Lady Friday (The Keys to the Kingdom 5)

Leaf stayed facedown, trying not to sob, her hand unconsciously going to the Mariner's medallion, her fin­gers clutching it so hard they turned almost as white as the whalebone disc.

She lay there for at least a minute, letting the fear slowly ebb away, to be equally slowly replaced by her natural courage and determination. Now that Lady Friday had gone, she could think again, no longer struck with a feeling that had been as close to blind panic as she'd ever experienced.

So long as Friday's not in front of me I can be brave, thought Leaf. She bit back a sob. That's better than being a total coward, I guess. I just have to stay out of her way ....

"I told you," said Harrison. "Guess you'll help me now, won't you?"

Leaf didn't answer. She slowly stood up and looked over at the balcony on the crater rim where Lady Friday and her attendants were alighting. She watched them go inside, ignoring Harrison.

If I give in now, she'll just experience Aunt Mango any­way, thought Leaf. Giving in never works ... and I can't let her use me against Arthur ....

"I said you'd better help me now," said Harrison again, stepping around so he was in front of her and she couldn't ignore him.

"Why?" asked Leaf. "She won't keep her word. Besides, Arthur will sort her out before too long. You'd do better to help me."

"What?" asked Harrison weakly. "But you've seen Her, the power of the Key ...."

"You'd better decide whose side you're on," said Leaf. "You said you wanted to get back to Earth, didn't you?"

"Yes ..."

"Do you reckon Lady Friday will ever let you go?"

"No ..."

"Then help me!" urged Leaf. "Is there a telephone any­where here that connects with the House?"

"I don't ..." replied Harrison. He looked around, to check if any Denizens were in earshot, but he and Leaf were alone in the crater, save for the fallen sleepers who lined the shore.

"I don't know ...." he continued. "I'd have to ask a Denizen. But they'd never tell me. It's pointless anyway. Just help me work and we'll both stay out of trouble."

"Staying out of trouble won't get you back to Earth," said Leaf. "Or help anyone else. I'm frightened by Friday too, but we have to do something!"

"I can't," whispered Harrison. "I ... I haven't got the guts. Not anymore."

"Cover for me, then," said Leaf. "Give me some job that'll let me wander around carrying something."

She didn't mention that this was a trick she'd learned from her friend the Ship's Boy Albert, who'd been killed by Feverfew. Skiving, he'd called it. The trick was to find some­thing that looked like it needed to be delivered somewhere else on the ship and then you could walk around for ages with it before someone in authority noticed and took action. Denizens in particular were susceptible to this ruse, as they couldn't imagine someone inventing a task for themselves.

"But if you're caught somewhere you shouldn't be, they'll blame me!"

"If you won't help, then you're as bad as She is," said Leaf. "You'll be with the enemy when Arthur gets here."

"He will come? You're sure? Is he really ten feet tall?"

"He will come," said Leaf with a conviction she was far from feeling. "He's ... he's not quite that tall, but he is ... um ... well, he's beaten four Trustees already."

"I guess you could go get pillowcases from the linen store," said Harrison. He was weakening, Leaf could tell. "But that won't help you find a phone. Like I said, you'd have to ask a Denizen ...."

"Yes," said Leaf. "I have an idea about who to ask. Where is the linen store?"

Harrison didn't answer; instead, his face twisted up in indecision.

"Remember, helping me is helping Arthur, and he's your only chance of ever getting away from here," said Leaf. "It's now or never."

"I'll do it ...." said Harrison. "I mean, okay! I'll do it. Come on-I'll show you the way to the linen store. It's at Circle Three, Twenty-five Past."

"What about them?" asked Leaf quietly, pointing to the quiet bodies on the shore.

"Martine takes them from here," said Harrison. "She'll come out when the sun goes down."

"Who's Martine? A Denizen?"

"No, she's human too. She's been here longer than me. Crazy as a loon, though. She only works nights. Not that night here is anything like home. There's three moons and they're big ... and they change color."

"Maybe she's worth talking to," said Leaf. "Where would I find her?"

"Circle Six, Half-Past," muttered Harrison. He started walking back to the door where they'd entered the crater. "But she is crazy. Come on!"

Leaf followed him, but not without a glance back at the sleepers.

"Also, I need a drink. Have you got human food and, drink, and uh, a toilet I can use? And tea?"

"I get basic food and there are four restroom facilities for us mortals throughout the establishment," said Harrison. "But I don't have any tea. The Denizens love the stuff and they keep it for themselves. I don't have any coffee either, so you'll have to make do with water."

"Oh, I don't want the tea to drink myself," said Leaf. "I was thinking about using it to trade with a Denizen. I'll have to think of something else."

Just after she spoke, a thought did occur to her and she bent down and picked up a small stone, one of the few that lay around the smooth floor of the crater.

"By the way, do you know where that Denizen Feorin hangs out?" Leaf asked.

"There aren't many Denizens here," said Harrison. "Maybe fifty altogether. Most are up on Circle Ten from Ten to Noon to Ten Past. I guess they have rooms there. They supposedly patrol around as well, but I don't often see them on my rounds-which reminds me, I'll have to get started again soon. Got to keep everyone turned ...."

He sighed and bent his head, and the small spring in his step that had come on when he agreed to help Leaf disappeared, giving way to his usual depressed shuffle. Leaf followed silently, her head full of plans and schemes, most of which she had to admit were totally impractical. She kept coming back to just three basic aims, but was entirely unsure how she might achieve them.

First, find a telephone to the House and call Arthur. Second, find Aunt Mango and get her away from wherever she is. Three, hide out with Mango somewhere until help comes.

Actually, there were four basic aims, Leaf thought, and the fourth was perhaps the most strident in her mind. Keep away from Lady Friday.

As Harrison had predicted, they met no one on the way to the linen store. This was a chamber almost identical to the room where Leaf had found the Skinless Boy's pocket. It brought back unpleasant memories and also made her think, because the linen was all branded with the name of the same laundry service that served East Area Hospital .

"All this stuff gets washed back on Earth, right? Not here."

"I guess so," said Harrison. "I dump the dirty sheets and stuff in a chute and get the fresh linen here ...."

"So someone must take it back and forth," said Leaf. "There must be a way between here and Lady Friday's hos­pital back on Earth."

"If there is, you need to have her power to use it," said Harrison.

Leaf shook her head.

"No way Lady Friday takes the dirty laundry to Earth and carries back a load of fresh sheets herself! So there must be a way ... but maybe it's some kind of sorcery. It's worth checking out, though."

"I have to get back to the people stores ... I mean wards," said Harrison nervously. He was backsliding already. "Axilrad might come looking. Don't stay away too long. You'd better come and help me fairly soon, otherwise-"

"You go, then," said Leaf. "I'll find you when I need you."

"Don't do ... well, don't ...." Harrison's voice trailed off. He looked at the floor, scuffed his feet, and left.

Leaf looked around the linen store till she found a loose bolt in one of the metal shelves. She pulled it out and used it to scratch some invented letters onto the stone from the crater, in an effort to make it look interesting and strange. Perhaps even sorcerous ....

At the same time, she practiced a rhythmic, barking cough.

"Ah-woof, ah-woof, ah-woof." Chapter Thirteen

Arthur stretched out his arms and drew his hands into the sleeves of his new paper-patchwork coat, so Pirkin could cut the cuffs to the right length. The Denizen was using a huge, old pair of bronze scissors, which should have made Arthur nervous, but he was feeling quite relaxed. It was very warm inside the but on the raft, thanks to a fridge-sized porcelain stove that was sitting on a ten­by-ten-foot slab of red stone deeply chiseled with huge incomprehensible letters. There was no fire visible through the stove's smoky quartz door, nor had Arthur seen it fed with any fuel, but there had been smoke outside.

New, dry clothes were also a good thing. Arthur, like the others, was now completely dressed (from underclothes up) in garments made from paper or parchment or soft hide, all with lines and lines of writing. He'd expected the clothes to be itchy or uncomfortable, especially the paper coat, but they were surprisingly soft and comfortable. He'd also thought they'd be no use outside in the wet snow, but Pirkin had explained that they would shed water. It was one of the Paper Pushers' few unique powers, to make clothes that would survive work on the canal and be proof against both textually charged water and the normal kind.

Arthur was also pleased because the raft was moving along the canal at quite a high speed, perhaps twenty miles an hour, fast enough to generate quite a wash behind it. So he was moving towards his objective-if indeed Lady Friday's Scriptorium was his objective. He was having some thoughts about the situation and what he should do, and was weighing whether he should discuss matters with Suzy and Fred.

They are my friends, he thought. But they are also bound to serve the Piper. Ugham is a good bloke, but ulti­mately he has to serve the Piper too. If we get to the Key, Ugham would have to try to take it for the Piper ... or rather, call the Piper in, since he wouldn't be able to take it himself. I wonder if he has some means of contacting the Piper ....

Pirkin finished cutting the sleeves and took up a long needle and some red thread, swiftly hemming the cuffs to finish the process. Arthur was the last to be outfitted, as he had ordered, unconsciously following the ethos of the Army of the Architect, that an officer must look after his or her soldiers first. Suzy and Fred, already resplendent in their typographical coats, had gone outside to make sure the boar-unicorn Nithling was not somehow pursuing them, Ugham following them like a large and faithful hound shepherding some toddlers. The Newnith had been reluctant to change his uniform, but had complied when Pirkin explained that the textually charged currents and other sorceries in the canal would actively try to drown anyone not wearing the correct clothing, as made by the Paper Pushers.

The Piper and Saturday will go for the Scriptorium, thought Arthur. One of them will almost certainly get there before I do, and they will also probably fight over it and try to stop each other. But if I can find Part Five of the Will, it doesn't matter who has the Fifth Key; the Will can help me get it. Particularly since I don't trust Lady Friday anyway. So I should try to find the Will first. Though it might also be in the Scriptorium ... I wish Dr. Scamandros were here to do that spell with the gold leaf ....

"Cup of hot water?" asked Pirkin, interrupting Arthur's reverie. "We haven't got any tea. Not anymore. We had some on the wharf, but ..."

"Sure." Though Arthur was now quite warm, a cup of hot anything would be welcome. It might help banish the memory of the cold-and would help if he had to go out­side, where it was still snowing. "Are the other Paper Pushers coming in? They don't need to do any poling now, do they?"

"We're in the up seven-six current now, and the canal is a full twenty fathoms deep," said Pirkin. He was quite agreeable now that he had given up trying to prevent Arthur and the others from boarding the raft. "But some­one has to watch the raft, make sure nothing falls off or sinks, to upset the trim. Besides, they're not so used to strangers, being as how they're only ordinary members of the association and not Branch Secretary like I am."

Arthur gratefully took the steaming enamel cup he was offered.

"Thanks. So we're in an up-current? How long will it take to get to the Middle of the Middle? And can we keep going from there to the Top Shelf?"

"We'll reach the Lower Sky by morning," said Pirkin. "Then it depends how long to get through the skylock-"

"The Lower Sky? Skylock?" asked Arthur. "What do you mean? I thought the Middle House was all one big mountain."

"It is and it isn't," said Pirkin. He took a swig of his hot water. "Ah, that's the stuff. Nearly as good as tea, leastways if you haven't got any tea. Where was I? Oh, the Lower Sky. There's a sky above the Flat, that's the Lower Sky. And there's a sky between the Middle of the Middle and the Top Shelf, that's the Middle Sky. And then there's a sky right up top, I suppose. Least there's clouds and suns and suchlike up above the Top Shelf. Top Sky, that would be."