The Vorrh

taken him to reach the outskirts, he had used almost all of the money and food provided by Nebsuel on his departure. He thought about his ability to survive in a world that was so expensive. Previously, he had been sheltered from such realities; now, the mechanics of existence were dawning, and he found them baffling and rather crude.
    His instinct was to head for 4 Kühler Brunnen; at least there he would find a friendly face. He would be invited in and fed, even if it was by the sour old man, Mutter. A plan finally in mind, he began to stride through the tangle of streets with purpose and exhilaration.
    * * *

    A mild panic had begun to grip life in Essenwald. The established pulse of the city’s great heart of timber had fluttered and slowed, the supply of wood withering as the demand blocked the arteries with its swollen need. Since the Limboia had vanished, only a dribble of trees left the forest. The scant workforce that brought the wood out was expensive, and their labour was hasty and sporadic. No one wanted to work in the Vorrh day in and day out, and no amount of wages could pay for the devastating effect that such exposure produced. At first, the new work teams consisted of volunteers, collected from the industries that fed from the forest. This system quickly broke down, only to be replaced by foreign labour, lured there by rumours of rich payment. But it took no time for the outsiders to discover the city’s secret, and they added their own layers of myth to the brooding trees.
    Now the workforce consisted of a mixture of the desperate, the criminal and the insane, most of whom had been dragged into enforced labour. Nobody knew what effect might be produced by adding such a volatile mixture into the mind of the forest. It was a desperate measure, and the elders of the Timber Guild met daily to try and devise the next alternative. The old slave house became a hostel for the unstable, itinerant crew who now cut and ferried the trees: it was undeniably a place to be avoided and Marie Maclish had acquiesced to that understanding, taking the guild’s compensation and fleeing to raise her child in more stable lands.
    * * *

    Ishmael was lost. He had walked past the same garden four times in two hours, each time approaching it from a different direction. Eventually he stopped and looked for the spires of the cathedral to guide him home, but they could not be seen from the elegant streets he was walking through: he needed to get higher. He searched out a street that seemed to head vaguely uphill and followed its lead.
    He had been walking for ten minutes when he sensed it, though not with sight, but familiarity: he had been here before. He looked confusedly at the dozen or so vast houses that lined the street, at their imposing walls, grandiose towers and long, sliding roofs of immaculate tiles. Why would he have ever been here? At the very moment the question was formed, it was answered: it was the street of the Owl! He had found it – or it had found him. His visual memory of the outside of the mansion was scant, so he walked up and down the street, each time lingering a little longer at the house with the ornate metal gates in its wall. He had nothing to lose. He smoothed down his long, black hair, now grown to shoulder length, dusted down the blue riding coat that Nebsuel had given him and approached the gates, pausing momentarily before pulling the metal ring of the bell. He adjusted his collar, turning it up about his face, and waited.
    A dim, absent little man came to the gate and peered through.
    ‘Yes?’
    ‘May I speak to the mistress of the house?’
    ‘What is your business with Mistress Lohr, sir?’
    ‘It is private. Quite private. But she will know me.’
    The little man peered more eagerly at the suspicious figure hiding within ill-fitting clothing and an upturned collar.
    ‘Your name, sir?’
    Ishmael looked at the man in dismay, seeing the problem a second too late: he only had one name, and the Owl did not know it. Furthermore, he knew that saying just one name would be considered strange: most other people he met had two names, if not three.
    The man behind the gate was getting agitated, believing less and less that this individual could ever have any legitimate business with his mistress.
    ‘Please, tell her it is Ishmael, from the night of the carnival.’
    Now the gatekeeper was sure that this shabby figure, with his crude, long bundle and scruffy rucksack, had no real business