Drowned

by Nichola Reilly

  She looks over her shoulder, then bites her lower lip, propels her feet behind her and launches herself up so that her elbows are resting on the pipe. Then she manages to squirm the rest of her little body up to safety.

  All the fear I’d had to keep in during those tense moments, while pretending to be the strong one, spills out of me. I start to cry. “Thank goodness,” I breathe into her ear as we lie there across the pipes, panting. “I don’t want anything to ever happen to you.”

  She gives me a small smile. “Now I really would rather be with Finn. But I’m happy you’re with me.”

  I pick up the torch and we continue on. Fern moves with determination, like a person who wants to be anywhere else. The pipes are hard and uncomfortable to lie on, much less move over, so I find myself lagging behind. Concentrating hard, I dig in and really leap forward, froglike. I find my face pressed against the black bottoms of Fern’s tiny feet. “Why have we stopped?”

  “There’s a wall here.”

  “Oh.” Great. I poke my head down and see another door on the left wall. I can just make out the L and the Y on the plaque beside it. Thank goodness. “He’s here. In this room.”

  “How do we get in there?”

  “We crawl down and open the door.”

  “But...the scribblers?”

  “They’ve stopped hissing.” I figure we can get down in there and inside the room before they come at us again. Maybe. Of course, once I open the door, all the water will come rushing into the laundry room, and will I be able to close the door before the scribblers come? It’s not the greatest of plans.

  Fern senses my apprehension. “No. Way. Coe.”

  “Okay, okay,” I say, trying to peer around her in the dark. “Scooch over so I can get up there.”

  She moves on her stomach to the side, and I slide in next to her. Straight ahead of us is a wall of stone. It looks as if it’s the end of the passage. That’s where the pipes come to an L-joint and veer off to the left. Predictably, they disappear into the wall, right above the laundry room. I inspect the place where the pipes meet the wall. It’s too dark to see but it seems as though it’s not watertight. Did someone carve through solid stone in order to fit the pipes there? I press my finger against the wall there. It’s spongy. Not stone. Decayed wood, I think.

  “Hold on,” I say, drawing my head and shoulders back and bringing my feet in front of me. I bring my heel to the soft section of the wall, and push with as much might as I can muster in such a small, enclosed area. It budges, just an inch. Fern catches her breath. I do it again and again. Each time, the wall moves out a bit, until at last it falls away, and there is a hole large enough for us to climb through.

  “You did it!” Fern exclaims, holding tight to the pipes. She shivers. “Hooray. Let’s get out of here.”

  “Hold on.” I don’t want to dash her glee by bringing up the horrible creature Tiam and I fought the last time we were together in this room. The creature that puts the ferociousness of the scribblers to shame. I haven’t heard from Tiam in much of a tide; he could have fallen victim to one of them and be lying dead on the floor right now, a hideous, bloody sight. I motion for her to give me the torch. “Let me look.”

  I swing the torch out into the room and peer over. The room looks even more enormous from this angle. There are piles of crates everywhere, but the light doesn’t stretch out far enough to see the door to the laundry chute or the place where I’d left Tiam. “We’ll have to go down,” I tell her.

  I turn onto my stomach and drop down feetfirst, then motion for her to do the same. When she falls into my arms and looks around, she sighs, relieved. “Yay. It’s dry in here.”

  “Tiam?” I call out. No answer. I call his name louder.

  “Why isn’t he answering?” she asks, following behind me.

  She starts to gravitate toward a crate, so I pull her back toward me. “Stay close.”

  She raises an eyebrow. “Why?” She looks around and then says, “What is that noise?”

  I freeze and listen. I hear it, too. Whispering. Gulping, I yank her toward me. “Tiam!” I yell, urgent.

  The light stretches forward, and I can see the chute in the distance. Before it, though, there is a lump... Actually two... No, three shapeless masses lying on the ground. Holding in my breath, we step forward, ever so slowly, until the torchlight illuminates the forms. The first thing I see is black blood, pooling around it.

  Not Tiam. Please, not Tiam.

  Then I see the fur. Masses and hunks of fur curled around blood. Claws and fangs. A black button eye, staring forever at nothing. No human parts. There are three of them. So, Tiam must have had a run-in with two more. But where is he?

  A second later I realize my toes are wet and sticky. We’re standing in the blood.

  “Agh!” Fern yelps. “Gross. What are those?”

  “I don’t know. They’re not very friendly, though.”

  Her body tenses like a board. “Where is Tiam?”

  “I don’t know.” We step around the massacre, and I wave the torch ahead of us. There are footprints in the dust, his footprints, heading in the opposite direction and disappearing around a stack of crates. Of course. Leave it to Tiam not to stay in one place for very long. “I think we need to follow those.”

  She nods and hugs herself, rubbing her bare shoulders. It’s freezing. “What has he been doing down here?”

  I don’t know how to explain it without giving away Tiam’s secret about being afraid of closed spaces, so I just shrug and answer, “Exploring. You know Tiam.”

  She laughs nervously. “He’s funny. He should explore someplace without creatures that want to make him their dinner.”

  I can’t help but laugh, too. “You’re right. Let’s find him and tell him that.”

  I stop when I come to the candle, lying in the middle of the passage. It’s considerably shorter than it once was. The hair on my ears bristles. If it is his, then he’s down here, without any source of light. And that’s impossible.

  At the end of the room I think we can go no farther, but then I spot a small corridor in the very corner, in the shadows cast by the crates. Tiam must have done the same thing, judging from the way his footprints hit the wall, turn and then head off in that direction. When we get to the opening, there is a big sign above it, but the letters have been scratched out. Over it, I can make out the words, scratched very faintly: B MT ENT.

  It must be a passage to the palace, maybe a secret door to and from the building, used for emergencies. Maybe Tiam found a way out and is roaming the island now, trying to lie low and avoid Finn and the other commoners. If so, it makes total sense why he hasn’t been answering me. After all, he did say he would find his own way out, and for as long as I’ve known him, Tiam has always accomplished whatever he sets out to do.

  I feel silly for spending all this time worrying and planning to help him. He doesn’t need me. Never has. It was foolish to think that maybe, for once, he did.

  I turn my attention to the sign on the wall. What is B MT ENT? It feels as if I’ve seen the letters before, somewhere. Maybe in my book, but if so, I can’t place what part of the book it’s from. That’s strange, considering I have most of it memorized. I sigh, realizing I can’t even flip through the book since the ink is bleeding everywhere. But where else would I have seen those letters? Maybe I’m just dehydrated and hallucinating.

  And then I realize what about those letters is familiar. The letters are wobbly, strange, not like the way Kimmie and Cass wrote. I think of letters, drawn in the sand, washed away by the tide. That was how he taught me to read and write. His B, especially, was very different. It was a vertical line, astride two perfect circles, stacked on top of one another. So as I gaze at the markings scratched into that wall, I can’t help but feel a little weak. I might be wrong, but it looks very much l
ike my father’s handwriting.

  No. That’s impossible. Buck was a fisherman. He’s never had a reason to be down here.

  We creep on. It’s so dark that I can no longer make out Tiam’s footprints in the dust. The passage begins to angle downward, then two even narrower paths branch off to the right and the left. They look like cracks in the walls, mistakes, instead of actual pathways. They’re so narrow we’d have to walk single file. And as creepy as this place is, those pathways are even more so. I wave the torch down each and see nothing but blackness; no plaque announcing its purpose, no indication that it was meant to be traveled by humans. A giant black spider spins a web in the upper corner of the crevice, uninterrupted by our presence. I shudder, then continue down the wider middle passage. The safer passage.

  We walk another ten feet or so before it breaks off again. Two more narrow passages. Then, twenty feet later, it does so again. Each time, we seem to be descending farther and farther underground. It’s so cold I see my breath billowing out ahead of me, something that only happens every once in a while at night on the island. I can hear Fern’s teeth chattering. That’s when I begin to hear the dripping. Not a good sign. The black walls glisten. The dusty floor turns to mud. Suddenly we’re splashing through water.

  “Oh, no,” Fern whispers. “Not more water!”

  We walk on another few feet, slowly descending until the water is up to our knees.

  “Let’s go back,” Fern whispers, clenching her teeth.

  I shine the torch ahead of us. “I think the path starts to rise up there,” I lie. I can’t see anything at all. “Tiam must have gone this way.”

  “How do you know? Maybe he’s...” She doesn’t say it, but I know what she’s thinking. It’s the same thing I was thinking, something I thought and wished Fern was too innocent and hopeful to believe. Maybe he’s dead. No, I’m not going to consider that again, not when I wasted so many tears on it before, only to find out he was fine. So I just press ahead in silence, and we go lower, lower, lower, until I have to raise my good arm to keep the light out of the water. He’s got to be safe. He’s got to be okay.

  Fern’s squeal plays on my eardrum. She’s up to her chin in water, her neck stretched as high as it will go, teeth clenched. I can’t carry her, so I know she’s right. We’ll have to go back. I wave the torch ahead of me one last time, hoping to see some evidence that Tiam was here, but there’s nothing. Then I sigh and lead her back the way we came.

  “Maybe he went down one of the other passages,” she offers as I squeeze the water from my tunic. She mimics me, shaking her head so that the water from the ends of her long hair sprays everywhere.

  “I guess,” I say. She’s right again. Tiam wouldn’t give up. He’d come here and find that this way was flooded, and then he’d check every other avenue until he’d exhausted them all. And that’s how we’ll have to be. We’ll check everywhere until we find him, alive or... No, don’t think it.

  I’m suddenly aware Fern has stopped walking. She’s standing, frozen, in midsqueeze, with her wet tunic in her white hands. I follow her eyes up the passage, to where the water meets dry ground. There, above the waterline, are four sets of eyes, glowing red, watching us.

  Sixteen

  The Eyes Reappear

  “Oh, Coe,” Fern moans, inching beside me and grabbing my hand, “I’d really, really rather be with Finn right now!”

  “It’s okay,” I say, just as much to calm myself as her. I wave the torch in a figure eight at them. “They don’t like fire. Or...water. See how they’re not coming near us? As long as we stay here, we’re safe.”

  “But, Coe, we can’t stay here forever.”

  “Well, of course. But we can take our time figuring out our next move. That’s a good thing.”

  Just then, there’s a splash. The red eyes are closer. They’re testing the water. They creep toward us cautiously. So they don’t hate the water as much as I thought. Wonderful. With each step, Fern clutches my hand tighter and moves so near that she’s standing behind me. I don’t blame her. I’d give anything for something to hide behind, too.

  We inch back until we’re in water up to my chest and Fern’s neck again. It’s so cold I can’t feel anything below my waist. My breath billows in front of me, blurring my view of the bloodthirsty creatures. No, we can’t stay in here forever. But the creatures don’t know that. All they know is that they’ve got us trapped, and they want to finish us off now. They’ve gotten used to the water. They wade in as far as they can, and then they start to swim.

  I study the walls, the ceiling, for something for us to grab on to and hoist ourselves up. There isn’t anything this time. This time, I’m about to drown in my helplessness. I try to breathe, but the air isn’t making it to my lungs. I try to think, but my head is thick and empty all at once. My entire body is shutting down; the only thing I can do is move farther along the corridor, my feet heavy and numb, as if I’m walking to my own execution.

  And then Fern looks at me, with that innocent sweet face so twisted in terror. I got her into this. Me. But even if I hadn’t, I would do anything to take that fear from her. To see her safe. Anything. I pull her up, onto my shoulders, piggyback, and wade until the water is up to my own chin. When I’m about to start treading water, a sudden loud crash rips the air, and a high, screaming squeal pierces my ears.

  “What’s that?” Fern whispers, her hands tightening around my neck enough almost to choke me.

  I turn. There are only three now, swimming with their noses in the air. Were there four before? Yes, I was quite sure there were.

  Another animal yelp. This time, I see something glinting in the firelight as it whistles down on it, again and again, plunging it beneath the water in a great splash. And then there are two.

  I squint through the darkness and make out a blond head. Tiam. He does away with another creature with a deep, guttural “oof.” “These things are really getting on my nerves,” he grumbles. His voice is the sweetest sound I’ve ever heard, even if his tone is angry. Now I see him, easily dispensing of the last one with a swift blow of the craphouse shovel, as if it’s a weak, defenseless little insect and not the same creature that had nearly ripped a hole in his neck two tides ago. He’s obviously gotten to be quite an expert at killing them.

  I slowly wade from the water, sink to my knees in the soft mud and sob.

  “Hey, hey, hey, what’s going on?” he says, and I feel his hand on my shoulder.

  I want to pour myself into his arms and stay there for a very long time, just feeling his warmth against my body. I am so starved for it that having him near and knowing it’s not possible is enough to drive me mad. If I look up, though, if I look into his eyes, I know I will crumble, weak, pathetic. So I wipe the tears from the back of my hand and, with every last bit of strength I have, say, very nonchalantly, “You came right on time.”

  “I noticed their whispering always gets louder when they find their next meal,” he explains. “I could hear them all the way down the passage.”

  I bring myself to my feet and try to ignore the quivering of my ankles as I motion around us. “Where does this passage lead?”

  “I think it’s the way out,” he says, brightening my mood. A back door, a way out of the castle, is exactly what we need. But my heart sinks when he says, “But it’s like a maze. I’ve been all over the place, but I can’t find the way. There are words on the walls, though.”

  “I saw the plaque in the entrance to this passage. It says B-M-T-E-N-T. I don’t know what it means.”

  He rolls the sounds over his tongue for a moment. “They’re not words?”

  “I don’t think so. Just letters.”

  He scratches his chin. “Did you find another way in here?”

  I nod. “But it’s no better than the way you came, I think. We had to climb through another narrow p
assage. And there are scribblers out there.”

  His face falls. “We have to find a way out through here. It’s here. I know it is.” He seems so sure, I wonder how he can believe that so deeply when our luck has been so bad, when nothing has indicated there’s another way out at all.

  Fern shakes her head, her face stone. “I wouldn’t go back the way we came, ever, in a zillion tides.”

  I look at him and nod. “It was that bad. Plus, I’ve made more enemies. I was stupid. I brought the honey up with me and dropped my bag, and they saw it. Now they think the princess and everyone who works for her is hoarding the stuff. Things are breaking down. They’re in the castle now. I think they’re going through the stores. It’s scary.”

  He doesn’t say anything for a moment. Then he exhales. “Wow. Do you think they followed you here?”

  “No. The stores are immense. I think there are rooms and rooms, and they’re not all empty, like we thought. Tiam, do you think the king and princess were hoarding it all? The princess says she never went down—”

  “That was always the rumor,” he says. “But Wallow and Star probably didn’t know half of what’s down here. If the stores managers kept quiet, they were rewarded with whatever they wanted.” He shakes his head. “Burbur never did look hungry.”

  I nod. That’s the truth.

  He looks behind me, as if expecting someone else. “Where’s Star? Didn’t she come?”

  “She wouldn’t come,” I say softly.

  His eyes narrow. “What? But she’s in serious danger! You said they’re in the castle now. The first thing they’ll do is go after her.” He runs his hands through his hair, angry. “Hell, Coe, didn’t I tell you to find her?”

  I’m shocked. Tiam has never been one to raise his voice. But then, this is his princess, his love. “I did! She thought I was trying to trick her. She wouldn’t come with me. She’s under this delusion that she’s safer up there and that the two of you will get married and live happily ever after. I couldn’t pick her up and carry her!” I cry, so defensive my words tumble out on top of one another. “Then we went back to find her after formation, but Finn was already in the castle. I knew he’d go crazy if he saw me! I doubted she’d come with me, anyway! She’s easily the stupidest and most obstinate person I’ve ever met! But in a way, she’s right. There’s no place on the island that’s safe for her.”