City of Time (27 page)

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"A compass or something ... we can't go anywhere without it."

"The Mortmain!" Dr. Diamond said. "Look at the shape of the hole. It's a fleur-de-lis!"

"Yes," Owen said, "of course ... But the Mortmain, the trunk ... the Harsh have the Mortmain."

"No, they don't," Dr. Diamond said, reaching under his overalls. "I retrieved it. Here!"

Owen, with wonder in his eyes, took the Mortmain and carefully placed it in the hole. It slid in with ease and locked in place. On its dull, battered surfaces, five concentric rings appeared, marked with strange symbols that shone with a bright fierce light. And the little craft was transformed as well. The tiller leapt under Owen's hand and the bow of the boat trembled, seeming eager to be gone.

"I'm not sure if I can hold it! The doors!"

Dr. Diamond ran to the street doors and flung them open.

"Here, Cati!" Owen grabbed her by the hand and hauled her onboard. The
Wayfarer
leapt toward the open door. With one long-legged leap, Dr. Diamond landed on the bow and fell flat on his face. Cati grabbed the side of the cabin, but Owen stood firm and proud at the helm as the
Wayfarer
burst through the open doors and out into the night, its prow aimed high into the sky.

"What's happening, Owen?" Cati gasped, the wind blowing through her hair and her eyes streaming from the cold.

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"She's been cooped up for years," Owen said. "She needs to blow the cobwebs off. Can't you feel it?"

And indeed, as the dust and grime of the museum blew away, Cati could see the ship's timber starting to acquire a proud shine. It was no longer a shabby exhibit, but a living thing.

"Marvelous!" Dr. Diamond said, struggling to his feet. "Where are the maps, Owen?"

Owen took them out from his jacket and gave them to Dr. Diamond, who spread them out on the wooden board beside the Mortmain. As he muttered to himself, Cati looked over the side and gasped. They were far above Hadima. She could see the Terminus and the smoky rooftops of Rosie's district. Around the City in a great circle, busy even at this time of night, ran the snarling, choked loop of the Speedway.

"I think I have it," Dr. Diamond cried. "Owen, can you see?" Owen leaned forward. The
Wayfarer
had slowed a little now and was forging evenly through the air.

"You see when you move the tiller, the rings on the Mortmain move as well?" Dr. Diamond said. "And the numbers and symbols on it are matched by the ones on the map?"

Owen looked at the map. He could see the City marked, and what was unmistakably the Workhouse.

"Now," said Dr. Diamond, "it would seem that if you line up the symbols on the Mortmain rings, then we should arrive at the Workhouse."

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"But the Workhouse isn't there anymore!" Cati cried.

"Cati," Dr. Diamond said, "we are about to sail through time. And therefore perhaps we can arrive
before
the Workhouse burns down,
before
the moon strikes the earth!"

"This ring looks like a normal clock," Owen said.

"Yes," Dr. Diamond said. "It seems to operate like one ... the other two are more complex. I can't work out the symbols, but never mind: we can set this one so that we arrive twelve hours ago. That should do it."

"Twelve hours ago?" Cati said.

"Yes," Dr. Diamond said. "It's the most we can do on a twelve-hour clock, but it should be enough. If the moon struck at, say, six in the evening, then we should arrive at six in the morning."

"But we're not flying through time, are we?"

"Not yet," Owen said. "Give me a hand with this winch." Cati took one of the winch handles, and as they turned, the mast, which had been lying flat, was raised into an upright position. It seemed much taller than it had been when lying down. A stained and ragged tarpaulin was wrapped around its crossbeam.

"What's that?" Cati cried. The night sky was suddenly full of lights: great sheets of green that shimmered momentarily and then were gone, reds and pinks that dropped in pillars, fantastic curtains of delicate blue that wavered and expanded to cover the whole sky, then faded away to nothing.

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"The aurora borealis," Dr. Diamond said. "The Northern Lights."

"Are you ready?" Owen said to Dr. Diamond.

"Ready?" said the doctor. "I was born for this moment!"

Owen reached out and grabbed a slender rope that fell from the mast. He gave it one hard tug and the tarpaulin opened. Cati gasped. What fell from the tarpaulin was not a sail, or at least nothing like any sail she had ever seen. A sheet of silvery matter that seemed alive draped from the top of the mast to the deck. It was like a cloth so fine that it was barely there. Or perhaps not even a cloth, for it seemed to be made of the same stuff as the Northern Lights that shimmered around them. As she watched, it billowed outward as though it had caught a wind, spreading proudly out in front of the
Wayfarer
.

But it hasn't caught the wind
, Cati thought.
Time itself has filled it!

"And it will carry us home across the worlds," Dr. Diamond said, as if he had read Cati's mind.

"Here goes!" Owen shouted, and the
Wayfarer
leapt forward into time.

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Chapter 33

Afterward it occurred to Cati that they had actually entered the Northern Lights. She could see them all around, vast distances of shimmering color, and beyond, great wheeling constellations of the stars. And when she looked down they were traveling on a deep dark nothingness, with currents that quickened and slowed, sometimes calm and sometimes choppy.

Dr. Diamond had removed instruments from his rucksack and was busy measuring and scribbling calculations. Owen looked forward, the tiller in his hand, as if he had stood in that spot all his life.

"How did you know?" Cati asked.

"I pieced some of it together," he said. "You know with the maps and stuff, and even the Navigator name--it had to mean something. I knew that there

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had to be a way of traveling through time, and then when I saw the tapestry in the Harsh's tower, I saw that it showed the Navigator on board the
Wayfarer
. And when I got on board her ... I don't know. When I put my hand on the tiller, it seemed that she knew me and I knew her. I can't explain it any better than that."

Cati set out to explore the boat. The cabin had four bunks, which converted into a table and chairs. There was a little cooker, and when she opened one of the cupboards, it was full of beautiful silver tableware, forks and knives and tankards, all decorated with the same symbols as on the map. There was a chest full of very old blankets, the beautiful embroidery faded, but still soft and warm. A closet held what looked like chain mail suits that a knight would wear. The forecastle at the front of the boat was full of ropes and spikes and other equipment. There was also an anchor, its spikes tipped with magno.

Cati went to the stern and sat down beside Owen. The sail spread out in front of them like a great silvery mist, and when she let her hand trail idly over the side it left a glittering trail, like phosphorescence, in the black stream on which they sailed.

"I don't understand any of this," she sighed.

"You don't have to understand it," Dr. Diamond said. "Just marvel at it." He produced a bar of chocolate for each of them and they sat eating it.

For five hours they sailed, according to the clock in the Mortmain. Cati went to lie down in the cabin with

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one of the blankets wrapped around her. Then Owen started to experience an occasional grinding sensation, as if the keel of the
Wayfarer
was grounding on shallows. He told Dr. Diamond.

"I was afraid of something like this," the doctor said. "The stream of time is getting shallow. Keep to your course, Owen. This may slow us."

The grinding got worse and was accompanied by bumping. The shifting patterns of colors surrounding them dimmed. It felt as if they were picking their way through a shallow river, trying to find clear water.

The lights grew dim and the atmosphere began to feel stormy. After a while the keel stopped grating and Owen had a sense of a great expanse on either side of them. "I suppose it's like coming out into a lake," he said.

"Yes," Dr. Diamond said, "and you can be sheltered from the weather on a river, but on a lake ..."

The
Wayfarer
started to rise and fall as though cresting waves. Sheets of blue flashed up on the horizon, not shimmering like the Northern Lights, but jagged like lightning. The sail billowed and crackled as though the wind had risen. All was still until a sudden gust of minute greenish particles struck them, like a very fine dust.

Dr. Diamond looked at it in wonder. "Some kind of ... I don't know ... a new compound," he murmured.

"Whatever it is, it's starting to sting a bit," Owen

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said. He lifted his hand to his face and it came away bloody. "More than a bit!"

"Cati said there were suits in the cabin," Dr. Diamond said, and darted inside. The green wind grew stronger, and with it came an eerie sound between a whistle and a roar. The
Wayfarer
rose and fell, and her timbers and mast creaked and groaned.

"Quick!" Dr. Diamond said, reappearing. "Put this on." The suits were like very fine chain mail, almost as soft as cloth. There were tarnished metal helmets with quartz eye guards, which looked like old-fashioned goggles. Owen pulled his on quickly. So did Dr. Diamond and Cati, who had reemerged from the cabin.

"What's going on?" she asked.

"Storm," Owen said. The suit fitted him well.
My grandfather might have worn this
, he thought. Then all thoughts were driven from his mind as a sudden gust caught the
Wayfarer
, pushing her hard over on one side. Cati caught the rail to stop herself being pitched overboard. Owen swung the tiller to try to turn the bow back. He could feel the craft straining under him. The wind, if wind it was, rose to a shriek.

"Get below!" Dr. Diamond shouted to Cati. The
Wayfarer
swung back on course, but seemed to be cresting vast waves that they could not see. Each time the craft plunged into a trough, a black spray rose over the bow. The sky was filled with crackling blue energy, and blue fire ran up and down the mast.

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Owen worked the tiller, although the
Wayfarer
seemed to know which way he wanted to go. The deck rose and pitched terrifyingly. On and on they ran, the great sail taut as a drum. In the cabin, Cati could hear every creak and feel every roll.

"The storm's driving us off course," Owen shouted. "We're losing time!"

But the doctor was rapt by what he was seeing. "Marvelous," he said dreamily. "A storm in time!"

Owen's shoulder ached with the strain of holding the tiller. He could feel the little vessel starting to struggle as well. But on they sailed into the storm, until Owen's hand blistered where he held the tiller, and his knees ached from the rolling of the deck. And then, just when the storm reached its pitch, when the
Wayfarer
rose and fell almost vertically and the air was alive with crackling energy, Cati's nose started to twitch.

"I can smell something ... evil. I can hear something as well," she said. "Music ... opera!"

"What?"

"It
is
opera.
Don Giovanni
," the doctor said. Owen stared at him in disbelief. But when he looked over the bow, his heart sank. Another vessel was coming toward them--a vessel made of welded plates of metal, bits and pieces of scrap bolted together. What appeared to be old car tires hung from its sides and rusty stanchions held its mast aloft. Harsh lights glared down from a gantry. The music was blaring from a speaker attached

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to the battered and corroded wheelhouse. But it was the figure behind the wheel that sent Owen's heart to his boots. A figure with huge sideburns and dark hair and a row of teeth like tombstones that now showed in a huge evil grin. Johnston.

"Of course!" Dr. Diamond breathed. "He has been traveling back and forward to Hadima all along, plotting with the Harsh!"

"But he doesn't have any charts!" Owen exclaimed.

"He doesn't have your grandfather's charts," Dr. Diamond corrected, "but the Harsh must have had a fragment showing this very route, if none of the others."

"Ship ahoy!" Johnston yelled. "Look!" He pointed to their port bow. A huge whirlpool had formed and the substance they were sailing on was being sucked into it.

"How did he do that?" Owen groaned.

"A whirlpool in time, like a small version of the Puissance," Dr. Diamond said grimly. "His Harsh masters have taught him well."

Johnston wrenched the wheel and charged at the
Wayfarer
. Owen couldn't maneuver out of the way. The metal hull caught the boat in the side and she was driven sideways, her planks groaning. Johnston rammed the
Wayfarer
again and Owen felt it like a blow to his own side.

"He's trying to drive us into the whirlpool," Owen shouted. And indeed, they had covered half the distance to it. Johnston rammed again and again. Owen tried to