by Jodi Ralston
“Oh, Perce.” She looked away from his impatient gesture to the waiting chasm and stairs. She shuddered as she peered down, hand going to her throat and the bow tied under her chin. “My, this place is rather warm, despite its . . . size.” Lydia’s fretting had disarranged her ribbons, so she pulled off her gloves and began removing pins from her hat. “Guard, would you mind terribly—?”
He moved the duster aside, so she had free access to his pouch.
“Oh, thank you.”
As she removed her coat as well, leaving a torn green dress (a color Victoria favored, too) and its other layers beneath, Guard noticed the temperature at last, and realized he should have paid attention to it before now. Variations upset humans with their weaker constitutions, and he had heard Mace say it “fouled up” their moods, too. That might go a long way to explaining Shalott’s temper. So, as Lydia added to his pouch (with a smile growing on her lips as each item disappeared one by one), and as Shalott’s glared at them both, Guard extended the invitation to him.
The response was a grumble. Still grumbling, Shalott yanked off and pocketed his gloves, retrieved the gun and bullets, tucked the one into the back of his waistband and the others into trouser pockets, and shucked the coat. By the time he had stomped back to them and tossed it Guard’s way, he had fallen quiet. Guard caught it easily despite the bow in his hand, and it joined the rest of their possessions in the expandable pouch.
For a moment, Guard thought the tactic had worked.
He had been listened to.
And the grumbling had stopped . . .
. . . to be replaced with: “I want that back once we are outside. Lydia’s, too. Humans don’t bear cold well, not that you’d notice—or care—if we didn’t say anything, would you, Great and Wonderful Guide?”
So Guard reasoned that temperature changes had very little to do with the unpleasantness of the male’s moods. “Of course, Shalott.”
The response, this time, was a scoff. Then Shalott held out his hand, shaking it at Lydia. “Coming now, dearest?”
“Oh, Perce.” Lydia shook her head and turned to Guard, her hands playing with her fiancé’s ring now that she didn’t pull on any more ribbons or unbutton any more buttons. “I can see why they call this one Labor. So many stairs. I fear it will make up my next nightmares—endless stairs—” Without moving, she craned to stare down into the chasm. “And I already know endless falls will haunt my nights for a while. That and grabby statues.” She shuddered again. “Or worse, grabby statues waiting at the end of a great fall to lift you up and drop you down all over again.”
While she rambled on, she dropped her hands and at last started to edge around the chasm. At that point, Guard retrieved the map. It had changed, having filled in to show the cavernous room, or at least this top part of the stairs. There was still no hint of the ultimate destination nor a hint of how to win, but there seemed to be nowhere but one place to go. Down. He carefully rolled up the map, returned it to his pouch, and carried his bow in his left hand for readiness. Then he followed, worrying over the citrusy tomb-wood he smelled behind cracked white walls and flooring, and the lack of evident enforcers like the retrievers. The memory of them awoke his imagination, making their touch spill down his back. He tightened his grip on his bow, not wanting to see one of those automatons in this place. But wanting didn’t change the reality, so instead Guard wisely kept a close watch on the unguarded walls for the first hint of danger.
* * *
They started down the deep stairs—and he had to take two large strides to move from one to the next. But where the stairs were generous in one direction, they were stingy in another: just wide enough for three abreast. After that first stair, he fell in on the outside, nearest the chasm, and they kept Lydia in the center.
His charges seemed to remember the retrievers, too, for their gazes constantly crept back to the smooth walls, searching among the wall lights for something . . .
They had not gone far before Guard smelled this anticipated something a couple stairs ahead: a moving spicy mass of . . . “Tomb-wood.”
Lydia stumbled as a figure bulged from the wall as Hasp had done on the outside of the Tower. But this formation was bronze colored. Guard caught her, and she clutched at him and Shalott equally. “Oh, no, what is it?”
“Stay here,” Guard ordered, and he approached it, arrow aimed.
It was not a retriever; it was . . . a figure of a man, life-sized, half a foot taller than himself and broader of shoulder. He pressed his arrow tip to it, and bone-wood faded right away. That meant a great deal of tomb-wood.
So Time’s enforcers were made of a weaker mixture than Labor’s? Not good.
What did the map say of these automatons? Or automaton. As he pulled his mother’s gift out, Guard looked around and could not spot others. Either this one was going to follow, or more likely, the tomb-wood threats would only emerge at certain intervals, for he doubted there would only be one to cover three people.
The map confirmed his scrutiny: only one stylized half-circle bulged on the wall. It was colored bronze.
He put his mother’s gift away, looked back up the stairs, and said, “You may approach.”
They did so slowly, and the automaton’s gaze tracked their progress.
Lydia stopped short, hand clasped over her mouth. “Oh, my, that is Ravenscar.”
Shalott squinted up at the statue’s face, beginning at the short wavy hair, moving down the strong, shaven jaw, then lingering on the slight, crooked smile. “Oh, yeah. Same irritating smirk.” He waved a hand before its eyes, but the gaze never left Lydia’s face. “So Ravenscar’s a retriever now?”
“It is made of the same material, but it is different. The material is purer, stronger. Its arms do not reach. And it emerged from the wall instead of lying in wait. I am not certain its function is retrieval.”
“Oh, I couldn’t bear if he—you can carry us down through the . . . the drop if he . . . if the statue turned out to be one, right, Guard?” Lydia’s hands crept to her throat. “Just maybe don’t carry us so tightly this time.” She coughed.
Guard wondered about that. That would completely circumvent the purpose of this Trial, but still it was worth finding out what sort weapon this place would wield against them. He shouldered the bow and said, “Wait there.” He pointed down the stairs, away from the statue.
“Why—”
“Move away from the possible threat.” Once they obeyed, Guard stepped backward, aetherizing as he went, proud of his speed at that ability. He didn’t even need to pause; he simply dropped off the edge, hovering just below stair level. From there, he floated out to the middle of the chasm.
The statue didn’t respond. The room did.
The stairs flattened and extended knifelike from every direction, aiming toward the center as fast as a bayard-back ride, the swiftest speed known to spirits.
Groaning and shaking, the stairs cast the seekers onto their hands and knees, perilously near the gaps.
Guard lunged up and to the wall, wondering if he should try for the seekers, but where would they go? The former stairs, now giant blades, heaved under him and threatened to buckle under and slice up his charges. The spot under himself was the most violent of all. Taking the hint, Guard quickly dropped back into human form.
The response? A soft rumble and then stillness and silence as the deadly stone-wood and tomb-wood mixture retreated, snicking neatly into place around an unfathomable depth. The weapons were stairs once more.
So scouting ahead was not only impossible but deadly. Running a hand along the bowstring secure across his chest, Guard sought his charges.
Shalott was helping Lydia stand, scowling and fretting over her. She held her knee and limped as she ascended toward the stair Guard stood on. “It’s all right, it’s all right. I just landed hard.”
“I can’t aetherize to scout ahead or carry you. It would defeat the purpose of this Trial.”
“Yes, thank you, Glorious Guide
, we got that when we nearly pitched headlong into Bara’s Toothy Pit.”
“Perce.”
“Some guide—he doesn’t even know this stuff. Just trial and error.”
“Because you are not the only ones being tested, Seekers.”
“And her love is being tested by a long descent?” They stopped on Guard’s deep stair. “How stupid.”
“No, it’s not.” Lydia stopped rubbing her knee and raised her chin. “I’d do anything for love. Even walk a million miles.”
Shalott sneered. “At least, he has to walk it with us—at our side, for once.”
“Oh, Perce.”
“If you’re going to cheat, Cambion,” Shalott began, stalking closer to him, “you have to do that at our side, too. Or better yet, not cheat at all!” He gestured wildly at the chasm. “I think cheating had nothing to do with the ‘complicated nature of her heart’ and everything to do with you. Which is why that death trap”—He stabbed a finger at Guard’s chest—“happened.”
Perhaps he meant Guard to flinch, but it was his friend who did instead, turning away from them.
Guard did not like to agree with the male, but in this case, there was a grain of truth to it. One the size of Time’s hourglass sand. Hard to ignore. “You are right, Shalott. This place will prevent like action.”
“Oh, really! Oh. You—” Shalott stopped, evidently confused by his agreement. This lead to a growl, a retreat, and his hand scrubbing through his straight, blond hair. “Fine, then. Why don’t you make yourself useful and start guiding, Oh Fearless Guide?”
Guard dipped his head in assent then resumed his descent, and they all fell into previous positions.
Lydia didn’t speak as they walked on, passing another Ravenscar statue. Or perhaps it was the same statue, for the first had shrunk back into the wall before this one had emerged a short time later in their journey. It seemed to submerge and reemerge at unknown intervals, sometimes after five deep stairs, sometime after ten, or three. Speed made no difference. At least, the occurrence caused Shalott to alternate his mutters between Guard’s usefulness and a distrust for how numerous and “smirky” the “smirkers” were.
After a long march with no change, they took a break. Shalott slumped onto a stair with a grumble. Lydia eased down and rubbed her sore knee—under the staring tomb-wood eyes of her fiancé’s statue. It had been a few stairs up, but the moment she sat, it emerged but a foot from her side.
The stairs were narrower after they began again. If Guard were free to walk as normal, he would not need to the full two strides to move from one to the next. The others, with their shorter pace, did not notice. Guard decided not to bring it up until her next break.
CHAPTER 9
Definitely narrower.
The stairs were not the only change. The statue that had emerged during their break looked different. The curly hair had grown longer. And . . . Guard stepped down to the stair nearest Lydia, so he could stand even with the statue. Yes, it is shorter: only as tall as me now.
The map confirmed what he had noted about the stairs; the statues, however, remained bronze semi-circles inked upon parchment.
“Why do you keep looking at that?” Shalott looked up from the stair below Lydia’s he had perched on. “It’s not going to miraculously change.”
Guard’s explanation about the stairs was not met with instant acceptance from Shalott. He stood up, demanding to see the map he had so callously disregarded a moment before. Lydia, far more trusting, just lifted her head from her hands and let out a small sound of dismay, twin to the one she had given at the start of the break, when, no matter how many stairs she moved down, the statue followed, emerging at her side. Now, from her seat, she asked, a little breathily, “So I shouldn’t take breaks?”
Because of this reaction, Guard decided to not to inform her about the statues, which she already considered “hateful.” He doubted the small alterations in appearance, or those to come, would make them less so. Instead, he answered, “I don’t know.”
She rose. “Or should our breaks be shorter?”
“I don’t know.”
“Of course, he doesn’t.” Shalott glared down at the map in his hand. “Why would he? Your heart is being tested? What does a cambion know of that?” Shalott tossed the map at Guard as he turned quickly on the stair. He stumbled, caught himself, and growled at Guard’s hand offered in assistance. “How can you guide anyone in this place, Half Spirit? By Bara, I think you are supposed to be more of a hindrance than a help.”
“Oh, no, we never would have made it this far, without you, Guard!”
Guard, replacing the map in his pouch, wondered if that was an example of human irony. A guide was required by the Trials—a guide bound by rules as much as the seekers were, a guide who wanted to succeed as much as, or more than, they did.
“Maybe we should resume,” Guard suggested. Partly because it was easier to puzzle out the changes and their impact by progressing.
Mostly because the seekers found it hard to talk and argue while descending the stairs.
* * *
Many stairs later, since their energy declined more rapidly than their downward progress toward the unseen exit, Shalott ordered breaks every half hour. “Starting now.” He groaned as he sat. “Because, there’s no way we’ll survive longer goes without refreshment. Too bad we didn’t think to bring any.” He snapped his fingers. “Oh wait, some of us wanted to but were overruled. Who could that be, Oh Glorious Guide?”
“Oh, Perce.” Then Lydia blushed as she caught herself rubbing at her mouth. “Sorry. You didn’t know any better, Guard.” From her seat, she reached up and patted Guard’s . . . booted ankle consolingly.
“He should’ve.”
“And how should we measure thirty-minute increments, Shalott? Did you bring a timepiece?”
Shalott scowled. “Fat lot of good it would have done us if I had remembered one, Guide—not part of your list of ‘necessities,’ now was it?”
“Oh, Perce.”
That did not stop you from bringing the revolver, Guard thought. Instead of saying this, Guard simply put away his map (still no exit or new clues) and wished his mother had given him a manual on human maintenance instead. He’d especially like a section on how to make males stop arguing that didn’t involve physical methods, like a firm shake or a gag. The spirits would approve; unfortunately, Lydia would not.
“We should move on,” Guard suggested.
So they did.
And the stairs narrowed a little.
The statues shrank and changed a little.
The seekers weakened a little.
* * *
The next break featured a minor blasphemy, all because Guard made the mistake of trying to hearten drooping Lydia by more than an offered arm. During the walk, he spoke on how the Trials were like the ordeals Purgatory’s ghosts underwent. Except those were in the name of penance. And lasted nine years before her ghosts faced The Vault, their final judgment, and their ultimate destination. Guard didn’t like to say too much on it because it reminded him Victoria, of her years of ordeal, and of the locket that embodied her temptation (her daughter Rose and her husband, whose pictures rested inside)—but it mostly reminded him of her journey that ended this night, and he didn’t want to think on that now. So Guard kept the explanation brief.
Guard’s “wonderful little pep talk”—as Shalott later called it—had not gone over well. If anything, Lydia tired more as they walked. And Shalott must have decided a rebuttal was required, for once the rest had restored his breath, he launched a diatribe on “Purgatory,” as he still miscalled The City:
“It just proves how arbitrary and unfair your kind is. And what do you know of sin anyway? Your shade snatchers decide this sin or this person gets a second chance, and so after nine years, he goes on to Pleasance? And what of the living? People make mistakes all the time. How many of them get second chances? Blast, there are many second chances I’d love . . . ” Shalott traile
d off—blushing, Guard thought, though it was hard to tell, since he and Lydia both were heavily flushed from the labors. Then with a groan, he pushed to his feet and cut their break short. “What are we wasting time for?”
The stairs narrowed.
The statues shrank and changed.
The seekers weakened.
And Guard stayed silent, electing not to disabuse them on their mistaken beliefs about The City and her goddess. He didn’t desire another blasphemy during the next break.
* * *
Guard got one anyway. Shalott had just eased his legs out, stiffly, before him on the stair and nearly fell off it despite the care he’d taken. “Bara take this! What is the point of this? A maze to test your love? A long set of stairs? These Trials are as ludicrous as our guide. They are just meant to torture you.”
Lydia, who sat perilously near the chasm to avoid the proximity of the staring statue, hunched her shoulders. “Oh, please, Perce. Don’t.”
“The truth is, this is just Purgatory, lots of endless suffering, and for what?”
“Perce, please.” Lydia hunched further. “Stop.”
If anything his voice, cracking, grew louder, “A pipe dream. That’s all Purgatory is. A lie. Sins and mistakes are forever, not something a select, random few get to work off. At least, the people in the Pit know they have nothing to hope for.”
“Perce—” She placed her hands over eyes. “Please!”
“And these Trials are the same. Lies.”
Unlike reapers, when Purgatory’s ghosts went out in the world, they went out unguarded. They performed their ordeal of labor by entering dreams or inspiring visions, and in this way, they subtly assisted humans in avoiding their fate. In this way, they made up for past sins. All the while, they could not forget they did so at risk of their own lives. After all, there was no safe passage to Pleasance’s Garden; one either paid for it with life’s risks and struggles, or with death’s. Many of the goddess’s ghosts did not return from their laboring. At first, Guard blamed the ghouls and spirit holders. It was not until later he learned, from those who watched through spectral windows, that some had simply given up the attempt. Because labor wore one down, making one want to surrender to the easier path. That was one of its purposes—to weed out the weak.