Abarat 2: Days of Magic, Nights of War. Clive Barker

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СКАЧАТЬ miner had died. In an attempt to put these troubling thoughts from his mind, he slipped away to a little inn called The Fool in Chains where he could drink some Hobarookian vodka. Perhaps it was time—he thought as he drank—to cease his life as a hunter and find a less risky means of making money. As a bug-wrestling promoter, perhaps; or a knife juggler. Anything, as long as he never had to come back to Gorgossium and wait…

      His clammy meditations were interrupted by the sound of laughter from outside. He staggered out to see what all the fuss was about. Several customers, many in states of inebriation as bad or worse than his own, were standing in a rough circle, pointing to something on the ground in their midst.

      The Criss-Cross Man went to see. There in the dirt was one of the uglier occupants of Gorgossium: a large zethek. He had apparently collided with a tree and had fallen to earth, under which he was now standing, looking very confused, picking leaves out of his hair and spitting out dirt. The drunkards just kept laughing at him.

      “Go on, laugh at me!” the creature said. “Kud seen a thing you be way afraid of. A terrible thing I seen.”

      “Oh yeah?” said one of the drunks. “And what was that?”

      Kud spat out one last mouthful of dirt. “A witch-girl,” he said. “Does bad magic on me. Almost kills me with her Word.”

      Houlihan elbowed his way through the crowd and grabbed hold of the zethek’s wing so that he wouldn’t try to escape. Then he peered into his broken, confounded face. “You said you fought with this girl?” he said.

      “Yes.”

      “Was she alone?”

      “No. She was with a geshrat.”

      “You’re sure?”

      “You saying I don’t know what a geshrat looks like? I’ve been drinking their blood since I was a baby.”

      “Never mind about the geshrat. Talk to me about the girl.”

      “Don’t shake me! I will not be shaken. I’m—”

      “Kud the zethek. Yes, I heard. And I’m Otto Houlihan, the Criss-Cross Man.”

      The moment Houlihan offered up his name, the crowd that had been pressing around Kud suddenly melted away.

      “I’ve heard of you,” Kud said. “You’re dangerous.”

      “Not to my friends,” Otto replied. “You want to be my friend, Kud?”

      The zethek took but a moment to think on this.

      “Of course,” the creature said, bowing his head respectfully.

      “Good,” said the Criss-Cross Man. “Then back to the girl. Did you catch her name?”

      “The geshrat called her—” He frowned. “What was it? Mandy? Dandy?”

      “Candy?”

      “Candy! Yes! He called her Candy!”

      “And on what island did you last see this girl?”

      “No island,” Kud replied. “I saw her on a boat, out there—” He pointed behind him, toward the lightless waters of the Izabella. “You go after her?”

      “Why?”

      Kud looked nervous. “Magic in her,” he said. “Monstrous. She’s monstrous.”

      Houlihan didn’t remark on the oddity of a creature like Kud calling Candy a monster. He simply said: “Where do I find her?”

      “Follow your nose. We spoiled their catch by befouling their hold.”

      “Very sophisticated,” Houlihan said, and turned his back on the befuddled beast to consider his options. If he stayed on Gorgossium he would eventually be admitted into Carrion’s presence and be obliged to explain how once again the girl had outmaneuvered him. The alternative was to leave Midnight and hope he would be able to find Candy and get some answers from her before Carrion summoned him back and demanded answers. Yes! That was better. A lot better.

      “Are you finished with me?” the zethek growled.

      Houlihan glanced back at the wretched thing.

      “Yes, yes. Go,” he said. “I’ve got work to do, following your stink.”

       7 SOMETHING OF BABILONIUM

      THE SHORT VOYAGE TO the Carnival Island quickly took the Parroto Parroto out of the darkness that surrounded Gorgossium. A golden glow on the horizon marked their destination, and the closer they came to it the more boats appeared in the waters around the little fishing boat, all making their way west. Even the most unremarkable of vessels was decorated with flags and lights and streamers, and all were filled with happy people on their way to celebrate on the island ahead.

      Candy sat in the bow of the Parroto Parroto, watching the other vessels and listening to the singing and the shouts that echoed across the water.

      “I don’t see Babilonium yet,” she said to Malingo. “All I see is mist.”

      “But do you see the lights in that mist?” Malingo said. “That’s Babilonium for sure!” He grinned like an excited kid. “I can’t wait! I read about the Carnival Island in Wolfswinkel’s books. Everything you ever wanted to see or do, it’s there! In the old days, people used to come over from the Hereafter just to spend time in Babilonium. They’d go back with their heads so stuffed with the things they saw, they had to make up new words to describe it.”

      “Like what?”

      “Oh. Let me see. Phantasmagoric. Cathartic. Pandemonical.”

      “I never heard of pandemonical.”

      “I made that one up.” Malingo smirked. “But there were hundreds of words, all inspired by Babilonium.”

      As he spoke, the mist began to thin out and the island it had been concealing came into view: a glittering, chaotic conglomeration of tents and banners, roller coasters and sideshows.

      “Oh. My. Lordy. Lou,” Malingo said softly. “Will you look at that?”

      Even Charry and Galatea, who were working on building a makeshift cage of timbers and rope to contain the captured zethek, stopped work to admire the spectacle.

      And the closer the Parroto Parroto came to the island, the more extraordinary the sight seemed to be. Despite the fact that the Hour was still early and the sky was still light (showing just a few stars), the lanterns and lamps and myriad little fires on the island burned so brightly that they still made the island shimmer with their light. And by that light the crowds could be seen, busy about the happy labor of pleasure. Candy could hear their contented buzz, even over a considerable expanse of water, and it made her heart quicken with anticipation. What were these people seeing that made them СКАЧАТЬ