Solace & Grief (13 page)

The bell shivered, cracked and crumbled into dust. Resonant in the aftersound of the bell-song, a single word, unspoken by Solace, hung in the air:

Remember
.

Solace settled down to wait.

Still asleep, Solace rose from Manx's side and began to walk.

Outside, the light was grey with the new day's efforts at dawn.

She went down the street, and down another, and then another. The sun came up and Solace, her skin unshielded by anything more than a slip-dress that Jess had given her, began to bleach and sway – but nonetheless, she walked on, and on.

She knew the way, now.

Marjorie Henson was getting up and ready for work when she heard the bell. Not in real life – surely not in real life? but her ears and mind burned with the memory of sound.

Quietly, without waking her husband, she went to the cabinet in the lounge room and turned the key in the door. Carefully setting aside all of the books from the middle row, she removed the actual shelf and set it down, too. With trembling fingers, she prised away the false panel at the back and pulled out an aged book. Gently, reverently, she set it to her left.

The book was covered in old black leather, devoid of inscription or sign, the pages yellowed. Marjorie did not open it. Instead, she replaced the false panel, returned the shelf to the cabinet, and the other books (the normal books, the safe books,
her
books) to the shelf. Then she picked up the leather tome, and grabbing her purse and uniform from the kitchen bench, jumped into her car and drove off. The book sat on the passenger seat, as innocent as a cat; which was to say, it had done nothing bad she could think of, but bore in its look and manner the potential that it
might
.

Marjorie drove, quite without thinking, down roads she hadn't used for years – roads she did not, in fact, recall ever having known at all. By the time she had reached her destination and climbed out of the car, the lucid part of her brain was screaming that she was lost. She clutched the book under one arm. The rest of Marjorie, content in a dream-like stupor, walked unerringly to a derelict, slouching building with boarded-up windows, climbing the concrete stairs to the door, which was sealed and bound with chains and two heavy padlocks. Despite all logic, the door opened at her slightest touch, the metal seeming to flicker, bend and vanish as she entered.

When the door swung shut behind her, heavy and hard, she heard the locks thump on the wood.

And then there were stairs. Marjorie climbed them – one flight, two flights, three flights, four, five, eventually revealing a single door to a single room, an attic at the summit of this broken, boarded house.

She opened the door.

‘Come on in,’ said a voice.

Marjorie stepped through, and shut the door.

‘Well,’ said Solace. The stranger was in her late fifties, curvy running to plump, with soft grey hair, watery blue eyes and a round, unfamiliar face.

‘My name is Marjorie,’ she said. Her voice trembled. ‘And you are…’ She looked at the bed, and saw the bodies, whole and not decayed, though pale. ‘You are
their
daughter.’

‘Yes. I am.’

‘This book is yours.’

She held it out. Solace, who had been sitting cross-legged in the middle of the floor, stood up and took it. Although it looked heavy, it weighed nothing in her hands, light as feathers, light as
light
.

‘I think –’ Marjorie bit her lip. Sweat beaded her forehead. ‘I think I delivered you. Here, in this room. But of course, I've never been here before. Have I?’

It was then that she saw the remains of the bell, piled on the floor where Solace had been waiting. It should have been impossible to tell what shape the dust had originally held, but Marjorie quivered, suddenly possessed by some subtle, animal fear, eyes widening, nostrils flaring.

‘That bell –’

‘The bell is dust,’ said Solace. Her voice was distant, speaking words in a ritual far older than any of the room's occupants, living or dead. ‘As it was broken, so I break your bonds. Ivory, the bone of sleep, is crumbled into dust. You will not dream. Bronze, the waking sound and sun, is crumbled into dust. You will not see. Go now. Go well. Go silently. You never knew this place.’

And, silent, Marjorie went.

Uncertain of whether she was dreaming, or in the real world, or both, Solace picked up the bell – now miraculously whole again – in her right hand, the book clutched tight to her body. She tilted her head to the ceiling.

‘Glide? Are you out there? I think I'm lost.’ She paused, uncertain. ‘Bring me home?’

Always, my lady
>

‘Sharpsoft?’

The world turned purple.

Solace sat up in bed, the book and bell in her hands. Beside her, Manx breathed deeply, one arm flung wide, the other curled close to his face; even in repose, his features seemed somewhat feline.

‘This bell is dust,’ Solace echoed, and flung it at the wall. There was no sound. Instead, a shiver of static rippled through the air, while featherings of silver ash fell softly down, like motes from a funeral pyre.

S
olace sat on the edge of the bed, the big black book in her lap. She stared at it, running her fingers lightly across the cover. Like any orphan, she'd always been curious about her parents, resenting her abandonment at times, but never raging at her lack of familial knowledge. She'd never played games, as many others had, imagining that one day two beautiful people would walk in and claim her as their daughter, separated from them by accident or chance; she'd never worked herself into a frenzy when potential adoptive parents had come looking for a child – at least, not after the first few disappointments. Thinking back now, with the weightless book on her knees – well, maybe not
entirely
weightless, here in the real world – it was as if the knowledge of her strangeness had given her something else to puzzle over, something more real than wistful thinking. Perhaps it had given her solace. But learning her true name had changed things. Her parents were more a part of her identity than she'd ever really suspected – maybe the greatest part of all.

Tentatively, she opened the book.

The first thing she noticed was the key, bound by two leather straps to the inside front cover. It was long, made of a dark, green-gold metal and – she looked closer – engraved along one side with a single word:
Starveldt
. Solace felt her fingers tremble. The key was cold to the touch; unreasonably so, as if it had just been withdrawn from ice. Gently, she tugged the leather straps. Each one had been positioned just so along the length of the key, behind or above its teeth, presumably so as to prevent it falling out, and the thought occurred to Solace that they must have been added to the book with this particular key in mind. Frowning, she peered closer – was it even possible to remove the straps without breaking them? It wasn't until she held the cover up to eye level that she noticed the press-studs, sunk so cunningly into the leather on both sides as to be almost invisible. For a moment, she hesitated. Should she undo them? Then, abruptly, she laughed – of all the things to puzzle over, with the book itself still unread! Shaking her head, she focused again on the contents.

The first page she turned was yellowed and blank; she passed it over, revealing an abundance of long, sloping, immaculate handwriting. Her heart began to beat faster as she read the first heading:

After Grief.

‘Grief,’ she echoed, thinking of Jess's words.

‘Read on,’ said a voice from beside her. Startled, Solace slammed the book shut and stood up, half expecting the speaker to be Manx – irrationally so, as he was clearly still asleep.

Glide grinned at her consternation, leaning one arm casually on the doorjamb.

‘That's some light reading you've got there,’ he said. ‘I could feel it when you opened the book.’

‘Feel?’

‘Not on the grand scale of wars or suchlike, but a part of the universe noticed. A small part,’ he added, seeing her expression. ‘Also, I heard you ask me to bring you home. I would have obliged, but –’ he shrugged, ‘– someone else beat me to it. Just who is Sharpsoft, anyway?’

Solace bit her lip.

‘Come on,’ said Glide. ‘We can talk in my room. Jess is downstairs,’ he added, almost as an afterthought. Solace chuckled obligingly as she followed him out into the hall, but felt her skin start to fizz.

‘You didn't take her up on the offer, then?’ she asked.

Glide raised an eyebrow, the edge of his mouth twitching almost imperceptibly. ‘I don't know what you're talking about. Now.’ Gentlemanlike, he stood aside and let her walk in first. ‘Tell me what's been happening.’

Shutting the door behind them, he gestured for Solace to take a seat on the bed, leading by example when she declined. Hesitantly, Solace perched next to him, hugging the book. The Vampire Cynic wanted to lie and keep her experiences to herself, but she opened her mouth instead and began with her time at the group home, seeing as Glide hadn't been privy to that much before. He listened silently, never asking questions, although his eyes widened just a little when she told him about Sharpsoft's visit and the woman who'd given her the book. When she was done, he sighed.

‘Evan showed me the spare surveys. I didn't tell him, but they're witched. I
had
to fill one out.’ He shook his head. ‘Your Professor Lukin has someone like Electra working for him, someone who can work their will in a very specific way. Whoever reads those things has to answer honestly, and is compelled – not forced, but compelled very strongly – to return them. I'm guessing that after the initial working, whoever it was didn't have enough strength left for a second coercion.’

‘Fin,’ she murmured suddenly. Glide raised an eyebrow. ‘One of the students handing out the surveys,’ she explained. ‘Before we showed up and told him, he didn't know about the questions. He hadn't read them. When we showed him, he seemed so… frightened, I guess. Like he wanted nothing to do with it. But as we were leaving, I saw him filling one out. It didn't make sense at the time. But now…’ She paused. ‘Do you think we shouldn't go? It's today, you know, our appointment with Lukin. This afternoon. Later.’

Glide shook his head. ‘No. I agree with what Manx said last night – you need to find out, and if Lukin's that serious about this, he'd probably chase you up anyway. What's that saying about forewarned is forearmed? I don't know. Sometimes I think I spend so much time drifting through reality that I've forgotten how it works when I'm not just watching. So much looks easy. It never is, though.’

A haggard look flickered in his eyes; it was there only briefly, but Solace saw it. For a moment, she was puzzled. Then a thought struck her.

‘You're addicted,’ she said, phrasing it almost as a question. Glide nodded. She laughed softly. ‘A harder habit to kick I can't imagine. What's it like, really? What can you do? What do you see? I imagine it's a big universe.’

‘Everything,’ Glide murmured. ‘It took me years to be able to control it, but then, I think that's the same for all of us with Tricks. As a kid, I always thought I was going mad. I'd get bored at school and suddenly I wouldn't be listening to a lesson about Caesar, I'd
be
there, watching his conquest. I tell you,
veni, vidi, vici
is one thing in a textbook, but in real life? All you can see is the mud and muck of Gaul, guts on the ground and some damn fool of a standard-bearer scrabbling around for a dropped eagle. Do you know what sound a horse makes when it's dying? Hundreds of horses? Thousands?’ He laughed, but the sound was mirthless.

‘And then, for no reason I could understand, I'd snap out of it. At some point – I think I was about nine or so – I made the mistake of telling my parents. See, they'd noticed before that I was odd, but a lot of what I said could have been put down to childish imagination. Or maybe they'd just been lying to themselves, wanting so much for me to be normal that they ignored it – I don't know. But I was old enough to know the difference between dreams and reality, or so they expected, and I was dragged to shrink after shrink. Not one of them could agree on what my problem was – they diagnosed epilepsy, schizophrenia, you name it. A couple insisted I must be on drugs, even though my tests were clean. They dosed me up for everything but, in the end, my dreams were still real. One day, I drifted – I don't know where. A dark place. And something… I couldn't get
out
. I went catatonic. That's when they locked me up. I was fourteen.’

Glide's voice was almost a whisper. Solace scarcely breathed.

‘So I let it take me. Somehow, accepting it helped – I had nothing else left, and they already thought I was crazy. What harm could it do? Before, I'd always fought it, hoped it would go away. But when I embraced it, I started to understand. I knew I was right, no matter what anyone said. The knowledge calmed me, made me sane again – because I did go mad, for a bit. For a little while. Eventually, I could control it well enough that they thought I was cured. They let me go after three years. But with nowhere to stay, with the world the way it is? It was easier just to let the universe win.’

Somehow, Solace found the will to speak. ‘You came here?’

‘Not at first. Here was when I started to get better. Before, I'd go days without food because I kept telling myself
just one thing more,
and when I came to I'd be stuck in a gutter somewhere. But I've been improving. Being here helps. Electra keeps me fed. The house keeps me dry and warm. And having other people like me here – that helps, too. Knowing I'm not the only one. But I still spend more time in the universe than awake. If I try and block it for too long, it all starts to creep in at the edges. I can watch in controlled stints if I have to, like I did back at the hospital, but that's as good as it gets. Otherwise things will look exactly as they should do, right up until they don't. But I've been getting better at staying lucid, fighting it more, like last night.’ He gulped, and then laughed, somewhat apologetically, as he ran a hand through his hair.

‘Sorry,’ he managed. ‘We
were
meant to be talking about you.’

‘Hey,’ said Solace, her throat tight. ‘Don't even worry about it.’

Glide blushed and looked away.

‘It's not like I just go around telling everyone my life story, you know? Or like I ever have. But… thank you. For listening.’ He paused, as if uncertain of what to say next. When he finally spoke, his voice had changed, becoming stronger, more confident.

‘Anyway, Sharpsoft. He must be a bit like me in some ways, except that he can move his body as well as his mind. Move
objects
. He's powerful, if he can do that. I've tried once or twice, but it's bloody hard.’

‘I thought you said you'd been going to bring me home?’

‘A part of you already
was
home. I'd just have prodded until you snapped back into place – don't ask for a better explanation, because I can't give you one. Sharpsoft, though, he just
put
you there, book and all. I probably couldn't have managed even this.’ He tapped the cover on her lap.

‘Well,’ said Solace, because there wasn't really anything else to be said. There was an awkward silence. Then Glide twitched – not much, but enough that the sudden motion made Solace jump.

He smiled guiltily. ‘Sorry. I didn't even let you read the thing. You're probably wanting to know what's in there, about your family.’

‘Just a bit,’ she admitted. ‘But it can wait one more day.’ She hesitated. ‘Do you mind not telling the others just yet, about Sharpsoft? I've got the strangest feeling. I think he
wants
to be kept a secret, not because of anything sinister – well, there's a reason, obviously, but I can't quite describe it. It's just … I
know
him. Or at least, it feels like I should.’

‘What do you mean?’

Solace took a deep breath. ‘It's like, when he helped me remember my parents, part of him crossed over, too. It was… odd, and a little intimidating, but I don't think he's a threat not now, anyway, not if we keep him to ourselves. I feel bad about it, but he's not really my secret to tell. He's his.’ She turned. ‘
Can
you keep a secret?’

Glide smiled. After a moment, he nodded. ‘All right,’ he said. ‘I trust you.’

‘Where are we going again, exactly?’ Manx asked.

Electra pulled out the piece of paper that Lukin had given them while Solace looked on, scanning it. There were directions and a time, yes, but no building name or number. And the directions themselves were
odd
.

‘We don't know,’ Solace replied, when Electra remained silent. Reflexively, she pushed her hands into her pockets, only to remember too late that doing so would squash Glide's survey. Although Glide himself had opted to stay at home, he had told the others about the surveys being witched. That alone had led to a half-hour discussion on whether or not going was still such a good idea, but in the end, curiosity and boredom had won out over caution, and in that spirit they had left the house. Wordlessly, Solace handed the paper to Manx, who took it with a feigned resignation. He could be the one to give it to Lukin, she decided – assuming they ever found him.

It was an overcast afternoon, for which Solace was grateful. As the clouds skittered mulishly overhead, they strolled down the broad footpath outside the Town Hall, coming to a halt beside the flat stone stairs. Thoughtfully scratching the side of her neck, Electra glared anew at the directions, as though daring them to make any
less
sense.