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“I had myself closed,” she said, “after having heard enough of human iniquity to despair of the species. Closed. So I tread the world lightly, lightly as possible, and I bring no infants forward to suffer as I have done. I worked with the underground vigilantes who struggle against the tyrant on the throne of the Emerald City—our Emperor Apostle—until I learned that in the service of their honorable goal they are capable of actions as dishonorable as the Emperor’s—then I gave myself up for lost. I wandered without aim or ambition, a sad folly of a way to spend one’s life.”
“I wouldn’t know, being drenched in accomplishment each time I open a new door—”
She laughed at him; a bell-like sound so devoid of malice that it made his ears ring. Brrr pressed her to continue, not just for the story but because he was blushing. “And the Clock found you and took you hostage?”
“You could say that,” she said, “if you believe in oracles. Since I don’t believe in fate, it can’t hurt me. Its capacity to predict my days is nil. I have apprenticed myself to the Clock’s company, and I serve as a kind of watchdog of its prophecies. The dwarf is unscrupulous, just doing his job; he doesn’t care what mayhem is rucked up by the Clock. The boys who cycle through the company for months or even years at a time join because they are young and scared of the possibilities of life. A belief in preordained history is consoling to those with few prospects, and the boys generally come from the families of blue-coal miners or serfs. They see a little of Oz, watch the Clock tell its predictions and stir up trouble, and do the dwarf’s bidding. I suppose they think it is a way to secure a brighter future.”
“Perhaps the boys know more than you do,” said Brrr. “Maybe believing in the Clock is its own reward. You’ve never seen it tell your future for you?”
“I have no future. It wouldn’t dare.”
“You sound very cynical.”
“You’ve seen enough of life to suggest I should be otherwise?” she asked.
“As I said, a bed of roses and a walk in the park, that’s my life story. But look, here comes Yackle blinking back to life. She is an oracle without a bevy of spies or a clockwork instrument. She’s the real goods. What might she say to you, if you asked her?”
“I wouldn’t listen to it, and anyway I wouldn’t ask her,” said Ilianora. “Regularly I ask blank paper, and in all my life I’ve never known magic writing to appear on its blank surface.”
• 6 •
Y ACKLE GROANED and made to sit up; Ilianora on one side and Brrr on the other helped her. She murmured unintelligibly. Then she spit on the floor, something thin and bubbly—liquid lace.
“I thought you were dead,” said the Lion.
“More’s the pity,” she replied, “not yet, but I may have seen my way out at last. I’ve had a Sighting, and maybe the truest one I ever had. But you have to help me. Get us out of this hell-nook.”
Brrr glanced at Ilianora and raised an eyebrow. “Lucky you,” he said to Yackle. “I’ve already cleared the doorway.”
“It’s very quiet here,” observed Yackle. She turned to Ilianora. “Where are your friends? They haven’t left without you, have they?” She became alarmed and turned back to Brrr. “It depends on them—on the Clock—I have seen it.”
“Don’t worry; they won’t have left without me,” Ilianora replied. “Give me your arm, old auntie.”
Yackle was irritable with fretfulness. “Are the sisters still in Council, or have they fled in advance of the approaching army? Help me on these steps, will you? I seem to have caught a tremble in my knees.”
“We’re here, on either side,” said Brrr. Yackle reached out her dry twiglike hand and squeezed the muscle of his right forward limb.
“W
ell, go ahead, you, and stop them if they are trying to flee without me,” said Yackle. “I’m not going to miss this omnibus!”
Brrr and Ilianora glanced at each other. Brrr nodded, and shifted his arms so he could support Yackle, supplying both a handhold and a backrest. Ilianora hurried down the steps ahead of them.
Shadowpuppet stuck close to Brrr’s side.
“I must rest a moment—a stitch in my side,” said Yackle. She leaned her forehead upon the stone wall and closed her sightless eyes.
“Was it upsetting? Your Sighting?”
Yackle said, “You gave it me.”
“I beg your pardon.”
“You told me. You cued me to that line—‘You have to leave the way you came in.’ You told me that was for me. And I saw that it was true—it is true for me, and it is true for you as well.”
“None of this will hold up in a court of law.” But he knew that she would hear the sweet mockery in his voice as encouragement.
“I’ll tell you what I saw as it pertains to you. If you want.”
