Electric Body Cages
My wife and I have co-written the first book in a Young Adult Fantasy trilogy. The novel is a mythopoetic adventure-quest written with an alchemical-science and art appeal. Its big inspirations are: alchemy, William Blake’s cosmology, and the 19th-century artists the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. The book’s mythology, philosophy, and cosmology are not too heady for young adults — we’ve made it very accessible for ages 12 and up. It’s a crossover novel, too, in the vein of Pullman, Frances Hardinge, and Winterson’s Tanglewreck, so we’re hoping adults will enjoy it also.
Here’s an excerpt from the chapter “Electric Body Cages.”
Despite being embraced by a framework of iron, Dylan was smiling. A mesmerized smile, full of the Brotherhood’s elixir. His eyes glistened with anticipation, but of what, he hadn’t a clue.
Lord Icon stared at Dylan’s limp hand hanging from the end of the cage’s protruding arm.
Grimshaw grinned. “You see, my lord, your heir’s eyes are bright and bold. He’s submissive but he’s not dumb like any old sheep.”
The wolf Maddox roughly handled Dylan’s delicate wrist. “His pulse is steady. When his pupils have dilated another fraction he’ll be ready for instantaneous transmission of pneuma.”
Maddox returned to polishing the gleaming steel of his Storm Box converter. Out of each side of the box a network of tangled wires sprawled, each ending in a skin-contact pad. Next to a steel hand-crank a glass dial’s thin black needle feverishly flicked back and forth. A raised two-pronged control lever was ready for its downward thrust. Maddox’s gold polishing cloth moved in larger circles over the humming box. “Its atmosphere is brewing, its ionizing particles charging.” He tapped the dial with his claws. “The conductivity currents are calibrated to the ratio of Icon’s and the boy’s body density and their thermal capacity. The velocity of the pneuma transferal will be precise.”
Grimshaw removed a soft sable brush from a drawer in the alchemical cupboard. He motioned Maddox toward him, who extended his hand with two vessel rings, one gold, one silver, poised on his hairy fingers. With a pointed claw, Grimshaw pried free the tiny lid to the silver ring and it opened on delicate hinges. The ring’s vessel held a swell of quicksilver. Next the arch-alchemist pried the lid off Maddox’s gold ring; it contained a swell of liquid gold.
Icon removed his long robe, his jacket, unfastened his gold cuff links, and then stripped off his crisp white shirt.
The Theomage carefully dipped the brush into the gold. Whispering an alchemical spell, he painted clockwise an open circle on the king’s forehead. Icon felt the liquid gold tingle as it quickly dried on his skin. Grimshaw then painted a golden ring on each of the king’s temples, and one over his heart. And, lastly, a large circle on the palm of Icon’s right hand and a similar large circle on the palm of the Dylan’s extended left hand. Continuing to mutter the enigmatic incantation, Grimshaw dipped into the flowing quicksilver of Maddox’s silver ring. He then painted V-shaped symbols just beneath the king’s gold circles, their silvery points directing downward from Icon’s head to his chest and along his right arm. Gold for pneuma. Quicksilver for the spirit’s transmission and the pathway the energy was to follow.
His painted skin dry, Lord Icon stepped up to his iron body cage. From the Storm Box’s jumble of wires, Maddox attached the skin-contact pads to the center of each gold circle on the king’s temples, forehead, and heart. He also attached similar wires to Dylan, whose expression was calm and willing.
With Maddox’s help, Grimshaw pulled open the heavy back of Icon’s cage. Its iron hinges shot tiny sparks as it grated open.
Icon braced a hand on Grimshaw’s bony shoulder. “I shiver to think how close I am now, Theomage. The powers of Primordial light will be ours to wield and command.” He licked his dry lips. “Light forever severed from darkness… No longer will the marriage of light and darkness rule this world. Seasons will no longer be pathetically predictable. And Nature — ” he spat the word out as if it was diseased — “will no longer be balanced measures dictated by some stranger god.” Icon’s eyes swelled with fire. “I tell you Theomage, earth, man, and beast will all bow under our control!” He searched the alchemist’s eyes. “I am relieved to part from this crude old flesh for a while. Once more I put my trust in you and the Brotherhood.
“But remember,” he gripped Grimshaw tighter, “though I will inhabit a youth’s body, I am still the king. The boy Dylan is but the host. I am the one who will be wielding eternal light!” Icon shot a final abrasive glance at the alchemist. Then Grimshaw heaved the iron door shut and locked it.
With a firm pressure, Icon pushed the gold-painted palm of his hand flat up against Dylan’s painted palm. A wired pad was affixed to the back of each hand.
Maddox returned to his Storm Box. A brisk nod to Grimshaw and he continued to rotate the box’s steel shaft. Nervy blue sparks crackled along its length of tangled wires. As Maddox cranked with force, the thunderstorm in the box throbbed and intensified. Sparks whorled and zapped. Maddox eyed the gauge’s frenetic needle. “Standby Theomage, the discharge of power will be ready in, five, four, three, two… one!”
Rubber gloved and quick, Grimshaw seized the Storm Box’s control lever and slammed it down.
A violent crack. A boom. Electric-blue streams of light burst along wires. Flashing currents spiraled up the iron body cages. In electrical arcs they clustered in a feeding frenzy of ragged cobalt jaws around the king’s and Dylan’s hands, palms pressed firmly together.
Claps of thunder reverberated about the walls of the sparking, illuminated room.
Suddenly the Modus Operandi’s door burst open. A falsetto voice sang out, “Theatrics for the King!” Clapping and laughing hysterically, Junction, the king’s fool, pranced in. The jester wore an outrageously enormous striped skirt. Like a hot air balloon the colorful silk swelled and toppled Maddox right off his stool.
The Storm Box’s handcrank spun chaotically. Crackling, hissing sparks shot in every direction.
“Fool,” shouted Grimshaw. “What’s the meaning of this?”
“A message from Queen Nessa!” hollered Junction back.
The jester’s vast skirt burst aside and a throng of acrobats tumbled out. In a frenzy of leaping and somersaults, they flung bright streamers at Grimshaw. The whizzing ribbons wrapped and twisted around the astonished Theomage. He tottered on his heels, swatted and cursed, fighting to detangle himself.
Fire-breathers sprang up, flames spewing from their mouths. Under a storm of electric sparks, white-hot flames forced Grimshaw back into a corner. He tripped over a pile of coffins as a ball of flame singed his ears and blackened the white wall around his cowering body.
Young players costumed in red and yellow silk, their faces masked in gold, dashed to Dylan’s sizzling body cage.
Jugglers popped up like jack-in-the-boxes. They hooted and hollered and tossed glinting knives. Maddox snarled and lunged. Shining blades whizzed. The wolf’s collar ruff was impaled to the wall, the quivering knife inches from his furred neck. Maddox tore himself free only to feel the back of his hand slap hard against the wall. Warm blood oozed down his wrist. To his horror Maddox saw a crimson stain spreading across his sleeve’s white lace. With his hand skewered to the wall, his yowl was barely audible above Junction’s hysterical, mocking laughter.
Junction snatched up the Theomage’s rubber gloves and yanked out the Storm Box’s long, twisted wires. Blue sparks zapped about the fool like a swarm of fireflies.
The acrobats somersaulted into the air. Higher and higher they rose with each new body’s gravity-defying feats. They were beginning to pile onto one another, forming a human pyramid.
Icon slumped against the bars of his locked body cage. He watched helplessly as Dylan’s limp body was freed from his cage and thrown over the shoulder of an acrobat. Icon saw the gold painted alchemical symbol on Dylan’s open palm… Was it his own hand he saw? Had the pneuma transferred — had he possessed Dylan? Or was he still in his own body? Icon called weakly to the alchemists. But flames kept Grimshaw back, knives held Maddox.
A young masked player flounced up to the king and stared unmoving and without a word. Nessa removed her mask and frowned at her father’s face behind the bars. She was ready to hail insults at him. But Junction grabbed her by the waist and she was tossed onto the back of a steadying acrobat. She followed the acrobat that hoisted Dylan up, climbing the human pyramid to the top, to the pried open window in the vault of the room’s stark white ceiling.
Half way through the escape window, Junction turned and hollered to the king, “Long live the Queen of Brim Umbra!” Then he jumped safely through.
The last fire-breather hung from the sill. From his mouth, a risky ball of flame shot down into the room and forked over the crouching, cowering, alchemists.
