‘Well?’ Aisling asked.
Mella shrugged. ‘You’re right,’ she said. ‘I’m not from New Zealand.’
‘But you’re my brother’s daughter?’
‘Oh yesh. That’s what Mummy says when I’ve done something wrong: you’re your father’s daughter, she says. She says father ’cause that’s what he is and he’s not her brother, of course, he’s her husband. But it’s all the same man, isn’t it? My father, your brother, Blue’s husband.’
‘Blue?’
‘Mummy,’ Mella said. She felt like giggling again, but didn’t. This had become a very serious conversation.
‘So you admit you’re from Fairyland? You admit you’re living there and so is Henry?’
Mella said soberly, ‘We don’t call it Fairyland – we call it the Faerie Realm. ’ She hesitated. ‘Actually, we don’t. We just call it the Realm. But it’s the Faerie Realm. And my mummy runs it.’
Aisling looked at her sharply. ‘Your mother runs the Faerie Realm?’
‘Queen,’ Mella said.
For a long moment Aisling just stared at her. Then she said, ‘This gets better and better. Henry is married to the Queen of the Fairies? ’
‘’S right.’ Mella nodded. She wondered why she was having difficulty pronouncing her words properly and decided some more tea might help.
‘What about Mr Fogarty?’ Aisling asked suddenly. ‘Is he with you or is he really in New Zealand?’
‘Dead,’ Mella said. Single words weren’t so bad; it was whole sentences that gave her trouble. All the same, she thought she’d better make the effort to explain properly about Mr Fogarty. She took another deep, soothing, wonderful draught of tea. ‘Got sick. Died. Now they have to talk to him through a Charaxes ark.’
Aisling stared at her. ‘Fogarty’s dead?’
‘Yesh.’
‘But Henry still talks to him? Like you’re talking to me now?’
Mella shook her head and giggled. ‘No, no, silly. That would be stupid. I told you, they use a Charaxes ark.’
‘What’s a Charaxes ark?’
‘’S a box that lets you talk to dead people. Henry – Daddy – got it from his friends the Luchti. They had one for ages and they made him a copy. Of course he was a blood brother of the Luchti. He got made one when he helped Lorquin kill his draugr. ’ She smiled. ‘That was years ago. Lorquin’s chief of the tribe now.’
Aisling looked momentarily confused, then shook her head and said, ‘You’re telling me Henry has a box, some sort of machine, that lets him talk to the dead?’
‘Yesh. Talk to Mr Fogarty anyway.’
‘And Mr Fogarty talks back?’
Mella nodded. ‘Yesh.’
Aisling frowned suddenly. ‘Have you been drinking, Mella?’
‘Tea.’
‘I meant alcohol.’
‘Tea,’ Mella repeated. She held Aisling’s gaze.
After a long moment, Aisling said, ‘Sit there and don’t move. Don’t go away. I’ve something I want to show you.’ She stood up and hurried from the kitchen. ‘Don’t move,’ she called over her shoulder.
Mella didn’t feel at all like moving so she stayed exactly where she was and drank more tea. The warmth in her belly – she called it belly to herself now, which was a bit rude, but a lot more friendly than stomach – the warmth in her belly, good old belly, was spreading through the rest of her body and the world, this Analogue World, looked wonderful. Even this tiny little kitchen looked wonderful. And it was truly wonderful that she’d become such good friends with Aunt Aisling, who seemed so genuinely interested in the Faerie Realm and what was happening there.
Aisling came back, concealing something in her hand. She set it on the table in front of Mella. ‘Do you know what that is?’
Mella blinked. She was having trouble focusing her eyes as well as talking, but even though it swam a little in her field of vision, she recognised the control at once. She made a huge effort. ‘Yes,’ she said with remarkable clarity.
‘What is it?’ Aisling asked. She was leaning forward now and actually seemed to be trembling a little with excitement.
‘It’s a transporter. Tha’s a portable portal control,’ Mella said. Even though she was concentrating very hard, she popped her P s. But that was because of the alliteration in portable portal. If there hadn’t been any alliteration, she definitely wouldn’t have popped anything. Definitely. ‘Mr Fogarty invented them,’ she added. ‘When he was still alive, of course.’
‘It opens up a gateway into the Faerie Realm, doesn’t it?’
Mella nodded. ‘Yesh.’ It occurred to her to wonder how Aunt Aisling had managed to get her hands on a portable portal control. She didn’t think her father would have given her one – he didn’t like Aunt Aisling all that much according to his journal. Besides, he said in his journal that he’d kept the Faerie Realm a secret from his family.
‘Do you know how to work it?’
‘You just aim and press the button.’
Aisling pulled over a kitchen chair and sat beside her. ‘That’s right. Except it doesn’t work any more. Can you tell why it doesn’t work?’
Mella picked up the control and turned it over in her hands. Her fingers felt sausagey but she still managed not to drop it. It was an early model, quite possibly even one of Mr Fogarty’s first prototypes, larger and more crudely made than the modern controls, but the basics were still the same. She slid her thumb along the side and discovered the safety switch was set to on. Aunt Aisling must have pushed it without noticing. There was no way the control would open a portal while the safety was in operation. She flicked it back and handed the control to Aisling. ‘It should work now.’
Aisling handled the control as if it were a precious jewel. ‘All I have to do is point and press the button?’
Mella nodded. ‘Tha’s right.’ From somewhere far away she heard the sound of singing. Sweet singing. ‘Maybe not indoors, though. Sometimes causes trouble with these old models.’ She smiled benignly. Aunt Aisling wasn’t really listening, but that didn’t matter: it was such sweet singing.
Aisling’s eyes had turned feverish with excitement. ‘We’re going on a trip, Mella, you and I,’ she said loudly. ‘I didn’t get very far before, but now I have you as my guide things will be very different. Just press the button, do I? Just press the button?’ She pressed the button.
A fiery portal opened in the kitchen, but Mella didn’t see it. Mella had slid gently from her chair and was snoring softly on the floor.
Thirteen
‘I think of Hodge every time we come down here,’ Henry murmured a little dreamily. Hodge – Mr Fogarty’s old tomcat – had always enjoyed hanging around the House Iris Portal Chamber and Henry still missed him.
‘Mmm,’ Blue said, her mind clearly on other things. She looked around. ‘Where’s Chief Portal Engineer Peacock?’
‘Dunno,’ Henry said. ‘Listen, Blue, I think it’s time you told me what you have in mind.’
Hodge had been an elderly cat when he first moved to the Realm, but something in the air suited him and he lived another twelve years before dying at the venerable age of twenty-eight. During a frisky moment in the interim, he surprised Madame Cardui’s translucent pedigree queen, Lanceline, and the result was four kittens who looked exactly like Hodge and were now, as adults, beginning to show Lanceline’s ability to talk. One of them appeared from behind the portal controls and polished Blue’s ankle. ‘Back in five minutes,’ it said.
‘Which one are you, darling?’ asked Blue, who was almost as enamoured with Hodge’s offspring as she was with Henry.
The kittens had been christened Rodge, Splodge, Podge and Emmeline. ‘Splodge,’ said this one. ‘Hello, Henry.’
‘Consort Majesty King Henry to you,’ said Henry, grinning.
‘Cat may look at a king,’ said Splodge philosophically. ‘Five minutes. Good hunting.’ He started to walk off, looking even more like Hodge from the rear than he did from the front.
‘Don’t go,’ Blue called quickly. ‘Who’s back in five minutes?’
‘Old Peacock,’ Splodge told her over his shoulder. ‘Gone to bandage his stump.’ He disappeared behind the portal again with his tail twisting into a high question mark.