Part 30 (1/2)
”What are you still fighting for, apostate? You've despaired. There's no quest left in you.”
”Then I'm fighting for myself,” Archer replies, and a de-livery truck rumbles past, oblivious of the monster on the sidewalk. ”If that's all I have left, then that's what I'm fighting for.”
”An admirable purpose. Do your G.o.ds know this?”
Her index finger tightens on the trigger, and the wolf smiles and raises its enormous head, baring its throat to her.
”If you still had the courage, would I die, do you think?”
it asks.
”Why don't we just find out, puppy dog,” Archer says, trying too hard to sound brave, too hard to sound like fear's the very last thing she could even comprehend, when her hands are shaking and she can smell the p.i.s.s running down the insides of her thighs.
”You're catching on, witchling,” the wolf growls. ”But don't catch on too slowly, ” and it lowers its head again.
268.
”There's no shame in being a puppet. Not if the right person's pulling the strings.”
And then the wolf is gone, and there's only the sidewalk and the crushed Taco Bell cup, the wind and a few dry brown leaves rustling hurriedly past. Archer Day sits down on the curb, the revolver cradled in her lap, and cries until her head hurts and she can't cry anymore.
After Niki has put on the clean, dry clothes laid out for her by Eponine Chattox-a pair of gray wool pants and a teal-green blouse and vest, a thick pair of wool socks, and her own boots, blue fur coat, and backpack-Scarborough Pentecost leads her quickly through the empty house, along the mustard hallway and past the thing that's almost a grandfather clock, and then back down the spiral staircase to the fish augur's chamber of nets and aquariums and pools of ink black seawater. Far overhead, cannon fire booms again and again, and the vaulted, liquid walls of the chamber ripple from the force of the blasts.
”Are they going to destroy the city?” Niki asks, looking worriedly back at the iron staircase dimly illuminated by the candelabrum.
”Certainly sounds that way, doesn't it?”
The next explosion seems much closer than any of those before it, and the concussion rattles the high shelves all around them. Several large jars tumble to the floor and burst, tainting the fish- and mold-scented air with the reek of alcohol.
”Either those a.s.sholes are getting lucky,” Scarborough grimaces and steadies the nearest shelf, ”or they've figured out where you are, Vietnam.”
”I should be with Spyder,” Niki says.
”That's exactly the last place you should be.”
And there's another explosion, not so close as the last, but the candelabrum sways like a pendulum, throwing dizzying chartreuse shadows across the chamber.
”That old conjure eel's hocus-pocus can't hold this place 269.
together for f.u.c.king ever,” Scarborough says. ”One more good hit and we'll be swimming with the fis.h.i.+es.”
”If I tried to go back, to find my way to Spyder, would you stop me?” Niki asks and, for an answer, Scarborough grabs her roughly by the collar of her coat.
”Listen here. Odds are we'll both be dead in a little while, anyway, so why don't you just shut up about the Weaver and do as you're told.”
”Let go of me,” Niki snarls, and Scarborough brusquely exchanges his hold on her collar for an even firmer grip around the wrist of her good hand. He hauls her stumbling and cursing forward, between the aisles of teetering shelves and falling books, a thousand rattling, slos.h.i.+ng jars of pickled sea things, the rows of stoppered vials and flasks filled with powders and potions, great pyramid stacks of oyster, ammonite, and nautilus sh.e.l.ls. They pa.s.s the stone dais and Esme's lectern, and then the next explosion throws them both to their hands and knees. The walls of the chamber bulge and roll as shelves collapse and come down, one after the next. The candelabrum groans under its own weight, a cacophony of creaking chains, riv-ets and welds strained beyond their limits, and finally tears free from the ceiling, plunging the chamber into near darkness.
”Jesus, Joseph, and Mary,” Scarborough mutters to himself and coughs, as dust and the pungent, acrid stench of the contents of all the shattered jars and vials settles over them. ”You dead over there, Vietnam?”
”I don't think so,” Niki replies, mumbling through her fingers, through the mask she's made with her left hand, and then she starts coughing, too.
”Look, we have to get out of here. I think that last one got the house.”
Niki squints through the haze and the gloom, the dust and noxious fumes stinging her eyes, and tries to imagine where there might possibly be left to run.
”What about Eponine?” she asks, and then Scarborough 270 has her by the collar of her coat again and drags her to her feet.
”Eponine Chattox isn't my problem,” he says. ”Right now, the only problem I've got is you,” and he leads Niki through, around, and over the wreckage of metal and gla.s.s and splintered wood that the cannons have made of the fish augur's chamber. She glances up at the walls and ceiling, and even in the s.h.i.+fting half-light filtering down through the sea and up from the dying remains of the glowing things from the candelabrum, she can see that they're contracting, and the sea is closing in around them.
”It's getting smaller,” she says.
”What's getting smaller?” Scarborough asks, pus.h.i.+ng aside a heavy oak table obstructing their path, and she points at the ceiling.
”Yeah, I was wondering when you were going to notice that.”
”We're going to drown down here, aren't we?”
”That depends on how well you can swim,” Scarborough replies, and Niki nods her head and thinks about what Spyder said back on the catwalk leading from the Palisades to the gates of Padnee, that there might be other worlds waiting just beneath this one, and she wonders how many times she'll have to drown before she finds the bottom.
”Please, Vietnam, tell me you can swim.”
”It's been a while. But that's not the sort of thing you forget, is it?”
”Let's hope not,” Scarborough replies, and Niki can see that they've come to the edge of one of the open pools in the floor, not far from the s.h.i.+mmering, steadily advancing wall of the chamber. A large fis.h.i.+ng net, studded with cork floats and steel hooks and lobster pots, has fallen across the pool, completely covering it. Scarborough curses, takes a long knife from his belt, and begins sawing at the heavy jute mesh.
”You mean we're going to try and swim out of here?”
Niki asks him, incredulous, unable to look away from the vertical slab of ocean inching towards them like some sci-fi movie special effect, swallowing everything in its path.
271.
”That's the general idea, unless you've got a better one you're not sharing.”
”But . . . Jesus, we must be at least a hundred feet down.
There's no way-”
”Two hundred and thirty-three feet,” Scarborough says, correcting her as he slices cleanly through one thick, braided strand of the net and starts on another.
”Then why don't we just stand here and wait for that?”
Niki asks and motions towards the chamber wall, no more than twenty or thirty yards away from them now and gathering speed. ”Why even bother with the net?”
”Because things ain't always necessarily what they seem to be. It's all just doors in a hallway.”
”What the h.e.l.l's that supposed to mean?” but this time he doesn't answer her, just shakes his head and cuts through another strand of the net. Niki's ears have begun to ache and ring, and she can feel the pressure pus.h.i.+ng painfully at her eyes and temples as Esme's bubble shrinks around them, compacting all the air trapped inside it. So maybe we won't drown, after all, she thinks. Maybe we'll be crushed flat before the water ever reaches us, before we even get our feet wet. And she can't be certain, but she's pretty sure that drowning would be preferable. She covers her ears with her hands and wants to close her eyes, too, wants to curl into a tight, fetal ball, leaving no weak spots for the air to force its way inside her. But Niki doesn't move, and she doesn't take her eyes off the towering, fluid wall of the chamber.
”Scarborough, it's coming. It's coming now!”
”Take a couple of deep breaths,” he says. ”Deep, deep f.u.c.king breaths,” and he locks one arm tight about Niki's waist, pulling her down and through the hole he's hacked in the fis.h.i.+ng net. The water that closes around her is so cold it instantly drives the air from her lungs, a sudden, silver rush across her trembling lips, as unseen icicle teeth stab her flesh and frost blooms sharp beneath her skin.