It was exciting, but Oscar was secretly glad that when he looked down all he could see were clouds - it made the whole thing a little less real. Occasionally there was a break in the cloud cover and he caught a glimpse of glowing ribbons of roads and little specks of house lights and realised quite how high up they were and he had to look away. The problem then was catching sight of the moon, which was full, bright and altogether a lot closer than he was used to seeing it.
It was still undeniably exciting, though. He had no idea how fast they were going, but the clouds appeared to be dashing past beneath them and a fierce wind was rattling the windows. That and the boom of the huge, leathery wings, beating steadily against the night.
When Ridley had demanded a fast means of travel, the Gnomes had immediately ushered them up to the roof, where they had rolled back a section to reveal, in a small hanger, the strangest craft Oscar had ever seen. It looked something like a small boat with clawed feet underneath and two great, folded bat's wings attached to it. The Gnomes had rolled it up onto the roof and the wings had parted and stretched and flapped experimentally with a creaking shake and Ridley had laughed and applauded.
"An ornithopter! Moons, Maggs, you knew how to travel in style, didn't you?"
"What's an ornithcopter?" It didn't look entirely safe to Oscar - it appeared to be made solely of wood, leather and brass fittings and it squeaked and juddered ominously.
"Ornithopter," Ridley corrected, "It's sort of like a plane, only it flaps its wings like a bird - it could only work with magic, of course, but it's worth the effort, don't you think?" She patted the wooden hull affectionately. The boat shaped bit in the middle had two eyes painted on it at the front and Oscar could have sworn that one of them winked at him.
The Gnomes had opened a hatch and let down a set of folding steps.
"Is it safe?" wondered Maggs.
"You tell me, you built it," grinned Ridley
"Then it probably isn't."
"Come on, all aboard," and Ridley ushered them all into the cabin. Oscar had barely had time to find a seat before, with a sickening lurch; the Ornithopter had flung itself into the night sky and started flapping up, laboriously, towards the clouds.
Now they were actually airborne and flying through the darkness, though, the whole thing seemed a lot more exciting rather than just dangerous. The cabin was small, but snug - liberally provided with large amounts of red velvet upholstery and dark, varnished wood. Erik and Karl were there, running up and down a control panel that was covered with brass knobs, little red lights and wavering dials, while Ridley and Maggs sat at a table in the middle of the cabin examining a map and arguing over directions.
The cat had somehow managed to get a porthole open and was even now sitting right on the prow of the craft, staring out into the darkness. It didn't look terribly safe to Oscar, but the cat seemed perfectly happy and he certainly wasn't going to go out to fetch it back in.
"I think, finally, we could be ahead of him," said Ridley, looking up from the map, "This could be our chance to catch him out."
"How?" Oscar still wasn't quite sure what, exactly, they were doing.
"Well, we now know something that the Erl King doesn't, that Maggs' researches had something to do with Cowper and the Bl..." she glanced at the gnomes but they hadn't noticed, "With the original White Tower..."
"So if we find out what that is..."
"...then we might just have discovered how to stop the Erl King."
"Let's just hope I was right," Maggs smiled grimly.
And the ornithopter swooped down towards the clouds and the distant fiery glow to the south, where the lights of London burned on through the night.
The ornithopter belled out its wings and swung into towards the ground with a great clattering, raising a storm of ravens around it as it landed on a small patch of grass within the Tower of London. Only a single raven remained, standing quite still on the grass, watching the ornithopter with one sceptical eye as the craft folded up its wings and opened the hatch to let to occupants out. The raven didn't look terribly impressed with all this showing off. The cat, who was still perched up on the prow, stretched leisurely, just to let the raven know that she wasn't terribly impressed with it.
Two Yeomen of the Guard came running up to the ornithopter as Ridley, Oscar and Maggs climbed out. They were accompanied by an officious looking man in the bottle green coat of the Knights Errant who was shouting at the new arrivals.
"Halt! Halt and identify yourselves in the name of the Royal Order of Magi!"
"You identify yourself," retorted Ridley, then she squinted at him, suspiciously, "I know you, don't I? Didn't you used to work in the library?"
"You must identify yourselves," the man seemed put out that Ridley had recognised him.
"Oh, for goodness' sake," Ridley stepped down from the ornithopter and started off across the grass with Oscar and Maggs after her, "You know fully well who we are."
"You must identify yourselves," the man was getting quite cross now, "It's after curfew - you have to identify yourself if challenged by a Knight Errant. The rules apply even to you, Ridley" The man had been trying to get in front of them, to make Ridley stop, but now she stopped of her own accord and rounded on him.
"That's Mistress Ridley to you, and what on earth are you talking about? What curfew? What's going on?"
"The Lord Chancellor, in accordance to the wishes of the Prime Minister, has instituted a curfew, Mistress Ridley, to be enforced by the Knights Errant. No one is allowed on the streets between the hours of eight and eight unless they have the appropriate papers. Do you have the appropriate papers Mistress Ridley?"
"We are Knights Errant. This is the Lord Protector, you fool."
"I answer only to the Lord Lector, Mistress, and you would do well not to call his representative a fool."
"Now, you listen to me, fool, and listen carefully," Ridley was speaking calmly and evenly but Oscar could tell that she was getting properly angry now, "For all your curfews and patrols the Erl King is still at large and, very likely, on his way here, if he's not here already..." She paused and sniffed the air, as if searching for him. The man blanched.
"The... Darklings... here?"
"Yes - now why don't you do something genuinely useful and go and contct the Temple: fetch help - when I say help, I mean someone competent."
"I'll..." the man was backing away, "I'll go and..." and he turned and ran back across the green towards the main gates.
Ridley turned to the Yeoman, "Are there any more of them around? Guarding somewhere, possibly?"
The elder of the Yeoman look at her for a moment and then apparently made up his mind about something.
"Up in the White Tower," he said, nodding at it with his head, "I'll show you."
