Lady Friday

  He dismissed the thought for the moment. He had to concentrate on what was in front of him right now.

  ‘Have you read all of this second letter?’ Arthur asked Pirkin cautiously. His hand fell to the Fourth Key at his side. He hadn’t put his belt back on, but he’d made sure it was never out of reach.

  ‘I read ’em both,’ said Pirkin. ‘But like Oddkin said, it’s just a load of old jetsam. Kill Piper’s children? Kill Raised Rats? That’s not something the association would stand for, I tell you. That Saturday ain’t got no rights here. She can do whatever she wants in the Upper House, I suppose, but no one here is going to do stupid stuff just because she says so.’

  He paused to take another sip of his hot water, then added, ‘Or almost nobody. I s’pose those toffee-noses up on the Top Shelf might want to look good. They’re always going on about how close they are to the Upper House anyhow. “Top of the Middle just means bottom of the Upper” they like to say. Most of ’em failed school there, I reckon. They should stick to fixing up records like they’re supposed to.’

  I hope you’re right,’ said Arthur. He started to lift his cup but had to grab it with both hands as the raft suddenly lurched and the floor tilted sharply, making his chair slide back to the wall. ‘What’s happening?!’

  ‘Started up the rise, haven’t we,’ said Pirkin. He put down his cup and moved to the door. ‘Not before time too. About ten hours’ climb to the Skylock and then we should see some sunshine in the Middle. Their weather isn’t broken. I’d best see we’re in the fastest current.’

  As Pirkin left the hut, Arthur settled back in his chair. The floor of the raft was now tilted up at about twenty degrees, which both looked and felt quite strange, but Pirkin had not been concerned so Arthur figured he would try not to be as well.

  He had just taken his long-delayed sip when the door opened and Suzy and Fred burst in, accompanied by a cold gust of wind and some flying snow. They advanced cautiously to the stove, the canted floor giving them some trouble, and sat down with their backs to the stove, facing Arthur.

  ‘No sign of the pig thing,’ said Suzy. ‘But Uggie’s keeping watch.’

  ‘Never thought I’d go for a ride on a Paper Pusher’s raft,’ said Fred. ‘Particularly not when I was up for another ninety-nine years of service in the Army before I could even get back to Letterer’s Lark.’

  ‘Still want to be a General, Fred?’ asked Arthur.

  Fred shook his head slowly and fingered the line of writing around his neck.

  ‘In whose army?’ he said. ‘I don’t reckon Marshal Noon or anyone would trust me now.’

  ‘I’m sure that can be removed,’ said Arthur. ‘Dr Scamandros, or Dame Primus—’

  ‘Can you do it now?’ asked Suzy. ‘I just can’t stand having to obey the—’

  ‘Suzy! Stop!’ both Fred and Arthur interrupted, but it was too late.

  ‘—the Piper,’ finished Suzy and as the word left her mouth, the line on her throat gave out a low, whistling hum and both boys saw it suddenly contract on Suzy’s throat.

  Suzy coughed once and fell to the floor, sliding down to Arthur’s feet. Her face went bright red and she scratched desperately at her neck, the writing there stark white against the red, irritated skin.

  ‘Arthur!’ shouted Fred. ‘Do something!’

  Arthur hesitated, but only for a second. He didn’t really have a choice. He drew the baton that was the Fourth Key and held it against Suzy’s throat as she thrashed at his feet.

  ‘Release Suzy from the Piper’s bonds,’ he said quietly. A faint glow of green light appeared around the baton, and a similar glow surrounded Suzy’s throat. It grew brighter for an instant, bright as an emerald in the sun, then disappeared, taking with it the line of type that forced Suzy to the Piper’s service.

  As Suzy took in a deep, racking breath, Arthur stood up and held the baton to Fred’s throat, repeating the process.

  It only took a few seconds to release both of them. Arthur sat back down, put the baton on his lap, and raised his empty hand. The crocodile ring on his finger caught the light, glinting in almost equal parts silver and gold. Arthur had to look at it more closely to see that, as he had expected, the gold had crept farther past the fifth line.

  ‘You did that on purpose, didn’t you, Suzy?’ he said bitterly. ‘To make me use the Key.’

  ‘I didn’t really mean to, Arthur,’ said Suzy, though her voice lacked conviction. ‘It just came out!’

  ‘Sure,’ said Arthur. He shook his head in exasperation.

  ‘Thanks, though,’ said Suzy. She punched Arthur lightly on the shoulder, but he did not react and she stepped back.

  ‘Yes, thank you, Arthur,’ said Fred. ‘It was more than a bit of a worry, you know, not knowing if it was going to choke me sometime. Or cut my head off.’

  Arthur didn’t answer. He was furious with Suzy for forcing him to use the Key, but he was also angry with himself for being furious, because it felt so mean not to help his friends when they needed it, just to save himself from becoming a Denizen.

  The three of them sat in silence for a few minutes, neither Suzy nor Fred looking up at Arthur. He, in turn, looked down and turned the crocodile ring on his finger so that only the silver side showed. Then he turned it again, back to the gold, and kept on turning, till at last he sighed and looked up.

  ‘What’s Ugham going to do?’ asked Arthur.

  ‘I think he’ll be all right,’ said Fred. ‘The Newniths are funny. The ones we were with kept talking about gardening. They’re good soldiers, but they don’t like soldiering, I reckon. They owe the Piper because he made them, but they don’t volunteer to do anything.’

  ‘Uggie’s said he’ll only do what he was ordered to do,’ said Suzy. ‘Look after us. ’Course, if he gets new orders, that’s different.’

  ‘We’ll have to be careful,’ said Arthur.

  ‘Look on the bright side, Arthur,’ said Suzy. ‘Now—’

  ‘What bright side?’ interrupted Arthur crossly. ‘You just don’t take anything seriously, Suzy!’

  ‘She really didn’t mean to make you use the Key, Arthur,’ said Fred cautiously. ‘Maybe you should say sorry, Suzy.’

  ‘Sorry,’ muttered Suzy.

  Arthur let out an exasperated sigh, and with it, most of his anger. He never could stay angry with Suzy, even though he knew she had almost got herself killed just then on purpose, to make him use his power and free her from the Piper’s compulsion.

  ‘Oh, forget it!’ he said. ‘Okay! Tell me what the bright side is.’

  ‘Now you can tell us what we’re going to do so you can get the Key and fix Friday for good and proper!’

  ‘Yes!’ said Fred, his face brightening. ‘What’s the plan?’

  Arthur frowned again, this time in thought, not anger.

  ‘You do have a plan, don’t you?’ asked Fred.

  ‘Yes,’ admitted Arthur. ‘But I’m not sure it’s a very good one. We’ll need to find a sorcerer, for a start. Or somehow get in touch with Dr Scamandros. Or I suppose we might be able to find out what we need to know some other way. Or—’

  ‘How about you tell us the plan?’ said Suzy. ‘Before the others come back in? Between Fred and me, we can probably fix it up.’

  ‘Thanks!’ said Arthur, not without sarcasm. ‘It is pretty basic. First, the Piper and Saturday will both go for Lady Friday’s Scriptorium to try to seize the Key. They’ll expect me to do the same, and I guess that’s what Friday would predict I’d do. But I think I’ll try to find the Fifth Part of the Will first, which may or may not be in the Scriptorium but probably is in the Middle House. And I have a way to find the Will. At least I think I do, if I can get a sorcerer to do a simple spell. If there are any sorcerers in the Middle House …’

  ‘Sorcerers?’ asked Fred. ‘Depends on what kind of sorcery. There’s heaps of Denizens who use sorcery up in the Top Shelf. Most of the High Guild, though they’re not exactly what you’d call full sorcerers, like
that Dr Scamandros. Binding and Restoration, that’s mostly sorcery anyway. What do you want one of them to do?’

  Arthur was about to answer when the door flung open and Pirkin leaned in, his face framed by a flurry of snow. An icicle fell off his nose and bounced on the stone floor.

  ‘All hands on deck!’ he said. ‘There’s some kind of battle going on above us, up under the sky!’

  Fourteen

  IT WAS COLD out on deck, colder than it had been before, but it was no longer snowing. The raft, travelling up the canal at a sharp angle, was already breaking through the low clouds, and the sky around them was clear and much lighter, though it did grow darker again overhead. Arthur could see a slice of the sun on the far horizon, where it had presumably stuck, its light falling in a tight band that did not extend to the top of the canal.

  There were some other lights in the darkness above, twinkling faux stars on the underside of the intermediate roof. Somewhere unseen up there was the skylock through which the canal would pass.

  As Arthur stared up, he saw half a dozen new stars move swiftly across the sky, till one of them suddenly exploded into many smaller, fiery fragments that rained down in a quickly fading shower. The other five swerved away and grew fainter, till they disappeared again.

  ‘A skirmish of the air,’ said Ugham. ‘I know not the combatants. One side is lit fair, the other stalks in darkness. Ah, the light-bearers come again!’

  He pointed at a different quarter of the sky. This time more than a dozen stars were moving in an arrowhead formation towards the point where the explosion had been. The stars grew brighter as they crossed the sky, and Arthur realised that they were drawing closer to the raft, descending as well as moving horizontally.

  ‘Who are they?’ Arthur asked Pirkin.

  ‘Dunno,’ answered the Paper Pusher. ‘I know who’s waiting in the dark, though.’

  ‘So do I,’ breathed Fred. Arthur glanced at his friend, who was staring entranced up at the sky.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Winged Servants of the Night,’ Fred and Pirkin said together. Pirkin had a strange catch to his voice, a melancholy that Arthur had not heard there before.

  As they spoke, two of the bright stars once more exploded into sparks, which slowly drifted down before fading away.

  ‘That’ll be lit-up wing feathers falling,’ said Suzy. ‘Whatever was wearing them will have a long way to fall.’

  Suzy’s comment made Arthur look back down and around. In the swath of light from the stuck sun, he could finally see the other side of the canal. It was at least half a mile away, but the width of the canal was not the most impressive thing about the waterway. It stretched ahead in a straight line for several miles before curving to the right, all the time climbing at a gentle ten degrees. At the curve, Arthur could see that the whole vast canal was supported on thousands of columns that disappeared down into the clouds. It looked like an impossible freeway flyover stretched up a thousand times and then flooded with water. Seeing it made him feel nervous and slightly giddy.

  It was easier to look up, so Arthur did, just in time to see something come hurtling down towards them. It had been practically invisible until it fell into the sunlight, a black speck against the black sky. It fell like a stone towards the raft, and for a moment Arthur thought it was some kind of missile. But when it got to several hundred yards out he saw it was roughly human-shaped – and that it was going to miss the raft and possibly the canal as well, to plummet down to the Flat.

  Then a black, crow-shaped wing spread out from its left shoulder, and, from its right, a crumpled, bent-up mess of wild feathers. Flapping madly with its single working wing, the creature corrected its course towards the raft and slowed a little, corkscrewing wildly as it fell.

  It hit the raft at a speed that would have killed any mortal, bounced twice, and immediately started to get up. Arthur thought it had to be some kind of Nithling, and his hand was on the Key as he raced over to it, on the heels of Ugham, Fred, and Suzy. Pirkin lagged behind, his head bent and his feet slow.

  But it was not a Nithling. As Arthur got nearer, he saw that the creature’s strange beaked head was a helmet with a long, open snout through which a Denizen’s mouth could be vaguely seen. Similarly, what looked like a natural leathery hide was a full bodysuit of black armour, and the taloned, webbed hands were actually taloned, webbed gauntlets of the same black material.

  It was impossible to tell if it was a male or female Denizen. It got to its knees as Arthur and the others approached, one wing crushed at its side, the other trailing behind. It tried to stand but couldn’t and fell back into a crouch.

  ‘Is it … this … a Winged Servant of the Night?’ Arthur whispered to Fred as they slowed to stand in a ring around the crippled flyer, no one sure what to do next.

  ‘Yes,’ said Fred. He pushed past and kneeled by the strange Denizen, his hands and fingers moving in a series of complicated signs.

  The Servant seemed startled, then quickly signed back, too quickly for Fred.

  ‘Slow down!’ he said and made several emphatic finger movements.

  The Servant signed again, with greater deliberation and many more pauses.

  ‘She … her name is … ah, something like … Cool of the Evening Before Full Dark. She says they are fighting winged Denizens from the Upper House. I think they’re called something like Clever Resters?’

  ‘Artful Loungers,’ said Ugham. ‘Our lord has made us study all the foe we might face. They are not the most puissant of Saturday’s host.’

  The Servant nodded.

  ‘She can hear?’ asked Arthur.

  The Servant nodded again.

  ‘Sorry,’ Arthur continued. ‘I mean, you can hear, but you don’t speak, right?’

  The Servant nodded again.

  ‘I didn’t know that,’ said Fred. ‘But then, I never did meet a real Servant before.’

  ‘How come you know the signs, then?’ Suzy asked.

  Fred coughed and looked away from the Servant and mumbled something.

  ‘You what?’ Suzy persisted.

  ‘Thought I might grow up to be a Winged Servant.’ Fred’s cheeks were red, and not just from the cold. ‘There was a book of signs I did a bit of gilding on … part of a manual for Middle House management. I kept it and learned how to do them.’

  ‘But Piper’s children don’t grow up,’ said Arthur, puzzled.

  ‘I know,’ said Fred sadly. ‘It was just … something to pretend. I didn’t want to be a gilding assistant forever. It’s lucky I can still remember most of the signs I learned. It was a long time ago and someone took the book back. I’ve been washed between the ears many times since then.’

  Arthur scowled at the mention of the washing between the ears. He wanted to know more about that whole process, and why it was done. It was yet another small mystery of the House that needed sorting out, but had to be put on the backburner.

  The Servant tapped Fred on the foot to make him pay attention, and her fingers spelled out a long message.

  ‘She has to get back into the fight; she wants to know if we have extra wings,’ said Fred. ‘Any wings will do.’

  ‘We haven’t got any,’ said Arthur. ‘Well, unless Pirkin has some …’

  ‘Wings is for those who don’t have a canal to ride,’ said Pirkin. ‘The Association expressly forbids wings on the rafts. Why, if it wasn’t for the extenuating circumstances, I’d have to ask Miss Cool of the Evening here to take her leave …’ The Servant hissed and reached for a slim metal tube at her belt.

  ‘However, given there is extenuations aplenty,’ Pirkin said hurriedly, ‘welcome aboard. I don’t suppose one more non-member will make any difference.’

  The Servant nodded and tried to get up once more. Fred and Arthur quickly helped her, but she shrugged them off and managed to keep standing alone. She raised one foot that could not bear her weight, either because it or her leg was broken. She made more signs and Fred translated.

  ?
??Her companions will come for her soon, if they win,’ he said. ‘Or the enemy. She suggests we stand away in case it is the latter. The Artful Loungers will leave us alone, as they have left the other rafts alone.’

  ‘Other rafts?’ asked Pirkin. ‘Where?’

  The Servant pointed up and again signed out a long message.

  ‘The skylock has been captured by the enemy,’ passed on Fred. ‘It is being held open to allow the Artful Loungers to fly down from Burinberg, which was taken by Saturday’s troops earlier today in a massed elevator assault.

  ‘Um, Friday’s Dawn has refused to accept Saturday’s authority and has ordered all loyal Middle House Denizens to resist. Friday’s Dawn and his Gilded Youths tried to hold Burinberg but have been forced to retreat to the Top Shelf. No one knows where Friday’s Noon and Dusk are, or Lady Friday.

  ‘Let’s see … the High Guild in the Top Shelf has not declared for either side. The Winged Servants are basically attacking Saturday’s forces wherever they can till morning, since they only fly at night. Can you repeat that last bit?’

  Fred watched the repeated signs carefully.

  ‘Oh, the rafts … lots of them were held up by the fighting at the skylock but now they’re passing through. The Loungers are too busy fighting the Servants and are ignoring the rafts. Did I get all that right, miss?’

  The Servant nodded, but her head was craned back, her masked head scanning the sky above, her hand once more on the tube at her belt. It looked to Arthur like a miniature version of the firewash projectors used by the Army of the Architect … which would be a very nasty weapon indeed. He was determined to keep a careful eye on it.

  ‘Why did you land here?’ Arthur asked now. ‘Why did you think you would be safe? We’re obviously not Paper Pushers.’

  Cool of the Evening shook her head and quickly signed a reply, without taking her gaze away from the sky.

  ‘You smell all right,’ said Fred. ‘Saturday’s Denizens smell of … I don’t know that sign … stone-smoke? Coal, maybe.’

  ‘The noses of the Servants are keen,’ said Ugham.