Wormwood Gate (9 page)

Before she could finish, the guard grabbed her upper arms and laughed delightedly, a delighful sound after the queen's dry, mirthless, mocking, cruel laugh. ‘You swore to that? Sure, we're away on a hack! An oath like that will find a way to come true.'

‘You're sure?'

‘Sure as sure can be. Come on.' He turned around and crouched down. ‘I'll give you a piggyback the rest of the way. We're going to visit your friend in the cells.'

Julie climbed up on his back. ‘And set her free?'

‘Of course,' said the guard, jogging down the stairs. ‘Sure, when your friend is free, you'll have a loose leg, won't you?'

‘Em, I suppose so.' Julie didn't know what ‘a loose leg' meant, but this was not the time to ask for definitions. ‘And you won't tell the patrols?'

‘Ah. Well, now. Now that you mention that … I'm going to have to, though I'd rather not.'

‘If you'd rather not, why do you have to?'

‘Your woman'll find out, and soon enough to make trouble for you and your friend,' said the guard, ‘and more trouble for me. No, I'll have to tell them, but I'll do you this favour: I'll dawdle and delay until the last moment. You should have a head start of ten minutes at least, and that's enough time to get to places where they won't find you.'

‘If you say so,' Julie muttered.

They reached the bottom of the stairs, and the guard crouched down. ‘You can walk the rest of the way, since you're supposed to be working for the queen.'

Julie shook out her legs quickly and started down towards the corridor where her and Aisling's cell was, with the guard following behind her. At the corner, they ran into a patrol and had to squash themselves against the wall to let the other guards march past, with Julie all the while bowing her head and hoping that none of them would guess that anything was amiss. When the last booted foot had long passed and their footsteps couldn't be heard any more, she let out a breath and ran down the corridor towards the cell, then skidded to a halt when she realised that she didn't know which cell had been hers.

The guard pushed past her gently and strode towards one cell in particular.

‘This one,' he said.

He took out a ring of keys and unlocked the door, then pulled back the bolt and flung the door open.

‘You've got it wrong,' said Julie. ‘This isn't our cell. It's empty.'

The guard sniffed the air. ‘It's empty now,' he said, ‘but it smells of you and your friend. This was your cell all right.'

‘Then where … Are you asking me to believe that Aisling's disappeared into thin air?'

‘Or escaped,' said the guard. ‘With the help of somebody less fearful than me.'

‘I don't believe it,' Julie said, stepping into the cell and looking around, her eyes sweeping the walls and the floor. ‘I haven't even been gone that long, how could she –'

She broke off what she was about to say. Her eyes had fallen on a small oblong object that looked thoroughly out of place in the cell with its stone walls and straw-strewn floor. It was so dark that it almost faded out of view, but when Julie picked it up, it lit up.

‘You're right,' said Julie flatly, staring at the screen of Aisling's mobile phone. ‘This was our cell. And Aisling's escaped.'

The guard was silent for a moment, then put a hand on her shoulder. ‘Then there's no need to worry about her. Come on, I have to take you to the exit.'

5

Aisling slumped down onto the bench after the door slammed shut. She didn't like the fact that the guard had called her fat (okay, so her body mass index was outside the recommended range, but she was still growing and it had never caused any health problems), but that was just a minor irritant next to the way he'd dragged Julie away. To see the queen, he'd said, as if that was meant to be reassuring. As if it hadn't been the queen who'd locked them away in the first place.

If it hadn't been so damp and cold in the cell, and if she weren't on the verge of a panic attack, it might have been funny; after all, she'd always wanted to travel to a magical land, and she'd always secretly liked the idea of being locked up as a political prisoner, and now she was doing both at the same time, and it was turning out to be … well,
interesting
, sure, but not exactly fun. As if someone had heard that she liked swords and also liked cats, and had given her a cat impaled on a sword.

She picked up her phone, climbed up onto the bench and peered through the window. There were streaks of pink and orange in the patch of sky that was visible; the light was still dim and diffuse, but the sun would be all the way up soon. She couldn't help wondering whether the City would still be there when the sun rose. Would she wake up to find it had all been a dream? Or would the City of the Three Castles dissolve in the sunlight, leaving only the Dublin she had always known?

Her train of thought was interrupted by a pair of bright red eyes staring directly into hers from the other side of the window.

‘Howaya?' said the owner of the eyes, who appeared to be a rabbit.

‘Um,' said Aisling. ‘I, um … I suppose I'm all right, considering. And yourself?'

‘Not too bad, not too bad. Would you be a prisoner, by any chance?'

‘Well … yes.'

‘And would you be happy being a prisoner? Mind you, I'm only asking.'

‘Of course I'm not happy,' said Aisling. ‘What kind of stupid question is that?'

‘Well, then,' said the rabbit in a considering sort of way, ‘would you be willing to help a body out, if a body could help you out, no pun intended?'

‘You … are you saying you can get me out of here?'

‘That I am, and that I can. Interested?'

‘What do you want in exchange?' said Aisling cautiously. It was dangerous to make promises in this place.

‘You and your friend came through the Wormwood Gate, didn't yous?'

‘How did you know that?'

‘Word travels fast in this place. Almost as fast as the Gate. I've been looking for it, you see, and I reckon if I could find a place where it was open, I could track it down by nose. All you'd have to do is take me to the place where you and your friend came through.'

‘And if I do this, you can get me out of this prison?'

The rabbit winked. It was a very peculiar sight. ‘These paws and whiskers know a trick or two. I can have you out of there before you blink. Well, what's it to be?'

Aisling bit her lip as she pondered her new options. On the one hand, she didn't want to leave Julie behind; on the other hand, hanging around in a cell doing nothing in particular wasn't helping Julie at all. On the third hand, did she really trust this rabbit? On the fourth hand, it wasn't as if she trusted the queen either. On the fifth hand, she really, really,
really
didn't want to leave Julie behind. On the sixth hand, if it worked out – which was, admittedly, a big ‘if' – maybe she'd be able to rescue Julie. She liked that idea. Swooping down in the nick of time to sweep her up out of the arms of the villain …

Well, it wouldn't be like that, of course. Not
exactly
like that, anyway. But …

Aisling looked at the rabbit. She had no idea what an untrustworthy rabbit would look like, if there even was such a thing as an untrustworthy rabbit. She had a cousin who had a pet rabbit which was vicious when provoked and had a tendency to chew cables if left unsupervised, but that didn't make it untrustworthy in any meaningful sense. ‘Do you
swear
you'll get me out of prison?'

The rabbit chuckled. ‘Oh, no, you won't catch me that way! I'm saying nothing till you say you'll help. Well, will you help?'

‘I'll help if you get me out of here! And if you promise not to pull any funny business once I'm free.'

The rabbit stretched its head forward. ‘What do you mean by “funny business”?'

‘Like, for example, selling me back to the queen's guards.'

‘I can swear not to do that easy enough, since I wasn't going to do it anyway,' said the rabbit. ‘Are we agreed, then? I let you out of prison, you help me find the Gate, and once I find it we part ways all friends together?'

‘That sounds acceptable,' Aisling said, nodding. ‘How are you going to get me out of here?'

‘Step down and away from the window,' said the rabbit. ‘It'll be done in a jiff.'

Aisling jumped down from the bench and backed away a few feet, her eyes fixed on the rabbit, which was just barely visible now that her face was more than a couple of inches away from it. There was a deep thumping noise, and then a high-pitched whirr, and the bars of the window somehow melted into the stones above and underneath them, and the stones themselves shrunk down or squeezed up so that the window was twice its former size – still a tight squeeze, but big enough to let her through, leather coat and all.

‘Wow,' she said, for want of anything more intelligent to say. She climbed back up onto the bench and was on the verge of pulling herself up through the window when she remembered Julie and thought of leaving her a note. She immediately dismissed that as a stupid idea, because if Julie could read the note, so could the guards. She glanced at the phone in her hand, quickly typed a text message and saved it in the outbox, then carefully placed the phone on the bench, screen-side-up. She hadn't seen anything like a mobile phone from the moment they'd arrived, and she was pretty sure the guards weren't technologically savvy enough to figure out how to use one without help.

‘Right,' she said, more to herself than to the rabbit, though the rabbit nodded and hopped backwards to make room for her. She grabbed onto the ledge and pulled herself up, squirming and twisting her body to fit through the window. It was a bit of a scramble, but she made it fairly easily, and once she was out, she could see that there was a clear path between the window and the nearest gate.

‘They're changing the guard,' said the rabbit, loping off towards the gate. ‘We'd best hurry.'

Aisling followed it, a little unnerved to realise that even though it was an ordinary-looking rabbit of an ordinary size, it was moving fast enough that she had trouble keeping up. They ran through the gate and through the streets, and they didn't stop running for what felt like half an hour, though when they finally stopped the sun hadn't moved enough for it to have been more than a few minutes. Aisling leaned against the nearest wall to catch her breath, while the rabbit flopped to the ground and panted noisily.

‘Well,' Aisling said once her lungs had recovered, ‘what's the next step?'

The rabbit pulled itself to its feet, a little unsteadily.

‘Introductions,' it said. ‘You can call me Coney Bawn. What can I call you?'

‘My name's – actually, you could just call me “friend”,' said Aisling.

‘Fair enough,' said the rabbit approvingly. ‘Now, do you remember how you came into the City?'

‘We didn't do anything,' said Aisling. ‘We were on a street called Wormwood Gate, and Ju – my friend and I were just standing there, and suddenly there was a really strong smell of – well, we weren't sure, but I thought it was wormwood. I have an interest in herbalism, you see, so a while ago when I was in London I went to … well, anyway, that's not really relevant. The point is, a moment later a white horse with a red mane appeared out of nowhere and knocked us down –'

‘A white horse with a red mane?'

‘Yes. And then when we got up, we were here. Or,' she glanced around at the dead-end alleyway they'd ended up in, ‘not here, exactly, but here in the City. Near the riverbank.'

‘Which side of the River?'

‘Ehmm …' Aisling tried to remember. It had been such a shock, and they'd hardly had a moment to catch a breath, much less orient themselves properly and figure out which way was north. Normally when she was lost in the city centre, she just kept walking until she could see the Spire, and then she would know.

She gasped. ‘The Tower of Light!'

‘Yes,' said the rabbit with some irritation, ‘that's where we've just come from, but where were you before then?'

‘The Tower was across the river from where we were. We're on the Northside now, aren't we? When the seagulls took us to the Tower, they must have flown us across the river.'

‘Had to,' said the rabbit grimly. ‘The queen's shut off most of the bridges, even for official business. Well, that narrows it down, but I haven't a notion how we're going to get to where you were. I can do a lot of things with these paws and whiskers, but flying isn't one of them.'

‘Could we cross by boat?'

‘Be boat? Are you mad?' said the rabbit. ‘There's only one boat goes across the River, and it's only the dead can ride in it. That's you ruled out, for starters. I could go, if I was willing to die and take me chances in the next life, but I'm not so sure I am, with things the way they are. There's rumours the queen is even trying to control that.'

‘Control what? Death?'

‘No, no – not even the Queen of Crows controls death.
She
calls herself the queen of death, but even she's not that powerful. No, no, I mean what happens
after
you die.'

‘Wait, back up a minute. There's a boat that only the dead can ride in? What's that about?'

‘We folk of the Realms Between aren't like yous mortals,' said the rabbit. ‘We can die, but when we die we go to the banks of the River and the Ferryman takes us across, back to the Realm where we died. Only, crossing the River changes us. The Ferryman decides how. At least, for the Fae folk. For the inbetweeners, they have enough of their own selves that all he can do is give them a new shape to choose from. He can't take away their old shape.'

Aisling digested this. ‘And the queen wants to control the Ferryman?'

The rabbit made a motion with its paws that was sort of like a shrug.

‘There's rumours. I don't think much of them, meself. The Ferryman's bound to serve the Queen of Crows. He has some liberty in what he does, but not much. Not enough to go free by himself, and not enough to choose a different mistress.'

‘And this river – the river you cross after dying – that's the same as the river in the City?'

The rabbit cocked its head to one side. ‘It is and it isn't,' it said. ‘The Ferryman's river has no bridges over it, and it flows through every city and every town and every village, not just the City of the Three Castles. But the River in the City is the Ferryman's river all the same.'

‘I don't get it,' said Aisling. ‘I mean, are you saying they're the same river but they exist in different dimensions or something?'

‘I don't know what you mean,' said the rabbit. ‘The Ferryman's river is not the River in the City, but the River in the City is the Ferryman's river. Except when it isn't. You follow me?'

‘Not in the slightest,' Aisling sighed, ‘but I suppose it doesn't matter. So the Ferryman doesn't work for the Queen of the City, then?'

‘No, and a good thing too.'

‘Is “the Ferryman” his true name?' said Aisling. ‘It seems like a strange sort of name for a person to have.'

‘I don't rightly know that he
is
a person,' said the rabbit, tilting its head to one side. ‘But either way, it's not just true names that have power. A make-name can be powerful too. I know a creature called Abayomiolorunkoje –'

‘I've met him!' Aisling exclaimed.

‘I bet you have,' said the rabbit. ‘He's got more faces than a mask shop, that one. He gets around more than you'd guess. Anyhow, that's not his name for real and true, but he tells everyone in the City to call him that, and he tells them what it means.'

‘“People wanted to humiliate me, but God would not let them.”'

‘Exactly! And what do you think happens any time people try to make him feel like he's got too big for his breeches?'

‘I think I can imagine.'

The rabbit nodded. ‘It's always a different thing, but
something
always happens. Something that looks like a coincidence. Some people even think it is, but I know better. It's that he's said it often enough that it's becoming true: people tried to humiliate him, but God wouldn't let them.'

‘Maybe not God,' Aisling muttered, for she had been an atheist since she was nine. ‘Anyway. If “the Ferryman” is his make-name – is it as powerful as his real name?'

The rabbit shook its head, then frowned. ‘I don't rightly know,' it said. ‘The thing of it is, a make-name you choose can't be used against you. You have control over it, see? It's your way of telling the world what you want to be. That's why nobody can shorten it for you: they don't have the power over it that you do. But a true name is something else altogether. A true name is the world's way of telling you what you are, whether you like it or not. If I knew the Ferryman's true name, I'd know what he was for true, and then I'd have power over him. But every time a person says his make-name, they're telling the world that he is what he wants to be. If that happened often enough, for long enough, maybe it'd be his true name for real.'

‘I see,' said Aisling thoughtfully, and for once she actually thought she did see. The world she and Julie had fetched up in was fluid, almost as if it were unsure of itself. A strong mind could poke it into a different shape just by willing it. But not any old shape; there had to be rules, limits to what a mind could do, or else the City would have no form at all. ‘Where do mortals fit into all this?' she said, adding, ‘If we're going to find the Gate, I need to know what I can do and what I can't.'