‘I dunno,’ said Phineas. ‘There’s a lot of Garden. You could sort him out, though, couldn’t you? What with being ... what did you say? ... the Rightful Heir and all that.’
Yes, I could, thought the angry, boastful part of Arthur. But his more sensible side said quite the opposite, remembering what he had been told about the Keys, and how the Seventh Key was paramount over all.
I’d have to find the Will quickly enough to get its help to force Lord Sunday to relinquish the Seventh Key, thought Arthur. But if I run into Lord Sunday first, I’ll be toast.Perhaps I should get help first, like Part Six of the Will said ...
‘I wouldn’t mind seeing you and Lord Sunday have a punch-up,’ remarked Phineas eagerly. ‘That’d be right promising, I reckon.’
‘You’d probably get killed just watching,’ said Arthur bleakly, remembering the Keys being used in battle back in the Great Maze, and when Saturday had first broached the Gardens.
He shook his head and took out the Fifth Key.
‘I have to go somewhere,’ he said. ‘Don’t tell anyone I was here, all right? And make sure this house ... this Garden bed stays weed free.’
Phineas nodded, but his dark eyes were fixed on the mirror, intent on what Arthur was going to do.
Arthur held the mirror up, looked into it, and tried once more to visualise Thursday’s room. At first he saw only his reflection, but that wavered, and he felt a surge of relief as the now-familiar carpet with its battle-scene motif slowly coalesced into a solid view, with the rest of the room shimmering into focus around it. But just as it was about to become entirely crisp and real, the mirror shook in his hand and the vision wavered. Arthur frowned and gripped his wrist with his left hand to steady it, but the mirror continued to shake and twist, as if someone else was trying to take it away from him.
‘Steady!’ hissed Arthur, exerting his willpower to keep the mirror still and the scene in view. But just as he had with the Atlas, he felt an opposing force, one that grew stronger and stronger, until the Fifth Key flew from his grasp and clattered onto the floor.
Arthur clenched his fist, but seeing Phineas watching him so intently, he managed to contain his anger. Instead of punching the walls, he knelt down and picked up the mirror, slipping it back into his pouch.
‘Maybe I won’t be going after all,’ he said. ‘How do we get out of here?’
‘Through the hedge,’ said Phineas. ‘It’ll open for me, being a Gardener and all. Just stay close behind.’
He touched the hedge that blocked the kitchen door, and a boy-sized hole opened in the greenery.
‘Come on, bigger than that!’ said Phineas. The hole grew large enough for Arthur. Phineas put one leg through it, then hopped back again. ‘My fork! Can I have it back, please, sir?’
‘Yes,’ said Arthur. ‘Do you want it lit?’
‘Oh, that’s all right,’ said Phineas. ‘I’ll swap it for another one. I just have to have one to hand in.’
He climbed through the hole.
Arthur looked around the kitchen, and glanced up at the ceiling, to the room above where his mother was trapped in a small circuit of time.
At least I know where Mum is, he thought heavily, then stepped through the hedge.
He found himself in a cool green alley between two hedges that were at least fifty feet tall. Above them he could see a perfect blue sky with a faint touch of white clouds – it looked like it might have been painted by some old master, and possibly was. He couldn’t see a sun, but there was a source of illumination somewhere above, for the sky was very light. Probably the sun moved along a track, just like the suns in other parts of the House, though Arthur guessed that the one here would be more impressive, and move more smoothly than in any other demesne.
‘Which way?’ asked Arthur. ‘Left or right?’
‘Oh, this way,’ said Phineas, pointing with his fork. ‘Four hedge junctions this way, then we take a left, go three junctions, take a right, two junctions, left again, straight on past four junctions, and then through another hedge and we’ll be at the Garden Path, which the dragonflies fly along all the time and sometimes the guard beetles run along, though you wouldn’t be scared of them.’
Arthur thought of the beetles he’d seen fighting Lady Friday’s forces. He’d almost been bitten in half by one himself.
‘How many beetles, and how often do they go along this path?’
‘Oh, half a dozen at a time, I guess,’ said Phineas. He started walking along the alley, idly thwacking the hedges on either side with his fork. ‘But you don’t see them around that often.’
They walked in silence for a while after that. It was pleasantly cool between the hedges, with the dappled green light and the beautiful blue sky above. They combined to almost lull Arthur into a sense of peacefulness, but he knew it was only an illusion. He was thinking hard about what he could and should do.
‘Are there telephones here?’ he asked as they approached the first junction, where two hedge-bordered alleys crossed at a broad, paved plaza. Arthur stayed close to the hedge, keeping in its shadow.
‘Telephones?’ asked Phineas. ‘Sure. There’s one in Karkwhal’s shed. That’s how he gets the weeding orders.’
‘Where is this shed?’ asked Arthur. He didn’t look at Phineas as the boy replied, but stared around and looked up and along the hedges. He had the unpleasant feeling that he was being watched, and there was a slight, sick-making ache in his bones, a sign that sorcery was being practiced somewhere nearby.
‘Karkwhal’s shed?’ asked Phineas. ‘That’s back the other way. It’s closer than the Garden Path, if you want to go there. Don’t know why you would, with only old Karkwhal and me there-’ ‘Quiet!’ ordered Arthur. He reached into his pouch and drew out the Fifth and Sixth Keys. ‘I can hear something.’
‘What?’ whispered Phineas, not very quietly.
Arthur held up his hand to silence Phineas again, then listened. There was something – a rustle in the hedge, as if a large rat was wriggling through the tight-packed greenery. But he couldn’t see anything, and the sound stopped as he slowly turned his head, trying to fix the position of the noise.
‘It’s gone.’ Arthur hesitated, returned the Keys to his pouch, and turned around to follow Phineas.
At that moment, two enormous, green-skinned Denizens burst out of the greenery, as if the hedge itself had come to life. They grabbed Arthur’s arms and began to twist them behind his back.
Arthur shouted in fury, and tried to throw them forward, but they held on tight, and their long, gnarled toes dug into the earth like tree roots, to hold him fast.
‘Keys!’ roared Arthur, and flexed his fingers. His pouch flew open, and the mirror and the pen flew up towards his hands.
But the Keys never reached Arthur’s waiting grasp. They were caught in midair by a bright silver net – a net wielded by Phineas the Second Assistant Sub-Gardener’s Aide Fourth Class Once Removed. Only he no longer looked like a Piper’s child. In that same instant the tall green Denizens had erupted from the hedge, Phineas had grown and changed. He was now a commanding figure some ten feet tall. He stood above Arthur, holding the writhing Keys in the net with his left hand, while his right was held tight around a small object that he wore on a chain around his neck.
The only thing that was not altered was the intense darkness of his eyes.
‘Bind him with the chains,’ instructed Lord Sunday. ‘Be careful. He is very strong.’
Six
‘ARE YOU SURE this is safe?’ asked Giac. He was holding on nervously to Suzy’s shoulder as they descended on the South-West Big Chain. While the grease monkeys regularly used the various moving chains to go between floors of the tower, Sorcerous Supernumeraries usually took the elevator, so this was a new experience for Giac.
The South-West Big Chain was like a greatly oversize motorcycle chain that ran the thousands of feet from the unseen nether regions of Saturday’s tower to a vast bronze guide wheel that was situated near the top. The Chain ran in a broad shaft, going up one side and down the other. Each link was six feet tall and six feet wide, and had a flat space in the middle where the grease monkeys stood, sat, or even slept as the Chain rattled up or down.