Maddigan's Fantasia (4 page)

‘I’m
eleven
,’ said Boomer indignantly. He hated it when Garland pretended to think he was only ten. ‘I can almost do magic
tricks. Hey, I’ll help you,’ he offered. ‘Maddie helps Ferdy – she used to help Ferdy that is …’ his voice trailed away.

‘Get out!’ cried Garland. ‘Leave me alone.’

‘It won’t work,’ said another voice. A childish one! Lilith again! ‘You’re not good enough yet. You need to practise for years. Years and years.’ She pranced beside them, black-haired, brown-eyed, trying to be cleverer than Garland as she always did.

‘Get out of the way, you kids! I’m going to practise for an
hour
!’ cried Garland. ‘Just leave me alone to do it.’

She did not think they would leave her, but (perhaps because the Fantasia was struggling there at Milton) they did. After all, they were all children of the Fantasia and when the Fantasia succeeded, they succeeded themselves. Garland struggled on, palming the coins, shuffling the cards. Deep down she knew she was not really good enough – but she might – she
might
(if things went well enough) be good enough for a timber town at a wild crossroads.

‘What are you doing?’ asked someone beside her, sounding almost like Boomer, but not quite like Boomer.

‘Leave me alone. I’m working at it!’ she cried.

‘Working at what?’ asked the voice. She understood the words easily, but found she still did not quite recognize the voice itself … and not just the voice. There was a strange quality to it as if the speaker were somehow breathing a different air. Garland turned.

And there they were. There they were again – the same two boys she had seen on the hillside. One (the taller of the two)
balancing
that little child on his hip this time, the other smaller one, a thin rather delicate-looking boy, was still strung around with those boxes including a curious black box … a camera perhaps. Garland had seen cameras in the museum in Solis and knew that, once upon a time, those boxes had somehow been
able to blink and that pictures of the world would peel up out of them. The boy’s jacket bulged as if he had something hidden in the front of it. And, back there, when they first met, these boys had known her name even though they had never met before.

‘Are you following us?’ she asked.

‘Listen! Just listen!’ said the older boy in a soft, urgent voice. ‘My name is Timon. My brother is called Eden and the little one here is Jewel. We’re …’ (he seemed to stop and think what to say next). ‘We’re friends of Solis,’ he said at last as if he were experimenting with words. ‘And we’re – we’re lost – well,
half-lost
. We’re hungry. We need food. But we’re not just begging. We’ll work for it.’

Garland hesitated. They did look tired and hungry … and of course the Fantasia always needed workers, to load and unload, to haul on the ropes and, later, to help with the folding, the lifting, the stowing, and the checking of the wheels. And they needed trackers to guide the vans over the rough pieces of the road or places where the road vanished altogether. She was about to suggest they talk to Yves or Bannister … when the older boy, glancing sideways, suddenly stiffened.

‘Oh no!’ he said softly, and nudged the smaller one. ‘Maska and Ozul!’ He turned to Garland. ‘We’ve got enemies following us. Can you hide us?’

The world was unreliable. It always had been and always would be. There it was, up to its tricks again. Garland shook her head, not understanding what was going on, but, even as she shook her head, she was opening the door of Ferdy’s cabinet of vanishment with one hand and pointing into it with the other.

‘In there!’ she said.

‘No time to tell you,’ muttered Timon, scrambling obediently into the cabinet, holding one hand over the baby’s head, protecting it from accidental bumps.

‘This could be a sort of trap,’ mumbled Eden, scrambling in after him. But Garland shut the door on them and, hands shaking, tried to palm a coin, and then to flick a card (which broke away from her indignantly, flying out, then down, trying to escape from her unpractised fingers). Who were those boys? What were they hiding from? Only a moment later she knew.

Two strange men were looking down at her from the back of two black horses … not Fantasia horses. Garland knew all the Fantasia horses well. They were part of her family. The men themselves had a strange, freshly polished look, as if their clothes were all new and their skins had been washed and oiled only minutes ago. What had that tall boy called them? Ozul and Maska? But which was which?

‘You!’ said one of the men. ‘You were talking to those boys just now.’

Garland shrugged boldly. Then, looking up at the man’s face she felt suddenly frightened, for his face did not look like a proper face … a face grown from a true childhood. It somehow looked as if it had been invented by some mad scientist back before the Remaking, before the Chaos … during the Destruction perhaps … back in some time when the wars were raging around the world like savage plagues. His companion looked rather more ordinary, but all the same there was nothing reassuring about him, and when he spoke his soft reasonable voice sounded strange coming out, as it did, between such pointed teeth and from such a grim mouth.

‘We’re trying to find those boys, you see. They’re relations of mine … my nephews and my dear little niece. We’re worried about them, and need to find them and bring them home again. They’re too young to be wandering around in a wild world like this.’

‘Why did they run away?’ asked Garland. She did not for a
moment believe that a man who looked so cruel could be a loving uncle … in fact she found it difficult to believe he could be an uncle of any kind.

‘Oh well …’ he was saying, and somehow Garland knew he was inventing a story, snatching it out of nowhere. ‘They had a fight with their mother … my sister. You know how it is. Sometimes there are fights even in the happiest families.’

Garland certainly knew that there could be fights in happy families. Sometimes she and Ferdy had argued fiercely with one another. All the same she did not believe this man had anything to do with any sort of happy family. And the man seemed to see in her expression that she did not believe him. His eyebrows tilted downwards across the bony bridge of his nose.

‘Come on now!’ he said, his voice darkening. The cruelty she had read in his face began to edge into his voice. ‘Where did they go?’

‘They asked me for food, but I haven’t got any. The Road Rats stole our stores. So the boys just took off …’ she waved her hand vaguely. ‘Perhaps they saw you coming.’

But the man who had spoken to her first swung himself down from his horse and advanced on her. He flicked one hand at Ferdy’s table, and the carefully arranged cards and coins and scarves and boxes leaped away into the wet grass as if they were terrified. Then, without asking, the man reached past her, seized the door of the cabinet of vanishment and wrenched it violently open. Garland cried out, partly in warning but in fear as well.

The cabinet was totally empty. Garland sighed with hidden relief. Those boys must have solved the mystery of the cabinet and must have managed to hide themselves in the secret spaces somewhere in the walls.

And then, before anything more could be said, Yves was suddenly upon them asking what was going on. Garland had
never imagined she would ever be glad to have Yves closing in on her … standing between her and the rest of the world. The second man turned to meet him, smiling and using his soft and reasonable voice – explaining that he was looking for his nephews and his little niece – declaring once again that there had been a family fight, and the boys had run away leaving a mother who was, by now, desperately worried about them. As the second man talked glibly on, the first man stared around as if he might suddenly see some clue in the air.

‘And there
is
a reward,’ the second man was adding slyly. Garland saw Yves blinking and thinking about the reward. Moving forward, he peered into the cabinet himself, then touched the hidden lever. The inside of the cabinet throbbed. Bits of it moved away from the rest of it. The false back folded up. The false sides slid across one another. The boys would be revealed, for they must – they absolutely
must
be hiding in there. Garland held her breath but, incredibly, the secret spaces were empty. The boys had truly vanished. Somehow they had not only solved the trick of the cabinet’s secret spaces, but had worked out some other escape as well, and had crawled and wriggled away, no doubt, into the flapping forest of tents beyond.

‘We’ll have a look around along here perhaps,’ said Yves, and moved off with the two riders, now leading their hor ses and picking their way after him. Garland lifted the magician’s table back onto its legs and began gathering up the coins and cards.

What’s happened to the world
? she was thinking.
Everything has turned terrible … and the bits that aren’t terrible have gone mad. I don’t understand anything any more.

‘Everything’s coming to bits,’
Boomer cried later like a tame echo at Garland’s heels. They had lost their ringmaster, and then their food wagon, and now they were having to perform with no time to catch a breath. Their dogs and their strong man all knew their acts by heart, their clowns were word-and-tumble-over perfect, but, peering in past the spectators, Garland could feel that the Milton people were not altogether happy with what they were being shown. Perhaps they had seen it all before. Perhaps they were hungry for some new revelation. She heard people exclaiming derisively to one another.

It’s not going to work
, she thought.
They won’t trade us food. They’ll throw rotten apples at us and drive us away
.

‘
You
can’t go on,’ Boomer said, echoing her thoughts once more. ‘The stars aren’t right.’

‘What do you know about it?’ asked Garland, changing her mind within a moment. She was cross that Boomer might be able to read what she was thinking. ‘I’ve practised all afternoon.’

Yves was pacing backwards and forwards, wearing Ferdy’s ringmaster jacket. Though it was a little too big for him, it seemed to Garland he was falsely swelling himself out in an effort to fill it, strutting around and using the very same jokes that Ferdy had used. She hated it when some of the crowd
laughed. She did not want to have Yves introducing her … yet if she did not perform it would be like yet another death for Ferdy. This was Maddigan’s Fantasia and there must be a Maddigan magician in the ring.

All the same she felt actually sick as the performance
stumbled
on. She was not the only uncertain one. Clotilde, one of the jugglers, spun, stumbled and dropped the stars she was juggling. There was a scornful murmur in the crowd. Someone jeered.

It’s up to me
, Garland was feeling both heroic and terrified as Yves quickly pointed in her direction. On she ran, waving, trying to dance her way to the centre of the circle, while Tane, Morris and Tonto the clowns carried on the magician’s table and trays with the cards and the coins. The rough, jeering voices fell silent. The people from Milton, longing to be amazed in spite of themselves, waited to see what would happen next. Garland looked out at her audience. Women and children sat in the front on the wooden seats, some men sat on the grass, others stood, arms folded behind the women. They looked at Garland with curiosity … without any great friendship but without any hostility either.

‘Come on you! Surprise us!’ someone yelled.

Garland heard her own voice begin shouting out at them, and her first trick went well. The children laughed and pointed. The women and some of the men smiled and shook their heads, happy to be mystified. The second trick went well too. But the third …

She moved too slowly. Her distraction did not work. Suddenly they were all shouting and pointing. Garland felt her hands begin to tremble, and knew that unless she could stop that shaking the fourth trick would not work either.

‘Come on! Surprise us!’ that rough voice yelled again. And the jeering came at her in a ragged chorus. ‘Sur
prise
us! Sur-
prise
us!’

But then, as she stood there fiddling frantically, the jeering
stopped abruptly. From the side, through the restless crowd, the cabinet of vanishment came trundling on, the tall blonde prince Timon pushing it. Garland could see Yves stop and step back at this unexpected entrance, could see Boomer and Lilith and other friends and enemies of hers peering after it. There beside her, Timon came to a standstill. He winked at her.

‘Open the door!’ he hissed, gesturing towards the door
himself
. Almost automatically (for after all she
was
a Maddigan) Garland flung her arms wide – then, turning, flung the door open with a flourish. Pink mist billowed out of it. A dark shape formed somewhere in the mist, and Eden stepped out, dressed, goodness knows how, in scarlet tights sparkling with stars. His clothes had none of the worn look of many of the Maddigan costumes. Eden looked as if everything he was wearing was brand new. He swept off his tall black hat to bow to the
audience
, and a whole flock of little balloons flew out from under the brim and into the early evening sky, seeming to dissolve, almost at once, into the air around them. When Eden clapped his hands, the world changed. Thunderclouds rolled over,
lightning
flashed. But then, within seconds, before the audience had time to work out what was happening and run for cover, the darkness rolled back and a rain of flowers began to fall around, perfect in the air but once again dissolving amongst the grass and into the ground.

The whole Milton mood changed. The little children began to run around, holding out their hands to catch the dissolving flowers … even the men turned their faces, transformed by wonder, towards the sky. At last, at last Maddigan’s Fantasia was filling the world around them with mystery and amazement.

Maddie came out and touched Yves on the arm.

‘Finish it,’ Garland heard her say. ‘Tie it off now, while we’re ahead.’

‘Yes! Right!’ she heard Yves reply. ‘But who are they?’

‘I don’t care!’ said Maddie. ‘They’ve saved us. Finish it!’

Behind Maddie Garland could see Goneril holding the baby girl, and for once looking blissfully contented. The magical act was almost finished. Timon stepped forward and gestured towards Eden. The Milton people waved too and cheered, before moving forward to mix with the Fantasia, still looking on with smiling astonishment. Garland was about to join them, but hesitated. She saw that Eden was sitting down now. He still held one arm high, but his head was bowed, and as she watched his arm sank limply to his side. She went to kneel beside him, planning to ask him just how he had done his astonishing tricks, but found herself asking him if he were all right instead.

‘He’s worn out,’ said Timon. ‘It’s hard, what he does. Particularly when there’s a crowd like this, and he has to touch every mind.’

Somewhere the band began to play. There they went … Bannister and Tane, a brassy duet, marching in front … Boomer coming behind, beating on his drum.

And from the very back of the crowd, hidden by the gathering dusk, the two men on horseback watched unsmiling. They had not wished to join that crowd of people, talking and laughing together and looking up into the sky as if more flowers might appear. Any Fantasia people who noticed them thought these two riders must be men of Milton. Milton people, if they were aware of them, imagined they belonged to the Fantasia.

‘I would say they’ve worked their way into this gang of wanderers,’ said the grimmer of the two men. ‘What do you think, Ozul?’

‘Oh yes,’ said the other. ‘And a crowd like that won’t let them go easily. There’s too much profit in them. But don’t worry! They may have made a lucky chance for themselves, but our turn will come. We’ll stay in this crazy time until we can steal them out of it without twisting the time lines too much – and
steal the Talisman with them. We’ll be patient and cunning. That chance will come and we’ll seize it when it does. And then the Nennog himself will reward us. Oh yes! Wait and see.’

Once again the Fantasia was weaving itself along a puzzle of tangled tracks. Those tracks made it seem as if somehow the mysterious world around them had clapped its hands together and had then drawn them apart revealing a whole cat’s cradle of strings stretching between its fingers.

Sitting up on the front seat of the van wagon – sitting beside her mother who was driving just as her father used to drive – Garland looked around, then bent over her diary. She frowned, struggling to record her distrust of the strange boys who had appeared out of nowhere – the boys Yves had taken into the Fantasia so easily. Who were they? Where had they come from?

Garland paused, staring rather sternly at the road, which seemed determined to lead them into a wilderness, then bent over her book again and pressed her pencil firmly against the page.

The van jolted and her pencil shot across the page as if it were trying to cross out what she had just written.

‘How can you write like that?’ a voice asked. Garland frowned accusingly at her pencil, and she looked sideways to find that Timon and Eden were walking beside the van, looking up at her through the open window and both smiling, Timon with his longish blond hair hanging around his face, Eden slender and brown almost like a stick-boy walking around in the world of skin-and-bone people.

‘I’ve asked her that over and over again,’ Maddie said, bending forward and half-shouting across Garland, just as if she wasn’t there to answer for herself. ‘Her words must go in every
direction. They looked as if they flew right off the page just now.’ The van jolted again.

‘They did … I mean I think they do. The words. Fly off the page, I mean,’ said Eden. Both boys were staring with interest, almost as if they could see her diary, and Garland hastily closed it, bending forward to slide it into her shoulder pack, which was slouching down beside her van seat.

‘You boys!’ said Maddie. ‘I think you saved our skins back there a bit. It was a great show you put on.’ She looked at the road ahead, such as it was, then sideways at the boys once more. ‘I can’t help wondering … where’s your luggage? How do talented creatures like you come to be wandering around on your own, with nothing but the clothes you stand up in?’

‘You know how it is!’ Timon shouted back, smiling.

‘We did have work,’ said Eden, ‘but the one we worked for was a bit rough on us so we ran off. And now he wants us back, but we don’t want to go.’

‘I suppose I shouldn’t ask,’ said Maddie, with something of a groan. ‘And on the other hand I suppose I should. Listen! You haven’t got any parents or loving relatives or anyone like that waiting for you back wherever you came from, have you? I don’t like to think that you might have a distraught mother somewhere …’

‘I absolutely promise we haven’t,’ Timon replied quickly. ‘No family, near or far.’

‘Orphans,’ Eden exclaimed, as if he had just invented the word. ‘Orphans with no relations.’

‘And who taught you to do tricks like the ones you did last night?’ asked Maddie.

Eden looked from side to side rather anxiously.

‘It’s his gift,’ Timon said quickly. ‘It’s more of a – more of a talent than a trick. He brings dreams out of himself and shares them around … not that it’s easy. I mean he does it for twenty
minutes and then he needs to lie down.’ He looked down at his brother who shrugged, still refusing to look directly at Garland or Maddie. ‘It makes him all shy,’ Timon went on. ‘You know! Being odd often makes people shy!’

Garland felt it was time she had something to say and turned to Maddie.

‘Stop for a moment! Stop! I need to stretch myself,’ she commanded, and Maddie laughed and signalled out through the window to let the vans behind her know that she was about to slow down.

Garland slid down to walk with the boys. Usually she rode Samala beside the van but on this occasion she really did need to stretch herself and, besides, even in these strange days after the Remaking, even when the world was full of unexpected meetings, there was something particularly
mysterious
about this one. The Fantasia had willingly taken the boys in, but they did not belong with the Fantasia or with the wild country rolling out around them. Yet nobody else seemed to feel this strangeness about the two boys … this quality they had of not truly belonging anywhere in the world around them.

‘What were you writing?’ Timon asked her, and though it was a perfectly ordinary question it somehow filled Garland with immediate suspicion. He smiled at her … an open easy smile. Garland liked his smile and his ruffled blond hair, but there was no way she wanted to tell anyone what she had been writing in the book with the battered blue cover.

‘Hey! You!’ shouted another voice, cutting in before she needed to answer, and there was Boomer – that pain of a Boomer – zooming around on his bike and waving his arms. He skidded to a stop beside them, cutting the little motor and sliding his heels in the grass. ‘You brought a baby with you. Is it your kid?’

‘She’s our sister,’ Eden said. ‘She’s called Jewel?’

‘Where is she?’ asked Boomer. ‘Have you dumped her somewhere?’

‘The old woman in the van back there offered to look after her,’ said Timon. ‘It’s better for Jewel to have a bed and a place to crawl in than to be carried all the time.’

‘You’re passing your sister over to
Goneril
,’ said Boomer derisively. ‘Great! Goneril hates little kids.’