Eclipse, p.22
Eclipse, page 22
James tailed off.
‘Can you hear that?’ he asked.
Now he mentioned it, Haezle could hear something. It had started off faintly, but had been growing in volume and intensity for the last few minutes. It was nagging at the edge of her attention, demanding that she notice.
She was noticing now. It sounded like a crowd of people. Angry people.
The doors of the library burst open and someone rushed through. As he turned to push them closed again, Haezle recognised him. It was the Authority Cadet she’d met the previous day.
Sim. Sim? Was that his name?
It seemed like weeks ago. A lot had happened, and she hadn’t slept, but it had only been the day before.
He leaned his back against the doors, as if bracing ready for them to be pushed from the other side. Looking around, he disregarded all the Readers who, although their attention was no longer on their books, did not even try to get up from their stools to help.
His attention settled on Haezle and James. Haezle thought she sensed a small jolt of recognition from Sergey, like he knew this man and was surprised to see him. Perhaps she’d imagined it. She’d seen nothing the other way.
‘Help me barricade this!’ Sim shouted across the Library.
Ordinarily this would have prompted a chorus of shushes from the assembled Readers. Haezle thought she felt the burning desire to do so, from some of them, heavy in the air. It was almost a reflex. She didn’t blame them. For a moment, she wanted to do it herself.
Instead, she ran across to her own bench, which was empty because of her not being at work and because of the lack of a meaningful text for her to study. She pushed it with all of her strength, but it didn’t budge.
‘Are you going to help?’ she cried out to anyone.
James quickly joined her. The bench was heavy, which made it an ideal barricade, but they were going to need more people. She didn’t hold out much hope. Readers were a passive bunch. It was going to be almost impossible to get it to the door.
‘Well, this is different,’ said a voice in her ear.
Haezle turned to see the pale, soft, grinning face of Isaak to her right. Her heart leaped.
‘We have to move it,’ she whispered, not so much an instruction, more a wish that she was trying to manifest.
The bench jumped forward suddenly, the force of the pushing overcoming the friction for a moment, before its legs caught again and they juddered to a painful halt. They pushed again. Wooden legs bent and creaked. There was the sound of fibres tearing. Haezle had visions of the bench collapsing and the three of them falling face first on top.
Then, with a jolting bounce that caused it to dig into her ribs, the bench lurched forward again. Now more Readers joined them, and now it was moving, feet screeching on the floor as they careered towards the door.
Sim jumped out of the way and the bench crashed into place with a reassuring thud, just before several loud bangs from the other side could be heard. There was a suggestion that the doors were about to bow inwards, but the barricade held firm and they stayed closed.
All of them - Haezle, Sim, James, Isaak and the other Readers, leaned back against the bench, chests heaving as they gulped in air. No one spoke.
The background noise grew steadily. More voices added to the crowd that they could hear was building outside. There were several thuds, at irregular intervals, but nothing that threatened the integrity of the door. They sounded like missiles launched from the mob, rather than concerted efforts to get inside.
‘What the hell is going on?’ asked James, eventually.
‘Lunatics,’ said Sim. ‘Fanatics. I don’t know what’s riled them up, but it’s something to do with an eclipse. Is there due to be an eclipse?’
Haezle’s heart thudded in her chest.
“The eclipse is the end.”
Is this the end?
‘Oh wow,’ said Isaak. ‘I… I think there might be.’
This was news to Haezle. She knew Isaak studied the charts - he thought that the Book of Moors might have an astronomical element to it - but he hadn’t mentioned an upcoming eclipse. Given what she kept seeing that morning, she definitely would have remembered. It definitely would have been something that Isaak wouldn’t have been able to shut up about.
Isaak turned to Haezle.
‘It was yesterday, after you’d gone to see Onu Lek about the…’ Isaak dropped his voice to a whisper and Haezle remembered that she’d asked him not to talk about her concerns regarding the Book of Keyes. ‘…problem you were having. With your book.’
‘It’s OK,’ she said, glancing at James. ‘I don’t think that’s a secret anymore.’
Isaak looked surprised, as well he should. A secret of the Citadel, let alone of the Library, was not something that would normally be shared with an outsider. Haezle could see him sizing Sergey James up, wondering who exactly he might be.
She wouldn’t be able to help him, she was none the wiser herself.
‘Right, OK,’ he said, not entirely convincingly. ‘So, yeah. I saw something. In the Book of Stay. It was…’
Isaak wasn’t the Reader for the Book of Stay. He looked guilty, but there wasn’t time to find out what had happened, however much Haezle would have loved to know.
He dug around in a pocket and pulled out what looked to be a napkin. It was scrunched up into a ball and had something stuck to it that might have been a boiled sweet, although it was mostly coated in fluff.
‘It looked like this.’ He unscrunched the ball. ‘Urgh, what’s… never mind… The moment I saw it, I knew. I felt what it meant. You know, when that happens, how it punches you in the guts?’
Haezle didn’t know, but her approach to reading was more logical and less based on feeling than Isaak’s was. She glanced down at the crumpled napkin in Isaak’s hand. Her heart pounded against her ribcage so hard it hurt. It was the same symbol.
Estrel’s symbol. From the Echo. From inside the time loop. The stupid, ill-conceived attempt to fix a future that seemed destined to happen whatever they tried. If Trinity was doomed to tear itself apart, it seemed improbable that stopping one woman’s actions on one particular day would prevent it. It had to be more complicated than that.
‘Where did you get this?’ She snatched it from him. ‘What kind of…’
‘I drew it!’ he protested. ‘It’s what I saw in the book. I needed a copy because I’m not sure I understood all of it. There’s this sword, and the jewel, but… It’s an omen of an eclipse, I’m sure it is. That’s why I went to check the charts. I wanted to understand when it might be coming. I was sure it would be soon, but I didn’t know how soon…’
‘Show me that,’ growled Sim, leaning over Haezle’s shoulder.
‘Do you recognise it?’ Haezle wasn’t sure what led her to ask that question. Maybe it was something in his tone, but she wasn’t surprised when he answered in the affirmative.
‘They’re appearing all over the city,’ he said. ‘That’s what all of this is about.’
‘All of what?’ asked Haezle. ‘The mob? How is that related? What does this mean?’
‘It’s a kind of symbol. There’s a gang, or an organisation or a… something. I don’t really know what it is yet. They’re called the Clippers. The Clippers of the Black Night. There’s graffiti. Slogans.’
‘”The eclipse is the end?”’ asked Haezle.
Again, she wasn’t sure why she was so certain. This time, however, Sim didn’t immediately agree.
‘The end? No, that’s not… “The eclipse is the beginning”, that’s what it says.’
‘The eclipse is the beginning,’ Haezle murmured, under her breath. ‘The eclipse is the end…’
Estrel was from the future. His message was from another time. A time that hadn’t happened yet.
Perhaps it wasn’t talking about this eclipse. Eclipses were cyclical things. Estrel’s message could have come from the end of the cycle. A cycle that would begin…
‘Isaak, what did the charts say?’
‘What?’
‘What did the charts tell you? When is the eclipse?’
‘Well, today, that’s what I’ve been trying to tell you. It’s today. In fact…’
Haezle looked up to the top windows of the Library. It was midmorning. The sun would have been bright and high in the sky by now and, whilst there was never a lot of light flooding in through those narrow slits, it was definitely dim.
If anything, there was less light than there had been when she’d entered the Library.
‘It’s now, isn’t it?’
‘Yes. Yes, it is. I think that’s why it’s getting so dark.’
‘And why the mob is getting louder?’ asked James.
It was true. It wasn’t just the volume of shouts. There was chanting, and the sound of missiles striking the door had increased in both frequency and intensity.
The voices swelled to a roar, and the door bowed, testing their barricade.
Haezle, Sim, James and Isaak all looked at each other.
‘It’s not going to hold,’ said Sim, reaching to his belt. ‘We need to get out of here.’
He withdrew a gun which, as he turned, he pointed at the door, taking a step back.
‘The Catacombs,’ said James. ‘There’s nowhere else to go.’
Haezle wasn’t sure how wise that was. The Catacombs were vast and sprawling, with multiple exit points. But they were also narrow and caving in and prone to developing dead ends without notice.
It would be very easy to get trapped in the Catacombs. But Sergey was right, there wasn’t anywhere else to go.
They abandoned the barricade and ran.
CHAPTER 44
LAGRANGE
Haezle’s friend, Isaak, doesn’t come with us. He shows us to the hole in the ground, with the ladder that drops into the darkness, and he leaves us to it. He seems to think that he’ll be safe if he stays in the library. He seems to think the mob is only chasing me.
I mean, they are chasing me. He also has a point that he makes repeatedly, that disappearing into a hole in the ground, into a labyrinth of underground corridors, may not be the best plan to evade them. But I’m not so certain that he’ll be as safe as he thinks in his precious library. They don’t seem like a very focused group. They’ve already engaged in a lot of unnecessary smashing.
I guess you can’t smash a book. But I don’t think they’d think twice about smashing Readers. Then setting fire to everything.
The other reason we’re ignoring his advice is the certainty that Haezle has that she needs to locate some guy named Lek. I think I recall the name. I think she talked about him yesterday. Wow, was that only yesterday? He’s the monk who found the book she’s reading. Compiled the book she’s reading. He seems to have gone AWOL in the Catacombs. She seems pretty pissed off at him.
It’s this other guy who has convinced her she needs to find him. He’s dressed weirdly. I can’t quite put my finger on what it is. Every garment is, in and of itself, completely acceptable, if a little flamboyant for my taste. But, put together, he looks out of place, like someone from another time. Not one I can identify. Not one that I think has ever happened.
He’s also looking at me funny. It’s been mostly glances, but he doesn’t seem to be able to stop checking me out. Even now, as I’m standing in the half-dark, waiting at the bottom of the ladder while he follows Haezle down, I can see him dart a look in my direction.
In different circumstances, this wouldn’t be unwelcome attention. Don’t get me wrong. There’s something about this guy, James, a comfortable energy between us, like we’ve known each other a while. He seems familiar, but in more than a “I recognise your face” way. But this isn’t the time.
Haezle takes a step back from the bottom of the ladder to give him some space. I stay where I am, so she has to squeeze behind me in the narrow passage. She looks at me with a puzzled expression, but I say nothing.
James drops off the ladder a couple of rungs early, landing with bent knees. He springs up and spins around, almost jumping about to face me. He smiles. It’s a confusing smile, with what seems to be a fair amount of genuine warmth behind it.
‘Perfect,’ he sighs. ‘I haven’t had a chance to introduce myself yet. Sergey James.’
He sticks out his hand. I have to unfold my arms to take it.
‘I’m…’ I begin, gruffly.
‘...Simeon Lagrange!’ he beams. ‘Indeed you are. You are, may I say, looking incredibly well. So fresh faced. So… not grey.’
I don’t look incredibly well; I look normally well, and I don’t know what he would know about it, anyway. He’s actually quite irritating when he opens his mouth. I conclude that I definitely do not know this man.
‘You know who I am, then?’ is all I actually say.
‘I do, oh yes, I definitely do!’ He pumps my hand a few more times before letting go. ‘Although, I guess in another sense, no, I don’t. You’re not like the man I know. It’s not just how you look. You’re a different man…’
‘I’ve changed? When did we meet?’
It’s possible that I do know him. From the Academy? From school? That might explain things. Perhaps he’s got more irritating as he’s got older?
‘We haven’t. Not yet, not from your perspective. You’re not like the man I know because you haven’t had a chance to become him yet. Oh, it’s good to see you…’
He takes a step towards me and raises his arms, as if he’s going to hug me, before thinking better of it. My face remains impassive throughout, which is exactly what I want to communicate. A determined lack of emotion in the face of over-familiarity. He’s not just irritating. He’s possibly insane.
‘Can we get a move on?’ asks Haezle. ‘We’re meant to be finding Lek. And escaping from the mob.’
Everything is still quiet at the top of the ladder. As far as I can tell, there isn’t an imminent danger from the mob, and whilst we don’t want to hang around and lose any head start we might gain, I have questions.
‘Who in The Creator’s name are you?’
James pauses. He seems to be doing some sort of calculation. His face is screwed into a puzzled expression.
‘I’m… OK… this is going to get complicated, but I’m a colleague,’ he says, apparently deciding that whatever he was worried about doesn’t matter. ‘From the future. I travelled back in time.’
I’m nonplussed. I don’t know how to process this. I look around and stare at Haezle, but she seems fine with it.
‘You…’
‘No, don’t say anything. Haezle’s right, there isn’t time. You’re going to find this difficult, but I just want you to hear me for now. You don’t need to trust me, you don’t need to believe me. I’ll just tell you what’s going on and then we’ll get on with escaping. OK?’
‘OK,’ I manage to splutter.
‘Right, so in the future… about thirty years, I think, we work together. You’re actually my boss, you’re a Senior Oficier in the Black Knight Division and I’m one of your Juniors…’
I mouth the words “Black Night”...
‘...not “Black Night”, though,’ he says, confusingly. ‘It’s with a “K”, in the future. I don’t know what’s happening here, but this “Black Night” was never a thing. Not unless it’s been forgotten or suppressed or something. And the Clippers? They’re just a death cult. They’re… nothing. Something’s changed. None of this happened before. But Lek warned me about things like this. That’s why he sent me back…’
‘He sent you back too?’ Haezle cuts in.
‘Of course, he sent more than one of us. He always needs a backup plan…’
He looks me straight in the eyes.
‘I came back for you, Oficier Lagrange. I came back to help you. Or protect you or… I’m not completely sure of the specifics, but Lek was very persuasive and absolutely adamant that this was about you. I wouldn’t have… but you don’t need to know about that…’
He trails off, his eyes a little glassy, his voice catching in his throat. Whatever he had to do to get back here had affected him deeply. He did that for me.
He also called me “Oficier”. It’s hard not to warm to that.
‘This whole Black Knight confusion. The possibility that you’re being chased by the very gang of criminals it will be your mission to bring down? That only convinces me he was right.’
‘Are you sure you should be telling him this?’ asked Haezle. ‘Don’t you have to be careful about cause and effect, or something?’
‘It’s Simeon Lagrange,’ said James. ‘It’s hard enough to persuade him to do anything. Nothing less than the truth is going to cut it.’
Despite myself, I’m coming round, although I’m uncertain that I’m not losing my mind at this point. None of it stands up to scrutiny, none of it withstands a rational interrogation. But I think I agree that this is what we need to do.
No, I don’t agree, that’s too logical. I believe that this is what we need to do. I feel it in my heart. In my gut.
‘So what…?’ I begin to say.
There is the unmistakable sound of the library door being blown off its hinges by a colossal explosion. The floor of the passage we are standing in shudders. Dust and dirt cascade from the ceiling.
Then there is silence. We need to run.
CHAPTER 45
ESTREL
Despite my reservations about meeting them because of the non-zero chance of accidentally ending reality, it was reassuring to be in Clar’s company. They brought a sense of calm, and of all things being possible. Situations that seemed dark and hopeless suddenly seemed less so once you talked them through with Clar.
Obviously, I couldn’t really do that, but they brought the aura, anyway. I felt better while they sat and waited for me to finish my drink. I felt better while we rode the miniTram back uptown.
We sat next to each other, but were no chattier than during my ride down with Mouse. I didn’t mind. It was late, and I’d had a few beers and I was worried that, if I started talking, I’d let my mouth run away with me and say things that it really wasn’t a good idea to say.
