‘I'm Ganza,' said the second speaker. She was dressed in the same plain black trousers and loose tunic as her brother, or lover, or whatever he was; and she too was bald. That, and their powdered faces, seemed to confuse all the cliches of gender. Their faces were vulnerable, yet implacable; delicate, yet severe.
Boaz looked towards the hill, where the fire-flies were still cavorting.
This is the Rock of the First Fatality.' he told Cal. ‘The Amadou always gather here. This is where the first victims of the Scourge died.'
Cal looked back towards the Rock, but only for a moment. Boaz and Ganza fascinated him more; their ambiguities multiplied the more he watched them.
‘Where are you going tonight?' said Ganza.
Cal shrugged. ‘No idea,' he said. ‘I don't know a yard of this place.'
‘Yes, you do,' she said. ‘You know it very well.'
While she spoke she was idly locking and unlocking her fingers, or so it seemed, until Cal's eyes lingered on the exercise for two or three seconds. Then it became apparent that she was passing her fingers through the palms of the other hand, left through right, right through left, defying their solidity. The motion was so casual, the illusion - if illusion it was - so quick, that Cal was by no means certain he was interpreting it correctly.
‘How do they look to you?' she enquired.
He looked back at her face. Was the finger-trick some kind of test of his perception? It wasn't her hands she was talking about, however.
The Amadou.' she said. ‘How do they appear?'
He glanced towards the Rock again.
‘... like human beings.' he replied.
She gave him a tiny smile.
‘Why do you ask?' he wanted to know. But she didn't have time to reply before Boaz spoke.
There's a Council been called.' he said. ‘At Capra's House. I think they're going to re-weave.'
That can't be right.' said Cal. They're going to put the Fugue back?'
That's what I hear.' said Boaz.
It seemed to be fresh news to him; had he just lifted it off the gossiping air? The times are too dangerous, they're saying.' he told Cal. ‘Is that true?'
‘I don't know any other.' Cal said. ‘So I've got nothing to compare them with.'
‘Do we have the night?' Ganza asked.
‘Some of it.' said Boaz.
Then we'll go to see Lo; yes?'
‘It's as good a place as any.' Boaz replied. ‘Will you come?' he asked the Cuckoo.
Cal looked back towards the Amadou. The thought of staying and watching their performance a while longer was tempting, but he might not find another guide to show him the sights, and if time here was short then he'd best make the most of it.
‘Yes. I'll come.'
The woman had stopped lacing her fingers.
‘You'll like Lo.' she said, turning away, and starting off into the night.
He followed, already full to brimming with questions, but knowing that if indeed he only had hours to taste Wonderland he should not waste time and breath asking.
II
AT THE LAKE, AND LATER
1
There had been a moment, back in the Auction House, when Suzanna had thought her life was at an end. She'd been helping Apolline down the stairs when the walls had creaked, and it seemed the house had come down around their ears. Even now, as she stood watching the lake, she was not certain how they'd escaped alive. Presumably the menstruum had intervened on her behalf, though she had not consciously willed it to do so. There was much she had to learn about the power she'd inherited. Not least, how much it belonged to her and how much she to it. When she found Apolline, whom she'd lost in the furore, she would find out all the woman knew.
In the meantime, she had the islands, their backs crowned with cypress trees, to wonder about, and the lisp of the waves on the stones to soothe her. ‘We should go.'
Jerichau broke her reverie as softly as he could, touching the back of her neck with his hand. She had left him at the house that stood along the shore, talking with friends he'd not seen in a human life-time. They had reminiscences to exchange, in which she had no place, and which, she sensed, the others had no desire to share. Criminal talk, she'd uncharitably concluded as she left them to it. Jerichau was a thief, after all. ‘Why did we come here?' she asked him.
‘I was born here. I know every one of these stones by name.' His hand still rested on her shoulder. ‘Or at least I did. It seemed a good place to show you -'
She looked away from the lake towards him. His brow was furrowed; ‘But we can't stay,' he said.
‘Why not?'
‘They'll want to see you at Capra's House.'
‘Me?'
‘You unmade the Weave.'
‘I had no choice,' she said. ‘Cal was going to be killed.'
The furrow deepened.
‘Forget Cal,' he said, his tone toughening. ‘Mooney's a Cuckoo. You're not.'
‘Yes I am,' she insisted. ‘Or least that's what I feel I am, and that's the important thing
His hand dropped from her shoulder. He was suddenly sullen.
‘Are you coming or not?' he said.
‘Of course I'm coming.'
He sighed.
‘It wasn't meant to be this way.' he said, his voice recapturing some of its former gentility.
She wasn't sure what he was speaking of: the unweaving, his reunion with the lake, or the exchange between them. Perhaps a little of each.
‘Maybe it was a mistake to unmake the Weave,' she said, somewhat defensively, ‘but it wasn't just me. It was the menstruum.'
He raised his eyebrows.
‘It's your power,' he said, not without rancour. ‘Control it.'
She gave him a frosty look. ‘How far is Capra's House?'
‘Nothing's far in the Fugue,' he replied. ‘The Scourge destroyed most of our territories. Only these few remain.'
‘Are there more in the Kingdom?'
‘A few maybe. But all we really care for is here. That's why we have to hide it again, before morning.'
Morning. She'd almost forgotten that the sun would soon be rising and, with it. Humankind. The thought of her fellow
Cuckoos - with their taste for zoos, freak-shows and carnivals - invading this territory did not much amuse her.
‘You're right,' she said. ‘We have to be quick,' and together they went up from the lake towards Capra's House.
2
As they walked Suzanna had answered several questions that had been vexing her since the unweaving. Chief amongst them: what had happened to the portion of the Kingdom that the Fugue had invaded? It was not well populated certainly -there was the considerable acreage of Thurstaston Common behind the Auction House, and fields to either side; but the area was not entirely deserted. There were a number of houses in the locality, and up towards Irby Heath the population grew denser still. What had happened to those residences? And indeed to their occupants?
The answer was quite simple: the Fugue had sprung up around them, accommodating their existence with a kind of wit. Thus a line of lamp-posts, their fluorescence extinguished, had been decorated with blossoming vines like antique columns; a car had been almost buried in the side of a hill, another two had been tipped on their tails and leaned nose to nose.
The houses had been less recklessly treated; most were still complete, although the flowerage of the Fugue reached to their very doorsteps, as if awaiting an invitation inside.