CHAPTER SIXTY


    Tom stood still for a moment, pressing his tongue between his teeth, thinking, with his eyes rolled up. He now had to get the Emperor into the chamber without Trinket doing him harm, considering that she knew he had come with his assassin, fully intending to harm her.


    Trinket stood tall on the bridge over the moat and although her bow dangled at her side, thumping against her thigh in an innocent way, she had an arrow loaded with a half tension held by two fingers against the string  With a small movement she could raise the bow, draw full and lethal tension, and send the arrow toward the Emperor. Or Tom.


    Tom, halfway between the tower and the door, spoke to Trinket.


    ‘The Emperor cannot enter while you hold a weapon.’


    Trinket smiled savagely, like a bare-toothed dog.


    ‘This is my insurance.’


    ‘Your insurance is your key, Princess.’


    Trinket shook her head.


    Tom, standing straighter and taller than he did when he was a middling school boy back on Earth, walked slowly toward Trinket, who tensed at his approach.


    ‘You will not become Queen of Coronet without the Emperor’s key.’


    ‘The Emperor brought his assassin to assassinate me


    ‘That isn’t going to happen. The Emperor wants the book and he needs your key to make that happen.’


    ‘Why does he want the book?’ said Trinket.


    ‘He is going to take it back to Earth, where the book has real power.’


    Although the side of her top lift arched up into a sneer, Tom could see that Trinket had softened. After a moment she placed the bow onto the stone wall that guarded the edge of the bridge. She took hold of the key and held out her left hand with the key clasped between two fingers. The key dangled over the moat. Trinket nodded, and said, ‘Okay, if the Emperor tries anything, the key drops.’


    Tom circled around and mounted the arched bridge where Trinket stood.


    The bow sat on the wall of the bridge, and although Tom knew that Trinket could pick the bow up, and fit an arrow, and fire the arrow before he could take two steps, he felt that he was safe, due to his unique position of being the only person who could take a seat in the machine. The Emperor had explained that when Elion sat in the machine, he had the power to seat and unseat rulers without war, and without repurcussion.


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    Just then Andrew called out and Tom looked over to where Andrew lay, his face white in the faint moonlight.  Andrew’s chest rose and fell in an exaggerated way, as though he was having difficulty breathing. He pushed his tongue in and out of his mouth. His tongue was purple. He scrunched and released his fist. He screamed again. Blood made a puddle under his thigh where the assassin''s arrow was embedded.


    He was dying.


    Tom wondered if taking a seat in the machine would mean that he would be able to stop Andrew from dying?


    ‘I don’t trust the Emperor,’ Trinket muttered to nobody.


    Tom walked up and took the bow from the top of the wall. Trinket watched him as he backed down the arched bridge. Tom carried Trinket’s weapon across the courtyard and met the Emperor who was waiting just out of sight behind the door. He passed Andrew who lay flat on his back and was visibly losing energy. Andrew howled again, but this howl was weaker than the previous one. It was more of a murmur. His body was losing the energy required to make the noises. A bubble came up to Andrews lips, the bubble glistening. His eyes were wide open and staring into the night.


    Tom had no time to spare for this dying school bully. A day ago Tom might have paid more attention. He would have been moved by the humanity of this, his enemy. But that time had passed. There were larger things at stake.


    The Emperor stood behind the door with his shoulders thrust back and his belly hinting at his blue shirt. His hat ran across his head like a ship grounded on the rocks. He wore a haughty and arrogant expression.


    ‘You have relieved her of her weapon,’ the Emperor said as a statement.


    Tom placed the bow on the ground near the Emperor’s feet, and said, ‘The Princess is holding the key to the tower. If she senses you endangering her, she will drop the key into the moat.’


    The Emperor didn’t acknowledge this. He stepped over the bow and entered the courtyard, though when he saw Trinket his face hardened and he made a noise in his throat of disgust.


    Trinket stood with her arm out, like a stiff German salute, dangling the key to the tower beneath her fingers.


    ‘Don’t even look at me Emperor, or I will drop the key.’


    The Emperor folded his hands in front of his belly and stopped for a moment, leaning back so that his shoulders were over his heels, and his hat leaned back like a tilting ship. He looked at Trinket with hooded eyes, then he made a smacking sound with his lips that sounded like derision. He walked toward one of the remaining two bridges, and when Tom saw which direction the Emperor was heading, he began a walk around the tower to the third bridge, keeping his corner-eyed concentration on the Emperor and the Thrip princess. He knew the Emperor would be sensible, but the princess was a maniac.


    Walking quickly, Tom was acutely aware of the key bumping against his chest. He hummed the song Over the Rainbow, which was strange because he didn’t even like that song, and he hadn’t seen the movie that it came from.


    On the far side of the tower Tom lost sight of the Emperor and Trinket. He mounted the bridge and walked over the moat, and looking down he saw that the water’s surface was a midnight blue, as though the water was wildly cold. Deep beneath he could see jagged mountains of ice. The lake smelled like moss and snow.


    Stepping off the bridge Tom was faced with the final of the three doors. The door was yellow, made of what looked like a single stone that had been cut and polished. In the centre of the door was a keyhole.


    Tom put his hands on the bricks and leaned forward to get a closer perspective of the tower. From in close, looking up, the tower seemed impossibly high, like looking up the side of a skyscraper in a city. The bricks felt hard like candy. They were shiny black and almost edible.


    Tom pushed the key into the lock and turned. The lock resisted, then gave way as the keys in the other two doors synchronised. To open an individual door it took all three keys being turned at the same time.  The bolt slipped from its hasp and the door released and swung inwards into the tower.