It was about one in the morning and the quarter was reaching its peak of activity. It only truly seemed to come alive late at night, with street traders still about and the taverns heaving with beer and laughter. People worked long hours and for some of them this was their only chance to pretend they had a life that was something other than total drudgery.
Boy tried, as a rule, to make himself unseen, and most of the time did a good job of avoiding trouble in this way. He was neither short nor tall, but he was very thin, and by emptying his mind and avoiding people’s eyes with his own, he made a very fair stab at invisibility as he passed through the City at night.
The City was looking its best. Some of its unpleasantness was obscured during the holidays. As was the custom, evergreen branches had been brought in to decorate houses, shops and other buildings. It was also traditional to burn candles at this time, and windows everywhere twinkled with pretty lights that burnt long into the night.
Night. It was all he seemed to see, especially during these winter days. Valerian kept Boy busy with this and that all through the small hours, until finally, just as dawn was creeping over the City, he would let him stagger off to his cot to slumber the day away; then, shouting through all the floors of the house, Valerian would rouse Boy for another evening’s performance in the theater.
“I am a vampire,” Boy said grimly as he stole down Dead Duck Lane. “That’s it. He’s a stinking vampire and now I am too!”
Realizing he was talking aloud, he looked rapidly around him, but he had gone unnoticed.
Boy thought again about what had happened to Valerian. It was only a recent thing; maybe just a few weeks or months ago, Valerian had become more irritable than usual. His moods had always swung rapidly from one extreme to another, but now they seemed fixed. Surly and preoccupied, he was less violent, less vitriolic. He spent hours on end in the Tower, only emerging to get Boy to run an errand. Boy had delivered a lot of letters for him recently, and collected many in reply.
Letters, thought Boy. Letters?
It reminded him-there had been one evening, one evening in particular, when he had delivered a letter to Kepler. Kepler lived a good way across the City, in the University Quarter.
Boy didn’t like Kepler much. He wasn’t sure why exactly; there was something about him Boy just didn’t warm to. Maybe it was because Valerian listened intently to what Kepler had to say, but showed little or no interest in any opinions Boy might have.
Kepler was thin like Valerian, but shorter and with none of Valerian’s strength. He was always muttering to himself, and tended to scurry about, like a rat, Boy thought. But if it was true that Boy didn’t like Kepler, it was also true that he was fascinated by him, for he was as much of a hoarder of strange devices and peculiar mechanisms as Valerian.
As well as being a Doctor of Medicine of the Human Animal, Kepler made specialized studies into the field of the Heavens. He had all sorts of equipment with which he looked at the stars. He recorded his observations in huge leather-bound books, having noted the motions of planets, stars and moons through his metal-and-glass devices. Kepler had told Boy that he could then make all sorts of predictions about people and their behavior, just by knowing when they had been born. Increasingly Boy had gone with Valerian on his visits to Kepler’s house. He would sit quietly in the corner of Kepler’s room and marvel at the astounding discussions they would hold.
Boy wished someone could tell him about his life, predict what would happen to him, just by setting his date of birth against the position of the stars. He knew, though, that even Kepler could not do that, because Boy did not know when he had been born.
Once Boy had been worried about this. He had even been bold enough to speak to Valerian about it.
“Who do you think my parents were?” he had asked. “How could I find out?”
But Valerian scoffed. “You will never know, nor does it matter one jot. Nor,” he added, “do you need to know. You are Boy, my Boy, and that is enough.”
Boy always tried to do what Valerian told him to- things were safer that way. So Boy tried not to think about the matter any more, but it was not always easy.
On this particular evening, however, when Boy had delivered the letter to Kepler, the Doctor had said, “Wait,” and sat down to write a reply. Boy had watched him as he scratched away with a sophisticated silver-nibbed fountain pen on a sheet of paper, pausing to consider his words. Kepler sprinkled the letter with sand, then folded up the paper and started to melt some sealing wax. As he dripped bloodred wax onto the letter and pressed his ring into it, he said, “Take this to him.” Without looking up from what he was doing, he added, “And may God protect his own.”
There was something odd in his manner that Boy remembered. And when Valerian had read that letter, his mood had sunk. That letter was when it had really started.
At about two o’clock Boy stopped at the top of Pigeon Pie Alley. At the far end of the street stood the Trumpet. All hell was breaking loose inside.
Oh, just perfect! thought Boy.
9
Korp stared at the stage, watching the ghost.
At first he thought it must be the Dark Duke. An old theater legend told how the ghost of the Dark Duke would stalk across the stage as a portent of disaster. History related how, years ago, the theater had relied on the duke for financial backing. If he didn’t like the work the theater was producing, he would storm across the stage during rehearsal, sometimes even during a performance. One day he had tried to stop a rehearsal and was stabbed by the lead actor, a touchy man at the best of times, whose brother had written the play in question. Since then the Dark Duke appeared at times of impending crisis, though he had not been seen in many, many years.
The theater was in trouble. Korp had seen so many strange things in his life that he was superstitious enough to believe that. There could be no mistake about it. The only question was when the trouble would strike.
In fact Korp was mistaken. He had only been watching the ghost for a few moments when it disappeared, leaving behind a slight cloud of dust that hung in the air, glowing.
A second later, Korp heard something behind him.
The thing slashed at Korp and he fell forward, one arm and his head across the edge of the box, dying.
10
Boy hovered at the end of Pigeon Pie Alley, trying to decide what to do. He knew he didn’t really have any choice. If Valerian wanted him to go into the Trumpet and meet a big, ugly man called Green, then he would have to do it. It was just that he didn’t want to.
There was obviously a fight going on inside. He waited, hoping things would settle down, but after a little while he thought, No-go now. Perhaps everyone in the tavern would be too busy to notice him; he could slip in and take a look around without being seen. Besides, he was freezing. At least inside he’d be warm for a while, and get away from the smell of the river just a street or two away.
As he approached the Trumpet the sound of tables breaking and bottles being smashed grew louder. The inn was really rough. There was no longer a sign with its name outside-its reputation spoke for it. There was grimy glass in some of the windows, though not all. The way into the Trumpet was down a claustrophobic alley that lay in the gloom between the buildings. Boy glanced in through a window as he headed down the alley. Things were getting lively, to say the least. He took one last gulp of the foul river air, and went inside.
The noise immediately seemed ten times louder, and if the stink was bad in the street, it was worse still inside. The whole place was a lurid riot of color, sound and smell compared to the darkness of the winter streets. For a minute Boy thought he might be sick. His head swam and he looked for a place to lurk.