by Linda Welch
He opens his mouth, shuts it and gives me a dark look. I sandwich my lips together and look away. Great. We’re both mad.
I walk off and he catches up with me. We tromp along, not looking at each other.
I glance at him after a few minutes and catch him watching me. He no longer looks angry, but his expression is one I imagine an Upside kid would wear if he came here and discovered Saint Nicholas isn’t a jolly old fellow and his elves don’t make toys for good little kids. His disappointment in me is worse than the anger. I silently tsk at myself - he’s not the only one who needs to grow a thicker skin.
He suddenly stops. “Damn. I forgot the groceries.”
“You bought groceries?”
“I left them at… .” His gaze drops to his boots.
He left the groceries at Angelina’s apartment. “We’re not going back for them.”
“No way.” His mouth twists wryly. “I’ll pay the gnome another visit.”
“Gnome?”
“The shopkeeper across the street.”
I know why, coming from Upside, he misidentified Noddy. Just the same, it’s funny. “Noddy?” I splutter. “He’s not a gnome, he’s a Munchkin.”
River stops walking again. I keep going and he hustles to catch up. “You’re kidding me, right?”
He’s smiling, his tone is light. The tightness in my chest diminishes. I’m sure the hurt is still there, you don’t let go of a sense of betrayal just like that, but he’s handling it.
I keep a straight face as I wag my head. “Where do you think Baum got the idea?” But I can’t keep up the act, his expression is so comical. “Noddy is a rock troll.”
“I thought rock trolls would be … kind of rockish looking.”
“Rockish? Is that a word?”
I stagger as my heel snags on a loose cobblestone. River reaches out but I skip sideways. “Did you meet his wife?”
“I saw a gigantic … female, with huge… .” he gestures with both cupped hands.
“Betty, a mountain troll. She’s Noddy’s wife.”
His brows jerk up and a look I easily interpret comes into his eyes.
I snort. “You’re trying to imagine how they do it, aren’t you.”
He averts his head but not before he smirks. “Do what?”
He knows, and I know, but I can’t resist saying, “If you’d seen under his apron you’d know rock trolls are - ”
‘Hey!” River still won’t look at me. “I don’t need to know that.”
“Have it your own way.” Laughter bubbles in my throat. “Just trying to further your education.”
With a sideways glance at me, he changes the subject. “Will you help me find an apartment?”
“Sure. I’ll be looking myself.” I’m moving. I’ve lived in my apartment for nearly five years, but Angie crossed the line when she lured in my guest. There are plenty of inexpensive, half-decent apartments in Gettaholt, though finding a vacant unit will be a challenge. “It won’t be easy. We’ll go down to Housing and put our names on the list and it’s a long list, so don’t expect to move in the near future.”
But I can’t wait months, I want to be far away from Angie now. We can get a motel room while we move up the list; they cost no more than my apartment.
Rain falls, at first lightly; I bring my shoulders up to my ears but it still dribbles down my neck. River’s hair gleams and water drips off the ends to become lost in the rain slicking his leather coat.
“I have a job tomorrow, and something else I should take care of. Want to come along?” I flash him a half-smile.
“What’s the job?”
“Some pests need to be resettled in another location where they can’t cause mischief.”
He joins his hands behind his back and watches the pavement pass beneath our feet. “Big pests or little pests?”
“Little.” I hold up my hand and make a four-inch space with thumb and forefinger. “Help me and you get half the fee.”
“You have a deal.”
I don’t tell him everything. Hands-on experience is the best teacher for these particular pests.
I wake in the night to see River kneeling at the window, but he doesn’t watch the street. He looks at something in his hands and lets out a low, amused chuckle.
I sit up and rub my eyes. “What have you got there?”
He shuffles on his knees and holds up the object. “I bought it at the market.”
“A mobile phone?” I blink. “You paid for a cell-phone? You know - ”
“It can’t make calls,” River finishes for me. He grins widely. “But it has cool games.”
I fall back on the mattress. He’s still messing with the phone as I drift into darkness.
Chapter Fifteen
The relocation service I use is in the corner of a hardware store. The cyclops stows everything in a hemp sack and pushes a piece of paper to me over the counter. “You know the deal, Rain, twenty-four-hour rental, you return it late you pay for another twenty-four. Sign here, please,” he says in a bored tone as he takes a pen from the pocket of his blue canvas coveralls.
I sign on the dotted line. “And the unit?”
He leans one massive, muscular forearm on the countertop. “On its way.”
“Thanks. An hour should do it.” We probably don’t need an hour to take care of a small hive but one never knows. I smile into his single blue eye, rest the sack and a long, slim plastic case against the counter and go looking for River.
Goods hang from the bare beams on the low ceiling and are stacked on metal and wood shelves. The wood floor creaks under other patrons’ feet but not mine. I find River poking into several shelves deep in the store. Guys and hardware stores have meaningful relationships.
“Ready to get this done?”
His head whips in my direction. “I know lots of this stuff, but some of it… .” With a perplexed expression he shakes his head and scratches his scalp.
I head for the exit. “Come on.”
“He’s not as big as I thought they’d be.” He jogs his head at the Cyclops who is unloading a box of tools and hanging them up.
“Big enough.” I lift the case and nod at the sack.
River grasps and jiggles it. “What’s this?”
“I don’t want to haul everything out. I’ll explain when we arrive at the location. Anyway, I want to see your face.”
“Don’t know whether I like the sound of that.”
I smile and walk faster.
We cross the river, autos streaming between us and the far footpath. Boats large and small cruise the murky water out of the city or head to the wharves to join those already moored. River stops to lean on the rail and watch crates being unloaded from a big cargo boat; its plate-metal sides gleam redly.
“How far to the sea?”
I stand beside him. “There is no sea, but a network of rivers connects most cities. It’s why they developed where they are, except Gettaholt, which grew up around The Station before there was a station.”
We carry on and soon walk among the tenements on the west side of the river. The relocation service’s van is parked outside a soaring structure of five floors, in front of steps which go down to the basement.
A dwarf in blue coveralls, his gray beard neatly braided, climbs from the van and opens the rear doors as we approach. He swings the unit to the sidewalk when we reach him. With a nod, he gets back in the van and drives away, leaving us in a cloud of exhaust.
“You can bring that,” I tell River.
He bends to grab the unit’s handle, starts to come upright and stops with a grunt. “This is heavier than it looks.”
“Than the dwarf made it look,” I correct. “A lot of muscle is packed into a small dwarf body, something you’d do well to remember.”
He comes upright with the unit dragging down one side of his body. “What is it?”
“Relocation specialists do what the title implies, move undesirables from the city to habitats suitable to their
survival. They don’t perform an actual capture, that’s a job for others, so we have to catch and box the pests for transit first. He’ll be back in about an hour, which should be plenty of time.”
The double doors are wide open. Mr. Tipola steps out and makes chivvying motions. We follow him through the door.
Big feet stuffed in orange patent leather high heels, the goblin rattles up the stairs. His padded rear end bobs in front of my face. River trudges after me.
“What a week, what a week,” Tipola prattles. “I cleared the attic out months ago but the contractors had a backlog. They finally arrive yesterday and what do they find? A hive, a hive! I have plans for the attic.” He pauses to strike a dramatic pose, hands out from his sides, long bony fingers protruding from a froth of lace at his cuffs, one hand holding a white lace-edged handkerchief between thumb and forefinger.
Continuing up the stairs, his hat slips off his head and sails over mine. I snatch and miss. River catches the thing and passes it up to me.
I hand the hat to the goblin when we stop on the landing. He settles it on his bald pate. Now he’s stationary, I hope it will stay there.
Goblins have moist shiny skin and they sweat. A droplet slides alongside the inner corner of his large, lashless green eyes and the long pointed nose, pauses above the wide lipless mouth, detours around and meanders down Tipola’s jutting chin. Watching it is kind of mesmerizing. The goblin pauses in his chatter to draw in a breath and the sweat bead hits the damp patch on his doublet.
One more flight to the top of the staircase. I tug Mr. Tipola’s coat, he stops and turns and I put a silencing finger to my lips. I prefer the pixies don’t hear us coming. He lowers his voice but continues to yak in a whisper. I tune him out.
This building gives me a feeling I can’t at this moment fathom. I know it, have felt it before, but can’t identify it. The place is filthy and I’ll be surprised if Tipola spends much on upkeep. Rat droppings litter the stairs and the smell of mold makes my nose itch. He’s the type of landlord I despise, who knows people are desperate for housing and won’t complain about substandard living conditions for fear of eviction,.
“Let’s get kitted up here,” I tell River, and with a frown at Tipola, which he ignores, add, “Hopefully they don’t know we’re here.”
He positions the small extraction unit on the landing and flexes his fingers, which are probably numb from toting the thing. It will weigh more when we bring it down loaded, but according to Tipola the hive is small so not too many pixies will be stuffed inside. An established hive has numerous partitioned living and working spaces, but this is a fraction of the size so must be to house the queen’s vanguard, sent to find a good location for a new colony. It will consist of a single inside space with their hammocks and weapon racks attached to the walls.
The unit’s hose is in good condition, the plug solid. I flip the switch; the needle rises to indicate a full charge.
And I can’t see River’s face as I examine the unit, a good thing as I have to smother laughter each time he tries to do the same.
He has held in his mirth since we arrived and met Mr. Tipola and his lurid sense of style. Teetering on his heels, the goblin sports mustard-yellow hose and short, padded orange breeches, which make him look like he stepped into a pumpkin and decided to wear it around his waist. His black doublet has slashed sleeves over a ruffled lace undershirt, and that ridiculous blue sock hat refuses to stay on his slippery skull.
If River snorts again, I’ll lose it.
I squat to take mesh face masks from the sack and pass one to River. He turns it in his hands and pulls and releases the elastic strap, making it twang.
“… or even a penthouse suite,” the goblin finishes.
“Sounds lovely, Mr. Tipola,” I offer. Penthouse suite? In this dump? I want to laugh again.
“Indeed, indeed.” The goblin looks up the staircase.
I smile at him. “Shouldn’t take long.”
“I’ll leave you to it.” Down he trips until the staircase turns a corner and he moves out of sight.
Next from the sack, two pairs of leather gauntlets and an aerosol can.
“Hive,” River ponders. He eyes the equipment. “We’re clearing out a wasp nest?”
“Worse. Pixies.”
I stay hunkered down on the landing to open the hard-sided case. A long-handled net is clamped to each section. “Pixies are four to five inches high, depending on the length of their stinger. They also carry arms - usually lances and daggers - and of course they fly. They’re ferocious but not intelligent, or they wouldn’t decide to make a new community in an inhabited city building.” I disengage a clamp and remove a net. “The mesh is coated in adhesive so don’t touch. I hope to clean out the nest before they’re any the wiser, but in case a few escape, button up your coat, turn up your collar, put on the gloves and mask and be ready with that net.”
He puts on the mask and starts buttoning his coat one-handed, muttering, “Pixies with stingers. Is nothing sacred?” Pulling on the gloves, he peers at me through the mask’s mesh. “Where are the stingers?”
“Where do you think? On their butts.” I hand the net to him and get upright to button my leather coat. “They can paralyze mice and small birds and a sting gives us a nasty welt.”
“Great,” he says, abruptly sullen. “But you can fade out and lose it.”
I offer him a smile. “River, you can do it, it’s there inside you. You just need the right stimulus.”
He doesn’t smile back.
With gloves and mask in place, I tuck the aerosol can of tranquilizing spray in a pocket. “If I can get to the nest unseen, this will put the pixies in a temporary stupor.” I point at the unit. “That works like a vacuum cleaner, it will suck them out. We trap escapees in the nets.”
“Sounds like fun,” he says dryly.
“You’ll know it if any get you with a stinger. Now, let’s do this quietly.”
I get the other net and pick up the extraction unit. We continue up the stairs to the top floor. A dirty wood door with blue paint flaking from the frame is dead center in the passage which extends the width of the old apartment building.
I nod at River to open the door because I’m all out of hands. I go in fast, gaze sweeping the room for a hive attached to the wall. It should be up high to allow the pixies to use one exit/entrance normally situated on the bottom.
The attic is large, and bare.
River scans the room. “Where is it?”
This space has been used, but a long time ago. Dangling strips of wallpaper shift slightly in the heavy damp air which pushes through a broken windowpane. Mold mottles the corners of the room in gray patches which climb the walls and spread across the… .
Ceiling. A black oily cloud boils on the ceiling. I can see in the dark, but not through this unnatural pall.
A faint chitter emanates from the mass. “River - ” I begin as the cloud falls.
Dropping flesh, I throw myself aside and open my eyes a second later in a crouch, clothes, equipment and blades strewn at my feet. A dark humped mass writhes on the board floor, thrashing limbs draped in shadow.
River is in there.
My desperately groping hands find two obsidian blades among my clothes. I rise up, charge across the attic and dive in. Panic suffocates me - I’m blind in a cloud of satanic darkness. The stink of rotting flesh clogs my nostrils and coats my tongue. A moist rubbery something wraps around my waist. I slash with a blade. A shrill sound grates through my head, hot wetness scalds my hand.
Tentacles. A nest of tentacles swarms me, which means a controlling body lurks somewhere in this mess. It can be cut, but its blood is acidic and eats at my skin.
Hacking, jabbing, I wade in deeper. Gods, don’t let me cut River. Or if I cut him, nothing vital. The blood stings, tempting me to drop flesh, but I will lose my blades. My sight is becoming accustomed to the dark miasma. The limbs all around me are paler than the surrounding shadow.
A t
entacle wraps my hips. I cut down; it uncoils and withdraws. Another grasps my left wrist. I slash with the blade in my right hand.
“River!”
The limbs are more thickly entwined in front of me, a nucleus of rubbery arms. A noise, staccato thumps. I fight through to where a dozen tentacles encase River’s long lean body. His heels drum the floor. His left arm is trapped to his side but his right hand, jammed against his throat, prevents a limb from strangling him.
If this isn’t reason enough for his body to automatically drop flesh, I don’t know what is. Yet he’s solid, using the strength of full flesh to resist the creature.
Blades swinging, jabbing, I reach him. His eyes are closed; he doesn’t know I’m here.
Huge lambent, lidless eyes glow palely beyond River’s contorting body. Below them, a horned beak clacks and drips bright-yellow acid which sizzles on the board floor.
I climb through the tentacles which hold River. Other limbs slither out, twisting to get me before I reach the head. Dropping so much weight I can only just hold onto my blades, I eel between them.
Not much free space, but enough. Pulling full flesh, leaning through a gap, my hands arc out and curve in. Each blade punctures a milky eye which pops like broken egg yolk. I put so much force into the blows, my fists submerge to the knuckles.
An unholy shriek pierces my skull.
I withdraw my blades; they are coated in slime, as are my hands, and my hands burn. Limbs erupt in frenzied thrashing. They beat my head and sides but don’t try to grasp me. I turn back to River with difficulty amid a barrage of rubbery arms. He’s supine on the floor, free, but his eyes are closed, his body limp. I drop down with him, the demon’s cry sawing through my head.
The creature stops squawking. Limbs whip past us as it draws them to its body. I know what this means, the demon is readying to return to the dark depths. We’ll go with it if we don’t get away.
I drop my knives and thump River’s chest with one fisted hand. His eyes pop open, he whoops in air and gags. I pull his mask off and yell for emphasis. “Come on! Move!” My arms on his back and chest help him to his hands and knees. Together, we crawl from beneath the shadow.
