Beyond the Knock Knock Door (16 page)

A few moments later, she moved to the edge of the balcony. ‘Isabelle and I have been friends since childhood. We played at my father's feet of an evening after the affairs of state were finished. For this tragedy
to strike such a wonderful, wonderful –'

She broke down and cried. He stood beside her and offered his strength.

‘Are you sure Isabelle was on that boat?'

‘Why do you ask?'

‘Maybe she didn't drown. Maybe she's been taken, just like her brother.'

She blinked at him. ‘But Guido is away on business. Captain Cavalli informed me of this himself.'

Michael fumed at this last name. He gripped the balcony then blurted, ‘Oriana, the monster is real.'

‘The monster?'

‘Yes, and working for someone here in the city.'

Her eyes widened. ‘Who?'

‘We don't know, but they're using the monster to kidnap people.'

‘For what end?'

‘I'm only guessing, but I think they're trying to overthrow your crown.'

Oriana stumbled. He caught and righted her as the two marines also rushed to her aid. She waved them away and wiped her eyes with a silk handkerchief.

‘You've known about the monster all along, haven't you?' he asked.

Absently, she stared across the empty city before walking to the other end of the balcony. ‘My government and I have kept proof of its existence to ourselves for some time now, fearing the panic it would create. But I see that ploy has now failed, and good people have died because of it.'

‘You have to warn your people. You have a better chance of catching both the monster and the traitor if everyone knows the truth.'

She pondered this gravely before nodding in resignation. ‘I will do as you ask. The blame must be solely mine.'

He left her to her thoughts as she retreated inside the observatory and ran her fingers over a mandolin crafted from silver and pearl. She drifted to the baby grand piano and
tink
ed a few keys until she slammed down her fists.

‘I hate being queen! Sometimes I'm a prisoner in my own kingdom.'

He reached out his hand and gently led her down the spiralling staircase. ‘Hopefully, I've something that'll cheer you up.'

After ordering her two marines to come no closer, Oriana stood at the crest of a steep boulevard lined with closed cafes and shops. Its cobbled street wound for three hundred metres without a single soul in sight. Michael handed her a thin but sturdy object with four wheels. He'd paid a craftsman to make a matching pair based on his journal sketches.

‘What is it?' she asked, half-averting her eyes as he shed his armour.

‘Madness!'

He jumped on his skateboard and hurtled down the boulevard. His armour flew after him and his
yahoo
howled all the way to the bottom.

Bursting with mirth, Oriana looked at her own
roughly made skateboard then at the marines, who appeared more nervous than her. In a very unlady-like manner, she hitched up her lionfish gown, stepped on the ride, then fell on her bum. She laughed as the marines rushed to help her. The moment she got to her feet, though, she was off! She zipped down the street, a little unsteady, but screaming with delight.

Back at the palace, on the same balcony, a sticky tearing sounded from above. A puff of white flecks dusted the ground as a statue did the unthinkable – it moved! First, his eyes blinked, then his fingers flexed, before his whole body ripped away from the wall. Painted completely grey-white to camouflage himself, the spy swung around the outstretched arm of a real statue, double-checked the marines posted on the bridge below, then snuck down the observatory's spiralling staircase. He stepped inside a holographic painting and pushed open a secret door, which descended to the hidden dungeon.

The boss would be pleased. The boy-knight was now at the centre of this conspiracy. It was time for him and his siblings to play their final part – and be killed by the monster.

Faces glowed red, green then gold as fireworks cannoned and bloomed above the gondola-filled harbour. A dozen more rockets shot from the docks, spiralled each other then exploded into cheers. On the wharves and promenades, great masses of people whistled, sang and pounded bongos amid giant floats. From the overlooking balconies, revellers tossed shimmering confetti and danced to the beat of street parties.

It was carnivale night – the start of the royal family's tricentennial celebrations – when no expense was spared. Everyone wore elaborate costumes. Tradition required that all citizens don capes and masks to allow nobles, politicians – even queens – to walk the streets anonymously and share in the hospitality of their neighbours. The boy dressed with the horse's head could be a young scholar. The girl with the cat mask could be a famous singer. Guessing other people's identity added to the buzz.

Sporting a frog disguise, Michael followed three Scorned waiters carrying platters of expensive cheese, caviar and smoked salmon downstairs from a rooftop into a noblewoman's parlour. Hundreds of guests clustered around antique lounges, armchairs, grandfather clocks, curtained doorways and low chandeliers, laughing and hugging the late arrivals. He spotted Samantha by a cold fireplace wearing a Zorro eye mask and, a few metres away, Luke picking at a two-metre high pyramid of chocolate doughnuts.

‘Now that Her Majesty has confirmed what we already knew, when are you and your companions going to confront this ghastly monster?' a politician asked.

‘Probably next week,' Luke answered, lifting his jester's mask to eat. ‘We're planning on trapping it.'

‘Whatever for?' asked the politician's fiancée.

‘Imagine how much money we'd make selling it to a zoo – or even a circus.'

‘Yes, and why don't we make it a two-for-one sale by throwing you in for free,' Samantha said, yanking Luke away by the arm. ‘I thought I warned you not to talk about the monster.'

‘How? Look around you, Sam. That's all everyone's talking about.'

They listened into the conversations nearby. He was right. Six days after Oriana's shock announcement, fear had been replaced by insatiable fascination.

‘Okay, then stop telling people
we're
going to hunt it,' she added. ‘It's the marines' job now. And lay off the
junk food, would you? Your body is finally catching up with your big head!'

He glared then threw the doughnuts at her. ‘No wonder everybody hates you!'

She grabbed his jacket, but he pulled free and slipped through the masses. ‘Go on!' she yelled. ‘Run! About time you did some exercise!'

The din lowered as all eyes turned towards her. Saving her from embarrassing herself further, Michael steered her into another room before the volume rose again. There, laughter snorted from a couch as a portly man in an elephant mask reeled at some joke's punchline. It wasn't hard to guess his true identity.

‘What does Pasquale actually do again?' Samantha asked, cutting off Michael before he spoke up. The last thing she needed was a lecture.

A pair of ladies laughed outrageously at the Prime Minister's antics.

‘What do any of them do except sleep all day and party all night?' Michael replied.

‘Since we've arrived here, have you seen any poets, actors, painters or nobles actually
work
?'

He shook his head. ‘Only the Scorned.'

‘So how come the Pacificans are so rich?'

‘Well, I heard some boys over there asking each other how much money the government gives them. It sounded like a lot.'

‘So then where does the government's money come from?'

Drummers pounded giant papier-mâché heads of kings and queens as the street party closed in on the central plaza. Revellers whistled and bashed cymbals. Luke stood in a doorway, waiting for a break in the crowd. Thank goodness for fresh air. It was too stuffy inside that parlour room. And Miss Stuffy herself was only stifling it more.

How dare she call him fat. Wasn't she the same girl who Aunt Vanessa called ‘Pudding' before she took up kendo?

He was about to blast into the sky when he heard a strangely familiar Belgian accent.

‘Make way! Make way! Any slower and it'll be yesterday.'

He searched the crowd until he spotted a man in a blue pinstriped suit, matching gloves and a derby hat. The man was pushing against the flow, and clearly in a rush.

‘Mr Goode Deed!' Luke yelled. ‘Hey! Over here!'

But the drummers were too loud. Luke fought past the giant papier-mâché floats, desperately trying to reach the shop owner, until the crowd grew too thick.
Enough of this
, he thought, before rocketing upwards.

‘Where is he?' Samantha growled, searching the central plaza, where the main show was about to start. ‘He better not be sulking.'

‘Over there,' Michael pointed. ‘Look.'

It wasn't Luke but Cavalli. He'd also spotted them
and started pushing his way through the masses to reach them. However, no one willingly stepped aside for him now that he'd lost his uniform and rank, and people complained when he grew more forceful. Two marines intervened and asked him to leave.

‘Serves him right,' Michael said. ‘He's just a citizen like everyone else now.'

‘But still as dangerous,' she added.

The plaza dimmed into an excited darkness. The crowd hushed and a spotlight blinked on a drummer boy in a harlequin mask. He began to play. Two more drummers blinked into existence behind him, then another four, then another eight, before the entire stage rumbled with their marching rhythm. They split into pairs then rolled across each other's backs – without missing a beat!

The still rapture broke into laughter as Prime Minister Pasquale, full of festive courage, tumbled through the onlookers in his elephant mask and wiggled his sizeable paunch to the beat. Two marines grabbed him by the armpits and escorted him off – and received applause of their own.

At once, the drumming halted. The boys disappeared with the lights. There was a long silence, a few impatient calls from the audience, then –
flash!
– a white harlequin appeared. She had a beautiful mask with rich red lips, a gold forehead and a hairline of large curled triangles made from sheet music that dangled with a dozen gold bells. She pretended to be a ten-year-old girl rolling an orange ball. Skipping
around it, she licked an oversized lollipop and teased the crowd like a spoilt brat. She grew cocky and refused to let anyone touch the ball when, suddenly, it braked. Confused, she tiptoed towards it, only for it to spin away. She chased it, screaming, as it jumped over her head or zigzagged out of reach every time she got close. Finally, suffering from a serious case of the grumps, she caught it when –
SSSPPPLLLRRRRRRR!
– the ball deflated, causing the crowd to laugh again and the girl to squeeze out fake tears. A section of the audience sang, ‘Oooh!' before a purple harlequin on a unicycle rode into view and handed her a foot pump. She tried inflating it but nothing happened, so she signalled for everyone to stomp their feet in unison. Michael joined in. Samantha stood, arms crossed.

Quickly, the ball grew. And grew. It reached the size of a hot-air balloon before the unthinkable happened: it began chasing her! She shrieked around the stage as the crowd swayed and cringed, fearing it too would be squashed. The purple harlequin returned. He crept up behind it with an enormous pin and –

BANG!

From its middle burst dozens of other harlequins!

‘
Wark! Wark! Wark!
Lords and ladies, boys and girls, honest citizens and, well, politicians, welcome to the Tricentennial Masquerade Carnivale!'

The crowd roared as the Vulture backflipped into the main spotlight, holding a microphone under his enormous beak. Michael clapped furiously too before a girl in a lioness mask squeezed beside him. He knew
those lavender eyes. He reached out and held her gloved hand.

‘Tonight, my friends, we harlequins will perform for you a multitude of death-defying feats and acrobatic skills that have never been seen on any world before. We promise to daze, amaze, scare and leave you gasping for air at our array of impossible tricks. But enough squawking! Bring out the Fireflies!'

Two burly blue harlequins sprouting silver bull horns and shouldering ropes pulled from the shadows a massive drum crafted like a girl's smiling face. However, this disguised its true purpose. A line of orange harlequins ran and leapt on top of the drum then trampolined into the sky. Somersaulting, they juggled flaming pins, burst through fiery hoops or breathed fire.

Act after act followed. Trapeze artists, sword swallowers, strongmen, contortionists, singers, musicians and wall dancers on bungee ropes dazzled the crowd. The scariest of all was the shark hypnotist. The green harlequin entranced flying tiger sharks and hammerheads then rode them bareback. Just as impressive was the red harlequin. Dressed in a red gown, gold mask and a large, red, heart-shaped collar, she was part-gymnast, part-illusionist. She rolled a glass ball up and down her arms, across her fingers and behind her neck, only to coax two more from the air and repeat the trick with all three.

‘
Wark! Wark! Wark!
How about the Lady of Hearts, folks? Sensational, isn't she? Just don't go tenpin bowling with her. She takes an hour to line up one ball.'

Older onlookers chuckled.

‘Now, do we have a treat for –' the Vulture continued until a man shouted over him.

‘Bravo! Bravo! Keep laughing everyone! Come now!' Prime Minister Pasquale said, walking into the spotlight and trying to turn up the tempo. The audience humoured him until he pushed its patience. ‘You can do better than that. Cheer louder!'

‘
Wark! Wark! Wark!
My, isn't Prime Minister Pasquale quite happy tonight, children. I think he's eaten more food than even his big belly can store. Then again, politicians never go to bed feeling empty – only the taxpayers who voted them in.'

A drum
ba-boom
ed in the background and the audience laughed. Before the Prime Minister could challenge the Vulture, six marines streamed onstage and starred in a comedy routine of their own making. They chased Pasquale round the plaza until he tripped over his orange robes and crashed – bells and all – next to the popcorn seller. Finally, he was hauled to his feet and escorted away, much to everyone's relief. Beside him, Michael felt Oriana sigh.

He asked her if she was okay when a clap of thunder struck. He cringed, worried about a repeat of the mega-storm, but, bizarrely, found the skies clear. Other onlookers shared his nervousness – then lightning flashed. It blazed bright blue from one rooftop to the next before two bolts collided and showered everyone with sparks. Fear turned to celebration as everyone looked up at an electric sign throbbing
with the number 300. Another massive lightning bolt exploded in the middle of the plaza. When the smoke cleared, a tall man in a cloak strolled forward with a
tap, tap, tap
.

‘The black harlequin!' a young girl in a cat mask whispered fifty metres away.

He swivelled upon hearing his name, pointed his ebony cane at her, raised his other hand and snapped his fingers. In a blink, the central plaza fell dark. Seconds later, more lightning flashed and he materialised right in front of the same girl!

‘Bravo!' the crowd shouted. ‘Encore!'

The black harlequin had one more trick. Spying to the left, then to the right, he twirled his cane, tapped it on the flagstones once –

Twice –

Three times before –

Fwooosh!

– he vanished in a puff of smoke. Stunned, the crowd searched for him across the plaza until a spotlight powered up and traced the length of the clock tower. At its top stood the black harlequin, waving his three-cornered hat and throwing down handfuls of candy.

‘C'mon, Lancelot,' Samantha said above the cheers, tugging on Michael's cloak. ‘Show's over. Say good-night to your girlfriend. We've got to find Luke.'