The Slanted Worlds (23 page)

Sarah turned and saw Wharton slide through the door and shut it with a gasp. He smiled at her.

“Sarah! Thank heavens!”

She stared. “George? What on earth are you doing here?”

“Good question! Venn came after you and I came because . . . well, I was worried about you.” He turned and stared at the smooth white wall behind him. “What happened to the door? What is this place? What the hell is going on?”

“I wouldn't trust him,” the bird breathed softly in her pocket. “Ask him a question only he knows the answer to.”

Sarah sat on a cushioned sofa. “We seem to be trapped in Summer's house of mysteries. When you met me at the British Museum, George, what sandwiches did you buy me?”

He stared at her as if she had gone out of her head. “Good Lord, Sarah, how am I expected to remember that? And what on earth does it . . .”

“Just try.”

Annoyed, he blew out his cheeks. “Egg? Definitely egg. Egg and cucumber.”

She smiled.

“Was that some sort of password?” He came forward, light on his feet. “Sarah, we have to get out of here, we have to find Venn and Gideon. Why on earth did you come here anyway? What are you looking for?”

“Don't say.”
The bird's words were less than a breath on the air, but Wharton tipped his head instantly. “What was that? Did you hear something?”

“No. So you want to know why I'm here? Why not make Gideon tell you?”

“Gideon?” he gazed around, baffled. “I left him with Venn. What . . . ?”

“No wonder you're puzzled.” Sarah stood, wandering along the row of sumptuous sculptures, her feet sinking into the deep carpet. “You don't know what would make me come so deep into the Shee country, do you? What could be so important. That's what worries you. That's what's tormenting you. Because you're not Wharton at all, are you. You're Summer.”

George Wharton giggled.

Then he began unraveling before her, his arms becoming slim and white, his boots shriveling to bare feet, his coat blanching to a turquoise-and-purple feathery dress with panels of lace. For a moment he was a patchwork being, part man, part woman, inhuman, un-Shee. Then he was Summer, and she was throwing herself full length on the sofa and giggling with glee.

“Oh your face, Sarah! And I thought I was doing so well! Such fun! Tell me, what did I get wrong?”

Sarah felt only a weary irritation. “If you must know, it was the cucumber.”

“Really! Your mortal food is all very confusing, I really don't know why you bother about it at all.” Summer stretched bare toes and pointed them. “So, do you like my house, Sarah?”

“It's beautiful.”

“Sometimes it is. Sometimes it's a cobwebby, dark, damp hovel. Sometimes a cave under the sea or a temple on a hot green island. It can be anything I want it to be.”

Sarah kept her hand on the box in her pocket. “It must be boring. Always changing, always staying the same.”

For a moment she was scared; a sliver of venom crossed Summer's face. She said, “Oh I'm never bored, Sarah. Now. You have something of mine. I want it back.” She held out her hand.

Sarah was calm. She had rarely felt so alert, her mind sparking with plots and lies. It was like the day they had broken through all the wire fences and electrified corridors into Janus's lab and entered the mirror, not caring if they were caught; the sheer audaciousness of it exhilarated her. She took the box and held it out to Summer. “I came for this. The prophecies told Jake about it, and I came to find it, because I thought it would help me defeat Janus. But I can't reach what's inside it.”

Summer raised a perfect eyebrow. She snatched the box and opened it and the bird unfurled itself, preened a green feather, and uttered a burst of tuneful song. Summer laughed. “You! I had forgotten all about you!” She extended a white finger and the bird hopped from its perch and gripped on, a tiny thing of string and feathers.

Summer glanced in at the bottomless abyss of stars and treasure. “Is everything in there? All my lovely things? Nothing missing?”

The bird slid a sidelong look at Sarah. She held her breath.

It would betray her. Surely. The Shee could never be trusted.

It said, “Gold and gems. Diamonds and dewdrops. Rubies and robins. Marcasites and the moon. Everything is here that should be here.”

Summer looked into the depths of the box. She gazed a long moment, as if she could see all that it contained, and in that instant Sarah's heart almost failed her, because the powers of the faery queen must be immeasurable. But the bird winked at her and she tried to hold hope like a bright flame in her mind.

“Well.” With a flick of her fingers, Summer snatched the bird, tossed it in, and snapped down the lid. “My box won't help you against Janus. And trespassers in my house need to be punished.” She lifted her head and pointed a fine fingernail. “As you see.”

And Sarah saw Wharton.

He was frozen, mid-step, in a cell of glass. It slid and protruded into the room like a great ice cube. His face was hard, caught in panic.

“What have you done to him!” She ran to touch him, but her hands slid only on a flat cold surface.

“I've stopped him.” Summer came and stood by her, gazing critically. “How very ugly some of these mortals are, Sarah. Such ungainly animals. Wrinkled and heavy and weighed down by the world. Not Venn, of course. Venn is a sleek white leopard. Fierce and adorable.”

“Let him go.” Sarah's voice was a growl. Wharton's face, caught in this rictus of ridiculous surprise, annoyed and upset her. She felt humiliated for him. “I'm the one you should be punishing.”

Summer smiled. “Well, yes. That's true.”

She did nothing, but the glass suddenly slithered down and became four silver-haired Shee in white satin coats who hauled Wharton by the arms and legs into the room. He came alive like a fury, struggling and swearing terrible army oaths as they threw him down before Summer.

He landed on hands and knees.

Then he saw Sarah.

His astonished relief made her smile. But as their eyes met, she knew he had realized what she was here for, and his relief became wary and cold, and she felt a sudden, unexpected pang.

Of something that might have been shame.

Don't betray me! she thought.

Don't.

Once—before he met his wife—I asked Venn what he loved best in the world.

“Freedom,” he said.

After Katra Simba, after he was married, I asked him again.

He looked away into the distance. “Leave me alone, Jean,” he said. “You know the answer now.”

Jean Lamartine,
The Strange Life of Oberon Venn

“D
ON'T HURT HIM.
He's my son.”

Jake felt il signore's surprise jerk the knife tighter. He tried not to breathe.

“Your son, dottore?”

“Yes. Come from England, as he says.”

“I do not believe the lies of devils. I saw the girl vanish. Through that black portal of hell.” The warlord backed, dragging Jake away from the mirror. It leaned like a slant of darkness in the hot room. Flies buzzed in the window.

“Listen to me.” David took a step forward. “You know me. I've served you now for four years. I delivered your children. I bound your wound after the battle with the Sienese and nursed you through the fever it brought.
I saved your life.
”

No answer. The grip just as tight. Jake made himself hold still. Sweat soaked his forehead. He tried not even to swallow.

“If that's not enough, I have something to give in exchange,” David said. “Something of great power. Only you should know of it.”

In the silence a cry rose from far off in the city. A woman's scream of grief. It rang in the sweltering, shuttered streets. In the pitiless blue sky.

“Do you hear that?” David said softly. “Signore, that is the city crying out to you. That is the cry of death itself.”

For a second, nothing. Then the warlord turned his hawk profile on the guards. “You men. Outside! Allow no one in unless I call.”

They obeyed him without question, though one glanced back, catching Jake's eye with a murderous glare. The door latch clattered behind them.

“Speak.” Il signore turned the knife against Jake's neck. “And be quick.”

David said, “Give me my son and let us both go in safety. We're no threat to you. In return I will give you this.” He took the vial from the folds of his robe and held it up. The amber substance it held gleamed in the slant of sunlight.

“Some sorcery.”

“Not sorcery. This is medicine. It may cure the plague. There is enough in this flask for you and your family, should you need it. No more exists, not in the whole of this world.”

In the obsidian mirror Jake watched the warlord's face. Perhaps the dark glass magnified emotion, revealed its intensity, because he was sure he saw the man's eyes narrow with greed.

Jake tried to pull away. The knife blade, sharp as a razor, jabbed into his skin.

“How can I believe this?” Il signore's voice was a rasp of doubt.

“You have no choice.”

“No? I could have your son thrown into a pest-pit. Infected with the plague. To see if you can cure him.”

“Take him and I smash the vial to pieces. Shall I do that now?” David held it high. “Because hear this, signore. I am no demon, but a man who has scryed into the future of the world, and I know about this pestilence. You think it's bad now. It hasn't even begun. It will sweep Europe like a black rain. Men will die in the fields, at the table, men will drop dead in the counting-house and the church. Their bodies will lie unburied, heaped in the streets, and even the rats won't touch them. Two out of every three will die, kings and princes and dukes as well as peasants. Your citizens will be decimated, your army reduced to a clatter of empty armor. Trust me, signore. This is horror. This is the truth.”

His urgency hung in the air like the murmured echo of his words in the high ceiling.

Sweat ran in Jake's eyes.

Il signore did not move. Jake felt the heat of the man's body in the strangling arm as he said, “Go where?”

“Into the mirror. Back to the place we came from.”

“To England? Or to hell?”

“This is hell. Seeing our children die is hell. Unless we help each other. I'm not offering you damnation, Piero. I'm offering you life.”

The vial caught the sunlight. It gleamed red now, red as blood, a warm comfort in the dim room.

The warlord moved, in sudden, powerful, decision. He forced Jake forward. “Very well. Put the flask on the floor and step back from it.”

“No.” David held the man with a steady gaze. “First you must release Jake.”

They faced each other. Pinned between them Jake felt the struggle of their mutual defiance. He dared not move now, because the knife was a razor's edge between life and a sudden, slashing death. He kept his eyes on his father. His belief was fierce and blind.

Suddenly he was shoved forward, a violent release that sent him sprawling against David. With the lithe speed of a snake, il signore snatched the vial and thrust it deep in his own robes and without even pausing lifted the knife and stabbed.

“Demon!” he snarled.

Caught in astonishment, David froze. The blade whistled; Jake hauled him aside with a great yell and grabbed the warlord's arm.

He was flung away like a rag. Something red and scorching ripped down his shoulder, his side, then David had hold of him and they were falling backward, back and back, into the exploding, enfolding embrace of the mirror, and the last thing he saw before darkness was the warlord on his hands and knees, staring dumbfounded at the opening in the wall of his world.

Rebecca burst out of the dark tunnel of the mirror with a scream of terror, straight into a mass of malachite-green webbing.

Crushed against her ribs, the baby screamed too.

The webbing caught her like a fly in a trap. Its mass of sticky threads bounced with the shock.

She picked herself out of it, breathless and confused. She felt as if she had been torn apart and reassembled and that all the pieces were in the wrong places.

“Maskelyne? Piers?”

The laboratory was empty. Strangely dark. Small lights winked on the monitors. Her breath smoked in the damp air. “Where are you?”

The chill silence unnerved her. She stood, turned, gasped in a deep breath. The mirror reflected her bedraggled anxiety. And where was Jake? Why hadn't he followed?

The baby cried again. She unwrapped the small heavy bundle and uncovered a white face that contorted itself in misery.

“Sshh,” she breathed.

The Abbey seemed more silent than she had ever known it, and the lab darker. There was something else wrong, a new stench of damp and decay.

Something slithered and fell.

She turned in terror, her heart thudding.

The far wall, a dark patched surface of medieval brick, was bowing, swelling outward into the room. As she watched, a brick cracked, a patch of plaster fell off, as if some great unstoppable force was building up behind there, the whole weight of the hillside forcing its way in.

She stepped back.

Then deep in the house she heard an enormous crash.

As if a chimney had fallen.

Or a bomb.

Venn prowled the mirrored hall with tormented anxiety. “Something's happening. Can you feel it? Something's changing.”

Gideon, his face and hands pressed to one of the identical glass surfaces, gazed into his own green eyes. He too could sense it. A subtle distortion of space, a contraction. A breathing in.

He said, “The room's getting smaller.”

“Smaller?”

“It's closing in on us. Collapsing.” He could hear it now, the soft, creaking shrinkage of the chamber.

Venn turned with sudden purpose to the mirrors. “Then we smash our way out.” He tore at the carved frames, but the gilded wood fell away as if it was rotten, desiccating in his fingers.

“Try this!”

Gideon found a chair, picked it up and crashed it down. Frail wood splintered. They each snatched a chair-leg, and attacked the walls. Already the room was half the size it had been, the floor and ceiling slanting at impossible angles.

Venn smashed the nearest mirror; it starred into jagged fractures. For a moment Gideon was reminded of the crevasses out in the ice field; he leaped back as the pieces fell in great slabs at his feet.

But there was no opening. Behind the first, another identical mirror showed them their own despair.

Furious, Venn smashed that too, and found only another.

Gideon dragged him back. “That's no use. Think! You must have some power here. The Venns are half Shee, everyone says. Summon it! Use it!”

Venn's cold stare chilled him.

“No.”

“But—”

“If I do . . . if I start that, where will it end?” He stared at the collapsing room. “That's what she wants, for me to give in to her, to enter the unhuman world. And it would be easy. So easy.” He took a deep breath. “You above all know that. You've heard their music. You went with them.”

Gideon nodded, but panic was growing in him. “I know. But if you don't, we die here.”

“Summer would never . . .”

Gideon faced him.
“Summer would kill us like flies,”
he breathed.

Venn was silent. As if he made himself face the truth of that.

Gideon watched the man's struggle with a cold compassion. “You have to,” he hissed. “The Shee all whisper about it. Ever since Oisin Venn your family have had the choice. The power is there, if you want it. Do it, Venn. Destroy her with her own gift.” His voice was fierce, he knew. His desire for vengeance on her shocked even himself.

Venn threw down the piece of wood and stood still.

Gideon waited, breathless. The room was so small now that he could reach out and touch both sides of it, as if the very cube of the world was dwindling to a point as minute as infinity.

Venn looked up.

The ceiling was a glass plane, still out of reach. He seemed to focus on it with a bitter, controlled fury. Gideon waited, fighting down panic. Glass walls nudged his arm. His own reflection pushed against him. He was replicated, hand to hand, face to face, an eternity of Gideons crowded together with his stifling terror. He would be suffocated, crushed against his own face, his hands clawing hopelessly against their glassy copies.

He tried to turn, but there was no space.

Venn shivered. He seemed thinner, paler. His fingers a little longer. His eyes bird-blue.

He had lost something of himself.

He crouched. “On my shoulders. Quickly!”

Gideon climbed, light and fleet; Venn stood, heaving him up. “Push. Push hard!”

He strained. His palms forced against the glass roof, but it was solid, hard as ice, impenetrable. For a second he understood the whole horror of being sealed in, the fear of the baby in the womb, the chick in the egg.

“Push!” Venn yelled.

The walls crushed against them.

Then, with a crack that sent Gideon's heart leaping, the world shattered.

Water roared down. Into his yell of terror. Into his mouth and eyes.

Sarah said quietly, “Are you all right?”

“I'm fine.” Wharton was a little startled. For a moment he was not quite sure where he was. He looked around curiously at the sumptuous room, then at Summer, who smiled sweetly.