It wasn’t a sight she was used to. What she knew was the regular shapes of roofs and walls, spires and masts, reflections from windows and the steady sodium orange of the street lights. And the sounds: the city hummed, a deep bass rumble of traffic and machinery that infested even skin and bone. The only sounds here were the drone from the clouds of insects that misted the air over the river, the hiss of wind in the leaves and the grasses, and the occasional arse-clenching wolf call.
Natural. She wasn’t used to it. Fortunately, she didn’t need to get used to it either. They’d find a way back soon, and everything would return to normal. Of course, she might not have a job anymore, depending on how much damage the Underground had sustained. She might not have a room at the hostel anymore, either. That was for someone else to sort out◦– her probation officer, her social worker◦– not her.
She became aware of a sudden silence, and a white glow just over the horizon. Slowly, slowly, an edge of a circle appeared, pocked like the moon with blue craters and bone-coloured lines. Like the moon but most definitely not, because as she watched, it grew and swelled, inflating like a balloon until it seemed to take up half the sky. It was impossibly massive, full and fat, a huge ball of stone just… floating.
It was just her, and this thing. She knew then. She knew that everything was different and nothing was the same.
‘Fuck.’ She turned, and called out. ‘You have to see this. You have to come.’
They walked towards her, and saw that she was silhouetted against the glow from the moon. She spread her arms out wide, and even then, her reach wasn’t quite wide enough to encompass it all.
It was a terrifying sight, something that big rising above them. It would rise higher, and at some point in the night, be hanging over them. Their moon was so distant, so small, that it could be covered by a thumb at full stretch. This one, this world’s version, wherever they were, couldn’t be blocked out by both hands together.
‘That’s incredible,’ said Dalip, eventually. ‘That’s,’ and words failed him.
The rest of the sky was turning black as the mountain-tops lost their reflected shine. The last rays of the sun against the high cloud faded, descending through pinks into reds. Only the pearly moonglow remained.
‘Where,’ said Stanislav, ‘are the stars?’
Dalip stepped out further, turned his back on the moon and stared upwards, his head tilted back and his mouth falling open. Mary hadn’t noticed the lack of stars, and would never notice them. Her sky was an orange haze, growing thicker or thinner depending on the weather.
The dome of the night was◦– apart from the bright moon, which had now crested the mountains completely◦– utterly dark.
‘There should be stars,’ said Dalip, shivering. ‘There should be thousands of stars.’
And perhaps for the first time, Mary looked up properly.
She knew something about stars◦– the stars formed pictures in the sky, some of which became star signs, and she was a Virgo. There was nothing. She turned her head to face the sea, then to face the mountains, and there was still nothing.
‘Are you sure?’ she asked.
‘The sky should be on fire. No light pollution, no street lights or houses or cars or factories: you should be able to see everything. Stars, planets, nebulae, the Milky Way. Everything.’
‘Maybe they don’t have them here,’ she said. ‘Maybe this is all there is.’
‘That’s impossible. Even if it takes millions of years for light to cross space, it gets to us eventually.’ He sounded close to panic, and no matter which section of the sky they checked, it always appeared blank. ‘And that, that is not our moon. It’s got none of the right craters, seas, anything. Where are we?’
‘We’ve come further than we thought, that’s all. It’ll be okay.’ She didn’t mean to try and sound reassuring. It just came out, as if it was the right thing to say at that moment.
Dalip stared wide-eyed at her, and she could hear his breathing, fast and shallow at first, slowly subside into something more normal.
Then he nodded, and looked at the ground so he didn’t have to look up. ‘It’s what we do now that counts.’
‘I guess so.’ She took one last look at the moon and started back to their camp under the trees. A wolf called again, and this time she didn’t mind it so much. It was probably the least strange thing, including her own presence, about where she’d ended up.
Dinner, suspended over the fire, was ready, and she was ravenous.
6
Dalip woke up with a hand over his mouth. He started to shout around the fingers, to simultaneously rise and push himself away, when he realised it was Stanislav.
The canopy above was outlined in silver moonshine, and enough leaked down to cast shadows. The fire had burned low: the red glow from the embers shifted slightly and a trail of sparks twisted upwards. Arranged around the circumference like the hours of a clock, were six fitful sleepers◦– five now.
Stanislav raised his fingers to his lips in an exaggerated gesture, and Dalip realised that there was something in the woods behind him. He didn’t need to turn around and look, he could feel it at his back, watching him, hot and hairy and hungry.
The only weapons they had were sticks, and his kirpan, which was more ornamental than not: blunt, as Mama had called it. He was supposed to use it to defend himself and others◦– that’s what the Guru said◦– but he’d never needed to do either, until now.
His hand rested on the hilt, and he drew it, trying not to make a sound. It was a tiny thing compared with his grandfather’s foot-long sword, but it was all he had and he felt better for holding it.
Stanislav rose from his crouch. He was holding a stout branch, with a heavy knot of wood at one end. The way he moved it easily from hand to hand showed he was no stranger to improvised clubs. He was testing its weight, how it would move and how hard he’d have to grip it to stop it slipping when he used it.
No one else was awake. That struck Dalip as a mistake, for surely they’d need everyone to defend each other. The Romanian woman, Elena, was closest, and he got down on all fours, ready to crawl towards her.
He glanced up. Wolves. And not only wolves.
There was a man. At least, he was guessing it was a man. He was tall and broad, with a hood that may have been made out of the actual head of another wolf. The detail of his face was lost, though his breath came in heavy clouds of mist that rolled out and down. In each hand, he had a wolf on a chain that was tight with anticipation.
He knew where they were, so there seemed little point in trying to be quiet and hoping he’d pass by.
‘Elena. Elena, wake up.’
She rolled away from him with a moan, then rolled back, eyes white and open.
‘Visitor,’ he said, and nodded in the direction of the wolves and their handler, who he assumed for the sake of sanity was human. That they might not be caused his gut to tighten and his bladder loosen. ‘Wake the others.’
One by one, they were stirred, and they instinctively retreated to the fire. Dalip reached into his pocket for his stubby torch, clicked the switch, and nothing happened.
He banged it against his leg, and tried again. When he lifted it up and shook it, drops of salty seawater leaked out. That, he presumed, was the end of the torch, and he dropped it by his feet.
In amongst the trees, a wolf shook its head, and its chain rattled: an odd, light sound. The man didn’t move at all, and the time they spent staring at each other stretched past breaking point.