And down.
My body already feels different, light, and I slide up through the gap, following Gabriel, and then spiral down the drainpipe with him. It’s swirling blackness. We go round and down like going down a plughole, speeding up as the spiral narrows until I’m spinning so fast that I’m afraid I’ll lose my grip on Gabriel, but his fingers are solid, bound round mine. Then we’re spiralling upward and slowing and I can see past Gabriel’s body above me to light, and I feel myself being sucked out and my body stops.
I’m heavy again and gasping for breath, sprawled on my front on a hard slope. I’m glad I didn’t have breakfast as my stomach is not happy with that experience. I roll over to sit up. I’m sitting on a roof of unevenly cut black slate. In front of me is a small expanse of grass and beyond that a tree-covered mountainside rises so steeply that I have to tilt my head back to see the blue sky. My head and body feel like they are moving in circles at different speeds.
‘We must stay on the roof until Mercury comes.’
Gabriel has scrambled up and is sitting astride the rooftop. I join him, moving cautiously.
The cottage is high on the side of a wide U-shaped valley passing down to the right. The valley is lined with trees, forest. At the top of the valley, to my left, there is snow and a glacier. The mountain tops that teethe the valley wall are snow-covered and across the valley another glacier hangs in them. The whole valley is a huge fortification.
There are no bird sounds but there is a chirping of crickets and beyond that is a constant, distant roar. The sound is not in my head and there is no hissing of electrical equipment. The roaring is relentless and I realize it’s the river in the valley bottom. I smile. I can’t help it. The river must be big, powerful.
The roof is made of thick slabs of slate. There’s a stone chimney with smoke curling out. The cottage is at the top end of a meadow area that’s surrounded by trees. The only other thing in the meadow, much further down the slope, is a huge, splintered tree stump.
‘This is Mercury’s cottage. There’s a trespass spell to protect it. You must step off the roof only when you are touching her.’
‘Where are we?’
‘Another part of Switzerland. I sometimes come here by train or I hike. Or I use the cut. I can go back through there.’ And he indicates a space above the drainpipe. ‘Mercury made the cut. Her Gift is control of the weather. It’s a strong Gift. It’s her only one but she has learnt other things and been given other things from the people she helps … that’s how she learnt how to make the cuts.’
The latch of the door rattles. We both turn and are met with an icy squall as Mercury steps into view.
She is tall and thin and her skin is translucently pale, almost grey. Her eyes are black holes but with sheets of silver passing over them. I think she’s looking at me but can’t be sure.
‘I thought I smelt something good,’ she says. The breeze becomes warm now. Humid and heavy. ‘Nathan. At last.’
Her voice almost doesn’t belong to her but to the weather; it’s as if it’s coming out of the breeze that’s passing round her body to mine. She walks to the back of the cottage. It’s built into the hillside so that the roof is only a foot from the ground on that side. She holds her hand out to me, beckoning me with her fingers. The wind picks up and is now swirling round me, pulling me to my feet and jostling me down the roof towards Mercury.
I reach for her.
At last!
It’s like holding hands with a skeleton.
part six
turning seventeen
the favours
I blink my eyes open. It’s still night. Gabriel is asleep near me. We’re in the forest above Mercury’s cottage. The cottage is special; I can sleep inside it, but I’ve only tried it twice. I’m too claustrophobic in there at night, though I don’t get sick. Anyway, I prefer it here in the trees. Rose sleeps in the cottage. I don’t know where Mercury sleeps, if Mercury sleeps.
The first night Gabriel said, ‘The cottage is the guest house. I think Mercury’s real home is far away.’
‘A stone castle on top of a craggy outcrop?’
‘That is more her sort of thing. I’ve seen her walking up towards the glacier. I guess there is another cut up there that leads to her real home. I’ve seen Rose go in that direction a few times as well.’
Rose is Mercury’s assistant and is in her early twenties. She is dark and curvaceous and beautiful but she is not a Black. She is a Shite – her name for White Witches – but she has been brought up by Mercury. Rose has the Gift of being a forgettable mist, according to Gabriel, which makes no sense to me and he says it is best experienced rather than explained. Rose uses her Gift to acquire things for Mercury.