Yael had her hands up at her shoulders, to show they were empty. Fenrir watched with unblinking eyes.
“You remember me, don’t you, Fenrir? We crossed the Waste together. You wanted to eat me. Remember?”
That seemed like a bad place to start, given the circumstances, but Fenrir issued a brief, rumbling growl, like an old engine attempting to start after idle years. Yael seemed to take it as confirmation, so I decided to do the same.
“Is Jenny here with you?”
Fenrir yawned, and then scratched aggressively behind one of his ears, where the skin was noticeably raw and abscessed.
“Don’t ignore me!” Yael snapped. “I’m not afraid of you, Fenrir.”
He ignored her.
“Jenny doesn’t know you’re here, does she?”
Fenrir stopped scratching, and turned his attention back to Yael. Anyone else would have shut up.
“I thought so.” Yael crossed her arms and gave him a pitying smile. “What are you trying to do, Fenrir?”
The dog glanced briefly in the direction of the dead fish-people.
“You aren’t that hungry,” Yael declared, despite all the evidence to the contrary. “There are easier meals to be had in the Nameless City.”
Fenrir made a very casual movement, seeming to amble in Yael’s direction almost incidentally. The perverse intent blazing in its eyes would have been impossible for a dog.
Dunwich darted between them, hissing and spitting like a firework. We were all given pause by the absurd display of bravado.
Fenrir rose to his feet, pausing for a long stretch. The cat held his ground, eyeing the dog nearly ten times his size with casual aplomb.
“What do you mean, Fenrir? You were waiting for me?”
It was a serious question. Yael looked personally affronted.
Another yawn from Fenrir. It climbed another step, planting a paw the size of Dunwich’s head.
“You were.”
Yael nodded slowly. I got the feeling that Fenrir had let her down, somehow.
“Why?”
If a dog could laugh, then it would have sounded like the noise Fenrir made. Dogs cannot laugh; Fenrir was no dog, so this presented no obstacle.
“So gross.” Yael pursed her lips. “Fine, then. Dunwich, please stand aside.”
The cat hesitated a moment, then retreated slowly, giving Fenrir a meaningful glare.
Yael beckoned for Fenrir.
“Come on then,” she chided sourly, “if you want it so bad.”
Fenrir exploded at her like a spring-loaded snake in a can. She just waited for him, hands outstretched as if inviting, on the balls of her feet like a dancer. The dog-monster’s mouth swung open like a gate, and only Yael’s outstretched arm prevented it from closing on her head. As it was, Fenrir’s jaw clamped shut on her left forearm like a well-oiled bear trap, and I braced myself for the screaming.
Yael grimaced, but made no noise. Fenrir worked his jaw and shook his head from side to side, eyes rolling with effort and frustration. Drool and bloody foam collected on the surface of her windbreaker, but Fenrir’s yellowed fangs found no purchase on the fabric, glancing off harmlessly.
Yael’s other arm jabbed up into the side of Fenrir’s neck, stabbing him quickly with something that I couldn’t quite make out. Fenrir whined and released his hold, snarling at Yael. I tried to call out a warning, but was too late, as Fenrir lunged and took hold of one of Yael’s legs, tugging her to the ground. Yael seemed unafraid of the monster attempting to devour her legs, calmly sticking him with something sharp and metallic below and behind his right ear. Fenrir had no more success biting through Yael’s tights than he had with her windbreaker. Yael kicked Fenrir firmly in his bloodstained nose, and then repeated the action when he failed to release his hold.
Dunwich detached himself from whatever shadow he had been lurking within, emerging as an animated ball of claws and teeth and feline rage, launching an assault on Fenrir’s hind legs. Fenrir howled, but the sound cut off as Yael landed another kick to his snout, freeing her leg. She scrambled to her feet as Fenrir spun and wheeled, snapping his jaws futilely in an attempt to halt Dunwich’s merciless assault.
Fenrir listed abruptly, as if dizzy or drunk, and then fixed Yael with a resentful look.
Yael kicked the dog in the side of his head, and he fell over. She studied him closely, and then followed up with a soccer kick that snapped Fenrir’s jaw shut.
Roanoke must have some rough neighborhoods.
Fenrir whimpered, and got hit across the nose for his troubles. Dunwich retreated, but not before he tore one Fenrir’s hind legs to ribbons.
“Stay down.” Yael held an aerosol can menacingly. “Bad dog.”
He whined and pawed at his neck and the syringe lodged there. I wondered about the advisability of the girl’s chemistry major.
Fenrir came to rest reluctantly, yawning and giving us an extensive viewing of his jagged teeth.
“It’s an extract of Azure,” Yael explained guilty, snatching the syringe out of Fenrir’s neck, and then carefully placing it in a pocket in her shoulder bag. “Sweet dreams, Fenrir. Or not.”
I winced at the mention of Azure. There were still strange lights at the periphery of my vision, occasionally, and my mind felt blunted and dulled.
“Fenrir…really has a thing for you, huh?”
“In the worst way,” Yael agreed bitterly. “I thought he would be over it, by now.”
“You think Jenny…?”
“No. This is personal, between me and him.”
“That’s disturbing, Yael.”
“You’re telling me.”
“Fenrir wants to eat you?”
“At least.”
That shut me right up.
I didn’t bother to dispute when Yael went to work with her unusual picking tools. She was worlds better than I was, and there was no certainty as to how long Fenrir would remain asleep. The door held out for a minute or two, and then the lock gave way to Yael’s efforts. Yael pulled her mask on, and then we continued, soft reflections of our flashlights glimmering off the knobbed surface of the coral.
“Where did you get all of that stuff, anyway?”
“Do you mean the mask?”
Duh.
“For starters. The jacket and tights that Fenrir couldn’t bite through are a nice touch…”
“The mask belonged to my brother, Jacob, who was lost to Avici,” Yael explained matter-of-factly. “In Roanoke, we called this fabric Weave, and traded with the Visitors for it. My family held an interest in such trade, so a portion of my wardrobe was composed of it. Weave isn’t indestructible, but it’s the next best thing. They are all I have left of my home, Preston, and wearing them is a remembrance – but they are also useful.”
“I’ll say.”
All the wet sealed out of the previous section of tunnel was apparent here. The coral was dotted with starfish and anemone, and salt water dripped from the walls and ceiling. From the angle of our brief descent, we were beneath the harbor itself, with a few meters of porous rock separating us from all that cold black water. A type of glowing barnacle was scattered across portions of the wall, providing limited light, at least near the door.
“The air is okay in here,” she said softly, panning her flashlight across the dripping surface of the ceiling. “Lots of moisture, but okay.”
“You can tell?”
“I can,” she said, tapping the side of her mask. “The lenses.”
As if that explained it.
“Do your lenses include tide tables?”
“Unfortunately, no,” she said. “I think we’ll be fine if we make it quick, though.”
“You’re insane! We’ll drown down there. You don’t even know how far it goes.”
“I’m going to find out.” She pointed up the stairwell. “Dunwich, watch the door. Watch Preston, too, if he decides to stay, I suppose.”
The cat padded over to the center of the open door, a safe distance from
the unconscious Fenrir, and gave me a smug look. Yael clambered down the stairs and out of sight. The cat and I stared at each other accusatorily, trying not to get close to the twitching dog.
“You’re one to talk,” I snarled. “She left you up here to protect you, fleabag.”
Dunwich began calmly cleaning his whiskers.
“This is crazy! She’s crazy! Aren’t you supposed to stop her from doing crazy things? She’s going to drown down there.” I was shouting, now, every word reverberating off the walls around me. “The fucking tide is going to come in, and then she’s going to…”
“Preston!”
I winced at the sound of Yael’s voice, coming up from below.
“Yes?”
“Please be quiet.”
“Sorry.”
In the half dark, Dunwich gave me a look.
“Okay, fine!” I snapped, stomping down the stairwell. “Have it your way. When I die, cat, I expect my tombstone to hold you responsible. By name.”
I splashed hurriedly down the uneven stares, arms out in case I lost my footing, eager to rejoin Yael, and the comparatively generous illumination of her flashlight.
The stair was mercifully short, for all my histrionics. Yael was already at the bottom, busy with her picks. I stayed quiet and let her work on the door. It was a bigger, thicker cousin to those we had already encountered, made of fire-hardened lumber sealed with pitch. It was fitted with thick metal hardware that appeared to have suffered more from colonization by glowing barnacles than rusting, thanks to a protective laminate, and its builder had obviously not intended for it to open for just anybody.
It took Yael thirty minutes. The entire time, I was losing my mind, certain that every trickle of water that leaked from the ceiling foretold a flood. The persistent effects of the Azure seemed to magnify my anxiety. I felt deliciously profound relief when the lock gave way, and I heard Yael’s satisfied hum and the tinkle of her tools as she returned them to their wrap.
The door required some persuading. I spent several nervous minutes fooling about with hand position and leverage, before it finally gave way. The door howled like a mother giving birth as it slid slowly open.
Yael turned her flashlight on to the gloom inside. And shrieked.
The beam blinded hundreds of unblinking, flat eyes.
I slammed the door shut, and we looked at each other.
“Dunwich!” Yael shouted, sprinting up the stairs, a step ahead of me. “Run!”
Behind us, I could hear the heavy door groan.
***
We sprinted as far as the middle door, and then we started tripping on the irregular stairs, and were forced by exhaustion and bruising to slow our pace. At the door, Dunwich waited, contrary to instructions, and then took the lead with an easy grace that made me want to murder him. Fenrir watched us run past him blearily, his muzzle wavering over his paws. The mob of fish-people somewhere behind us in the dark made unnervingly little noise until they encountered Fenrir, and then the tunnel was a cacophony of impacts and howling.
I stepped into a depression in the coral and fell, banging my shins. The rough surface tore at the palms of my hands as I struggled back to my feet, not daring to glance back at the fishy mob I could just barely hear behind me. Webbed fingers closed around my ankle like a vice, and I pitched forward. I kicked frantically, aiming to dislodge the grip on my ankle, the sole of my shoe impacting wet, squishy flesh to no apparent effect. I spun around to face the fish-person – the first of many, as the stairs behind him swarmed with Servants – and kicked it with both legs in his sunken chest. The fish-person toppled over into the crowd behind it, the scales on its hands scraping the flesh from my ankle as it fell. I turned and resumed clambering up the stairs on all fours. The light of the surface was frustratingly distant, and a fishy miasma surrounded me.
Another dozen stairs, my legs burning in protest. Another tumble over an unseen lip on the uneven stairs, tearing the skin from my shin, and making me cry out. Fish-person hands clutched at my hair and slapped my back. Only the narrow confines of the stairwell prevented them from mobbing me. I lashed out with balled fists in a furious panic, battering the nearest fish-person until I was free. Gritting my teeth, I resumed my agonizing sprint to the top.
The light grew brighter. A fish-person clamped onto the collar of my jacket, and for a terrible moment, my balance wavered, one foot scraping the top of the next step, terribly aware of the presumably ravenous horde behind me. I shrugged out of my rain jacket, and the fish-person lost its balance, tripping up the Servants behind it. The tangle gave me a moment, and I used it, making a final push for the doorway, my hands glued to my burning thighs.
The last of the stairs were as agonizing as the Stations of the Cross. I stumbled out into the light, and Dunwich was a yowling blur across my vision, using my shoulder as a stepping-stone to launch himself at the face of the fish-person in closest pursuit. The fish-person slapped at the cat ineffectually as Dunwich sliced its face into sashimi.
Yael yelled my name, and grabbed my shoulder insistently.
“Preston!” Her voice was hoarse and her face flushed. “The door! Help me!”
She was struggling with the heavy wooden door, throwing her whole weight against it. The door made slow progress, scraping along wet stone and damp ash. I staggered over and put my back to the door, planted my feet against the flagstones, and then pushed.
The door jerked forward a few centimeters, and then caught the edge of an uneven flagstone, buckled by the fire, and locked into place. Yael cried out, and we both redoubled our efforts, feet sliding through the puddles on the ground. The door squealed, giving way a few scant centimeters. A fish-person emerged from the door, both eyes ruptured by cat claws, Dunwich attached to the back of its neck.
“Preston!” Yael shouted, rain beading on the lenses of her gas mask. “Hurry!”
The door skipped forward another small distance, and then collided firmly with a Servant of the Deep at the head of the stairs. I took a step back, and then launched myself at the door, hitting it with the meat of my shoulder with an agonizing crack. The door shrieked and skittered across wet stone, knocking the fish-person back on his comrades. Yael was nearly horizontal, legs extended behind her, rain boots wedged into the cracks between the flagstones for leverage. I collected myself, took a step back, and threw myself at the door, this time spinning to take the impact on my back. The door gave way like a miser, the bare minimum.
Picking myself up was harder this time.
Once more. My back howled in protest at the impact, and the tips of my fingers went numb.
Yael kicked the door the final centimeter. The latch snapped closed. Yael dropped to the base of the door, taking a short metal spike from her satchel. She wedged it carefully beneath the door, and then kicked it a few times, until it was firmly lodged. The wooden door rattled and complained as the fish-people attacked it, and we watched apprehensively, but it held.
Yael ran over to assist Dunwich with the lone escaped fish-person, but the cat was firmly in control of the situation. There was little left of the Servant’s face and neck, and Dunwich was busy cleaning scales and fish oil from his muzzle. Yael cried out happily, tore her mask off, and then embraced the leery cat, oblivious to the smell.
“We should get moving,” I suggested, rubbing my back. “That door won’t hold forever.”
Yael nodded, and released Dunwich, who dashed away, and then set about rebuilding his dignity, safely out of reach. We limped through the alleys of Innsmouth, secretly grateful to hear the sound of the ocean recede as we went.
“Was that what you wanted to show me? The fish-people?”
“Servants of the Deep,” Yael corrected. “Not exactly. The main point was the arson.”
“I don’t get it.”
“Holly burned her sister’s home to the ground,” Yael explained, cleaning residual goo from her mask with a microfiber cloth. “Remember the bones upstairs, in the burned building?”
“Yeah?”
“Whoever set fire to Madeleine’s house didn’t bother to check to see if it was empty – or didn’t care. We underestimated Holly Diem.”
“I guess.”
I noticed a cat slinking across the roof of the warehouse across the street, and another near the footbridge on Cambridge Street. They took no special note of us, nor did they move to follow, but I got the feeling the Cats of Ulthar were keeping an eye on us nonetheless. I wasn’t sure if that made me feel better or not. Snowball was capricious and inscrutable, and I had no idea what his interest would be, if he chose to get involved with this mess. I snuck a look at Dunwich, wondering if he was doing double duty as Ulthar’s spy, but he did not so much as acknowledge the other cats, focused as always on his mistress.
“Are you doing okay, Preston?”
It wasn’t a particularly long walk to the train station, but I was feeling every step of it. My head buzzed and ached, my legs were shaky and weak, and my entire back was turning into one large bruise. I wanted to go to bed, but I was afraid that if I were to lay down, I would likely never make it back up.
“I’ll live,” I decided, with a sigh. “You?”
Yael nodded.
“You think those fish-people will follow us?”
“No. I don’t think they can go very far from the water. They had to dig a tunnel all the way from the ocean to Prospect Hill, in order to free Madeleine from the observatory.”
“Yeah. Guess that’s why Madeleine needed Elijah’s help.”
“Maybe. I don’t think Madeleine’s resources are limited to the slaves of the Drowned Empress.”
I didn’t have the energy to ask about it. The endless cults and horrowshow deities of the Nameless City bore me.
“I can’t decide which is worse,” I said, waiting at a deserted stoplight in the light rain, three blocks from the station. “The cultists or the fish-people.”
“The fish-people smell worse.”
“Good point.”
11. Celestewhite
An inventory of that which was taken. Faded and curling at the edges, damp from many hours held tightly to the chest, as a keepsake, as a burden. Spilled like honey, lost as time is lost. Tears collecting at the corner of the eye, hot and precious.
The Mysteries of Holly Diem (Unknown Kadath Estates Book 2) Page 19