The Court of the Air Read online

  Slowcogs led them along the cliff wall until they came to the façade of an old temple carved into the rock. On one side of the entrance a seated stone figure crouched, human except for an ugly beetle’s head. It was matched on the other side by a second seated man-statue, a mammoth spider-head rising from its neck.

  ‘I don’t like the feel of this place,’ said Molly. ‘Not one bit.’

  ‘The old gods lost their power after the fall of Chimeca,’ said Slowcogs. ‘The temples and forces of ancient Wildcaotyl have no capability here now. It will be better to sleep within these walls. There are prides of pecks living inside the forest.’

  Despite her misgivings, Molly accepted the steamman’s advice. It was only when she got inside the temple that the wave of tiredness overtook her. Molly shivered. Locust priests had once practised their dark rites down here … she could feel it. From what she recalled from her poorhouse lessons, the pantheon of Wildcaotyl gods still lingered over the world like an ugly ancestral memory; each deity more obscene than the last – from lesser gods such as Khemchiuhtlicue Blood-drinker and Scorehueteotl Stake-burner, right up to Xam-Ku himself, old Father Spider.

  It was the middle of the night in Middlesteel above, and she finally fell into a deep dream-filled sleep. Rachael’s ghost came to speak to her, warning that Grimhope was no place for a nice Sun Gate girl, telling her that she should find a respectable job as a seamstress. Next the Beadle came; his body still covered in the torture marks of the gang that had stormed the poorhouse. He shouted at Molly that she was headed for the gallows outside Bonegate – until he was decapitated by the refined old assassin from the bawdyhouse, whose cane split into twin sword sticks like a conjurer’s trick.

  ‘Where’s my father?’ Molly demanded of the killer.

  ‘I am your father,’ said the assassin. ‘And you are such a terrible disappointment to the family. I don’t think we can bear your existence any more.’

  ‘You shouldn’t be trying to kill me,’ said Molly. ‘I want to speak to my mother.’

  ‘She died of shame,’ said the assassin. ‘After you were born.’

  ‘That’s not true.’

  The topper shoved her to the dirt, pushing her red hair back from the nape of her neck. ‘Time to die, Molly Templar.’

  ‘Please,’ Molly pleaded. ‘I just want to see my mother once before you kill me.’

  ‘Hold still. I’ll send you to her now.’

  It was Slowcogs that shook her awake, rather than the kiss of cold sabre steel. Molly groaned.

  ‘It is midday in the world above, Molly softbody. Time to move on.’

  The first growths in the fungal forest were tall white mushroom trees with multiple cups and red mottling; then the lichen-covered ground grew denser with darker single-cup growths. At times they needed to retrace their steps so Slowcogs could squeeze through the thick forest.

  Molly watched a squirrel-like rodent chewing on one of the trunks. ‘You could live free out here, Slowcogs. If you didn’t mind a diet of mushrooms.’

  ‘Grimhope is safer,’ said the steamman. ‘Relatively speaking.’

  ‘Is it still like the legends of the Green Man?’

  ‘I doubt if it ever was the place of your tales, Molly soft-body,’ said Slowcogs. Then, as if it explained everything, he added, ‘It is an outlaw city.’

  ‘They will welcome us there?’

  ‘My people have not updated our knowledge of Grimhope for many years,’ said Slowcogs. ‘There are few outlaw steammen; although one of our kind does live down here. Silver Onestack. He is a desecration.’

  ‘You mean he is malfunctioning?’

  ‘Which of us does not, with age?’ answered Slowcogs. ‘No. He is a joining – a creature formed from steamman cadavers at the hands of one of your human mechomancers. His pattern has been violated, the architecture laid down by King Steam tampered with. Three souls of our fallen lay trapped within the corpses that make up his body by Onestack’s selfish refusal to deactivate. It is a great dishonour for him.’

  Molly remembered her dream of the night before. ‘Poor Silver Onestack.’

  ‘So he hides himself away down here in the undercity. But he is still steamman. Word has been sent by the controller – if he is alive I hope he will meet us outside the town.’

  ‘Word?’ said Molly. ‘Surely there is no crystalgrid network down here?’

  Slowcogs pointed towards the ceiling mist, where black dots rode the cavern thermals. ‘There are older ways to send a message, young softbody. Trained bird bats with leg clips do as well in the deeps.’

  They travelled at a steady pace for the rest of the day, uneventfully except for when one of the mushroom trees rained spores down on them as they passed. Molly’s eyes swelled up like the crimson ball from a game of four-poles and she sneezed uncontrollably for another two miles. Apart from the odd spike of earthflow-fed lightning, the bright red light from the crystals high above them never varied or dimmed. It was always day in the Duitzilopochtli Deeps.

  By the late afternoon the cavern floor started to slope upwards and the fungal forest began to grow less densely. The presence of fields of stumps in the dirt suggested heavy felling by the inhabitants of the undercity. Before the brow of a hill they came across a field of a different kind, the stone markers and headstones of a graveyard stretching back to the fungal forest.

  ‘This is where Silver Onestack will meet us, if he is still activate,’ said Slowcogs. The steamman rolled along a path towards a shrine at the corner of the graveyard. The temple looked as abandoned as the Chimecan structure Molly had slept in the night before, but with none of the half-human, half-insect effigies. She guessed the outlaw city, rather than the ancient fallen empire, had constructed the shrine. Peering inside its gloom, Molly saw a figure squatting on the floor. A steamman, as silent as one of the Guardian’s statues in Parliament Square.

  ‘Have you no greeting for us, Silver Onestack?’ asked Slowcogs.

  Raising itself on a tripod of three pincer-like legs, the large spherical body of the creature rotated, a silver-domed head emerging from an iris on the globe. ‘I had hoped no greetings would be necessary, Slowcogs. Did the controller not receive my message?’

  ‘We did not wait for your reply,’ said Slowcogs. ‘The Geargi-ju wheels have been thrown.’

  ‘Then he has read badly, Slowcogs. Grimhope is not the place it once was. Whatever threat this softbody faces in Middlesteel, it is only a fraction of the disorder that now rules down here.’

  Slowcogs rolled back. ‘I do not understand.’

  ‘Then let me show you,’ said Silver Onestack, his three legs scissoring him out of the temple. They reached the top of the hill and stared down into the valley.

  Old Chimecan ziggurats lay dotted around the cavern floor overwhelmed by the towers of a human city, smoke rising from workshops and manufactories. It looked like the Jangles in Middlesteel viewed from the top of the hill at Rottonbow.

  ‘Where is the tree town?’ asked Slowcogs. ‘Where is the palisade and Lake Chalchiuhtlicue?’

  ‘Cut down. Built over. Drained,’ said Silver Onestack. ‘The Anarchy Council fell three years ago. What is left of its members rests behind you in those plots.’

  ‘You have not reported this,’ said Slowcogs, accusingly.

  ‘Rather, I have, but you have not received my messages. The new regime brought flying things with them, all teeth and claws. I lost my whole loft of bird bats within a week. You were lucky the controller’s communication got through to me at all. It is the first word from the people of the metal I have received for years.’

  ‘It is strange this has been kept from us,’ said Slowcogs. He was clearly not used to the knowledge of something on such a scale having escaped the attention of the steammen’s all-knowing network.

  ‘Stranger still that the new regime were instantly able to identify all of the political police’s informers down here,’ said Silver Onestack. ‘Those informers that still live now tell the Guardi
ans on the surface whatever the new regime wish them to hear.’

  Molly stared down at Grimhope, deeply disappointed. She had expected freedom to look different, not like a miniature replica of Middlesteel. But however bad it was, her murderous family would not be able to track her down here.

  Silver Onestack passed Molly a green cloak with a large hood. ‘Wear this, Molly softbody. And if anyone speaks to you before we get to my lodgings, do not forget to address your reply with compatriot, not sir or damson.’

  ‘They are communityists?’ Molly asked.

  ‘Not any more,’ said Silver Onestack, looking back at the bone-white gravestones of the Anarchy Council. ‘No. Not any more.’

  Chapter Seven

  If Harry Stave was a typical criminal, then Oliver couldn’t understand how the constabulary had not captured him years ago. Since fleeing from the police station at Hundred Locks, all they had done was enter the woods to the south of the town, go into the middle of a clearing, and peg out a strange yellow flag with a black circle in the centre.

  ‘Now what?’ Oliver asked, watching the drizzle falling from the sky soak the odd-looking flag.

  ‘We wait,’ said Harry Stave.

  ‘For what?’

  ‘For three hours, old stick.’ said Harry.

  ‘That’s not what I meant.’

  ‘I know.’

  Oliver couldn’t goad any more out of him. So he shut up and waited. Someone must have discovered the bodies in the police station by now. The corpses at Seventy Star Hall on the other hand could take weeks to be found. Damson Griggs brought everything to the house; she would be noticed missing first by one of the nosy neighbours she was always complaining about. Or perhaps one of Uncle Titus’s businesses would send a runner to see what had happened to their reclusive owner.

  Shortly after three hours had passed, a figure appeared on the other side of the clearing, shrouded by the curtain of rain – heavier now.

  ‘Who’s that?’ Oliver whispered.

  ‘If we’re lucky, our ticket out of here,’ said Harry.

  ‘Harry!’ the figure called.

  Harry Stave stayed where he was, sheltered by the tree from the rain. ‘Monks! You’re not meant to be here. Where’s Landless?’

  ‘Reassigned,’ said Monks. ‘Who’s the boy?’

  ‘The whistler’s nephew. We need to extract, Monks. We’ve been rolled up here.’

  Oliver was about to ask why his uncle was called the whistler, but Harry signalled him back.

  ‘Did you get to meet the walk-in, Harry?’

  ‘The walk-in didn’t show. That’s why I put up a signal. A rival crew arrived and nearly did for us. We’ve been bleeding rolled up, we need to get out now.’

  ‘That’s why I’m here, Harry. Come on.’

  Stave shut his eyes, not moving. A shadow seemed to separate itself from the criminal, a spectral outline moving forward into the rain and across the clearing. To Oliver’s astonishment a similar figure misted out of his own skin, drifting after the Harry-ghost.

  Harry cautioned the boy.

  In the centre of the clearing two thunder cracks exploded, a lick of flame splashing through the apparitions and off into the trees on the left.

  ‘Damn,’ said Harry. ‘A marksman. I do hate to be proved right.’

  They were running back into the forest, the man Monks shouting something after them.

  ‘That was your friend?’ Oliver wheezed as they darted through the trees.

  ‘An associate,’ said Harry. ‘It was a bleeding set-up. My own people.’

  Another crack sounded beside them. Whoever it was, they were shooting into the trees blind.

  Oliver ducked under a fallen oak. ‘You don’t sound surprised.’

  ‘Let’s just say I had my suspicions.’

  Oliver pointed to the north. ‘The town’s that way I think.’

  ‘Too well covered by now,’ said Harry, pushing Oliver on. ‘And besides, I never like to go into a place without knowing where the back door is.’

  They followed the sodden forest trail to the west, doubling back and switching trails to throw off any pursuit. The breeze lent a cold edge to the run. Since he had found Damson Griggs on the floor of their kitchen, sprinting about Hundred Locks was all Oliver seemed to have done. The shots into the trees had stopped.

  ‘Not coming after us,’ panted Oliver.

  ‘Not their style, Oliver,’ Harry replied. ‘My associates like to keep to the shadows. The minimum of fuss. They were going after an easy kill, not a forced march through half the county’s forests.’

  They slowed their dash as they began to come across tracks, leaves and twigs scattered across the ground. A horse trail. Oliver tried to locate the sun beyond the trees’ canopy. By its position they were into the late afternoon now. Then, against the fast-moving white clouds, he saw it. A black globe rising into the sky.

  ‘Look, Harry. I’ve never seen an airship like that.’

  Harry stared upwards. ‘Bloody Monks. That was our ride out of here.’

  ‘But there’s no expansion engines on it.’

  ‘Don’t need them to go up and down, Oliver. Which is pretty much all it does.’

  ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘I’ll explain later. For now, let’s concentrate on our journey out of here.’

  Harry’s route led them to what Oliver at first took for a river; then he saw the towpath and realized it was the tail end of the Hundred Locks navigation. If they followed the canal path north they would eventually reach the hundred locks carved into the dike wall of the Toby Fall Rise.

  ‘Keep back under the trees for the moment,’ cautioned Harry. ‘We need to stay in the black. See the tunnel in the hill? We’ll head for there, keeping under the tree line at all times. The towpath goes into the tunnel. We’ll get into the channel behind that bush growing down there on the left.’

  Harry’s precise instructions left Oliver puzzled. ‘You think someone might be watching for us?’

  ‘Trust me,’ said Harry. ‘Someone’s always watching. Come on.’

  They hugged the forest until the mouth of the canal tunnel was upon them. The bush extended all the way up the hill and pushing past it, Oliver scraped his neck against the sharp twigs that grew between its small orange flowers. It was cool inside the tunnel. Damp too. Harry sat down in front of a navvy’s alcove and dangled his feet over the edge of the waterway.

  Oliver joined him. ‘Now we wait?’

  ‘Clever lad. You’ll go far.’

  After half an hour the tunnel mouth darkened as the first of three nearly identical narrowboats entered, a single paddle at the rear of each boat tossing water across the towpath.

  ‘When the middle boat passes,’ instructed Harry, ‘jump for the cabin.’

  Oliver did as he was bid – the narrowness of the tunnel and the slowness of the canal craft making it easy to step through the cloud of smoke and onto the deck. There was a steam-wreathed figure at the back, hand on the tiller, and if the canal man was surprised at the sudden addition of two passengers, he did not show it.

  Harry pushed Oliver through the door into a narrow room. It looked like the inside of the gypsy caravans that visited Hundred Locks during the Midwinter Festival. ‘Right. We stay here for the rest of the day – don’t even think about getting out of the cabin until tomorrow morning.’

  Oliver felt a wave of exasperation rise in him towards his enigmatic saviour. ‘Why, Harry? You think that strange-looking aerostat is going to be floating around looking for us? That’s a pile of horse manure – what’s the chances of us being spotted at that distance?’

  Harry sighed. ‘More than you’d credit, old stick. It’s not human eyes you need to worry about. There’s watchers up there with transaction engines to assist them; but they can only focus on a single place at a time, and we’ll be outside of their sweep area by tomorrow.’

  Oliver sat down on a
small three-legged stool. ‘Harry, that sounds like paranoia.’

  ‘It’s only paranoia if they’re not out to get you, lad. And judging by our reception back in the woods, they are.’

  ‘But who are they?’

  Harry sighed again and pulled up a stool. ‘Both myself and my associates back in the woods are what are colloquially known as wolftakers.’

  Oliver snorted in disbelief. ‘Wolftakers? So you’re a demon who’s come to—’

  ‘—snatch naughty children, Oliver? Every myth has its substance in reality. The tale’s just a twisted version of the truth.’

  ‘You’re an escaped convict, Harry. I saw the paper on you in the police station.’

  ‘That’s true enough,’ said Harry. ‘Although I would prefer to be known as a free-spirited entrepreneur who ran afoul of the navy’s taste for bureaucracy and regulations.’

  ‘So what’s this nonsense about wolftakers in the sky? Next you’ll be telling me you help Mother White Horse give gifts to the children every Midwinter.’

  ‘Wolftakers are human enough,’ said Harry. ‘Listen. When Isambard Kirkhill seized power in parliament’s name, he had only one fear left – and that was the throne. The navy and army wanted him to become king. Old Isambard had to fight them off with a sabre to stop them making him the new monarch. Then there were our own royalists in exile in Quatérshift plotting a counter-revolution and restoration. Kirkhill knew that if the rule of parliament was to last, it would have to resist both the plots without and the ambitions of its own Guardians within the house.’

  ‘What does this have to do with a children’s tale?’ Oliver asked.

  ‘Everything,’ explained Harry. ‘Kirkhill established a court sinister as the last line of defence, a body that was to act as a supreme authority and ultimate guarantor of the rule of the people. But it was to be a court invisible. The House of Guardians knows the Court is there, but they know nothing of its location, its staff, its methods or its workings. If any First Guardian were to start looking at the throne restored with envious eyes, the existence of the Court would give them pause to think.’