Woods

by Finkelstein, Steven

The waiting grave, the wedding band

  One ends a life, one kills the man

  Stitch smiled, sipping from his stein. “My apologies. I don’t wish to sound bitter.”

  The cards are dealt, the hand is played

  And each to each, the match is made

  “E’s in a cheerful mood, sure,” said the man who had risen, and now stood by Stitch, regaining his breath. “That’s a fair speak, but tell us something more.”

  “Tell us something as will make the hairs stand up stiff,” said the bride, clasping her new husband about the shoulders.

  “Which hairs are those?” Stitch said, and when the laughter died away this time he handed the stein to Tad and clasped his hands in front of him. He lifted the hood up and over the top of his bald head, so all that could be seen of his face were his lips and chin. When he began to speak, it was in a deep and sinister voice. The lights behind the walls, perhaps reacting to the mood, instantly lowered, and shadows raced in. The smoke no longer drifted, but remained motionless, as if listening.

  Well met, a man with graying hair and flowing beard

  Who bid me sit and told me of assorted things,

  The floating castle angel wings and moonlit desert wrought of tears

  The banishment of all my fears

  And all the creatures gathered round behold their eyes!

  They silent sit until the night and cold are done

  And they may bask beneath the sun

  The tempest ran untimely knell

  And treasure paved all roads in hell

  Contentment be the nighttime musing

  All is lost upon the choosing

  Desecrated all delight the fiery day the stunted night

  The ancient man the ghostly mask

  The night now coming day is past

  The silent creeping doom and dread

  The hoary boughs the ancient head-

  There was silence. “What next?” someone shouted.

  “I don’t know,” Stitch said, removing the hood and taking the stein from Tad. “That’s as far as I’ve gotten in that one.” The lights were gradually kindling in the walls again.

  “Another,” someone cried. “Spin us another.”

  “Later,” Stitch said, taking Tad’s shoulder again, who started as if awakening suddenly from a doze. “I promise a full oration later. Just now I am neglecting my duties as host. I was on my way to fetch this boy a drink.” They moved along again, the sounds of merriment starting up once more behind them. They marched down the hallway, hurrying past rooms where Stitch waved to other guests distractedly. It seemed to be growing warmer the further in they went. “So many people to see,” Stitch muttered to Tad. “If we don’t hurry along we’ll never get you set up…ah, here we are.” And he steered the boy sharply left, and they were in the kitchen. There was a long wooden bench down its center, and on top of it a double row of circular disks filled with what looked like black putty, out of which spurted tongues of flame, heating metallic trays heaped with fish and roasted meats that gave off a toothsome smell. There were round loaves of crusty bread and wedges of cheese piled high, reaching toward the ceiling, and other foods that were less easy to identify; there was a pyramid of clear gelatinous cubes, flecked with dark pellets that looked to Tad liked wingless insect larvae. There were frog legs and hooves that were similar to pig feet, but much larger. There were coiled strings of grayish sausage and vats of steaming soup. On one counter was a cornucopia of exotic fruits, mangoes, plantains, papayas, breadfruit, and others that Tad had never seen before, enormous melons with blue rinds sliced down the center to reveal their purplish pulpy insides.

  Tad selected a green apple from the pile and bit into it. It was perfect- slightly tart yet succulent. “Well,” he said, speaking with his mouth full. “This is certainly…decadent.”

  “As advertised.” Stitch mopped at his brow with the hood of his robe. “This way.” Tad was not surprised to see that he was heading for the scullery. They descended the stairs to the cellar, and padded across the earthen floor, edging around the food bins and barrels, till they came to the tunnel sloping down. Stitch had to duck his head as he entered, beckoning for Tad to follow. Here too the Wytchlight or Foxlight was in evidence, the effect particularly eerie since the lights were shining through solid soil walls. Tad removed his hat and clutched it in one hand as he walked. It was fiendishly warm. He was thinking of the gothic horror stories he’d read for school in the past year that had taken place underground, Poe, Lovecraft. Stories of madness and immurement. Among the company tonight they did not seem so farfetched, though no harm had come to him yet, unless you counted a little social awkwardness. You know how in a party, the heavies don’t usually arrive until late. They began to pass rooms on either side that Tad remembered previously as being grim jumbles of old furniture. Now they blazed with light, and the sounds of music and laughter spilled out from them into the tunnel. He heard a low steady drumming, hooting, catcalls. From somewhere the blatting horns of a mariachi band. As he hurried to catch up with Stitch, he glanced in at the doorways to see people in festive dress grouped loosely together, jostling one another or lounging on the couches and futons. They passed a room with what appeared to be a multi-person pillow fight in progress. Feathers drifted past them into the passageway.

  Tad was so busy looking about him that he didn’t notice Stitch had stopped until he ran into the larger man’s back. They had come to the end of the passage. As Stitch moved aside and Tad stepped forward, an astonishing brilliance flashed before his eyes. He blinked, trying to adjust to the light, and a hot breeze, like a draft from an oven, swept past his face. In his previous exploring of this part of the house, he had been able to see only what the light from his meager torch had provided before he had fled from the voices. Now the gallery could be seen in all its splendor. Tad tilted his head back, the hat falling from his hand onto the ground, unnoticed. He and Stitch had emerged from one of dozens upon dozens of tunnel entrances set at irregular intervals in the base of the rock wall, which curved along to either side of them. The cavern was easily several hundred feet high, circular, with a rough stone floor. There were many people walking along its floor, alone, in pairs or in small groups, and animals as well. Tad saw dogs trotting at their master’s heels, a wisp of a woman with a Pekanese, an unescorted Husky, a man flanked by a pair of Wolfhounds. He spotted a pack mule laden with packages and baggage being led along, and further off, a llama sat without saddle or bridle, contentedly working its jaws back and forth. Here and there cats slunk in among the traffic, a woman with a python draped over her shoulders, the menagerie that Daddy had once spoken of. Many of them were speaking loudly, their faces lit up with mirth and good will, but he heard little of what was said, for most of the sound in the place was drowned out by the noise of falling water. In the center of this subterranean station of commerce, busy with its comings and goings, was a fountain, if it could rightly be called that, for it was, in essence, a single mighty pillar of water extending from the lofty heights of the roof to splash down in a wide basin in the floor. He turned to Stitch. “Essence.”

  “Come on.” The large man set out across the flat rock face, and Tad followed, snatching his hat up from the ground. They made their way toward the center, snaking their way through the crowd. This is it, Tad thought, looking around wonderingly. The nerve center. The source. But who are all these people? Where do they come from? And where do all these other doorways lead? Are they entrances and exits to other passages around the house? But he didn’t think they were. He thought he’d made a connection. How was it that so many strange folk could converge on one spot, avoiding being seen by the normal inhabitants of a sleepy rural town? Perhaps by traveling beneath the earth. And if that was the case, then was there a network of other tunnels besides the one from the scullery, coming from places much farther away? How far did the network extend? He smiled, ducking around a heavyset man in a leather jerkin with multiple gold studs in each ear. The possibilit
ies were endless. If he were to pick out one of the tunnels at random and take it to its destination, then where might he eventually end up? The other side of the world, or another world entirely?

  If this was the hidden center of all the activity here at Decadence, he thought it was also the center from which the light emanated. Far brighter here than anywhere else, it rose beaming from the very rock. He could feel here the floor beneath him vibrating and pulsing, though it felt perfectly solid, and he was unafraid. It’s glad that all of us are here, he thought wildly, and he capered a few improvised steps, drawing a grin from Stitch. He felt inexplicably glad, glad to be a part of this, glad that he’d been one of the privileged chosen to take part in this gathering. All was right, and there could be no doubt, or fear, or danger. What could Stitch have been worried about? This was truly Decadent, and it was wonderful.

  They approached now the rim of the flat, circular basin into which the water poured. The basin was not natural, he saw, or if it had been once, human hands had a part in molding and shaping it, for there was a thin border, about two feet high and two across, running along, on which people were sitting, like at the edge of a fountain in a public park. He saw that many were filling various receptacles from the still surface around the edges, cups and flagons of all different shapes and sizes, rude dippers of hand carved wood, wine glasses or heavy steins like Stitch’s, even plastic beer cups such as one might find at a sporting event, or gleaming gold and silver chalices or whole pitchers that they took along with them, holding reverently above their heads, and he saw that one and all were smiling, their faces positively lit up, for in the presence of this marvel one could not be sad. He sat on the edge and peered in, and Stitch seated himself beside him, dipping his mug. Now that he was this close, Tad bent down to look at the surface, and he noticed several things.

  Firstly, the liquid was not water, whatever it might be called. Come to think of it, he wasn’t even sure that it was liquid. He looked from the calmer surface of the edges out to the great funnel cascading down from the ceiling, and he saw that the stuff was not actually falling at all. In defiance of gravity, it looked as though the column was suspended in midair. He saw ripples of motion indicating, though perhaps it was only a trick of the eye, that the substance was flowing both up and down, simultaneously. It seemed to be hanging there, with nothing visible holding it up, and where it should have been splashing into the surface of the pool, causing a tumult of ripples, landing with such force from as high above as it was, there was actually no disturbance to speak of at all. It was simply seeping into the pool, while at the same time the pool was seeping back up into it. There was no splashing or churning, only an unbroken give and take between the stuff below and the seemingly never-ending source from above. Looking up toward the roof of the cave, he saw that above was the only place that the Foxlight or Wytchlight did not hold sway. Shadows raced across the rock face above, and he could not see where the water originated, or where it went. It came down from the heavens as mysterious and unknowable as a gift from the darkness itself.

  And it was thicker than water, of that there could be no doubt. Looking into the pool, he thought that if he reached down to scoop some up, it might very well have substance. He might be able to kneed it like dough or squish it between his fingers, or mold it into a ball and fling it at one of the passers by. It was a clear protoplasm of uncertain design and density. He looked over at Stitch, who was drinking again. The large man tilted his head back and gasped, as color flooded his cheeks, and Tad could actually see the color flowing and ebbing, rising up from his neck while beneath the man’s feet which were still planted on the ground the rock hummed appreciatively. He turned toward Tad, a dopey smile playing about the edges of his mouth. “You have come,” he said. “You are here. Join us and be.”

  “Be what?”

  “What you were intended to be. You’re not here by accident.”

  “I don’t have a cup,” he said. It was true. He hadn’t brought one.

  Stitch frowned. “I’m sorry. I’d let you use mine if I could, but it’s house rules. You can use what you brought, and nothing else. It’s a part of the whole deal.”

  Tad looked down at his clothes, uselessly. He had nothing that could be used as a dipper to scoop up some of the water. He removed his hat, thinking that perhaps it might be of use, but whatever the stuff was, it would be too heavy. The hat was made of a flimsy material, being intended as a novelty. Tad put the hat aside. “Very well,” he said. “Improvisation is one of the finest human qualities.” He got down from the edge of the fountain, kneeling on the rocky floor, which was much warmer than solid bedrock should have been, and he bent over the rim, as Stitch shouted a word of warning, and dipped his face toward the water. Even as he did so it reached up and gripped his head and pulled him in.

  Essence

  There was a tremendous sucking noise in his ears and he felt an intense, though not unpleasant, pressure. Here goes. I’m drinking the Kool-Aid. He heard, as he thought, many voices speaking at the same time, and though they were not strictly English, he found that he was able to understand them perfectly well. They were speaking a single word, and the word was “DRINK.” And drink he did, opening his mouth and swallowing greedily, as the stuff swam joyously down his eager throat. What did it taste like? This is difficult to say, for Essence tastes different to everyone who imbibes it, and also no two sips are exactly the same. Suffice to say that Tad did not experience it as a taste in the same way that one “tastes” some new delicacy, by lifting it up on the end of a fork and nibbling at it daintily, or indeed some new liquid by taking a modest sip and swirling it about on the tongue. Instead of the experience taking place wholly in the mouth, the entire head and torso was involved, and the sensation spread so quickly that it might be said that Tad was “tasting” with his entire body, as though his entire being had just become a single receptor whose entire purpose was to experience this new and dazzling thing that threatened to overwhelm him, and if it had, he would have been perfectly happy to let it do so. It felt rather like a first kiss, and though Tad had kissed girls before, in the awkwardly timid adolescent way, this was more along the lines of ones first time being with an overzealous floozy with jaws like a wet bear trap who has sucked the entire head into her mouth and is trying to pry it off like a bottle cap by pulling it in several directions at once. But again it must be stressed that Tad was not repulsed or frightened, in fact, he had never felt calmer in his life. He opened his mouth still wider, and concentrated only on breathing and swallowing, and he drank, and drank, and drank. The taste was bitter, by turns, and sweet, and hot, the cold, and hot again, and his entire body reacted in the same way, rushing toward intoxicating peaks of hotness, during which time he wriggled like a trout on a hook, to sinister moments of incredible iciness during which times he shivered so uncontrollably that he thought he might be in danger of biting off his own tongue. It is difficult to say how long he was down, his entire head being submerged, for time had gotten strange since his leaving the shelter of his home some hours ago, and while up until this point it had still been progressing with something approaching normalcy, it was about to go completely out the window. Nevertheless, it seemed like a good long while before he felt two strong hands gripping his shoulders, and Stitch dragged him back out again. There was a reluctant screaming in his ears that sounded as much animal as human, and then the stuff released him and he shoved Stitch away so violently that the large man’s returning look was as much of anger as concern. “I won’t, I won’t!” Tad shrieked, though what it was he wouldn’t do he couldn’t have said. Several others passing by noticed this behavior, but they only laughed, entirely unconcerned.

  “It’s all right,” Stitch yelled. “Can you hear me?”

  Tad could, and he could hear a good deal else as well. Several things were happening to him simultaneously, and he was doing his best to process them, but it was difficult. Essence can be hard to deal with under the best of circumstances, tho
se being when you are an experienced user and used to the effects, and also are drinking at a slow and controlled rate rather than dunking your entire head into a pool of the stuff and trying to empty it at one go, particularly as undiluted a source as was active underneath Daddy’s house once every seven years. Tad’s head hummed and whined, and many voices spoke inside and around it, whispering in his ear, shooting past like cars on a freeway, rising up from his feet, shouting down from above. He heard insane laughter, and delighted shrieks, and children crying. He recalled the feeling that he’d experienced weeks before, on the walk home from school on the first day of the Summer in Between, when he’d entered the woods in search of he knew not what, and had met with the man who he was quite sure had orchestrated the changes that had come over him since then. He remembered the crazy gleam in Daddy’s eyes that day, and the strings of nonsense that had poured out of his mouth, and he thought that now he could understand what could flash fry a man’s brain like that. He started giggling, and then he began to run his hands over his face, expecting it to be wet, and his shirt dripping. They weren’t; they were quite dry. Any of the Essence that he hadn’t swallowed had seemingly leapt off of him back into the pool. There was no trace of it on the rocky ground, not so much as a drip. The stuff had returned to its source, refusing to be spilled. “The Essence contains no alcohol,” he said. “It never has.” He wanted more. He wanted to go leap head first into the pool. He wanted to roll around in it.

  “Yes,” Stitch said gently. “That’s right. You sure you’re okay now, lad?”