We’ll be at the Dice soon, and then we all need to be on our guard It was a dismissal. Annoyed, Attia jumped from the cart.
‘About time,’ the giantess snarled.
Rix smiled his toothless smile. ‘Gigantia, darling. Go back to sleep.’ He whipped up the ox. Attia let the cart rumble ahead; in fact she let them all pass, the gaudy painted sides, the red and yellow spoked wheels, the pots and pans clattering underneath. Right at the back a donkey trailed on a long rope, and a few small children trudged wearily.
She followed, head down. She needed time to think. The only plan, when she had heard the rumours of a magician who claimed to own Sapphique’s Glove, had been to find him and steal it. If she had been abandoned by Finn, she would try anything to find her own way out. For a moment, as her feet tramped along the metal roadway, she allowed herself to relive the frill misery of those hours in the cell at the World’s end, Keiro’s scorn and his pity and his ‘He’s not coming back. Get used to it.’ She had turned on him then. ‘He promised’ He’s your brother!’ Even now, two months later, his cold shrug and his answer chilled her.
‘Not any more.’ Keiro had paused at the door. ‘Finn’s an expert liar. His speciality is getting people to feel sorry for him. Don’t waste your time. He’s got Claudia now, and his precious kingdom. We’ll never see him again.’
‘And where are you going?’ He had smiled. ‘To find my own kingdom. Catch me up.’ Then he had gone, shoving his way down the collapsed corridor.
But she had waited.
She had waited alone in the dingy silent cell for three days, until thirst and hunger drove her away. Three days of refusal to believe, of doubt, of anger. Three days to imagine Finn out in that world where the stars were, in some great marble palace with people bowing to him. Why hadn’t he come back? It must have been Claudia. She must have persuaded him, put a spell on him, made him forget. Or the Key must have got broken, or lost.
But now it was harder to think like that. Two months was a long time. And there was another thought that hid in her mind, that crept out when she was tired or depressed. That he was dead. That his enemies out there had killed him.
Except that last night, in that moment of fake death, she had seen him.
A shout, ahead.
She looked up, and saw, towering over her, the Dice.
That was exactly what they were. A great tumble of them, vaster than mountains, their sides white and faintly gleaming, as if a giant had tipped a pile of sugar cubes in the way, with smooth hollows that might be arranged in sixes and fives. In places stunted stubby growths struggled to grow; deep in the clefts and valleys a faint moss clung like grass. No roads led up there; the cuboid hills must be hard as marble, and smooth, impossible to climb. Instead the track ran into a tunnel hacked into the base.
The waggons halted. Rix stood up, and said, ‘People.’ Quite suddenly faces were peering out from the waggons, all the stunted, enormous, shrivelled, dwarfish faces of the freakshow. The seven jugglers clustered round. Even the bearguard ambled back.
‘The rumour is that the gang that runs this road is greedy but thick.’ Rix took a coin from his pocket and spun it. It vanished into the air. ‘So we should get through without problems. If there are. . . obstructions, you all know what to do. Be alert, my friends. And remember, the Art Magicke is the art of illusion He made an elaborate bow and sat back down. Puzzled, Attia saw how the seven jugglers were distributing swords and knives, and small balls of blue and red. Then each of them climbed up by a driver. The carts closed together, a tight formation.
She climbed hastily behind Rix and his guard.
‘Are you seriously taking on some Scum gang with collapsible knives and fake swords?’ Rix didn’t answer. He just grinned his gappy grin.
As the tunnel entrance loomed Attia loosened her own knife and wished desperately that she had a firelock. These people were crazy, and she didn’t intend to die with them.
Ahead, the tunnel’s shadow loomed. Soon intense darkness closed over her.
Everything disappeared. No, not everything. With a wry smile she realized that if she leant out she could see the lettering on the waggon behind; that it was picked out in glowing luminous paint — The One, the Only, Travelling Extravaganza — that its wheels were whirling spokes of green. There was nothing else. The tunnel was narrow; from its roof the noise of rumbling axles reverberated into an echoing thunder.
The further in they went, the more worried she became. No road was without its owners; whoever held this one had a surefire ambush site. Glancing up she tried to make out the roof, whether any one was up there on walkways or hanging from nets, but apart from the web of one uberspider she could see nothing.
Except, of course, the Eyes.
They were very obvious in the darkness. Incarceron’s small red Eyes watched her at intervals, tiny starpoints of curiosity She remembered the books of images she had seen, imagined how she must look to the curious Prison, tiny and grainy, gazing up from the waggon.
Look at me, she thought, bitterly. Remember, I’ve heard you speak. I know there is a way Out from you.
‘They’re here,’ Rix muttered.
She stared at him. Then, with a crash that made her jump, a grid smashed down ahead in the darkness; and another, behind. Dust billowed up; the ox bellowed as Rix dragged it to a halt. The waggons creaked into a long straggling stillness.
‘Greetings!’ The shout came from the darkness ahead.
‘Welcome to the toll gate of Thar’s Butchers.’
‘Sit tight,’ Rix muttered. ‘And follow my lead.’ He jumped down, a lanky shadow in the darkness. Immediately a beam of light lit him. He shaded his eyes against it. ‘We’re more than willing to pay great Thar whatever he wants.’ A snort of laughter. Attia glanced up. Some of them were overhead, she was sure. Stealthily she drew her knife, remembering how the Comitatus had captured her with a flung net.
‘Just tell us, great one, what’s the fee?’ Rix sounded apprehensive.
‘Gold or women or metal. Whatever we choose, showman.’ Rix bowed, and let relief creep into his voice. ‘Then come forward and take what you want, masters. All I ask is that the properties of our art are left us.’ Attia hissed, ‘You’re just going to let them—’
‘Shut up,’ he muttered. Then, to the juggler, ‘Which one are you?’
‘Quintus.’
‘Your brothers?’
‘Ready, boss.’ Someone was coming out of the dark. In the red glimmer of the Eyes, Attia saw him in flickers, a bald head, stocky shoulders, the glint of metal strapped all over him. Behind, in a sinister line, other figures.
On each side, green lights flared with a sizzle.
Attia stared; even Rix swore.
The gangleader was a halfman.
Most of his bald skull was a metal plate, one ear a gaping hole meshed with filaments of skin.
In his hands he held a fearsome weapon, part axe, part cleaver. The men behind him were all shaven-headed, as if that was their tribemark.
Rix swallowed. Then he held up a hand and said, ‘We’re poor folk, Winglord. Some thin silver coins, a few precious stones. Take them. Take anything. Just leave us our pathetic props.’ The halfman reached out and gripped Rix by the throat.
‘You talk too much.’ His henchmen were already climbing all over the waggons, pushing the jugglers aside, ducking under the canvas.
Several of them came straight back out.
‘Hell’s teeth,’ one muttered. ‘These are beasts not men.’ Rix smiled wanly at the Winglord. ‘People will pay to see ugliness. It makes them feel human.’ A stupid thing to say, Attia thought, watching Thar’s grim face.
The Winglord narrowed his eyes. ‘So you’ll pay us coins.’
‘Any amount.’
‘And women?’
‘Indeed, lord
‘Even your children?’