‘The Piper!’ said Arthur. ‘We’ve got to get out of here!’
‘So much sorcery!’ said the Will. ‘Saturday is bound to respond at any moment!’
‘I think she already has,’ said Arthur. He pointed up at the clouds of smoke above them. A huge ring of fire was beginning to form above the ships, a ring the size of an athletic track, easily five hundred yards in diameter. Flames began to fall from it, small flames at first, like fiery rain, but they began to get bigger and, from the way they changed colour from yellow-red to blue and white, much hotter.
The ships responded by increasing their speed. They were heading straight for the quay where Arthur was standing, their funnels belching smoke as their engines were stoked for maximum power.
‘They’re going to run aground right here!’ said Arthur. ‘Are you complete?’
‘Not quite,’ said the Will calmly. ‘Just one short paragraph to go, but an essential one, to make a flight feather . . .’
‘Hurry up,’ Arthur urged. As the ships came closer, the ring of fire was moving too, and the storm of incendiary rain was increasing in ferocity.
But it wasn’t setting the ships alight, Arthur saw, or even hitting the Newnith soldiers on the decks. The rain was sliding off an invisible barrier that stretched from the masts of the ships down to the side rails, a sorcerous barrier that was, for the moment, proving impervious to Saturday’s attack.
We don’t have that barrier, Arthur realised. That fire is getting way too close . . .
He could feel the heat of the flaming rain now, fierce on his face. The drops were so hot that he could see them keep going for several feet underwater, unquenched, their fire lasting for much longer than it should.
‘Are you ready?’ Arthur snapped again. ‘We have to run!’
‘Almost, almost, almost there,’ crooned the raven.
Fiery raindrops were hissing into the water ten feet away. The ships, steaming at full speed, were three hundred yards away. A group of soldiers pointed at Arthur and suddenly there were arrows in the air, which flew true but didn’t make it through the firestorm.
‘Done,’ said the raven. It flew up and perched on Arthur’s shoulder. ‘I am complete. I am Part Six of the Will of the—’
Arthur didn’t wait to hear any more. He turned and ran along the quay as fast as he could go, flames spattering on the stone behind him. Steam klaxons sounded too, and the war cries of the Newniths, which he knew all too well from the battles in the Great Maze.
Through all that noise, through the hammering of engines, the scream of klaxons, the hiss and roar of the firestorm and the shouts, there was still that other sound. A clear and separate sound, beautiful and terrible to hear.
The sound of the Piper, playing a tune upon his pipes.
‘Ah,’ said the raven. ‘The Architect’s troublesome third son.’
‘Troublesome!’ Arthur snorted. ‘He’s a lot worse than that.’
The quay ended at a solid rock face, with no obvious exits. Arthur stared at it for a second, then started to hunt for protuberances or bits of stone that looked out of place. He quickly found one, pressed it, and rushed in as the rock-slab door groaned open.
The cavern beyond was an equipment room, the walls covered with racks of many different metalworking tools, which at a different time would have interested Arthur. With the Piper’s Army landing behind him, he barely spared them a glance.
‘How do I lock the door?’ he asked the Will, after he made sure there was another exit.
‘I have no idea,’ the Will replied.
‘You’ve been here for the last ten thousand years! Haven’t you learned anything?’
‘My viewpoint has been rather limited,’ the raven explained. ‘Not to mention extremely fragmented.’
Arthur grabbed several long iron bars and propped them up against the door, kicking them down so they were wedged in place.
‘That might last a few minutes,’ he said. ‘Come on!’
‘Where are we going?’ asked the Will.
‘Out of here, for a start.’ Arthur opened the far door and looked up a circular stairway made of red wrought iron that was decorated with gilded rosettes in its railings and on the steps. ‘The Piper will take a while to land all his troops, but they’ll send out scouting parties for sure, and I guess Saturday will send forces down. We have to stay out of the way of both.’
‘Saturday may well be occupied high above,’ said the Will. ‘Her tower has reached the underside of the Incomparable Gardens, and the Drasil trees are no longer growing taller.’
Arthur started running up the steps, taking three at a time. The raven flew behind him, occasionally alighting on his head.
‘Why does she want to get into the Incomparable Gardens?’ Arthur asked as he climbed.
‘Because the Incomparable Gardens are the first place the Architect made, and so shall be the last to fall,’ cawed the raven. ‘But also because Saturday believes that she should have always ruled there. She envies Sunday and would supplant him.’
‘Even if it means destroying the House?’ asked Arthur. The stairway was winding up between walkways like the one where he and Suzy had arrived out of the Simultaneous Nebuchadnezzar.
It would be really easy to enter the Improbable Stair right now, he thought. Going up these steps makes it really easy to visualise . . .
‘She believes the Incomparable Gardens would survive even if the rest of the House crumbles into Nothing,’ said the raven. ‘She may even be correct. Making the lower parts of the House fall was the only way she could stop the Drasils from growing.’
‘So she’ll get in? Can’t Lord Sunday stop her?’
‘I know nothing of Sunday’s current capabilities,’ said the Will. ‘Nor his intentions. We must find and free Part Seven to help us with that. But first, of course, you must claim the Sixth Key from Saturday, the self-proclaimed Superior Sorcerer.’
‘I know,’ said Arthur. ‘But how am I supposed to do that?’
‘Where there’s a Will there’s a—’
‘Shut up!’ protested Arthur. ‘I’m sick of hearing that.’
‘Oh?’ asked the Will. ‘Heard it before? I do apologise.’
‘How about something a bit more concrete?’ asked Arthur. ‘Like a plan, or some intelligent advice for a change?’
‘Hmm,’ said the raven. ‘I take it my lesser Parts have not endeared themselves to you?’
‘Not exactly,’ said Arthur. ‘Some bits are better than others. How long is this stair going to go up?’
‘I do have a plan, actually,’ said the Will, after another fifty steps.
‘Okay, what is it?’ Arthur wasn’t even slightly out of breath, despite running up so many steps. He still found that incredible.
‘Your friend, the Piper’s child, you want to attempt a rescue?’
‘Yes,’ said Arthur.
If Suzy’s still alive . . .
He stopped and the raven almost crashed into his face before managing to land on his shoulder. ‘Are you sure you’re part of the Will?’ Arthur had to ask. ‘The rest of you doesn’t usually care much about . . . anyone, really.’
‘It’s all part of my plan,’ the Will assured him. ‘You see, when I was suspended in the rain, I did get to visit many nooks and crannies that were rarely visited by anyone else. Including the hanging cages where they put prisoners.’
‘Hanging cages?’ Arthur didn’t like the sound of that.
‘Yes,’ said the raven eagerly. ‘Now, on the south and west sides of the tower, there’s all the big lifting apparatus and so on. On the north side it’s completely sheer and undisturbed, I don’t know why. But on the east side, there are lots of small extensions, platforms, balconies, crane-jigs and suchlike. Toward the top, around 61620, the Internal Auditors have a buttress that sticks out about fifty feet, and from that buttress they hang cages for prisoners. That’s probably where your friend is now. Unless the Artful Loungers killed her straight off. They are vicious c
reatures, and those Nothing-poison daggers of theirs—’
‘Let’s assume she’s alive,’ Arthur interrupted. Then he hesitated before adding, ‘I want to rescue her – but how would we get to these cages and not attract the attention of the Internal Auditors? There’s going to be a battle going on – maybe two battles . . .’
‘That will help us,’ said the Will. ‘But as to how we get there, it’s rather simple. We disguise ourselves as a Bathroom Attendant.’
‘Ourselves?’ asked Arthur. ‘As a single Bathroom Attendant?’
‘Yes,’ croaked the raven happily. ‘You’re almost tall enough to be a short Bathroom Attendant, and I can make myself into the mask.’
‘But why would a Bathroom Attendant go up there in the first place?’
Arthur shuddered as he remembered the gold-masked faces of the Bathroom Attendants who had washed him between the ears, temporarily removing his memory.
‘Because they’re Internal Auditors,’ explained the Will. ‘I mean, all Bathroom Attendants are Internal Auditors, though not all Internal Auditors are Bathroom Attendants.’
‘You mean they work for Saturday? She’s the one who wants all the Piper’s children’s memories erased?’
‘Yes, yes,’ said the Will. ‘It’s all got to do with trying to delay the appearance of the Rightful Heir. Or, if you get knocked off, another one, and so on.’
‘So we disguise ourselves as a Bathroom Attendant, get to the Internal Auditors’ offices, and rescue Suzy from the hanging cage. But how does that fit in with getting the Key from Saturday? Or anything else, for that matter?’
‘Well, there shouldn’t be any Internal Auditors there,’ said the Will. ‘They’re Saturday’s best troops, so they’ll be up top, ready to fight their way into the Incomparable Gardens. Like I said, it’s the east side, so it’ll be the quiet side. We rescue your friend, then we watch the Piper’s troops fight Saturday’s troops and, at the right moment, you open an elevator shaft to the Citadel and bring your troops through.’
‘I don’t know how to open an elevator shaft,’ said Arthur.
‘It’s easy – or at least it will be then, because all of Saturday’s sorcerers that are stopping the elevators will be distracted. Or if they’re not, you use the Fifth Key to take us out, we regroup, and then come back the same way. How does that sound?’
‘Dodgy,’ Arthur said. ‘But the disguise part might work. If I can just rescue Suzy, and all three of us can get out, that’s enough for now. I have to go back to Earth too. There’s something important I need to—’
‘Forget Earth!’ insisted the raven. ‘Earth will be all right. It’s the House we have to worry about.’
‘Isn’t that the same thing?’ asked Arthur. ‘I mean if the House goes, everything goes.’
‘Nope,’ said the raven. ‘Who told you that?’
‘But . . . everyone . . .’ stuttered Arthur. ‘The Architect made the House and the Secondary Realms . . .’
‘That’s Denizens for you,’ said the raven. ‘She made most of the House after she made the Universe. I bet Saturday made up that ‘Secondary Realms’ stuff, the sly minx. The Architect made the House to observe and record what was happening out in the Universe because it was so interesting. Not the other way around.’
‘Most of the House,’ said Arthur intently. ‘You said “most of the House.” ’
‘Yes, well, the Incomparable Gardens were first out of the Void.’
‘So they are the epicentre of the Universe? What happens if the Incomparable Gardens are destroyed?’
‘Everything goes, end of creation, the jig’s up.’
‘So basically what everyone has been saying is true,’ said Arthur. ‘It just means that until the last bit – the first bit – of the House is destroyed then the rest of the Universe will survive.’
‘I suppose so,’ said the raven. ‘If you want to get technical. Is that a door?’
It flew ahead, up through the middle of the spiral stair.
Arthur followed more slowly, deep in thought.
NINETEEN
‘WAIT! DON’T OPEN IT!’ Arthur said, but it was too late. The raven had jumped on the handle and ridden it down, and then pushed the door open with its beak. On hearing Arthur’s call, it turned around and looked back at him, with the door left ajar.
‘Yes?’
Arthur reached the doorway and carefully looked through, out on to a paved square at the foot of the tower. There were two Sorcerous Supernumeraries only three or four feet away, fortunately standing with their backs to the door. Beyond them, the square was packed with a crowd of Denizens. There had to be at least two thousand of them, including hundreds of Sorcerous Supernumeraries and many more full sorcerers of varying ranks, all with their umbrellas folded despite the rain.
The Denizens had their backs to Arthur. They were all looking at a huge iron platform at the base of the tower. As broad and long as a football field, it was about twelve feet high. Made from thousands of plates riveted together, it looked like the deck of a very old battleship, with its hull and upper works sliced off.
Located next to the tower, the massive platform had a dozen twelve-foot-high bronze wheels along two sides. On each corner there were raised, open-roofed turrets packed with sorcerers.
But it wasn’t the platform all the Denizens in the square were looking at. They were staring up at the construction that stood on the platform, which looked like a giant bullet. It was a cylinder several hundred feet high, with its bottom half solid bronze and its top half an open framework of bronze rods like a baroque birdcage. This caged section was divided into eight levels, which had woven wicker floors like in a balloon basket. The floors were connected by spindly metal ladders that ran up the full length of the cylinder, from the solid ‘cartridge’ part to the top of the open section.
A dozen of the octopoidal construction automatons perched on the top of the rocket or whatever it was, flexing their tentacles. In the air around them flew fifty or sixty grease monkeys, their wings fluttering. Most of them held shiny pieces of metal.
Like the watching Denizens, all the grease monkeys were looking up. Arthur couldn’t help but look up too, though he also eased the door shut a bit, to make it harder for him to be seen.
Blinking aside a raindrop that fell into his eye, Arthur saw a shape so dark, it had to be composed of Nothing. It was slowly descending out of the rain toward the bronze-wire cylinder, so slowly that at first it appeared to be levitating of its own accord. It was only after Arthur’s eyes adjusted to its darkness that he saw faint lines of light upon its surface, traces made by the Immaterial ropes that were being used by several hundred flying Denizens to bring the object over to the bronze rocket.
The ropes were bright, but it was the dark shape that hurt Arthur’s eyes. He immediately knew what it was: a spike of sorcerously fixed Nothing, like the one that the Piper had used to stop the movement of the Great Maze. This one was much, much taller, though it was also more slender. Arthur figured it to be a hundred feet long, with an incredibly thin, sharp point at the top.
The flying Denizens lined the spike up with the cylinder of bronze wire. When this was done, there was a shouted order from one of their number, and together they released the ropes. The spike fell straight down the remaining few feet and was caught by the automatons, whose tentacles were cased in some kind of protective coating that sparked and glowed as they handled the Nothing. They moved the spike around, shifting it to the right position, and lowered it into place. Immediately the grease monkeys moved in, fitting a collar of a sparkling translucent material – probably Immaterial Glass – to hold the spike in place atop the cylinder.
‘Saturday’s vehicle to pierce the underside of the Incomparable Gardens,’ said the Will, not quietly enough for Arthur’s liking. He eased the door shut and turned on the raven.
‘You need to be quieter and more careful,’ he whispered. ‘There are thousands of Denizens out there.’
‘I thought
I was being quiet,’ said the Will, lowering its voice only a little. ‘I haven’t been this corporeal for ages. It’s hard getting used to having a throat . . . and a beak.’
‘Well, try harder to be quiet,’ Arthur admonished.
‘Very well,’ croaked the raven, its voice so quiet that Arthur could barely understand it. ‘All I wanted to say was that if that’s Saturday’s vehicle for piercing the Gardens, then it’s likely that all the Denizens down here will get in it. And when they get in it, we can get going.’
‘It must be the assault ram mentioned in Alyse’s orders. And that’s the Exterior Lift One or whatever it was called.’
‘It doesn’t matter what it’s called,’ said the Will. ‘As long as it goes. The sooner Saturday starts fighting with Sunday, the better for us to sneak up the other side of the tower.’
‘Okay.’ Arthur looked down at his ragged coveralls and bare feet. ‘I have to get some clothes.’
‘No problem!’ said the Will. Before Arthur could stop it, it hopped to the door, pried it open, and hopped out, transforming as it did so into a small, extremely dishevelled grease monkey.
He heard the Will say something to the closest Denizen, who answered loud enough for not only Arthur to hear, but every other Denizen within twenty yards.
‘You sure? Asked for me, by name? Woxroth?’
‘Yes,’ said the Will. ‘That was it. Woxroth. Just go in there.’
Arthur pressed his back to the wall and wished that he’d set some firmer ground rules with the Will. He didn’t even have his wrench, and he was wondering whether he could actually strangle the Denizen or just hit him with his fist when the Sorcerous Supernumerary came in, closely followed by the Will, who shut the door behind them.
The Supernumerary looked at Arthur, who raised both his hands, then his fist. When the Denizen just kept staring at him with a sad expression, Arthur lowered them again and said, ‘I just want your coat, hat and boots. Hand them over.’
‘What?’ asked the Denizen. ‘Haven’t you got a letter for me?’