"That's it," I said, wandering towards the Pit. "Time to find a pike to impale myself on."
Diana grabbed my shoulder so hard I felt it coming off its socket. It was the first time I'd ever seen her so angry. Her irises took on a reddish tint that spelled murder if I didn't heed her silent warning.
I froze as I did when I was too scared to move, and watched as she pulled out pen and paper, furiously scribbling a message on the page.
Get a grip, and calm yourself. There's a simple solution to this.
She ran and jumped into the Pit, and I cringed at the sound of breaking bones. I approached the edge against my better judgment so I could see what Diana was up to.
Her unassuming face and frame were now scouring through the bodies. This sentient doll tore a fastened cloak off the back of a corpse so fast that its head went flying off its shoulders. Now that she had what she needed, Diana punched the closest wall, burrowing her fists in the earth.
She repeated this motion until she reached the surface.
She grabbed the bloody gloves that I'd thrown aside, put on her new getup, and effectively disguised the obvious trademarks of her inhuman nature.
Take me with you, She wrote in her journal. Act like I'm your project.
I knew that I didn't have a choice in the matter, and just like everything else in my life, I obeyed.
Dinnertime was a mandatory affair when all living members of Nethermount gathered in the central cavern. I don't know why this rule exists, but I know that the penalties for avoiding it are bad enough where even my mother doesn't want to mention what they are.
Diana and I navigated through the servant route alongside a number of patchwork cadavers that were dressed in butler attire. The clothing distracted me from the stitches that kept the eyes of the undead permanently open and their mouths fixed in too-wide smiles.
The black suits were impeccably maintained, and often recycled from the clothing people had died in. Necromancers were an unexpectedly thrifty bunch. They also made surprisingly good tailors.
Half the designs weren't bad, either.
I ran a hand down my face. How a group of people could have such good and bad taste at the same time, I'll never understand.
5: Hall of the Six Houses
The denizens of Nethermount dined in the Hall of the Six Houses. Of all the caverns in the place, it was the largest as well as the most uniform. Straight edges formed diamond-sharp corners, and from above one could tell that room was in the shape of a six pointed star.
Each House had their own alcove and specialization with regards to their research.
House Soma dealt with physical aspects in their experiments. Its members often jumbled corpses together like patchwork quilts. Transplants and taxidermy were among its most common practices. Knitting was also quite popular among its distinguished young ladies.
House Myalo's psychologists were held in the highest esteem. They were unusual among the Six Houses, for they preferred their subjects alive. Its members would then test the mental capacity of various races through the most creative experiments. Unsurprisingly, some of the best artists could be found among their numbers.
Myalites were also seen as the philanthropists of the Six Houses, for they were the only ones so generous as to offer the bodies of their test subjects once they were through with them.
House Astheneia was comprised solely of women. They could often be found tending the garden at the heart of their section of the caverns. Medicines were their trade. They had a deal with House Myalo, for any subjects that had their minds broken, but still breathed, were sent directly to the women so they could test their pharmaceuticals. If a woman's research was deemed particularly ground-breaking, then she would earn the honor of having her face disfigured by acid. This often did more to aid the appearance of the Sickly Sisters than not.
House Ponos the was counterpart to Astheneia, and natural mates. Girls were born to the Sickly Sisters, while boy-children were given to the men of Ponos. They took subjects that were widely considered scraps by the rest of Nethermount society, and tested the strength of the tissue, often through means of tearing or crushing.
House Psychi possessed some of the most talented anthropologists in the continent. Its members go through astounding lengths to research the background of the cadavers that come to Nethermount. They pride themselves in making the most life-like undead, so much so that their rite-of-passage involves reanimating a body and successfully integrating it in its natural surface-dwelling society.
Last but not least, there was House Thanos; the smallest of the Six Houses with its two living members.
My mother, the current Head of House, shot me a wary look from across the Hall. I looked around and realized that other members of our community were also facing my direction.
I was used to people staring at me because I was seen as the heir of an incredibly prestigious House. The fact that it was verging on extinction also made me somewhat of an endangered species in their eyes.
This time was strange for a different reason, and that was because I always entered alone... until now.
Although Diana's face and joints were hidden from public view, her movements were still too graceful to be either human or undead. I felt the blood draining from my face; the only thing necromancers liked more than conducting their own research was scrutinizing someone else's. I know that Diana told me to act like she was my project, but I didn't know if I would be able to treat her like one.
And at the rate interest was growing, it was only a matter of time before I'd find out.
6: Lenold and The Sand Whale
Lenold, of House Soma, made a beeline towards me almost as soon as I entered the room. I suppose I could say he was a friend of mine, but he lacked the quiet understanding Diana and I shared. Regardless, he was a friendly sort, and his presence would buy us some time from the rest of the people who would wait to see how this conversation played out.
I feel I should mention that, even among Nethermount society, there were certain... eccentric figures. Lenold, (or Leo, as he preferred to be called) was most definitely one of them.
He was tan, for starters, something highly unusual for our sun-deprived group. His hair was brown, rather than some dowdy shade of white or gray, and then there was Tully, his skeletal parrot (which was actually a chicken), who was perched on his left shoulder at all times. There were other things as well, but I was certain they would become apparent soon enough.
Leo clasped me by the arms with an enthusiastic grin. "Marvin, I'm so glad you made it!" his voice boomed.
The chicken-parrot flapped its beak open, prompting Leo to pat it on the head.
"Tully's been missing you as well. Isn't he a softy?" He made a kissing face at his... well, to be honest I wasn't sure what to call Tully. With Leo it could be family, a pet, or a fetish, and I wish I could reject the possibility that it wasn't all three.
Once Leo was through with his public affections, he cast Diana a curious look.
"It's awfully rare that you come wanting to display a project." His voice was a combination of excitement and seriousness.
"She's not for display."
I kicked myself a little for calling Diana a "she" instead of the neutral "it". Leo gave me an unabashedly puzzled stare.
"She's not?"
I hesitated. "She... isn't finished just yet." I took a mental sigh of relief for coming up with an excuse. "The bell rang while I was in the middle of some adjustments, so I was forced to take her with me."
"As expected of the heir to House Thanos!" Leo's eyes lit up with admiration. He sat a hand on my shoulder, swerving me away from view. "Don't be too upset with me for saying this," he began in hushed tones, "but I wasn't sure whether or not I'd be able to trust you with something."
I blinked, having no idea where this was coming from.
Leo opened his other hand. I wasn't sure what to make of the object that sat in it, which seemed to be nothing more than a leather oval with strings hanging from ei
ther end.
"Is that a... parrot-sized codpiece?"
"A parrot-sized..." his mouth drooped, and the stupidity of my guess hit me at full force. "That's brilliant!" Leo exclaimed. "But no, Marvin. This is an eye patch."
"An eye patch?"
"My grandfather gave it to me just yesterday after dinner." Leo nodded vigorously. "You see, Marvin, this isn't just any old eye patch. It was my great-great-great-great-great grandfather's eye patch."
"You mean, Larry?"
"No, that was my uncle."
"Lionel?"
"That was my second cousin, twice removed."
"What about Liechtenstein?"
"No, Marvin! Leeroy's!" He shook me my the shoulders. "And while we're on the topic, Liechtenstein isn't actually related to me. He was the family golem for a few generations, so I understand how someone from another House could get confused. But honestly, you should know me better by now."
I felt a little bad for Leo at that moment. He often went out of his way to eat next to me at the Thanos section of the Hall. The sad part was that I regularly blacked out whenever I looked at some of the other experiments in the same room. Leo was just the special sort of person who could talk at someone as well as with them, so I doubt it would've mattered if I was comatose at the time.
"Okay... so Leeroy." I raked my brain through the history of House Soma. The names of all its male members inexplicably began with the letter L, so it took me a while. "You mean the one that kept getting thrown down the Pit by surfacers every time he went topside?"
"Yes!" Leo grinned so hard I thought his face might break in half. "You see, Leeroy's life mission was to find a naturally occurring automaton."
That last phrase rang a bell.
A naturally occurring automaton was a fancy term for something we called a True Golem. Topsiders commonly referred to them as elementals or nature spirits. These beings were popular characters in children's bedtime stories. I remember falling asleep to a number of them myself. Among these parables, none were as popular as the Tale of Leeroy.
I gave Leo a funny look, wondering if he and I were thinking the same thing.
"Do you mean the Leeroy who tried to hunt a Sand Whale?"
"One and the same." He shook the fist with the eye patch. "Don't you see, Marvin? The mantel's been passed down! It now falls unto me to finish the quest!"
I wasn't sure what to tell him. In the stories that I'd heard about Leeroy, he was a bit... touched in the head. He ran out into the middle of the desert only to encounter a group of barbarians. No one is sure how he managed not to get killed. He'd be away from Nethermount for weeks at a time, inevitably getting thrown down the Pit upon his return. The story was a popular lesson on persistence... and all but solidified the fact that Sand Whales did not exist.
Regardless, Leo was kind-hearted and relatively benign as compared to the rest of the people in Nethermount, so I didn't see the harm in giving him an encouraging smile.
"I believe in you, Leo."
Though there was no way in hell I'd believe in a Sand Whale.
Tears came to his eyes. "I shouldn't have doubted you, Marvin." He pulled me in for a sudden, back breaking hug. "You're a true friend!"
"Leo... I... can't..."
I struggled immensely. Through their research, members of House Soma were possessed of inhuman strength, and Leo was no exception. I went blue in the face, terrified, yet amused on some deep level. I was convinced I was going to die in Nethermount for being a failure of a necromancer, handed over as material for any number of experiments before becoming some hideous undead slave. I never thought I'd die in the arms of a friend.
The world began to go black when I felt myself getting jerked back. I gasped as air rushed into my lungs. It was about a minute before I realized how quiet it had gotten.
When I raised my head, Leo wasn't staring at me, and neither was anyone in the room.
In the moment Diana pulled me out of Leo's crushing embrace, her hood had fallen back. She glared daggers at everyone, and I felt tension running through her porcelain limbs.
A familiar clacking pierced my ears as my mother walked across the room. She stopped right in front of me, and I saw such a foreign emotion flash across her eyes that she looked like a stranger.
"Marvin..." my mother's voice was breaking. "What have you done?"
7: The Crone of Astheneia
My mother seemed human for the first time in over two decades. There was real emotion reflected in her eyes, not the frosted mirrors I'd known for years. She looked from me, to Diana, and asked one question.
"Does he know?"
Diana shook her head.
Something was tapping in the room. It was slow and measured, and any necromancer worth his salt was filled with foreboding.
Approaching our small group was a ghastly hag known as the Crone of Astheneia.
Like other high ranking members of her House, her face was chemically burned. A web of scars that never completely healed limned her skin in reddish welts. Her one remaining eye socket was a sagging, oblong shape hanging off her cheek. Strands of gray hair clung to the edges of an otherwise bald scalp, and the whole picture was decidedly hideous.
If there was such a thing as a ruler of Nethermount, the Crone would be the one to hold that title. It was said that she had been here long before the Houses were formed. In numerical terms, this placed her age at a minimum of four centuries.
While I can't say I believe that rumor, she certainly looked it.
The tapping sound came from the gnarled cane in her hand. It was warped all the way up, culminating in a six headed hydra. Its individual necks coiled around her fingers and around her wrist. I was horrified to witness one sinking its fangs into her thumb, and I wondered what kind of monster this woman was that she didn't even flinch at the cane making a meal of her fingers.
"Diana." The Crone's voice suited her namesake; a scratchy sound that was breathless and forceful all at once. "I see your... knack for making an entrance is the same as ever."
The Crone came closer, and I was surprised to discover that she smelled... sweet, like chocolate and fresh cut flowers.
She raised her cane at me.
"Wait!" My mother held her hand for pause.
"What is it, Formosa?" The Crone asked. "You can still bear another child to inherit Thanos. This one is a failure."
The word cut through me like a serrated knife. In my mind, I cradled this severed piece of ego, but I couldn't stop it from bleeding out no matter how hard I tried.
"Great Witch." My mother dipped her head in a low bow. "Marvin's only crime was his ignorance. He couldn't possibly have known that-"
The Crone slammed her cane on the floor, jarring everyone in the room.
"Would that I could show you the terrors that Doll rained upon us, Formosa." Her voice had a new, sinister edge to it. "We couldn't even destroy her, only lock her up in a wooden box," the Crone wheezed in her interpretation of a snort. "Ignorance is not enough to excuse such a stupid blunder."
Something strange happened then.
It felt as though a hook had latched onto me... not physically, but deeper; much, much deeper. I panicked for a moment, but was soon filled with a reassurance I couldn't place.
"Spare him, Mahlah," a new speaker commanded. I tilted my head back slowly. Diana's painted lips had somehow become faceted... and moved in a way that looked oddly human. She stared down the Crone, something that I didn't think was possible.
Diana's sudden ability to speak must've been significant. Something changed in the older faces in the room, and it was especially pronounced in the way Mahlah the Crone stared at us because of it.
"You would risk your life for his, Diana?" She lowered her head. "Very well." The Crone held her cane with both hands, looking at me directly for the first time in any of this. "Marvin of House Thanos, you have committed the highest taboo through your affiliation with the marionette known as Diana Galatea. This is grounds for immediate execut
ion."
I gulped.
"However..." The Crone shot Diana a menacing glare. "She has deemed it fit to form a Doll Contract, hereby marking you the Inheritor."
The Crone flipped her cane around in the blink of an eye, and six very hungry hydras snapped at my nose point-blank. Diana squeezed my shoulder extra hard to keep me from passing out.
"You have two choices, Heir of Thanos," the Crone declared. "Die now, for your impudence, or accept the quest necessary to clear your name."
"What... is this quest?"
"Descend the deepest veins of Nethermount, until you reach the Moor of Souls. Find the Eyes of the Leviathan, and return to us a hero." One of the hydra's lunged forward, drawing blood.
"What is your choice, Son of Thanos?"
I felt my consciousness slipping.
"Life," I garbled.
Before I passed out, I heard a sound similar to a steam engine, like the bastardized echo of a sigh.
"You are a fool, Marvin."
A failure, and a fool.
8: The Seventh Disciple
The world was bobbing up and down.
My eyes flicked open, catching sight of the torches that lined the walls through the servant tunnels.
Diana's face looked down at me, looking more human than ever.
"Don't look behind us, Marvin."
I looked behind us.
A gathering of undead marched at a respectable distance, and also blocked the way back by sheer numbers.
Diana sighed, "You never listen."
The events of what transpired returned to me. I ran a finger down the bridge of my nose, where the Crone's hydra headed cane had drawn blood. To my dismay, the wound was still there.
Diana was holding me in her arms princess-style. The embarrassment didn't faze me nearly as hard as my need for answers.
"Diana... what's going on?" I quickly clarified my question. "Who are you?"
Years ago, when I had opened that coffin in the attic, I expected to find surgical equipment, or maybe broken pieces of an alembic or distillery.
A Different Kind of Deadly Page 2