by Chris Ward
Two ghouls at its rear fell into the water. Something long and snakelike glided across the surface and dragged one of them away, while the other floundered, ignored by its companions, unable to get out.
The first ghoul sneaked forward, ducked low, and snapped at Wilhelm’s legs. He knocked it back with the stick, but lost his footing, one leg slipping off the causeway edge. Warm, sticky water soaked him up to the knee, but he shrugged it off and struggled back out.
‘No….’
Something dark rose above him, a beating orange heart on the outside of its body casting enough light to reveal black wings. Wilhelm stabbed the stick upwards, but it jarred and then snapped. The ghoul squawked as if in pain, then spindly arms made of lime-crusted plastic frames stretched out for his neck.
Wilhelm didn’t get a chance to jump aside. Something heavy landed on the causeway at his back and a sudden wave sloshed over him. He rolled over, coughing. He turned, looking for the ghoul that loomed behind, until a massive claw swept it away.
‘Lawrence!’
‘Where, Master Wilhelm?’ the snake-train boomed.
‘Anywhere!’ he shouted, and Lawrence scooped him up in a huge paw, then rolled him gently across his back until Wilhelm fell through an open skylight into the first train carriage. He hung on to a ceiling safety strap as Lawrence swatted the nearest ghouls out of their path, then turned and bounded away.
When they were safely out of the forest, Lawrence let Wilhelm climb out, then he curled around into a coil to peer down at him.
‘What happened?’ Wilhelm asked.
‘Master Edgar, no recent speak,’ Lawrence said. ‘Lawrence feel nothing but cold, like long winter come.’
‘They’ve been captured,’ Wilhelm said. ‘All of them, even the ones who don’t know it. The place was full of dark magic. It was like taking a cold shower but not being able to get dry.’
‘Master Edgar…?’
‘He was with them, I think.’
Lawrence’s head lowered and he let out a low, slow cooing sound.
‘We’ll save them,’ Wilhelm said, patting the snake-train’s giant head. ‘But I can’t do it alone. I can’t control reanimation magic. We need to find Benjamin.’
‘Master Benjamin?’
‘They were looking for him. He wasn’t there when I snuck inside. Back at the school, he was talking about finding this place where the river begins. Do you know it?’
Lawrence’s head lifted and fell, creating a wind that made Wilhelm shiver. ‘Master Benjamin … yesterday. Climb the mountain, he wanted. Lawrence brought him back.’
‘Source Mountain? Is it near?’
Lawrence gave the best awkward look a snake with the head of a train could give. He lifted his great headlight eyes and, swinging them toward the northwest, gave one massive blink and then a low groan expressing his displeasure.
‘Too near,’ Lawrence said. ‘Always too near.’
‘I need to go there.’
‘Noooo …. Source Mountain is death for Endinfinium.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘We come, we live. We go back, we die.’
Wilhelm nodded. ‘Like real life in reverse. You fear your birthplace, because that’s the only place you can’t be what you are now. Is that right?’
Lawrence gave a long nod.
‘Can you at least take me close?’
Lawrence growled, and his body shook as though afraid. Then, when Wilhelm was about to give up and set himself for a long walk, the snake-train nodded again. ‘Close,’ he said. ‘Close enough to see where death becomes life.’
36
The Beginning
The pathway between the two walls of water grew steeper and steeper. At first, Benjamin walked normally, then scrambled with his hands out behind him, then finally tumbled forward into a free fall, rolling and bouncing over the rocks until he thought it might batter him to pieces before he even got to where everything began.
All around, the roar of the water was deafening. He tried to scream, but the thundering sound swallowed his voice, as though he was trapped in the centre of a circle of waterfalls all falling upwards. As he crashed into the ground, his first thought was relief that he wasn’t dead. His second was that the world had become so loud, he couldn’t be sure he wasn’t. As he climbed to his feet and brushed himself down, he looked up at the wall of water surrounding him, and gasped.
Hundreds of people floated there, arms outstretched, faces turned upwards, mouths open and eyes squeezed shut as if they had found divine enlightenment. Some were adults, old men and women, and some were children. The nearest were close enough to touch, hands trailing in the edges of the water walls, fingertips as white as bone.
Let go, Benjamin. Release your hold on the magic and join us.
He looked around, searching for the voice, though there was no single voice; it had come from all of them—the sound of a thousand people at once.
It’s wonderful where we are. If you want to go home, join us.
Panic rose, and for a moment, the towers of water shifted and shook as his magical hold faltered, the air he had instructed to push them back losing its strength.
Join us, Benjamin. All paths lead here. We are the end, and we are for infinity. We are Endinfinium. Look.
Cold fingers closed over his, but instead of a rising horror, he felt only a loving warmth. He smiled and let the hand draw him toward the edge of the water—
David is playing with a wooden train set on the floor of his bedroom. Over in the corner, a video game console sits untouched. Benjamin can never understand why his brother prefers these older, physical toys that came from a dirty cardboard box in the attic, labeled ‘Grandpa’s Stuff,’ but now as he watches, his five-year-old brother touches a finger to the back of one toy train and it jerks forward, as if by magic. David giggles and claps his hands, then reaches for another wooden locomotive. As he lifts it up, the top bends toward him, and a score line in the wood meant to represent a radiator grill bends up at the corners.
It looks like a smile.
Benjamin lifts a hand to attract his brother’s attention, when he realises he is sitting on the edge of a bed. There seems to be only one in the room, when he is sure there used to be two. In fact, as he stares at the shadows on the other side of the room, details knit together, and he sees a bookcase filled with all of his books. His desk and bed are gone, though.
David?
His voice isn’t his own. It comes from somewhere outside, as though he is drawing it from the air. Still, his brother frowns and starts to turn back.
A door opens, and a tall woman with her hair tied back in a ponytail marches into the room. Mum! Benjamin shouts, and this time David does turn, eyes briefly lighting up, mouth falling open. His mother, Jennifer Forrest, shows no acknowledgement as she marches through the room like an organised wind, scooping up wooden blocks and pieces of train line in hands that work like the buckets of some great machine, to pour them into a toy box that sits against the wall.
‘Dinnertime, David,’ she says in a voice that makes Benjamin’s heart creak with longing. Then her scooping hands shovel David up and usher him from the room.
David! Mum! Wait! Benjamin cries out. He tries to get up off the bed, but suddenly there is nothing underneath him, and he crashes forward. To avoid the inevitable impact, he closes his eyes—
The young man is sitting hunched in an armchair, a book open on his lap. Benjamin doesn’t recognise him at first because David is much older, and the bob of hair his five-year-old brother couldn’t help sporting is gone, cut short, neat and trim, slightly curled up at the front; the kind of haircut you would walk right past in a crowd.
The book is a picture book of wild birds. David runs his fingers over the photographs, a relaxed smile on his face, when a door opens somewhere behind and in walks a man, grey-haired, white-coated. He leans over David, who looks up and smiles. The man pats his shoulder and, lifting a clipboard off his chest to make a quick note
in pencil, leaves again.
As soon as the door closes, David smiles once more, and this time, the picture lifts up off the page. The bird, before static and inanimate, takes on dimensions and shape, its feathers blurring as it ruffles them. Then it looks up at David and tweets. David grins and pats it on the head, then watches as it sinks back into the page moments before the door bursts open and three men rush in.
Two of them grab David under the shoulders, and the third grabs the book. Benjamin jumps up, realizing for the first time he’s been sitting on a chair a little off to the side.
David!
Again the scream comes from all around. David looks up, and his eyes widen with surprise. He starts to say something, but is instead dragged out through the door. Benjamin takes a few steps forward and stops as the white-coated man from before comes in. He stands still, clipboard held protectively against his chest, and looks from left to right, eyes passing through where Benjamin stands.
Where are you taking him? Benjamin screams, but the man pays no attention. He goes out, slamming the door. Benjamin tries to follow, but when he gets to the door, nothing happens. He tries to reach out a hand, but when he looks down, nothing is there. The space in front of the door handle holds nothing but empty air.
Panicking, he turns. The room is sparse. A bed, a dressing table, a chest of drawers. A bookcase filled with picture books and children’s stories. He starts to go to it, then stops and turns back.
Toward the mirror.
He needs to see who or what he is. The men looked right through him, but there was recognition in David’s eyes. Benjamin gulps as he steps in front of it.
The mirror is empty. Benjamin’s heart thunders, and he takes a step forward to make sure.
And he sees that, no, it isn’t quite empty. A shadow is there, a vague difference in the light, something that suggests a person. He grits his teeth and concentrates, and for the briefest of moments, an outline appears. Then it is gone. Frustrated, he squeezes his eyes shut and howls with anger.
When he opens them again—
A woman sits in an easy chair set on a porch overlooking a garden that is lovingly untended. Wild roses and hydrangeas fight for space amongst lower-sitting shrubs and scraggy patches of azalea. Her hair is almost entirely grey, the hands that hold the coffee cup in her lap wizened like old tree branches.
Benjamin is standing behind her. He has a compulsion that is impossible to resist to see her from the front. He takes a step forward just as she gets up and turns to him.
Mum! he screams, and for an instant, she lifts a hand and puts it over her chest, then she shrugs and walks toward him, bent with the shackles of age. He waits for her to look up at him, but her eyes lower. She lets out a long sigh.
‘Benjamin … where did you go? Why did you leave us?’ she mutters to herself, so quietly that he wouldn’t have heard from any farther away. He wants to cry out and tell her that he’s here, right here, right here in front of her, but his eyes fill with tears and he blinks to clear his vision—
A hand grabbed him, pulling him backwards, and Benjamin gasped, looking up as the walls of water shuddered above him, threatening to bludgeon him with their load.
‘You going to haunt them forever? What use is that?’
The voice sounded brittle, scratched, like two pieces of rusty metal rubbed together. Benjamin started to look down, but was instead swept off his feet, pulled into the earth, a sudden rush of compression washing past him. He closed his eyes, trying not to scream.
When he opened them this time, he was sitting in a dim, underground rock chamber. The surrounding air had a thermal warmth that banished the memory of the chilling towers of water. Benjamin stood and turned around, wondering where the light was coming from, but there was no one source—the walls themselves lit the tunnel with a soft, comforting glow.
‘You like the décor? It was the best I could do.’
He turned. The man sitting on a rock-hewn throne was ancient beyond words. Clearly he was a man from the grey stubble that poked out from his chin, but his body appeared shrunken and shriveled, sucked dry of moisture to leave only a mummified remnant that had found the ability to talk.
‘Jeremiah Flowers,’ said Benjamin.
The creases where the man’s mouth should have been widened into a smile. ‘It’s rare that I’m recognised. And you are?’
‘My name is Benjamin.’
‘Welcome, Benjamin.’
‘Where am I?’
Jeremiah smiled again, holding the gesture as though enjoying a long-forgotten feeling. ‘You are at a place that many seek yet few find. The beginning of everything.’
37
Shivers
‘I’m not sure I want to go,’ Miranda said. ‘It doesn’t feel right without the teachers being there. That man, Barnacle, gives me the creeps.’
Cherise grinned. ‘No, I think you’re right. You should stay here. It might be dangerous.’
‘No it won’t!’ Amy shouted from the other bed. ‘It won’t be dangerous at all. She just wants you out of the way so she can talk to Cuttlefur.’
‘Shut up!’
‘Admit it.’
‘I’m not some silly little girl like you, Amy. I’m just thinking of her. It’s not like he likes her anyway. He told Sally—’
‘What?’ Miranda said, turning on her. ‘What did he tell Sally?’
‘Oh, nothing. Just that he was getting tired of hanging around with a first-year.’
Miranda’s cheeks burned. Obviously a lie. Listening to Cherise and Amy backstabbing each other to their faces was almost theatrical, but doubts had crept in. Cuttlefur had said they were leaving together today, so it didn’t matter what these two airheads said. And it also wouldn’t matter if she gave them something to remember her by.
She reached for her magic, aware that using it on another pupil would get her enough cleans to see the end of infinity.
Nothing.
In the upheaval, she had almost forgotten. Now, frustration from the previous day returned with a vengeance, like an angry dog snapping at her heels. She pulled her knees up in front of her and lowered her head.
‘Oh, what’s the matter?’ Cherise said. ‘Don’t worry, I’m sure Sally was just telling tales. I mean, she also said she saw him around the back of the guesthouse with some girl, and that’s got to be a fib, hasn’t it? There aren’t any other girls here.’
Miranda wanted to scream. Instead, she rolled over on her bed and, grabbing hold of one of her shoes, lifted it over her shoulder, ready to fling it at Cherise.
‘You’d better not try that—’
‘I can prove he likes me.’ Miranda’s eyes narrowed. ‘He gave me something.’
‘What?’
She had caught their interest. Both Amy and Cherise crawled over to the ends of their beds to sit and wait patiently for the revealing of some great secret.
Miranda put down the shoe, reached into her top, and pulled out the ruby, holding it up so the glow caught the light through the window.
‘This. He said it matched my hair.’
‘Ooh … pretty.’
‘Can I look?’
In seconds, they had gone from savage bullies to gawking fangirls, and Miranda couldn’t resist the gnawing craving for acceptance. ‘Sure. Just don’t get fingermarks on it.’
Amy and Cherise came closer. Amy’s head swayed from side to side as if hypnotised, while Cherise pouted, cooing quietly, when she suddenly lunged forward and pushed Miranda back, pinning her shoulders to the bed with her knees.
‘Quick, grab it!’
Miranda struggled, but Cherise had pressed all of her weight down onto her shoulders. Amy’s fingers closed over the ruby and started to pull, then she screamed and jumped back.
‘It’s freezing!’
‘What are you talking about? Grab it!’
‘No!’
Cherise twisted around. One knee slipped off of Miranda’s shoulder and Miranda immediately pushed her, swingin
g her free hand as hard as she could into Cherise’s midriff. Cherise ignored the blow and grabbed the ruby, when she, too, screamed and leapt back in shock.
Miranda stood up as the girls backed away across the room.
‘That’s freaky,’ she said. ‘What’s he given you there, a red piece of ice?’
‘What are you talking about?’
Cherise ignored her. ‘Come on, Amy, let’s get out of here. I’m getting bored of the company.’
They grabbed their day packs and left, Amy slamming the door behind her. Miranda stared after them for a moment, then looked down at the ruby still hanging outside of her shirt. She reached out to touch it, but it wasn’t cold, not really. A kind of cold had permeated the room, though, all around. She looked up to see if they had left the window open, but it was closed.
Miranda shrugged. Perhaps cold water pipes ran under their floor? Didn’t matter. The ruby showed how much Cuttlefur liked her, no matter what they said. As she closed her fingers over it, though, she wondered why she kept doubting him. He had always supported her. No one else could be trusted. Perhaps the girl Sally had seen him with was his contact, to take them back to England and her new family.
Didn’t matter that Benjamin had disappeared. Shame she wouldn’t get to say goodbye to either him or Wilhelm, but no matter. Perhaps she would write them a note after breakfast and find someone to give it to them after she had gone.
Yes, that was a good idea. She would write them a letter, thanking them for their friendship.
Miranda smiled and put the ruby back under her shirt. As she turned to get her bag, she shivered, but she wasn’t sure why.
All of a sudden, she felt warm again.
38
