The Infernal Aether

by Oxley, Peter

  “I know exactly what Andras means to do,” said N’yotsu. “I also know that it is too late. You cannot stop it now.”

  “No,” said Maxwell. “I will not believe that. I know that with your help I can disable the machine before it is too late.”

  “This is the culmination of millennia of thinking, centuries of planning and decades of work. Andras has been meticulous; every step of the way it has been ahead of us—you. Do not forget that it is not just since you met me that Andras has been playing you like puppets; it has been moulding you ever since you were children. There is so much more here than you could ever fight against.”

  “But we have a secret weapon,” said Kate. “Something which gives us an advantage over Andras. We have you.” N’yotsu shook his head but she continued regardless. “You said yourself that you remember what Andras did and how it thinks. You can help us. There must be something we can do; some way we can stop it.”

  “There is nothing,” said N’yotsu. “Andras has prepared for every eventuality. The best thing you can do is find somewhere to hide. And pray.”

  *

  The rest of the night continued in the same vein until, tired and frustrated, we gave up and tried to get some sleep, although the constant background noise of the Banshees meant that any form of rest was extremely difficult to come by. “My penance,” N’yotsu called it. By the time dawn arrived and the creatures slunk off to wherever they took refuge from the daylight, I was firm in my resolve that we were not going to spend another night in that shack.

  Maxwell and Kate needed little persuading. We stood in front of N’yotsu’s huddled form, ready for one last attempt to sway him.

  “You are wasting your time,” said N’yotsu from behind his arms.

  “Please,” I said. “We need you.”

  “No, you do not. You do not need a man who is not a man, a creature which does not know whether it is good or evil. You do not need the burden of the thing which has brought so much pain into your lives.”

  Kate put her arm on my elbow. “He’s right. Come, let’s go.”

  I stared at her. “But we cannot just go...”

  “Look at him. He’s no use to us, even if he did want to come with us. Let’s go.” She turned her back on him and walked out of the door.

  I looked back at our friend, not wanting to give in. “N’yotsu, you must help us. I know it must be difficult to find out that you are... who you are. But we need you; we really need you. I do not know how we can stop Andras without you.”

  “Gus,” said Maxwell. “There is no point. Look at him; he does not care. We need to go.”

  Our friend looked up at me with blood-shot eyes. “He is right. The N’yotsu you knew is dead.”

  CHAPTER 36

  We travelled, not because we had a plan, but more because we could think of little else to do. Every minute, every hour, every mile took us closer to London and Andras’s Apocalypse. We had long ago ceased discussing what we would do to prevent the end of the world, for the reality was too depressing for words. We were but ants, trying to stop an oncoming steam train.

  I tried to distract myself by focusing on the scenery on our route, but even that was scant consolation. The world was changing rapidly as a result of the malign influence of Andras’s portal to the Aether and everything served to remind me of the normality that we would soon lose forever. A couple of times I managed to lose myself in the banality of the normal, a well-ploughed field or a line of trees, only to be wrenched back into darker thoughts by a half-glimpsed image in the background, which I fancied to be a demon or other such fiend.

  My companions seemed to be affected by the same malaise. Maxwell was brooding in the way that only a scientist can when he has neither books nor equipment to distract him. Kate, usually the most talkative and boisterous of us—often indecently so—was completely silent, a state which was alien enough to add to my own feelings of unease. She caught me looking at her and offered a smile which began and ended with her lips. I smiled back, hoping I did not betray the desolation I felt.

  The carriage bumped to a halt and the driver opened the door. “All out!” he yelled.

  We stepped out of the carriage, blinking and looking around in confusion. “Where are we?” I asked the driver.

  He pointed at the tavern in front of us, a rather ramshackle affair with a crowd of horses and carriages outside it. The building was literally in the middle of nowhere, the only sign of civilisation on the long road which twisted from one horizon to the other.

  “Our stop for the night,” said the driver, tethering the horses to a post.

  “But our agreement was that you would take us to London as quickly as possible.”

  “That’s right. But not at night. We rest here, start again in the morning.”

  “I am willing to pay extra,” said Maxwell. “But we really cannot afford to linger anywhere; why, we are not even past Manchester yet.”

  “You can pay as much as you want,” said the driver. “But I’m not going anywhere until the sun comes back up. It’s not safe at night no more. You get caught out of doors once the sun goes down, you’re as good as dead.” He shook his head. “You must have seen them: the ghouls, wraiths, and revenants. I always thought they were scare stories to tell the kids.” He turned toward the tavern. “We’ll be safe here, and can carry on our way in the morning.”

  *

  We were not the only ones with that idea; by the time the sun set the tavern was filled to bursting, with every available table, chair and foot of floor occupied. All of the bedrooms had been sold long before we arrived and so we satisfied ourselves with squatting in a corner of the room, nursing cups of tepid ale and cold broth. The happiest person in the building was the landlord, who was keen to let in all who demanded sanctuary and more than happy to fleece them when they were securely within.

  We spent a few hours in quiet contemplation and then I decided that it was time for some fraternisation with our fellow prisoners. For that was what we were in reality: unable to escape and confined to highly restricted accommodations.

  “So, it is bad down here too, then?” I said to a man sat next to us. He was a rather nervous-looking creature, with a shrew of a wife and two demanding daughters in tow.

  “You mean, with all these strange creatures which keep appearing? Aye, it is. I thought it was just silly superstition at first, but then I was chased across the moors by some huge black creature with two heads. Ever since then, I’ve been a lot more cautious. You seen any of them yourselves?”

  “Aye, and heard them,” I said. “Up in Scotland we spent a night shut away in a hut while some bizarre creatures screamed at us all night.”

  “Banshees,” the man nodded. “We’ve had them. Don’t know what the world’s coming to. Our church is talking of these as the End Days, that we should all repent our sins and get ready to ascend.”

  I snorted. “If only.”

  The man and his family glared at me as one. “You mocking the word of The Lord? Don’t care how high-and-mighty you think you are, you can’t deny the evidence of your own eyes: this is happening to us all.”

  I opened and closed my mouth and was relieved when there was a scream from upstairs. The room froze. The screaming continued but still no one moved. I looked at Kate and Maxwell, and as one we jumped to our feet and rushed across the crowded floor.

  We leaped over legs and heads and elbowed our way through those who were standing, ignoring the curses which followed in our wake. We raced through what passed for a back parlour, noting how much less crowded it was than the room in which we had been sitting, and then mounted the stairs. The screaming led us to a room on the first floor, the source a woman standing in the doorway. I came to a halt at the woman’s side, transfixed by the sight within.

  “My sister,” sobbed the woman, pointing at one of the beds in the room. On it lay a young woman, no older than twenty years of age, in her nightdress. My attention was drawn, however, to what was on top of her
.

  She was unconscious and lay with her mouth open in a silent scream, her body tensed in terror. On her chest sat a small, squat creature which put me in mind of a rather malignant version of the chimpanzees which Freddie and I had come across on a particularly desperate run back in deepest, darkest Africa. The creature we were now faced with was covered in rough, downy fur and had over-long arms and legs, the latter of which were wrapped around the girl’s body. Broad shoulders and a thick neck ran seamlessly into a small, fat head bookended by the largest, pointiest ears that I had ever seen.

  The creature turned to glare at us with eyes which glowed red in the half-light and I took an involuntary step backwards; I had the distinct impression that the creature was weighing up which of us it would torture next.

  As if on cue, the girl’s prone body convulsed in another wave of silent terror and it was this movement which spurred us into action. We stepped into the room and then stood at the side of the bed. “What do we do?” I asked Maxwell.

  “We need to be extremely careful,” he said. “There appears to be some form of psychic or symbiotic link between this creature and the girl. If we attempt anything too precipitate we could cause irreversible mental damage to the girl.” He yelped as Kate elbowed him aside and swung a chair at the creature. There was a rather satisfying clunk and the creature fell sideways, its grip on the girl’s chest released. It fell to the floor and then leapt up onto the windowsill and out into the night.

  “Kate!” yelled Maxwell. “Were you not listening to a word I was saying?”

  “I was listening, but you were using a lot of long words and not doing much in the way of action. One of us had to help that poor girl.”

  “But she could have—” began Maxwell, then stopped as the girl sat bolt upright in her bed, gasping for breath. Her sister ran over to her side and they hugged, sobbing.

  “It was terrible,” said the girl. “I saw some terrible things.”

  “What was that thing?” asked Kate.

  “I have no idea,” I said, peering out of the window into the thick darkness. “It looked like some sort of goblin creature. Whatever it was it seemed to be torturing that poor girl.”

  “A Mare,” said a voice from the door. We turned to see an old man leaning on the doorframe. “They come at night, feed on your dreams. Nasty things.”

  “Ah,” said Maxwell. “Of course. Mythical creatures which were the source of the term ‘Nightmare’.” He nodded, looking incredibly pleased with himself.

  “Maybe,” said the old man in the doorway. “All I know’s they’re nasty things. You don’t want to find yourself in bed with one of them riding on your chest. Lucy there was lucky: I’ve known people not wake up from a thing like that. I thank you for your help.”

  I smiled at the old man and then turned to Maxwell. “Presumably this is yet another thing spilling out from the Aether.”

  “Indeed. We really need to get back to London before it is too late.”

  “But to do what?” I asked.

  Kate nudged me and nodded at the old man, who was listening intently to us. “Let’s continue this downstairs, eh?” she said. “The girl’s fine, if a bit shaken. And she probably won’t sleep again tonight.”

  “I do not think she will be the only one,” said Maxwell, leading us out of the room.

  The old man grabbed my arm as we passed. “You three were the only ones to come running when she started screaming. I thank you, but I wonder why?”

  “We... we do not like to stand idly by when someone needs help.”

  “But these past weeks’ve shown people—them that play the Good Samaritan mostly end up dead.”

  I smiled as reassuringly as I could muster. “Let us just say that my companions and I do not subscribe to that philosophy.”

  The old man peered into my eyes. “You be careful down there. It’ll have been noted what you did. It don’t pay to be different round here. The old witch-hunting ways are coming back in fashion, if you understand me.” I nodded and turned to leave but the old man tightened his grip on my arm. “We’re going to need all the people like you we can find. Don’t get yourselves killed in a place like this.” He released my arm and stepped away.

  “We will try not to,” I said, patting my sword and then setting off after the others.

  *

  We huddled in an empty corner of the room; the others in the tavern had clearly decided that they did not wish to be seen near us. The old man’s warnings of witch-hunts were still fresh in my mind, but as long as the others kept their distance I cared not what they thought.

  “So, what do we do next?” I asked.

  “We go to London,” said Kate, “and stop Andras.”

  “But how?”

  “I may be able to find some way to disable the device which is creating the portal,” said Maxwell. “After all, it is my own invention.”

  “But I thought you could not do so without N’yotsu’s help?”

  He stared at me. “I have to try.”

  I nodded grimly, admiring but not wholly convinced by his firmness. “And while you do so, we try and fight off the hordes of Hell which will be trying to stop you,” I said. “I cannot shake the feeling that we are basically planning to embark on a rather intricate form of suicide.”

  “There’s always the army,” said Kate. “Some of them must still be on our side; a few battalions of Her Majesty’s finest Redcoats behind us, that’ll put a stop to Andras.”

  I stared at her. “I never had you pegged for one of those blindly optimistic types.”

  She met my gaze. “Look around you. What’s the alternative? You hope for the best or are sent glocky by how bad everything is.”

  CHAPTER 37

  The arrival of dawn brought an audible sigh of relief from the room. Sleep had come in snatches, particularly for ourselves; put on edge by the old man’s words I had insisted that one of us stay awake all night to guard against any hostile actions from those crammed into the room around us. Fortunately, nothing had occurred, but I only truly relaxed when we filed out of the room and found everyone heading away from the tavern, rather than lining up to lynch us.

  Unfortunately, our driver and his carriage had also joined the hasty exodus, prompting an angry rant from Maxwell. “That thieving, malignant, good-for-nothing...” he fumed. “I paid over the odds for him to take us to London and what does he do? He abandons us in the back-end of nowhere, days from our destination.”

  “Look,” said Kate. “I’m sure we could get someone to help us.”

  “Who?” Maxwell gestured around us. “You may not have noticed, but we’re hardly the most trusted people round here.”

  “Maybe I can help,” said a voice from behind us. We turned to see the old man from the night before, leaning on a cane. “I have some horses you could have. They’re not much, but with some careful riding they should get you where you need to go.”

  “Thank you,” said Maxwell, pulling out his purse and starting to count out coins.

  The old man held up his hand. “I do not want payment. You helped my girl; consider it a debt repaid.” He winked at me. “And besides, I think it’s important that you get to where you need to go. For the good of us all.”

  He led us to the stables at the rear of the tavern and pointed out two rather sickly-looking sorrel horses. “You can have those. They’re our remounts, but we’re less than a day from home so we’ll be fine.”

  Kate kissed the man on the cheek while I eyed the horses suspiciously. I was not convinced that the creatures would manage to make it out of the stables, let alone take us the couple of hundred miles we still had left to travel. I glanced at Maxwell, who clearly shared my concerns. “What do you think?” he asked me.

  “Better than the alternative. Anyway, as they say, never look a gift horse in the mouth.”

  “Indeed,” muttered Maxwell. “Their teeth would probably fall out.”

  *

  Maxwell and I took it in turns to share a
horse with Kate, who was unaccustomed to riding. The beasts were in better health than we had initially given them credit for and, whilst we were loath to push them too hard, we were at least on the move once again.

  “So, these Redcoats that are going to help us save the day,” I said to Kate as she clung to me, shortly after one of our many rests and changes of passenger. “Any idea how we will find out whether they’re on our side before they imprison or kill us?”

  “I’ll use my womanly charms on them.” She squeezed her arms round my waist and I jumped slightly in spite of myself, blushing as she giggled in my ear. “Reckon that’ll work, don’t you?”

  The day passed uneventfully and before we knew it the lengthening shadows were turning to dusk. I brought my horse alongside Maxwell’s. “Bit of a problem,” I said. “Nowhere to shelter for the night.”

  He looked around. The last settlement was a good hour behind us and there was no sign of civilisation around or in front of us.

  “We press on,” he said. “There must be something on this road sooner or later.”

  “Hopefully sooner,” I said. “I really do not want to be out of doors once night falls.”

  He grunted and we pushed the horses into a trot, all of us tensing up at the thought of being caught in the darkness with whichever creatures haunted that area. My toes curled in the stirrups as I forced my weary mount to keep the pace.

  The sun dipped below the horizon to our right and then a howl in the distance made us jump. I let out a nervous laugh. “Just a fox,” I said.

  “I think I see something,” said Maxwell, pointing ahead of us at a squarish structure about a mile away.

  “Let’s hope so,” said Kate. “’Cause there’s something following us.” I turned to glance back. “I wouldn’t look if I were you,” she warned. “Just get us moving, fast.”

  Maxwell and I wordlessly kicked our horses into a gallop, or as close as they could manage. I caught a glimpse of something in the periphery of my vision, a palely glowing form with long, grasping appendages. I gritted my teeth, leant forward in the saddle and urged my horse a bit faster.