Catherine Fisher - The Slanted Worlds

Let the snake’s eye open. Let the hearts reach out.

Piers looked up. Maskelyne nodded slowly. “Yes,” he said, his voice husky. “I remember. The snake’s eye can be opened.”

“What do you mean . . . remember?”

A crash made the cat jump.

Then another.

Three separate crashes, as if a giant was beating at the door until the house shook.

Like the slow rumbling thunder of an avalanche, movement in the roots and depths of the earth itself.

“What’s that?” Piers breathed.

Maskelyne listened, alert. “The wood is walking,” he said. “Summer’s revenge.”

“Dad.”

The word hurt. He couldn’t move. Couldn’t breathe.

But to his astonishment the figure in the gray robe exploded into rage. “What the hell do you think you are doing, Jake! Telling him you can cure the plague! How do you think you can say that! These people are dying, don’t you realize! Really dying! Babies, and women and little children, dying in agony of this filthy, endless disease and there’s nothing, nothing any of us can do and you, you have the reckless, stupid arrogance to stand there and—”

“Dad.” Jake’s voice was soft. “Dad, it’s all right. We’re here now.” He stepped forward, giving one glance to Rebecca, where she crouched on a chair, watching with wide eyes. “It’s all right.”

He reached out.

His father’s hands, thin and oddly frail, grabbed him, pulled him close.

His father’s face was muffled in his shoulder. He was sobbing, muttering, “Oh God. Jake. Jake. I never thought I’d see you again. ”

Jake closed his eyes.

Rebecca bit her lip and blinked away tears.

For a long moment in the dark room no one said anything, as if just that holding, that watching, was enough.

Then, slowly, David Wilde pulled back. He managed a weak grin. “Look at me! Stupid. Hysteria.”

“It’s all right.”

“It’s been so long. On my own. So hard . . .”

“You don’t have to say anything. I get it.” Jake gave a wry grin. “God, you look awful.”

His father laughed, a rusty, snatched gasp of relief. “Do I? You look great. So much . . . more grown-up.”

“I’m sorry about what I said. The plague. I just . . . I get carried away, caught up in the excitement. I know it’s not a game. It must have been hell.”

David nodded. He cleared his throat, wiped his face with a dirty sleeve, and stepped back. “That’s one word for it. The one they would use here.” He glanced at Rebecca. “Is this . . . ?”

“I’m Becky.” She stood and held out her hand; he took it and shook it, slightly bemused.

“Why are you both dressed like that?”

Jake said, “Bit of a mistake. We were trying to reach you through Alicia. I had no idea we could get this far.”

“And Venn? Where’s Venn?”

“Gone into the Summerland after half a Greek coin. Look, I haven’t got time to explain it all now—we need to get straight to the mirror and get you back home. With both the bracelets we should be able to do it, even in stages.”

Jake stopped. “What. What’s wrong?”

David Wilde turned and walked to the window. He unlatched the shutter and let it swing wide; immediately heat entered the room on a ray of scorching sunlight. Swifts screamed outside, high over the houses.

“Il signore. His family. I can’t just leave them.”

Jake stared.

“Don’t look at me like that, Jake! I’m a doctor, it’s my duty.”

“No!” Jake couldn’t believe this.

“If I go, they’ll die. I’ve been working day and night. I’ve managed to prepare a crude antibiotic—it’s a tiny amount and the process is almost complete. If I could just . . .”

Before it could come again, the words, the flood of terror, Rebecca intervened. She took his hands and held them, and looked straight into his eyes. Jake was amazed at her strength.

“Listen to me, David. This is not your time. I’m a history student, I know about the Black Death. It raged through Europe and nothing and no one could stop it. It was there, it happened, it’s over. It’s not your fault, or your responsibility. If you stay, you’ll die. And so will we, because I can’t see Jake going back without you.”

David stared at her. She could see how exhausted he was, how worn to a shadow.

He said, “I lie awake at night and dream, you know. About the mirror. It torments me. What use is a time travel device if you don’t use it? I could go back to Wintercombe, get the drugs, bring them here. Perhaps we could stop the epidemic, stop it spreading. Save thousands of lives. Change history. We could do that.” He stepped back, sat down on the meager bed, as if stunned. “Think of what we could do.”

She threw a worried glance at Jake. “Get burned for sorcery more like,” he snapped, and she had never been so glad of his self-assurance.

“What do we do?” she whispered.

“Get him home. That’s all I care about.” He went to the window and looked down. The street was deserted, burning in the noonday heat. Only the swifts screeched in the eaves.

“And we need to go now. During the siesta.” He came back and knelt at David’s feet. “Dad. Where is the mirror? You said you knew.”

His father looked at him. He drew a hand over his face and said, “Yes. I know. It’s in the old palazzo.”

“Can we get there?”

“Il signore lives there. His official apartments are there. With his guards and his torture-rooms.” He frowned. “But Jake . . .”

“We go. Now.”

David stood, picked up the bird mask, and looked around. For the first time Jake took in the meager poverty of the room, its crucifix, its dusty jug of water, its bleached walls.

“You’ve got the bracelet?”

“On my wrist, always.” His father hesitated. “Jake . . . there’s something I haven’t told you.”

“Is there anything else you want to take? From here?”

There was a wooden chest at the end of the bed. Some garments were folded on it; Jake pulled one out. “Maybe we could use this as a cloak for Becky or . . .”

His voice died.

It wasn’t a cloak.

It was a baby’s shawl.

A small sharp cry rose from the woolen fabrics. He tugged the topmost blanket aside, and stared.

A baby gazed up at him. Its eyes were blue and wide.

Rebecca put a hand to her mouth.

“Who’s this?” Jake whispered. He felt numb now. Dread lodged in him like something unswallowed.

David hesitated. Then he came over and picked the baby up, folding the coverings down around its face.

“This is Lorenzo, Jake. This is my son. Your brother.”

Venn felt the snow crash down on him like memory, as it had on Katra Simba, the weight of the past white and blank blotting everything out. It filled eyes and mouth and nose, it filled grasping hands, it swept even Leah’s memory away and bowled him backward into the doorway that he knew led to Summer’s house.

His whole being screamed out against it, but it was fate, it carried him along, and there was nothing he could do about it except rage.