Far Horizons: Tales of Sci-Fi, Fantasy and Horror. Issue #15 June 2015 | Page 40

foot hit the floor with a wet slap, not a squeak, Tonmerion realised his mistake. The liquor.
His foot slid away from him, betraying him so casually that his leg, and the rest of him for that matter, were
powerless to resist. Tonmerion performed an ungraceful wobble and grabbed the nearest thing his flailing
arms could reach … his father’s dead arm.
A small wheeze of relief escaped his tight lips as he
found himself upright, safe. A similar sound came
forth when he realised what exactly it was that had
saved him from the most embarrassing fall, though
this time it was strangled by horror, and disgust.
Tonmerion’s gaze slowly tumbled down his arm, from
the expensive cloth to his ice-white knuckles, to the
dead, bruised, slate-coloured flesh that his fingers
were squeezing so tightly. Tonmerion gurgled something and quickly righted himself, red in the face and
wide in the eyes. He quickly began to smooth the front
of his shirt, but stopped hurriedly when it dawned on
him that he had just touched a dead body. He held his
hands out in the air instead, neither up nor down, close
nor far.
‘A cloth,’ he murmured. The surgeon obliged him,
leaning over to pass him a startlingly white cloth from
beneath the bench. Tonmerion dragged it over his
knuckles and fingertips, and nodded to the constable.
‘Lead the way.’
Pagget had not yet decided whether to stifle a laugh
or to share the boy’s revulsion. He simply looked on,
one eye squinting awkwardly, his face stuck halfway
between the two expressions.
‘Jimothy?’ the surgeon said, and Pagget came to.
‘Right! Yes. This way if you please.’ He only barely
managed to keep from adding, ‘Mind your step.’
Tonmerion followed him without a word.
*
‘America.’ Tonmerion gave the man a flat stare that
spoke a whole world of disbelief.

Witchazel was his name, like the slender shrub, and it
was a name that suited him to the very core. He was
more stick than man, loosely draped in an ill-fitting
suit of the Prussian style, charcoal striped with purple.
His hair was thin and jet-black, smeared across his
scalp and forehead like an oleaginous paste. Tonmerion had never liked the look of the lawyer. One with
power should dress accordingly. His father’s words,
once more.
Witchazel shuffled the wad of papers in his leather-gloved hands and coughed. It meant nothing except
a resounding yes. Tonmerion looked at Constable
Pagget, but found him idly thumbing the dust from
the shelves of his ornate bookcase. Tonmerion looked
instead at his knees, and at the woven carpet just
beyond them. He tugged at his collar. The constable’s
office was stifling, heavy with curtains, mahogany, and
leather. The news did not help matters, not one bit.
‘And this aunt …’ he asked.
‘Lilain Rennevie,’ filled in Witchazel.
‘Lives where exactly?’
Witchazel’s face took on an enthusiastic curve, a
look of excitement and wonder, one that had been
well-practised in the bedroom mirror, or so it seemed
to Tonmerion. ‘A charming place, right on the cusp of
civilisation, Master Hark,’ he said. ‘A frontier town,
don’t you know, going by the bucolic name of Fell
Falls. A brand new settlement founded by the railroad
teams and the Serped Railroad Company. They’re
aiming for the west coast, you see, blazing a trail right
across the country in search of gold and riches and the
Last Ocean. An exciting place, if I may say so, sir. I’m
almost envious!’ Wichazel grinned.
‘Almost,’ Tonmerion replied drily.
Witchazel forced his grin to stay and turned to look at
the constable, hoping he would chime in. All Pagget
did was smile and nod.
Witchazel produced a map from the papers in his hand
and slid it across the desk towards the boy. ‘Here we

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