When Joe Warbeck thought back on it later, he realised that none of it would have happened if he’d left right away.  But he’d had visions of the front entrance packed with police cars, waiting for him to come through so they could slap the handcuffs on him.  What had happened back at the house had been a clear-cut case of self-defence, but Jackie’s cousin had always struck him as the kind of person who’d have the local police in his pocket.  He went up one of those paths to look for a back way.  There was bound to be one.  People like that always had to have something hidden from the little people.

The path got steeper as it went along, until eventually Joe had reached a definite hill.  That was OK- he wasn’t afraid of a little extra exercise.  Could be quite a pleasant walk, really.  Most people would have been too busy shitting themselves over what had happened back at the house to think clearly, but Joe was actually feeling very calm.  Could be quite a pleasant walk.  Lovely breeze.

This whole mess was typical of Jackie.  It was all about her own comfort.  God forbid anything interfere with that, even her own children.  It hadn’t been any different when they’d been together.  Joe would be the first to admit that he wasn’t the easiest guy to live with, but if you stuck it out instead of giving up the moment things got a bit difficult, he made it worth it.  He paid you back in spades.

Joe was starting to get out of breath.  He hadn’t even been able to see these hills from outside.  Went to show how much land they had, he supposed.  Nice life if your daddy was rich.  You could buy up half the planet.

Joe sat down on a little bit of grass by the path, wiping his forehead and looking up at the sky.  Jackie had sent the girls here, of all places.  Instead of letting their father take care of them, she’d packed them off to the middle of nowhere and got them exposed to nutters who waved swords around.  Joe couldn’t think about it too long, or he’d get too angry.  He’d…

There was something strange up ahead.  Like… a cave?  A hole in the hill?

Slowly and painfully, Joe got up and moved towards it.  As he got closer, he saw how big the hole was, and he saw what was in it.  A grand, golden staircase, leading up into the dark.

(To be continued)

Rube had thought of Sleet and the other people in Wallfruit Cove as “they” because she hadn’t known whether any of them were men or women.  The person she was speaking to now was a “they” in a very different sense.

They’d introduced themselves as the Finery family.  The woman they’d seen leaving the building was Til Finery, and her siblings were Ab, Si, Bon and Koo.  Together, they made a silver, tree-like being who worked for the Opal City council.

“So,” said the family, who’d sat behind a desk made out of dark green stone, “what can we do for you?”

Rube swallowed.  She wasn’t sure where to start.  “Well… do you know Colwyn Ballantine?”

“From Dovecote Gardens?”  When the Finery family spoke, it sounded as if one person was speaking, not five.  Rube wondered what everyone’s individual voice sounded like, and whether that affected the whole.  “Yes, we’ve crossed paths from time to time.  Wonderful man.”

Jeanette said it before Rube could.  “He’s been kidnapped.  We need your help.”

The Finery family didn’t reply right away.  Their face might have looked more like tree bark than anything human, but Rube was sure it had frozen into a rictus grin.  “OK.  And you are…?”

“His nieces,” Rube said quickly, “His sister Jackie’s daughters.”

Jeanette gave her an odd look, but didn’t say anything.  Rube was sure she’d done the right thing.  Mum and Colwyn were practically siblings, right?  And “cousin” might have made them sound too far-removed.  They needed to make it clear that things were urgent.

The Finery family nodded.  “And who told you he’d been kidnapped?”

“He did,” said Rube.

The Finery family looked confused.  Rube wondered if they had phones in Opal Hill.  If not, the idea of someone talking to you while they were trapped somewhere else might be a hard one to swallow.

Sally cut in.  “There’s a horse’s head in…”

“It’s OK, Sally,” said Rube.  If they didn’t already know about Falada, it was best not to bring it up now.  “The point is, he has a way of getting in touch with us.”

“I see,” said the Finery family.

Rube wasn’t sure if they did see, but she decided to carry on anyway.  “Did Colwyn ask you questions about the Iridescence family?  And about a boy named Kai?”

This time, the Finery family smiled.  “Ah.  Kai Domino.  We’ll tell you what we told Colwyn- there’s absolutely no record of a boy with that name going missing.  I don’t know who Colwyn relies on for his information, but they steered him wrong this time.”

“We’ve met him!” Sally burst out, “They turned him into a moth!”

The Finery family edged back, as of they were worried that Sally was going to spit at them.  “A moth?”

“Yes!”

“Why would they do that?”

“I don’t know!  Ask them!”

The Finery family settled in their chair.  “And where is he now?  Kai the moth?”

“He went to Wallfruit Cove to get help for us,” said Rube.  She didn’t feel like getting into the whole story, but if it would get things moving…

“Ah.”  The Finery family smiled.  “Well, I’m afraid we can’t proceed on this without him.  We’d need to hear….”

“But they’re keeping Colwyn prisoner!” snapped Jeanette.

The Finery family sighed.  “The Iridescence family?”

“Yes!”

“And do you have any proof of that?”

“Colwyn told us!”

“From his prison?  In, what, the Iridescence family’s attic?”

“I don’t know!  Probably!”

The Finery family sighed again- a heavy, long-suffering sigh- and stood up.  They were around eight feet tall, although Til Finery had looked much shorter on her own.  “Look.  We’re going to take you to the Iridescence family’s house.  You are going to see that Colwyn’s not there.  And then do you promise to drop it so that we can actually find your uncle?”

Rube looked at her sisters.  What other option did they have?  “OK.  Yes.”

(To be continued)

Everywhere they looked, things glittered.  The buildings shone and gleamed a million different colours.  The neon signs glowed a million more.  Even the ground sparkled with reflected light.  And the people bustling past them all looked like silvery trees.

“Do we stop someone and ask for directions?” whispered Rube.

Jeanette weighed it up in her head.  All the signs so far had been in an alphabet they didn’t recognise.  They hadn’t heard any of the passers-by speaking English, either.  And why would they?  The people they’d spoken to in Wallfruit Cove and Tavin Chapel had, but only because they’d seen them coming.  It didn’t mean everyone would.  They weren’t just talking about different countries here; they were talking about different worlds.

As the tree-people went past, some of them turned and gave them funny looks.  Just funny looks.  The kind of backward glances you’d give something weird that you didn’t see every day, not the half-amazed, half-horrified gawp you’d give something you’d never heard of before.  So, the people here didn’t see humans very often, but they did know what they were.  If Jeanette and the others looked, they’d probably find someone they could talk to.

Jeanette made up her mind.  She walked up to the nearest tree-person and tapped them on the back.

The tree-person whirled around, one of their branches raised as if they were about to slap Jeanette across the face.  Then, before she’d had a chance to think anything more than, Oh shit, they saw her and stopped in mid-spin.  Jeanette was pretty sure it was because they’d noticed she was a human.  She could practically hear them thinking, Well, everyone knows they don’t know how to behave in public.

Jeanette took a deep breath.  “I’m sorry, but… um…  Do you know where the council building is?”

No reply.  The tree-person just seemed to stare at her.

She had no idea what to do.  “We’re looking for the council building,” she repeated weakly.  She remembered going to Spain last year, and the woman in the queue for the arrivals desk who’d been confused about why you couldn’t pick up your luggage as soon as you got off the plane.  She’d leaned into the airport employees’ faces as they tried to hurry everyone along.  Excuse me, where do we get our bags?  Excuse me?  Ba-a-ags?  As if the problem was them not speaking English rather than her not knowing how airports worked.  Jeanette had made fun of her at the time- they all had- but now she was stuck doing the exact same thing.  When you only had a few words, you had no choice but to repeat them and hope for the best.

The tree-person made a low, rumbling sound, and, no matter how strange things got, Jeanette knew an exasperated sigh when she heard one.  They waved a branch at something just behind where she was standing.

Jeanette looked at the street they’d indicated.  It was a turn-off to their right, one that she and her sisters had just passed two minutes before.  “Oh!  Thanks!”

The tree-person made a grumbling sound, and cleared off.

Jeanette turned back to Rube and Sally.  “Right.  So…  Down there.”

The street they went down was a little less sparkly and crowded than the main road.  Not much less- maybe one building in three looked like it was made out of stone instead of glass and neon- but enough to make it clear that they were in the backstreets.  None of them said anything.  None of them mentioned that they had no way of knowing if the person who’d sent them down there had actually just sent them off to be mugged or murdered.  They just walked on, because they had nothing else to do.

After a few minutes, they saw a woman leave a building in front of them.  A woman, not a tree-person.  She wore a businesslike black dress and jacket, with matching earrings and high-heeled shoes.  She looked almost human, except for the fact that her hair and skin were exactly the same shade of mauve.

She walked down the steps in front of the building, and greeted a tree-person waiting for her on the street.  And as she touched their arm…

Jeanette’s first thought was, They sucked her in.  But it wasn’t exactly like that.  It was more that the woman seemed to become a part of the tree-person, filling a gap that Jeanette hadn’t noticed was there, and then disappeared into the background.  Jeanette remembered what Kai had said.  You know how the Opal City guys can combine, right?  Their thing is that they can join up into a weird pod with their siblings.  But she hadn’t expected to actually see it. 

As soon as it was done, the tree-person looked up and spotted them.  “Oh.  Excuse me!  Are you looking for the council building?”

(To be continued)

Onrey approached Dovecote Gardens from the side, and that was when he heard the crash.  A dull, splintering sound from the direction of the front porch.  Immediately, Onrey took cover behind a little grove of trees nearby.  He counted out three minutes in his head, then decided that his path was clear.  It might not be safe to continue towards the house, but it was, at the very least, a calculated risk.

As he sidled up to the house, Onrey couldn’t help admiring the fine carvings on the pillars and the foundations, the white marble resembling an ancient fresco in places.  As a rule, Onrey didn’t usually notice the finer points of architecture.  Most buildings left him cold.  But then, few buildings today were as impressive as this.

Immediately, he saw where the noise had come from.  The front doors were open, all but hanging on their hinges, with flakes of wood broken off and fallen to the floor.  Onrey could barely even imagine it, but the evidence was clear:  Someone had kicked the door in.  Onrey was revolted.  He might have had a code of honour, but it was clear that someone didn’t.

“Who goes there?” he called through the open doors.

He barely even noticed the scratching sound until it stopped.  It sounded as though it was coming from the upper floors of the house.

Onrey wasn’t sure what to do next.  Was he to run upstairs and protect the property of the very people he’d come here to fight?  Maybe.  No matter the quality of people who currently lived in it, Dovecote Gardens was important.  It was the only joining-point between the worlds.  Who knew what could happen if it fell?

He stepped across the threshold, sword drawn.  Across the hallway and up the stairs (not stopping to take notes on the décor for his siblings’ benefit), and on until he found the source of the scratching sound.

In the upstairs building, his questions were answered.  A dishevelled man stepped sideways out of one of the rooms, palms raised and grinning foolishly.  “It’s OK!” he told Onrey, “I’m a member of the family!”

And why would a member of the family need to kick in the front door? thought Onrey.  It was true that few of the other members of the family had behaved much better recently, but this was something else entirely.  Besides, the man’s appearance revolted him.  Onrey’s father had always said that when he was a boy, it was mostly only serfs who’d gone about with their faces half-shaven and their clothes creased into wrinkles.  But it seemed that standards were dropping everywhere.

He decided to get down to business.  “I am Onrey Tavin, heir to Tavin Chapel, and I am looking for Colwyn Ballantine.”

Onrey loved the startled reactions he usually got from people when he mentioned his family name. That dawning awe (or horror, depending on the circumstances) as they realised who it was the were dealing with.  Unfortunately, though, this man just looked nonplussed.  “Right…  Well, I’m looking for him, too.  I don’t think he’s here.”  The man put out a hand.  “Joe Warbeck.”

Onrey stared at the hand.  “What are you expecting me to do with that?”

Warbeck shrank back, his upper lip curling, but Onrey was unmoved.  The proper procedure for greeting an heir to a noble house was to bow.  Offering your hand instead betrayed a worrisome level of ego.

“And who are you supposed to be?” whined Warbeck, “I’m here looking for my children, mate.  If you’re not here to help, then get out of the way.”

At first, Onrey was almost frozen with shock.  How did you respond to someone who spoke to you like that?  Where could you even begin?  But then he looked over Warbeck’s shoulder, into the room he’d just left, and shock changed to fury.  It was clearly some sort of a bedroom- Ballantine’s judging from the décor- and it had been ransacked.  Clothes and bedding torn to pieces and left on the floor.  Drawers pulled out of cabinets.  The mattress dislodged from the bed.  A chair in pieces below a smashed patch of plaster, where it had hit the wall.

Onrey barely had to think about it.  He knocked Warbeck to the ground with his sword handle.

The man slumped against the wall, and Onrey leaned over him.  “Since your parents seem not to have provided you with even the most basic education, let me give you some advice.”  He pointed his sword at Warbeck as he spoke, emphasising his points as he made them.  “You do not damage the property of a noble house.  You do not address…”

Something struck Onrey’s legs, and he fell to the ground.  In an instant, Warbeck was upon him, grabbing him by the hair and ramming his head into the floorboards.  Onrey felt about for his sword, but it was no good- he could see it halfway across the hallway floor.  Had it landed there when he’d fallen, or had Warbeck kicked it away?  Onrey supposed it made no difference.  Either way, he couldn’t reverse time so that it hadn’t happened.

Warbeck reared back, and then smashed an elbow into Onrey’s temple.  By the third or fourth time, he could no longer even feel it.

(To be continued)

Rube ended up making a few false starts and doubling back on herself, but after an hour or two, they started to see strange silver and purple lights on the horizon, and Jeanette had a hunch that they’d found what they were looking for.

As they got closer, the lights came into focus- tall, glassy buildings in a kind of pointed rectangle shape (like corncobs, Jeanette thought), with smaller versions of themselves clustered around them, spreading out all over the side of the nearest mountain.  And then there was the music.  You’d have thought that you’d either hear one tune over everything else or a weird cacophony of instruments, but instead it all seemed to harmonise, as if the whole city was playing together.

As they approached, the sky became a little darker- nowhere near sunset, but definitely the afternoon turning into evening- and one by one, glowing shapes began to appear.  Neon lights, if the people of Opal Hill had neon.  A pink palm tree here, a green pineapple there.  Probably dozens more over the next few hours.  And in the distance, behind the buildings on the mountain, was a calm, green sea that definitely hadn’t been there a moment ago.

Opal Hill.  Soon they’d be there.

(To be continued)

For a long time, High Priest Tavin and his family didn’t want to believe it was true.  But as the day faded into night, they could no longer deny it.  Those girls weren’t coming back with the bird.  They had never intended to find it in the first place.

Their youngest daughter began to sob- she was the one who missed the rocfinch most- and Sameander took her into her arms to comfort her.  She looked at her husband, her lovely face creased in anguish.  “In our own house,” she whispered, “How can anybody behave like that?”

High Priest Tavin shook his head grimly.  It hardly bore thinking about.  It seemed as though loyalty and deference were foreign concepts at Dovecote Gardens these days.  And to think their family had once trusted them so!

It was his oldest son, Onrey, who finally roused the High Priest from these dark thoughts.  He waited for the women to quiet their sobs and sighs, and then raised his powerful young voice above the throng.  “I’ll go to Dovecote Gardens,” he announced, “I won’t leave until they’ve agreed to put things right.”

Sameander’s hand went to her heart.  “Would you really do that?” she gasped.

Onrey looked at her in surprise.  “It’s my duty, mother.”

High Priest Tavin felt himself quite touched by his son’s bravery.  Barely seventeen years old, and already willing to go out and defend his family name.  “A prayer circle,” he announced, and drew his wife and children around him, hand in hand, o that they could begin.

Each family member took their turn in explaining why they felt they were blessed at this moment.  Onrey’s brothers and sisters said what was expected- they were blessed because Onrey might be able to get their pet back, they were blessed because they might hear from him what Dovecote Gardens looked like after so long.  Sameander counted herself blessed for having such a brave, high-minded son.  Finally, it was High Priest Tavin’s turn to speak.  “I am blessed,” he told them, “because today, we are addressing a two-hundred-year-old wrong.  If our ancestors had thought to do this at the time- to go to Dovecote Gardens and demand justice- then many of the terrible things that have happened since might never have come to pass.  I am blessed to know that there are limits to the indignities that can be placed on Tavin Chapel.  The people of Dovecote Gardens should have considered that from the start.”

*

Onrey’s father had told him the story countless times.  Two hundred years ago, the owner of Dovecote Gardens had been a good man and a close friend to the High Priest at the time.  The two of them had planned for Tavin Chapel and the rest of Kindling Grove to take their place in the alliance of communities around them, and direct them to new and better things.  But sadly, all this was not to be.  The owner died suddenly, and his stepson- a cruel, wicked man- wrested control of the estate from his true children. Since then, the Tavin family had been cut off from Dovecote Gardens and the rest of the alliance, forced to live like exiles in disgrace.

Onrey said goodbye to his parents and set out on foot.  Dovecote Gardens would be expecting him (if they expected him to come at all) to arrive on horseback, waving a sword in the air.  He would take them by surprise instead.

He did have a sword, of course; the servants had worked hard to find him the right clothes and weapons for the journey.  Most of it had been in the family for centuries.  The leather jerkin on his chest had belonged to his ancestor of two hundred years ago, the very one who had been betrayed by the owners of Dovecote Gardens.  At a moment like this, it was impossible not to feel the weight of history upon you.

Onrey Tavin set out down the mountain, towards the paths and the white walls, on the way to reclaim his birthright.

(To be continued)

The Iridescence family had a windowless, whitewashed attic, shaped (as most rooms were in Opal Hill) in a kind of circular cone, with the ceiling tapering up towards a point in the middle.  Colwyn Ballantine had had nothing to do for the past three days but walk circuits of the room and think about how worried he was about his nieces.  Had Sleet of the Meadows persuaded them to stay in Wallfruit Cove with Kai, or had they set off to find him as they’d planned?  Colwyn hoped it was the former.  At least that way they’d be safe

When he felt the ache between his eyes that told him Falada had been activated, Colwyn’s legs went weak with relief.  This would be Ruby, calling to apologise because their plans had changed.  But when he opened his eyes to look through Falada’s, all he could see was the living room floor.

Colwyn heard a crash from somewhere else in the room, and understood what had happened.  Falada hadn’t been activated; he’d been knocked off the wall.  Most likely by the same person who was smashing up the rest of the room.  Were they throwing a tantrum because they hadn’t found what they were looking for?  Colwyn certainly hoped so.  He had a nasty feeling that he knew who it was.

(To be continued)