Lady Friday (The Keys to the Kingdom 5)

"You still have the medallion?" asked the Mariner. "Yes, sir," said Leaf.

"You had best give it back to Arthur when you can. It was not meant to be passed into other hands."

"I'm sorry," said Leaf. "I didn't know who-"

"No harm done," said the Mariner. "But I am not with­out business of my own. Three times I will answer to the call. I owe young Arthur that. This is the second, and for the third and final time, the call must come from Arthur himself."

"Yes, sir," said Leaf again. The Mariner raised his hand and indicated for her to go on.

The window was where she remembered. It was clear glass or something like glass, about seven feet long and three feet high. It looked directly out on to the lake and the crater floor, a few hundred feet below.

"There," said Leaf. "All those people, the sleepers lined up on the shore. Oh! Friday's already landing on the rock. She'll use the Fifth Key to suck all the people's memories out of them. Their experiences!"

The Captain looked out-at Lady Friday alighting on the silver chair upon the rock; at the thousands of sleepers who were lined up all around the crater; at the dozen or more Denizens who circled above Friday.

"The odds are poor," he said. "But the position is good."

With that, he tapped the glass with the point of his harpoon and it flew out in a single piece, shattering on the rock far below. Leaf shuddered as a wave of pain and nau­sea went through her, but it was soon past. The feeling came from the harpoon, she realized, and she sidled away from the Mariner.

"Now," mused the Mariner. "I shall get perhaps two good casts before they are upon us. What, then, shall be my targets?"

Down below, Lady Friday raised her hand and the mir­ror that was the Fifth Key shone even brighter.

"Quick!" shouted Leaf. "She's going to-"

The Key flashed, its stark light banishing darkness from every corner and crevice within the crater. The lake and dome flicked to silver, and from the eyes and mouths of the thousands of sleepers, a mad spaghetti of colored stream­ers sprang out towards Lady Friday's hand. Once again she gathered them up, the mirror in her hand transforming from something of pure white brilliance to a bright rain­bow that overflowed down her arm.

Lady Friday raised the mirror and tipped her head back, opening her mouth with its perfect white teeth.

"Stop her!" yelled Leaf. "Don't let her drink them all up!"

"That's Leaf's voice," said Arthur as he stumbled out onto the rocky surface of the crater, accidentally pushing over several sleepers. For some reason his balance was way off and he stumbled again before he righted himself. He could hear his friend but he couldn't see her anywhere or make out what she was shouting. All he could see was a sea of sleepers, Friday perched on her rock, and the Denizens who flew above her.

"Friday is using the Key," warned the Will, who came right after him. It shrank itself down some more and scut­tled between two swaying sleepers. "In a most peculiar fashion."

"This is unusual," said Scamandros, who was next to emerge from the white-lit transition from the Seven Dials. He raised his glasses to his forehead and peered at the near­est sleeper. "These mortals are being drained of ... well, not life, exactly, but close to it."

Leaf had stopped shouting. Arthur was about to push forward when he heard a distant crackling sound and a pain he knew danced across his teeth. An instant later, the Mariner's harpoon flew down from the crater wall. It looked as if it would strike Friday but she leaped up the merest fraction of a second ahead of its impact, yellow wings bursting to turn her jump into flight. The Key stayed in her hand, rainbow-bright and full of experience.

"The Mariner!" shouted Friday, pointing up at the cra­ter wall. "Attack him!"

A dozen Denizens, including the monocled Noon, wheeled in the air and flew towards the window where the Mariner held out a hand for his returning harpoon.

"Stop!" roared Arthur. He raised the baton of the Fourth Key high, hands steady in the gauntlets of the Second Key. "Keys, bring Friday to me! And you Denizens, leave the Mariner alone!"

Arthur's voice echoed throughout the crater. It did not sound like a boy shouting, but a great lord calling for his servants to do his bidding.

Lady Friday jackknifed in the air as she tried to fly back to her balcony. Still holding the mirror with its cargo of experience, she was carried backwards as if blown by a wind, landing in an unladylike sprawl in front of Arthur. More sleepers tumbled out of her way, but she paid them no heed.

"So, you got out," she said to the Will conversation­ally. "This boy managed what you could not yourself."

"That is so, madam," said the Will. "And now it is time for you to relinquish your charge to this same boy, who is not a boy at all, but Lord Arthur, the Rightful Heir."

"I am ready to do so," said Friday. "But may I just taste a little more? I am defeated, I know, but only as a mortal can I truly know the feeling of defeat. Give me just a few minutes more, let me enjoy the rich textures of mor­tal life once more-"

"No," said Arthur. He sheathed the baton and held out his hand. "I, Arthur, anointed Heir to the Kingdom, claim the Fifth Key-"

Friday screamed and tried to tip the mirror to her mouth, rainbow threads falling everywhere around her face. Arthur spoke more quickly, gabbling out the words.

C4-.. and with it the demesne of the Middle House. I claim it by blood and bone and contest out of truth in tes­tament and against all trouble!"

The mirror flew from Friday's hand into Arthur's. She shrieked again and hurled herself after it. Arthur dodged aside, hurtling farther than he intended due to the lesser gravity. Friday whirled to try again, but the Will, grown larger again, gripped the back of her neck with its sharp bat teeth and shook her till thin rivulets of blue blood ran down her shapely neck.

Arthur looked for a moment at the rainbow-hued mir­ror in his hand and then at all the sleepers. He felt no sense of triumph. He felt sick in his heart, hollow and defeated.

"I suppose my mom's here somewhere," he said. "We were just that little bit too late."

Dr. Scamandros coughed and raised his hand. "Ahem, Lord Arthur, I believe it may not be entirely too late. The great majority of the extracted experiences must still lie within the Key. It is possible they can be returned. Friday would know best."

Arthur turned to Friday, who hung limp and silent in the Will's jaws. "Is it possible to return the experiences?" he asked.

"Perhaps," said Friday dully. "I do not know. If it lies within the power of the Key, it can be done . I am no sor­cerer."

"Arthur, the Mariner is signaling," said Fred.

Arthur looked up at the crater. He could make out the Mariner clearly now, and he felt a small surge of happiness when he saw that the small figure by his side was Leaf.

"Arthur!" roared the Mariner, his seagoing voice of command almost as loud as Arthur's sorcerously magni­fied shout had been. "There are dangerous plants getting in! Order Friday's Denizens to repel boarders!"

"What?" Arthur shouted back. "Dangerous what?"

"Plants!" shouted the Mariner, and Leaf too, from the look of it, though her voice was totally drowned out.

The Denizens who were circling above heard it clearly. All but one swooped down towards Arthur and for a sec­ond he thought they were going to attack. But they halted to hover a good distance away, and one of them spoke.

"Lord Arthur, may we go to fight the plants at once? If their way in is not stopped promptly, we will be swamped."

"Go and fight the plants," ordered Arthur. Then he looked up and said, "Hey, where have Friday's Noon and Dusk gone?"

"Lord Arthur, if I may interrupt," said Scamandros. "There may be a time factor in returning the experiences. A degradation may occur if it is not done quickly-"

"Right!" said Arthur. "How do I put the experi­ences back?"

Scamandros looked doubtful and the tattoos on his cheeks changed from books with turning pages to a wild tangle of question marks that began to fight one another.

"The Keys shortcut much sorcery," he said. "If you assume the position Lady Friday took when taking the experiences, and simply ask the Fifth Key to replace the stolen experiences, it may work. Unfortunately, to discern a more rigorous technique would take me days or weeks."

"Give me your wings, Fred," Arthur said quickly. "Stick them on. Thanks. Don't let Friday go, Will. Suzy, keep an eye out for Friday's Noon and Dusk. They should know they're beaten, but ..."

He flexed the wings and leaped into the air, careful to hold the Fifth Key level. He knew that it wasn't like a cup and he probably couldn't spill the contents, but it didn't hurt to be careful.

The silver chair was sunk, though Arthur could see it through the clear blue water. So he stood on the stone pil­lar and faced the direction Friday had. Seeing all the sleepers standing and swaying all around him, he couldn't help but search for his mother's face. Was she here? Were there other people he knew?

"Hurry!" called out Scamandros, who was looking closely at the back of one of the sleeper's heads.

Arthur took a deep breath, raised his arms as he had seen Friday do, and concentrated his thoughts on the Fifth Key. Just to be sure, he also spoke aloud, though quietly, so only he could hear.

"Fifth Key, return the experiences you hold to these poor people, so that they are just as they were before Friday stole their precious lives. Repair their memories and give back all their happinesses-"

He paused for the briefest instant, wondering whether that was all they needed, but in that same moment knew that it was not. He would not himself be content to have only his happy memories.

"-and all their sorrows. Thank you."

The Key flashed with multicolored light, and streamers exploded out from Arthur's hand, snaking back across the silver-mirrored lake to connect with all the sleepers, mak­ing for just a few seconds a brilliant shining lattice of every color of the rainbow.

Then the streamers were gone and the mirror in Arthur's hand grew dull. As the sleepers still swayed and shuffled in their places, Arthur spread his wings and flew back to the others.

"Did it work?" Arthur shouted in dismay as he landed. "They don't look any better!"

Scamandros leaned back from the head he was inspect­ing, pushed his glasses farther up his forehead, and shouted back, "Yes! Most, if not all, of the stolen experience has been returned. The sleep is a different matter, merely an instruc­tion from Friday, easily broken. But I suggest we leave them asleep until they can be returned."

"You have done well, Arthur," said the Will, who had spat out Friday and was now content to keep her wrapped under one wing. The former Trustee did not complain or struggle. She sat there, staring into space, her eyes unfo­cused. "Very well indeed."

Arthur was not listening. He was already aloft again, flying over the crowd, searching for his mother.

"That's a dozen gold roundels you owe me, Fred," said

Suzy. "Told you we'd get back to Arthur and get the Fifth Key before we got a decent cup of tea."

"We got a cup of tea at Binding Junction," pro­tested Fred.

"Not a decent cup," said Suzy. "That was poison."

"I wonder how we are going to get all these people back to where they belong," said Scamandros. "And now that I think of it, I wonder how we are going to get back. I forgot to pack a Transfer Plate!" Chapter Twenty-Six

"She's not among the sleepers in the crater," Arthur said an hour later. The silver chair had been fished out of the lake and set up on the shore, and he was sitting on it, as the centerpiece of an impromptu court or council of war. "Leaf, are you sure this Harrison fellow would know if she was here?"

Harrison, who had been found hiding in the linen store, nodded from where he was kneeling in front of Arthur. Leaf, who was sitting at Arthur's side on a wooden chair from one of the closer rooms, also nodded. Her aunt Mango stood next to her, swaying from side to side and occasionally snoring.

"Harrison had the records from Friday's hospital back home of everyone sent through. I'm on the list, but there's no mention of your mom."

"Someone else has taken her, then," said Arthur. "Scamandros, there can be no doubt she is not on Earth?"

"If we could not find her through the Seven Dials, she is either shrouded by sorcery or somewhere else," Scamandros replied.

Arthur bit his lip, then asked the question that had been worrying him for a long time.

"Could she be dead?"

"Only if no one knows she is dead. Which is very unlikely."

"I have to find out," said Arthur. "I don't suppose it's any use now, but Scamandros, if I use the First Key instead of the Fifth, will it contaminate me less?"

"No, Arthur," Scamandros said sadly.

"Thought not," Arthur muttered. He raised the mirror, glad that he couldn't see the crocodile ring and its measure of his sorcerous contamination under the gauntlet of the Second Key. "Friday, I charge you by the power of the Fifth Key to tell me truly if you know anything of what has hap­pened to my mother since last Thursday, in the time of Earth, my home."