The Eye of Zoltar

  ‘If the Emperor’s men find you with this your head will be off,’ said Gabby. ‘It’s better to let it go.’

  And so saying, he released the section of skin, which floated off into the air like a helium balloon.

  ‘Leviathans are lighter than air?’ I said, amazed at what I was seeing.

  ‘How else do you think something so large could fly?’ asked Gabby, then added: ‘We’d better get going. With a bit of luck we can get to the edge of the Empty Quarter before something considers that we’d make a fine breakfast. And Jennifer?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘I think you’ve still got some puffins inside your jacket.’

  It was true. They seemed to have taken a liking to the pockets, and had to be carefully removed.

  We walked in silence for the next three hours or so, now and then pausing to hide from danger, drink from a mountain stream or nibble on some wild radishes. Eventually we came across the now-dormant marker stones that denoted the edge of the Dragonlands and the northern edge of the Empty Quarter. The stones were covered with a thick crust of lichen, and appeared forlorn and forgotten. Llangurig would be only a few miles away.

  Gabby called a halt.

  ‘Any particular reason?’ I asked.

  ‘Breakfast.’

  ‘You have some?’

  ‘No,’ said Gabby with a smile, ‘but they will.’

  He pointed towards a stunted oak. The roots had grasped one of the marker stones tightly, and the overhanging branches partially hid a small group of people. A quick leg count told me this was a group of five people and I was suddenly suspicious until I realised that six of the legs belonged to one creature – a Buzonji – and that the other legs belonged to Perkins, and Addie. I blinked away some tears. I had convinced myself I would not see them again.

  Friends reunited

  ‘Heigh-ho!’ said Addie cheerfully as she walked into the clearing. ‘How are my tourists?’

  I must say that I have rarely been so glad to see someone safe and well. Perkins, that was, and Addie a close second.

  ‘Hey, Jenny,’ said Perkins, and he gave me a long hug, taking the opportunity to whisper in my ear how much he’d missed me. I returned the compliment gladly and unconditionally, but I must confess that his increased age – he’d put on ten years with Ralph’s Genetic Master Reset, remember – was not something I was going to get used to quickly.

  ‘Are you okay?’ I asked. ‘Not harmed in any way, I mean?’

  ‘I’m fine,’ he said, ‘but I can’t say the same for the kidnappers.’

  ‘Dead?’

  He didn’t say anything, but just looked at me and raised his eyebrows.

  ‘Hail, fellow,’ said Addie to Gabby, grasping his hand and shaking it warmly, ‘good to see you again.’

  ‘You know each other?’ I asked, surprised, but unsure why I should be.

  ‘He’s my secret weapon,’ said Addie. ‘Everyone should have a Gabby to look after them.’

  ‘You sent Gabby to keep an eye on us?’ I asked.

  ‘Only to remain on standby in case anything happened.’

  I looked at Gabby, who shrugged.

  ‘I should have said something, I suppose,’ he said, ‘but I didn’t know until two minutes ago that Addie was okay, and, well, I’m just in it for the rescuing.’

  I thanked him, and Addie quizzed Gabby further. Safe jeopardy tourism – any tourism, actually – I had decided, was all about information. The more of it you have, the better the decisions you can make.

  ‘I found them two clicks north-west of the pod poles,’ said Gabby when Addie questioned him. ‘They’d lost their transport and were about to be emptied by a Lifesucker. I brought them here by way of the Dragon’s lair.’

  ‘Was that wise?’ asked Addie.

  ‘Perhaps, perhaps not,’ said Gabby, ‘but we made it without loss.’

  ‘Except Ralph,’ I said, ‘who tried to attack a Cloud Leviathan while it was on a low-level feeding run. I think he had an exciting ride while it lasted.’

  ‘And the others?’

  I explained that Curtis had stolen the half-track with my ‘handmaiden’ on board and Addie agreed Curtis would be heading towards Llangurig, almost certainly to sell Laura, as Wilson suggested.

  She didn’t yet know, of course, that Laura was anything but a handmaiden – but for now, while an odd one, she was a handmaiden nonetheless. I also told her Ignatius was dead.

  ‘Flesh-eating slugs?’ she asked. ‘He never was a fast mover.’

  ‘He tried to escape to the border in a rowing boat and was shot down by anti-aircraft fire.’

  ‘Wow,’ said Addie, ‘I would never have seen that coming.’

  ‘Neither did he.’

  ‘If you don’t need me for anything more,’ said Gabby, ‘I’ll be off. I’ve got some raw recruits to train in the risk management business. Staff turnover is savagely high these days.’

  We all shook hands. I thanked him again and after politely refusing an offer of breakfast, he was off at a brisk walk and was soon lost to view over a rise.

  We sat on the warm grass, and a picnic breakfast never tasted so good. There was tea in a billycan, too, boiled up over the residual Thermowizidrical energy emanating from the runic markings on the fallen marker stones.

  ‘So what’s the deal with Gabby?’ I asked.

  ‘He’s exactly what you see. Someone who assesses risk of death, and steps in to intervene if the right conditions prevail.’

  ‘Why didn’t he save Ralph if he works for the insurance companies? Someone like that wouldn’t come out here without adequate life cover.’

  ‘Ralph wasn’t human,’ said Addie, ‘and Gabby’s instructions are clear. If he was rescuing non-humans, where would he draw the line? Tralfamosaurs? Rabbits? Ladybirds?’

  ‘He was definitely a rum cove,’ added Wilson thoughtfully. ‘He never ate or drank, and I didn’t see him sleep last night. He was still awake as I nodded off, and awake before me.’

  ‘And me,’ I said. ‘And he never took off his backpack. I only saw him struggling with it once, when he returned to camp this morning.’

  ‘Listen,’ said Addie, ‘Gabby is what Gabby does and it’s best not to ask too many questions. There are some things out here that defy ordinary explanation, and Gabby, well, he’s one of them.’

  ‘So … what about the kidnappers?’ I asked, helping myself to another bread roll, but this time with peanut butter. I saw Perkins and Addie exchange looks.

  ‘If you’d rather not—’ began Wilson.

  ‘No, we should tell you,’ said Addie. ‘I tracked them to a camp about five miles from Cambrianopolis,’ she continued, taking a sip of tea, ‘and then waited until dawn before walking into their camp. I told them my word of death was in the steel I carried, and that they could stay there alive if they relinquished Perkins, or stay there dead if they did not. I knew they wouldn’t give him up, but it’s traditional to offer some sort of deal.’

  ‘Three against one?’ I said. ‘No offence or anything, Addie, but you’re not even half their size. Did you think you had a chance?’

  ‘What I lack in weight I make up for in savagery,’ she said, ‘and no offence taken. I weighed my chances in at about seventy/thirty in my favour. It would have been a hard hand-to-hand struggle, but I would have won out eventually. I would have left them to the flesh-eating slugs, set free their Buzonjis, and returned with Perkins. They knew I would have to do this when they took him. They would have expected me to come for them.’

  ‘Did it pan out that way?’ I asked.

  ‘It would have,’ said Addie, ‘but for your friend here.’

  I turned to Perkins.

  ‘What did you do?’ I asked him.

  ‘She turned up and, yes, did the whole dopey tribal honour speech,’ replied Perkins, ‘which was quite stirring in a simplistic, barbaric and pointless-death kind of way, and I said that if she killed them I wouldn’t come with her.’

  ‘I to
ld him he didn’t have a choice,’ said Addie, staring into her teacup, ‘that I would bind him like a hog and return him whether he liked it or not.’

  Wilson and I looked at Perkins expectantly.

  ‘So,’ said Perkins, ‘I told her I would pop myself if she laid so much as a finger on any of them.’

  I raised my eyebrows. ‘Popping’ was the last resort for a wizard, a simple spell that caused a haemorrhage in the brain. Unconsciousness would be instantaneous, and death would soon follow.

  ‘That put me in a quandary,’ said Addie, ‘for it would be a treble failure. I would still have to kill the bandits as threatened, the Silurians and the Oldivicians would go to war, and the trophy in the argument – Perkins – would be lost too. There were no winners. So I did something I’ve never done before. I told them that I would not be killing them as there was no good reason for it, and that I would lose my honour in order to keep the peace between our two tribes.’

  ‘I’m getting really confused over this whole honour thing,’ I said. ‘Isn’t a willingness to die and to kill for an abstract concept of dubious relevance a bit daft?’

  ‘I’d be the first to admit that it is,’ said Addie. ‘Honour is kind of what you get when you weaponise manners, but if you’re brought up in a system where honour is valued more than life itself it makes a lot more sense. Some. A bit. Anyway: they attacked me as they were honour bound to do, and I defended myself as I was bound to do, but killed them in self-defence. I think it was what Gareth had planned. He had dishonoured himself by kidnapping Perkins in the first place and causing our tribes to fall out, then been the cause of me dishonouring myself, which then brought dishonour upon himself. By attacking me, he allowed me to restore my lost honour by killing him, and, odd as it might seem, his honour as well. He died with honour, and I thank and respect him for it. We didn’t leave them to the slugs at all, and instead buried them with tribal honours, which is why we were kind of delayed. The ground was hard and we had to ride for miles to find a shovel.’

  ‘I’m totally lost,’ I said.

  ‘Me too,’ said Wilson.

  ‘And me,’ said Perkins, ‘and I was actually there witnessing it.’

  ‘Okay,’ I said, ‘what happened then?’

  ‘We got to the pod poles long after you had left, found your note and followed your trail as far as the Hotax-attacked Range Rover. By that time is was late afternoon, so, we decided to find a hotel in Llanidloes.’

  ‘So the plan is now …?’ I asked.

  ‘Same as before, pretty much,’ said Addie. ‘We’ll head into Llangurig and see if we can retrieve your handmaiden, the half-track and get some payback on that idiot Curtis.’

  ‘And then?’

  ‘See what Able Quizzler has to say for himself, I guess – and take it from there.’

  This seemed the best plan, and after Addie had instructed her Buzonji to head on home, she led us towards a path that led downhill.

  ‘Any news from home?’ asked Perkins. I showed him the latest note from the homing snail, and watched his reaction to the part that read ‘all other considerations secondary’. I saw a look of consternation cross his face, but it was soon gone.

  ‘They’re keen to keep the Princess safe,’ he said, ‘and the Eye is still our number-one priority.’

  ‘Maybe so,’ I said, ‘but if Able Quizzler hasn’t any information about the Eye of Zoltar, I’m pulling the plug. We’ve lost two people already, and hunting Leviathans and a legendary pirate across Cadair Idris sounds like a fool’s errand.’

  ‘Fair enough,’ said Perkins.

  He pointed at Moobin’s note again.

  ‘What’s all this about a “leap of faith”?’

  ‘No idea,’ I said, ‘and why did Moobin want to tell you “all other considerations secondary”? Are we in some kind of trouble?’

  ‘I’m not sure,’ said Perkins. ‘Perhaps he wanted to impress upon me just how important this mission was.’

  Just then we came to a thin line of beech trees on the ridge, and Addie pointed towards a town on the valley floor.

  ‘Behold,’ she said in a dramatic tone of voice, ‘Llangurig.’

  Llangurig

  Llangurig was situated on a bend in the river and was roughly circular. It was defended by a high wall that was curved inwards with an overhang at the top in order to better withstand attack by Tralfamosaur and other terrors. There was open countryside outside the walls but it was churned and shattered by recent conflict. And by recent, I mean really recent – several armoured vehicles were smouldering from a battle earlier that day.

  ‘What are they?’ I asked, pointing to what looked like two encampments, one a half-mile to the east of Llangurig, and one the same distance to the west. Each encampment seemed to have its own system of trenches and earthworks, within which I could see troops at readiness.

  ‘Two conflicting sides,’ said Addie, ‘who have fought violently over Llangurig’s territory for the past one hundred and forty years. A period of endless strife, aggression and political manoeuvring. The leaders of these two factions will stop at nothing to defeat the other, while in between them, the target of their endless battle awaits the outcome with long-bated breath.’

  ‘Warlords?’ I asked.

  ‘If only,’ replied Addie. ‘At least power-hungry Lunatics eventually know when to call a truce. No, these two factions are fuelled by greed and are utterly ruthless in their pursuit of power, influence and territory.’

  ‘You mean—?’ said Perkins.

  ‘Right,’ said Addie, ‘railway companies.’

  I looked again. Now she mentioned it, the two encampments to the east and west did appear to have cranes and piles of building materials, coal, even a locomotive or two, and behind each fortified area was a railway, snaking out behind and soon lost to view in the endless green folds of the countryside. The area of churned soil and shattered earth was confined, I noticed, solely to the area around Llangurig.

  As we watched, a salvo of artillery was fired from the railway company to the east, and a few moments later several shellbursts appeared close by their enemies in the west, who returned fire and felled an ancient oak that looked as though it had survived several near-misses in the past. While the artillery barrage continued, I noticed that engineers and armoured fighting vehicles on the western side were attempting to lay some railway track in the direction of Llangurig. This was soon noticed by those in the east, who sent forward some skirmishers to stop the engineers, which they managed to do – only three sleepers were laid, for a body count, as far as I could see, of five.

  While this was going on the engineers in the east used a steam crane to deliver a completed section of track about thirty feet in length, which was met with a fusillade of small-arms fire from the west. As we watched, welders in heavy body armour ran out to fix the new section of track, and even though they welded with incredible bravery, the section of track was condemned by the Inspector of Works, who was dressed in a stripy umpire’s outfit.

  ‘Not enough ballast under the track,’ said Wilson expertly. ‘It would never have taken the weight of a locomotive, let alone fully loaded coal wagons.’

  It all seemed very strange indeed, even by Cambrian Empire standards, which were admittedly quite broad. The two factions seemed to be fighting over the mile of empty ground between the two railheads.

  ‘Okay,’ I said slowly, ‘and they are fighting because …?’

  ‘I’ll tell you as we walk down,’ said Addie, glancing at the sun to gauge the time. ‘We want to get to town in time for the 12.07 ceasefire.’

  ‘That seems very precise.’

  ‘Railway militia are notorious sticklers for punctuality. They are sometimes late, but always apologise and let you know why, and if the ceasefire is really late, you can apply for a refund.’

  ‘A refund of what?’

  She shrugged.

  ‘No one really knows.’

  As we climbed down, the story unfolded itself co
urtesy of Addie’s spirited storytelling. The conflict began with Tharv’s grandfather, who was keen that the Cambrian Empire make full use of the then new railway technology to bring modernity and riches to the Empire. A flurry of railway companies sprang up to bid on the lucrative railway contracts but, owing to a misunderstanding, two railway companies were mistakenly awarded the potentially lucrative line from Cambrianopolis to the deep-water anchorages at Aberystwyth.

  ‘After some wrangling,’ concluded Addie, ‘the Emperor decreed that whoever got to Llangurig first would control the line, so a flurry of building ensued. The Cambrian Railway Company built from the east, and the Trans-Wales Rails Corporation from the west. The companies met either side of Llangurig, and one thing led to another – angry words, a bloody nose, someone shot someone, and before you know it there was a war, which has lasted over a century. There are goods stacked high at the docks and in Cambrianopolis waiting to be transported by rail. If your great-grandfather ordered a Cambrian piano, it’ll be in a warehouse somewhere, still waiting to be shipped.’

  We stopped within sight of the town walls as the warring companies exchanged another artillery salvo and several brave railway militiamen were cut down by a scythe of machine-gun fire.

  ‘How many people have died over this mile of railway track during that century and a half?’ asked Perkins.

  ‘Eight thousand,’ said Addie, ‘give or take.’

  ‘Working for the railways is quite dangerous out here,’ said Wilson.

  ‘True,’ said Addie, ‘and each of those soldiers is fighting not for glory, but a share of the profits. If the company you fight for builds the track to Llangurig and you survive, you’ll be rich beyond your wildest dreams.’

  ‘What if you’re killed?’

  ‘You get a cardboard box to be buried in, and a fifty-pound Argos gift token goes to the widow.’

  ‘Do they have any trouble recruiting?’ asked Wilson.

  ‘They’re queuing up.’

  ‘Someone should put a stop to this,’ growled Perkins.