Catherine Fisher - Corbenic

Merlin was still cursing the dog. His face was narrow; he had spread his hands and was muttering things about pigs and apple trees and a prison under a stone. He was crazy. He should be in some hospital. Cal watched him in silence.

Suddenly Merlin’s eyes went to Cal, sly. “The knight has spent his vigil in the chapel. The knight continues the quest.”

Cal nodded. Then he turned and walked away. Deep in the wood he turned and looked back. Merlin and the dog were eyeing each other warily. Then the dog yawned and lay down.

Cal walked for twenty minutes before he found the lane. Climbing over a stile he scrambled down into it, a deep lane between two hedges, sparse now with winter twigs. Turning to his right, he followed it. It led downhill, around a bend, widened out, became a two-lane road, rose into a bridge.

He leaned on the bridge rail in a bewilderment of noise. Below him, in a thundering explosion of trucks and fast cars and searing speed, a motorway stretched in both directions. As far as his eyes could see.

Chapter Twenty-two

He emerged from the forest and came upon a most wondrous land.

2nd Continuation

Bath was beautiful. He wandered around its shops in weary appreciation, looking in at the fabulous furniture, the sumptuous giftware. Swaths of expensive fabric and chandeliers hung in shop windows; there were open-topped buses with Japanese tourists and taped commentaries about the Romans, Jane Austen, John Wood. And the streets amazed him—they were so grand, so sweeping, elegant facades of golden stone. Classy. That Shadow lived here impressed him.

He had to ask a few times for Great Pulteney Street; it was over a quaint bridge with tiny shops on each side. When he’d crossed it he stared down the wide expanse of perfectly matching elegant houses. Each one was Georgian, with a big painted front door, the steps in front leading down into an area behind black railings, where the servants would once have lived.

At Shadow’s number he stopped. There were window boxes with tiny daffodils and primulas, yellow and blue. The door was a glossy red, the huge brass handle gleaming, the curtains looped back. It all screamed money.

He swallowed. He’d caught sight of his reflection briefly in a window in town and had been shocked. He looked ten years older. His hair was matted and his clothes filthy with mud and dirt; he must stink. Merlin had loaned him an old army coat that came down past his knees, tattered khaki but warmer than just his jacket. He looked down at it with a sour smile. A few weeks ago he wouldn’t have touched it with a barge pole. But that was a lifetime away. He climbed the steps and rang the bell, turning and watching the street warily.

“Yes?” The tone was distasteful. He turned back and saw a woman of about fifty, stocky, in a flower-print dress. Her sleeves were rolled up, her hands floury. It wasn’t what he’d expected.

“Hi. I’m a friend of Sh . . . Sophie. Is it possible to speak to her?”

The woman looked him up and down. “She’s at school. Who shall I say called?”

“Cal,” he began, “but . . .” The door shut in his face. “Bloody snob,” he snarled. But he wasn’t surprised.

It was two o’clock, and fairly warm. He walked back to the bridge and down some steps at the side and along the riverbank, then sat and watched the water thunder over the weir. There were two swans on the river, performing an elegant bobbing and intertwining love dance; joggers and tourists stopped to watch them.

Cal lay down on the bench and dozed in the weak sun. If she wouldn’t help him, he didn’t know what he’d do. The money was gone. He wouldn’t sit in an underpass and beg. Glastonbury, Merlin had said. On the maps he’d looked at in the bookshops it wasn’t so far. Perhaps he could walk there. But he needed food.

He must have slept. Faces and voices disturbed him, as they always did. His mother said, “Get yourself something from the chippie for your tea,” and he laughed sourly and said, “What’s new,” and then sat up, cold and strained, because she was dead.

She was dead.

He still couldn’t take that in. He knew it, understood it, couldn’t bear it, was glad of it. And yet she was here, still a weight on him. He got up quickly and went back up to the street.

After twenty minutes leaning in a doorway, he saw Shadow coming along. She looked so different. Her hair was lighter, and she wore the school uniform he’d seen in the photo on the poster, a blue blazer, a tartan skirt. And the tattoo was gone. There was another girl with her, dressed the same. They had a magazine open and were looking at it, laughing.

His heart thudded. She didn’t look unhappy. For a moment he froze. He couldn’t speak to her. He should go away and leave her. And then, with an almost desperate lunge, he made himself step out right in front of them. “Shadow,” he said.

The friend gave a small scream. Startled, Shadow looked up. Her face was a blank shock. Then she said, “Cal?”

He tried to smile. Passersby turned. In a flash he saw what they saw: a homeless good-for-nothing harassing two well-heeled girls. Until Shadow grabbed his arm. “What are you doing here? What’s happened to you? ”

Stupidly, stupidly, he felt his voice choke. He shook his head. He knew if he answered he’d break down.

She moved fast. She said something to the friend, ushered Cal firmly up the steps and opened the door with a key. Then he was inside, the door closing behind him, with one last glimpse of the girl on the pavement clutching her magazine in astonished surprise.

The hall was huge, carpeted, mirrored. She led him into a big room at the back and sat him on the sofa. He felt weak, and useless.

“Shadow, I’m so sorry,” he whispered.

She crouched. “Not now, Cal. Look at the state of you! How long since you’ve eaten?”

He couldn’t remember.

She went out. In front of him the fire roared over fake coals, but the heat was real and he was glad of it. He took one quick look round. Chippendale furniture. Portraits, great gilt framed things. Real. A clock like something out of The Antiques Road Show . He felt small, shriveled up.

Shadow came back, and the woman was with her, carrying a tray, silver, with a teapot on it and small cakes. The woman stared at him with dislike.

“This is Marj,” Shadow said quickly. “She works for us. Put it down there, and go and run him a bath, will you? Are there any clothes that would fit him?”

Their low voices discussed him as if he wasn’t there. Maybe he wasn’t. He felt so light-headed and weak he wasn’t even sure.

Then Shadow was giving him tea and he was drinking it. The hot liquid shocked him into awareness; for a second it made him think of the time in Hawk’s van after the fight in the Dell; maybe Shadow thought of it too, because she said, “We’ve all been so worried about you!”

He smiled, trying to eat some cake. It tasted like ashes. He needed to explain but she wouldn’t let him talk and he was glad, because the words would have come out all jumbled and useless. While she fussed around upstairs he laid his head back on the plush sofa, and if he had closed his eyes he would have slept.

Then she was saying, “Cal. Come on.”

The bathroom was white and gold. He sat on a chair and looked at it. “Wow. Beats the van.”

Shadow grinned, preoccupied. “There are towels, and some old clothes of my father’s. They’ll be big but you’re as tall as him. Come down when you’re ready.”

As she went out he said, “I didn’t think you’d be speaking to me.”

She looked at him hard. “Why not? It seems we’re both liars.”

The hot water was such luxury he could not believe his own luck. Drowsing in it he felt the aches of his body gradually ease; there were cuts and stings and bruises he had no idea that he had, and he couldn’t remember where they had come from. The whole of the time in the Waste Land seemed far off, the green chapel like a dream. And yet Merlin’s ragged coat hung over the chair.