Arthur ran up the stairs and quickly looked out in each direction, making sure he refastened the shutters. He knew that back in the Secondary Realms the Fetchers – winged or otherwise – couldn’t cross a threshold without invitation but he wasn’t sure if that applied in the House.
Thinking of that reminded him of two things. One was that he hadn’t actually confirmed his location. He assumed he was somewhere in the Middle House. The second was that even though he didn’t want to consult it, Dame Primus still had his Compleat Atlas of the House and he felt a bit funny about that. He’d rather have it with him, so if he absolutely needed to he would be able to check things out in it. He also didn’t want Dame Primus to have it.
It’s not that I don’t trust her, he thought. It’s just that … I’m not sure if I should trust her.
Arthur shook his head and sighed. Thinking about the Will and its manifestation as the annoying Dame Primus wasn’t helping the current situation.
Focus, he told himself. Focus!
There was nothing immediately threatening in any direction, or at least nothing that Arthur could see. He went back down somewhat slower than he’d gone up, but his mind was still running fast, thinking through the situation and what he was going to do. At the bottom, he returned to the antechamber, turned the handle around, and opened the door back on to the chamber of molten gold and all its workers.
Arthur had hoped that he’d immediately see a sizeable force of former veterans of the Army parading ready to receive his orders, but that was not the case. Only three Denizens stood in line, at ease. They were carrying the ten-foot-long gold-scooping poles, with no other, more effective weapons in evidence. Everything else was much as it had been ten minutes before, a hive of activity, except that the group of Denizens lying down with paper or parchment strips stuck on their foreheads had got noticeably larger. At least another twenty or thirty Denizens had lain down in that area.
Marek was nowhere in sight, but a female Denizen who was wearing a ruffled green shirt, as well as a rather cleaner and more impressive apron than the others, was standing by the door, giving instructions to several workers. She turned as Arthur marched in, and bowed low.
‘Elibazeth?’ asked Arthur.
‘Yes, lord.’
‘Is this all the Denizens here who have done Army service?’
‘All who are not experiencing,’ said Elibazeth. She gestured to the sleeping, paper-stuck Denizens.
‘What?’ Arthur didn’t think he’d heard her properly, over the noise of the hammers and everything.
‘Experiencing.’
‘Experiencing what? Being asleep?’
‘No, lord,’ said Elibazeth. ‘They are not asleep. They are partaking of mortal experience. They will wake in a month or two.’
‘What!’ exclaimed Arthur. ‘What are those papers they’ve got stuck on?’
‘Mortal experiences,’ said Elibazeth stolidly. She did not appear to be so overawed by Arthur as Marek had been. She was simply matter-of-fact. ‘They are pieces of mortal experience that Lady Friday has discarded. As they are not explicitly forbidden, they are allowed.’
Arthur stared at her, then shook his head. Obviously he was going to have to get a lot more information, and as quickly as possible.
‘Wait here,’ he instructed Elibazeth before he strode over to the pitifully small line of former soldiers.
‘Ten-hut!’ called the Denizen on the right. The trio came to attention.
‘Present ar—!’
‘Thanks!’ called out Arthur. ‘We won’t bother with all that. Stand easy! I’m Arthur, Commander of the Glorious Army of the Architect. Um, are there really only three of you here who’ve done military service?’
‘Yes, sir!’ answered the Denizen who’d been about to give the order to present arms. ‘That is, the only ones not experiencing, sir. There’s probably twenty among the ’spe-riencers. Sir.’
‘Right …’ said Arthur. ‘We haven’t got much time. What are your names, with former rank and unit, please?’
‘Lance-Bombardier Jugguth Flat Gold of the Moderately Honourable Artillery Company,’ replied the right-hand Denizen. ‘I’ve only been out fifty years. This ’ere is Private Lukin Flat Gold of the Regiment and Trooper Serelle Flat Gold of the Horde.’
‘Okay, Bombardier Jugguth. There is a force of Nithlings – Fetchers and maybe worse – nearby, who will probably attack soon. I want you to take your … ah … section into the tower and keep a lookout in all four directions. If you see anything, send someone to report to me at once. I’ll be here with Elibazeth. Got that?’
‘Yes, sir,’ shouted Jugguth. ‘Only as there’s only three of us, how can we look in all four directions, sir?’
‘Swap sides,’ said Arthur, biting back a sharper retort. ‘Check the canal side every five minutes for a minute or two, then go back to whichever side you’re covering. Understand?’
‘Yes, sir,’ said Jugguth, but Arthur wasn’t absolutely sure the Denizen had understood. While the Bombardier marched his section out the door, Arthur ran over to Elibazeth, who was inspecting a large sheet of gold foil that had been brought to her by another Denizen. She had moved closer to the pool of molten gold, and it was much hotter there, hot enough to make sweat start to run down the back of Arthur’s neck.
‘Elibazeth!’ Arthur interrupted a technical discussion about how much more hammering the foil needed. ‘How do you normally protect yourselves against Nithlings? I mean, the Lower House has Commissionaires and so on. What guards do you have here?’
‘When Friday’s Dawn is here, he is accompanied by a flight of Gilded Youths,’ said Elibazeth. She didn’t sound very concerned about the prospect of being attacked. ‘They patrol the Flat and the First Ascent of the Canal, and dispose of any Nithling incursions. After sunfall, I believe the Winged Servants of the Night do likewise. However, the Gilded Youths have departed with our Guildmaster – that is to say, Friday’s Dawn. I do not know if the Winged Servants will come with the night, or even if there will be a night. Day and night have been rather uncertain here since the weather has been broken. However, the mill itself is very securely built, the gate is much stronger than perhaps it appears, and we have other defences. It would be very difficult for any Nithlings to get in.’
Arthur wiped the sweat off his forehead and tried to gather his thoughts. It was good to hear that the defences were strong. And he had sentries now, so at least he wasn’t going to be surprised by a Nithling attack. What he needed to know now was … pretty much everything.
‘Right. Let’s start with the basics. Where exactly are we?’
Six
‘AN AMBULATORY SEEDPOD, ’ Milka told Leaf, gesturing to the smoking husk of the creature that had just been destroyed. ‘They get in from outside occasionally. If you’re unlucky enough to see one again …’
‘What do I do?’ asked Leaf.
‘Count yourself lucky that you mortals die easily,’ replied Milka grimly. ‘Denizens can live for months while the bloom grows in them.’
Leaf didn’t answer, but crossed to the other side of the corridor, to keep as far away as she could, even from the scorched fragments of the seedpod.
‘Come on,’ ordered Milka to Leaf. ‘Leave that, Feorin! You don’t have to wear it here.’
Feorin stopped struggling with his trench coat and simply scrunched it under his arm. His wings turned in towards his spine and folded themselves flat, the tips withdrawing up from his knees to just below his waist.
Leaf wasn’t sure how long it took to get to their destination. Every time Feorin hesitated or slowed, she felt an overpowering urge to jump back. The immediate fear of encountering another seedpod overlaid the more general anxiety of her situation; the shock of the sudden encounter had intensified her already nervous state. Leaf felt incredibly jumpy, even on the brink of breaking down. Only the knowledge that this would do no good at all helped her keep herself together.
‘Feorin … stop,’ said Milka after a
small, exasperated sigh. She pointed to a left-hand door Feorin had just passed. It had the number 18 above it, the numeral made of small blue stone chips. ‘This is it.’
The room beyond the door was about as big as Leaf’s living room back home. The far wall was dominated by a full-length window, the first Leaf had seen. It looked like frosted glass so Leaf couldn’t see anything through it, though it did admit a great deal of purple-tinged sunlight that was bright enough to wash out the ubiquitous blue-flamed gas jets in the ceiling.
An old wooden table with one chair was in the centre of the room; there was a bed in the corner, and a man – a normal mortal human from the look of him – was asleep on top of the covers, fully dressed in the same kind of green hospital uniform the cleaner back in the ward on Earth had worn.
‘Is that her?’ asked Feorin.
‘Him,’ said Milka. ‘I told you they change them all the time. Wake up!’
The man sat up with a startled cry. He was quite old, Leaf saw. Older than her grandfather, his short hair white as paper.
‘What?’ he said. ‘I only just lay down!’
‘We’ve brought you a sleeping waker,’ said Feorin.
‘A waking sleeper,’ corrected Milka. ‘We need a receipt.’
The man rubbed his eyes and looked at Leaf.
‘Hi,’ he said. ‘I’m Harrison. I expect they’ve stuffed up again. You’re a Piper’s child, aren’t you?’
‘No …’ said Leaf. She tried to act puzzled and disoriented, which wasn’t hard. ‘I was in the hospital …’ Harrison got out of the bed with a frown.
‘But She never takes anyone under fifty!’
‘We need a receipt!’ interrupted Milka. ‘And quickly. We’ve got better things to do.’
‘Like drink tea,’ said Feorin.
‘All right, all right!’ Harrison shook his head several times, blinked, and wiped his eyes, then went over to the desk and quickly wrote something on a piece of paper, using a ballpoint pen. Milka took it and pursed her lips in distaste.
‘Poor penmanship,’ she said. ‘Those pointy things are not proper writing instruments!’
‘Will it do as a receipt?’ asked Harrison.
‘I suppose so,’ said Milka. She folded the paper very precisely into a square one-eighth of its original size and put it in her pocket. ‘Feorin! Come on.’
The two Denizens stalked out, leaving Leaf standing in front of the desk. Harrison rubbed his eyes again and leaned forward, propping his chin on his hands for a moment, with his eyes closed as if he were asleep. Then he shook himself awake again, pushed the chair back, and stood up.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘You’d better sit down. This is going to be a shock.’
Leaf took the chair.
Harrison paced in front of the desk, scratching his head. Finally he stopped and turned to face Leaf.
‘Look, I don’t know how to tell you this. Uh, let’s see … how can I put it? The two … ah … people who brought you here. Well, they’re not human. They’re like kind of aliens, called Denizens, and normally they live in a place … a world I guess … called the House. Only this isn’t there, it’s another planet somewhere in maybe the Lesser Magellanic Cloud, I think, or maybe … oh … I’m too tired to even think, let alone explain. Anyway, most of the real people here are asleep and they’ll stay asleep until … but there are a few normal humans like me who are awake … but we’re prisoners too … Ah, I bet none of this is making sense …’
‘You say you’re a prisoner here?’ asked Leaf. She wanted to be sure he wasn’t a willing servant of Lady Friday.
‘Yeah,’ said Harrison. ‘I was dumb enough to take a job in ‘Dr Friday’s’ hospital back on Earth. Next thing I know …here I am, and here I’ve stayed. What year is it back home?’
Leaf told him. Harrison asked her again and she repeated it. He stood completely still the second time, the muscles working in his throat as if he were holding back a sob.
‘Then I’ve been here for fourteen years … I thought it was longer. Weird stuff happens when you go through the House between Earth and here.’
‘We got here via this House place?’ asked Leaf.
‘According to Axilrad,’ said Harrison. ‘One of the Denizens. She talks to me sometimes. Ah, what does it matter … I’m stuck here, you’re stuck here, we’re better off than the sleepers …’ ‘What happens to the sleepers?’ Leaf felt her whole body tense up with that question, because she really meant ‘What’s going to happen to my aunt?’
‘You don’t want to know,’ muttered Harrison. He kept pacing. ‘Really, you don’t. You’re bound to be in shock already; I don’t want to make it worse.’
‘I do want to know,’ said Leaf. She took a deep breath, preparing herself for whatever she might be about to hear. ‘And I already know about the House and the Denizens and Lady Friday being a Trustee of the Will and all.’
Harrison stopped pacing and stared at her.
‘How? I mean, you are a human?’
‘Yes,’ said Leaf. ‘But I’ve been in the House before. I’m a friend of Arthur, the Rightful Heir to the Architect.’
‘You mean Arthur’s real?’ Harrison sat down on the edge of the desk and looked directly at Leaf for the first time, his eyes suddenly lively, the weariness gone. ‘The Denizens talk about him sometimes. Axilrad said he doesn’t exist, that there are always rumors about a Rightful Heir … but if he can defeat Lady Friday … maybe … there is a chance I can get home after all …’
‘He’s real enough,’ said Leaf. ‘He’s already beaten Mister Monday, Grim Tuesday, and Drowned Wednesday … and probably Sir Thursday too, only I don’t know for sure. Now, tell me … what happens to the sleepers?’
Harrison looked away again and clicked his fingernails in agitation.
‘She only used to bring across a dozen or so a month,’ he said. ‘I don’t know why there’s been this sudden influx. Thousands of them, and I have to turn them in their beds every twelve hours, until they … until it’s time …’
His voice trailed off.
‘Until it’s time for what?’ demanded Leaf.
‘They go to Lady Friday,’ said Harrison. ‘Then—’
Whatever he was going to say next was interrupted by a sudden electronic squawk, followed by a crackle from the wooden box on Harrison’s desk that Leaf had taken for a large paperweight or something, but was in fact an intercom.
‘Harrison! I hear you’ve got new help. Get over to the Yellow Preparation Room now and set up a dozen for the boss.’
‘Axilrad,’ Harrison explained to Leaf. ‘The Denizen I work for. She’s not so bad, compared to most of the others. Come on!’
‘But what happens to the sleepers?’ Leaf asked as Harrison hustled her to the door.
‘You’ll see,’ said Harrison. Despite his comment about Axilrad being not too bad, he seemed extremely fearful of keeping her waiting. ‘Follow me.’
Harrison walked so fast he almost broke into a jog. Leaf kept up with him as best she could, though her legs were still not fully working and it took her much more effort than usual just to maintain a fast walk.
A hundred yards or so along the corridor, they passed a large rectangular window of clear glass set into the inner wall. Through it, Leaf could see a large circular lake a few hundred feet below, and for the first time she got a clear sense that all the corridors and rooms she’d been in were definitely in the crater wall of something like an extinct volcano.
Looking out the window and up, Leaf at first only saw the strange, purple sky. Then she noticed a delicate tracery of pale gold, in a crazed pattern arching up from the far rim of the crater. It appeared to be an ultra-thin wire or metal framework, but it took Leaf several more seconds to work out that there was glass or something like glass between the metal wires, and that together they made up a domed cap that sat over the whole crater – a dome that was at least a mile in diameter and three or four hundred yards high.
‘Hurry up!’ calle
d Harrison. He’d got a long way in front while Leaf was gawking out the window. The girl stopped sightseeing and ran after him. But when she’d caught up, she slowed again. The lake in the middle of the crater had reminded her of something. It was a large body of water, easily big enough to sail a small craft on.
Water … lake … sea … boat … ship … Mariner, thought Leaf.
She let Harrison get ahead again. She didn’t stop; she just slowed her pace so that he disappeared around the curve in front of her. Then she pulled out the Mariner’s medallion on its rather sad twined necklace of dental floss and raised it near her mouth.
‘Please help me,’ she whispered to the small whalebone disc. ‘It’s Leaf here, Arthur’s friend. He gave me the medallion. Please help me. I’m a prisoner of Lady Friday’s, somewhere in the Secondary Realms. Please help. Or tell Arthur. Or Suzy Turquoise Blue. Please help.’
She managed to repeat this almost-mantra several times before Harrison came into sight again, waiting outside a door marked 5. He frowned at Leaf, waited till she was only a few feet away, then knocked. He didn’t wait for a reply, but opened it straight away and went in. Leaf followed more cautiously, worried about what she was going to see.
The Yellow Preparation Room was indeed yellow, having daisy-coloured walls and a brighter, egg-yolk-coloured ceiling. A large, rectangular chamber about the same size as Leaf’s school gymnasium, it contained thirty of the same basic beds as had occupied Friday’s hospital back on Earth, and all the beds were occupied by sleepers. Leaf quickly looked at the closest, to see if she recognised anyone, particularly Aunt Mango. But no one looked familiar. They were all quite old.
A Denizen stood in the middle of the room, behind a wooden table that was loaded with numerous bottles of different sizes and shapes, each containing a mysterious-looking fluid. A female Denizen, wearing an old-fashioned Florence Nightingale getup, complete with a starched white hat that made her even taller. While she was very attractive and at least six feet tall without the hat, she was not awe-inspiringly beautiful, or much taller than normal, so Leaf figured her to be only a mid-ranking servant of Lady Friday. She was intent on pouring a rich blue fluid from a bottle with a very long neck into a measuring cup, and didn’t immediately look up as Harrison and Leaf came in.