finger and points to a part of the network of streets before us. ‘The shadow of the tower,’ he says, in such a solemn manner that it becomes comedic. He is correct that the tower’s enormous shadow sweeps out before us. It is difficult to see what lies beneath that shadow, but it looks like more of the city, more of the same bustle and sound.

  ‘It can’t be that bad, surely?’

  Thyme shakes his head, and dust fills the air. ‘Thou art perhaps misunderstanding. The sun here is no celestial body, but a fixed point unblemished by clouds: a nightless day eternal. And while the city we stride is baked, there is a slender portion,’ he squints his watery eyes, ‘which remains… in the dark. And it is this slender portion where the city takes on a different countenance. Its streets no longer simple. Its doors leading to little hells. Its inhabitants often less than human.’ He lays his hand on the hilt of his surprisingly well-kept sword, still wrapped up in leathers. ‘I can keep thee safe, if thou hast trust for a liar.’

  ‘What’s the alternative?’

  ‘The tower itself,’ he says. ‘By which we might avoid the shadow.’

  It is at this point that I dearly wish I trusted Thyme. Or, at least, trusted him enough to reveal the nightmare-hunter’s compass. I am not sure the device would be much use in navigating the city, but it would bring me a lot of comfort to know whether Thyme is a dreamer or something else. Still, he seems earnest enough, patiently waiting for me to come to a decision. And there is something endearing in the way that everything about Thyme is at odds with everything else; he is a liar who announces his lies, and he is a knight in not-so-shining armour.

  I give him the benefit of the doubt.

  ‘All right. Let’s try the quick way through.’

  At this, Thyme grins his wolfish grin. ‘Splendid,’ he says. ‘Stay close, Manderlay the Bard, and I shall guide thee through the labyrinth hence.’ And with that, he strides across the street, causing an immediate collision somewhere further down the road as cars and bikes slam on their brakes to avoid hitting him. I quickly follow in his wake.

  *

  Without further pause Thyme steps into the shadow of the tower.

  I go in after him, and I am immediately struck by the gloom. Blinking, I wait for my eyes to adjust, but they do not. I find I am clumsy along the cobbled pavement, stumbling after my guide as he navigates through the dark without the aid of a torch or lamp. Trying not to pay too much attention to the black alleyways and side-streets we pass, I follow the clinking of Thyme’s greaves.

  ‘Stay near,’ says Thyme, but his voice sounds far away.

  Though the sky is still blue, the rooftops of the buildings around us have enclosed it, like the jaws of some enormous beast. The tower itself has become a black monolith, blocking out the sun, and there is a layer of slippery frost across everything in the cold.

  I raise my aching hands to my mouth, to breathe some warmth across them, and when I lower them again, Thyme seems distant. I can see the gangly shape of him ahead, but I am falling behind. ‘Further!’ he says, and his voice sounds distorted somehow. ‘Deeper still we must go.’ And then, ‘Keep thy wits about thee, Manderlay the Bard, and do not stray from the path.’

  ‘Wait!’ I call, but my voice sounds small. I lose sight of him.

  Rushing across the icy road to try and catch up, I come to a warren of streets leading off in almost every direction. Thyme could have gone down any of them. I pause, rubbing at my eyes as if I might clear the gloom away. There is no traffic here, but there are shifting figures shuffling along the paths and bulkier shadows moving vaguely behind blackened doorways.

  I have no idea where Thyme has gone.

  I feel a cold air lift the hairs across the back of my neck. Shivering, I attempt to retrace my steps, to find my way free of the tower’s shadow, but the streets I walk seem different, as if they have somehow changed since I moved through them.

  Turning about, I make my way to the nearest source of light, and find that it is one in a small series of low-glowing street lamps, arranged around a dark park filled with black and leafless trees. I stop, bathing in the yellow glow, and try to get my bearings.

  Perhaps it would be best if I just try and make my way towards the tower itself. It is the most obvious landmark, after all.

  I strike out, hunching my shoulders against the gloom and trying to make myself seem small and insignificant. I make my way up a brief incline and come to a long dark bridge lined with bent-backed street lamps, where a swathe of mist is swirling in. And as I cross that bridge I lose sight of the tower.

  I wonder if this was Thyme’s plan all along: to lead me here, to trap me here. To take the nightmare-hunter’s compass from me, perhaps.

  Halfway across the bridge, I stop and peer over the edge. There is nothing but black below. Beneath one of the bridge’s pale lamps I draw out March’s compass. There is no comfort on its face. There is a blue needle pointing at me, and a handful of red needles pointing here and there. But there are so many black needles encrusting the face of the compass that I can no longer see any white. With a sharp intake of breath, I squirrel the compass away.

  ‘Damn you, Thyme,’ I say, quietly. Something howls in the distance.

  I rush as fast as I am able to leave the bridge. On the other side, there is nothing but thin and winding streets, buried in mist. I go from dark doorway to dark doorway, feeling the ache in my legs. The shadowy figures here have started to take notice of me. Some are shrouded in great black cloaks, and others have odd, white skin. Their eyes are sullen hollows, staring with hunger.

  Completely lost, I stumble on.

  Through cold alleyways I pass, and from time to time I will catch sight of an open door, beyond which is a frightening dream: a meat factory, or a war-zone, or one of countless dark and stormy nights with lightning flashing and thunder booming. I try to keep myself calm, tell myself that soon these terrible streets must end, but I find that I am walking quicker and quicker, in defiance of my aged legs, desperately seeking the edge of the tower’s shadow.

  I jog up another cobbled incline, slipping through the mist. I keep glancing behind myself, catching glimpses of cloaked figures, some with arms outstretched, stumbling after me. There is a rushing sound now, like a frenzied whispering from a hundred mouths unused to speaking. My violin case thumps against my hip, and I find a railing by which I am able to pull myself up the hill.

  I have somehow returned to the bridge. Or is this a different bridge? Breathing heavily, I part the mists, pausing beneath the glow of a white lamp. I see a whole crowd of terrible cloaked figures moving in the mist behind me, visible only in snatches. Beginning to panic, I draw another rattling breath and force myself onwards.

  Almost at once, I am confronted by a bright light as it emerges from an alleyway at the end of the bridge. I have to shield my eyes from the sudden brightness, stumbling as if the sun itself has come to burn me. And there is a voice with the light, a somehow noble voice, belonging to the silhouette standing beneath it: an upright silhouette looking like s
omething from a tale of mighty heroes.

  ‘Hark!’ cries Thyme, holding his burning torch aloft.

  He advances through the mists until he is beside me. The crowd of terrible figures on the bridge halt and raise their hands to protect their eyes from the sudden beacon. They fall about themselves, but they do not retreat. ‘Liar!’ calls one, and that word ripples out among them. ‘Liar!’ comes the cry, and, ‘Liar!’ goes the echo.

  ‘Hark!’ repeats the dusty knight, except that he is dusty no longer. His hair is now silver instead of grey, and the stains across his tabard are battle-wear instead of rot, and the dark patches across his armour are blood instead of rust. His hand rests on the hilt of his sword, still wrapped in leathers. ‘This,’ he calls, ‘is the sword that once guarded the gates of Eden! Mark ye well: should I choose to draw this blade, ye shall see before ye a righteous conflagration, for the blade burns eternal still! I give ye the choice! Disperse now, and begone back to your shadows, or face the wrath of the heavens themselves!’

  Though that same hateful word is passed among them – ‘Liar! Liar!’ – the nightmares on the bridge rush away, to be devoured by the mists almost all at once. Thyme keeps his torch aloft, his watery eyes glinting.

  ‘Art thou well, Manderlay the Bard?’ he asks.

  My heart thumps heavily in my chest.

  ‘I’m fine,’ I tell him. ‘Can we… can we leave here, please?’

  Thyme inclines his head. ‘This way yonder,’ he says, and this time it is easy for me to follow him. There is no mistaking his torch in the gloom. And while by myself, the streets beneath the shadow of the tower seemed like an impenetrable labyrinth, Thyme strides with purpose through them, until I gladly catch sight of a bright street before us.

  ‘Thyme?’ I say to him, as his torch begins to burn low.

  ‘How may I aid thee?’ he asks, and in the light of day he seems himself again – all rust and dust and old pointed features – and I wonder why he seemed so formidable before.