Obsidian Mirror

16

There was always something strange about the boy. He laughed at shadows, he sang different songs. When the other children were merry, he was still and silent. More than anything he loved the music of pipes and viols.

His mother’s anxiety about the Shee made her stern. He was never to enter the Wood. He was never to stray from the cottage and the lanes.

But one winter twilight, when the stew was simmering on the fire, she went out to call him, and he was gone. It was said he had been seen hand in hand with a woman in a green dress.

He was never seen again.

Chronicle of Wintercombe

JAKE LAY CROOKED and sore against a slimy brick wall.

His neck was bent at a painful angle; his right leg was numb. Something was sticky and wet on his fingers.

He moved, and groaned as pain shot from his ankle.

“He’s alive,” a voice said.

Jake froze. His first instinct was to open his eyes, but what he saw made him close them at once and play dead. There were two figures bending over him, and one had a knife. He’d caught the dull glimmer of the blade, the dirty thumb on the hasp.

He held his breath.

“Finish him.” Hands grabbed him, hauled him over, rummaged quickly through his pockets and jacket, a quick rough search all over him. He felt something—his watch?—dragged from his wrist.

“Useless.” A coin jangled on the wet cobbles. “Filthy foreign tin.”

“Take it anyway. The siller ring will fetch.”

Jake’s fear was becoming anger. Then, sharp as a squealing rat, a whistle pierced the air.

“Peelers.” The two men jumped up; Jake rolled instantly to his hands and knees and threw himself at the nearer, grappling for the knife that came slashing at his chest.

He got one good kick in before a punch cracked darkness into his eyes; when that had cleared, the alley was empty, except for a two-pence coin and a spatter of blood.

He picked himself up, cursing, and looked around.

He was in a narrow place, dark, with high buildings on each side. He took a breath and his eyes widened at the stench of the air. A fetid, gagging smell of sewage and old vegetables, of smoke and sweat, it almost made him retch.

Groping toward light, he peered out onto a tiny courtyard, and his hand felt a few words incised into the stone. He rubbed away soot and black moss to read: SOLOMON’S COURT.

It sounded familiar. Dizzy, he tried to remember where he had heard the name, but then the whistle came again, urgent and near. A group of black-suited men charged in from the street against a small door in the corner, burst it open, and ran inside, yelling.

Jake stood still, one hand still leaning on the wall.

He had to fight against astonishment. Keep calm. He had entered the mirror. He had journeyed. But where was he? He felt so sick, it was difficult to think, and his head throbbed. He took a few steps nearer the door.

Screams met him; a large woman hurried out, throwing on a shawl, and after her a stagger of wrecks and drunks fled into the night. Was this some sort of raid?

And instantly the memory of where he had seen the name came back—it was the place Symmes had written of in the diary, the place he had gotten the mirror.

Was this the same night?

At once, ignoring his blurred vision, Jake raced down the three steps, past the pentangled doorway and into the opium den.

It was in chaos. The police—if that’s what they were—were grabbing money and goods for themselves, rummaging in the pockets of opium-eaters too drugged to even notice. The sweet smell of the drug choked the close air. Remembering Symmes’s journal, Jake looked for the back room; he raced across, shoving a man out of his way, and burst in through the dingy curtain.

The room was empty. Beyond, a back door banged in the wind.

He made two steps toward it before a hand grabbed him. “And we’ll be taking you down too, sonny.”

He was swung around. A huge man in a dirty black uniform grinned at him. “See the duds on this! Come and take a look, lads. Here’s a gallimaufry.”

A few chortling faces grinned through the curtain. “Let me go,” Jake snarled.

The peeler snorted. “Very good, milord.” He opened his hand.

It was sarcasm, but it gave Jake an idea. He drew himself up, raised his chin, and fixed the man with a glare. “Take your hands off me, man. Don’t you recognize your betters when you see them. How dare you involve me in this disgusting farrago!”

Wharton, he thought, would have been proud.

The man’s face lost its grin. He said, “You mean…Lor love you sir, I…”

“I shall have you dismissed without pay for this…audacity.” Jake dusted down his clothes. He had too many bruises. Too much dirt for the part. But the man was cringing.

“I ’ad no idea, sir. In this den—”

“I’m not here for the opium! I’m looking for a gentleman. His name is Symmes. John Harcourt Symmes. Have you arrested him?”

“We ain’t nabbed no toff ’cept yerself, Mister…?”

Jake shrugged. “Jake Wilde. Son of Lord Wilde…Surely you know my father, man? The personal assistant to the Home Secretary?”

He had no idea if there even was a Home Secretary at this date, but it didn’t seem to matter; he was rapidly understanding that just to be haughty and speak in his crisp twenty-first-century English might be enough. As the peeler looked around hopelessly for help, he pushed past him. “He was here, in this room, minutes ago. It was he who had you summoned. He can’t have gone far.”

“We come on a nark’s word.”

“Nark?”

“Grass. Informer.”

Jake frowned. Symmes had set up the raid, he would have been ready. He’d have already taken the mirror in the cab. He turned quickly, past the peeler. “I have to find him!”

“Ah now sir, you can’t just…”

But Jake was already out in the dingy courtyard. The rattle of hooves made him turn; he saw the quick glimpse of a cab rattle past the archway; saw in the flash of the gaslight a plump, rather smug-looking man settling down inside.

Jake raced after the cab. Bursting out into the street, he saw it swallowed by fog. He took two steps after it and crashed into a small shape that burst from the alley and grabbed him to stop itself falling.

He looked down and saw the dirtiest child he had ever imagined. The girl wore a ragged blue dress over trousers and worn boots. She screeched, “Let me go!”

He dropped her, but the cab had gone; the fog was a silent, greasy swirl. He swore. Then he said, “Listen kid, what year is this?”

The girl stared. Her eyes widened. “You from the Bedlam, mister?”

He pulled out the two-pence coin and tossed it; she caught it, bit it, and pocketed it in one smooth move. “Foreign tin and no good.” She grinned. “But as I like yer face, I’ll tell you. It’s 1848.”

Two years.

Wrong raid. Symmes had had the mirror for two years. Jake swore again.

He said, “I don’t have much time. You live here?”

She shrugged.

“Two years ago a man came here. A gentleman.”

She rolled her eyes. “They all do.”

“Not for opium. He came to buy a mirror. There was someone in the back room, a man with a scar on his face…” He groped after the name. “Maskelyne. Do you know him?”

For a moment intelligence flashed into and out of her face. Then a yell from the den made her twist.

“I knows him. And I knows them as robbed you.” She sounded breathless. “As took yer siller. Bail me and I’ll take you to ’em.”

For a moment he thought she was speaking some foreign language. Then a peeler came out of the door and said, “You! Girl! Come ’ere.”

The girl snatched Jake’s hand. “Bail me.”

The peeler came over and grabbed her. “With me, you.” He dragged her away; she screamed, tugging and struggling, a small thin whine of woe that set Jake’s teeth on edge. He shook his head.

“Siller? What’s siller?”

Did she mean…silver?

With a sudden terrified jerk he whipped up his sleeve, and stared.

The only thing around his wrist was a bare white ring in the flesh.

The snake bracelet was gone.

A small yellow flame cracked and flickered in the darkness and Piers’s high voice said, “Don’t anybody move. I don’t want any injuries. Or accidents.”

The flame moved jerkily across the blackness of the hall; Wharton heard noises of opening, and then the click of a powerful flashlight beam swept his face. He had a nightmare glimpse of a slot of dark room with Sarah standing in it before Piers focused the beam on the generator.

“This is our emergency supply. If everything’s in order, we should get…”

Light.

A faint, flickery crackle as the overhead lights came back on, the generator erupting into an efficient hum.

Then it went off, just as abruptly.

Piers groaned and tried again. Nothing. “I loathe machines,” he hissed.

Wharton took the flashlight and turned it on the mirror, black and enigmatic in its silver frame. Sarah came and stared into it, and her reflection turned Wharton cold.

She looked devastated.

He hurried across. Rebecca, just a voice behind him, said, “But where’s Jake? What happened?”

“Are you all right?” Wharton caught Sarah’s elbow and drew her gently back.

She shook her head. Near the glass the air was charged; it felt as if a great surge of power had somehow drained it; and Sarah too. As Wharton held her arm she staggered; he grabbed her and said, “Fetch a chair, quickly.”

Rebecca dragged one over.

“I don’t want a chair.” She wished the shaking in her fingers would stop—no wonder he thought she was scared. How was he to know it was dismay and sheer fury. Jake—Jake!—had journeyed.

“This girl is in shock.” Wharton swung accusingly to Piers. “And I have to say so am I. What has happened to Jake and Venn? Have we lost them too?”

Piers had lit a candle and was studying the controls. He seemed calm, but Wharton could see the faint sweat on his lip.

“How am I supposed to know! You’re the teacher, mortal!” He took a breath. “Okay. They both seem to have entered the mirror, apparently only one-fiftieth of a second apart, though only Jake wore the snake. I don’t know what that will mean. They could come back at any moment. Or not for hours.”

Or never, Wharton thought, catching the panic under the forced control. He drew himself upright. “Then I’m taking charge. Listen to me now. We need to re-group. Split up and work together.”

In the slant of the flashlight beam he caught Rebecca’s giggle.

“Well, you know what I mean. We have two emergencies here. This intruder. He seems to have disabled the lights. How?”

“The mains supply comes down under the drive. There’s a control box in the stable block.” Piers shook his head. “I’ll need to get over there and work on it. But after I’m gone, you must make sure every window and door is firmly locked.” He glanced at Sarah.

Wharton said, “Is this intruder anything to do with you?”

She wanted to tell him. But then: “We know who it is.” Piers came over, wiping his hands on his coat. “He’s been spying on the place for a while. We call him the scarred man. Venn thinks…well, you’ve read the journal, Sarah. You’ve read about Maskelyne…”

Rebecca, turned, restless. “Look, it doesn’t matter who he is, he could be forcing his way in right now. You should have seen that huge white wolf. It was terrifying. Let’s lock this place down!”

Wharton nodded. “Okay. You’re with me. Sarah, stay with Piers. No one is to be on their own.”

He hurried out, and Rebecca, after another glance at the mirror, ran after him.

Sarah reached out toward the obsidian surface, and touched its solidity with her hands. “So where did they go, Piers?” she said quietly.

He shrugged. “Somewhere near where the mirror is. David told us that he did not actually emerge from it, but it was within a mile or so from his arrival point. They have to find it.”

But his voice was uncertain.

As she turned, a flicker of eyes caught hers, a green glimmer in the mirror.

She gasped. “Who’s that?”

Piers grabbed a crowbar. “Where?”

At first she thought it was one of the cats. Then she reached into the shadows and drew him out. He slid into the candlelight as if he had materialized out of air, a green-eyed boy in a ragged frockcoat, watching her with the wary stare of a trapped deer.

The boy from the Wood.

Gideon said slyly, “Don’t you know me, Piers?”

Sarah saw Piers’s eyes widen in disbelief and then raw fear. “You! How did you get into the house?” He whirled, flashing the flashlight into all the dim corners. “Are they here? Is Summer here?”

Gideon smiled. “Stay calm, little man. It’s just me.”

His eyes moved to Sarah’s. “After an eternity in the greenwood, I finally got inside.”

“Wait!” Jake came forward and grabbed the peeler’s arm. “There’s no need for this. The kid’s…the child is perfectly harmless.”

His heart was thumping. Terror froze him. Without the bracelet, he was trapped here forever. He would have to live out his life in this stinking century and never see his father again.

The girl watched him through her thatch of dark hair. Her eyes glinted with sly triumph.

“Er, allow me to…” Jake’s hand scrabbled in his empty pockets. A single pound coin remained; he pulled it out and held it up, so that it glittered in the gaslight. “Allow me to recompense you for your troubles, my man. And leave the child out of this.”

He sounded like a bad actor in a worse period drama, but that was all he knew of the past, all anyone could ever know, the thousand clichés of film and TV. All the history lessons in the world couldn’t help him now.

The coin gleamed.

The peeler said, “Well…mebbes I could.” His eyes on the coin.

Jake threw it.

It flashed through the dark. The man let the girl go and grabbed for it; instantly she ran, past Jake, so that he had to yell and twist after her, over the slippery cobbles of the yard, under the arch into a street ripe with the refuse of the dark houses that overhung it.

She was fast and fleet as a rat, and he was still aching from the journey, but he caught her at the corner and flung her around.

“Wait, you little brat.” Breathless, he held her off as she kicked and tried to bite. Then he held her in a firm arm-lock. She screamed.

“Will you be quiet!” Jake looked around nervously. The fog masked the houses’ deep doorways. “Quiet! You said you saw them. The men that robbed me. I paid for your freedom. You owe me!”

She stopped struggling and stared at him. Then she said, “Leave off.”

He let her go.

She looked up at him through her hair, poised to run. “You don’t ’arf talk rum.”

“So do you. What’s your name?”

“Moll.”

He grinned. “I’m Jake. Moll, I need to find these men and I need to find them now.”

Behind them in the fog, a whistle blew. The girl gave a quick glance and said, “Not here, mister. Too many rozzers. We’ll go to Skimble’s.”

Before he could argue, she was gone, running into the fog, and he had to follow, clutching at the pain in his side.

Down dim streets lined with runnels of flowing sewage, through labyrinths of dark alleys the girl led him, and he followed, deeper into the warren that was London’s squalid heart, totally lost among the courtyards and warehouses, the occasional flaring naphtha light of a late shop or a tavern where shrieks and shouts echoed. Cabs clattered by him, dark figures in cloaks and tall hats, women with painted faces called at him from doorways. Every wall was a patchwork of peeling advertisements.

Moll slowed to a walk, darted down a passageway between two derelict buildings and clattered down some steps behind a rusty railing.

“Wait,” Jake said, uneasy. “Why here?”

“Because this is it, mister.” She pushed at a warped dark door until it opened.

Jake stopped.

She caught his arm, impatient. “Don’t be frit. It’s just Skimble’s.”

She pushed through into a corridor and he followed, wary. The corridor was dark, running with damp. Once it had been ornate though, because above him were odd swirls of gilt paint, a ragged swathe of scarlet curtain, tied with a fat tassel of silk.

“What is this place?”

She shrugged. “A doss. A night pad.”

He had no idea what she meant. And then, as they came to the end of the corridor, she ducked under a broken barricade of what looked like smashed-up chairs and led him into a sudden emptiness of tilted palaces and crumbling, painted paper mountains.

They stood on a wide stage and before them ancient seats soared in tiered glory into the ceiling.

“Skimble’s,” she said.