Part 27 (1/2)

Soundlessly, I stood up and watched, as Noah did the same. We didn't need to speak; we were thinking the same thing. We crept along the side of the room. When Noah thought I wasn't watching, he wet the edges of his lips. Had he kissed me? Had it been real? Averting my eyes, I looked at my face in the mirror. It was dusty and hollow, as if it were an older me, an ancient me from a past life. If it had been a kiss, it must have happened in a different world, when we were both different people.

Once in the hallway, I could hear voices coming from downstairs. Closing my eyes, I tried to count how many there were. One by the window. One by the door. Another two at the kitchen table. Four more outside, by the barn. A handful more in the field. The only way to go was left, down the hallway.

Cautiously, I took a step, and then another, and another, until we reached a room on the other side of the house. Turning the k.n.o.b, I pushed the door open and went inside, Noah at my heels.

We found ourselves in a narrow, dank room, with low ceilings and a narrow staircase going down the side. The maid's room. Except, instead of being furnished like a proper room, it was filled with toys. Worn toys, chipped and broken, as if they were lifetimes old. Plastic trucks and Matchbox cars and marbles and jacks were scattered across the floor. I stepped around them carefully, gazing at the room. What was this place?

I was about to lead us down the narrow staircase and out the door, when we heard more voices. They seeped through the heating vent like frost. I crouched down and listened. There were dozens of them, talking and laughing and fighting, their voices high-pitched and playful, almost whiny. They were children; boys, no older than twelve, for their voices hadn't dropped yet. I tried to make out what they were saying, but it was all chatter.

I was about to turn away when a deep voice cut through them, speaking in Latin. It sounded like a boy-or rather a man-around Dante's age, maybe older. The room went silent. My lip trembled as I waited, but when he spoke, all I could make out were words here and there: ”The Nine Sisters.”

”Name in the mailbox.”

”Hold her and wait for us to come.”

”Serve the Liberum.”

Soundlessly, I stood up, willing my heart to beat softer. My eyes darted about the ceiling. The Liberum. Was the deep voice one of the Brothers? Were they employing Undead children to help them find the secret of the Nine Sisters?

I glanced out the window to where the taxi should have been waiting for us, but it was gone.

”What is he saying?” Noah mouthed.

”We need to get out,” I whispered, so softly that I wasn't even sure Noah heard me.

But how? We were miles away from civilization. Without realizing it, I backed away from the wall, trying to distance myself from the voice, but I had forgotten that the floor was cluttered with toys, and lost my footing on a train set that wound around the room.

It happened too quickly for me to catch myself. I stumbled, my arms flailing as I reached out for a desk. I was too slow, and fell to the floor with a loud thump, the toys beneath me scattering across the room.

I didn't move until everything had settled. The house went still. Noah's eyes were wide as they traveled from me to the open door and the shadowed hallway beyond.

From somewhere in the distance, I heard the light pitter-patter of footsteps. They seemed to be coming from nowhere and everywhere, like rain falling on the roof. The sound was low at first, and then grew louder, like dozens of tiny feet running up the stairs.

I felt them before I saw them: a rush of cold, as if I had just fallen into an icy lake. Goose b.u.mps rose over my skin as they got closer, closer; the cold air enveloping me, wrapping itself around my throat until it was so tight I could barely breathe.

A pale figure emerged from the darkness at the end of the hall, running toward us. Another followed behind him -a flailing white thing-followed by another, and another. They were moving so quickly and so strangely, their limbs thras.h.i.+ng as they ran.

Noah's voice boomed across the room. ”Come on.”

Taking his hand, I pulled myself up.

We clambered down the narrow back stairway, my feet so close to Noah's heels that I thought I was going to knock him over. At the bottom was another long hallway, lined with family photographs and doors. On the other end I could see the windows of the kitchen, and beyond that, a back door.

We began to run for the door when I saw a white blur moving toward us from that direction.

Noah skidded to a stop, the oriental carpet bunching beneath our feet as I slid into him. He turned to me, his breath quick. Above us, I could hear the boys running through the maid's room, the ceiling sagging slightly beneath their footsteps. They were getting louder, closer.

”What now?” I said, searching the hallway, looking for a way out.

Noah ran to me just as an Undead child emerged from the stairwell, his eyes a cloudy gray. They didn't move as he turned about the room like a dizzy child listening for our sound. He couldn't have been older than six. I watched him, taking in his worn pants, his bare feet, his wild hair; then I realized that he was blind.

Two others stumbled down the stairs behind him. Their eyes were clearer, more focused, tilting their heads as if trying to figure out what I was.

I felt Noah behind me. ”Why are they staring at us like that?” he whispered.

”They're just interested,” I uttered, cringing every time their blurry eyes met mine. ”They're only children, remember? They don't know who we are. Just don't let them see-”

”Shovel!” one of them said in Latin, pointing to the small trowel sticking out of the inside pocket of Noah's coat.

Slowly, I walked backward toward the line of doors, hoping one of them led to a way out, when I felt a tiny hand on my leg, tugging at my skirt. Startled, I fell down, the carpet rough against my legs as the boy crawled on top of me, his small body smudged with dirt as he grabbed at my face. Arching my neck away from him, I covered his mouth with my hand, flung him off of me, and stood up.

Noah was a few feet away, kicking off three small boys, all barefooted and s.h.i.+rtless. Pressing my lips together, I pushed through them, pulling them off of Noah and dragging him out. They grabbed at our ankles as I turned the k.n.o.bs of the last door. It was pitch-black inside, and dank. A bas.e.m.e.nt, I thought, staring down at the cement staircase. Just then, an Undead boy wrapped his hands around my leg. I pulled Noah through the door, taking the Undead boy with me.

The boy clung to my stockings, his tiny fingers pressing into my thighs as I stumbled underground. I tried to kick him off, but he grew breathless, desperate, grasping at my skirt, my arms, my hair. Before I could catch myself, I slipped, crying out in pain as I toppled down the stairs, the cement bruising my back.

I felt the boy's face close to mine, his breath cold against my cheek. And then we hit the ground. The unfinished floor scuffed my knees, and the boy's grip grew loose. Peeling him off of me, I scrambled away and watched his cloudy eyes grow bloodshot. They rolled back in his head. I gasped as he twisted his neck one way and then the other, as if in pain; faster, faster, until he was writhing on the floor.

Noah grabbed my arm.

”Wait!” I said, staring at the boy's slim body, his b.u.t.ton nose, his chubby cheeks smudged with dirt. ”He's dying. We have to help him.”

”Leave him!” Noah said.

”He's just a child!” I said.

”He isn't anymore. He's a monster.” Before I could say anything else, Noah took me by the waist and pulled me toward the back of the room. It was a long stone bas.e.m.e.nt filled with bales of hay and rusty farm equipment.

”Maybe there's a ground entrance,” Noah said, scanning the ceilings until he found a set of metal doors. Standing on a bale of hay, he pushed them open to reveal the night sky, blue and wild with stars.

He lifted himself up and then leaned over to me help me, but I was right behind him. A vast field stretched before us, the snow packed into ice. We ran through it, the air sharp on my lungs as we headed for the lake and the woods beyond.

I skidded to a stop as we reached the sh.o.r.e, where the ice met the snow.

”Is it safe to walk on?” I shouted, my hair whipping about my cheeks as I turned. Behind us, the Undead boys were slipping out of the farmhouse, their skin pale in the moonlight, like moths.

”Of course it is,” Noah said, slowing as he stepped onto the lake. ”This was an ice farm. They had to have gotten it from somewhere.”

I wavered as I listened to see if the ice beneath Noah was cracking. But all I could hear was the snow crunching beneath the feet of the Undead behind us.

The blackbirds nestled on the surface scattered as we ran across the lake, our shoes slipping on the ice as the January winds numbed my lungs. When we made it to the woods on the other side, I saw the boys through the branches, their pallid faces a dim blue in the darkness. It looked like they were going to follow us, until a deep voice boomed behind them. ”Enough,” it said, as a dark figure appeared, tall and narrow like a scarecrow. I felt the Undead children gather and become still along the perimeter of the lake, their dulled eyes following us as we vanished into the night.

ICE, THE GAS STATION ADVERTISED IN NEON.

It had taken us an hour to get there, trudging through the woods until our legs were numb and caked with snow.

”There was no riddle in there,” Noah said, catching his breath. ”What was that place?”

”I don't know,” I said, bending over my knees. ”A place where the Undead live. A place run by the Liberum.” I looked up at him. ”They're looking for the riddle, too. They're trying to find the secret.”

”They said that?”