Urlick looks to me, and then away. The woods roll with so much brume we can hardly see one another. Fingers of tree limbs reach in from all sides. The thick, cloud curtain parts, and a vision becomes clear. Ahead of us, not five metres, the land drops off into the ravine.
“Embers,” I whisper. Black filth belches up from its guts. The Neo Locator has led us to the very brink of Embers.
“I don’t see the Core.” Urlick sucks in a breath.
“I don’t either.” I twist around.
“Do you think perhaps that thing isn’t working and we’ve become lost.”
“Whatever’s happened, we’re here now.”
What little light there is slowly dissolves.
Everything around us fades to black.
Urlick gulps. “Perhaps we should turn back.”
“Without the necklace?” I reach for his hand.
“Perhaps I could replicate the serum from the formula in your father’s journal.”
I suck in a shaky breath. “Urlick Babbit-Winslow, I’ve never known you to be afraid of anything. Don’t you dare start now.” I squeeze his hand in the darkness. My stomach spirals. Strangely, the tip of the rod lights up again, and I almost drop it from the shock. It blinks more erratically than ever now. It’s red and so hot, I’m almost unable to hold it.
“She must be near,” I whisper, my heart beating in time with the light. “Very near.”
Urlick stares back at the tip of the convulsing prod. His adam’s apple bumps the length of his throat. His eyes shine like rose-coloured fire.
The treetops eerily stir. Our eyes drawn upward.
The rod in my hands, jerks, snapping my arm sharply left. “Urlick!” I shout, as I’m dumped from the cycle. The end beats red, green, red, green, as the rod drags me across the forest floor. “Urlick?” I’m pulled over branch, bush, stump.
Urlick gives chase on foot, unable to catch up to me at first, following close behind, leaping over logs, stumps, fallen trees, and through a stocky thicket of saplings, on my wild adventure through the woods, dragged upon my belly. At last, my shoulder catches on something hard, and I slam to a stop against the trunk of a tree. The rod pops from my hand and sails on without me…falling to the ground just a stone’s throw beyond me. The light on its tip turns mysteriously black.
I scramble to my feet and hurry to retrieve it, but it scorches my fingers so I drop it again, shaking my hand out at my side.
“Are you all right?” Urlick catches up to me. He examines my hand.
“Yes.” I curl it into a numb fist. “It…it just…” I stammer, breathlessly.
“I saw it.” He pulls me to him.
Slowly, the rod begins to turn in place on the earth, rotating slowly until it points in a south-westerly direction. It shakes, then shoots forward, cutting through leaves, grass, and twigs as it zips along the forest floor away from us.
Stunned, we give chase find ourselves in a second clearing, much larger than the first. The rod grinds to an abrupt halt. It rotates again, this time indicating a bare spot in the trees just up ahead. The rod shakes, quivering.
Through the mist, shadows dance. Tattered, drape-like, bodies angle down from the trees, weaving eerily in and out of the branches. They sway on the wind, which has been gradually picking up again, and gnash their teeth.
“It’s them,” Urlick whispers. “Flossie can’t be far off.” He pulls the snub-nosed steamcannon from his holster and tosses me the rest of the pack. “This is it. Remember now”—he turns to me smiling—“we only get one shot at this, so it’d better be the clearest one possible.” He stops to dawn a pair of silver-threaded gloves he pulls from his pocket. I’ve never seen the gloves before. Then he dumps a box of shimmering silver cast ammo into his gloved hand. The ammo looks to be coated in oil.
“What are you doing? What are those?” I whisper.
“Special bullets.” He holds one up, gingerly. “Laced with a special disintegrating agent.” The substance on the bullets drips from his palm, hits the leaves below, and sears through them.
Both Urlick and I look down then right back up.
He quickly drops the bullet into the chamber of the steamcannon gun, then loads the rest, making sure not to touch them very long. They hiss and sizzle as they drop into place.
“Where did they come from?”
“A special gift from Sadar.”
It figures.
There is no time for further questions, as the shadows in the clearing up ahead have begun to shift.
Quickly, I load my pockets with the meager bits of ammo I was able to spare when I was forced to dump the packs: a few cherry burst bombs, a pack of poisonous darts, and steam-pepperbox revolver that I stuff up my sleeve. I dump a box of bullets into the other pocket, feeling weighed down, but happy to be, then check the knife I stashed in the leg of my boot, before I left the castle. It’s still there. Like a knife will do any good against ghouls.
Not that any of the rest of this will either, other than make noise.
The Infirmed hate noise.
We nod to one another, indicating we’re ready to go, and start forward, when Urlick grabs my hand. “Promise me you won’t go doing something stupid,” he whispers.
“As long as you promise the same to me.”
He nods and kisses me, then lunges forward. I wish he’d never dropped my hand.
Cackles chill the air over our heads. Tattered bodies swoop and sway.
My head snaps up. My legs feel rubbery. The forest in front of us breaks into eerie song. A low ceremonial, chant. I’ve heard this demonic chorus before.
“Don’t listen to them! Remember?” Urlick cautions as we run. “Don’t let them in your head.”
I remember. I remember. I close my eyes briefly, willing their voices away.
The chanting falls into rounds of spine-crimping laughter. The wind increases, circling around us, wrapping us in its currents. This doesn’t feel right. Even for Follies.
Beyond that, there’s a sort of flapping of wings, a swooshing of brooms, as if someone—something—is sweeping the air clean. When I hesitate, Urlick tugs me along. “Come on! This needs to be our surprise, not hers.” His hand finds the steamcannon on his hip.
Dried leaves crunch beneath our boots as we carve our way through the dense forest under cover of brume. The wind tugs at our hair and flaps our clothes. A mysterious feeling overwhelms me, as if the wind were the hands of my mother trying to force us back. Then, as unexpectedly as the wind rose, it draws back, revealing its wicked surprise. I stagger to a fear-driven stop.
Flossie stands an arm’s length away from the frothing ravine, rising and dancing about on swollen tentacles. She is cloaked on either side by a drape of trees—great, grand, towering willows. She cackles, fat and sassy, her arms extended to the heavens, as she twirls. Ghouls swirl and churn above her head, chanting. Twenty or more frightening apparitions—Infirmed, in various states of Turning.
Her face and hands shimmer, nearly translucent. Her clothes are now the starkest shade of white. Gone is any resemblance of her earthly state. She no longer looks human, save for a swatch of peach glow in her cheeks. The rest of her face shines liquid blue. Her once beady, black eyes give off beams of bone-jarring white-silver light. She tracks her followers’ movements in the trees, unaware of our presence—until her adoring entourage startles to a stop. Their tattered, wispy bodies retreat to the trees.
Flossie whirls around. Her mouth forms a surprised ‘O’, her eyes aglow with death light. They squint to mere piercing pinpoints. “You,” she howls, her head twisting from me to Urlick and back. “What are you doing here?” She slops toward me on shaky tentacles. “How did you find me?”
My heart rockets into my throat
They Infirm move in, silvery fangs bared, churning and chattering around us, diving dangerously close to our heads.
“Get back!” Urlick swings.
I draw my knife and slice at the air.
“Stop! You fools!�
�� Flossie shouts, throwing up her arms.
The Infirm shrink back.
“If anyone gets to kill her, it’s going to be me.” She shoots toward me, and my breath evaporates. The wraiths in the air cease to move, hanging like gothic curtains suspended on invisible rods above our heads. Their ghoulish eyes peer down, penetrating us. I try not to look, but their gaze holds me steadfast. I shield my eyes with my hand, and fight to break eye contact.
“What’s the matter, Princess?” Flossie waddles close. “Not so brave when it’s not your territory?”
The apparitions cackle overhead.
She leans in and rasping in her weathered voice, her rancid breath lingering in the clouded air between us, causing me to choke.
“Brave enough to destroy you,” I say, and slowly pluck a cherry-burst bomb from my pocket.
Flossie breaks into a wild, laugh. “Oh, please.” All her teeth show as she tosses back her head, laughing. “You honestly think you could end me with that?” She reaches out, knocking the bomb from my hand. It rolls between my feet.
Her eyes drop to it, leisurely. “I certainly hope, for your sake, that wasn’t lit.” The ghouls in the trees enjoy another round of high-pitched snickered laughter.
“There’s more where that came from,” I say, stupidly. Urlick elbows me in the side.
Flossie narrows her jealous-tinged eyes. “Let me guess.” She closes the gap. The suction cup bottoms of her tentacles clomping sloppily, affixing and unaffixing to everything in their grip. “You two have come armed to the tits for this?” She yanks my pendant out from between her breasts, and her followers in the trees gasp in shock. “Shut up!” she yells back at them, then turns to me again. “I knew you’d be along for it eventually. But then again, what other choice do you have?” She purses her damaged, now parchment-thin, puttied lip, and swings the necklace like a pendulum, just out of my reach.
I know better than to lunge for it.
“That’s why I didn’t bother to kill you back there in the swamp,” she adds in a slithery voice, her tongue sloshing in and out of her mouth. “You’re far more useful to me as a lure than a corpse.” She juts out her neck, her voice sultry. “Not that the corpse part isn’t coming up.”She stares into my eyes, and I swear I see the future go black. I shake it off and grip the poison darts in my pocket tighter.
“I read all about it in your pretty purple book,” She snaps backward, her voice an octave higher.
A cold wash of horror threads through me. What does she mean, book? The necklace ticks on its chain. She sprouts a wry smile
And then it hits me. A shock-filled gasp escapes my lips.
Soleil.
My father’s journal. That’s where it’s been.
It’s been in the hands of my enemy the whole time.
“Where is it?” I stupidly throw myself toward her.
“OooOooo, wouldn’t you like to know?” She leans cockily back. “You really shouldn’t leave such important information just lying around.” She swings the necklace, winding and unwinding it around her fingertips. “I would have thought you’d learned that lesson by now.”
I clench my teeth. “Hand it over.”
“Which?” Flossie laughs. “The book or the necklace?”
“Both!” I lurch crazily at her.
She snaps the necklace tight in her palm.
“No!” Urlick shouts, and hauls me back.
“Oh, would you look at that,” Flossie addresses her cronies in the trees. “The not-so-handsome prince to the rescue.” They laugh.
“She said, hand it over.” Urlick steps up in my place. His body tenses as he grits his teeth.
“Hmm.” Flossie snorts, sizing him up and down. “Seems a bit of a tall order from someone who’s come intent on eliminating me.” Her eyes fall to my cherry-burst blooming pocket. The wind picks up at her back, tossing the loose tendrils of her hair about her Infirm-pocked face.
Instinctively, I step back.
“Hand it over,” Urlick says, “Or—”
“Or what?”
Slowly, provocatively, she walks the pendant chain through what’s left of her fingers. “Just what will you do, Urlick?”
“This.” He pulls the steamcannon from his hip and aims it at her forehead.
Flossie bursts into laughter again. The sardonic sound echoes through the forest, and bounces off the trees. “Oh, Urlick, really,” Flossie drawls, moving in uncomfortably close, and strokes his chest with her withering finger. “And to think I mistook you for brilliant.” She shoves him backward. His head thumps against the bark of a tree. “As much as I adore you, and God knows I do.” She struts. “I’m afraid you’re out of your league. You see, I am as unaffected by your bullets as you are by my affections.” She throws open her jacket, and pokes a finger through a previous bullet hole, and then stuffs her hand through her head, and waggles her fingers. “You see. Nothing.”
What I had for breakfast nearly comes up.
Urlick gulps and stares, his eyes round as teacups.
“Perhaps you’re unaffected by ordinary bullets,” Urlick says confidently—though I can tell, he’s struggling to muster the confidence. “But not these.” He cocks the cannon gun.
“Why?” Flossie flits a sarcastic hand in the air. “Are they special? Made of silver stakes or something.” Her followers giggle in the trees. “Or loaded with some sort of special spirit-killing powder?”
“As a matter of fact, yes.”
“Really?” She shifts forward, plugging the snout of his gun with her finger. “I’m terrified.”
More ghoulish laughter.
Urlick daggers his eyes. “You should be. Now hand over the necklace like she said, or I swear I’ll fill you with bullets.”
Flossie smiles. “I think you’re forgetting who’s the real threat here, Urlick.” She pulls her finger from the snout of the gun. It making a childish-sounding pop. “Now, shall we talk business, or shall I just have my friends up there eat her in front of you?” She swings her venomous gaze my way.
The ghouls in the trees hiss and chatter. Their fangs glint in the dim light.
A pull of terror shreds across my chest. My heart beats triple time.
“I’d like to propose a deal.” The leaves beneath her tentacles creak. “A little…I’ll scratch your back and you scratch mine…” She drags a precocious fingernail the length of Urlick’s tipped-up chin.
He swallows. “The time for bargaining is long over, Flossie.”
“Is it, really?” She arcs her brows. “I’d rather thought it had just begun. But if you’d rather not—” She turns her back.
“All the better target to shoot,” Urlick says.
The ghouls lift from the trees.
“Now hand over the necklace and the journal,” he says, “or prepare to meet your spirit maker.”
Flossie scowls and spins slowly around. “That’s how you want to play, is it?” She winds the necklace around in her hand, until the pendant on the end is under strain
Urlick’s eyes dart my way. Worried lightning flashes in his gaze. He prompts me to prepare to make a move, but I’m not sure which.
Flossie’s worshipers swoop from the trees.
“Look out!” Urlick shouts, raising his steamcannon in the air. He fires off a round, striking one of the ghouls in the head. The apparition bursts into a blazing ball of flame. It disappears in a loud puff of smoke before it can reassemble. A handful of dust drops to the forest floor.
Flossie whirls around in shock. Her bottom lip wobbles.
“Are you ready to do as I say now, or do I aim for you this time?” Urlick turns the cannon on her.
Flossie’s eyes swoop to the trees, where the rest of her whimpering, cowering followers hide. “Don’t just hover there! Attack them!” she shouts.
One by one the apparitions shriek and flee into the sky.
I laugh. “Looks like you’re on your own, Flossie.”
Urlick cocks the cannon and aims.
&nb
sp; Flossie breaks out in a sweat. Her wicked gaze finds me. “You want it?” She sticks out her hand, necklace dangling on its chain, the pendant swinging wildly. She snares her puttied lip and bares her fangs. “Come and get it.” She throws her arm up in the air.
“Don’t!” Urlick shouts, as instinctively I lunge, my eyes fixed on the green glow of my father’s antidote.
Flossie’s hateful gaze trains on. She yanks the necklace back. The winds pick up, tossing the hem of her tattered clothes about her waist, and whipping her hair about her face, craftily snatching the necklace from her hand.
Heart pounding like a drum, I watch as the necklace uncoils from her hand, and slowly, painfully, slips through her half-dissolved fingers, and spirals through the air, out over the ravine.
“Oh, no.” She gulps, drawing her trembling hands to her face. “No, no, no, no, no!” She bolts forward on her flopping tentacles, barely stopping at the edge of the ravine as the necklace disappears into the smoke.
My world slows. My mind crashes. The necklace—my necklace, my only hope—tumbling end over end, off the side of the earth.
I gasp, paralyzed, as it falls.
Without warning, Urlick strips off his jacket and dives into the belly of the pit, after the necklace.
“No, wait!” Flossie races up to the edge, nearly tumbling into the ravine. “Urlick! Come back! I need you!” Her feet leave the ground, as she too, dives headlong after him.
And I follow.
Chapter Twenty-Six
C.L.
WE FALL THROUGH THE front doors of the Palace, Masheck and Pan and I. We’re winded and coughin’, spewin’ smut from our guts. My tongue burns from the arsenic-laced taste of Vapours. I guess I underestimated ‘ow much of the vile stuff was actually gettin’ through. It takes us a good bit to get the front door to close up.
We fall with our backs to it, the winds outside, bayin’ and barkin’ like a hungry wolf, circlin’ the building over and over. A biting shiver runs up my spine. My skin lifts from me bones. I’ve not felt a storm like this since—the memory of the twister that hit the Freak Train comes to mind.
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