Free King Rat by China Miéville Page A

Queenstown Road now, fast approaching Battersea Park.
    He was riding an incline, racing towards Chelsea Bridge. He took the roundabout with casual arrogance, put his head down and climbed towards the river. On Fabian’s right, the four chimneys of Battersea Power Station loomed into view. Its roof was long gone, it looked like a bombed-out relic, a blitz survivor. It was a great upturned plug straining to suck voltage out of the clouds, a monument to energy.
    Fabian burst free of South London. He slowed and looked into the Thames, past the towers and railings of steel that surrounded him, keeping him snug on Chelsea Bridge. The river sent shards of cold sunlight in all directions.
    He scudded over the face of the water like a pond skater, dwarfed by the girders and bolts ostentatiously holding the bridge together. He hung poised for a moment between the South Bank and the North Bank, his head high to see over the sides into the water, to see the black barges that never moved, waiting to ferry cargo long forgotten, his legs still, freewheeling his way towards Ladbroke Grove.
    The route to Natasha’s house took Fabian past the Albert Hall and through Kensington, which he hated.
    It was a soulless place, a purgatory filled only with rich transients drifting pointlessly through Nicole Farhi and Red or Dead. He sped up Kensington Church Street towards Netting Hill and on through to Portobello Road.
    It was a market day, the second in the week, designed to wrest money from tourists. Merchandise that had cost five pounds on Friday was now offered for ten. The air was thick with garish cagoules and backpacks and French and Italian. Fabian cussed quietly and inched through the throng. He ducked left down Elgin Crescent and then right, bearing down on the Bassett Road flat.
    A gust of wind stained the air brown with leaves. Fabian swung into the street. The leaves boiled around him, stuck to his jacket. Pared-down trees lined the tarmac. Fabian dismounted while still in motion, walked towards Natasha’s flat.
    He could hear her working. The faint thumping of Drum and Bass was audible from the end of the street.
    As he walked, wheeling his bike beside him, Fabian heard the sound of wings. Natasha’s house teemed with pigeons. Every protuberance and ledge was grey with plump, stirring bodies. A few were in the air, hovering nervously around the windows and gables, settling, dislodging their peers. They shifted and shat a little as Fabian stopped at the door directly below them.
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    Natasha’s rhythm was loud now, and Fabian could hear something unusual, a clear sound like pipes, a recorder or a flute, bursting with energy and exuberance, shadowing the bass. He stood still and listened.
    The quality of this sound was different from that of samples, and it was not trapped in any loops. Fabian suspected it was being played live. And by something of a virtuoso.
    He rang the bell. The electronic boom of the bass stopped cold. The flute faltered on for a second or two. As silence fell, the company of pigeons rose en masse into the air with the abruptness of panic, circled once like a school of fish and disappeared into the north. Fabian heard footsteps on the stairs.
    Natasha opened the door to him and smiled.
    ‘Alright, Fabe,’ she said, reaching up to touch her clenched right fist to his. He did so, at the same time bending down to put an arm around her and kiss her cheek. She responded, though her surprise was evident.
    ‘Tash,’ he whispered, in greeting and in warning. She heard it in his voice, pulled back holding his shoulders in her hands. Her face sharpened in concern.
    ‘What? What’s happened?’
    ‘Tash, it’s Saul.’ He’d told the story so often today he’d become an automaton, just mouthing the words, but this time it was difficult all over again. He licked his lips.
    Natasha started. ‘What is it, Fabe?’ Her voice cracked.
    ‘No no,’ he said hurriedly. ‘Saul’s fine. Well, I guess ... He’s