Henry gawped. Stupidly, he stood trying to figure out whether he'd heard a ripping noise or just imagined it because the fabric of reality had torn apart. Then he realised it didn't matter and tried to make sense of what he was seeing instead.
What he was seeing was an enormous hole in Mr Fogarty's shed. But it wasn't like a steam engine had driven through it or anything. Actually it was the edges that were peculiar. Around the edges of the enormous hole he could still see bits of the shed – pots, tools, shelves, the big lawnmower – but stretched and twisted as if they were melting. Everything had a shimmery quality, and never mind about the ripping noise, there was a high-pitched whining noise that somehow made you think everything was about to blow apart.
Henry hit the green button.
The hole closed instantly. No tearing noise, no noise of any sort for half a second. Then there was the clash and clatter of earthen plant pots smashing on the floor, shelves cascading their contents, tools toppling over. The whole shed creaked as if it were about to cave in. Henry ran for the door.
Once he was clear, he stood outside and watched the shed guiltily. How was he going to explain to Mr Fogarty if the whole thing collapsed? For a moment it shimmered and shivered as if it would indeed collapse, but then things settled down again. He watched a little while longer, just to be sure, then decided everything was going to be all right. He wouldn't have to explain anything to Mr Fogarty. Except the breakages inside.
Henry pressed the red button again.
There was no ripping sound. That had just been his imagination. And what opened up outside caused far less damage than the enormous hole that appeared inside the shed. In fact it didn't cause any damage at all that he could see. He seemed to be looking down some sort of corridor, but the edges simply blended into the rest of the world without all that peculiar melting business. It was as if somebody had just built a corridor in Mr Fogarty's back garden. Sort of.
There was carpet on the floor of the corridor and expensive-looking crystal chandeliers at intervals along the ceiling. There were doors in the walls and other corridors branching off. There was another world in there! It had to be a portal! Even if this looked like nothing Pyrgus had described, it had to be a portal! He was looking at the world where Pyrgus lived!
Henry stepped into the corridor.
He swung round at once and was relieved to find he was looking into Mr Fogarty's back garden. The quality of the light seemed a little different now, but otherwise it was just as he'd left it. Nothing changed. Nothing broken. A single step and he'd be back again. So that was all right.
Except he couldn't very well leave the portal open. Mr Fogarty had gone to a lot of trouble with his codes and secret messages to hide this opening into Pyrgus's world.
And even though Mr Fogarty was a bit peculiar at the best of times, Henry could see the sense of keeping the portal thing quiet. If you left one open and somebody found it, the next thing you knew there'd be tourist coaches driving through and package holidays and things. Pyrgus would never forgive him. He had to close the portal.
Henry pressed the green button firmly. Mr Fogarty's back garden vanished and he was looking along a continuation of the corridor. He drew a deep breath and pressed the red button. To his immense relief, the portal opened up again. He closed it down and dropped the cube into his trouser pocket. Then, with a mounting sense of excitement, he set out to explore a whole new world.
He was inside some large, luxurious building. There were carpeted floors, well-finished walls, decorative mouldings, tapestries and paintings, ornamental statuary at junctions. Could this be Pyrgus's palace? It had all the trappings, but there was one thing that was really weird – it was empty.
At first Henry was quite relieved not to be bumping into people, but after a while he began to feel spooked. He wandered through empty corridors, opened doors to look into empty rooms. There was no sign of Pyrgus or Mr Fogarty, which mightn't be all that surprising since he'd no idea how long it was since they'd gone on ahead. But apart from them, there was no sign of anybody you'd expect to find in a palace. No servants, no footmen, no butlers, no courtiers, no sign of life at all.
It was as if everybody had been… wiped out.
Henry opened yet another door and found himself staring into a linen cupboard. He closed the door, turned round and called, 'Hello…?' He waited.
Nothing. 'Hello…? Hello…? Is anybody there?' His voice didn't echo – there were too many carpets and curtains for that -but it managed to sound lonely all the same. Where was everybody? A palace this size should be teeming with people.
He wandered for another ten minutes before beginning to suspect he was going round in circles – there was a painting of a unicorn that looked terribly familiar. He still hadn't seen a living soul. He kept moving doggedly, but his unease continued to increase.
At the junction of two corridors, he thought he heard a distant voice. Henry stopped to listen. Nothing. He waited. Still nothing. Then he heard it again: not just one voice but several. And laughter.
Relief flooded over him like a wave. Until that moment he'd not realised how frightened he'd been in this huge empty palace. But now he knew there were people here, it was somehow all right. Was it Pyrgus? It was difficult to tell, but he thought the laughter sounded a little high-pitched for Pyrgus, certainly too high-pitched for Mr Fogarty. But whoever it was would help him. Especially when he told them he was a friend of Prince Pyrgus.
He started off in the direction of the sound.
Henry had never seen a naked girl before. She was standing near the edge of an enormous sunken bath at the junction of four corridors and surrounded by nothing more than pillars. She had auburn hair and large brown eyes and open features. Several other girls – mercifully clothed – were preparing her bath and tying back her hair. She was chatting to them with an easy familiarity.
Henry couldn't take his eyes off her body. He knew he shouldn't look, but didn't know how to stop. Her body was so different from the way a boy's body was formed. He looked at her shoulders and her arms and her feet and could not breathe properly because of what he was looking at. His face was on fire with embarrassment and still he couldn't look away. His heart was pounding and his hands were shaking. He felt his legs begin to tremble.
The girl stepped down into the steaming waters of the sunken bath. She was much the same age as Henry himself, maybe a year younger. She was not particularly tall, but he thought she moved with grace. He thought she moved with wonderful grace. The water came up to her calves, then her knees, then her thighs, then she plunged and actually swam a stroke or two. She returned to the edge and lay back so that only her head was above the water.
Henry had no idea what to do. He wasn't a Peeping Tom. He knew it was unfair to the girl to look at her like this, knew he should turn and walk away (quietly, so she wouldn't know some ghastly pervy boy had seen her with her clothes off). That's what he knew he should do, but somehow his legs wouldn't work.
He had to do something. He couldn't stay standing here, looking and looking. It wasn't fair on her, whoever she was. He had to stop looking and go away.
Henry groaned.
One of the girls looked up and saw him.
'What do you make of it?' asked Apatura Iris, the Purple Emperor.
'Strictly speaking, Majesty,' Tithonus said, 'Her Serene Highness was within her rights to commandeer a contingent of palace commandos. As Princess Royal she is their Commander-in-Chief. Purely an honorary title, of course, but – '
The Purple Emperor waved a dismissive hand. 'I'm not talking about the commandos,' he said. 'To be honest, if she must make these ridiculous jaunts, I'd rather she had protection. I was wondering what you thought about the story she brought back.'
The alleged assassination attempt?'
'Alleged? You don't think it's true then?'
Tithonus sighed. 'I don't think Jasper Chalkhill is the most reliable of sources.'
'He made the claims of his own accord,' Apatura said. 'Unless you disbelieve my daughter.'
'Oh, I believe Princess Blue, sire,' Tithonus said. 'She may be a little fanciful, but she was never a liar. Besides, we have corroboration from the trinian. It's Chalkhill I'm less sure about.'
'You don't think he's one of Hairstreak's agents?'
'Actually I do,' Tithonus said. 'Our espionage people have had their suspicions about him for some time now. Nothing they could prove, but – ' He shrugged, then went on, 'It's just that this whole idea of replacing you as Emperor…' He spread his hands helplessly and shook his head.
'But we know there was an attempt on Pyrgus's life. And it may yet be successful – we still haven't found him.'
'That's true, Majesty, but that's also a weakness in the story Chalkhill told Blue. As I understand it, he claimed the reason Lord Hairstreak wanted Pyrgus killed was so there would be no legal claimant to the throne after your supposed assassination. But there are two further claimants to the throne should you and Pyrgus both be killed.'
The Purple Emperor looked at him thoughtfully. 'Comma and Blue.'
'Exactly, sire – Prince Comma, then Princess Blue. The moment Pyrgus should die, Comma becomes Crown Prince. The moment you should die, the Crown Prince becomes Emperor. If Lord Hairstreak really wished to clear a road to the throne, he would have had to assassinate Comma and Blue along with Pyrgus and yourself. There has been no indication of that happening and nothing in Chalkhill's story to suggest it was planned. I'm frankly suspicious the whole thing may be a fabrication.'
'For what purpose?'
Tithonus shrugged again. 'Possibly to sow confusion – these are troubled times. Or possibly the whole thing is a fantasy of Chalkhill's to make himself appear important. He may be one of Hairstreak's agents, but he is still a very unstable character.'
'So you don't believe any additional security measures are required?'
'Not at this time,' Tithonus said. 'At least not until Chalkhill has been properly interrogated. Which is something that has already begun, of course. We will find out the truth quickly enough.'
They were together in the Emperor's quarters, protected as always by the silence spell. Apatura walked to the window and looked out thoughtfully. After a while he turned back and said, 'I think you may be right, Gatekeeper. Additional security precautions at this time might be interpreted as a sign of weakness. You were correct not to put them in place when my daughter urged it and I agree it may be better to take no further action in this area unless something else emerges from Chalkhill's interrogation.'
'Thank you, Your Majesty,' Tithonus said. 'Now, perhaps if you'll excuse – '
He was interrupted by a loud knock on the door.
'I gave orders we were not to be disturbed.' The Emperor's voice betrayed his irritation.
'It may be news of Pyrgus,' Tithonus said. He unlocked the door and opened it.
Mr Fogarty pushed past him rudely. His eyes were glazed and he was carrying his pump-action shotgun.
The guards were rough, but not brutal. They marched Henry down flights of stairs and locked him in a room that seemed to be used as a temporary store. After a moment he righted a wooden chair and sat down, staring miserably at the door. He felt deeply ashamed; and not just for getting caught. He'd done a dreadful thing and he didn't know how to undo it.
He didn't feel guilty about coming across her. That had been completely innocent – he'd just gone in the direction of the laughter. He wasn't to know it was a girl having a bath. And what was she doing having a bath right there in the open anyway? When you had a bath, you went into the bathroom and closed the door.
All the same, when he did see her, he should have turned away. He should have turned away at once, not just stood there and stared. The thing was, it wasn't fair. Charlie once said, How would you like it if some of the girls were looking at you and giggling when you were in the showers? Henry wasn't sure, but he didn't think he would like it; certainly he wouldn't like the giggling and he wouldn't like it at all if he had spots.
He hadn't noticed any spots on the auburn-haired girl he'd stared at.
The trouble was he could still see her in his mind's eye. And that made it worse somehow. It was as if he'd taken photographs and was sneakily looking at them now. The girl would have hated it if he'd really taken photographs, but what was the difference?
To distract himself, he got up and wandered around the room. It wasn't very large and there was a lot of stuff in it, bric-a-brac and packing cases pushed against one wall. There was a small window high up. He wondered what was outside, through the window.
It wasn't that he wanted to escape or anything, but he did want to see what was outside. He pulled a case over to the wall and found a stool which he put on top. He shook the stool and it seemed stable, so he climbed on to the case and on to the stool to look out through the window. He couldn't see much except a sweep of well-kept lawn so he clung to the windowsill and pushed himself up on tiptoes.
'What do you think you're doing?' asked a voice behind him.
Henry stopped himself from falling, but only just. He turned awkwardly, fighting to keep his balance. A girl had entered the room. For a fraction of a second, Henry didn't recognise her, then he realised it was the girl he'd seen in the bath. She was dressed now, which was a huge relief. All the same Henry felt himself flush crimson.
'Come down!' she told him sharply. 'Come down at once!'
Henry climbed down slowly from the stool, wishing he were dead.