The Phenomenals: A Game of Ghouls

  What about the other tunnels? The south led back to the Kryptos and that was blocked, but there was still east and west. He tried to envisage the landscape above him and concluded that Degringolade itself must be to the east. Surely it would not do any harm to look down that tunnel. He had his spear and a manuslantern and his courage. What more could he need?

  Folly opened her eyes, but the blackness around her was so complete that she had to blink to make sure they really were open. Her head was aching and her mouth was dry. She licked her lips and tasted salt and remembered what had happened.

  Was she dead? She had certainly thought she would drown in the slime. She felt her leather coat. It was heavy with damp and caked in mud. Her feet and fingers were cold, but she was definitely alive. She breathed warm air on to her hands and rubbed them together. She couldn’t put her finger on it, but she had the feeling that something was missing. Her hand went to her belt; her Blivet was gone.

  ‘Hello!’ she called out softly, sitting up. ‘Is anyone there?’

  Her echoing voice confirmed that she was under the shelter of a roof, in some sort of cave perhaps. She stood and made painful contact with a low ceiling.

  ‘Ow!’ She dropped to the floor again, rubbing her head. She began to crawl on all fours and reached a rocky wall. She made her way along it slowly, but she could not feel a door and for all she knew she was going round in circles so she sat against the wall again, wondering what to do.

  It was then the whispering began, at first very soft, but quickly becoming louder and louder. Folly tried to quell the fear that was rising inside her. She was certain that she could hear footsteps too. But she could see nothing and, strain her ears as she might, she could not make out a word of what the voices were saying.

  ‘Who are you?’ she asked, her steady voice belying how she really felt. ‘Show yourselves, please.’

  The whispering stopped abruptly and a second later the darkness was lit up with a score of dancing blue lights, like candle flames. There came the sound of laughter, the lightest laughter she had ever heard, and behind the lights, for the very first time, she could see what she had always suspected was there: a host of delicate long-legged small-headed dancing figures.

  ‘Oh my,’ she breathed. ‘You’re the Puca.’ And she started to laugh too.

  Having tramped for some time along the eastern tunnel, Jonah was reaching the point where he had to decide whether to go on into the unknown, or to return and make his way to the manor as agreed. This tunnel showed no sign of going upward to the surface. It was long and straight and by the weak light of his manuslantern he couldn’t see an end to it. He had no idea if he was any nearer to Degringolade, or if he was even going in the right direction.

  Then, to his dismay, he came to a fork and this time there were no helpful markings to indicate direction. He stopped and stood with his hands on his hips.

  ‘Looks like the decision has been made for me,’ he said.

  He adjusted the whale spear on his shoulder and was about to retreat when his hand brushed against a lump in his coat. Wenceslas’s glasses. He had forgotten he had them.

  ‘I wonder,’ he mused, and put them on. They balanced quite well on the bridge of his nose, but the arms were tight on the side of his head. They were not designed for a skull the size of his.

  ‘Now, what was it Wenceslas said?’ he murmured. ‘Twist the screws and they act like a telescope.’

  He felt for the screws at the sides of the lenses and began to turn them simultaneously, no easy task with his huge fingers. He went to one branch of the fork, placed the lantern on the ground in the entrance and stared straight ahead. With each twist he could see that the darkness beyond seemed a little brighter. He kept on turning the screws and was surprised when shapes began to appear in the darkness. Blurry, moving shapes.

  ‘John Dory McCrory,’ he muttered. ‘Now what’s this all about?’

  He turned the screws another one hundred and eighty degrees. The edges of the shapes became more sharply defined. Now they had limbs, arms and legs and heads. They were still some distance away, but Jonah knew already that they weren’t human. He could smell them. That ain’t Lurid stink neither, he thought.

  He was right. This wasn’t the smell of decaying flesh, it was more like a lady’s perfume, but it was in no way pleasant or alluring. It was nauseatingly sweet. Involuntarily he curled his lip and spat, trying to get the taste of it out of his mouth. He pulled up his collar and shielded his mouth and nose, but the choking perfume permeated the thick wool.

  Jonah began to back away as the figures advanced. He remembered the black beans in his pocket and threw a handful down the tunnel, peppering the ground at the creatures’ feet. With a sinking heart he sensed that the beans had annoyed rather than deterred them. They were coming more quickly so he sprayed a long burst of Natron at them. Again, it had no effect other than to obviously infuriate them.

  The riled creatures were now so close that Jonah could see into their open mouths. Rows and rows of needle-like teeth were set in red gums that dripped with sticky mucus. The atmosphere was heavy with an almost tangible malevolence that increased as they came closer and closer.

  Jonah reached over his shoulder for his whale spear. Slowly, deliberately, he brought it round and raised his arm and prepared to throw. In his heart he knew that his trusted weapon would be of no use against these Superents, whatever they were. He almost wished they were Lurids or a Pluribus. At least then he would die knowing what had killed him. But to be felled by a nameless monster? It didn’t seem right.

  The freakish fiends were well within range now and Jonah realized that, for all their menace, they had made not a sound between them.

  ‘Poseidon!’ he cried, and hurled the spear into their midst. And then they were upon him.

  CHAPTER 25

  AN EXCHANGE

  When the merriment died down, Folly leaned forward to see the Puca closer. They shied away and their flames dimmed, but she could feel that they were giving off heat. Makes a change, she thought. Most Superents were freezing.

  ‘Can you help me?’ she asked gently. She was wary and a little fearful. They were known, after all, for their deceitful guidance. ‘How did I get here? Did you save me from the marsh?’

  The flames brightened again and the oval-shaped heads nodded vigorously. One of the figures came closer and she perceived that it was wearing a short close-fitting tunic of some sort. It gesticulated with its slim pale arms and hands and spoke in a whispery voice, exactly the way, Folly realized, she had always imagined they would sound.

  ‘We saved you,’ it said. ‘You’re safe now.’

  ‘But I have to get back to Degringolade,’ said Folly quickly. ‘To tell the others that Kamptulicon—’

  At the mention of Kamptulicon’s name all the Puca began to hiss and their flames became very bright, almost white. ‘Leopold Kamptulicon is no friend of ours,’ said the one that had spoken. It seemed to be in charge.

  ‘Domna, nor mine,’ said Folly hastily. ‘I have to warn my friends. They are in danger from him.’ Then she remembered. ‘Do you have my Blivet? I will need it.’

  There was silence and the blue lights dimmed almost to extinction. Another Puca stepped forward. ‘We took your Blivet – it is a nasty weapon.’

  ‘I would not use it on you!’ declared Folly. ‘But on Pluriba and Lurids and other Superents.’

  ‘We have seen the Pluriba,’ said the first Puca.

  ‘I know,’ said Folly. And you didn’t help me then, she thought.

  ‘And the beast,’ said another, but Folly wasn’t interested in beasts, only escape. She persisted. ‘Please let me go,’ she persisted.

  ‘Let you go? Of course we will let you go.’

  Folly sensed a certain hesitation in the Puca’s voice. ‘Then show me the way out. Am I in one of the tunnels under the marsh?’

  ‘Yes. But what will you give us in exchange?’ The Puca’s tone had changed and Folly was reminded of how
Axel had switched with such ease between playfulness and menace.

  ‘Give you? What do you mean? Not my Blivet!’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Then what?’

  The Puca came right up to her and began to whisper into her ear.

  Folly walked quickly and carefully over the rocky ground, head slightly dipped on account of the low roof, her hand resting on her Blivet, drawing comfort from the familiar object. She was still shaken from her encounter with the Puca. She looked over her shoulder more than once, worried that they might be following her or, worse, had played a trick on her and had not shown her the way out but instead a way into danger. Wasn’t that what they usually did, she asked herself, lead people into peril? Her fears were countered somewhat by the fact that they had at least given her a light, a knot of reeds soaked in some sort of liquid that was burning brightly. The ‘chief’ Puca said that it would last an hour or so, by which time she should be safe. And they had sworn solemnly to keep their side of the bargain, if she kept hers.

  But she would think about that when the time came . . .

  On and on she stumbled, damp and stinking of the marsh and feeling rather wretched. She wondered how Vincent had fared. Better, she hoped, than she had. He should be at the Caveat Emptorium by now, waiting with Citrine. And what of Jonah? She shook her head.

  ‘Domna, let him be OK,’ she muttered. ‘Please.’

  CHAPTER 26

  DOWN TO BUSINESS

  Vincent stood, a shadow in a doorway, across the street from the entrance to the governor’s funicular railway. The barred gate was closed and could only be opened from the other side. Just beyond it there was a control room and the moving shadow at the window suggested a lone guard within.

  Vincent knew that he could not wait much longer. For whatever reason, Folly had not come. He hoped she was all right, but in the same way that she had expressed confidence in his talent for self-preservation, he too felt that she was well able to look after herself.

  He was calm. It felt good to have real purpose again. All this sneaking about taking food and blankets, it was hardly challenging. And he was particularly pleased that his target was Leucer d’Avidus. If anyone deserved to be robbed, surely it was the Governor of Degringolade? He was practically asking for it. The circumstances were not ideal, to have to go up in the funicular carriage to reach the house, but when he looked at the other option, a sheer rock face now covered with snow, he knew that even he, with all his climbing experience and grapnel, would not be able to make it. He took a deep breath. Time to put the plan into action.

  It was a simple plan. The best often are.

  Vincent crossed the road quickly and crouched down against the wall beside the gate. He unscrewed his hand, flicked the magnetic switch and set it down on the pavement. Then, using a large pebble of impedimentium, he started the hand moving, just as he had been practising. It moved slowly but without a sound and was barely visible. It crawled easily between the vertical bars of the gate and up to the control-room. There Vincent brought it to a halt and, using the impedimentium in a sequence of deft movements, caused the hand to ‘knock’ on the control-room door. Seconds later it opened, and the guard looked out and then down.

  ‘Domne!’ he exclaimed when he saw what was at his feet. ‘What’s this?’ He picked up the hand. He turned it over and saw that something was gripped under one furled finger. It was a small corked apothecary’s phial. There was a label curled round it and he read aloud: ‘Sniff me.’

  To Vincent’s immense relief, the guard pulled the cork out and, as people are so often wont to do, blindly obeyed an instruction for no other reason than it was there. He sniffed tentatively and promptly collapsed just as Citrine had done when she had smelled Lady Degringolade’s narkos potion.

  After that Vincent worked quickly. He picked the gate lock with his treen picks, ran in, reattached the hand, collected the bottle and pressed the large red button that indicated to the guard at the top of the hill that someone was coming up. Then he pulled back the operating lever in the control room before running out to jump into the carriage as, with a loud clank, it began to climb the steep hill.

  Vincent stood just inside the carriage door looking up to the platform above, where the other guard would be waiting. When he had travelled about halfway, at the darkest point, where the lights from below were as dim as the lights from above, he climbed on to the roof of the carriage. He lay flat and covered himself with his cloak. The metal was very cold and when it touched his skin he shivered. It reminded him rather too much of the Lurid’s touch.

  The carriage came to a halt abutting the platform at the top of the line. Vincent heard footsteps, the sound of the safety gate opening and a nervous and surprised voice: ‘Governor d’Avidus, you’re back early . . .’

  There was a moment of silence broken by a snort of disgust. ‘Domne! There’s no one in there, again! I suppose that fool down below thinks this is funny, getting me out of me warm office on a night like this for no reason.’

  He turned away and Vincent jumped down and shoved the fellow in the back so he stumbled. Then, before the guard could regain his feet, Vincent sat on his chest and rammed the bottle of narkos under his nose. A second later the guard was out like a snuffed candle.

  Vincent went straight to the exit gate. It was locked, but that was no obstacle, and within seconds he had it open. Cautiously he peered out into the fine mist. The ground sloped up then flattened out and he could see the Governor’s Residence close by, no more than twenty yards from the terminus. He could just make out the guards at their posts by the gates. He had no intention of trying to get past them when all he had to do was scale the ten-foot wall. Besides, knocking out two guards was enough for the time being. No point in using up the narkos unless absolutely necessary.

  Keeping low and enveloped in his cloak, Vincent went up the slope to take advantage of the cover of the tall pine trees that flanked the residence. He skirted the perimeter until he was well away from the guards and then lobbed the grapnel over the top and walked easily up the wall. He flung over the thick blanket he had taken to protect him from the jagged glass and climbed on to the wide top. There he surveyed the lie of the land. Even all the way up here, at the very peak of Collis Hill, he could still hear clearly the wailing of the Lurids. He wondered if you ever did get used to it.

  Next he turned his attention to the large house in the grounds. It was certainly a striking property, in the metal and stone style that was peculiar to Degringolade. The broad cobbled drive that led from the gates to the main entrance was lit by lanterns hooked to poles at regular intervals. There were lights on in some of the many windows, but no other sign of life. Vincent moved along the wall, keeping low until, when he was out of the lights’ reach, he dropped down on to the lawn.

  Vincent knew exactly how he was going to get in: from the roof. People didn’t expect that, and he had spotted a way from the eyrie. The building was excessively ornate, providing hand and footholds in abundance. He gloved his metal hand to muffle any noise and scaled the west tower easily, pulling himself from gargoyle to stone corvid to grotesque and up on to a flying buttress that led directly to the roof.

  Once on the roof he took out a metal bar with a curved end and began to lever up the lead from around a chimney. Then, as if merely opening a can of sardines, he turned the bar and effectively rolled open the roof.

  Seconds later, he was in.

  Vincent had done this many times before and crawled confidently along in the attic eaves, a thin wall being the only thing that separated him from the servants’ quarters on the other side. Most probably they were unoccupied; it was too early in the evening for the servants to have retired. They would be either in the kitchens or, at least the more senior staff, in the Degringolade Playhouse being entertained by Professor Soanso.

  Vincent found his way almost instinctively to the landing. Taking stock for a moment, he pulled a piece of folded newspaper from his pocket and shone the smitelight
on it. It was a short article from the Degringolade Daily. A small Depiction showed three men wheeling what looked like a metal safe towards the gate of the funicular railway. The article, by Hepatic Whitlock, read:

  Governor d’Avidus Plays It Safe

  A new safe was seen being delivered to the Governor’s Residence via the funicular railway. Thought to be a Dual-Key Bertram QuadraLock, this is the very latest in safe design. Traditionally the Governor’s Residence is home to many valuable artefacts belonging to the city. In the light of recent events, doubtless the governor is intent on thwarting thieves, especially Vincent Verdigris.’

  Vincent had laughed when he had read the piece. It was almost a direct challenge to him, and he never could resist a challenge. ‘What was it Leucer called me? A stone in his shoe. Well, I shall give him such a blister he won’t walk until Torock or Gevra!’

  Decisively he descended the stairs, resisting the urge on each level to explore the many rooms, trying to focus on the job in hand. He was certain the Blivet would be in the new safe, and chances were it was in the study.

  From somewhere far away he could hear the sound of kitchen machinations, but the ground floor was deserted. He looked into the drawing room, and the smoking room, another drawing room, and a meeting room before creeping along a short corridor that he suspected led to the study.

  He was right. Gently Vincent closed the door behind him and stood silently observing the room. It was no different to what he had expected: shelved walls packed with books, dark curtains drawn across the window, and a large desk upon which stood a pair of brass lamps, one at either front corner. The desk was tidy, with an inkwell, a large blotter and some neatly stacked papers. There were two fireplaces, one brushed and cleaned with an empty basket, the other a glowing dome of coals. A large deep chair was positioned to one side, mirroring another.