The Whispering Swarm (60 page)

Suddenly Nick, who was between Duval and me, grunted and went down onto the ice, apologising to us and struggling to rise. But he couldn't easily do it. He had turned his ankle. Using our muskets as a makeshift pair of crutches, he continued to hop as we kept pace with him. We could now hear the Puritan guns. But they were still too far away. Only a lucky shot would bring us down.

I hoped that the pursuit of our half of the party had succeeded in taking attention from Prince Rupert. Unless she had been recognised by someone, Moll should be home by now. I was despairing a little when Duval began cheering and tugging at me. He had spotted the Temple Stairs. Not far on from them was Whitefriars Old Stairs where with luck the Roundheads would be unable to follow. It seemed only misfortune could stop us.

At last I spotted the familiar stretch of shingle by which we had entered the city! Soon thin, grey fingers of fog drifted around us like a fisherman's net. At moments we could hardly see one another. Duval and Nevison began searching for an opening but I told them not to waste their time.

‘There's only one way of leading us in and I'm not sure I can do it. Remain close to me.' I pulled my pistol from my sash and offered it butt first to Duval. Understanding what we must do, he took hold of it. Supporting Nevison he grasped the thing. ‘On your lives, do not let go.' Leading my friends, I had to dance somehow, or at least step the way we used to step as kids, following the figures of the reels and jigs geeky old Miss Mackintosh insisted we learn. And I had to sing. More a kind of calling, similar to vocalising I sometimes did on stage, echoing the harmonics of the guitars and keyboard. Very high. And I must remember the numbers, the figures of the tarot, the sight of the silver roads, like strings on an instrument, shivering and whimpering. All this is what Father Grammaticus had taught me, sowing the seeds in my brain as I sat hypnotised before his strange and elaborate orrery!

‘They have us,' murmured Duval. ‘Unless we can get deep into this sorcerous fog, we are lost.' He grinned at his own despair as his eyes grieved for Jemmy.

More musket balls whistled past us. Getting closer. My blood was crystal cold. We'd be dead or badly wounded if we remained there. I had to concentrate and do what Father Grammaticus had taught me in the visions he had induced. Use the tarot. The real. The imagined. Anything. I remembered his lessons. I had to find a focus—in my case the tarot. A goal—the Sanctuary. Marshal my powers and prepare myself mentally for the so-called moonbeam roads: those thin bands of silver, no thicker than a guitar string, which, once sighted and used by an adept, became a pathway. I had used them to get out onto the ice. I recalled clearly all Father Grammaticus had taught me: how to visualise the cards and the reality around me at the same time; how to find in the fog of my vision a slender string which became a narrow ribbon to be followed pulsing and curling into the darkness.

Between the stalls—eights and fours—avoiding the whores—fours and eights—the clouds roll black the raven caws—flapping canvas, eights and fours—threes and nines—dodging the law—the Fool, three staffs—the smell of ice—chestnuts and hot wine—kings and knaves—the Ace of Spades—scales and spears from the buccaneers—twelves and four for the scales of law—twos and eights don't hesitate to the nine of Fate don't deviate as the six and eight the queen shall take to the busiest road of the eight hundred and eight the heaviest weight of all the loads is the load we share on eighty-eight and here she rises like a vein under flesh to the flick of a thumb time enough to drive the needle in. I look I see clearly I see the moonbeam roads, I see everything at once. Everything. At once. To survive I must narrow that vision to sharp sharp focus, a thin silver rope on which to tread most carefully and now we're on the moonbeam road just for a minute. The Second Aether is open to us and so are all the worlds and places of the heart, deal another card and bile rises up but my friends are all through—threes and nines and Twelve of Cups—adieux adieux—four for the law adieux adieux—Play the Fool, Play the Fool; and Play the knave two by two and Harlequin the tale shall spin. Weary, we of the Eighth Degree, finding only the golden scale to bring down the fist of mail. Weary, weary, we of the Eighth Degree. Rhythm and the rhythm and the rhythm and the rhythm and the beautiful blues. Are we that part of God that grieves? That part of God Weeping as so much knowledge fills us. Skipping from stand to stand seeking to save so much. For how long? And for what? How we must sadden Him. The feeling is mutual. I resist the lure of fur and fang. God is good. God has a plan. God is merciful. God is divine. Find the knight and follow him. Find the knight that's all in green. Find the great Green Knight and follow him.

I had no doubt where all this was coming from. Somehow it was being dredged from my unconscious. Of course, there was just a chance that the whole adventure was taking place in my own mind, the events were so much like a bizarre dream. I saw a silvery ripple cross the unstable grey wall between us and Whitefriars Old Stairs. I had to get us where I hoped Marvell, Love and Clitch could not pass. The shadow of a rider in the mist. I strained my eyes to see. Nick did his best to stand on his sprained foot but his will wasn't enough. He staggered. He jerked again. I saw blood spread over his shirt from a wound in his side. A redcoat shot. Blood darkened the ice. Between us, Duval and I dragged Nevison. He was a heavy man but made no complaint. The Roundheads were rapidly gaining on us. I saw Marvell in the lead, yelling something to Clitch and Love. His arm around his friend, Duval tugged a big horse pistol from his belt and fired it at Marvell. He missed Marvell but took a redcoat soldier full between the eyes.

‘I fear that's war,' said Duval with a shrug. We were both thinking of Jemmy. The Frenchman looked at me and grinned again. There was little humour in that grin but there was passion. Fighting was what he loved. I could imagine him as a pretty implacable opponent. Thankfully, a daring ally.

Round and round me ethereal silver figures, the slightly sinister figures of the tarot, danced singing their silent song and clapping time with their soundless hands. In my mind's eye I tried to read them, discover their logic, order them and then I had done so.
I had done so.
The Whispering Swarm? Did I now visualise the Whispering Swarm? It was singing. It became a choir.
Nine by nine,
the strands curled together.
Twelve by twelve,
create the weather strong enough to carry us. Strong, strong enough.
Three by three
. A mounted knight reared his beautiful black Arab stallion directly in front of us, his chain mail glinting silver, his silk surcoat glistening jade, his tall lance flying the fluttering dark green banner of Islam! His spiked burnished helmet was inset with gold and shimmering emeralds, the leather of his horse's harness was stained the colour of grass, his eyes were a piercing green. A Saracen knight of the tenth century in all his magnificence. He signalled to me with his mailed hand. His bearded face was partly obscured by the curtain of steel dropping on either side of his face. His deep green eyes glared into mine for an instant. Was he signalling? I knew that our only chance was to follow him.

Nevison was a heavy man. I had trouble helping Duval with his friend, who now and then uttered a grunt of pain. I met the Saracen's gaze and called out to him. My allies of the tarot swarmed around his horse. Nevison and Duval looked at me in surprise. They could not see what I saw. They thought me mad. Yet they trusted me enough to stay close beside me. I did all I could to visualise what I sought to find. Then that stallion stamped with his silver-shod hoof and the Green Knight pointed with the lance on which the emerald banner fluttered. One silver road was fractionally wider than the others. It shook and quivered but I was at last able to set foot on it.

A sudden fusillade sounded nearer and might easily have killed us if we had not kept close and acted together. I pulled them both with me. Neither man knew exactly what was happening but willingly trusted my judgment as they trusted Prince Rupert's. Duval and Nevison could not see the Green Knight, whom I followed with the same trust. My last sight of our pursuers was of Marvell's frowning gaze as the mist, now glowing a golden green, folded about us.

At that moment I hated Andrew Marvell. Who would have guessed him a mere sneaking meddlesome spy! He had tricked me into believing he was a friend, an ally. God knew how much information Marvell/St Claire had subtly milked from me in our conversations. Thanks to his coming to my aid more than once against Love and Clitch, I thought he was solidly on my side, shoulder to shoulder with us. But he had fought in those last battles of Alsacia only to gain our confidence and learn our plan.

What would have happened to us all if we were captured by him at Whitehall? At the very least we should have been racked and otherwise tortured to discover all the conspirators. We might have been burned alive! Or worse, hanged, drawn and quartered. What was left of us would have been buried in an unmarked grave. He knew the consequences and willingly condemned us to that horrible death.

I experienced a sensation of fierce cold, worse than anything I had known before. I was almost tempted to turn round and go back. Then we stepped through to the thinner mist following the road which widened to form something like a bridge.

Silence fell for a moment. The Swarm muttered and mumbled. I caught a glimpse of the green-cloaked Saracen knight ahead of me. Was he real? An illusion? A projection? I heard the muffled sound of hooves. What had Father Grammaticus said about the Second Aether? That it was dangerous to anyone not familiar with it. And familiarity with it sent you mad? The only safe way through was by a silver road. The silver roads crossed the Second Aether like paths through a swamp and if you fell off you'd be sucked into what the abbot called the Black Aether, which appeared to coexist with the Second. I knew that I confronted a whole new kind of physics. Grammaticus called it Natural Philosophy but some called it magic and it obeyed its own rules. I would need to understand those rules if I was going to survive for long!

The Whispering Swarm was suddenly gone. In their place, I saw a complex of silver roads on which I walked from world to world.

 

50

CONFERENCE

The slime-green mist gave way to whatever filthy stuff filled that part of Alsacia. We were still on the ice, still hurrying, still expecting a musket ball to smash into our heads. We panted from the weight of poor Nick Nevison doing his best to use a musket as a crutch.

For a moment the Green Knight was still there, as if he watched over us. Then he, too, faded. We paused, drew breath and continued on until at last we had reached Whitefriars Old Stairs. The scarred, knotted, half-rotten wood of the steps was slippery with greenish slime which seemed to absorb the vanishing mist. The figures of the tarot had also disappeared. I sent out silent thanks to the Saracen knight, whoever he was. But for him, we should all be dead or captured. But what of Prince Rupert and the musketeers? They had gone the other route home. Had they been so lucky?

With considerable effort, we pushed and heaved our wounded friend up onto the wooden pier and from there to damp cobblestones. There was no one visible on the quayside. Even Alsacia's strange watermen disliked the river. But we carried Nevison a few yards further up a steep, unlit cobbled street to a desolate public house with crumbling timber beams, vine-stained slates, with flaking lathe and plaster walls. The battered board was weather-stained and its words were faint: The Lost Apprentice
.
Inside, the bleak place was scarcely warmer than outside. A few surly customers, drinking tin shants of thin ale beside a guttering fire, looked at us warily. Not one offered to help. The sickly-seeming publican, a Mr Sam Sweetlick, from the notice over his door, forced himself to be friendly enough. He was probably glad of the custom. I ordered brandy and hoped Claude Duval or Nick, who was no longer groaning but had taken on an intense pallor, had money to pay for it.

As soon as we discovered that Nick's wound was painful but relatively superficial we bound it up, left money on the bar and ventured out into the streets again. I had the overwhelming feeling that the people in The Lost Apprentice were half-dead, waiting for a boat across the Styx. Given that we must have been a very strange-looking party, they showed only a dull interest in us. Mr Sweetlick did make a half-hearted attempt to keep us at the bar for a further drink but nobody followed into the cold. I had the impression they never went out. Were these the undying damned of the Sanctuary?

In ten minutes we had reached familiar territory, the lively, bustling heart of the Alsacia. In another five minutes or so we at last saw our square, with the big, welcoming coaching inn on one side and the solid old stone abbey on the other. Wood smoke, ornamented by glinting sparks, drifted up from the inn's big crooked chimneys. Had Prince Rupert been successful? It was our first question as friends and acquaintances gathered. Was the king safe? Who had died on the scaffold? Someone, they claimed, had heard the bells.

I could tell them very little. It wasn't my place. I looked impatiently for Rupert and the musketeers.

‘And the ravens came in. They perched on the roof of the abbey before they flew away!' Tiny, rotund Sebastian Toom brought in hot wine. We were glad of it and thanked him heartily. The unique chill down by the old stairs had woven itself into our bones. Was that stuff only a mixture of miscellaneous gases onto which I imposed my imaginings? To me, it was something almost intelligent and probably malevolent. I associated it with the Whispering Swarm.

‘It's ravens flying south, I tells thee,' Mr Toom confided. ‘That says good luck.'

On cue I heard a busy flapping. Out of the shadows my old friend Sam came to settle on his shoulder. The bird cocked his head with what I took to be a sardonic expression. Good luck for whom? Sam looked at me and winked. Did anyone else there know he could talk?