CHAPTER TWELVE

The soldiers moved off down the adjacent path, their backs stiffly upright, their grey uniforms slipping into the shadows.

‘You must hide,’ said Borrowdale.

‘You are being dramatic.’

‘You need to hide until the Empire soldiers forget about what just happened and move on to some other problem.’

‘Who is standing up to the Empire soldiers?’

Borrowdale shook his head and his eyes almost disappeared behind the slits as he searched for an answer. Then his face twitched, and he looked ashamed.

Trinket said, ‘How did my father allow this to happen? We have a city guard that should have resisted the Empire soldiers.’

‘With all due respect to your father, our King … the people do not know. The King hasn’t been seen and no statement has been given. The Governor from the school of alchemy ... our Governor from our school ... has taken charge and ordered the thrip guards to withdraw until a formal statement is given by the King.’

Trinket’s mouth quivered and her cat's eyes were narrowed and there was a resolve in her face. She wasn't going to give in to Empire soldiers. She was going to come up with a plan.

She spoke quietly, with menace. ‘Is my father alive?’

‘We don’t know … we pray he is. We have been praying to the departed Elion that he is.’

Trinket nodded at Borrowdale then said to Jane. ‘We will continue to the Palace.’

‘Please hide,’ said Borrowdale, and the worry in his face was of one who had already seen things that must be feared.

‘We will continue to the Palace.’

The thrip and Jane left Borrowdale standing on the walkway amidst the crowd, and they walked the Wyld Fell marketplace.

Above the city in the giant trees the night had turned deep purple. Candles and flaming torches lined the paths, and lanterns cast yellow box shapes from inside huts. Tiny grey birds flew through the cathedral of leaves and trilled to one another.

Jane and Trinket walked into the crowded marketplace. Here all kinds of stalls were gathered under an awning of leaves. Cane benches held crates of fruit, oranges, lemons, brushed red apples, and baskets of herbs, mint and sage and rosemary, and barrels filled with potatoes and carrots and pumpkins. Tomatoes on green vines hung from hooks. Behind the benches sat large glass urns of honey filled with every shade of gold, some as dark as wood, others as light as lemon. Honeycomb was piled upon white cloth. Honey alcohol brooded in strange red bottles. Something named yellow syrup was in a small vial with a label depicting a young thrip with a strong face and dark eyes and an expression of power.

Trinket took hold of Jane’s arm to stop her and pointed at the label.

‘This is Elion.’

Jane leaned in.

‘Nothing like my brother.’

‘He will have changed, of course.’

‘What is yellow syrup?’ asked Jane.

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‘It is the drink of youth.’ Trinket looked sharply at Jane. ‘Only thrips are permitted to drink the drink of youth.’

Trinket suddenly changed subject. ‘If things don’t go as planned with our audience with my father then we may have to go into hiding.’

Jane was about to answer when Trinket put a hand up. She jerked her head to the left, and she sniffed the air, the way a wolf might sniff the wind for the scent of prey. Her eyes widened, and her nose twitched and flared. Jane noticed that the crowd in the marketplace fell silent at an unseen danger, in the same way the thrips back on the boardwalk had fallen silent when soldiers appeared on the adjacent path.

Trinket moved quickly. ‘In here,’ she said. She pushed open a door that was carved into the central trunk of the giant tree. Jane followed Trinket through the door into a tavern. This was so like the taverns where Jane’s foster carer would sit with her legs sticking out from a stool, while her cheeks shone as red as the wine she was drinking. There was always a group of men fighting over who would be standing her the next splash of red.

The tavern was filled with patrons, and upon hearing the door open the eyes of the patrons turned. Immediately thrips called greetings. They shouted: 'Our Princess has returned.'

Trinket shook her head, and glanced around the tavern, looking for danger, looking for somewhere to hide.

Along the back wall was a bar and behind the bar was a female thrip and a male dwarf. They had the unafraid look of those who had seen the barrels bottom, the worst of behaviour, the most dangerous of ideas.

'Behind the bar,' she said quietly.

Only, the door to the tavern banged open.

Two soldiers came in through the Tavern door and took positions either side of the door, with their hands on the hilts of their swords.

Another soldier entered, and he paused and scanned the room, looking for weapons. He registered Trinket and his eyes paused for a brief second. This soldier took up a position several feet inside the room. He unsheathed his sword and held it up at an angle, gripping with both hands.

Two more soldiers entered and took up position along the wall. These two had long spears, and they held the spears out at an angle. Near the tips of their spears were flags with the red and black symbols that looked like square spirals.

Another soldier entered and marched past the first soldiers with the confidence that the room had been cleared of danger. He went to the far corner and stood with a sword held aloft. The mirror sharp blade hovered over the head of a thrip, in the stance of an executioner. The thrip ducked then carefully work his way out from under the sword by slipping off his stool onto the floor, where he proceeded to waddle away.

The soldiers were men - like human men, only bigger. They wore grey coats with bands of red around their biceps, and embroidered into these bands of red were the same strange symbols as those on the flags.

Finally, through the door came a diminutive thrip wearing the green outfit of the thrips. He had a shirt of green flax and a vest of green wool. On his legs he wore black tights.

‘The Governor,’ Trinket said so quietly Jane almost didn’t hear her.

The Governor was small enough to be a jockey back on earth. His eyes were beaded and his nose was long and he had green and grey sideburns that came down the side of his face almost to his throat. He had a slight hunch, with his shoulders up close to his ears, which were sharp triangles. He looked like he was about to pounce on something.

A stony-faced soldier followed the Governor into the tavern. The soldier stood at attention. He brought his chin up and spoke in a rich and loud voice.

‘The staff of Spill the Wine must go immediately to the kitchen area.’

Behind the bar, the dwarf and the thrip looked at each other, trying to read each other's intentions. Do they obey or defy? Jane sensed that when there were no soldiers around, these two probably spoke boldly about taking on the Empire. But with the soldiers directly in front of them it was a different matter. The dwarf murmured and the thrip nodded. They went through a door into the kitchen.

The soldier said, ‘Now all patrons must exit the tavern and remain outside until the Governor’s business has been completed. We will empty one table at a time.’

The soldier gestured to a table. Immediately, and thankfully, the thrips at that table stood and made their way to the tavern’s entrance. The soldier pointed to the next table, only this table proved a problem.

The solitary thrip stood with his hand in the air.

‘This is offensive to thrips, to be ordered about by foreign soldiers, and it is a shame to all thrips who obey this order.’

He looked around for support, but there was no rallying effect. The patrons remained silent. The soldier hesitated while looking for a course of action. His hand went to his sheathed sword, and suddenly the solitary thrip realised where this was going, and he put his head down and shook at with disgust at those around him. He walked from the tavern.

After all the thrips had departed there was only Jane and Trinket left.

Trinket made to stand only the Governor put a hand in her direction, ‘Not you Princess ... you stay in your seat.’