The Nightmare Garden ic-2

by Caitlin Kittredge

  He took another step toward us, then planted his feet. “I’m going to take you from here, Aoife, and I’m going to put you in an iron box, where you can never, ever hurt anyone else. You’ll think I’m a monster, but what I really am is a man. A normal man, without any gifts, a man who protects his world and the people in it by any means necessary. I thought in Innsmouth we could come to an understanding, but that blood of yours will always betray you.” Another step.

  “Fine,” I said. “But I’m through letting you threaten the decent people, who don’t know the truth.”

  He sneered at me. “You think you’re meant to stop me, be a heroine who casts aside the darkness? You’re the opposite. It’s you who is the bringer of darkness and damnation, Aoife, and I’m the cleansing fire.”

  His hands flashed out and one closed around my arm, the other around Casey’s. “Now you come with me. We’re going to put you where I should have in the first place.”

  Casey stared at me with panicked eyes, but I shook my head. Draven had found the Brotherhood, but he hadn’t found the truth, and the sooner we got out of this room, the better. Before he realized how close he was to the unimaginable power he craved.

  We made our way to the ground, where two Proctors thrust us into our cold-weather gear. Casey was shuffled off with the other line of prisoners. I caught sight of Crosley, the side of his head bleeding red droplets onto the ice, handcuffed in a row of men waiting to board the Dire Raven. He glared at me as I passed by under Draven’s protection. “I hope you’re happy,” he snapped. “I know you brought him here. I knew I shouldn’t have trusted you.”

  “I’m not remotely happy,” I told him, and meant it. Draven huffed and pulled me along.

  “You’re about to get unhappier still,” Draven said. “And believe me, the only reason you aren’t shackled with the rest of them is because you agreed to help me.”

  We rounded the corner of the dirigible, and my heartbeat picked up. I had one chance to get away from Draven, one chance to hope that I hadn’t accepted his vile compass and doomed everyone in the Brotherhood for nothing.

  I’d visited the nightmare clock. I’d done what I’d come back to the Iron Land to do. Now where the hell was he? He’d always had a flair for the dramatic.

  Draven pounded on the hull, and a black-clad Proctor slid open a small hatch, extending a set of steps that I guessed ran straight to Draven’s personal quarters. The Proctor shivered in the harsh wind sweeping across the glacier. “W-w-welcome back, sir.”

  Draven reached back to pull me inside, and I decided all was lost, just before the vertigo gripped me and I fell to my knees.

  Another gust blew snow across my eyes, and when they cleared, Tremaine stood before me. “Aoife …,” he started, and then his eyes fell on Draven and the gaping Proctor. “Oh.”

  I stayed still, watching. Waiting to see what would happen. Draven stared, absolutely still, as did Tremaine. The Proctor was the first to move. He raised his rifle and aimed it at Tremaine, but the Fae was too quick. I watched, almost awed at his fluid movements as his silver knife slipped from its hiding place in his sleeve. He ducked behind the Proctor and drew the knife soundlessly across his throat.

  The man dropped to the snow, a fan of crimson spreading from under his body and freezing on the ice. I stared, shrinking away from the corpse. Tremaine’s savagery always came as a shock—his face was so beautiful, you couldn’t see the cruelty in it until you looked into his eyes.

  Draven raised his chin. “Am I supposed to be afraid of you, silver-blooded freak?”

  “I don’t know,” Tremaine said with a grin. “Are you a smart man or a stupid one, human?” He wiped his knife on his sleeve, twice, and tucked it back into his sheath.

  “Oh, come on, Draven,” I said, sensing my opening. “Surely you’re not going to let this Fae get away with that. After all …” I looked to Tremaine, hoping he’d pick up my cue. “The Head of the Proctors would never be worried by one Fae.”

  Tremaine grinned at that, thin and cruel. “Oh,” he said. “So clever, Aoife, well done.”

  Draven pulled his pistol, but it was already a losing proposition. The Fae was faster, stronger, angrier, and I watched the same way you’d watch a frog strike a fly. Tremaine pulled Draven close, disarmed him with a wet cracking sound in his wrist and spun him around, front to back. “I think we’re going to have a fine time together, Grey Draven,” he hissed. “My queen will be so pleased to meet you.”

  “No.…” I watched Draven struggle, all the color draining from his face. “No, you can’t.…”

  “See?” I told him. “I told you I wouldn’t help you. You should listen to me, Draven.” I stepped closer, looked into his eyes. “Maybe you’ll actually stay alive for more than a few minutes when I see you in the Thorn Land.”

  Tremaine laughed when I stepped back from Draven, showing every one of his pointed teeth. “You’re more Fae than you admit, Aoife. And pursuant to that, you’d better get moving.” He gestured at the Dire Raven. “Go south and find your mother. The two of you belong at home.” He pointed to the sky, and far off, I saw a great blackness surrounded by a crimson corona, as if a blot had appeared on the surface of the faint Arctic sun.

  The Old Ones. I hadn’t expected what I’d done. But I was also elated as I watched the tiny black dot in the sky. That meant the clock had worked. Somewhere, my mother was safe.

  I looked back at Tremaine. “I told you, you’ll get us when I’m finished.” I could see from his frown this wasn’t what he wanted to hear, but I didn’t care. Everything Crow had said had been true. I did matter. I had the gift of the Gates, and all that implied. And it was a truth as vast as the encroaching objects in the sky, a truth that I was going to need time, possibly all the time I had left, to accept.

  Now, however, I had to find Dean.

  Tremaine dragged Draven back into the swirling vortex of magic that led to the Thorn Land, but I didn’t stay to watch. I didn’t need to be told twice that I’d made a miraculous escape from Draven. Feeling the soft whump of displaced air as Tremaine used the hexenring, I ran through Draven’s quarters toward the bowels of the ship, toward the cell where I’d last seen Dean.

  Draven had gotten what he deserved. I didn’t feel sorry for him, and I never would.

  “Aoife?” Dean stuck his hands through the bars when he saw me, and I ran up to him, clasping them in mine. “Hell, I thought I might never see you again,” he said.

  “Course you would,” I said. “Don’t be silly.”

  “I’d try for a snappy comeback, but I’ve waited long enough,” Dean said, and pulled me to him, kissing me through the bars. I took my time, the relief at seeing him alive and well making me feel like a puppet with its strings cut.

  “You’re freezing,” I said when we finally broke apart.

  “Funny, what with this being the Arctic and all,” Dean said. I searched the small brig until I found a spare set of keys for the cells, and a pair of mittens, goggles and a coat for Dean. He raised an eyebrow when I unlocked the cell.

  “No magic tricks?” he asked.

  I shook my head, tucking the keys into my coat. “It’s a long story. I can’t do the things I used to.” At least, not without possibly scrambling my brains like an egg, and that was a chance I’d be just as content not to take.

  “Are you all right?” Dean said, staring at me anxiously until he pulled down the goggles over his eyes and obscured his gaze behind reflective glass.

  “I think I am, actually,” I said, and reached out to take his mittened hand. I didn’t know how we were going to get home, and I didn’t know what we’d find when we got there, but for once I’d done something right.

  “Good,” Dean said. “Can we please get the hell out of here? I’ve been in that cell for days.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “I think that’s probably a good idea.”

  Dean flicked a glance at the sky when we were outside. “You hear that? The droning? It’s been going on for a wh
ile now.” He turned his eyes back to me. “What in stars is going on here, Aoife?”

  “I’ll tell you everything, I promise,” I said. “As soon as we’re away from here.” When the sun came up, the Dire Raven could probably fly. Probably. It was a big ship, and getting enough lift in the freezing air would be a trick. I wasn’t too worried about the remaining Proctors. Whoever was still alive would just be grateful to be headed away from this terrible, barren place and away from the slowly spreading stain in the sky. I would be, if I were them.

  “Not soon enough for me,” Dean said, and shivered. I tugged at him.

  “Come on. Let’s at least get back inside the ship, until it’s warm enough to try and fly out of here.”

  “Right behind you,” Dean said. “Just glad to be breathing free air again.”

  Nobody in the prisoner line paid us much attention, nor did the Proctors, who were all running around trying to find Draven. Good luck on that one, I thought, not without happiness. The Iron Land was a better place without Grey Draven in it.

  Harold Crosley saw me again, pointed at the sky with his shackled hands and screamed, “Do you have any idea what you’ve done? You stupid girl! You’ve killed the world! All the worlds!”

  It happened so fast that I wouldn’t have had time to react, even if I’d known what was coming. I played it over and over in my head during the next few days, but I could never find any other conclusion.

  Crosley snatched a gun from a nearby Proctor with his manacled hands. He aimed at me, screaming wordlessly. A weight hit me from the side, throwing me down onto the ice, and there was a blinding green flash as the pistol spoke. I screamed, thinking I’d been shot, but when I looked down expecting a burnt hole in my guts, there was just my dingy white coat, my mittened hands clutching the fabric.

  “No …,” I whispered, looking to Dean.

  He said, “Aoife,” and I turned to see him fall, not all at once but first to his knees, and then to a curious, folded position, his mittens pressed against a dark, wet spot on his stomach. I screamed again, and kept screaming as I rushed to him and tried to cradle his head. Behind us, the Proctors disarmed Crosley and beat him savagely with their truncheons, but it didn’t matter. Dean was still bleeding, and I was still screaming.

  Dean coughed, a small sound against the wind, and I pushed his goggles up before pulling off my mitten with my teeth to stanch the bleeding. Dean had gone white, and a thin line of blood so dark it was nearly black dribbled from the corner of his mouth.

  “You’ll be all right,” I said desperately. He had to be. Had to be all right, despite the ghostliness of his features and the blood that had made his parka sodden and was now spreading into the snow around us. I started to unzip my own coat as he shivered, his teeth rattling.

  He stopped me, squeezing my wrist. “Don’t,” he whispered.

  “Don’t be silly,” I said. “I’ll get you back on the Dire Raven and everything will be fine.”

  Dean swallowed and tried to smile, but he was shivering too much. “Don’t think so,” he muttered. “Not this time.”

  “Dean …” My face was hot despite the icy wind, and my eyes were wet. Dean couldn’t be mortally wounded. My mind wouldn’t accept it, even as the evidence stained the snow under my knees. “Don’t leave me,” I begged.

  “Sorry, princess,” Dean whispered. “Looks like this is the end of the line.”

  “No,” I whimpered, feeling gut-shot myself. “No.…”

  “It’s not so bad,” Dean murmured, his face going slack. “It doesn’t hurt. Doesn’t really feel … like anything.”

  “You’re cold,” I insisted, my mind flying a thousand miles an hour. He was cold. I had to get him warm. If I could just get him warm it would be all right. “I have to get you inside.”

  “No,” Dean said, fumbling to get my bloody mitten back on my already numb hand. “Don’t waste your strength … on me. I’m not going any farther. Aoife …” He struggled with his own mitten until I pulled it off, and he put his hand against my face. “Aoife … I don’t want you to think this is your fault.…”

  “It is,” I said. I was crying in earnest, and could feel the glassy half-frozen tears sliding down my cheeks. “If you hadn’t pushed me—”

  “No,” Dean said forcefully. “You make your own luck in this life, Aoife, and my luck was to be here with you.” He brushed away the tears with his thumb. “I love you, Aoife Grayson, and that’s what I want you to remember. The rest …” He coughed again, and more blood trailed down his chin. “The rest doesn’t matter one good damn.”

  “Things can’t end this way,” I said, although all the desperation had run out of me. I wasn’t very good at lying to myself, when it came down to it. Dean’s eyelids fluttered, and his hand dropped away from me.

  “Just say it back to me,” he said. “Even if it’s not true.”

  I grabbed up his hand again and pressed it against my lips. “It is true,” I whispered. “It is, Dean.” It was painful to voice, but I figured I’d always known Dean was it. Dean was for good. He deserved everything I had to give him, so I did the best thing I could think of to do. After the truth, I told him one more lie.

  “It’s going to be all right, Dean,” I whispered. He looked up at me, and I could see that he knew. He squeezed my fingers once with his, light and fast, like a heartbeat.

  “Yeah,” he whispered. “It is, isn’t it?”

  Dean’s eyes slid closed, and he stilled. He didn’t go limp or convulse, he just went perfectly still, and except for the red stain still spreading beneath us, he could have been part of the ice.

  I bent my head over his chest and sobbed until it felt as if my lungs were frozen, and then I too went still. I couldn’t have moved even if I’d wanted to. I stayed where I was, clutching Dean until ice had grown on my exposed skin, and I would have stayed there until I was completely frozen, while the Proctors loaded the prisoners and ignored one dead boy and one frozen girl, probably thinking her dead as well.

  She might as well have been. After a time, the Dire Raven took off, and my hope of escape along with it, and I still didn’t care. Dean was here, and I couldn’t leave him. I’d failed him, just as I’d failed Nerissa the last time I’d tried to do what I thought was right and destroyed the Engine. I’d tried to save everyone, and I’d saved nobody, nobody in this entire world.

  I would have stayed crouched in the snow until I did freeze to death, except that after it had grown dark, a spotlight framed me as turbines whirred above my head, and an airship blotted out the aurora borealis as they danced above me, wild and free.

  Ladders lowered and two figures dropped down, the crampons on their boots throwing up spikes of ice. One of them raised his goggles and I saw my father’s eyes. I stared back numbly. How had he found me? Why did it matter to him whether I lived or died? I was worthless to his cause now.

  “Aoife!” he shouted, above the wind and the whirr of the Munin’s engines. He came and crouched by me, his breath hot on my ear. “Thank stone you’re all right. When Conrad told me what you’d done …” He saw who I held, and trailed off. “Oh, gods.” He felt for Dean’s pulse beneath his coat, and then he gently put his hands over mine. “Aoife, you have to let go now,” he told me. “Let him go and we’ll take care of him.”

  I knew that I couldn’t let go of Dean, but I was so cold and weak I couldn’t resist as Archie hauled me to my feet and slung me into his arms, carrying me like a tiny child as the ladder lifted all of us into the Munin.

  While we floated off the glacier, I felt as if I were staring at myself from down a long tunnel, or through a spyglass, watching a thin-faced girl with dark hair poking wildly from under her cap letting herself be taken aboard an airship, leaving behind nothing but blood on the snow to mark that she’d ever been there.

  20

  Aboard the Munin

  ONCE I’D BEEN settled in blankets aboard the Munin by my father, I pressed my forehead against the porthole and watched the true aur
ora borealis as we turned south. It was bright and sharp and unpredictable, like Dean. I could almost think he was out there, rather than strapped in the hold of the Munin.

  Someone sat down across from me and pressed a mug of something warm into my hands. Eventually I looked up and saw my brother.

  “So,” Conrad said. “It looks like despite your best attempts, you didn’t manage to kill yourself. Dad says you have some frostbite but you weren’t out there long enough to get hypothermia.” He took a sip from his own mug. “I know you probably hate me for ratting on you, Aoife, but …” He sighed. “I’m your brother, and I’m not going to stop looking out for you just because things change.”

  “How are we flying?” I said, because it was the only thing I could think of to say. “We should be icing up and crashing and dying.”

  Conrad blinked. “The Munin has a deicing system. Valentina designed it, I think.”

  “Oh,” I said. Dean was dead. Dean was dead and cold and it was my fault.

  Archie came and stood by Conrad, putting a hand on his shoulder. “You doing all right, kiddo?” He shook his head. “Stupid question. Of course you aren’t. You going to be okay to go back down the coast, or do we need to set down once we’re out of the Arctic Circle?”

  “She’s covered in blood,” Conrad pointed out.

  “It’s not mine,” I said. The words came out flat and toneless. It was how I felt, as if something had stepped on me and stopped my heart from beating right along with Dean’s.

  Archie squeezed my hand. “I’m furious with you for running off like that, and for running to the Brotherhood,” he said quietly. “But that doesn’t matter now. Are you going to be all right, at least?”

  I couldn’t muster the energy to outline the many ways in which I was not, so I just turned my face back to the porthole.