‘Suzy!’
Arthur took a step, ready to open the door, then stopped himself. It sounded like Suzy, but he couldn’t be sure. Even if it was her, she might have been sorcerously forced to obey the Piper and would treat Arthur as an enemy. Jugguth had described New Nithling uniforms and one of the three outside must be one of the Piper’s soldiers.
There was a muffled exchange beyond the door, then another voice sounded through the mail slot.
‘Ray … I mean, Arthur … it’s me, Fred. Can you let us in? It’s freezing out here.’
Fred and Suzy, thought Arthur. With a New Nithling soldier.
‘Stand back!’ Arthur called out. He waited till he heard footsteps crunching in the snow, then he gingerly crouched down a foot or so away from the mail slot and looked out … hoping for the best and expecting the worst.
Eight
IT WAS GETTING dark outside. The sun – or suns, since there might be more than one high above the clouds – was setting. In the twilight, made still darker by the steady fall of snow, Arthur studied the faces of the two Piper’s children and the male Denizen or New Nithling who stood between them.
The two children certainly looked like Suzy Turquoise Blue and Fred Initial Numbers Gold, but they were in the uniforms of the Piper’s army, and the soldier between them was definitely a New Nithling. He appeared to be a Denizen at first, but Arthur saw that he had seven fingers on each hand and the small dent in the middle of his forehead under the black fur hat was not a bruise but a third eye, a quarter the size of the other two.
Arthur looked out for ten long seconds, blinking his eyes against the cold wind that blew in through the slot. He didn’t know what to do, or think. He badly wanted to let Suzy and Fred in, but he couldn’t help remembering what Dame Primus had said: All the Piper’s children were suspect … and he was alone.
Finally, he looked away. Staring at the ground, he spoke.
‘I don’t think I can let you in. You’re in the Piper’s uniform, so you serve him now.’
‘Not on purpose!’ called out Suzy. ‘He made us wear the uniforms, but he never got around to ordering us to do anything else. It’s me, Suzy Turquoise Blue! I never do what I’m told anyway. I’m definitely not going to obey the Piper … ah … urg …’
Arthur looked out again. Suzy was on her knees in the snow, struggling with a rope or something that was around her neck. Arthur couldn’t quite see it, but it was strangling her. Fred was trying to get his fingers under it without success, but the Nithling soldier was paying no attention, instead looking back out across the snowy plain.
‘Of course she’ll obey!’ shouted Fred. ‘We both will! We’ll follow orders! Nod your head, Suzy!’
Suzy nodded desperately. Fred let go of the noose or stranglecord, and the girl took a huge intake of breath and then burst into a paroxysm of coughing.
‘What was that?’ asked Arthur.
Fred pulled his collar down and took a few paces closer to the door. Arthur still couldn’t see clearly, but there was something around Fred’s neck. A thin line of writing – a tattoo perhaps.
‘The Piper put a spell on us,’ said Fred. ‘If we disobey a direct order, or talk about disobeying, it chokes us. But we were never ordered to attack you, Arthur, or anything like that. We got away first. Can we come in and get warm and talk?’
Arthur hesitated. He really wanted to have Fred and Suzy as friends again, and talk over everything. But he just couldn’t be sure they could be trusted.
‘What about the New Nithling soldier?’ he asked.
‘Banneret Ugham?’ croaked Suzy as she staggered to her feet and massaged her throat. ‘He says he’s only been ordered to look after us and so that’s what he’s going to do. You haven’t been ordered to attack Arthur or anything, have you, Uggie?’
‘I have no present quarrel with Lord Arthur,’ said Ugham. His voice was surprisingly high and rather flute-like, quite at odds with his size and fearsome appearance. In addition to his charged spear, he had a broad-bladed sword hanging from the left side of his belt and a knife with a bronze knuckle-duster hilt on the right. A big knuckle-duster, to cater for his seven fingers.
Arthur noted that Suzy and Fred also had knuckle-duster knives on their belts, smaller ones, scaled to fit their hands. So if they were enemies, he’d be facing three blades at the least.
‘Indeed, it may be such that we face a common foe and should join hands with Lord Arthur against this enemy,’ Ugham continued, pointing with his spear at a vast line of hundreds of Fetchers that had suddenly come into sight about a hundred yards away, a dark mass of Nithlings stark against the snow. They marched forward a few paces and then stopped and somewhere behind them came a distant, disturbing shout from something that sounded neither human, Denizen, nor Fetcher – a kind of squealing shriek that was suddenly stifled, as if a muzzle had been applied. The sound of it made the Fetchers quiver in their ranks and sent a visible shiver through Fred and Suzy. Arthur felt it himself. There was just something wrong about it.