Archibald Lox and the Bridge Between Worlds Read online

  Inez points to a hill in the near distance. “That’s where I was heading before I stopped for a rest,” she says.

  I follow after her as she sets off towards the hill. It’s as warm down here as it was up on the vine, so I take off my blazer and walk with it slung over a shoulder.

  “What’s the Merge?” I ask Inez, drawing abreast of her.

  She looks at me with a frown. “A universe of sorts, but we call it a sphere. It’s...” She scratches her head. “I’ve never had to explain this. I’m not sure where to start.”

  “Start with the sky,” I suggest. “Why is it green and where’s the sun?”

  “The colour of the sky differs from zone to zone,” she says. “As for a sun... Space isn’t the same here. There isn’t an endless universe above us, peppered with stars and planets. Each zone has a clearly defined boundary.”

  “How can that be?” I croak.

  Inez thinks for a long time. Finally she stoops, breaks off a mushroom and hands it to me. “Eat that.”

  I stare at the mushroom nervously. “I was told never to eat wild mushrooms.”

  “These are different,” Inez says. “Mushrooms are the only natural food source in the Merge, so you might as well get used to them.”

  I don’t want to look like I distrust her, so I take a nibble. It tastes OK. I pop the whole thing into my mouth and chew.

  “These are the building blocks of the Merge,” Inez says. “You’ll find soil, vines and mushrooms everywhere. In the beginning there wasn’t much else.”

  “How long ago are you talking?” I ask.

  She shrugs. “Twenty thousand years or so. People called devisers can reshape the land and turn mushrooms into other objects.”

  “Just like that?” I ask, snapping my fingers.

  “They can make small transformations quickly,” she says, “but changing the landscape takes a long time. A hill might take years, while a mountain range could take decades, even centuries.”

  “Your devisers live that long?” I gasp.

  Inez makes an odd little noise in the back of her throat. “Devisers usually work in teams,” she says. “If one is working on a mountain, another might be building a forest to run along its base, while another creates snow for its peak.”

  “You can change the weather too?” My head is spinning.

  “We can do pretty much whatever we want,” she says.

  I try to make sense of what she’s telling me. When we reach the hill and start climbing, I say, “How can there be day and night if there’s no sun?”

  “Our light’s supplied by devisers called solaristas,” Inez says. “They find places where vines join with the Born – like on the bridge in London – and direct daylight from your sphere into ours, through tiny vines high up in the skies of our realms.”

  We climb the hill in silence as I think about solaristas and a world that draws its light from a different universe.

  “What’s a realm?” I ask.

  “I’ll tell you in a minute,” Inez says. “I want to look around first.”

  We’ve come to the top of the hill. Inez turns to look back, so I do too. Apart from the aqueduct there’s nothing to see, except vines and more hills in the distance. Then she looks ahead, and when I switch my gaze, my breath catches in my throat.

  There are more hills, and a few villages, but what stuns me is a wall of green that stretches across the horizon three or four kilometres in front of us. It rises from the earth and curves up to join the sky. Vines run through it, like veins in the hide of a giant green beast. There are also a lot of shimmering patches dotted across it.

  The wall leads off to my left for several kilometres before bending around a hill and veering off into the distance. To my right it zigzags, cutting along the side of a village before jutting out, then in again, then out, then running in a more or less straight line to a point a long way off.

  Inez starts down the hill but stops when I don’t follow. She spots my shocked expression. “What’s wrong?” she asks.

  I can’t answer. I’m still staring at the wall.

  Inez casts her gaze around, puzzled. Then the penny drops. “You haven’t seen a buffer before.”

  She returns to the brow of the hill, sits down and pats the space next to her. I collapse into a bed of soft grass.

  “What is it?” I wheeze.

  “This zone’s boundary wall,” she answers. “Zones come in all shapes and sizes. Some are the size of a country, others the size of a room. Every zone exists within a massive cluster of zones, and those are realms, our equivalent of continents. There used to be nine but three have fallen.”

  “How does a continent fall?” I ask.

  She waves the question away. “Stick with me, Archie. This is complicated, so I only want to give you as many key details as you need.”

  “Yes, teacher,” I say drily.

  “Each zone has a buffer. It surrounds and isolates the zone, the way a sea or lake surrounds an island in the Born.”

  She stands and pulls me to my feet. Her hands are colder than mine and her flesh is rougher. She smells like the mushrooms we ate earlier. I blush a bit, though I’m not sure why. I’m like that sometimes with girls.

  “Come on,” Inez says, trotting down the hill. “I don’t want to hang about.”

  “In case the killers catch up?” I ask nervously.

  “No,” she says. “I doubt they’ll find me here.”

  “So why are you in a hurry?” I ask as she picks up speed.

  Inez shakes her head. “Let’s take it one mystery at a time.” And off she shoots, forcing me to run to keep up.

  We’re racing by the time we get to the bottom of the hill, both of us grinning.

  “Watch this,” Inez shouts, then does a cartwheel and carries on running. She does more cartwheels. Dry flecks of mud fly from her navy boots like glitter as her feet scythe through the air, and the arms of her red blouse billow out as if someone is pumping her up. On her last cartwheel, she turns and lands facing me. She doesn’t come to a halt, but continues to run at a fast speed backwards.

  “That’s just showing off,” I growl.

  “I know,” she chuckles, slowing down to let me catch up.

  “Why aren’t we panting?” I ask as we jog along. “I don’t feel out of breath.”

  “There must be more oxygen than normal in this zone,” she says.

  “You can change the amount of oxygen in the air?” I cry.

  “Devisers can alter just about anything,” she says.

  “What about gravity?” I ask. “If we’re not spinning round a sun, what’s holding us down?”

  Inez pats my shoulder. “Excellent question. The answer is... We don’t know. That’s befuddled us for generations.”

  We push on at a brisk pace, slowing only when Inez takes a short detour, leading me into one of the villages I’d spotted from the top of the hill. It’s an unimpressive collection of small huts with straw roofs. There are no paths or roads, except where they’ve been created in the grass by people walking back and forth.

  “Hello?” Inez calls.

  Nobody answers.

  She marches to a house and knocks on the door. When there’s no response, she pushes it open and enters. I think about staying outside but I don’t want to lose sight of her, so I head in. The house is plain inside, just one room, straw piled in a corner where I guess the residents sleep, a few roughly carved chairs, a bare table, hooks in one wall with clothes hanging from them.

  Inez checks a few of the other houses. They’re much the same as the first. No bathrooms, TV rooms, studies or kitchens.

  “Why are there no toilets?” I ask as we step outside again.

  Inez smirks. “When you need a toilet break, shout, and I’ll explain.”

  “Why not now?” I grumble.

  “You’ll find out,” Inez says in a sing-song voice. Then her smirk fades. “This is a ghost village.”

  “You don’t mean actual ghosts, do you
?” I ask nervously.

  “No,” Inez says. “It’s just been deserted.”

  “Are there ghosts in the Merge?”

  Inez looks at me, makes a throat-clearing noise, then heads out of the village and on towards the wall of the green in the distance without answering the question.

  7

  The wall doesn’t look solid when we get up close, more like a long beam of green light. “Walk into it,” Inez says when she sees me eyeing it edgily. “Nothing bad will happen.”

  I stick an arm into the wall of green light. The temperature drops a little, and I can no longer see my hand, but my fingers are fine when I withdraw my arm.

  “Do it,” Inez says. “I dare you.”

  I glare at her – I hate it when people turn something into a dare – but take a quick step forward, into the buffer. There’s a second where it’s like being inside a heavy green mist. Then I’m stepping out, and Inez is in front of me.

  I blink with confusion.

  “How did that happen?” I mutter. “I didn’t turn or take a step back.”

  “That’s the way buffers work,” Inez says. “Once you move into one, you find yourself stepping out again. You can’t stay inside. It’s impossible.”

  I try again and the same thing happens.

  “Cool,” I beam.

  Inez moves to one of the shimmering patches that I noticed from the hill. It’s the size of a door, but jagged round the edges, a dark blue colour. “This is a borehole,” she says.

  “Like on the bridge?”

  “Yes, but that was hidden and required a key, whereas this is open.” Inez points to more boreholes, which are different colours, shapes and sizes. “Each leads to a zone, but I’ve no idea what they’re like. We’ll try this one and hope for the best.”

  “Is it safe?” I ask.

  “Probably,” she says, “but there’s always a risk when you take a step into the unknown.”

  I gulp. “Is there any other way to cross?”

  “Through the vines.” She nods at the network above us. “We could slice our way into one of them and follow it for a time, then cut our way out again in a different zone, but that could lead anywhere as well.”

  “What if we just stay here?” I ask.

  “And do what?” she throws back.

  I glance at the ghost village and see her point.

  “There’s a third option,” she says. “We could part company and you could return to the bridge.”

  I chew my lower lip.

  “If I go with you,” I say quietly, “how long before I can return home?”

  Inez shrugs. “I’ve no idea. I have a long way to go, and the path will be hard. There’s no telling when I’ll find my way back to the Born, or even if I will. You saw the men who are chasing me.”

  “The killers will target you again?” I ask.

  “Oh yes,” she says darkly.

  “Why?” I whisper.

  “That answer lies further down the road, if you travel with me.” She sighs. “My advice is to go back.”

  I almost do turn tail, but then I remember the house of death. Silence and sorrow wait for me at home. This, on the other hand, is a place of wonders. The risk might be great, but the lure of the Merge proves greater.

  “Let’s see what’s through the borehole,” I bleat.

  Inez doesn’t smile. She simply nods, then steps through the door of shimmering blue. And I step through after her.

  FOUR — THE PRISONER

  8

  There’s a second or two of disorientation. The area around me is pitch black. I pause, wondering what would happen if I got trapped. Then, shivering at the thought, I emerge into the adjoining zone. It’s much like the one we’ve just departed, except the sky is a pale red.

  “Bizarre,” I murmur, staring up at the scarlet veil.

  Inez has already set off.

  “Where are we going?” I ask, scurrying to keep up.

  “That way,” she says, pointing ahead.

  I squint. There are hills in the distance but nothing else.

  “Do you know where you are?” I ask.

  “No,” she says. “We need to criss-cross zones until we determine our location. When we figure that out, we can hopefully find a way back to where I need to be.”

  We walk for a few hours, then night falls in a matter of minutes. The darkness worries me – I wonder about savage, nocturnal animals – but Inez keeps going. Finally, as I’m dragging my weary legs along, we come to the wall of a small, ringed village.

  “This might be a good place to stop,” Inez says.

  “Definitely,” I gasp.

  She looks at me. “Are you tired?”

  I nod miserably.

  “You should have said,” she tuts. “We could have stopped at any point.”

  “And slept in the open?” I snort.

  “Yes.”

  I stare at her. “Really?”

  “I often sleep in the middle of nowhere,” she says.

  “Then why didn’t you stop before this?”

  Inez shrugs. “I wasn’t tired. I could go for hours more if I had to.”

  “I could too,” I say hotly. Then I add sheepishly, “But we don’t, do we?”

  “No,” Inez smiles. “It will be nice to sleep indoors for a change.”

  She leads me around the wall. It’s about three metres high, made of blocks of turf. We don’t find an entrance. The village is completely sealed.

  Inez judges the height of the wall and grunts. “Give me a leg up.”

  I bend, join my hands and let her put a foot in them. We count to three, then she pushes herself up and I heave. She grabs hold of the top of the wall and pulls herself to her feet in one smooth movement. Stands there for a minute, studying the village, before saying, “There are lots of domed huts, like beehives.”

  “Any sign of life?” I ask.

  “No,” Inez says. Then, startling me, she roars, “Hello?”

  Her voice echoes back to us but there’s no answering call.

  “I don’t think anyone’s home,” she says, then leans down and extends a hand. I jump and grab her arm. Inez pulls me up, my feet scrabbling against the wall as I do my best to help her. Not that she needs much help. She’s stronger than she looks.

  When I’m on the wall beside her, Inez casts her gaze around and calls, “Hello?” one more time. When there’s still no answer, we slip down into the village and go in search of a bed for the night.

  The beehives are small, domed buildings, not much bigger than Portaloos. They’re made of stones, stacked one atop another, no cement to bind them. There are no windows, and the doors are only about a metre high. Most are hanging open.

  Inez steps up next to one of the beehives and reaches into a pocket. She pulls out a bag, dips a few fingers into it, then rubs her fingers together. A glow spreads from her hand.

  “This is gleam,” Inez says, “a dust that creates light.”

  “How long does it last?” I ask.

  “It varies. This type will only give us a minute or two of brightness.”

  Inez kneels and leans into the beehive. She’s braver than me. I’d be worried that a monster would be hiding inside.

  “What was it like?” I ask when she withdraws, the light from her fingers already starting to fade.

  “A bare cell,” she says.

  We start to wend our way through the eerie, silent village, but after a few steps I have to pause to stifle a yawn.

  “You’re exhausted,” Inez says.

  I try to reply that I’m fine, but get cut off midway by another yawn.

  “Wait here,” Inez tells me. “I’ll have a quick scout round, find a place where we can sleep, then return for you.”

  “I want to come,” I object, afraid to be left by myself.

  “I’ll be quicker without you,” Inez overrides me, and slips away.

  I yawn again as I’m waiting. I want to sit down, but I’ll fall asleep if I do, and I’d rather
not be snoring when Inez comes back.

  If she comes back.

  Maybe this was her plan all along, to lead me to an isolated spot where she could cut me loose.

  I’ve no reason to suspect treachery but I’m tired and scared, and the dark thoughts won’t go away. I look for something to distract myself, and spy a standard keyhole lock in one of the closed beehive doors, the same as you’d find on any door on my world. I walk over and study it, remembering what Inez said about me being a locksmith. The hole on this one is too small to stick a finger in, and there’s nothing lying around that I can use as a tool, but I have a strange feeling that I can charm it into opening for me.

  Acting on that feeling, I run a couple of fingers around the lock. It shimmers at my touch and the hole expands as part of me somehow suspected it would. It’s large enough now for me to insert a finger, so I do and wriggle it around. A picture of the lock’s interior forms inside my head. It’s a simple model, less complicated than those on the bridge.

  I twist my finger several times, flicking pins and levers, and the lock clicks. I start to pull the door open, but stop when Inez calls, “Hey.”

  I turn and she’s standing close by. “This way,” she says.

  “You’ve finished?” I ask, walking over to her, leaving the door ajar.

  “Yes,” she says.

  “That was quick.”

  She shrugs. “There wasn’t much to see. Come on, I’ve found somewhere.”

  Inez leads me to a building that’s larger than the others, more like the huts in the village we visited earlier, with a log roof. She rubs gleam between her fingers as we step inside. There isn’t much to look at. A single room, hardly any furniture, no clothes hanging from the hooks on the walls. There isn’t even a bed, although there are no floorboards, so there’s plenty of grass beneath our feet.

  “Are you happy to call this home for the night?” Inez asks.

  I sniff. “It’s not luxurious, is it?”

  “No,” she says, “but it’s as good as we’re likely to find.”

  “Where will we sleep?” I ask.