The Dark Citadel (The Green Woman)

by Jane Dougherty

  The baying of hounds was getting louder, and the water horses were champing on the edge of the reed beds, making their way along the water line, casting about for a scent, their heavy heads dripping cold water. The pups whined but dutifully followed Jonah into the black hole. A reptile hissed, too loud and too close. Waiting no longer, Deborah kicked the earth back over the metal and strewed it with reeds. She backed through the narrow gap and stuffed the rest of the reeds in the opening, not daring to close the door completely.

  The smell was musty and putrid. She turned in the dark, her feet edging across the concrete of the floor, pushing aside objects littered across it. Jonah’s hand reached out to her, their fingers entwined and he pulled her close. She could feel his heart pounding and saw, over his shoulder, the shadows piled high against the wall.

  “There’s something horrid in here. What is it?” she whispered.

  Jonah pressed his mouth to her ear. “Don’t look. Corpses. Loads of them.”

  So, of course, Deborah looked. The back wall of the bunker was a mass of shadow, and she could make out nothing distinctly. But she could sense what the shadows contained, and her flesh crept. She felt sick. Hounds bayed and their call was answered by the carnivorous whinnying of the water horses, closing in now, their champing and snarling almost as close as the sibilant reptile noises.

  Jonah released Deborah and crouched down, rummaging about on the floor among the objects the workmen had dropped. His fingers found what he was looking for and curled around a flashlight. He darted the feeble beam about the concrete box and swore as it flickered and dimmed, the batteries corroded, useless.

  There was nothing for it; he would have to do it blind. He moved towards the back wall, and gulping back the taste of bile in his throat, grabbed at a coat collar among the tumbled heap of rags. Deborah heard the sigh and the dry rustling as the pile moved and shifted, and clapped her hands over her mouth. Jonah felt green. The coat came away, bringing with it the corpse that was wearing it.

  Fighting back the waves of nausea, Deborah reached out to help, to share the awfulness, and fumbled for a sleeve to shake it. The shrivelled thing that had been a workman—a father, brother, some woman’s son or husband—tumbled out of it.

  Without a word, Jonah took the coat and stuffed it in the doorway with Deborah’s reeds. He wiped his hands on his trousers and just looked at them. Deborah put her arms around him to ease the sadness and the horror from his body. Together, they waited.

  Hissing breath filtered through the makeshift barrier, more poisonous and corrupt than the air inside the bunker. Hooves trampled heavily overhead, and the thud of great dog-paws and the swish of thickly muscled bodies pushing through the reed beds came closer. Suddenly the pad of giant paws stopped dead, and the hooves scuffled to silence. Deborah screwed her eyes tight and pressed her face against Jonah’s shoulder. The sound of sniffing grew louder, more excited. Claws tugged at the flimsy screen. Jonah pushed Deborah away from him and reached slowly for an arrow.

  Chapter 16

  When Zachariah recovered his wits he was lying in a dark cell, his ankles manacled to a heavy ring set in the wall. He was faint from lack of food and trembling with the cold of shock, though the air in the cell was close and muggy. His wound hurt horribly and his shirt was stuck in the blood so if he moved the bleeding started again. With trepidation he touched his throat and felt the welts left by the fox-like monster’s grip. His nostrils were full of the rank stink the creature gave off and the stench of decay and decomposition that hung in a miasma about the demons.

  He tried to recall what exactly he had said. Had he betrayed his friends? He wondered who was the girl the Dananns were supposed to be harbouring, and tried to remember if Ezekiel had mentioned her. He sighed. No, Ezekiel had never spoken about a girl.

  He wouldn’t have though, would he? Not if the Dananns didn’t entirely trust me, Zachariah thought bitterly. Wolfmen were to take him back to Providence, the fox-faced monster had made that much clear. To have come so far for nothing! Despite the disastrous situation, he clutched at straws of hope. Perhaps, once he was back in the city he could escape from the wolfmen and warn the Dananns. Or he could make up for his betrayal by fighting alongside them.

  Zachariah had a confused idea that some kind of conflict was preparing, a conflict that would pit the Dananns against the vile creatures of the desert. What he could not understand was the role of the Witch. The fox creature seemed to imply she was his enemy, and that she was an ally of the Dananns. The Dananns wouldn’t have allied themselves with the Serpent Witch, would they? Perhaps this enemy of the fox’s really was the Green Woman who Maeve had spoken of. The more he thought about it, the more convinced he became that the evil he feared to find in the Garden was in fact stalking around it still trying to get in. And he had walked right into its lair.

  He was not left to ponder on the question for long. With a rustle of dark plumes, Azrael returned and freed Zachariah’s manacled legs.

  “Get up.”

  He scrambled to his feet.

  “Out.”

  He limped to the door of the cell and waited.

  “Move!”

  A powerful hand pushed him forward, and he almost fell. Stumbling to regain his balance, he hurried as best he was able, up a winding stair and into one of the dark, whispering chambers that had so frightened him when he arrived.

  The chamber had a high vaulted roof, too high to make out in the darkness, full of shadows that seemed to hang from the walls. The air throbbed with a muttering or twittering, so low it was more like vibrations than sounds uttered from a living throat. The sounds grew louder, gasping and panting, and the shadows stirred. Zachariah took a step backwards but Azrael pushed him again and he fell forward onto his hands.

  Before he could raise himself up, a foot crushed his right hand, and he stifled a scream. The foot was heavy and man-like, with long toes that ended in cruel curved claws. The sole was hard and divided into pads like a dog’s, and Zachariah shuddered at the touch of the bristly hairs that covered the entire foot and ran up the sinewy leg. His head was suddenly wrenched back, and he found himself staring at something from the nightmare world that lies between the human and the bestial. The face was covered in bristling hair, and the nose and mouth ran together into a dog-like muzzle. Pointed canines gleamed in the dark gums, but the eyes were the eyes of a madman.

  Chapter 17

  Neither Deborah nor Jonah drew breath for what seemed like an eternity. Then there was a sneeze followed by a low growl, and the sniffing stopped. Another second and they heard the trampling of hooves. Minutes passed and the irritated, confused baying of hunting hounds that have lost a scent moved away, growing less and less distinct. Deborah let herself slide to the ground and sobbed with relief.

  That sudden slackening of the taut cord of tension got the better of them, and they slept a brief, exhausted sleep, huddled together on the floor of the bunker. They woke when the night was almost at an end, in a heap of wriggling wolf-dog pups whining to be away. Jonah got to his feet and parted the reeds that still blocked the doorway. The air inside the bunker had begun to filter through the narrow gap, and the musty smell of slow corruption, bottled up for so many decades, was dispersing into the atmosphere. The eastern horizon was already a luminous pearl grey; dawn was not far away.

  Jonah listened. The only sound was the distant lapping of water. Carefully he pulled away the tangle of reeds, and the coat dropped through to lie by his feet, stiff and anonymous. Ignoring the reflex of disgust, he picked up the jacket and carried it over to the mummified remains of its owner. The workman—father, husband, son—lay in a shrivelled heap, one arm out-flung in a hopeless gesture to ward off the death that fell from the sky.

  Almost reverently, Jonah covered the pathetic body with the coat. “Thanks, mate,” he murmured.

  Pulling themselves out of the bunker, they looked around at the churned ground. The reeds that partially concealed the trap door had been trampled. The
pile of earth kicked up by the pups was scattered about and flattened by huge hooves. Deborah hugged her arms across her chest and shivered though the morning breeze was not cold. Her hands, clothes, and hair stank from days and days of not washing, and her nostrils were full of the rotten stink of the air raid bunker. She hugged herself closer, but the smell of death clung to her. She still felt as if she stood on the edge of the grave.

  “Why didn’t the…whatever they were…dig through the bunch of reeds and find us?”

  “The smell of death. The hounds and the kelpies and the worms were searching for warm blood. Here they could only smell corpses. That poor sod’s coat alone probably buried our scent.”

  Deborah looked back at the dark crack in the door that wouldn’t open any further and shivered. But her voice, when she finally spoke, was soft and warm. “Thank you. Whoever you were.” Then she turned her back on the bunker and gazed across the river, a look of intense concentration on her face. Jonah found a patch of dryish sedge and sat down, waiting to hear what Deborah suggested they do next.

  “People built roads once, and roads were full of cars and things. I saw it in the vision—so much movement and bustle! People and cars, and huge cars and…and other things on wheels, everywhere! This was an important port, so they must have had a way of crossing the river.” Her voice was a monotonous murmur, like running water, and Jonah knew he was not required to participate. He just listened.

  “And not that stupid little rowboat either! There must have been…Jonah!” Deborah called shrilly. “I can see it!”

  The flash of Memory lit up the river from side to side. Green water curled past reed-covered banks. A grassy meadow undulated back from the far bank, rising to meet low woodland that climbed higher into denser forest. The forest in turn climbed up the foothills of mountains that shimmered pearl and pink in the morning light. Across the river, nine stone arches soared, and the stone arches carried a road.

  “Holy Mother, a bridge,” she gasped, but already the stone was losing its solidity.

  “Where?” Jonah asked in astonishment.

  Deborah concentrated as hard as she could, harder than she had ever concentrated before. Her head swam, river and roads blurring in a confusion of colour. She staggered and Jonah grabbed her before she fell. Stone piled on stone and arched out of the river waves, and Deborah slumped back in his arms. Gently Jonah lowered her to the ground and laid her head in his lap. The spinning world slowed, and the ground gradually stopped lurching. The shimmering vision stabilised into real stone piers and graceful arches that in the morning light would gleam golden and warm.

  “There,” she said in a voice so faint as to be barely audible. “Now we can cross.” Her eyes rolled, and her head fell back in a faint.

  Chapter 18

  Zachariah, with a whimper of terror, tried to shrink away from the beast, but he was held fast—paralysed too by the eyes that seemed empty and at the same time capable of piercing right to the back of his skull. The slack gums curled back into an evil grin, and the creature snarled.

  “The wolfmen will take you back,” it panted. “The wolfmen will sniff out your tracks. The wolfmen will follow you into the city and sniff out the Serpentspawn. The wolfmen will tear you apart if you try to betray them.”

  As the wolfman spoke, flecks of saliva scattered from his jaws and fell onto Zachariah’s face. Zachariah was so afraid he wanted to die. He became aware of other shapes in the shadows, some man-like, others four-legged. They shuffled forward into the quavering light flung from a smoking brazier, and he felt his soul shrink into the depths of his body.

  Never had he felt so alone and vulnerable. The flesh torn by Azrael ceased to torment him as his mind dwelled instead upon all the horrors these creatures could inflict. A dozen pairs of yellow eyes fixed him with pupils that reflected neither humanity nor intelligence. They were black holes let into a deranged brain, where frenzied cruelty was amusement, and the unspeakable was the only morality.

  The wolfman let go of Zachariah’s hair and stepped back off his hand that was numb with cold and bloody where the monster’s claws had punched holes in it. Zachariah crouched, nursing his hand, gulping rapidly in an effort to keep back the tears of fear and humiliation. His shoulder was gripped, and Azrael dragged him to his feet.

  “You will retrace your steps with the wolfmen. They will pick up your scent and find the entrance to Providence. You will go to the Danann leader and say that their Queen sends for her daughter. They will bring her from her hiding place, and the wolfmen will carry her off. The Dananns will deal with their betrayer themselves.”

  Zachariah hung his head, unable to think how he could prevent this from happening, but determined that whether the Dananns trusted him or not, he was not going to lead this pack of mad beasts into Underworld.

  “Get up,” the wolfman snarled, drawing himself up to his full height. Though not quite as tall as Azrael, his shoulders were broader, knotted and gnarled with muscle. His upper arms and hams were heavy and powerful, and his skin, covered in sparse, coarse hair, was black and furrowed with deep scars. Zachariah obeyed, forcing his limbs to stop their trembling.

  “Taste!” The wolfman ripped Zachariah’s shirt from his back and held it out to the pack. One after the other, the wolfmen took the bloody shirt and chewed it, absorbing the smell and the taste of his blood and sweat.

  “Now we have your scent, we will go.” The pack leader’s eyes gleamed, injected with blood and filled with humourless laughter. Another wolfman moved out of the shadows, a four-legged creature with a sideways lope and lolling tongue. If the first creature was like a deformed, bestial man descending to the animal state, this second was more like a twisted, mutated animal striving toward humanity.

  “Get on my back,” he said in a voice thickened by the animal tongue. “And hold!”

  Zachariah grimaced but did as he was told. The wolfman loped towards the door, broad, clawed paws gripping the sandy floor like hands, the hard muscles of his back rolling uncomfortably, like a man walking on all fours. The rest of the pack followed, gathering speed as the end of the tunnel opened onto the desert. The night seemed blacker than usual and full of the stench of caged, unwashed animals. They bounded forward in the direction of the river, and from each throat came a chilling howl that ended in a snarl and the snapping of jaws.

  Chapter 19

  Jonah gasped in amazement as the river broke around the stone piers of the bridge and flowed beneath its arches, as if it had been doing so for centuries.

  “Wow! That was deadly! How did you...? Princess? Are you okay?”

  Deborah lay still, her eyes closed, circled with dark blue. Shocked by her pallor, Jonah reached for a limp hand and squeezed it tight.

  “Princess?”

  Fear snatched away his voice leaving a mere whisper. He shook at the unresponsive hand then tapped her cheek. Harder.

  “Princess!”

  Only seconds passed, but to Jonah it seemed like hours before Deborah’s eyelids flickered and opened. She turned her head towards the river and smiled.

  “Isn’t it gorgeous?” she whispered.

  With his heart beating wildly, Jonah wrapped his arms around her. Deborah sighed, and he felt her whole body relax as she nestled into his arms. He scarcely dared breathe for fear of breaking the spell. He studied the face turned up to his, the way the thick lashes lay on the cheek he knew was scattered with freckles, but in the grey first light gleamed an unearthly white. There were blue hollows beneath her eyes now, filled with the last of the night shadows.

  Gently he released his right arm and brushed the hair back from her brow. He drew his finger over her temple and round the curve of her ear. He ran his finger lightly over the contour of her lips and along the line of her jaw. His hand ran through her hair then lingered to cup the upraised chin. Deborah did not open her eyes, but a smile spread across her face, and she raised her arms to tighten them around Jonah’s neck.

  Slowly he lowered his lips to he
rs, ignoring the putrid smell of decay that still hung in the air over the bunker.

  “Oh, Jonah,” Deborah whispered and let herself melt into the kiss with the feeling that nothing could hurt her now. Whatever happened, wherever her destiny led her, Deborah knew Jonah would follow her to the ends of the earth.

  * * * *

  Jonah cradled Deborah in his arms as she slept, kneeling in the damp reeds of the riverbank until the cold gave him cramps in his legs. It was almost more than he could bear to wake her, but he was growing increasingly uneasy¬—they ought to cross the bridge before it grew fully light. Abaddon’s spies might have already reported its appearance, and they had not yet tested its solidity. What if it turned out to be built of river mists?

  “Princess,” he whispered. “Princess, we should be moving. If you can, of course.”

  Deborah’s eyelids fluttered, and she sighed again. With an effort she opened her eyes and smiled. “Of course I can,” she replied in a thin voice. “It seems to have drained all my strength that’s all.”

  “How did you...?”

  “The bridge?” Deborah’s eyes took on a dreamy expression. “I’m not sure. I saw the memory of it. There must have been a bridge here before. By concentrating hard, I managed to hold it, not let it fade. It seems to have worked.” She grinned.

  Jonah looked at her with respect as well as admiration, hiding his emotion with a joke. “Wait till we’ve crossed it before you start crowing. It might be just a mass hallucination.”

  Still looking deathly pale, Deborah pulled herself into a sitting position. “If you’d rather swim,” she said with mock irritation in her voice, “feel free. I’ll take the hallucination. See you on the other side.”

  Jonah got stiffly to his feet and offered her his hand. Together they stood and stared. The mists had cleared from the river and the far bank was plainly in view. Their eyes followed the meadow that ran back from the waterside, over the trees, higher, to where the clouds met the shimmering flanks of mountains. Deborah turned to Jonah, her eyes brilliant in the early light.