The City of Dreaming Books (56 page)

‘ “So be a good boy and stay put!” Claudio Harpstick put in from behind Smyke’s back.

‘“I also took the liberty”, Smyke went on, “of implanting a few new organs in your body. I’m sure you’ve heard of the experiments the Bookemists conducted on Animatomes. They made immense strides in the field of artificial organ manufacture - a process sadly prohibited by the laws of Zamonia. I have given you a new heart powered by an alchemical battery. Your liver was constructed out of five ox livers and should last you for centuries. Your brain now contains an anger-management gland that once belonged to a mountain gorilla. As for your muscles, we persuaded an exceptionally well-built Bookhunter to donate a few of his - after giving him one of my Toxicotomes to read. Then there’s the organ which few people realise
is
an organ: the blood.”

‘Smyke went over to a cupboard and took out a large, empty glass bottle.

‘ “We took the liberty of pepping up your blood a little. For this we used a precious fluid - the most precious fluid of all, in fact: a whole bottle of Comet Wine, the rarest wine in Zamonia. We spared no expense, as you see.”

‘Smyke tossed the empty bottle heedlessly over his shoulder, smashing it.

‘ “It’s said that the admixture of blood in Comet Wine is imperishable and imparts eternal strength, so there’s a kind of fountain of youth flowing inside you. What I find far more interesting about Comet Wine, however, is the fact that it’s accursed, so you’ll always carry a curse inside you. That renders you a tragic figure, so to speak. Romantic, no?”

‘Smyke looked at me with feigned regret.

‘ “We’ve also changed one or two other things inside you, some organic, others mechanical - I won’t bore you with the details, you’ll notice this from your increased energy and new faculties once you’ve recuperated properly. Lead a healthy life in the catacombs and you’ll be able to survive there for centuries.”

‘Smyke went over to a laboratory table and proceeded to fill a large hypodermic syringe with yellow fluid.

‘ “There’s something else that must be puzzling you,” he said. “Why on earth have we gone to so much trouble? Why don’t we simply kill you? There’s a very simple and valid reason for that too. It’s like this: on the surface of Bookholm I’ve got everything under control, but what goes on in the catacombs is an entirely different matter. It’s quite impossible for me to intervene and regulate things down there. The Bookhunters have been running amok lately. There are too many of them and they’ve grown too greedy, too stupid. Some of them, especially that demented butcher Rongkong Koma, have become too powerful and arrogant for my taste. In short, I’d like you to restore a little order down there. That’s why I’ve made you so strong, so big and dangerous. I’d like you to effect something of a clearance among the Bookhunters - to prune their numbers a trifle, let’s say. Would you do that for me?”

‘Smyke grinned.

‘ “I know what you’re thinking,” he went on. “Why the devil should I do Pfistomel Smyke’s dirty work? Well, I’ve taken care of that too. I’ve put a big fat price on your head and I’ve promised Rongkong Koma the biggest bounty of all. If you don’t go after the Bookhunters, they’ll come after you. They’ve no idea how strong you are. You’ll have sent half of them into retirement before the word gets around. There’s nothing you can do about it. The moment you appear down there they’ll be hot on your heels, and I’ll make sure your arrival is signalled by a few fanfares, take it from me.”

‘Smyke looked at the fluid in the syringe.

‘“So now you’re a walking book - the rarest, most valuable, most dangerous and sought-after book in the catacombs. You’re the stuff of which legends are made. Which brings us to your last and probably most pressing question: Why am I using you for this purpose? You haven’t done me any harm. You showed me a sheaf of manuscript, that’s all, so what is it that makes you so dangerous to me?”

‘Smyke heightened the suspense by leaving the question in the air for a moment.’

Homuncolossus, too, fell silent and left Smyke’s question in the air for one agonisingly long moment. It was all I could do to refrain from making some interjection. Even the Animatomes rustled and squeaked impatiently. At last Homuncolossus went on.

‘ “I’ll tell you the real reason for all these measures,” said Smyke. “You write too well.”

‘He gave a hoarse laugh and approached me with the syringe.

‘ “Unlike our obtuse friend Claudio Harpstick here,” he said, “I’m quite capable of telling the difference between a piece of good writing and a hole in the ground. I’ve read everything you’ve written, including the story about your writer’s block, and I have to admit that nothing as good has ever come my way. Not ever! It made me laugh, it made me cry, it drove me to despair one moment and banished all my cares the next - in short, it had everything really good writing ought to have. That plus a bit more. All right, much more - very much more! There’s more meat in a single sentence of yours than many a whole book contains. Your writing is pervaded by the Orm with an intensity I’ve encountered in no other form of literature. I attached your poems to my Bookemistic ormometer and it burnt out all the alchemical batteries! You’re hot, my friend. Far too hot!” ‘Smyke expelled the last remaining bubbles from his syringe.

‘ “To put it simply: if you published even one title here in Bookholm, the Zamonian book market would be up the spout, and the Zamonian book market is me, Pfistomel Smyke. Your kind of writing is so perfect, so pure, so utterly satisfying, that nobody who sampled it would want to read anything else. It provides a shameful demonstration of the banality of our usual reading matter. Why browse on that rubbish when
your
books can be read again and again? Have you any idea how much time and trouble it has taken me to reduce Zamonian literature to the carefully controlled mediocrity it now displays? Worse still, you might set an example. You might inspire other writers to produce finer books and aspire to the Orm - to write less but better.”

‘Smyke gave me a look of entreaty. “The problem is this: in order to make money - lots of money - we don’t need flawless literary masterpieces. What we need is mediocre rubbish, trash suitable for mass consumption. More and more, bigger and bigger blockbusters of less and less significance. What counts is the paper we sell, not the words that are printed on it.”

‘Smyke found a spot in my thigh, inserted the needle between two shreds of paper and thrust it into my flesh.

‘ “To sum up,” he said, “you were an endangered species at birth. You’re the first and last of your kind, the greatest writer in Zamonia and, thus, my direst foe. I wish you a new life in the catacombs and better luck there than in your former existence, which is now at an end.”

‘So saying, he injected the fluid into my bloodstream and rendered me unconscious.

‘When I awoke I was deep in the catacombs. Beside me lay a bundle containing all the manuscripts and other possessions I’d brought with me to Bookholm. I had been exiled here, complete with my life to date. And in the labyrinth of passages around me, which were lined with ancient volumes, I could already hear Bookhunters in full cry.’

H
omuncolossus gave a mirthless laugh. ‘Believe me,’ he said, ‘it wasn’t long before I started to enjoy hunting Bookhunters. I killed the first one purely in self-defence. Still completely bemused by Smyke’s toxic injection, I had no idea where and who I was when he turned up in his crazy armour, equipped with an arsenal of weapons. He probably thought I was easy meat for his spears and his two-edged sword when he saw me staggering around in a daze.’

Homuncolossus raised his right hand and regarded it thoughtfully. Outlined against the candlelight, his talons looked as sharp as a set of carving knives.

‘Paper shouldn’t be underestimated,’ he said. ‘Have you ever cut yourself on a sheet of ordinary writing paper?’

Yes, I had, more than once, when hurriedly sorting out manuscripts or opening letters. The cuts had always hurt a lot and bled profusely.

‘Then perhaps you can imagine the damage inflicted by sheets of sharp-edged, carefully laminated and neatly glued parchment, especially when they’re wielded by a colossus with the muscles and reflexes of a gorilla. Believe me, I was even more astonished than the Bookhunter when he sank to the ground at my feet, streaming with blood. And that concluded the Bookhunters’ hunting of me. From then on,
I
hunted
them.
’

Homuncolossus lowered his hand.

‘I felt at home in the catacombs from the very first. I mean, I was naturally bewildered and angry, at a loss and in despair, but my new environment never for a moment struck me as alien or menacing. I liked the scent of the Dreaming Books, the chilly gloom, the silence and solitude. I had been reborn into a world for which Smyke had literally made me to measure. I had no need to create an imaginary world in order to come to terms with the real one. The catacombs of Bookholm appealed to me on sight; they were like a vast palace in which every room belonged to me. I wasn’t even angry with Smyke, not at first. Once the drug wore off I experienced an immense accretion of physical strength. Energy surged through me like a tidal wave of unadulterated Orm. I had been relieved of all my fears and cares. I was as wild and free and unconstrained as a predator in a primeval forest.

‘My new body held some new surprise for me every day: greater strength and speed, unlimited stamina and amazing reflexes, the toughness of my new skin and the ease with which I could see in the dark. I could hear the inaudible squeak of a bat and locate an insect by smell in utter darkness.

‘I liked the shadows in the catacombs and they liked me. They concealed me from Bookhunters and allowed me to become one with them, so that I could suddenly emerge and fall on my enemies like a ghost. They enshrouded me and kept watch over my slumbers. It’s not surprising that people in many parts of the world call me the Shadow King, although no name could be less appropriate. No one rules the shadows of the catacombs.’

Homuncolossus gave a little bark of laughter and fell silent.

‘Are you referring to the shadows that flit through this castle?’ I asked.

He looked up. ‘So you’ve seen them too? Yes, they’re the ones I mean, but first things first. All in good time. I still haven’t got to Shadowhall Castle in my story, not by a long chalk.’

I was afraid he might give me another harsh reprimand, but he simply picked up where he’d left off.

‘All Bookhunters have a style of their own, their identifying marks, their own types of armour, their special weapons, methods of hunting and killing and so on. These are dictated by their personal vanity and code of honour. They may band together to carry out joint military operations, but they always go their own way afterwards. Most of them are inveterate loners. That was my great advantage from the start, and they still haven’t grasped that they’ll never deal with me unless they cooperate. But then they’d have to split the bounty and they’re too avaricious for that. So I picked them off one by one, and it gave me particular pleasure to employ their own techniques against them. For instance, Hokum Bogus used to hound his adversaries until they went mad with fear. I drove him insane by whispering to him out of the darkness for a whole year without ever showing my face.

‘The Krood brothers, Aggro and Glubb, were among the few Bookhunters who operated as a team and attacked their victims from two directions at once. I managed to trick them into slitting each other’s throats.

‘Yonti Yooble, known as “The Sexton” because he liked to bury his opponents beneath piles of books, I buried beneath a pile of books.

‘But what I enjoyed most was using my own body as a weapon in one-to-one confrontations. I sensed that I was growing stronger every day. If paper is compressed tightly enough it turns back into timber. My arms are as robust as tree trunks, my fingers as sharp as spears, my teeth as keen as razor blades.