The Mariner (34 page)

Only two of the cells were empty.

The Oracle sat in the third, like a dignitary about to play host, just as ethereal in beauty as he’d first experienced. If Harris had been hoping that her incarceration would have weakened her, he was going to be disappointed. Flesh glowed with health, eyes sparkled. One could think her reclining within the cell of her own free will, and only for a matter of minutes, rather than locked there for several weeks, the last of which without nourishment.

Her eyes widened with delight as he entered the room.

“Claude! Oh Claude! How wonderful to see you again. I was saddened by your abrupt departure, there was so much to discuss. And how silly of me not to recognise you. I recognise you now though. Very clearly.”

The Mariner slowly walked towards her cage, the others filing in behind. The Oracle’s smile faltered as she saw his accomplices.

“Oh, Claude, you’ve fallen in with bad company. How sad.” She began searching their faces with her piercing eyes, finally falling on Harris. “And the captain! Back for more games?” Her silky words slithered through the bars. “Loose lips sink ships, wouldn’t you say?”

“Look at the ground, don’t speak to her. Unless you want to end up like the last crew.” The Mariner glared at those behind until they averted their gaze from the caged creature.

“Claude, how could you?” she chuckled in mock anguish. “The least you could have done is bring your friend, he was delightful. So many stories, so much history. Delicious.”

“He’s dead.”

The Oracle shifted uncomfortably. “Dead? Oh my, how sad.”

It doesn’t like not knowing
, he thought as he stared at her, powerful yet vulnerable in her enclosure.
It’s not used to having to ask. It prefers to take.

“Not interested in my thoughts?” Her sour expression, oh so brief across an expertly-honed mask, betrayed the truth in his teasing.

“That would be rude wouldn’t it?” she retorted, smooth once more. “I just want to talk. If only we’d talked sooner we could have both avoided falling in with our mutual friends here.” She leaned forward and whispered conspiratorially. “They will be the death of
you
, you know.”

But the Mariner was not going to be diverted. “You tried to steal my thoughts before, but couldn’t. Why not?”

“There’s nothing to steal!” she snapped, bitterness returning. “Nothing in your head at all!”

Ice deep in his chest.
The Wasp took everything else.

“That’s not all.”

“No, you’re right, it isn’t!” she spat, suddenly seeming childish and petty, striking out to hurt.

She’s an infant
, he thought, suddenly understanding an aspect of the creature before him.
It’s subtle, but it’s there; she’s merely a child, and she doesn’t understand what’s happening.

“Your mind stinks! It makes me want to puke. Urrgh! Yuk! I wouldn’t eat a thought from your head if I’d been in this cell a thousand years. I think a Gradelding must have snuck up during your sleep and shat in your skull. Or perhaps you fell in the sea and the Ethusmanier laid eggs in your ear? Yes, perhaps that’s what must have put that stink in there?”

“Or perhaps it was the Wasp?”

The Oracle suddenly stopped her ranting and her once knowing, then furious, eyes widened with fright. Colour drained from them, as colour would drain from a frightened cheek.

“What do you know of the Wasp? How could you? Unless?” Her hands suddenly flew up, covering her face. “Unless?” Fear became terror. The Oracle leapt to her feet, jumping up onto her bunk as if he were a rat nipping at her toes. “Get away from me! Get away! Don’t look at me with that horrid head of yours! Don’t bring the Wasp here!”

“What is the Wasp?” He grabbed the bars, pressing his face closer, eager to learn. “Where can I find it?”

“I didn’t wake it! I wasn’t the one! The Pope, he knows! The Pope! The Pope!” she screamed, bawling like a frightened toddler. “Just stop looking at me. Please, please leave me alone! The Pope woke it, it’s his fault!”

Behind him, the Mariner heard an intake of breath.

“What is it?” he whispered.

“The Pope!” Heidi hissed back, although the Oracle, still wailing and shrieking, was beyond listening. “We’ve been searching for him as long as any Anomenemy. He’s worshipped across the whole ocean.”

“Where is this Pope?” he yelled at the Oracle. “Where is he?”

“North! Past the waterfall, where the air is cold and the Ethusmanier swim. He lives on the Moors, not the sea. He hates the sea. I would too if I’d woken the Wasp!”

“But what is it? What is the Wasp? What’s happening to the world? Is the Wasp a demon, stealing our world from us, is that it?”

The Oracle, suddenly stopped crying and peered at him between her fingers. “No, you’ve gotten it all wrong, the Wa-”

The gap between her fingers exploded with dark blood as a bullet pierced her hand and then her face, shattering skull, snuffing out life. The creature known as the Oracle was thrown back against the wall, where she stood for a second or so, teetering on shaky legs, before sliding down into a heap. Stunned silence followed and the Mariner, ears ringing, turned to Harris, his shotgun still smoking from the blast.

“We have the location of the Pope,” he said, unapologetic. The Mariner’s fury was dark. “He’s the most notorious Anomenemy in the whole ocean. Other than that, I can’t see how listening to any further heresy can help.”

“It was going to tell us the truth!”

“What truth?” Harris laughed. “Do you think that creature knew anything? You’re not the only one to spend time with that witch. She was mad, and she’d tell you anything to buy her own freedom. But that doesn’t stop it being nonsense. Besides, we know what’s happening to the world. Mavis told us. We know what needs to be done.”

34
FIVE-FEET HIGH AND RISING

“W
ORD OF THE
P
OPE FIRST
came to us through graffiti scrawled on walls within abandoned ships. Usually they would be in the most squalid of cabins, the sort littered with drugs and faeces, but later they appeared in more extravagant abodes. At first we thought they were deluded references to some shared hallucination, a mass dream if you will, but as we began scavenging more and more vessels, we began to realise that the Pope was real, and had wide reach.”

Heidi spoke with a slow sincerity, easily heard by those gathered around her upon the Neptune, a small fire lighting their faces in an otherwise stiflingly dark night. McConnell sat behind Grace, with her leaning against him, not just for warmth, but for protection from the ghost story being told, for that’s what the Pope had become across the endless ocean: a whispered ghost story.

Crowded aboard the Neptune were a number of Mavis’ loyal followers, those chosen to remain with Heidi and Harris whilst they searched for the Pope. The rest had been returned to the Beagle, to protect the old lady and her research.

The devils, suspicious of strangers as ever, had growled and spat at the new crew, before scampering into the lower chambers where they could have peace. For the Mariner himself it was all part of an ever increasingly uncomfortable intrusion, like being put on display. Still, if it helped him find the Pope, the Wasp, and the Island, then perhaps the discomfort was worth it.

“I’ve heard of the Pope,” said McConnell. “But only a little. It was something sailors used to talk about in Sighisoara, though they were careful to hide their words near me. I’m a religious man, and they knew not to bring heresy to my door, yet still I couldn’t help but pick up scraps of information here and there. His followers lurk at all ends of the world, though I’ve never met one myself. Crazy I hear,
and
dangerous, all dreaming of performing some sort of pilgrimage to receive his blessing.”

Heidi confirmed McConnell’s story. “We’ve heard that too, some event called ‘Mass’, though what goes on is a mystery. We’ve never found one of their followers alive to interrogate.”

“But you have found followers?” The Mariner was intrigued.

“Oh yes, but dead.
Long
dead. Most of the time suicide, but sometimes I’m just not sure. I can’t imagine someone mutilating themselves to such extremes just to end their own life.”

“So what do you think happened?”

“Rivalries in the sect? Internal struggles? It’s impossible to tell without understanding how his cult operates. What we suspect is that he’s an Anomenemy, perhaps
the greatest
Anomenemy, the one with influence enough that it’ll make all the difference once he’s removed.”

“So this Moor the Oracle mentioned, do you think that’s where the Mass is held?”

“It’s the only clue we’ve ever had.”

McConnell was surprised that the Mariner only asked questions. “Arthur, you’ve travelled more than the rest of us, surely you’ve heard of the Pope?”

He could only shake his head in response, he’d never heard the name before. Something about it rang a bell, but his shroud of ignorance proved too thick. “Perhaps I haven’t been asking the right questions.”

“What about this Wasp of yours then? What’s that all about?”

“I don’t know. Just a name.” The Mariner clenched his hands in frustration. “It’s somewhere, lodged inside. I just can’t get at it.” He looked up at McConnell, his eyes tired. “Does it mean anything to you?”

McConnell thought for a moment, massaging his temples. “I remember sitting in Lloyd’s Park, back in Croydon. It was one of those rare days in summer when you can actually sit in the sun and feel
warm
for a change. Not that false warmth that we sometimes kid ourselves into believing we’re experiencing, but genuine heat. I was relaxing, sitting back in the grass, when this wasp came and landed upon my hand. Instinct told me to kill it, or try to shake it off, but a logical part of me said,
that’s how you get stung! Let it be. These creatures don’t want to sting you, they’re just insects reacting to their environment. Let it be and it’ll fly away in its own time.
So I held my hand still and watched the wasp as it trotted across my hand, as leisurely as you please. And you know what? It looked at me.”

“Insects don’t look at you!” Grace giggled.

“It did! It looked right at me, into my eyes with its beady black ones. And do you know what happened next?”

“What?”

“The bastard stung me! It looked me right in the eye and jabbed me with its fat behind!” The audience began to laugh, but the reverend wasn’t done. “Any normal beast would have reacted to this, but not I! I am a free-thinking
rational
human being. I wasn’t going to react to a bit of pain. So I tensed, but did not move. No wasp was going to force me into retaliation. I was going to do the rational thing and let it fly off, none-the-wiser to the offence it had caused.”

The audience, enjoying the light hearted distraction leaned in close for the inevitable climax.

“But did it fly off? Did it bollocks! The damned thing walked across my hand and then – I swear I’m not making this up – it looked me in the eye, just as before, did a little jig, and stung me again!”

Giggling, Grace teased the reverend. “That’s cos you’re dumb.” He laughed and jabbed her in the side, making her squeal.

“It was then that I learned,” he concluded, “that wasps are the only creatures outside of primates that act like man. They’re vicious, spiteful little monsters. Just like us.” McConnell’s eyes glazed over for a moment as he recalled something from long ago. “‘Cancer won’t catch and wasps won’t sting, man would owe no God a thing.’”

“What’s that?” the Mariner asked, curious at the little chant.

“Something I used to tease my father with. It wound him up. ‘In a perfect world.. yadda yadda yadda.’ It meant that most of the world’s problems –
the old world
- stemmed from religion. All that fucked up shit in the Middle-East, Northern Ireland, Africa, everywhere. All down to religion.” He sighed and looked into the fire, his face suddenly drawn. “I was wrong though. Or right, depending on how you look at it. Turns out we do owe God something, and this ain’t a perfect world.”

After a long period of silence, McConnell spoke again. “Perhaps you have been asking the wrong questions? Perhaps there’s nothing to seek out at all?”

The Mariner gave McConnell a warning glance, urging him not to begin on his Jesus Haych Christ theory again, but the reverend continued regardless, addressing Heidi with his ideas.

“Things are falling apart. They disappear, they are forgotten, they are lost to us.”

“Yes,” she agreed. “It’s the influence of the Anomenemies, undermining the natural laws.”

“Well, I call it the Shattering, and in all my years I’ve never seen anything
come back
. Have you?”

“No, never. Though it would be difficult to know when something forgotten returns. You might not notice.”

“True, but some things are unmissable. Such as whole islands.”

Harris, who’d previously been keeping quiet and listening to the exchange, responded. “Hang on, are you saying you’ve seen an island pop into existence?”

“I have,” McConnell nodded. “The zoo upon which your ship crashed used to be a part of Sighisoara, the town I am from. But one day it tore itself from the mainland and drifted away, not just physically, but in the town’s collective consciousness too. Most forgot; only a couple of us remembered and soon learnt to keep quiet. Eventually it disappeared from the horizon altogether.”