Philip Reeve - A Darkling Plain

The strange thing is, I don’t mind too much, because I know that you will live on, and see marvelous things, and one day I hope have children of your own, who will be just as much of a worry and a joy to you as you were to me. That’s what History teaches us, I think, that life goes on, even though individuals die and whole civilizations crumble away: The simple things last; they are repeated over and over by each generation. Well, I’ve had my turn, and now it’s yours, and I mean to try and make sure that you live in a world that is free of at least one threat—

Wren had her coat on and was halfway to the door before Theo even finished reading. He was glad of an excuse to stop; the letter was private, and he felt wrong for looking at it. “Where are you going?” he asked.

“The hangar, of course!”

“He’ll be gone… He says—”

“I know what he says, but we don’t know when he wrote that, do we? He’s ill; it probably took him longer than he allowed for, going all along the Holloway Road.” She wasn’t tearful, just very angry at Tom for keeping such secrets from her. And how on Earth did he hope to fly all the way to Shan Guo without her to help?

She and Theo ran off together, stopping only to cadge a flask of water from the kitchens. Angie was helping make breakfast. Wren pushed the letter at her and said, “Wake Mr. Pomeroy and show him this!” and ran off before the other girl started asking questions.

The day was gray and cheerless. It seemed to Wren to smell of ash, as if the immense pall of smoke from all those slaughtered cities had drifted east overnight to blanket London. As they ran on, the murk grew thicker; fog hid the deeper parts of the debris field, and the spires and blades of wreckage that towered on either side of the trackway took on a ghostly look.

“Is what your father said true?” asked Theo as they ran. “Is he really that sick?”

“Of course not!” Wren replied. “He’s just saying that because he thinks I won’t feel so bad then about him going off to Shan Guo. His heart hurts him sometimes, but he’s got pills for it. Green ones.”

The fog grew deeper. By the time they reached the terminus at the eastern end of the Holloway Road, they could not see ten feet in front of them, and when they finally emerged from the old duct, they found themselves in a white world where they could barely see each others’ faces even though they stood side by side, holding hands.

At first they thought both airships were gone, but when Theo collided with the Archaeopteryx ’s underside tail fin, they realized that only the Jenny Haniver was missing.

“Who goes there?” shouted a nervous voice.

“It’s me! Wren!”

A grayish stain appeared in the fog and condensed into Will Hallsworth and Jake Henson. “It is, you know,” said Jake. “Pass, friend,” said Will.

“Where’s my dad?” demanded Wren, who didn’t have time for games of soldiers.

“He came by early this morning,” said Jake.

“Very early,” agreed Will. “Said Mr. Pomeroy had asked him to take the Jenny on a reconnaissance trip and he’d be back soon. I ’spect he’s circling up there now, delayed by all this fog.”

“It’s a real London particular!” said Jake.

“Why didn’t you stop him, you idiots!” screamed Wren.

“Steady on!”

“He said it was orders from the committee. We couldn’t argue with that.”

“Was he armed?” asked Theo.

Will and Jake looked sheepish. “Not when he got here, no.”

“But he made us give him one of our lightning guns. He said he might need it if he ran into any of those Stalker-birds up above all this pea soup.”

Wren turned to Theo, almost fell against him. She was tired by their journey along the Holloway Road, and she felt that she would never see her father again. She was ready to cry. “He’s gone. He’s gone forever!”

Echoey sounds came out of the dank throat of Holloway Road. Footsteps and voices. Someone was approaching, and the sound of their coming was rolling ahead of them down the tunnel. Theo held Wren and tried to comfort her while they all waited for the newcomers to emerge. The hard beams of electric lanterns poked through the fog, lighting up all the little individual water droplets without illuminating anything.

“Zagwan?” said a tetchy voice from behind the torch glow.

“Me?” asked Theo.

“Put your hands up! Step away from the airship!”

“I’m nowhere near it,” protested Theo.

“No, that’s me,” said Will Hallsworth.

“Is it?” A shape blurred out of the fog. It was Garamond, holding the revolver he had taken from Wolf Kobold. “Where’s Wren?”

“Here,” said Wren. “What is all this about?”

“We caught you just in time, I see,” said Garamond. “Just in time for what?”

Other figures were appearing behind Garamond; they surrounded Wren and Theo in the fog like a circle of stones. Wren thought she recognized Ron Hodge and Cat Luperini among them.

“They were going to steal the Archaeopteryx!” said Garamond, loud and triumphant. “Natsworthy has taken his own airship east, and now he sends his daughter and their Green Storm accomplice to take the Archy. They planned to leave us with no way of escape when the Storm’s Stalkers march in.”

“What are you talking about, you silly little man?” shouted Wren. “My dad’s gone to try and talk to Naga—”

“Exactly! To betray us to his Green Storm paymasters; yes; we have read the letter. I thought it was a little too neat, your African friend turning up at the very moment the birds struck! You arranged that attack just so that he could appear to save us, thinking it would make us trust him. Well, Wren Natsworthy, I have news for you; I don’t trust him; I don’t trust you, and I don’t trust your traitor father!”

Wren’s fist caught him full on the nose. He went backward into the fog with a muffled squeal (“Ow! By doze! By doze!”). Theo held Wren back as she tried to fling herself upon him, though she couldn’t even see him anymore. Sobbing, she screamed at the fog that hid him. “What were you doing, reading my letter? That was private! From my father! I told Angie to show it to Mr. Pomeroy, nobody else!”

“Wren,” said Cat, coming to help Theo restrain her. “Wren, Wren …”

“It’s Garamond who’s the real traitor! When Mr. Pomeroy hears you tried to arrest Theo, he’ll—“Wren…”

“What?”

Cat hung her head, fog water dripping from her hair. “Mr. Pomeroy is dead.”

“What?”

“Angie found him when she took your father’s letter to his hut. All yesterday’s excitement must have been too much for him. He died last night, in his sleep.”

Garamond lurched out of the fog, one hand clutching his nose, blood dribbling down his chin. “Take theb both!” he ordered nasally. “Tie their hands. Brig theb to Crouch Ed. The Ebergency Cobbittee cad decide what to do with theb.”

The Jenny Haniver Purred eastward through the poisoned sky, toward the wall of mountains that marked the eastern borders of Shan Guo, and the broad pass through them that was barred and guarded by Batmunkh Gompa. As he drew close to the fortress city, Tom opened the general channel on his radio set and sent out again the message he had been repeating ever since leaving London, explaining that he came in peace. There was still no reply. He turned the knobs on the front of the set, scrolling up and down the airwaves. Static spat and popped like a fir-cone fire, and some kind of interference shrilled. Faintly, behind the gales of white noise, someone was speaking Shan Guonese, fast and panicky.