Adornments of the Storm Read online

Bismuth said, “I think he wanted me to run the shop with him when I was older. I would have, gladly, but I became consumed by my calling and lost myself in it. I was alone, with powers I barely understood, and it obsessed me. And then he died. He died in my arms on the floor of his shop, and my heart broke. I recreated this arcade in my Quay, as a memorial to him, but it was foolish. The devil-in-dreams trapped me in my grief, and I had to relive his death every time I came here. I couldn’t do my calling without coming here and seeing him, and watching him die.”

  John stayed silent. He had never heard Bismuth speak for so long, about such personal things. They reached the end of the arcade and stopped at the door of a small shop built into the facing wall. Next door was a derelict café. John could see the dusty blue tabletops and a copper urn behind the counter through a grimy window. On the corner was a barbershop. The door was gone, wrenched off its hinges some unknowable time past and he could see chrome fittings in the floor from which the chairs had been ripped out. The walls were covered in perforated display board, yellowed and peeling.

  “After Doctor Mocking rescued me from the Gantry I found this place derelict. Any life I had put into it was gone. My dad was gone.”

  “How did you feel?”

  Bismuth looked back along the empty arcade.

  “I felt strong again. I’d let go. Accepted it. I stopped wasting energy on this.”

  He turned to the door of the shop and opened it.

  TREVENA AND DANIEL took Lesley and Anna back home. They watched the girls walk up the drive. They turned and waved. Trevena wondered how they were feeling about losing their father. They had been quiet on the journey back from Invidisham-next-the-Sea, sitting together in the back of the jeep. They had drawn close, their relationship sustaining them in privacy and introspection. Trevena couldn’t believe the doc was gone.

  “He’s not gone,” Daniel said.

  “Are you reading my mind, now?”

  “In a way. If you weren’t thinking about Doctor Mocking I’ll give you my jeep.”

  “Jeep’s safe. What’s going to happen to him?”

  “He’s got Chloe with him. Anything could happen.”

  DANIEL STOPPED OUTSIDE the Mental Health Unit and Trevena went to the sliding doors that led into the foyer. He pushed the buzzer and after a few seconds there was a crackle as the intercom was activated on the ward. Trevena looked up at the CCTV camera above the doors and grinned.

  “It’s Phil Trevena. I need to get something from my office.”

  The intercom buzzed and the doors slid open.

  Trevena went through the foyer and headed for his office. He walked past the untenanted reception desk, and thought about Emily and her surprise comment about dinner. Was she taking the piss? Trevena couldn’t be sure; she was a sarcastic cow sometimes. But he was very fond of her and there was a certain edgy chemistry between them. She was a bit younger than he was and there was nothing spinsterish about her prolonged unattached status. She liked low-cut tops and a bit of makeup. She was a looker, Trevena reminded himself. He also had to remind himself that with Chloe’s intervention, Emily would have no memory of driving him home and tending his injured head. It would keep things simpler between them, he thought, with a touch of regret. Let’s get business out of the way first. Maybe he’d ask her out if he survived this.

  He opened the office door and went to his desk. He shuffled through his notes, stacked in an untidy pile beside his computer. He hadn’t got around to writing everything up and still had Chapel’s details written on a sheet of A4. He grabbed the address and left the office.

  “Got it,” he said. “It’s outside a village called Holt off the King’s Lynn road. Be in the middle of nowhere. Probably some artistic retreat.”

  “Tell me when we get close,” Daniel said, and they pulled out of the hospital grounds.

  THEY ARRIVED AT Chapel’s address half an hour later. It was, as Trevena had suspected, off the beaten track. A road through the village of Holt took them onto a country lane that wound through a flat region of farmland.

  “It’s up there,” Trevena said, his face illuminated from the glow of the satnav on his phone. The jeep bumped over potholes. Daniel swung the jeep onto a driveway and guided it between narrow ranks of bushes until they reached a detached cottage. It was unlit and had been hidden completely from the road. There were no neighbouring houses, Trevena estimated, within a quarter of a mile of the cottage. The huddled, indrawn aspect of the cottage provoked in Trevena a sense that it had been discovered trying to hide from something intent on preying on it, and had failed, and knew it. As the headlights from Daniel’s jeep slid across the front of the building, the glass in the darkened windows appeared to blink quick, pale membranes.

  They went to the front door and knocked. While Trevena was waiting for any response, Daniel made a circuit around the outside of the cottage.

  Trevena knocked again. He squinted through a panel of frosted glass set into the door and saw movement. He stepped back from the door, suddenly alarmed. They had talked about what they were going to say to Chapel if they found him. They knew he might be dangerous, or distressed, or both, and Daniel had assured Trevena that he would be able to deal with him. He could be very persuasive. But where was he?

  “Daniel!” Trevena hissed.

  The latch rattled and the door opened.

  Daniel stood there. “Back door was open,” he said. “There’s no one here.”

  THEY WENT THROUGH the cottage, but Daniel was right; there was no sign of Chapel. The rooms were dark and cold. The bathroom was missing toiletries and drawers were open in the bedroom. Chapel had packed and gone elsewhere.

  “He’s got a head in a jar and he stopped to get his toothbrush,” Trevena shook his head. “Fastidious.”

  “Fits the bill,” said Daniel. He was standing by the bedroom window, looking out over the dark plot of land at the back of the cottage. “There’s a big shed down there. Might be a studio of some sort. Let’s check it out.”

  They went downstairs and through the kitchen. A cold Aga cooker took up most of one wall and they had to skirt a small pine table in the middle of the room set with only one chair.

  They went across the yard and approached the shed. It was a solid-looking construction with a sloping roof and a single door. It had no windows but Trevena could see a cable running from the corner of the cottage that disappeared into a hole in the side of the shed, so he assumed an electricity supply.

  Daniel tried the door. It opened onto darkness. Daniel felt around for a switch and found one. A fluorescent strip hummed and came to life in a fitting above the door. They went in. The floor was bare and covered in rock dust and chips of stone. A small bench in the corner was covered with stone-working tools, and Trevena recognised the hammer Chapel had brought with him to the Unit. There was a pile of black stones, each about the size of a loaf of bread, tumbled beneath the bench. They looked rough-hewn, possible debris chiselled off from a larger piece.

  “Nothing here,” said Daniel. “Not now, anyway.”

  They returned to the kitchen. Daniel looked around, his expression unreadable to Trevena. He might have been frustrated or furious, Trevena couldn’t tell. Daniel went over to a telephone plugged into the wall above the sink.

  “Have you got his details there?”

  Trevena took the pre-assessment form from his pocket and unfolded it.

  “He hasn’t got a mobile,” he said. “Or wouldn’t give me the number.”

  “I’ve got an idea,” Daniel said, and picked up the landline. He pushed a few buttons and brought up the last number Chapel had dialled.

  “0208. That’s London, right?”

  “Outer London. You think he rang one of his arty mates to hide him out?”

  “No. It’s not a friend Chapel needs right now. He doesn’t want to hide out, either. He’s on a mission. Is there a next-of-kin on that form?”

  Trevena put the form flat on the worktop. Daniel read out the number, mat
ched it.

  He put the phone back in its cradle.

  “He’s gone to his mum’s,” he said.

  TREVENA USED HIS mobile to phone Doctor Mocking’s number. Index answered on the first ring.

  Trevena filled him in on the situation with Chapel.

  “Go,” said Index. “It’s all quiet here. Steve and Claire are asleep. I think Elizabeth gave them something.”

  Trevena hung up and he and Daniel walked to the jeep.

  “I feel like we’re being played,” Trevena said. “Or led into something. Do you feel that?”

  “I think there’s only so much Chapel can tell us,” Daniel said. “But he’s leaving clues. The part of him that’s fighting the corruption wants us to find him. Did he talk much about his parents?”

  “I got the impression he wasn’t close to his mother. I think he blamed her for the way he felt. That’s not unusual in my field. Most of the blokes I see with long-standing depressive illness have mummy issues.” Trevena noticed the set of Daniel’s jaw, the tension there.

  “Sorry, mate. That was a bit poorly phrased,” Trevena said.

  Daniel’s expression softened. “It’s okay. It’s the truth. When you see what’s behind the hopelessness, it’s easier to understand. It just makes me more determined to help Andrew Chapel, if I can.”

  Trevena put Chapel’s mother’s address into his satnav.

  “North Cheam,” he said. “Around the M25, over Dartford Bridge and round to Reigate. Three hours max this time of night. Should we call ahead and warn her?”

  “No. I don’t think she’s at risk from him. Besides, I want her to be asleep when we get there.”

  They left the cottage in darkness and headed for London.

  JOHN AND BIX followed Bismuth into the shop. It was empty, bare and cold. There was a small counter facing them with a door behind it and another at right angles to the back wall.

  Bismuth went around the counter and opened it. “Stockroom,” he said. John waited while Bismuth was in the cubbyhole. Bix sat at his feet.

  John stroked his head.

  “You okay, chap?”

  “It feels sad in here,” the dog said.

  John fussed his ears. “I know,” he said. “Sadness never entirely goes away.”

  “But we learn to live with it?”

  “We have to, don’t we?”

  Bismuth returned from the stockroom and stood behind the counter. He looked huge and suddenly rather poignant, a giant shopkeeper with strange metal goods in his hands. He placed them on the counter top and, to John’s surprise, said, “Take these and go back. The boys are in danger. And Colin.”

  John looked at the objects. One looked like a small brass telescope and the other was a lever of some kind, not dissimilar to the ones Bismuth carried, but shorter and thicker with a bolt attachment at the base of the rod.

  “What’s happened?”

  “I heard these calling to me from the stockroom. Sometimes I find things here, things dad made and I forgot about. The boys will know what they are. They need their instruments back. It’s the Despatrix. I can sense it. It likes to go for the young ones.”

  “Will you be all right?”

  Bismuth pushed the Instruments towards John. He moved towards the door set into the back wall. When he opened it, John saw a vast landscape of dereliction and ruin. Bombsites from the Autosomachy, the war with the Autoscopes that had raged for so long. This was Bismuth’s Quay, and none had fought the war harder.

  “I’ll stay,” Bix said. He followed Bismuth out into the grey, blasted rubble. Bismuth put a huge hand on the dog’s neck. He looked up at John, who still stood behind the counter.

  John nodded. He picked up the objects and came around the counter, stepping out onto the edge of the debris at the back of the arcade.

  Bismuth took a lever from his belt and put it in the ground. He opened an egress Gantry for John, one that would lead him back to the caravan site. As the Gantry widened to become a shining band of light, John went through without a backwards glance at his dog.

  “I love you, John,” said Bix.

  The Gantry closed.

  IT TOOK THEM three hours and seventeen minutes to get to Chapel’s mother’s house. Daniel had rigged a canvas roof over the top of the jeep but it was still cold, damp and uncomfortable.

  “Why didn’t we go back for my car?” Trevena said as he climbed out, stretching his cramped back and massaging his frozen buttocks.

  Daniel ignored him. He had allowed the question to become rhetorical after the third time he’d heard it. They’d have lost too much time swapping vehicles and Trevena knew it. On the way down, Trevena had asked other questions, less rhetorical ones, and Daniel had been happy to answer them.

  Wrapped in his coat against the weather, Trevena had asked, “Why didn’t you just open a Gantry and spring us to London?”

  “There’s a limitation to what we can do. We all have different abilities and to be honest, I’m pretty sure we don’t all know what they all are yet, even now. Seven years we’ve been together and we’ve been getting stronger, more connected, but I don’t think we’ve optimised fully.”

  Trevena was aware of the organic nature of the Night Clock, of the Dark Time it controlled. It was as fluid in places as a dream but fixed by rules that became evident even as they were being discovered. It was a paradox, its totality glimpsed but always immediately beyond his grasp.

  “Bismuth can travel like that, but only if he senses either one of us or an Autoscope in the region, and even then it’s not an exact science. I think the emotional investment he has with his Instruments connects him somehow, grounds him like a lightning rod. Index, too. He can pretty much do anything. The rest of us need these.” Daniel tapped his palms on the steering wheel.

  “Ever take the bus? A number 87 to the nearest Autoscope, please, driver?”

  “Elizabeth likes the bus. Sometimes we go into town on it. Saves paying for parking.”

  Trevena studied Daniel’s profile, looking for anything that might give away the joke, but there was nothing in Daniel’s expression other than a slight frown of concentration as he peered through the windscreen. Another paradox: this man had embraced a simple life, finally accepting the love of his woman, and fought demons with a tenacity and courage Trevena could only marvel at. It was enviable.

  “Okay,” Daniel said. “You’re the psychiatric nurse. I’ve been having a recurring dream. I’m walking in some woods and come to a clearing and hanging from the branches of the trees are all these old tin cans. They’re full of water and swarming with mosquito larvae. They repulse me and I pick up a branch and start smashing them up. Then I wake up. What’s that about?”

  “You should ask the Doc, he’s the shrink.”

  “I never got a chance.”

  Trevena took out his phone and waved it at Daniel. “Wonders of the modern age,” he said. He brought up Googleand searched for dream analysis. He typed in mosquito. “Passes the time,” he said. “When I was a kid we used to have spotter books. Here we go: To see mosquitoes in your dream suggest that some situation or someone has been draining you of your energy and resources. Alternatively, mosquitoes indicate that your resistance to attacks will be in vain. To dream that you are killing mosquitoes denote that you will eventually overcome your obstacles. Happiness and fortune will be in your grasp. How do you like those apples?”

  “I like the last bit. I think it’s more than that, though. I get a sense that those larvae are going to become something more than just mosquitoes. I have to kill them all before that happens. If they germinate in the dream they’ll infest Dark Time.”

  “And do what?”

  “Feed on more than blood? Feed on dreams? Draw off fragments of the collective unconscious, combining all the eternal variables of the human dream state. To make a monster from the transcendental molecules of the imagination. A host body for the devil-in-dreams.”

  “You won’t get that on Google.”

  T
revena turned off his phone. “How do you know when you’re dreaming and not just in a Quay?”

  “Same as anyone else. I don’t have control.”

  “Here’s one for you. If you’re dreaming could another Firmament Surgeon enter your dream and change it?”

  “I suppose so. I don’t think anyone’s done it though. Kind of an unwritten rule. It might fuck up the Night Clock.”

  CHAPEL’S CHILDHOOD HOME was a small mid-terrace on a side road off the high street. Trevena remembered what Chapel had told him during the assessment, how the road must have been pretty once. There were echoes of the past still – in the low walls and front gates that remained and the tree-lined alleyways that separated the houses at intervals – but most of it was gone, crammed and cramped by families with more cars than garage space, dropped curbs, paved front gardens and extensions erected on every end-terrace plot available. The road itself was a chicane of bollards and speed bumps. Trevena felt hemmed in. There was just too much here; it was a municipal palimpsest where ghosts of the original features could be glimpsed beneath the endless pouring of concrete and tarmac, the buckling of the pavements by constant laying and re-laying of pipes and cables, and the grasping enlargements of properties once meant to be appealing and that now just looked tumorous with home improvements.

  They walked up the path and stood outside the house.

  “Do we break in?” asked Trevena.

  “No need,” said Daniel. “She’s asleep.” He looked up, towards the small bay window overlooking the garden. He sighed and smiled. It was a reassuring smile Trevena recognised.

  “It’s all right,” Daniel said. “You’re dreaming.”

  He wasn’t speaking to Trevena. Daniel was The Hypnopomp. He was speaking to Chapel’s mother.

  Upstairs, a light came on.

  A FEW MINUTES later a frail-looking woman opened the front door. She was in her late seventies. She was wearing a shabby pink dressing gown over a tatty red cardigan and fluffy slippers. Her thin grey hair was pressed flat against her head on one side and stuck up in a fan on the other. She had dribble on her chin. Her face was pinched with sleep but her eyes shone out from beneath her crumpled, speckled brow with a cold, determined vigour.