The Girl who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of her own Making

CHAPTER V
THE HOUSE WITHOUT WARNING

In Which September Measures the Distance to Pandemonium, Receives a Brief Lecture in History, Meets a Soap Golem, and Is Thoroughly Scrubbed

September bit into a fat, juicy persimmon. Well, something like a persimmon. Rather larger, greener, and tasting of blueberry cream, but it looked terribly like a persimmon, and so September had resolved to call it that. A-Through-L still worried a poor tree, which was so tall and stubbornly thick that no small girl could ever have hoped to climb it, even if she had known that there was fruit up there in its yellowy-silver branches. Still, if a dragon-a Wyvern-brings it to me, September thought, it’s dragon food and not fairy food at all, and no one should blame me for breakfast. September insisted she was full between peals of laughter, but the Wyverary seemed to delight in charging the tree with a cheerful snarl and smacking into it full force until the helpless fruit gave up and came tumbling down. After each blow, A-Through-L sat back on his enormous haunches and shook his head, sending his whiskers a-flying. The sight of it kept September laughing helplessly, her skirt tumbling-full of oozing, green-orange, blueberryish persimmons.

The sun hitched up her trousers and soldiered on up into the sky. September squinted at it and wondered if the sun here was different than the sun in Nebraska. It seemed gentler, more golden, deeper. The shadows it cast seemed more profound. But September could not be sure. When one is traveling, everything looks brighter and lovelier. That does not mean it is brighter and lovelier; it just means that sweet, kindly home suffers in comparison to tarted-up foreign places with all their jewels on.

“How far is it to Pandemonium, Ell?” yawned September. She stretched her legs, flexing the bare toes of her left foot.

“Can’t say, small one.” The beast thwacked into the tree again. “Pandemonium begins with P, and, therefore, I don’t know very much about it.”

September thought for a moment. “Try ‘Capital’ instead. That starts with C. And Fairyland stars with F, so you could, well, cross-reference.”

A-Through-L left off the nearly persimmon tree and cocked his head to one side like a curious German shepherd. “The capital of Fairyland is surrounded by a large, circular river,” he said slowly, as if reading from a book, “called the Barleybroom. The city consists of four districts: Idlelily, Seresong, Hallowgrum, and Mallowmead. Population is itinerant, but summer estimates hover around ten thousand daimonia-that means spirits-”

“And pan means all,” whispered September, since the Wyvern could not be expected to know, on account of the p involved. In September’s world, many things began with pan. Pandemic, Pangaea, Panacea, Panoply. Those were all big words, to be sure, but as has been said, September read often, and liked it best when words did not pretend to be simple, but put on their full armor and rode out with colors flying.

“The highest point is Groangyre Tower, home of the Royal Inventors’ Society (Madness Prerequisite), the lowest is Janglynow Flats, where once the Ondines waged their algae wars. Common imports: grain, wishing fish, bicycle parts, children, sandwiches, brandywine, silver bullets-”

“Skip to the part where it says, ‘I Am This Many Miles Away from a Girl Named September,’” suggested the girl helpfully.

A-Through-L grimaced at her, curling his scarlet lips. “All books should be so accommodating, butler-wise,” he snorted. “As you might expect, the geographical location of the capital of Fairyland is fickle and has a rather short temper. I’m afraid the whole thing moves around according to the needs of narrative.”

September put her persimmon down in the long grass. “What in the world does that mean?”

“I… I suspect it means that if we act like the kind of folk who would find a Fairy city whilst on various adventures involving tricksters, magical shoes, and hooliganism, it will come to us.”

September blinked. “Is that how things are done here?”

“Isn’t that how they’re done in your world?”

September thought for a long moment. She thought of how children who acted politely were often treated as good and trustworthy, even if they pulled your hair and made fun of your name when grown-ups weren’t around. She thought of how her father acted like a soldier, strict and plain and organized-and how the army came for him. She thought of how her mother acted strong and happy even when she was sad, and so no one offered to help her, to make casseroles or watch September after school or come over for gin rummy and tea. And she thought of how she had acted just like a child in a story about Fairyland, discontent and complaining, and how the Green Wind had come for her, too.

“I suppose that is how things are done in my world. It’s hard to see it, though, on the other side.”

“That’s what gnome ointment is for,” winked the Wyvern.

“Well, we’d better be at it, then,” said September. “At least I shall have no trouble with the shoes.” She kept a persimmon or two for a late lunch-the pockets of her smoking jacket were quite full, yet the jacket was quite sensitive about its figure and did not bulge in the slightest. A-Through-L squirmed down to the ground to allow her to climb up onto the bronze lock, where September sat pertly, clutching the wiry red stripe of fur that ran down the Wyverary’s long neck. She drew her sceptre from the belt of the smoking jacket and extended it to the horizon like a sword. Blue mountains rose on either side of their path, shining and faceted like lumps of sapphire.

“Onward, noble steed!” she cried loudly.

Nothing much happened. A few birds catcalled and trilled.

As the two of them travel along, I shall take a moment’s pause, as is my right. For it deserves remarking that if one is to obtain a monstrous companion, a Wyvern-or a Wyverary-is really a top-notch choice. Firstly, they rarely tire, and their gait is remarkably even, considering the poultrylike disposition of their feet. Secondly, when they do tire, they snore, and no ravening bandit would dare to come near. Thirdly, being French in origin, they have highly refined tastes and are unlikely to seek out unsavory things to eat, such as knights’ gallbladders or maidens’ bones. They much prefer a vat or two of truffles, a flock of geese, and a lake of wine, and they will certainly share. Lastly, their mating seasons are brief and infrequent, and the chances of experiencing one is so small as to be beyond the notice of any native guidebook or indeed the concern of any small girl with brown hair who might be utterly innocent of such things. Truly, the latter hardly bears mentioning.

September knew none of this. She knew only that A-Through-L was huge and warm and kind and smelled like roasting cinnamon and chestnuts and seemed to know simply everything. The rest of the alphabet held considerably less charm once she saw the world from her perch on his back.

A-Through-L walked late into the afternoon. The alpine grass full of little red flowers gradually turned into a wide, wet valley, full of rich chocolate mud and bright iridescent flowers nodding on pearly stalks taller than September. September tried very hard to look intrepid on her beast’s back, and Ell tried on a look of grim determination. It did not seem to be moving Pandemonium any closer to them. After a long while, she tucked the sceptre between two links of chain and laid her cheek against Ell’s back. Perhaps a city takes a long time to rouse in the morning when it has not had its breakfast yet, she thought. Or perhaps it has other young girls to tend to first.

And then, suddenly, a house rose up before them, as though it had been crouching in wait for hours and sprang out when it thought it might scare them most. It looked much like a Spanish mosque-if a giant had firmly stepped on it. All the curly door frames and tiled mosaics were broken and leaning, each blue-green wall propping up the other. Fragrant red wood lay about in rough piles, and pools of seeping black mud dotted the halls. Moss covered every shattered pillar. September and her Wyverary stood before a beautifully carved archway leading into a little courtyard, where a shabby fountain gurgled valiantly. The arch read:

THE HOUSE WITHOUT WARNING

“What is this place?” breathed September, climbing down the Wyverary’s red flank. She was becoming quite agile at it.

A-Through-L shrugged. “Too many W’s,” he whispered. “If only my brother were here!”

“It is my mistress’s house,” came a thick, wet voice behind them.

September turned to see a most curious lady standing serenely on a patch of tile depicting a great blue rose. The woman stood in the precise center of the rose. A rich, clean perfume surrounded her in a light pinkish haze, for the woman was carved entirely from soap. Her face was a deep olivey-green castile, her hair a rich and oily Marseille, streaked with lime peels. Her body was patchwork: here strawberry soap with bits of red fruit showing through, there saffron and sandalwood, orange and brown. Her belt was a cord of hard, tallowy honey soap, her hands plain-blue bathing soap, and her fingernails smelled like daisies and lemons. Her eyes were two piercing, faceted slivers of soapstone. On her brow someone had written TRUTH in the kind of handwriting teachers always have: clear and curling and lovely.

“My name is Lye,” the soap-woman said. A few bubbles escaped her mouth. She was utterly still. No soapy muscle trembled. “It is my part to welcome you, to show you to the baths, to tend to you and to all weary travelers, until my mistress returns, which will not be long now, I’m sure.”

“Why does it say ‘truth’ on your forehead?” asked September shyly. She could be quite brave in the presence of a Wyverary, but tall and lovely ladies made her shy, even if they were made of soap.

“I am a golem, child,” answered Lye calmly. “My mistress wrote it there. She was marvelous clever and knew all kinds of secret things. One of the things she knew was how to gather up all the slips of soap the bath house patrons left behind and arrange them into a girl shape and write ‘truth’ on her forehead and wake her up and give her a name and say to her: ‘Be my friend and love me, for the world is terrible lonely and I am sad.’”

“Who was your mistress, Lye?” said A-Through-L, settling into the courtyard as best he could, his feet crunched up against a broken pillar. “She sounds like someone who spends a lot of time in libraries, which are the best sorts of people.”

Lye sighed-her bayberry soap shoulders rose and fell abruptly, as though no one had really taught her how to sigh before. “She was a beautiful young girl with hair like new soap and big green eyes and a mole on her left cheek and she was a Virgo and she liked a hot bath first and then a very cold one right after and she always went barefoot and I miss her. I am sure she did spend a lot of time in libraries, for she was always reading books, little ones she could hang from her belt and regular ones with garish covers and big ones, too, so big she’d lie on her stomach in their spines to read them. Her name was Mallow, and she has been gone for years and years, but I am still here, and I keep going, and I never stop because I don’t know how to stop because she said I’d never have to stop.”

“Mallow!” cried the Wyverary, his scaly red eyebrows shooting up. “Queen Mallow?”

“I am sure she could have been queen if she wanted to. She was marvelous clever, as I said.”

“Who is Queen Mallow?” asked September, who felt quite left out of the excitement. “You mentioned her before. And why is there a Marquess now if there was a Queen before? It seems to me that if you want to mess about with monarchy, you might, at least, get your traditions straight.”

“Oh, September, you don’t understand!” said Ell, curling his tail down around her. “Before the Marquess came with her lions and her great old panther with his ivory collar, Fairyland dwelt in the eternal summer of Good Queen Mallow, the Bright and the Bold. She loved us and governed with rhyming songs and cherries for all on Sundays. When she rode out on holidays, she wore a crown of red pearls the selkies gave her, and all the pookas did gymnastics just to make her laugh. Every table groaned with milk and wheat and sugar and hot chocolate. Every horse was fat. Every churn was full. Queen Mallow danced in circles of silver mushrooms to bring on the spring and apparently, before she became queen, ran a bath house.”

“But Mallow begins with M. How do you know so much about her?” asked September.

“Everyone knows about Good Queen Mallow,” replied the Wyverary, shocked that September did not.

“Master Wyvern, if you please, where has my mistress gone? It has been many years, and I have drawn many baths, but she has never come back to me, and I cannot sleep or eat because she didn’t teach me how to sleep or eat, and it is dark at night and bits of me slough off in the rain.”

“Oh, darling Lye,” cried the Wyverary. “How I wish I could bring you good news! But late in the golden reign of the Queen, the Marquess arrived and destroyed her. Or made her sit in a corner. Reports vary. And now there are complicated proclamations, and the lamentations of the hills and my wings are locked down to my skin, and no one has cocoa at all. Some of us hope that in the dungeons of the Briary, the Queen is still alive, and playing solitaire to pass the years, waiting for a knight to release her, to repeal the Marquess’s laws, and restore cocoa to Fairyland kettles.”

A single liquid tear melted the cheek of the soap golem. “I suspected,” she whispered thickly. “I suspected when the place began to break down and crumble and cry big dusty tears at night. I suspected, because I am not very good company. Why stay with a silly golem when you can be Queen? Even if she said I was her friend.”

“I’m sure she meant to come back,” said September, trying to comfort the great, kindhearted golem. “And we are going to Pandemonium to steal back a part of what the Marquess has taken away.”

“A girl with green eyes, perhaps?”

“Well, no, a Spoon.” September suddenly felt her lovely quest was a bit small and shabby. But it was hers. “Do you know how far it is from here to Pandemonium?”

“What an odd question,” said Lye.

“I’m not from these parts, you see,” September said demurely. She was beginning to feel she ought to have that stitched on her jacket.

“Wherever you are, child, the House Without Warning lies between you and Pandemonium. However you turn, you cannot get to the City without passing through the House, without being cleaned and prepared, without having the road washed from you and your feet made soft and your spirit thoroughly scrubbed. I thought all cities were like that. How could they bear to have a great lot of filthy, exhausted folk milling around inside them, grumpy and nervy and dingy?” The soap golem extended her long, stiff arm, her skin a spiral of buttery greens. September took it. “When you leave this place, human child, you will find Pandemonium. The two are tied together, like a ship and a pier. Like my mistress and I, once, years and years ago.”

The soap golem led them to the center of the House Without Warning, which was not really a house at all but many small rooms connected by long tiled halls and courtyards, which would once have been charming but were now covered in slime and green with age, falling apart, morose. Lye thoughtfully led A-Through-L to a great waterfall whose pool would accommodate him but drew September farther into the depths of the House. The soft smacking sounds of her soapy heels against the floor were pleasant, lulling. No one else seemed to be about. Everything was quiet-but not frighteningly so. The place seemed to be, well, napping. Finally, they entered the largest courtyard yet. In the midst of copper statues and fountains caked with verdigris rested three huge bathtubs. The floor showed two winged hippogriffs rampant in cobalt and emerald. The tubs covered their hooves like great horseshoes.

Lye pulled at September’s jacket and she wriggled out of it-but when the golem tugged at her orange dress as well, September quailed.

“What’s wrong?”

“I… don’t like to be naked. In front of strangers.”

Lye thought for a moment. “My mistress used to say that you couldn’t ever really be naked unless you wanted to be. She said, ‘Even if you’ve taken off every stitch of clothing, you still have your secrets, your history, your true name. It’s quite difficult to be really naked. You have to work hard at it. Just getting into a bath isn’t being naked, not really. It’s just showing skin. And foxes and bears have skin, too, so I shan’t be ashamed if they’re not.’”

“Did Mallow tell you her true name?” September asked.

Lye nodded slowly. “But I won’t tell you. It’s a secret. She told me and then cut her finger and mine and blood came out of her and liquid soap came out of me and they mingled and turned golden and she kissed the place where I’d been wounded and told me her name and not to tell, not ever. So I won’t. She already knew mine.” The soap golem pointed shyly to the word written on her forehead.

“The Green Wind told me not to tell anyone my true name. But I don’t know of any name truer than September, and if I didn’t tell anyone that was my name, what would they call me?”

“It cannot be your true name, or you would be in awful trouble, telling everyone like that. If you know someone’s true name, you can command them, like a doll.” Lye stopped uncomfortably, as though the subject caused her pain. “It’s very unpleasant.”

“Can’t you call Mallow back then, if you know her name?”

Lye sobbed a little, a terribly awkward noise at the back of her throat, like snapping a bar of soap in half. “I’ve tried! I’ve tried! I’ve called and called and she won’t come so she must be dead! And I don’t know what to do except keep the baths full.”

September took a step back from the force of the golem’s grief. She slowly pulled off her orange dress-which to tell the truth had become rather filthy-and her precious remaining shoe. In the cooling evening, she stood naked before the many-colored golem, uncomplaining. “The baths smell very nice,” she whispered. She only wanted the golem to stop being sad.

A breeze came sighing along the courtyard and picked up her clothes and her shoe, shaking them and soaking them in the fountain water to get the seawater and beach grime out. The green smoking jacket spluttered and wrinkled, most upset.

Lye lifted September up suddenly and put her down in the first tub, which was really more like an oak barrel, the kind you store wine in, if you need to store rather a lot of wine, for it was enormous. September’s head ducked immediately under the thick, bright gold water. When she bobbed up, the smell of it wrapped her up like a warm scarf: the scent of fireplaces crackling and warm cinnamon and autumn leaves crunching underfoot. She smelled cider and a rainstorm coming. The gold water clung to her in streaks and clumps, and she laughed. It tasted like butterscotch.

“This is the tub for washing your courage,” Lye said, her voice as even and calm as ever, performing her task, grief packed away for the duration of a bath.

“I didn’t know one’s courage needed washing!” gasped September as Lye poured a pitcher of water over her head. Or that one needs to be naked for that sort of washing, she thought to herself.

Lye poured a bucketful of golden water over September’s head. “When you are born,” the golem said softly, “your courage is new and clean. You are brave enough for anything: crawling off of staircases, saying your first words without fearing that someone will think you are foolish, putting strange things in your mouth. But as you get older, your courage attracts gunk and crusty things and dirt and fear and knowing how bad things can get and what pain feels like. By the time you’re half-grown, your courage barely moves at all, it’s so grunged up with living. So every once in a while, you have to scrub it up and get the works going or else you’ll never be brave again. Unfortunately, there are not so many facilities in your world that provide the kind of services we do. So most people go around with grimy machinery, when all it would take is a bit of spit and polish to make them paladins once more, bold knights and true.”

Lye broke off one of her deep blue fingers and dropped it into the tub. Immediately, a creamy froth bubbled up, clinging to September’s skin and tickling.

“Your finger!” she cried.

“Don’t fear, little one. It doesn’t hurt. My mistress said: ‘Give of yourself, and it will return to you as new as new can be.’ And so my fingers do, when the bathers have gone.”

September looked inside herself to see if her courage was shining up. She didn’t feel any different, besides the pleasure of a hot bath and clean skin. A little lighter, maybe, but she could not be sure.

“Next tub!” said Lye, and lifted her up, still covered with golden foam, out of the oak barrel and into a shallow, sloping bronze tub, the kind noble ladies in films used. September loved the movies, though they could not afford to go often. In her most private moments, September thought her mother was prettier than any of the girls on the screen.

The water of the bronze tub gleamed icy and green, redolent of mint and forest nights and sweet cakes, hot tea and very cold starlight.

“This is for washing your wishes, September,” said Lye, breaking off another of her fingers with a thick snap. “For the wishes of one’s old life wither and shrivel like old leaves if they are not replaced with new wishes when the world changes. And the world always changes. Wishes get slimy, and their colors fade, and soon they are just mud, like all the rest of the mud, and not wishes at all, but regrets. The trouble is, not everyone can tell when they ought to launder their wishes. Even when one finds oneself in Fairyland and not at home at all, it is not always so easy to remember to catch the world in its changing and change with it.”

Lye dropped in her finger, which did not foam this time, but melted, like butter in a pan, over the surface of the green water. September sank under and held her breath, as she often did at home, practicing for a swimming meet. I used to wish my father would come home and my mother would let me come sleep with her like when I was a baby. I used to wish I had a friend at school who would play games and read books with me, and then we would talk about what wonderful things had happened to the children in the books. But all that seemed far away now. Now I wish… I wish the Marquess would leave everyone alone. And that I could be a… a paladin, like Lye said. A bold knight and true. And that I will not cry when I get afraid. And that Ell really is part library, even though I know he probably isn’t. And that my mother will not be angry when I get home.

September’s hair floated up above her head in drifting curls. Lye scrubbed her, even under the water, with a rough brush until her skin tingled. Abruptly, the soap golem lifted her up and dropped her into the next tub, a silver claw-foot filled with creamy hot milk. It smelled of vanilla and rum and maple syrup, just like Betsy Basilstalk’s cigarette. Lye stroked September’s hair in the new bath and lifted several pitchers of it over her head. She broke off her thumb and swirled it three times through the bath, counterclockwise. All traffic travels widdershins, September thought, giggling. The golem’s thumb fizzed and sparkled, showering the surface with blue sparks.

“Lastly,” Lye said, “we must wash your luck. When souls queue up to be born, they all leap up at just the last moment, touching the lintel of the world for luck. Some jump high and can seize a great measure of luck; some jump only a bit and snatch a few loose strands. Everyone manages to catch some. If one did not have at least a little luck, one would never survive childhood. But luck can be spent, like money; and lost, like a memory; and wasted, like a life. If you know how to look, you can examine the kneecaps of a human and tell how much luck they have left. No bath can replenish luck that has been spent on avoiding an early death by automobile accident or winning too many raffles in a row. No bath can restore luck lost through absentmindedness and overconfidence. But luck withered by conservative, tired, riskless living can be plumped up again-after all, it was only a bit thirsty for something to do.”

Lye pushed September down into the milk again. She shut her eyes and sank into the warm cream, enjoying it, flexing her aching toes. She did not know whether her luck was even then growing more robust, but she found she did not much care. Baths are marvelous whether or not, she thought, and Fairy baths best of all.

The soap golem pulled September at last from the luck-bath and began drying her with long, flat, stiff banana leaves, baked brown by the sun. She tousled her clean, wet hair. When September was beginning to feel quite dry and happy, the Wyverary ducked into the courtyard, shaking his scales like an indignant cat. He tried to shake out his wings, but the chain stopped him short, and he winced. September’s sceptre jangled against the padlock.

“Brrr!” he boomed. “I suppose I’m clean, if it matters. Books don’t judge one for being a touch well-traveled.”

The soap golem nodded. “And ready for the City to take you in.”

The little breeze returned September’s clothes, crisp and clean and dry, scented lightly with a bit of water from the baths of courage and wishing and luck. She could not be sure, but she thought the breeze might have purred a bit, rather like a Leopard.

“If you see her,” said Lye softly, almost whispering. “My mistress. If you see her, tell her I am still her friend, and there are ever so many more games to play…”

“I shall, Lye, I promise,” said September, and reached up suddenly to hug the golem, though she hadn’t meant to. Lye slowly enfolded her soap-arms around the child. But when September reached up to kiss the golem’s brow, Lye drew back sharply before her lips could touch the word written there.

“Careful,” Lye said. “I am fragile.”

“That’s all right,” said September suddenly, feeling the warm cinnamon courage of her bath bubble up inside her, fresh and bright. “I’m not.”

The House Without Warning was possessed of a small door nestled beside a marble statue of Pan blowing his horn-if only September knew that Pan is also a god, and not merely a prefix! Well, never mind. It was too late for warnings now, as the House well knew. The door straightened up and opened gallantly for the Wyverary and the girl. Seagulls cried from inside, and many voices jangled together, but all was dark within. Slowly, they stepped through into the black.

“Ell,” said September as they crossed the threshold, “what sort of tubs did you wash in?”

The Wyverary shook his great head and would not speak.