Jack of Ravens

1

England, 1 May 1851

Beneath a dreaming night sky, the massive bluestones of Stonehenge stood sentinel on the windswept Downs, their setting barely altered since they had first been raised 4,000 years earlier. Church knew all that was about to change. In a few short decades they would be packaged and presented for the modern world, swarmed over by tourists, imprisoned by roads and traffic and watched over by new buildings that were temples of mundanity.

For now Church could enjoy the circle as it was originally intended, part of an ancient landscape of tranquillity where the only sound was the wind across the grass.

‘Get a bloody move on. They’re only stones.’ Tom had grown bad-tempered on the long walk from where the carriage had dropped them off.

‘You know that’s not true.’

‘Losing your lamp has addled you. Can you not feel it?’ Tom rested one hand on the turf. ‘There’s barely a flicker under here. The Blue Fire has gone to sleep. What did you expect? This is the Age of Reason. People these days haven’t got any time for magic, if the journey here is anything to go by. They like big machines and stinking factories, and as much money as they can possibly make, and damn the consequences and the poorhouses.’

‘When I was looking into the Wish-Post, the Libertarian told Shavi that the earth energy was gone, and so were the Fabulous Beasts.’

‘Aye, well, maybe they are gone by then. Right now the energy’s just dormant. It’s linked to our unconscious. If we don’t want it around it dies down. And this is the first time in human history when things we make are more important than things we feel.’

Jerzy gambolled up like a monkey. Despite the failure to remove the Caraprix, his new-found freedom had left him changed: brighter, more optimistic, filled with passion and humour.

‘Bloody hell!’ Tom strode off, shouting, ‘Damnable ape! What I would give for some intelligent companionship.’

Niamh followed Jerzy, her cape billowing behind her. ‘There is beauty in these Fixed Lands.’ She lifted her head to survey the sea of stars.

Jerzy did a little jig. ‘Methinks the beauty she has her eyes on is earthbound.’

Tom was sitting on a fallen megalith, smoking, when Church reached the circle.

‘At least you’re starting to use your God-given brains,’ the Rhymer said.

‘You were the inspiration.’ Church searched for landmarks, then began to pace out the distance. ‘I needed to stop seeing time from my own narrow perspective. Start taking the long view.’ He weighed in his hands the stone he had brought from Niamh’s court. ‘I need to send a message from now to then.’

You’re starting to make as much sense as the monkey-boy,’ Tom observed.

Church reached the correct spot and then dug a hole with a silver trowel. He dropped the stone in it, replaced the soil and the turf and stamped it down.

When he looked up he was not where he had been standing and the shock of dislocation almost threw him off his feet. Stonehenge was nowhere to be seen, nor were Tom, Niamh or Jerzy. He was on the Downs somewhere — he could tell from the rolling landscape. Struggling with his disorientation, he walked a few paces, calling to the others.

‘What, ho!’

Church jumped. Jerzy was standing a foot behind him, although he had not been there when Church had looked a moment before.

‘Where did you come from?’

Where did you come from?’ Jerzy mimicked.

‘This is no time for your jokes.’ Church looked around uneasily. ‘We need to find out where we are.’

‘We are here, and if we were over there we would be here, too.’

Church ignored the Mocker’s mischief. He was wondering whether this was the start of some attack by the Army of the Ten Billion Spiders, or if the Libertarian or Salazar or Veitch were going to descend on them.

‘I must bid you farewell, to seek my fortune in London,’ Jerzy said.

We’re all going to London,’ Church replied, distracted. You know that. I’ve got to start spreading the word.’

‘There is much mischief in these lands, and mischief is what I love the most. Things shall be turned on their head. What is down shall be up, and vice versa, and inside out. I go to serve at the foot of a master.’

Church was puzzled by Jerzy’s tone, and when he looked at him properly, he caught a strange cast to the Mocker’s face. The unfamiliar expression may have been caused by a shadow passing across the moon, but for one fleeting moment it didn’t look like Jerzy at all.

Church heard his name called, and when he looked up he saw he was back at the same spot where he had buried the stone. The others were walking across the grassland on the other side of the stones; and Jerzy was with them.

Church looked behind him, where Jerzy had been standing. He was alone. He shivered, not quite knowing why, and ran to the others. But when he rounded the circle he could only see Tom and Niamh.

‘There you are,’ Tom snapped. ‘What are you doing, wandering off? I thought the spiders had got you.’

Where’s Jerzy?’ Church asked.

Tom and Niamh looked around, puzzled. ‘He was here only a moment ago,’ Niamh said.

Though they called his name for more than an hour, there was no sign of him. Church told the others what Jerzy had said about going to London, and they all agreed that they had little choice but to hope Jerzy would meet them there.

As their carriage pulled away from the moon-shadows sweeping over the Downs, Church felt that they had been at the centre of something very strange indeed.