Drowned Wednesday (The Keys to the Kingdom 3)

'But the greatest destruction to actual Denizens was not wrought by the Deluge, but by Lady Wednesday herself. In the shape of a Leviathan she was hungrier than ever, and in her early years, she ate not only the usual plankton, krill, and other small creatures by the ton, but also many of her own servants, including her Noon and Dusk. No one has dared approach her for millennia, save her surviving Dawn, who it is believed she communicates with by moving the pupils of her massive eye in some code, so Dawn need not get too close.

'That is why it is strange that you should be invited to lunch with her. How can you have lunch with a Leviathan? Particularly one that eats everything that comes anywhere near her?'

'Why is she called Drowned Wednesday?' asked Arthur. 'I mean, she's obviously not drowned.'

'I believe that when she first began to transform she flung herself into the Border Sea and was presumed drowned,' said Scamandros. 'A nasty fate for a Denizen, since some consciousness would remain until the fishes completely nibbled you away. I also suspect that the term 'Whale Wednesday' is shied away from by her still-loyal Denizens.'

Arthur nodded and hopped forward to completely catch up. They were quite a long way along the beach now, the lights of the camp a hundred yards or more behind. Arthur glanced at Doctor Scamandros's face. Most of it lay in shadow, only the lower part of his visage illuminated by the candle. His tattoos were moving and shifting, but it was too dark for Arthur to make out what they were showing, save for one of a ship that was cruising across the Denizen's cheek with all sails set.

'Perhaps we should turn around,' said Arthur nervously. Scamandros halted and looked at Arthur.

'We have come far enough to try a little sorcery that may find an answer to your questions,' he said, walking up the beach to set his candle down. Arthur followed, the blue sand sticking to his wet feet.

'What was it you wanted first?' asked Doctor Scamandros. 'A message to Dame Primus or news of your friend?'

'I want to see what's happened to Leaf,' said Arthur. Even though she hadn't listened when he'd told her to get out of the hospital room, he still felt responsible . . . and guilty. He hoped she was all right.

'Your friend was picked up by another ship?'

'Yes,' said Arthur. 'A bit like the Moth, but thinner and longer, with three masts. It had sails that glowed green. I think it was meant to pick me up, like it said in the invitation. 'Transport has been arranged.' Only they got Leaf instead.'

'The ship sounds like the Flying Mantis. One of the ships of Wednesday's original merchant marine. Which would make sense. Now, do you have anything that belongs to your friend? A lock of hair, perhaps?'

'No!' said Arthur. 'I mean, she's just a friend. Like a fairly new friend too.'

'Mmm, that makes it more difficult, even though knowing the ship will narrow things down,' mused Scamandros. 'Did you shake hands with her? Or have anything she may have touched, like a cup or bottle?'

Arthur shook his head. He tried to think back to the hospital room. Leaf had sat on the bed . . .

'She did read Wednesday's invitation. Will that do?'

'That will do,' said Doctor Scamandros with satisfaction. 'May I have the invitation, please?'

Arthur handed it over. Scamandros took out a tortoiseshell-inlaid penknife and cut a small, curling sliver off the surface of the card, which he deposited in a tiny tin pillbox. Reaching once more into his greatcoat, he removed a cardboard chessboard - or something divided into coloured squares like a chessboard - which he unfolded. On this board he laid down with some exactitude a small round shaving mirror and a conch shell the size of Arthur's fist. He then placed the tin pillbox down as well, arranging it so mirror, shell, and pillbox formed a triangle against the red-and-black-chequered background.

'A trigon on my work-square,' he said, taking out a quill pen and a small bronze bottle labelled ACTIVATED INK. BEWARE! 'Arthur, please place your hand flat above the trigon, not quite touching.'

He indicated the three objects. Arthur complied, holding his hand level just above the mirror, conch and pillbox.

'Now I shall have to write on your hand. It may sting,' said Doctor Scamandros, in the tone doctors and dentists use when something is going to hurt. He set the bronze bottle down, carefully unscrewed the lid, and dipped his feathery pen.

'This is going to help me find out what happened to Leaf?' asked Arthur. He had a strong urge to pull back his hand and run down the beach, back to the camp.

Sunscorch did nod okay, thought Arthur. So Scamandros must be mostly trustworthy …

'Yes, yes,' said Scamandros. 'Hold still.'

Arthur held still. Scamandros poised the pen above the back of the boy's hand. A tiny drop of ink fell from the pen and splashed on Arthur's skin like molten metal, sending up a small plume of Nothing-laced smoke.

'Aahhhhh!' screamed Arthur as intense pain shot through him.

Eleven

DOCTOR SCAMANDROS didn't pause. With incredible speed, he wrote a word on Arthur's hand even as the boy snatched it away, the ink leaving a trail of fire across his skin.

'It will only hurt for a moment,' Scamandros promised, as Arthur rushed to the sea and thrust his hand in. 'If I'd warned you, you wouldn't have kept still.'

Arthur couldn't speak. The pain occupied his entire mind - but only for a few more seconds. Before Doctor Scamandros had finished speaking, the pain ebbed and was gone, as if it had been washed out with the last wave.

Arthur walked the few yards back up the beach. Scamandros had already packed away the board and the pillbox, leaving only the shell and the mirror. He held these out to Arthur, who didn't notice, as he was holding the back of his hand to the candlelight. As far as the boy could tell, there weren't any scars or ink stains. He couldn't see any writing either.

'What did you write?' asked Arthur.

'My signature,' said Doctor Scamandros. 'Most House Sorcery is done with prepared apparatus that will only work for the authorised sorcerer.'

'Was there Nothing in that ink?'

'Yes. A very small, refined amount. Not made by me, I hasten to add. I do not work directly with raw Nothing. Though it is true most House Sorcery depends upon apparatus or consumables originally created from or with Nothing.'

'Right,' said Arthur. He took the mirror and the shell suspiciously. 'What do these do, then?'

'I have, I hope, attuned the mirror to show the current situation of your friend Leaf,' said Scamandros. 'And the conch so you may listen as well. It should work for some days, before the spell degrades and begins to show other persons or places. I should not use it once that occurs, as it may well show you to those who look for such open passages into the mind .'

'How do I make it work?'

'Merely hold the shell to your ear and gaze into the mirror. It will work best somewhere quiet, with a little but not too much light shining into the mirror. Here, with the candle, would be ideal. It is generally best to have someone watching over you, as you will not be aware of what is happening around your corporeal form.'

'Thanks,' said Arthur. 'I think I'll try this a bit later. Closer to the camp.'

'As you wish. Now, as to messages, I'm afraid that neither telephone nor telegraph will work for us. Though we are not in the Border Sea, we are of it, and any connection would thus normally go through there and the exchange has been long flooded. However, I can send a message by slower means. Have you paper, pen, and ink?'

'No.'

'Here you are, then.' Scamandros handed Arthur a cracked leather case tied closed with a blue ribbon. 'Write a letter while I prepare the messenger.'

Arthur opened the case. It was like a pop-up book, with an inkwell, a pile of paper, and several pens rising up as he opened it. Arthur selected a pen, dipped it in the ink, which he noticed was turquoise blue, and wrote.

Dame Primus

Monday's Dayroom or Tuesday's Pyramid

Dear Dame Primus,

Lady Wednesday invited me to luncheon and sent a ship for me, but due to an accident I am now in another Secondary Realm with a different, wrecked ship, called the Moth. A House Sorcerer called Dr. Skamandross is sending this letter for me. I think I might try to find the Third Part of the Will, since I'm here. If you can send help or advice that would be good. Also my friend Leaf got picked up by accident and I think is on a ship called the Flying Mantis. If you can help her get back home that would also be good.

Yours sincerely,

Arthur Penhaligon

P.S. Say hi to Suzy for me, and Sneezer and everyone.

Arthur looked at what he had written. He hadn't even been sure he was going to try to find Part Three of the Will until he'd written it. But the idea must have been growing in his head ever since Leaf had said that he should do something first instead of waiting for the Trustees to do something to him.

The only problem was where to start.

'Finished?' asked Doctor Scamandros. 'Fold it over and write the addressee on the front. Then press your thumb on the fold and it will seal.'

Arthur did as he was instructed. When his thumb pressed down, a spray of rainbow light ran around the edges of the paper, and when he lifted his hand, there was a thick round seal that showed his own head in profile with a laurel wreath around his temples.

'Now, don't tell Captain Catapillow or Concort,' said Doctor Scamandros. 'Having a shortage of prepared stamps, I have taken something suitable from their collection.'

He showed Arthur a large, colourful stamp that pictured a bird with a dark body, a white rump, and a forked tail. It was labelled in small type Leach's Stormy Petrel and there was a large number 2 and an unfamiliar currency sign.

'From your Earth,' said Scamandros. 'A nocturnal seabird. I shall just dab a drop of activated ink on its eye and utter a little incantation. You might wish to stand behind me, Arthur. Some of the Architect's words are inimical to mortals.'

Arthur quickly moved behind Scamandros and put his fingers in his ears. He remembered the effect of the words the sorcerer had used on the ship.

Scamandros bent over the folded letter, opened his bronze ink bottle, and, using a tiny eyedropper, sucked up some ink. He then carefully dropped just a speck of the liquid on the eye of the bird in the stamp, at the same time muttering something that Arthur couldn't hear, though it made his elbows and knees twinge and ache.

The bird twitched and flapped its wings. It poked its head up and out of the stamp and, fluttering its wings furiously, worked its whole body out. As it left the stamp, it grew larger and the letter grew smaller. It continued to grow until it was about two feet long and its wings spanned six feet. The letter was tiny by then, a rectangle only an inch long. The bird, a bright twinkle in its eye, picked the letter up in its beak and swallowed it before waddling down the beach, slowly beating its wings till it was able to take off, immediately becoming graceful and swift.

'Well, I shall just clear up here,' said Doctor Scamandros. 'I have to spread some of this magic-tainted sand around and so forth. If you want to try the mirror and shell, I suggest you ask Mister Sunscorch to watch over you, and sit between the Captain's tent and the sea.'

'Thanks,' said Arthur. Doctor Scamandros was being very helpful.

Maybe I'm too suspicious, thought Arthur. He must have some reason of his own for helping me … I wonder what it is … I wonder if he can read my thoughts -

'How long will it take the letter to get to Dame Primus?' Arthur asked quickly, just in case Doctor Scamandros could read his mind and was offended that Arthur still didn't trust him.

'It's difficult to say. Barring accident or interception, a day or two in our time here. What that would be in the House, I cannot say without considerable calculation. Time does not run true between the House and the Realms.'

Arthur nodded. It looked like he was stuck here for a week anyway, till the Moth could be repaired. Since there was nothing he could do about that, he might as well use the time to work out what to do. And to do that, he needed to find out what had happened to Leaf.

'I'll go back now,' said Arthur. 'I will ask Sunscorch to watch over me. Thanks for your help, Doctor.'

Scamandros bowed.

Arthur turned away and started to walk back along the beach. It was dark without the candle, but he could see the lights of the camp, which weren't that far. Even so, he started to walk quite fast.

He was halfway there when something made him turn around and look back. He could see the glow of the candle, and a partial silhouette that might have been Doctor Scamandros. But there was something else there as well. Another shape, a dark cutout against the candlelight. Arthur only saw it for a moment, then it was gone. But in that instant, he thought he recognised what it was.

Another stormy petrel. Doctor Scamandros was sending a message to someone else.

I knew it, thought Arthur fiercely. He's probably trying to sell me out to Wednesday or one of the other Trustees. They might send Superior Saturday's Dusk if that's who it was who attacked me in Grim Tuesday's Pit. If he comes back with his sword I'll be helpless without a Key, though maybe the crew of the Moth would defend me because of the Captain's disc. I still don't understand why Saturday would want Nothing to destroy the House. There is definitely something going on with the Morrow Days and Nothing. But what? Why is everything so difficult -