A Boat Made of Bone (The Chthonic Saga)

by Grotepas, Nicole

  Kate surveyed what she had to work with as she clapped her hands together to get rid of the dust and chalk. The mountain was so unnatural because it was actually a city wall. Down below her the streets and buildings spread out like a blanket full of blocky, bluish Lego buildings. Statues hung from the ledges of the tops of the structures, many of them tall enough that they seemed disproportionate to the buildings they balanced upon. There was something ghostly and ghastly about the winding, labyrinthine streets that disappeared into an orange haze in the distance with their gargoyle guardians. From her perch, she could see a towering statue in the very center of the city, on a small hill, of a man triumphantly holding something aloft that looked like a badly done sea creature, and next to it a white palace full of gaudy domes like the kind out of Russian architecture.

  Kate switched out of her climbing shoes quickly, and then the dragonfly led her along the rim of the wall until she came to a trail of switchbacks that led down into the city. She took it and tried to focus on not tripping over everything. Her legs were so tired she found it hard to walk. With each step she felt her thighs threaten to give out. The thin muscles that ran along the top of her shinbone were taut and sore from the workout she’d given her big toes.

  Misty tendrils of vapor rose from the smokestacks jutting from the angled roofs of houses on the outskirts of the city. Kate wiped beads of perspiration from her upper lip and wondered why anyone would need heat in a place so naturally hot. Perhaps to cook? She stumbled on the narrow path and shot a hand out to catch herself. The dragonfly drew up short and waited for her to recover before it continued on.

  Her steps grew heavy with trepidation as she considered what she’d find in the city. So far she knew there were dragons. What else? She hadn’t seen a single sign of life except for the dragon and the smoke. Other than that the place felt like a mausoleum. Could Will really be here?

  At last Kate put a dusty foot on level ground at the bottom of the cliffs. She took a few more steps and halted. Her body was baking in the heat. The ground beneath her shoes was still unnaturally hot and her throat was parched.

  “Wait,” she said to the dragonfly to stop it from zipping away. When it darted around to face her, she slipped out of her backpack and found the last remnants of her water. “If I don’t drink something, I’ll die of thirst.”

  There were less than twelve ounces of water left in her Nalgene. Though her instinct was to gulp the entire thing down, she rationed herself and drank only three ounces. There was no way to know when she’d be able to replenish her water supply.

  After stowing the bottle in her pack, she shouldered it and continued on. “Where we going?” she asked the ever-silent guide. It did nothing but float on, dripping light in its wake.

  The hair on the back of Kate’s neck prickled as she walked through the narrow avenues of the house-like structures on the outskirt of the large city. The whole place was only the size of a small metropolis. In one glance at the top of the mountain she’d seen to the other side with no trouble. There’d been a smattering of tall and large buildings and that aggressive statue in the very center and its palace, plus the block-like structures that seemed like maybe apartments, and then these houses.

  The dragonfly darted ahead of her, fearless and fast, but trepidation made Kate’s heart stutter. She knew nothing about the city. The dragonfly, though helpful as a guide, was silent and that caused an ominous anxiety to grip her lungs and squeeze the air from them.

  The patter of her shoes echoed through the empty cobbled streets. An inexplicable sour odor hung like a fog around her as she darted nervously from alleyway to house to alleyway. Heavy-looking barrels were stacked against the rock walls of the houses and Kate found herself wondering if they held water. Before she could stop to look, her guide turned down an alleyway and vanished. Kate raced after it, turning the corner and hurrying along till she discovered it resting on the stone door of one of the houses.

  “You scared the hell out of me,” she whispered at it, breathless from fear and exhaustion.

  The dragonfly didn’t budge. This must be it, Kate thought. Could this be it? Could this really be where Will lived? Sweat broke out on her palms—additional sweat, since she’d been hot and covered in perspiration since arriving on this strange, frightening world.

  Suddenly, she had no desire to see him. The only thing she wanted was to run away and fall asleep, and perhaps to see him again in the dream, but not this. Not this . . . this reality. Though she’d never done it, it was exactly how she imagined it would be to find someone on the Internet and then try to meet them in real life. Strange. Disorienting. Nerve-wracking.

  But no, she had to do it. She’d come all this way. There was no turning back now. And anyway, how would she even get back? And maybe . . . Maybe this was a dream. The only thing she could do was carry on and if possible, hope to wake up. Without dying.

  Kate squared herself to the door. It was stone—dark blue, almost black and glittering with crystals, like basalt, or something of volcanic origin. She couldn’t knock.

  As though in answer, the dragonfly moved to a cord dangling at the side of the door which Kate had overlooked. She touched it—it was a strange scale-covered kind of hide, leather but suggestive more of the skin of a snake . . . or . . . a dragon. It was like nothing she’d ever touched before and the feel of it sent a chill through her.

  It was obviously the way to notify the occupants that someone was at their door.

  Kate held her breath and yanked on it.

  There were windows with glass in them on either side of the door, but she hadn’t dared to look in. A muted light turned on in one as Kate waited, the thumping of her heart ricocheting through her bones and causing her knees to quiver. She was about to see, literally, the man of her dreams.

  And she couldn’t breathe. The stone door began to slide open, making a grinding noise.

  This is it. This is it.

  The dragonfly was all but forgotten as the door came to a stop. A figure moved into her view.

  Kate couldn’t believe her eyes.

  26: Necropolis

  “Can I help you?” The creature’s voice grated and it spoke with a slight accent that Kate couldn’t place. It tilted its lumpish head to one side, and a hand rested on what could only be called—anatomically, anyway—a hip. The other gripped the inside edge of the door.

  “Uh, there seems to be some kind of mistake. I’m sorry to bother you,” Kate said, turning to go.

  “Probably not. You’d better get in here, before anyone else sees you, young girl.”

  Kate couldn’t move. The creature wanted her to go into its . . . its lair.

  “Pick up your chin and come in, now, before Cipher’s minions find you,” the creature said, raising an arm and motioning for her to get inside.

  Overhead Kate heard the shrill cry of the dragon she’d seen earlier. Without further hesitation she rushed past the creature and paused just past the door.

  Kate turned, inspecting the room, and saw that the dragonfly followed her. It landed on a polished black table next to a lantern that glowed with a white chemical light. The dragonfly was the one thing that reassured her. The only thing she held onto as an anchor, in fact, in this nightmare she’d stumbled into.

  The room was sparse and Kate realized as she surveyed it that it was a hovel, rather than a house. There was a fireplace in one wall with a blue fire going in it, but it didn’t give off heat. Instead, Kate felt a cool air emanating from it, and the fuel that she would have called coals glowed like chunks of ice. A blue vapor hovered around them. Everything else in the room was made of either that bluish stone or polished black wood, while only a few items seemed to be constructed of glass, like the windows, a small table against one wall holding some kind of transparent icebox. Within the icebox she could see red apple-like objects and what might be some kind of pale yellow cheese.

  “How’d you come to be here?” the creature asked, taking a seat in a high-backed cha
ir made of the black wood. It was positioned next to the cool fire. “Please, sit down.” It held a hand out to indicate another chair by the fire.

  Kate turned toward it and remained standing, finally accepting that she was face to face with a mud creature. The only thing that looked human about it were the eyes—dark brown with flecks of green. The light in the room emanating from the strange fire and the white stone lantern at the center of the blackwood-hewn table cast odd, disfiguring shadows across the creature’s body, which wasn’t clothed except with an occasional dead leaf or stick.

  She opened her mouth to answer, but the creature cut her off.

  “Doesn’t matter,” it said, waving a hand. “The point is you’re here. Obviously to stage some sort of rescue. Who’ve you come for?”

  Kate shut her eyes and held up her hand to stop the creature’s plying questions. “Wait, just wait a second, please. Who—who are you?” She blinked and then stared at it levelly.

  “The question is, who was I? You’re looking at the form I’m trapped in. Alive, I was called Leonardo.”

  Kate inhaled. “When you were alive? So—no—it . . . it can’t be true,” she said, rubbing a sweaty palm across her face.

  The mud creature—Leonardo—stood, crossed its—his—hands behind his back while drawing himself up straight and began pacing in front of the table. “Let me guess, please, young girl. You followed a guide of some kind, which brought you here—how, you don’t really grasp. But you traversed a plain of burning grass after the forest of flaming trees? Before that, you lived a life that was disrupted by nightly dreams of the person you’ve come for?”

  “How—you’re not—” Kate struggled to form the ideas.

  “I’m not real? Yes, actually, I am. And no, I’m not the one who brought you here. It was someone else. But you’ve come to me first—your guide led you here—because as all creatures of Chthonos know, I possess a way out.”

  “So there’s a way,” Kate echoed, breathless. Her knees suddenly weakened and her body drained of all strength. She teetered, nearly falling over. Before she could topple, Leonardo sprang to her side displaying a surprising speed, and helped her into one of the chairs in front of the eerie fire.

  “You’re weak,” the creature said, pointing out the obvious as he settled her and stepped back to inspect her. His brown eyes glowed intelligently as he studied her face. “You’re in no shape to be here.”

  Kate sighed. “It wasn’t exactly an easy journey. I had no idea I was coming and I only brought a small amount of water.”

  “This won’t do. No, I’d say you have less than twenty-four hours to get out of here before your body begins to desiccate because of the intense heat and lack of potable water,” Leonardo explained, rubbing a stubby finger across his chin. “Take this,” the creature said, giving her one of the glowing white stones.

  “What is it? Ice?”

  “Ice?” He backed away a few steps and began to pace in front of the fireplace.

  “Frozen water. Ice,” Kate prompted, taking the stone and turning it over in her fingers. “And what am I supposed to do with this?” She turned the object over and over in her fingers. Kate had only seen coal when she had been a child and visited her grandmother in a small town. There was a coal pile beneath the car port, but that was before her grandmother had gotten a gas fireplace and a furnace. Before that, she heated her house with a coal stove. The chunk of rock Leonardo gave Kate looked like white coal.

  “Ah, yes, ice. When I lived on earth, such a thing was rare and could only be obtained in the winter in the high hills. Though, there were ways of packing it with wood shavings that could keep it cool as one brought it down into the warmer valleys.”

  “Wait, you said no water. Really? You’re made of mud,” Kate sputtered. “Mud! That’s water and dirt. Where’s the water?

  “My dear young girl, this,” Leonardo said, making a dramatic sweeping gesture across his body from head to toe, “is a mere illusion. Consider that we live on an accursed planet, in a city of death, and are given the privilege of living prisoner to a narcissistic demon. A fallen angel, if you will. He couldn’t let his creatures be more beautiful than himself. The bodies he gives us are capable of two phases. When Cipher is in a bad humor, like now, we go out of phase and resemble a half-made man.”

  “Phase,” Kate said, beginning to regain her strength, still staring at the white coal. “Like a phaser, from Star Trek?”

  Leonardo stared at her with wide eyes like she was on the brink of insanity. “Star what? You’re getting off the subject. Please remember that whatever time you live in now, I existed on earth when the Medici’s controlled Florence. There are things that you know which I’ll regretfully never know.”

  Kate sat forward. Wait a minute. “When you say that your name is Leonardo, you mean, The Leonardo? As in Da Vinci?” A chill spread across Kate’s back, capitalizing on the profuse perspiration caking her body.

  “You’ve heard of me. Good. As in son of Piero, yes. I was of the town Vinci,” Leonardo said, nodding in confirmation.

  “But . . . what . . . I mean, why are you here? If you have the way out, why haven’t you left?” Kate asked, beginning to feel revived. She inhaled deeply and caught an odor—a bad one, more of that sour smell—that made her nose crinkle.

  “You have a habit of incomplete sentences, don’t you?” Leonardo’s eyes clouded and his brow lowered as much as it could, it already being rather heavy and droopy. “There are many reasons, young girl. I won’t leave until all of Necropolis has been freed,” he said. He shuffled to his chair at the cold fire and sat down.

  Kate shifted and sat forward. “I’m feeling better now, actually,” she said, glancing at the rock.

  “It’s a shard of the breath of ten angels,” Leonardo answered, his visage clearing as he looked up at her. The accent in his voice softened as he explained. “It’s designed to cleanse the soul. We need it here. Our souls become polluted by the atmosphere of Chthonos and being around the demon. Just call it angel ice, if you’d like. No one ever uses the entire phrase.”

  “How about neither? I feel sort of silly saying ‘angel ice.’ I’ll just call it a rock.”

  “It’s not a rock. It’s a refined glass imbued with the essence of an angel,” he explained, frowning as though filled with regret.

  “How do you get the essence of an angel?” Kate asked with a sarcastic laugh. Leonardo coughed and shrugged, looking out the window next to the table, which held the transparent icebox.

  “Oh,” Kate said, adjusting in her seat uncomfortably. “You mean you killed an angel to make this?”

  “Now look, it wasn’t like that. The angels volunteered,” he began, shaking his head and trying to explain. “It’s part of the grand plan to get us out of here. I can’t say more, young girl. What we need to do now, is find whoever you’ve come for and get you out of here before it’s too late.”

  The sound of a thousand voices crashed against the windows before Kate could answer. She stood, pausing to make sure she wouldn’t get lightheaded and lose her balance, and went to the window. Leonardo followed her, his steps padding quietly over the stone floor. Outside a crowd of mud creatures resembling Leonardo moved down the street toward them.

  “The show has ended. They’re returning to their homes,” the mud-man said at her elbow.

  Tall and squat creatures ambled along, figures disappearing here and there into stone houses like the one Kate watched from.

  At that moment as Kate gazed out at the mob of ugly beasts, something happened. It was like watching a static TV effect in a video editing program. The figures buzzed and vibrated like a flickering light, and the image of ugly mud creatures vanished in a luminous burst, replaced by relatively average looking humans. An enormous sigh rose above the remaining crowd. From her side a soft breath of relief came from Leonardo.

  “Ahhh, that’s better. Much better,” he whispered.

  Kate turned to him. “Does it hurt? I mean, being i
n the, uh, ugly form?” Leonardo had changed too. Black, dark hair that curled around his ears replaced a bald, mud colored pate. A nose like an oozing lichen and a cavernous, toothless maw were gone. Instead his brown eyes watched her from a face with a strong, Roman nose and a wide mouth with soft lips that were set into a determined line. He was thin and just slightly taller than Kate. He wore a plain brown shirt tucked into black pants, with gray thick-soled boots. Kate had observed the same sort of clothing on the other prisoners of Chthonos just a moment before.

  “It hurts like being forced to live when you’d rather be dead,” Leonardo answered. “We’re trapped. All of us. Promised one thing and given another. Cipher has never lived. He doesn’t understand choice and desire and empathy. He believes worshipping him makes us happy.”

  “Sounds like your typical dictator,” Kate answered, thoughtfully. Her tone was almost flippant, but it hid the anxiety tamped down in her gut like a wad of gunpowder. All it needed was something to ignite it. The thought scared her. What could happen?

  “Come away from the window, girl,” Leonardo said, touching her shoulder gently. His hand felt real where it bumped into her body. Kate found herself wondering if Will would touch her, if she found him. When she found him. “Cipher’s minions will be coming through on patrol, to make sure we’ve all returned to our sanctioned cells. You don’t want them to see you.”

  “Will they come in here?” Kate asked, dread gnawing at her anxiety.

  “Come, sit down, let’s discuss who you’ve come for and how to get you out,” Leonardo said. Kate noticed that he didn’t answer her.

  “So they will?”

  “Maybe,” he answered with a sigh. “But that’s why you won’t be here.”

  ***

  “Well, well, Leonardo, looks like you’re behind schedule on completing the depiction of Cipher’s triumphant birth,” one of the minions was saying. Kate watched the interchange from her hiding place inside the glass cabinet next to the refrigeration box. Before they arrived, Leonardo showed her some of his experiments in tinted glass. She’d opened her mouth to explain that most cars were equipped with windows like that, but he’d stopped her. I know, he’d said. Don’t say it. But remember, I died in the 1500s.