The Lighthouse at the End of the World, page 30
“Syzygy!” he cried. She twittered in response and settled on his shoulder, butting up against his chin in a show of affection. With a chirrup, she slipped under his clothes and into her nest beneath the crook of his armpit. She was exhausted.
“A-ha! So, she is paired with you?” asked Fauks. “To tell it plain, you have her to thank for your rescue. She arrived demanding assistance and would not stop badgering me until we despatched Adiona. She does, though, appear to be utterly spent after her flight between the worlds.”
Marya Petrovna regarded the nuajin fondly.
“She is every bit as clever as I hoped,” she replied “To be honest, old friend, I doubted it would work. It has been long time.”
Fauks grinned broadly.
“Madame, let us not question what providence in her wisdom hath wrought. Tis enough that the Fates have seen fit to unite us once more.”
“It is wonderful to see you, Benjy, but there are things we need to do. Something is coming. Something bad, I think. And we will need your help. We’re looking for someone. An old colleague.”
“Why you are in luck, then, for that is Benjamin Isiah Fauks’ speciality.” He turned and pulled a brass speaking tube from the nearest wall. He blew into it and was answered with a whistle.
“Midships, please proceed at full speed. And request that Madame La Pilota prepare the Brazen Head.” He turned to Marya Petrovna. “As always, you may count upon me, unequivocally. Our bond was forged by peril and tempered by the heat of our own panache! En garde!”
With a cry, Fauks unsheathed his sword, thrusting it into the air at the exact moment that the Spitalfields lurched into motion. He went tumbling into the chaise longue.
Oyster looked on, not sure whether to be disturbed or amused by the man’s antics.
Fauks stood, looking confused. He cleared his throat and fumbled to replace his sword.
“No doubt, you are both in need of rest and refreshment. The Spitalfields should amply provide in both respects. Forward!”
He indicated a membranous door which had opened at the far end of the hallway.
“Is he always like this?” muttered Oyster to Marya Petrovna, who studiously ignored him.
They followed into the Spitalfields and through a wood-panelled corridor whose floor was finished in chequer-pattern linoleum. The overall effect was of a suburban nightclub that had seen better days. Hanging at various points in the ceiling were what Oyster had thought were dim electric light bulbs. Another glance, though, revealed they were part of the market itself: larger, brighter versions of the lures grown by deep-sea angler fish. The lights throbbed in time with the Spitalfields’ rolling movement. From all around, conducted through the floor and the walls, came the low murmur of people. Oyster’s stomach swam.
They emerged through a low doorway and into a high arched chamber shimmering with chatter, so much so that Marya Petrovna had to raise her voice as she caught Fauks up on all they knew. There were stalls and small shops everywhere, thrown together in a ramshackle pattern. Shacks lounged against much larger and grander bazaars, coated in yellowing plaster. Their minarets and bulbous domes reminded Oyster of some of the posher Indian restaurants he’d seen. The sheer mixture of people, buildings and goods was dizzying. The air was alive with the smell of spices and food.
Most of the people were dressed in a similar style to Fauks: calf-length trousers, topcoats, powdered wigs and clubbed hair, and yet here and there were black-garbed gebel and people in regular street garms. All of this was too much to take in at once. The sensations hit Oyster like a wave.
“I ain’t feeling tip-top,” he said, leaning against a damp wall. His mouth was watering and his stomach was close to the back of his throat.
“Kinetosis is most common when one first boards, young sir,” said Fauks. “Why, even I myself was stricken with it for some time when I made my home here. Naytheless, it will pass. In the meantime, this may help.”
He pressed a perfumed handkerchief into Oyster’s hand.
“If, as you seem, you are Marya Petrovna’s protégé, I’ll wager you are composed of sterner stuff than this. Generalement, the most efficacious manner to inure oneself to the market’s motion is to pick a lofty point and fixate upon it, thusly.”
Fauks stood still and stared at a point on the chamber roof myopically. Pale daylight shone down from a transparent patch in the chamber roof and Oyster stared up at it too, trying to tune in to the pulsating yellow light around him. He shut his eyes and inhaled, submitting to the Spitalfields’ rhythm rather than anticipating it. He sniffed at the handkerchief and counted to ten.
“Onward!” cried Fauks. “If what Marya Petrovna says is true, we may have shilly-shallied enough already.”
Oyster pushed himself away from the wall and the market chamber swayed around him. He lurched forward, Marya Petrovna at his side, feeling his way across the gently rolling floor like a drunk crossing a ship’s deck.
MADAME LA PILOTA
Now that his stomach had settled, Oyster almost came to enjoy the market’s rolling motion. The spaces they passed through within it had not so much been built or grown, but rather collected from other places. There were oak-panelled corridors, branching off into brick alleyways. There were tiled spaces and waiting rooms that looked as though they might have belonged to office blocks, libraries or even cruise liners. All were in constant motion as the looüt continued on its passage over the scudding waves.
One circular passage thronged with people. Here the skin of the great creature thinned to transparency. Oyster pressed his nose up against it and peered out. The backs of his knees tingled and his head swam.
When they’d first moved into Deeside, it had taken him months before he could look out of the windows without imagining himself tumbling downwards, end over end like a leaf in an autumn storm. But he’d made a point of doing it every day, steeling himself against the dizziness. It was a way of proving he wasn’t scared of anything, although the knot in his gut never went away.
“Where are all these people from?” Oyster asked.
“Spitalfields is home to those who have fled the constraints placed upon them by the city or the East India Company. Or anywhere else, for that matter. They are, rather like myself, inadaptés magnifiques. Each one with a tale, oftentimes tragic. We are despised as outlaws and émigrés. As hated for our differences as we find ourselves bound by them. They leave us be, as long as we remain beyond their jurisdiction.”
Fauks walked on, dancing with the undulating movement. Through the creature’s skin, Oyster caught sight of the great stalactite-like formations he’d seen on his arrival. They hung in the distance from the dome of the lid near the horizon, reminding him of upended termite mounds.
“The hives,” said Fauks, answering his unspoken question over his shoulder, “where the gebel are born.”
As Oyster hurried to catch up, a fat, spider-like something crept into view around the stalactite’s edge. The creature worked its way intently and methodically around the surface of the hive.
“Woah! What is that?” said Oyster.
“Maiaguna kashaka. It guards the hive,” replied Fauks.
The creature’s painstaking movements reminded Oyster of a worker tending a field.
“And what’s it doing?” he said.
“Well, its primary crop is gebel,” said Fauks.
Finally, they arrived at a large, jewelled sphincter door. Fauks removed a silver whistle and blew a few notes on it, and the door puckered open with a rush of cool air.
“The helm,” said Fauks. “Madame La Pilota prefers a distinct ambiance compared to most of our crew and passengers.”
Oyster took a breath and stepped into a darkened room.
“We have guests, Madame,” said Fauks.
A horizontal slit appeared in the darkness, opening like an eyelid as the skin of the looüt altered to admit daylight. The room was braced with concrete joists arranged in a way that made it resemble the cabin of an old sailing ship. As Oyster’s eyes adjusted to the sea-green light that dawned around the room, he saw it was crammed with every conceivable type of navigation aid.
There were maps of Greater London, his London, maps of England and maps of countries Oyster had never seen. There were globes that spun on brass hinges and cubes covered in silver dots that looked like maps too. Arrayed around the walls and in piles on the floor were yellowed rolls which, Oyster had no doubt, contained yet more maps. The air was heavy with the stale scent of old paper and dried seaweed.
At the end of the cabin was a figure in a ballgown that reminded Oyster of an old wedding cake. The person wore a netted veil, drawn tight around the throat and supported by branches of smoked glass that protruded from her head like antlers.
“Madame la Pilota,” said Fauks with an elaborate bow. “Allow me to present our arrivals. Forgive me for this interruption, but events demand we plot a new course.”
La Pilota glided towards them. It was only when she was close that Oyster realised she had no legs. Rather, she was supported by a pillar of grey muscle that snaked up from the cabin floor and under the lacy frills of her dress. Whether she was some sort of meat puppet or an integral part of the looüt wasn’t immediately clear.
La Pilota’s features were hard to distinguish beneath the veil, but her hair was long, shiny and of a black so intense and artificial that it was blue. Her features, too, bore only a passing approximation to a human face. There were doll’s eyes and a sort of gap for a mouth. It was a face situated entirely in the uncanny valley.
Fauks introduced both Oyster and Marya Petrovna, but as soon as La Pilota clapped her glassy eyes on the latter, she stiffened.
“And what is this one’s relation?” she said, addressing herself directly to Fauks.
“Why, we are merely old friends, ma chérie,” said Fauks with a strangulated giggle.
La Pilota looked unconvinced.
“In any case, your message about the head preceded you, mon chéri,” she said coldly. “That ghastly truc of yours is all prepared for use over there.”
La Pilota waved behind her with a waxy hand. Over her shoulder stood a circular table with a metallic head in its centre. Around it were five black candles, giving off wreathes of sweet, fatty smoke.
Like everything Oyster had seen in Greater London, the head’s workings were constructed from repurposed components: clockwork cogs, pieces of an Etch-a-Sketch and some glass valves. The head itself, though, had been cast in brass from several pieces and its features were locked in a mocking leer.
Fauks advanced to the table and tapped the metal head in front of him with his index finger. He stepped back into the shadows, and returned holding a thick coil of grey sinew that connected back into the looüt herself.
“Do you have to use that hateful thing?” pleaded La Pilota.
“It is, alas, a necessary accoutrement upon occasion, Madame,” replied Fauks with a wave of his hand. La Pilota grimaced.
“It’s not so much what it says when you’re talking to it; rather, I object to the way it mutters at the back of the cupboard after I’ve put it away.”
Fauks plumbed the cable into a collar at the base of the head. Once attached, its valves fizzed and glowed with an orange light.
“So, Benjy,” said Marya Petrovna, “we are trying to locate our old acquaintance Luka Fillian, who now goes by the name of Lucas McLellen, and whom I believe is avatar of Lugones.”
Oyster had to hand it to the old man, he had a good game face; barely an eyebrow twitched. Without skipping a beat, he cleared his throat and busied himself with the head. Producing a piece of chalk from his waistcoat, he drew three concentric circles around it, then rapped on the head three times.
“Awake, please, good Doctor Magnus. I would converse with you a while.”
There was a puff of steam from one of the head’s ears, and to Oyster’s surprise its eyelids flicked opened, its lips curled, and it yawned.
“Speak thy question and it shall be answered with the truth as best ’tis known in the universal mind.”
There was an echoing, monotone aspect to its voice; something inhuman and buzzing that sounded like an insect in a bottle. More steam puffed from its neck.
Madame La Pilota hovered beyond the table’s edge, her hands gripping the neck of her dress. Oyster wondered whether this device was what made Marya Petrovna so sure of Fauks’ ability to locate people.
“I wish to know the situation in both time and space of a veteran confrère,” said Fauks.
“Place before me thy token and pronounce unto me the true name of thy quarry.”
“Ah,” said Fauks, “but of course.” He turned expectantly to Marya Petrovna, who gave a gallic shrug and turned to Oyster.
“Well?” she said.
Oyster frowned.
“Me? I got nothing. Aren’t you supposed to be in charge?”
Marya Petrovna pinned him with a glance. He felt like the thin one from Laurel and Hardy.
“For fuck’s sake!” he protested.
“Don’t bring me into it, dear boy,” retorted Fauks. “You do seem a tad scatter-brained for an apprentice.”
“I said ‘fucks’, not ‘Fauks’,” said Oyster, exasperated. “And for the last time, I am not her bloody boy.”
“Wait. We may have no token. But he is Fillian’s son,” said Marya Petrovna.
“Is he indeed?” Fauks peered at Oyster with renewed interest. “Well then. Let us make an assay. Approach the good doctor.”
Oyster edged forward, intently aware of the head’s twisted expression. Fauks leaned forward and muttered something in its ear. Its metal eyes rolled for several minutes; gears churned and its valves fizzed with an acrid smell. Oyster was coming to the conclusion that whatever scam the old boy was running, it had come to an end. Then the head spoke.
“Attend!” it said, steam flooding from its ears. “The personage thou seeketh is beyond sky and earth. Beyond sea and land. Betwixt the empyrean and the pit. That is all.”
“Tell me something I don’t know,” muttered Oyster.
Fauks hushed him with a wave.
“Indeed, that is not very much to go on,” he said. “Fillian would seem to be in existence, but that would be about the end of it.”
The brazen head fixed Oyster with a lopsided gaze. It seemed very pleased with its failure to be useful. He bit his lip and thought, running through what had happened to him in the last few days. He thought of Syzygy, which was usually enough to rouse her, and he pressed gently under his armpit, but she refused to move. Then he thought of her previous owner.
“Wait up!” he yelled. “Tell it to find Motet! I’m wearing his jacket! Motet knows where Lucas is!”
Fauks nodded. “Very well. Let us try once more. Doctor Magnus, we seek the owner of this garment. Inform us of their co-ordinates in the terrestrial firmament?”
The head gurgled and twisted around to face Oyster.
“Thy quarry is where you cannot tarry,” it hissed, “held betwixt the Red Queen’s Bridge and Clerks Bell Tower…”
The head wheezed to a stop, grinning horribly, its eyes half open. Fauks appeared unhappy with the answer and attempted to reanimate the device, but no matter how much he cajoled it, it remained frozen.
“Well, that’s it,” he said. “It would appear that we must take you where we are unable to go. We shall have to return you to that thrice-damned city.”
TROJAN
Fauks led them across the market to a low chamber at the looüt’s interior containing a scattering of rusted shipping containers. There was an instant of homesickness as Oyster was reminded of the Clip. Fauks pulled the bolt on one of them and swung its door wide, which squealed like raw metal.
“Please, make yourselves at home,” he said, bowing low.
Within were two leather armchairs and a coffee table that had been made from the top of an aluminium barrel. In the container’s centre, hanging a couple of feet from the floor, was a chandelier containing one of the Spitalfields’ pulsing globes, which dappled Oyster and Marya Petrovna with diamond light.
“Allow me to bring you some refreshment.”
Fauks produced a thimble-sized silver bell from his pocket and shook it. Within moments a man in a maid’s uniform appeared bearing an enamel tray on which stood a dusty bottle of Black Tower Liebfraumilch, a pair of dustier-looking crystalline wine glasses, and a bottle opener.
Fauks motioned them to sit down and then laid the tray on the makeshift coffee table.
Marya Petrovna collapsed into a chair, sighing as though she had a slow puncture. Oyster joined her in the chair opposite. Fauks opened the wine then wished them good day and left, telling them that he would return when they had neared their destination. Marya Petrovna filled the glasses to the brim. The liquid shimmered in the golden light.
“Well,” she said, raising a glass that sloshed with the Spitalfields’ undulating motion. “We made it. No thanks to you, of course.”
Oyster rolled his eyes and grabbed his own glass as Marya Petrovna made short work of hers.
“Lady, I have done trojan work keeping it together this far. Get off my case,” replied Oyster. He felt his failure keenly. But his inability to flit was only part of it. Broadsides was dead, and it was his fault.
Marya Petrovna harrumphed and pulled a soggy bunch of tobacco from her pouch. She spread it on the barrel, where it resembled a patch of seaweed, and grimaced.
“This place is a lot to take in at once. I could really do with smoke right now, you know?”
Oyster regarded her as she slurped the remains of her drink and refilled her glass. He was surprised. He had thought she would have taken this all in her stride.
“You not in your element?”
Her nose twitched. “Well, there is knowing about something, and then there is practical knowledge. Here, it is fair to say, you have more field experience.”
Oyster took an experimental pull of the wine. Its dense flowery taste flooded his mouth. He pulled a face and swallowed; the sour liquid tumbled down his throat. He’d never really enjoyed getting plastered. He remembered bunking off school once, and sneaking onto Tooting Common, where he’d sat with a plastic bottle of cider and some Frazzles. He could still taste the fizzy, sweet booze now. How it had tickled his tongue and bubbled up his nose; how he’d burped up apples and the weird fake bacon taste of the Frazzles. He’d ended up drinking the entire bottle and then, helicoptered out of his wits, had stumbled behind a bush to puke and pass out.
