The Vorrh (56 page)

‘Begone, you midnight nuisance! He will be yours tomorrow. Allow us a final evening together without your tramping.’

The words seemed to resonate with the spirit of Tsungali; they heard him change direction and walk away.

‘Do ghosts ever sleep?’ Ishmael found himself asking.

‘Yes, but not the sleep of men; theirs is an emptier kind of slumber. Our sleep is always full: from catnap to coma, it brims over. Those hollow
ones have thin, dangerous dreams.’ There was a pause, as if the air might be listening. ‘It is contagious to some; thin sleep can last for centuries,’ Nebsuel continued. ‘It can allow its owner to become modified or change themselves entirely. Some say the creatures that infest the Vorrh use it knowingly for that purpose, that they bury themselves deeper and grow young, in their desire to return to nothing. It’s the only way they can ever escape the Vorrh and their charge at its centre.’

‘If they lie buried and forgotten, how is this known?’

‘Because some get dislodged, dug up by animals or men, dragged to the surface. These are the dangerous ones, because they no longer know what they are, and if they enter the world of men, they grow back deformed into its shape.’

‘You mean that some of them walk with us out here?’ Ishmael sounded at once fearful and defensive of his new world.

‘It is said to be.’ There was a pause while both men seemed to ponder the impossibility of such a thing.

‘Do they breed with women?’ said Ishamel.

Nebsuel laughed. ‘It is better and worse than that. Some mix the contagion of their sleeping with a knowing human, and fuse with humans inside its influence.’

‘To what advantage?’

‘If an Erstwhile and a willing human enter that condition and seal themselves away from the world, they become something else, something quite different, without form, like a memory, a tangible genie of the place where they hide. It can insist itself into the imagination of all who that pass by, stirring up great feelings and powerful emotions in the unsuspecting traveller. Some say that such a thing has been used in the defence of holy places. Jerusalem is said to be guarded that way, protected by longing. It is even said that the spirit of the forest himself is composed of such an unmitigating force, that the Black Man of Many Faces is held together by it.’

These were big thoughts for Ishmael, whose head was already full of the melancholy of departure. He asked no more questions, and Nebsuel offered no further wisdom. They stared into the fire as it flickered in its raised iron grate in the middle of the room. They stared and sipped wine and said nothing.

The next morning they embraced in the doorway. Nebsuel had prepared a travelling bag full of potions and charms; it sat awkwardly in the door frame between them. The bow was already outside, and the old man felt a lightness and relief at its departure. As they said their goodbyes, Nebsuel gave his warnings and advice, and Ishmael offered his deepest thanks. They vowed to meet again, and parted.

* * *

It had been seven years since the outrage, and now he was returning to London by public demand. He wondered if his machine was still there, gathering dust in those lonely rooms. He had packed the pistol and the key to find out.

For the first time, Muybridge was getting tired of his long transatlantic shuffles. Each trip seemed to take a little longer. The jewels of the night sky and the luminous waves seemed dimmer and less appealing, and he spent more time in his claustrophobic cabin, planning and brooding about what might await him.

He would anticipate the criticisms of those who constantly whinged about the ‘validity’ of his work, and rehearse for their unprovoked attacks. He had hounded his critics ruthlessly with his letters to the press. The ship rocked against his adversaries, and all who would disclaim him: the cowards who hid in the shadows and waited for the moment to belittle him; those who objected to his retouchings, his improvements on the
original, slightly blurred pictures; the artless, who envied his talent with the brush and the lens. He would have them all, open them up from crotch to craw for such impertinence. Again the ship rocked, and he thought about those who had betrayed him or let him down. There were many, and in some ways they were worse than the obvious foes.

He wondered why Gull had stopped writing to him. The last four letters had gone unacknowledged; not even the set of prints he had sent appeared to warrant a reply. The doctor may have been busy, but surely it wouldn’t have taken much to extend a common courtesy?

* * *

Essenwald had changed; Ishmael sensed it the moment he entered its outskirts. It had grown impatience out of its security, become frantic and hectic inside the dynamo of its industry. All this was worn in the air: the scent of qualm.

Walking through the streets, he shaded his face from the crowd. He was not yet used to showing himself openly. His was still a face that caught glances, made strangers gawp, but no longer in abject horror. Their reaction was now rooted in something else, a compulsion he did not fully understand, though he recognised at least three of its components as surprise, curiosity and pity. Of the few who had seen him so far, none had run or cried out in shock; either they had searched for a deeper understanding or simply turned away. It was a transformation of wonderful importance, and it fuelled an excitement that bubbled and pumped inside him.

In the five days it had taken him to reach the outskirts, he had used almost all of the money and food provided by Nebsuel on his departure. He thought about his ability to survive in a world that was so expensive.
Previously, he had been sheltered from such realities; now, the mechanics of existence were dawning, and he found them baffling and rather crude.

His instinct was to head for 4 Kühler Brunnen; at least there he would find a friendly face. He would be invited in and fed, even if it was by the sour old man, Mutter. A plan finally in mind, he began to stride through the tangle of streets with purpose and exhilaration.

* * *

A mild panic had begun to grip life in Essenwald. The established pulse of the city’s great heart of timber had fluttered and slowed, the supply of wood withering as the demand blocked the arteries with its swollen need. Since the Limboia had vanished, only a dribble of trees left the forest. The scant workforce that brought the wood out was expensive, and their labour was hasty and sporadic. No one wanted to work in the Vorrh day in and day out, and no amount of wages could pay for the devastating effect that such exposure produced. At first, the new work teams consisted of volunteers, collected from the industries that fed from the forest. This system quickly broke down, only to be replaced by foreign labour, lured there by rumours of rich payment. But it took no time for the outsiders to discover the city’s secret, and they added their own layers of myth to the brooding trees.

Now the workforce consisted of a mixture of the desperate, the criminal and the insane, most of whom had been dragged into enforced labour. Nobody knew what effect might be produced by adding such a volatile mixture into the mind of the forest. It was a desperate measure, and the elders of the Timber Guild met daily to try and devise the next alternative. The old slave house became a hostel for the unstable, itinerant crew who now cut and ferried the trees: it was undeniably a place to be avoided and
Marie Maclish had acquiesced to that understanding, taking the guild’s compensation and fleeing to raise her child in more stable lands.

* * *

Ishmael was lost. He had walked past the same garden four times in two hours, each time approaching it from a different direction. Eventually he stopped and looked for the spires of the cathedral to guide him home, but they could not be seen from the elegant streets he was walking through: he needed to get higher. He searched out a street that seemed to head vaguely uphill and followed its lead.

He had been walking for ten minutes when he sensed it, though not with sight, but familiarity: he had been here before. He looked confusedly at the dozen or so vast houses that lined the street, at their imposing walls, grandiose towers and long, sliding roofs of immaculate tiles. Why would he have ever been here? At the very moment the question was formed, it was answered: it was the street of the Owl! He had found it – or it had found him. His visual memory of the outside of the mansion was scant, so he walked up and down the street, each time lingering a little longer at the house with the ornate metal gates in its wall. He had nothing to lose. He smoothed down his long, black hair, now grown to shoulder length, dusted down the blue riding coat that Nebsuel had given him and approached the gates, pausing momentarily before pulling the metal ring of the bell. He adjusted his collar, turning it up about his face, and waited.

A dim, absent little man came to the gate and peered through.

‘Yes?’

‘May I speak to the mistress of the house?’

‘What is your business with Mistress Lohr, sir?’

‘It is private. Quite private. But she will know me.’

The little man peered more eagerly at the suspicious figure hiding within ill-fitting clothing and an upturned collar.

‘Your name, sir?’

Ishmael looked at the man in dismay, seeing the problem a second too late: he only had one name, and the Owl did not know it. Furthermore, he knew that saying just one name would be considered strange: most other people he met had two names, if not three.

The man behind the gate was getting agitated, believing less and less that this individual could ever have any legitimate business with his mistress.

‘Please, tell her it is Ishmael, from the night of the carnival.’

Now the gatekeeper was sure that this shabby figure, with his crude, long bundle and scruffy rucksack, had no real business here. ‘Mistress Lohr will not be able to help you, sir. Be off with you! Be off!’

Ishmael tried again to explain, but his words only served to raise the man’s guard higher.

‘BE OFF! No beggars here, we’ve had enough trouble with your kind!’

Ishmael gave up trying, picked up his bundle and walked wearily away.

‘What’s wrong, Guixpax?’ called Cyrena from the balcony.

‘Nothing, ma’am, just another beggar.’

‘Ringing the bell?’ she asked, surprised yet again at the rising levels of boldness that poverty seemed able to induce.

‘An insolent rascal who claimed to know you, ma’am.’

‘Really? Whatever next?!’ She turned and started to walk away from the balcony, but something outside of sight stopped her. She closed her eyes and stepped back to the rail, almost afraid to voice the question on her lips.

‘Guixpax – did the beggar give a name?’

‘Why, yes, ma’am. ‘Ishmael’, I think it was.’

He was almost at the corner when he heard the sound of shouting and
someone fast approaching behind him. He stopped, sensing that running would be seen as a sign of guilt, and hunched his shoulders, waiting for trouble to descend. He had only rung a bell and asked a question, but he realised this was probably enough to cause outrage in this neighbourhood. He heard the footsteps stop behind him and braced himself.

‘Ishmael?’ said the gentlest of voices. ‘Ishmael, is it really you?’

His heart leapt. It was the voice of the Owl, and she knew him! He turned slowly into his hope, hesitant in her sudden company, his face half hidden by hair and uncertainty. She stared at his presence, her vivid eyes reading and absorbing every detail of his sheltering features.

‘You have two eyes!’ she said in amazement. ‘Ghertrude said you only had one.’

‘You know Ghertrude?’

‘She has become my dearest friend; I found her when I was searching for you.’

‘For me?’

‘Yes. I looked for you at once, there’s so much…’ She became abruptly aware of their surroundings and shivered at their exposure to unseen ears. ‘There’s so much to say. Shall we return to the house? It may be better to discuss things there.’

She took the arm he offered and they walked slowly back up the road, past the gate, where the bemused Guixpax was waiting and watching.

Inside the mansion, they sat like strangers, in chairs that faced one another. His hand returned repeatedly to his face. Neither quite knew what to do next, though their hearts strained palpably towards each other; their passions and unfamiliarity clenched together, forming a barrier of embarrassment between them.

‘May I ask to wash?’ Ishmael requested politely. ‘My journey has been long and arduous.’

‘Of course! I should have suggested it immediately!’ Cyrena rang the
bell and Myra came into the room, subtly observing the injured young man from the corner of her eye. Her mistress ignored the question in her eyes and instructed her to prepare a bath and bring towels, perfumed salts and a dressing-gown. Guixpax was summoned and sent to town to buy suitable clothing.

When alone again, Cyrena listened at the bathroom door, and heard him splashing with what she hoped was pleasure.

Dim, bewildered old Guixpax returned with the weirdest selection of clothing she had ever seen. She pawed through the tangled mass on the polished table while the gatekeeper stood behind her, proud of his unique purchases.

‘Thank you Raymond, a fine choice. You can leave it to me now.’

Guixpax left, glowing with achievement but confused by the situation that his mistress appeared to be so enjoying. Cyrena waited for him to depart, then selected a choice of garments and placed them outside the bathroom door.

‘Ishmael, there are clean clothes outside the door.’

‘Thank you, er…?’

She realised, with some embarrassment, that she had not yet told him her name. ‘Cyrena,’ she replied. ‘My name is Cyrena.’

‘Cyrena,’ he repeated, the room of steam and perfume echoing the name.

Tsungali’s ghost had followed its master as far as the garden; he had neither the will nor the desire to enter the elaborate and confusing dwelling.

He watched from the dense colour of the unusual foliage. It was a pleasant place, and he passed through the plants and trees with idleness. His master was safe and at peace inside the house, with a woman and servant to look after him; the villain who had threatened Ishmael’s life was nowhere near, so Tsungali let himself be diluted by time, so that no one saw him crouching down among the energetic growth and high, containing walls.