The Story of Cirrus Flux (17 page)

Bottle Top shrugged. “It’s nothing,” he said. “You’d’ve done the same.”

Cirrus looked again at his friend—the fancy clothes, the brand-new teeth, the horsehair wig on his head. He looked just like a proper gentleman.

“Where did you get that money?” he asked.

Bottle Top glanced up and down the stairs, then blushed.

“The ladies give it me,” he said.

“Give it you? For what?”

Bottle Top hesitated. “For kisses,” he said.

“They kiss you?” said Cirrus, scrunching up his nose, appalled. Then he laughed.

Bottle Top blazed with anger. “It ain’t funny,” he said. “I’m Cupid with the Sparkling Kiss, the highlight of the performance! Just ask Mr. Leechcraft.”

Cirrus quickly wiped the smirk off his face. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean no offense.” He spat on his hand and offered it to Bottle Top. “Are we friends?”

Bottle Top frowned at the dirt on Cirrus’s hand, but then accepted it in his own. “Friends,” he said.

They spotted Mr. Leechcraft coming up the stairs and rushed on to the next levels of the museum. The abundant trophies that decorated the main hall were soon replaced by empty corridors with flaking ceilings. Patches showed where mirrors and paintings had once been displayed. The walls were gray and dingy.

At last they came to a room at the top of the building. It was just like the boys’ dormitory in the hospital—only with fewer beds and fewer boys. Four boys, naked from the waist up, were wrestling on a pair of four-poster beds that had been squeezed into the corner. They were all scrawny and thin, but had tough, bitter expressions, as if they were used to fending for themselves. The floor was strewn with clothes.

“This here’s Cirrus,” said Bottle Top, running through the introductions, “and that’s Micah, Daniel, Ezekiel and Job. They’re the Beautiful Boys.”

“The Beatified Boys, you oaf,” said one of the older boys, chucking a pillow at his head.

The boy who had spoken had fine white scars—like gills—on his cheeks.

“Don’t mind Micah,” said Bottle Top, under his breath. “He’s just sore because I’m the new attraction.”

“What happened to his cheeks?” asked Cirrus in a whisper, as the other boys resumed their wrestling match.

“An accident, I believe,” said Bottle Top. “A halo shattered during one of the performances and cut his face to shreds. He was even uglier before, I’m told.”

Cirrus shuddered, wondering exactly what this meant, but then followed his friend to a basin of cold water that had been set on a dilapidated washstand next to the window. He checked his reflection in a mirror on the wall and started scrubbing the worst of the mud from his body.

He felt tired and sore, but also oddly proud of his battle scars. A thin line of blood had formed where Cut Throat Charlie’s knife had nicked his skin.

He toweled himself dry with his nightshirt, careful to keep his sphere out of sight of the others, while Bottle Top rummaged around on the floor for some clothes. Finally, he selected an outfit, not as nice as his own, and handed it to Cirrus. The jacket was made from pale blue silk and discolored here and there with ugly brown marks. Were they bloodstains or burns? Cirrus couldn’t tell.

“What happened to Ezra?” he asked, as he slid his arms into the sleeves.

Micah looked up from the bed. “Don’t you worry about Ezra,” he said. “He’s gone to a better place.” His eyes turned heavenward. “If you know what I mean.”

The other boys chuckled and picked at their hair.

“Ezra isn’t important,” said Bottle Top, grabbing him by the arm. “You’re here now.” He handed Cirrus some slightly soiled stockings and, as soon as Cirrus was ready, guided him down the stairs.

“Normally, a tour like this costs half a guinea,” he said, as he led Cirrus into the first of the museum’s many rooms. “But for you I’m willing to make an exception.” He grinned, once again displaying his new teeth.

Cirrus followed, eager to see what the Hall of Wonders contained.

Each room was more startling and lavish than the last. Hundreds of glass cases stretched before his eyes, each filled with curious objects. There were thunderstones, bloodstones, serpentines and agates; feather stars, sea fans, sea lilies and corals; scorpions, scarabs and iridescent beetles. Cirrus had never seen so many things in his life. All the treasures in the world seemed to have been collected and exhibited on the shelves.

He touched the token round his neck, wondering if his father might have been a natural philosopher or an explorer. Perhaps he had seen some of these things himself?

At last they came to a dark, musty room near the back of the museum.

“These are devil’s toenails,” said Bottle Top, pointing to a cabinet full of spiral-shaped fossils, “back from the days when God drowned the world in the Flood. And these,” he said, hurrying over to a case full of sharp, flinty objects, “these are Elf Arrows, used for killing deer in the past. At least, that’s what Mr. Leechcraft says.” He zigzagged across the room. “Now I want to show you where he keeps his heads.”

Cirrus was about to follow when he noticed a thick black curtain hanging in the shadows.

“What’s behind there?” he asked, surprised by the goose bumps that had erupted on his flesh. A strange smell, much like Mr. Leechcraft’s breath, seemed to hover in the air.

Bottle Top hesitated. “That’s where Mr. Leechcraft performs his experiments,” he said. “You’re not to go down there. At least, not yet. He’ll show you soon enough.”

He pulled Cirrus toward a cabinet full of skulls and frightening masks. “These are my favorites,” he said, smiling happily at a row of shrunken heads. “Gruesome, ain’t they?”

Cirrus stared at the ugly, scrunched-up faces. Their eyes and mouths had been sewn shut, and barbs and quills had been thrust through their earlobes and noses.

“First they remove the brains with sticks,” explained Bottle Top with relish, “and then they dry the skin. They put pebbles in them to keep their shape.…”

Cirrus looked at him, surprised. How did he know all this? Once again, he was struck by the transformation in his friend.

“What happened to your teeth?” he asked.

Bottle Top glanced away and touched his lips. His cheeks were fatter than usual and daubed with white powder, which didn’t quite hide the bruising underneath.

“Mr. Leechcraft took me to the best tooth surgeon in London,” he said finally. “Mr. Crucius Fang.”

Cirrus cupped a hand over his mouth. “Did it hurt?”

“Only a little,” said Bottle Top bravely. “The worst bit was the blood.”

Cirrus listened squeamishly as Bottle Top described in gory detail everything that had happened: how, after loosening the boy’s teeth with a hammer and chisel, Mr. Fang had reached in with a pair of rusty pliers and ripped each of them out from the gum.

“There was blood everywhere,” said Bottle Top. “Course, it was all worth it in the end.” He stopped to consider his reflection in a glass cabinet. “Mr. Leechcraft says I’ve got the face of an angel … and the Virtue to prove it.”

Cirrus took another sidelong glance at the curtain, remembering how Mr. Leechcraft had used the word “Virtue” to describe the strange crackling sensation he had been able to extract from Bottle Top’s hair. What sort of experiments did he conduct there?

“What about you, Cirrus?” said Bottle Top suddenly. “What brings you to the Hall of Wonders?”

Cirrus looked around, aware of the eyes watching him from the walls: the masks, skulls and shrunken heads. He didn’t know what to say. He was afraid of what Mr. Leechcraft might do if he learned about the sphere—especially if it was
as important as the man from Black Mary’s Hole made out. He wasn’t sure if he should confide in Bottle Top.

Instead, he told him about sneaking off to the Gallows Tree and spying on the man from Black Mary’s Hole before running away from the hospital. He made it sound like an adventure. He followed this with an account of how he had escaped from Cut Throat Charlie and finally run into Jonas, who had pointed him in the right direction.

“And now you’re here,” said Bottle Top cheerfully. “Like old times.”

Cirrus nodded. “Like old times,” he said, though the smile on his face wavered at the edges.

The Moon-Sail

M
adame Orrery grabbed Pandora by the arm and dragged her up the stairs. “You deceiving little creature! You interfering child!” she said. “Just look at what you’ve done! Thanks to you, that wretched boy is missing, and now that vile man is presumably looking for him, too, in that infernal flying contraption of his. Just pray that I find the boy first, child. For, if I do not, you will never leave this room. I shall leave you up here to rot!”

She threw Pandora into her room at the end of the corridor and slammed the door behind her. The key turned in the lock and angry footsteps charged back down the staircase.

Pandora stood where she was, too stunned to move, and then rushed to the window, hoping the man from before might be there to help her. She had resolved on the way back to the house in Midas Row to ask him for assistance—if not
to carry her away, then to pass word to the Governor at the hospital that she was in trouble and needed his help. But the sky was full of turbulent clouds and there was no sign of the mysterious stranger.

Her gaze settled once more on the gallant young knight on the church tower opposite, driving the end of his spear into the curled belly of a dragon. How she wished he could protect her! And then she noticed the plain round shield he was holding, a circular mirror, and was reminded of Mr. Sidereal. What had he said? His lenses were positioned on the highest rooftops and steeples, all trained on the streets below …

All of a sudden, she could feel his eye on her, watching her from his observatory halfway across the city, and backed away from the window, into the furthest corner of her room. She crawled onto her bed and lay down, covering herself with a thin blanket of shadow.

Below her the house was quiet. She listened to the silence, breathing it in, remembering Madame Orrery’s chilling words from the night before: she could remain up here forever and no one would know, no one would care.… She scrabbled in her pocket for the piece of fabric she carried with her and then, with a stab of anger, realized that it was no longer there. Madame Orrery had taken it.

She closed her eyes and tried to block out the feelings eating away at her heart.

She must have drifted off to sleep, for when she next opened her eyes she was aware of a red glimmer in the room,
like firelight. She leapt to her feet and, this time, rushed straight to the window.

The man in the basket was there, hovering outside. She could make out the fiery bird flapping its wings above his head.

“Did you find him?” she asked eagerly, opening the window as far as it would go. “Cirrus Flux—is he all right?”

The man leaned toward her. “There was no sign of him, child. Do you know where he might be?”

Pandora thought of the two boys she had seen sneaking around the edge of the square with the golden statue—she was certain one of them had been Cirrus—and was about to tell him what she knew, when she heard something move in the depths of the house. It could have been anything: a shifting floorboard, scuffling mice or even Mr. Sorrel, she supposed, venturing as far as he dared. Or had Madame Orrery been suspicious? Had she been waiting for the man to return all along?

She held her breath and listened, trying to isolate different sounds in the darkness. And then it came again. The sound of footsteps on the stairs.

Someone was coming.

“Please! Take me with you,” she said at once. “I can help you find him. I think I know where he is.”

The man dipped momentarily out of view as a gust of wind blew him to one side and she feared he was going to leave her, but then he pulled on the ropes connecting the
wicker basket to the net of fabric and his grimy face reappeared.

“I can’t, child, I can’t,” he said, as soon as he was able. “Tell me where to find the boy.”

Pandora hopped from foot to foot. She was certain now that the person had reached the landing.

“Please,” she said again, her eyes widening in terror. “Madame Orrery knows you’re looking for the boy. I think she’s coming now. You’ve got to take me with you!”

The words were spilling out of her and she tugged on the window, struggling in vain to lift it. Tears were streaming down her face.

Her desperation seemed to goad the man into action. With a swift glance at the bird above him, he raised a fist in the air.

“Quick! Step back from the window!” he cried, as, moments later, his gloved hand swung through the pane and showered the air with glass.

A holler sounded from the landing outside and footsteps rushed toward the door. Keys slipped and jangled to the floor.

“Here, give me your hand!” said the man to Pandora, as the door burst open and Madame Orrery appeared.

With a savage cry she lunged toward them and scrabbled for a hold on the girl’s ankle, just as the man scooped Pandora into the air.

Pandora felt herself pulled through the open window toward the basket, but Madame Orrery caught her foot and
refused to let go. Pandora kicked out in alarm. One of her shoes came loose and spiraled all the way to the ground. She looked down. It was a terrifying drop.