Dreamwalker. Part 18

"Who are less and less willing to rein him in."

"Because they fear his power, or his madness?"

"Anyone with a brain would fear such madness," Morgana said quietly. "But that's true for all the umbrae majae, isn't it? There's no way a Shadowlord could be anything other than stark-raving mad, given what Communion requires of them."

"You really think he would call for a full Cleansing?"

"Why not? He's already called for a partial one. And the Shadows who called for genocide in the past may still be around, whispering advice into the depths of Virilian's soul. That's the true curse of their kind, that even death can't free them from the madness of their predecessors."

Cleansing? Genocide? The words. .h.i.t me like electric shocks. What the h.e.l.l had I stumbled into?

"At least Jessica is on this side of the Gate now." I gasped as Seyer spoke my name. "So whatever happens on Terra Colonna won't affect her."

"Yes." There was a pause. "She seems to be quite resourceful, doesn't she?"

Seyer chuckled softly. "She takes after her mother."

My mother! Too much, too much! Bits of information were pouring into my brain at such a pace that I had no time to a.s.semble them into a meaningful picture. Only one thing stood out, bright and clear: Whatever the mystery was that tied me to this world, these two women were at the heart of it. They knew who I was and why I'd been abandoned on a foreign world.

They knew who my real mother was.

"I'm impressed by how quickly she got her bearings," Morgana continued. "I feared for a while we might lose her." She paused. "Of course, with the Shadows hunting her, we still might."

"They don't suspect what she is, do they?"

"Heavens, no. They called me in for an official a.s.sessment, and I told them what they wanted to hear: that the boy was a latent dreamwalker. Who among them would dare doubt the word of the Mistress of the Guild of Seers? I even tried to convince them to kill the boy-the neatest solution from our standpoint-but I doubt they'll do that. Most likely they'll study him for a while, seeking insight into the ancient curse he supposedly carries. The boy's mind is filled with wild fantasies, so if he's resourceful enough to figure out what they want, he may be able to last for a while. Meanwhile, he's a true Colonnan by birth, so nothing they find out about him is going to put our project at risk."

"Unless they get hold of Jessica herself."

"Ah." Morgana's voice dropped to a murmur. "Then we'll see how resourceful she really is, won't we?" There was a pause. "You're sure she's outside the Warrens right now?"

"Yes, your Grace."

"The Lord Governor told me he's going to 'flush out that rat's nest once and for all.' I smell Virilian's hand in it. Let's keep her out of there for as long as we can."

I heard Seyer hesitate. "You know that my methods don't lend themselves to guarantees. If you want me to act more directly-"

"No. No. You're right; we can't risk her catching on. Try to keep her aboveground until nightfall, if you can. The worst should all be over by then. Though if she returns after that, what she finds may be . . . disturbing."

I didn't hear what they said next. Something about dreams and strong negative emotions and how trauma might open a door for me. Fear could be a good thing.

They were going to raid the Warrens. Right now.

Devon was still down there. So were all those children. Orphans of this heartless culture, cast adrift to live in squalor, now due to be exterminated like rats-or maybe something worse. In this crazy place even death wasn't certain.

I hesitated only an instant. True, I'd learned more in the last half hour than in all my previous time on this world. These women clearly knew the answers to my most burning questions, and once I left here I might never have another chance to get them. But. . . .

Devon.

Ethan.

Moth.

I had to go back. I had to warn them all.

I started to head back the way I'd come. My limbs felt numb, as if the informational overload had somehow seeped into my arms and legs and clogged my veins. I tried to focus on moving quietly, keeping my head low, and not thinking too hard about what I'd just heard, but the last was impossible. The women's words echoed and remixed in my head, drowning out all other thoughts.

I tried to convince them to kill the boy . . .

Those who called for genocide are still around . . .

She takes after her mother . . .

When I finally got to the open stretch just before the fence, I peeked up over the bushes one last time to make sure the two women were turned away from me, and then I bolted. Or tried to bolt, anyway. The damage to my ankle turned the motion into a feverish stumble, and my attempt to dive neatly into the juniper branches nearly turned into a belly-flop. That kind of stunt isn't as easy as it looks in the movies. I saved myself at the last moment by grabbing on to a handful of scratchy branches, and I didn't stop to listen for pursuit, just kept going. If someone was following me, I wanted to at least pa.s.s a warning on to Isaac and Rita before any pursuer caught up with me.

I didn't emerge at the same location where I had entered the estate, but my companions saw me through the fence and came running. I almost blurted out something about the raid then and there, but I realized that if I did, Isaac might not want to wait for me to climb the fence again, just run off to warn his people. I wasn't sure I could manage the climb with only Rita to help me, and even if I did, that would still leave us in the middle of this strange city without a guide. So may G.o.d forgive me for my selfishness: I kept my silence while he thrust his hands between the bars and cupped them to give me purchase. Rita grabbed hold of whatever part of me was within reach, to help steady me as I climbed. My hands were shaking so badly I could barely hold onto the bars, and as I pulled myself over the top of the fence I felt one of the iron finials sc.r.a.pe across my stomach. I didn't dare look down to see if I was bleeding but fell heavily on the other side, taking Rita and Isaac down with me.

"There's going to be a raid," I gasped. "The Warrens. They're going to clean it all out . . ."

They helped me to my feet, and then Isaac looked in my eyes and said, "I'll take care of this. You head back to the plaza for now; the crowds will keep you safe. We can meet up at the Elemental's pavilion"

I knew he meant it well, and was just trying to protect me, but he had no personal investment in Devon's safety and I doubted he would take personal risks to save him. I had to go myself.

"We have people down there too," I reminded him. Not to mention I don't want to be left up here without a guide. What if you don't come back?

We started running. Or rather, they started running, and I started lurching quickly. Each time my left foot hit the ground there was a sharp pain; what would happen if it got so bad I couldn't keep up with them? In my mind's eye I could see Devon peering out from the shadows of the Warrens, and the thought that he might be swept up in some terrible pogrom was more than I could handle. Not to mention that the thought of dividing our party terrified me. In the movies that's always when disaster strikes, when people split up. Driven by fear I struggled on, trying not to let the others see how injured I was.

But Isaac could see that I was having a hard time. He hooked an arm around me, letting me throw my left arm over his shoulder so that I could transfer some of my weight to him. With his support I was able to move more quickly, and the pain muted slightly. His body was warm and firm against mine, and the contact was comforting. It shouldn't have been. Nothing should have been comforting at a time like this. But he was strong and confident, and he seemed to know what he was doing, and some of his certainty seeped into me through the contact.

Everything is going to be all right, I told myself. Over and over again. Everything is going to be all right. Everything is going to be all right.

But try as I might, I couldn't make myself believe it.

21.

THE WARRENS.

RUN TO THE WARRENS AND WARN EVERYONE turned out to be a task more easily described than accomplished.

Isaac led us to the nearest entrance he knew of, which turned out to be a manhole in a dingy alley. He stopped a block away from it, ostensibly so we could catch our breath, but also because he wanted to get the lay of the land before moving in closer. I wasn't about to complain. The pain in my ankle was becoming more intense with every step, and it was getting harder and harder to keep up with my companions. It helped to have a few moments to hang my head and catch a deep breath, while he went on ahead to scout our route.

Soon he returned, and his dour expression said it all. "Too many people around," he told us. "More than should be here. I don't like it."

"They're covering the exits," Rita said quietly.

I remembered how alert she was when we first met at IHOP. I remembered the look in her eyes as she checked out all the exits in the place, before committing herself to a defensive position at the table. Always wary. Always ready to run.

She looked like that now.

Isaac led us to several other access points. The story was the same at each one: too many people nearby, an unexpected obstacle in our path, or something else unexpected and ominous. Clearly, people and equipment were being moved into place so that when the raid went down any kids who tried to escape would run straight into a trap. Or maybe the raid was meant to drive them topside, so they could be scooped up more easily.

Flush them out, Morgana had said.

I felt sick inside, and not just from pain.

What if the raid had already begun, deep underground? Isaac told us he didn't think that was the case, because the people standing near the access points didn't look particularly alert. They hadn't yet been cued to spread their nets. But that could change at any moment.

Devon, please tell me you haven't wandered off somewhere. Please tell me you're sitting in the middle of the magpie room, bag packed and ready to go . . .

Finally Isaac found a route that the raiders didn't seem to know about. We had to burrow under a collapsed storage shed to an uncovered drainage pipe, which headed down into the earth at a steep angle. It would serve us as an entrance, Isaac warned us, but not an exit. That's probably why no one was watching it.

"Are you sure you want to do this?" he asked. His eyes were fixed on me.

I nodded. But in truth, I was no longer sure of anything. The pain in my ankle was growing so intense that I was beginning to wonder if I could keep my footing in the treacherous labyrinth. But what was the alternative? Let Isaac go down alone, and entrust Devon's fate to him? Send Rita down with him while I waited up here, defenseless and alone? Each option was worse than the last.

No, I had to remain with them. Whatever that required of me.

Rita and I sent our bags sliding down the pipe, then followed them. It was a tight fit. The inside of the pipe was covered in slime, and while the lubrication was helpful, it was also unspeakably gross. Slime-slicked, we slid down the steeply angled pipe with no visibility and no control. I wondered if I was going to hit something hard at the bottom, and break both my legs. Or maybe splash down in some reeking, garbage-filled dumpster, like in Star Wars.

The answer, as it turned out, was neither. One minute I was whizzing down the pipe, and the next I was flying through open air, and then: thwump! I landed on a thick pile of mattresses. Fortunately I managed to draw up my left leg just before landing so that my injured ankle wouldn't have to absorb the shock. I landed hard on my b.u.t.t and tiny winged creatures flitted off in all directions, chittering as they flew off into the darkness. Probably complaining about how I had messed up their nice home.

When all three of us were safely down the chute, Isaac produced a small blue lamp from his pocket, so that we could finally see our surroundings. I could spend a week with a thesaurus and still not find the words needed to capture how filthy, wet, and disgusting that place was. But at least there were no guards here, ready to capture us.

I fell in behind Isaac as he led us through the putrid labyrinth. He salvaged a broken pole from a heap of garbage for me to use as a walking stick, which helped take some of the weight off my wounded ankle. But there was a hot pain spreading across my belly now, where the finials from the fence had sc.r.a.ped me, and I was afraid to lift my shirt and look at it. If I had any kind of an open wound I'd need to clean and bandage it immediately, lest it get infected in this dismal place. But that would require a delay, which meant Devon might not be warned in time, which meant the raid might catch him. What was I supposed to do? With pain lancing through my leg at every step I couldn't think clearly enough to weigh the options, so I just stumbled behind Isaac, focusing on keeping my footing.

After awhile we climbed a ladder that brought us to cleaner tunnels, and soon after that we came across one of the residents. The little girl started to run away as soon as she saw us-hardly a wonder, with us looking more like swamp monsters than people-but Isaac got her to stand still long enough for him to warn her about the coming raid. I watched as the color drained from her face, and before he could ask her to help tell the others she bolted off into the darkness. So much for that plan.

Isaac did seem unusually calm, through all this. On some level of my pain-hazed brain, I recognized that was odd. But maybe he figured that his aris...o...b..ckground would protect him. He wasn't one of the common sewer rats that the raid was meant to eradicate. He mattered.

Soon, we came to an area that looked familiar, though that was due more to a nebulous sense of deja vu than any concrete recognition of detail. We started pa.s.sing the tiny lamps that the denizens of the Warrens kept burning to drive back the darkness in the outer tunnels, then the larger lamps that were used in the Warrens proper. When there was finally enough light to see by, Isaac put his own lamp away. I hadn't paid attention to it before, but as he shut it off and put it in his pocket I saw that it was simply a large gla.s.s marble, with no visible markings. A fetter? Since I knew that he came from an aristo family it shouldn't have surprised me that he possessed something like that, but for some reason it did. I guess I'd pictured him running away from home with nothing but the shirt on his back, as he left behind all the trappings of his former life. It was, in hindsight, a foolish vision. One could be rebellious without being stupid.

As soon as we reached the magpie room, the children there realized that something was wrong; they gathered closely about us, anxious to hear the news. I was distantly aware of Isaac's filling them in, but I was no longer listening to him. My attention was wholly fixed on seeking Devon in the shadows.

He wasn't there.

Once the children understood the Warrens were about to be raided, they began to scatter. I still had no clue where Devon was, and in a few seconds there would be no one left to ask. I caught sight of a young boy I'd been introduced to the night before and called out his name. He ignored me. I called to him more loudly, and when he tried to run past me without acknowledging my existence I grabbed his arm and jerked him to a stop, forcing him to turn and look at me.

"Where's Devon?" I demanded.

"Dunno," he said, and there was panic in his eyes as tried to break loose from my grip. But I was d.a.m.ned if I was letting him go before he gave me an answer.

Finally he said, "In the gallery. Maybe."

I let go. A moment later he was gone, swallowed by the shadows of the underworld.

I turned to Isaac, but before I could speak I was interrupted by a sudden metallic clanging. It took me a second to realize that someone must be banging on the pipes elsewhere in the Warrens, and the sound was resonating throughout the underground sanctuary.

"It's started," Isaac whispered. I could hear a note of fear in his voice now. Maybe he'd counted on getting out of the Warrens before the raid began in earnest.

Too late now.

"We need to find Devon," I said. "Where's the gallery?"

"This way," Isaac said, pointing to a tunnel opening across from us.

We followed him into the depths of the labyrinth. The clanging had ceased now, leaving the abandoned halls tomb-like and silent. When we pa.s.sed the last of the guide lamps he took out his glowing blue sphere again. By its light we finally reached a chamber where a series of rectangular items had once been attached to the wall. They were gone now, but they'd left behind ghosts outlined in grime, as neatly ordered as the paintings in an art museum.

Devon wasn't there, so we called out his name, though not so loudly that distant raiders would hear us. For one terrifying moment it seemed that he wasn't going to answer. But then he stepped around a corner, and if I'd been standing closer to him I would have hugged him. "Thank G.o.d," I whispered. "Thank G.o.d." He had his backpack with him, I noticed. Even in this refuge he had never felt confident enough to leave it behind. Yet another thing to give thanks for.

He opened his mouth to speak-and then the screaming started. It was impossible to tell how far from us the source was, as the stark tunnels echoed and amplified every cry. There were at least three different voices, however, and they all sounded young.

And then suddenly they fell silent, which was even more terrifying.

"We need to get far away from here," Isaac muttered, and none of us felt like arguing with him.

I won't catalog all the twists and turns we took, trying to find a way out of that deathtrap. The rusted pipes we squeezed through, the rotting ladders that shattered beneath our feet, the abandoned corridors that led nowhere. My ankle was getting worse and worse, and pain shot through my leg every time I put pressure on it. But whenever we stopped to listen, the noise of the raid was still too close. The screaming had begun again and it seemed to be coming from all sides. One time we emerged from a narrow crawl s.p.a.ce to see a half-dozen lanterns coming toward us, and we barely got out of their way in time.

But eventually we reached a place where there was relative silence. We paused in a narrow tunnel to catch our breath, though it was not a comfortable respite. Ankle-deep water rushed past our feet, heading from nowhere to nowhere, and when we started moving again the current was so strong that it nearly knocked me down. Rita grabbed me and kept me from falling, then let me rest an arm across her shoulders for support, like Isaac had done earlier. But it was hard to maneuver through the narrow tunnels in such a posture, and soon I had to go back to stumbling along by myself, terrified that a fall would land me face down in that lightless soup.

"Do you know where we are?" Rita asked Isaac at one point.

His grim silence was an eloquent response.

"Great," she muttered. "Just great."

"So how are we going to get out of here?" I asked him. I was starting to feel feverish, and I hoped that was a consequence of fear and exhaustion, and not something more ominous. "We'll have to do that eventually."

No one said anything for a moment. A long moment.

"We have compa.s.ses," Rita offered.

"That'll tell us direction," Isaac said. "Not which way is out."

"No," Devon said, "but the water will do that."

I looked at him. In the bluish light of Isaac's glow lamp Devon's dark skin glistened eerily, like some fearsome obsidian statue. Since my expression could not possibly capture the full extent of my confusion, I offered, "Huh?"

He pointed to the water coursing about our feet. "It's moving." A rotting bit of something that might once have been food floated into our field of light, and we watched as it made its way past us, moving down the tunnel until it was swallowed by darkness again on the other side. "It's heading toward some kind of exit."

"Or some kind of underground cesspool," Rita muttered.