She- the voice that chimed through his mind had been female- was gone the next morning, which, based on Jake’s limited knowledge of women, was par for the course. There was a big pile of clothes on the bedside chair, and a little note.

Dear Jake, I see you met Jenn! This stuff is a bit of a mixture, but it should all fit you. Breakfast will be laid out on the lawn. I hope you slept well.
S.

Jake shook his head. A shower’d be good, maybe that would clear the fog in his memory. Standing up, he went to the mirror.

"This wasn’t my idea. Stuff happens. You of anyone should know that."

The black-and-white figure paused to think, the sticks paused in mid-air, then shrugged and went on. "No special gifts. You’d call him boring. But I couldn’t let the Unity kill him for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Is there no room in that Balance of yours for charity?"

The figure sniffed, and Silver shook her head tiredly. "No, I’m not about to pick a fight with a Harlequin. Even I’m not that reckless. Oh, I know that’s what they say about me." She tried to meet eyes that weren’t surrounded by makeup after all.

"Ah. I always wondered. Mind you, I imagine you could look however you pleased."

The Harlequin traced a spiral in the air with the one remaining flame.

"I understand. I’ll take my new second with me, shall I?"

But the Harlequin was gone.

"I wouldn’t look up, if I were you. Tell yourself it’s a starry sky."

"Right. Hey, nice spread."

She nodded. "I’ve yet to get the hang of cooking for one. Anyway, you’re going to need the energy. I was hoping to have a nice quiet day to acclimatise you, but we’re to go to Layers. A direct order, would you believe."

"Order? From who, I mean, whom?"

"The Harlequins. Everyone obeys the Harlequins."

"Aren’t they, like, clowns?"

"Not here. Nobody knows what they call themselves, or what they really look like, but they- they have a gift. They twist the trail of cause and effect so it does as they please. That’s why everyone obeys. They respond to situations as normal, but those situations were brought about by the Harlequins."

"So, what do they want?"

"Well, as far as I know, they want to keep the Balance. Don’t look like that, I’m sure I’ve mentioned it before. The symbol for power around here is the scales with three pans, black, white and grey. Or however non-humans perceive them. But white is always so light, and grey so heavy, I don’t get it. I guess the Harlequins aren’t completely omnipotent."

For a moment, Silver looked so down Jake wanted to hug her. But he guessed that would be a Very Bad Idea. She probably still had that cosh on her. He lay back on the lawn, and thought vaguely that the stars above looked a little strange, somehow. He didn’t know why, though.

"I have got so many questions about all this."

"Ask two now, and we’ll sort the rest out after breakfast." Silver was leaning over to look at him, and Jake wondered if she realised how close she was.

"Okay. What’s Layers?"

"A bar. Somewhere you can go and meet people without anyone ambushing you or paying much attention to anything beyond their own drinks. That’s one."

"Is Jenn the talking cat?"

"Yes. And she doesn’t talk, not really. It’s sort of complicated. Best understood after the second pint."

"Are you buying? I don’t think English money’s going to get me very far."

"Oh, don’t worry about that. Fala the barmaid’s a bit of a magpie, likes anything golden or glittery. You can get wasted on half a packet of sequins."

"Berric, good to see you. This is my second, Jake. Who’s around?"

"Now, Silver, you know better than that. There’s a table free on the third stretch. Take your weaponry?"

"Thanks for the advice. No, I’m joking. Here we are."

Silver handed over her cosh, and Berric turned his attention to Jake.

"He’s not carrying anything. As well you know."

Berric grunted them forward, and another, more greeny Portal folded into existence elsewhere. Silver dumped herself inelegantly onto a chair.

"Well, here we are. What do you think?"

"Bit seventies."

She grinned. "Hmm. I expect you’re right. Good venue for a date, though." Her expression collapsed suddenly, as though remembering she wasn’t allowed to smile. Jake wasn’t sure what to do, so he laid a hand on her arm. It wasn’t much, but it seemed to help.

"Thanks. What are you drinking?"

"Do they have beer?"

Silver nodded, and began the long troop down to the bar...

Except that there was some kind of shimmer, and suddenly she was at the bottom. A moving sparkle Jake guessed was Fala served the drinks, and her squeal of delight at Silver’s payment was clearly audible. So maybe not everyone around here was hostile or prone to talking in riddles. At that moment, a gauntleted hand crashed its way onto the table.

"You be page of Silver?"

"I know Silver." Jake stopped his voice from shaking. He just knew Berric had arrived behind his shoulder, and as far as he could tell from under the armour, that was itself under a dark grey cloak, it would be a pretty even match. Not the sort he wanted to get into, either. He was seriously considering hiding under the table when Silver arrived with the blue-tinted tankards.

"Lads, come on. Hello, Milton. I didn’t know your lot were here."

"Sil!" He swept her up in a bear hug, and she accepted with good grace, giving Berric a ‘what can you do?’ look. He nodded, relaxing subtly. If Silver didn’t mind, then the knight could stay.

"Come join us! Adwen’s here, so’s... oh, people."

"Sorry, Milton, stuff to do. How many have you had?"

"Doesn’t matter. ‘m still upright. I can still swing a sword, and recite poetry to a beautiful lady." He gave her a look that made Jake frown. With surprising gentleness, he plucked a piece of grass from Silver’s sleeve.

"’I know a bank where the wild thyme blows,
Where the oxlip, and the nodding violet grows.
Quite over-canopied with luscious woodbine,
With sweet musk roses, and eglantine.’"

Conversation had stopped on the tables nearest them, and Jake had to almost shake himself awake. He hadn’t imagined this great oaf to have the whisper of an angel. Silver put a hand to his cheek, and spoke equally softly.

"You know why not."

"Yes. I do. But when you need me, my lady..." He kissed her hand gallantly, and strode off. Jake opened his mouth to ask, but Silver sitting there subdued was enough to make him decide to drink up.

This could have continued for a while, but then Jake realised that what he’d taken for the next table’s furry cloak was actually a wolf, pacing calmly among the people. It regarded Jake with a solid blue gaze, then padded on.

"Silver, I think we’d better get out of here. There’s a wolf loose."

"Yup. Not much good as messengers if they were confined, after all."

"Messengers. Look, this is what I wanted to ask you about. Everyone looks human, or like an Earth creature and everyone speaks American English. Except you, of course."

"Really? I still hear British English. It’s the starry sky thing again. Look, Jake, your brain evolved on Earth, you’ve spent your whole life staring at things within a strictly Terran context. So if you see something you can’t handle, you automatically decide it’s a wolf, or a man, or a sky. That’s why you have to keep your eyes shut in the Outside. That’s too powerful for even your unconscious safety guards, and you’d go insane. You’ll start noticing more and more inhuman things as your mind adjusts. And as for the language... I think you may be one of those people who can... the Unity are, of course, extremely telepathic. I think you could hear just enough of that to understand what the green man said, and after that the Complex systems took care of translation. Even I can’t translate in my own right yet, I haven’t the contextual knowledge. For example, in every human language there’s bound to be a word or whatever for sky, or water, or moon, things every human sees. But you can’t make even those kind of assumptions with other species."

Jake worked his way through Silver’s train of thought. "So I’m a little bit telepathic?"

"Just a smidge. You would have gone through all your life with nothing more than a knack for languages."

"So, that knight wasn’t really human, and wasn’t really speaking English?"

"The poem is English, I think, Shakespeare."

For once, Jake was on surer ground. " ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream.’ Oberon describing where Titania sleeps."

"Ah. Milton has a subtle sense of humour, after all. And that answers your question about Jenn."

"That I wasn’t really hearing her, but her thoughts. This is so weird. "

"You’re doing pretty well. I just stood and gawped my first time here."

The thought of Silver doing anything so untogether made Jake smile. She looked as though she’d been born here.

The wolf returned, and this time looked at Silver for so long Jake started shuffling on her behalf. Finally, she acknowledged it.

"All right, what is it. And not too strongly please, I have no wish to have your Brillo pad mind scrape my more delicate neuroses."

A flicker at the back of Jake’s mind told him something was being transferred. Silver gulped slightly, but that was the only outward sign.

"Right, I’ve got to go see the knights, after all. Coming?"

Winding down the long spiral, Jake could hear a sound that could only be described as carousing. Armour-clad figures had about three tables to themselves, and quite a lot of alcohol. Milton noticed Silver, and called her over. Somehow, she ended up wedged between the corner and her admirer. A female knight put an arm around Jake.

"Well, well. Silver, nice page!"

"Glad you approve, ‘Dwen. Oh, put the poor boy down. He’s blushing like a stop sign."

"Sweet, isn’t it?"

Silver managed a shrug. "I guess so, yes. Where’s the bard?"

"Our songsmith? Heed, Maccan, you got a request."

A bleary-eyed man, the colour and posture of limp celery, looked up. "Always a pleasure, my lady. What’ll it be?"

"The Bell Cycle." Silver sounded as though every word had been forced out on a fish hook. Milton laughed.

"Well, well! I thought you didn’t care to hear about yourself. Although, heroics should always be celebrated." He lowered his voice. "And beauty."

Maccan shrugged open a sack, and brought out a small harp that had probably been quite lovely once, before time had scratched and rubbed at the gold leaf. Carefully, he struck a few chords, and then began to chant.

Tears were rolling down Jake’s face before he knew it. Of the gold and marble city of Du Cray, let men speak. It’s beauty, learned and noble inhabitants, courageous warriors and valiant deeds. Of it’s cold destruction, the desert reclaiming the smooth courtyards and echoing towers. Of the bell, hidden deep beneath the sands, which would be sounded by she who was metal named. And of the surviving knights, who waited for that day.

No wonder, thought Jake, the knights were mostly drunks. It sounded as though they’d been cast out of Heaven. Against the tenor of the songsmith, he thought he could hear a rumbling echo, and when he looked around he realised that Milton was softly whispering along to Silver, who seemed almost asleep. Adwen saw his look.

"Don’t worry boy, songcharms harm her nothing, just cause sleep. And Milton, the fool, holds her safe and warm until she wakes. He hurts his heart a little whenever he sees her, I think."

"He’s serious about her?"

"For half a breath he’d carry her off, to his tower." She shrugged, then added in a more normal voice, "of course, he’d get his head kicked in when she woke up. And Berric keeps things peaceful even if that involves murder, so that’s as close as he’s going to get."

"Oh, I thought..."

"The slightly archaic speech was for real? It’s how we talk to outsiders, and we’ve got to be all bluff and hearty and enjoying life. Never mind we’ve had our home destroyed, or that the Unity hunt us down for fun, or that when we do turn up to do some good, we get laughed at. We used to own Layers, you know that? Of course, it wasn’t called that. We probably called it something like Crusade. Now it’s more like a cocktail bar."

As she spoke, Jake suddenly had the very strong impression that she had no nose. It lasted only a moment, but it made him wonder. Behind him, Milton stopped murmuring, and gently brushed some hair out of Silver’s closed eyes. Jake realised he was half-standing, and hastily sat down. Adwen saw his reaction.

"She doesn’t need rescuing. And she doesn’t need another man to go foolish over her. Grief for the city, what is it about her? Perhaps if I wrapped myself in denim all the time, I’d stand a chance."

"I’m not, I mean-" Jake stopped. Oh, he was, he was, he had been since the library. "Oh, great."

Adwen smiled sunnily. "Find the right person, and it is indeed. What is she doing here, anyway?"

"Something about a Harlequin, and then a wolf put something in her mind."

Adwen said something Jake assumed was a rude word. "Then there was a clue in the tale. You’d better wake her up, she’ll have a busy day ahead."

Milton shot her a glare, but stroked Silver’s hair until she awoke. Jake was amazed at how vulnerable she looked. "Did I fall asleep again?" Even as she said it he knew she knew what Milton had done.

"Yes, my lady. You were tired."

"I always am, these days. Well, I know the command code now. Thanks, Maccan. Come on, Jake."

"This for later." Adwen kissed Jake’s nose, and this time he was convinced she didn’t have one. Silver rolled her eyes, and started opening the Portal. Berric glanced up, saw it was a satisfied customer leaving, and nodded.

© Naomi 'Ni' Claydon 2000. No copying without permission.