Widdershins

by Alexander, Alex

  ‘Thank you. Very polite,’ said Cassandra.

  As the two walked into the shadows, the Witchhunter pulled his remaining gun and tipped his hat down over his face. He knew what he was doing. It was the only thing to be done. But still, he hoped he’d not sent the two children to their deaths.

  The buildings either side had faces made of doors, windows, bars and cracks. They watched the two children as they ventured deeper. It would have been silent, had the wind not crept through the winding alleys, creaking the rotten wood and slamming the open shutters. The sky above began to shrink away as the roofs closed in and the light faded to grey. There were no rats, no roaches, no lice; not a soul breathed in that foul place.

  ‘I’m most curious to actually meet a witch,’ said Cassandra, doing her excited thing again. ‘I mean… I guess the cat was a witch… but he was also a cat… so not a real witch.’

  ‘He weren’t no witch, miss.’

  ‘Well he was something. He said himself that a witch is someone who uses the world differently. He was able to talk. And he was able to find me in the Academy. Sounds like a witch to me.’

  ‘Wot you know ’bout it?’ said Niclas, bitterly.

  ‘More than you do, I can tell you that. I’ve been reading up on the subject since we crossed paths in the library.’

  ‘Wiv that book you stole?’

  ‘Yes. That one.’

  ‘That one you gots burned.’

  Cassandra hurt a little bit.

  ‘Look, cheer up, he’s not dead. You don’t have to look so glum. We’ll find him. Once we’ve done as this gentleman wants, we’ll go looking and we’ll find him. We have to. Rufus’ life depends upon it.’

  ‘I’ll be as glum as I like, miss, and don’t you go acting like you cares, you didn’t knows ’im like I did.’

  ‘On the contrary, I do care. I care a great deal. It would be difficult for Inquisitor Sinclair to argue logicide with a talking cat, don’t you think? Once we make all this public, lots of things will have to change.’

  ‘Wot makes you fink they’ll believe you?’

  ‘Evidence. Proof. The laws of logic dictate that proof is stronger than testimony. If I can find something illogical and bring it before the Academy, it would be illogical of them to denounce it…’

  Cassandra continued to ramble on about justice, logic, conspiracy, treason and other words Niclas had no understanding of until his head began to ache.

  ‘Shush will ya!’ he said.

  ‘I beg your pardon?’ Cassandra stopped, turned and raised the gun at him, shaking it like a rebuking finger. ‘Don’t you speak to me like that, sir.’

  ‘I’m sorry. I meant no offence. It’s just, I’ve come to notice, miss, that you like to talk a lot, a bit too much if you don’t mind me sayin’, and ’ere o’ all places you shouldn’t be makin’ so much noise. It ain’t smart.’

  Cassandra’s eyes inflated. There was something up ahead, lurking in the shadows, barely visible but certainly moving.

  And moving towards them.

  ‘Wot?’ said Niclas. Then he noticed something else. The necrocardium that hung around his neck was now warm and a weird, black nimbus was beating out of it. His fingers picked open the lid. Inside, the glass was black with blood, the little piece of heart twitching unpleasantly within.

  ‘Wot does that mean?’ he said.

  ‘Shh! There’s something over there.’

  Niclas narrowed his eyes into a stare down the alley. He couldn’t really make out anything in particular. Probably because he’d never had his eyes checked, and, truth be told, was seriously in need of a pair of glasses. But what he could see, were two glowing slits of blue that seemed to be getting nearer.

  Something scuttled behind them.

  They spun around.

  There was nothing there.

  Cassandra held up the gun and wrenched the hammer back with an arduous pull.

  ‘Mister?’ Niclas called out, his voice bouncing off the empty buildings and silent cobbles.

  Cassandra looked back.

  The thing, whatever it was, was still there only nearer, and she could just about see that it wasn’t human.

  It looked like a dog.

  ‘It’s a dog. I think,’ she said.

  Niclas didn’t reply. He didn’t even move to look. His eyes were stuck on the other thing. The other thing that had come the other way.

  It too was a dog, the growling from the shadows confirmed as much.

  ‘Oh! Another one…’ said Cassandra, turning.

  Before they could realise just how much danger they were in, the nearest dog bared its teeth and leapt towards them.

  Cassandra froze.

  Niclas snatched the gun and pulled the trigger.

  The shot struck the canine in its upper body sending it crumbling into a whimpering heap on the floor.

  The gun’s mechanism ticked bringing the next shot into line with the barrel.

  ‘It’s alright,’ said Niclas, ‘we gots two left.’

  Cassandra didn’t notice the mechanism. Her eyes were fixed on the dying dog squealing before them like a stuck pig.

  ‘Sorry, miss, but… but it was gonna get us.’

  She pushed him aside, snatched the gun, pointed it and pulled the trigger.

  The second shot entered the dog’s head and tore its ear off, acquainting them with its maggoty brain.

  They shuddered in a cloud of gun smoke.

  ‘It’s dead,’ said Cassandra.

  ‘No, it ain’t,’ said Niclas.

  ‘Yes, it is.’

  The dog was dead. But it was also alive. Its flesh was somewhere betwixt and between, with patches of rank decay growing all over its body. The jelly in its eyes had long ago rotted away, and its ribs and organs could be seen pulsing beneath its belly. Yet, it still moved. With a shot in its body and another lodged in its skull, it got back to its feet and growled.

  Cassandra raised the gun to fire the final shot. But there wasn’t really any point. And now the second dog was growling down their backs.

  In such situations, when faced with a pair of immortal hounds set on tearing one’s throat from one’s neck, there’s only one thing you can do. That is to scream. Or piss your pants. But Niclas and Cassandra were both too scared for either, and so, using the last deafening shot to stagger the nearest dog, made like a pair of jackrabbits and bolted for their lives.

  Niclas was faster, and not knowing the meaning of the word chivalrous, was prepared to leave Cassandra behind. He didn’t know which way to run. He couldn’t remember the way out. But that was the least of his worries.

  The shark-like jaws were snapping at the Princess’ heels, closer – closer – until their breath and spittle were beating down on her. The gun was heavy. It slowed her. She discarded it with a wild toss and the first dog tripped over it and sent the second dog rolling. The fall bought her a metre, perhaps two, but just like that they were both up and galloping down on her once again.

  To outrun a pair of dogs takes some legwork. But these weren’t just dogs, they were greyhounds, and as anyone who’s ever been to the races knows, you can no more outpace a greyhound than you can the wind. The dogs reached their full speed, pounding over the cobblestone, legs over legs, jaws up, noses pointed.

  Niclas was running as fast as he’d ever run in his life. So fast, that his feet couldn’t keep up with his legs. Was it this way? Was it that way? His clunky boots caught on the cobbles, he floundered, fell and tore his knees across the floor.

  He expected to see Cassandra overtake him. But she didn’t. She stopped, pulled him to his feet and urged him on.

  She immediately regretted this.

  The first dog rounded them and blocked off the way ahead. The second dog came up behind, cutting off their retreat. They were trapped.

  There was more light in this part of the Narrows. Only a fraction more, but it was enough to see the dogs clearer. The second dog was more skeletal than the first. Its rotten flesh clung to
its bones like wet newspaper, and its calcareous tail twisted behind it.

  Niclas and Cassandra cradled each other in their arms and faced the panting, slavering, growling sets of jaws. Cassandra imagined what her bones would sound like, crunching in the dog’s salivating chops. Niclas wondered how the dog facing him would swallow him, there was almost nothing around its throat, only bone.

  ‘Where is he?’ said Cassandra, clutching tighter at Niclas’ arm.

  ‘Miss… We’s done for…’

  Then…

  ‘Castor. Pollux. There.’ The dogs stopped advancing and growled from the spot.

  A man’s shadow had stepped out into the alley further down.

  ‘That’ll do,’ he said, easing the dogs into calm, and they sauntered past the children, tails wagging, to be at his side.

  Now that consternation wasn’t blurring their senses, they both clearly saw that the dogs were grotesquely decayed; one more so than the other. They stood panting at their master’s feet. A ghostly blue nimbus seeped from their mouths and eyes.

  ‘GULP…’ said Niclas.

  ‘Who are you?’ demanded the Princess.

  The dogs answered with a growl.

  But they were growling at something else.

  Something at the other end of the alley.

  It was the scent of the Witchhunter. He stepped into view, his pistol held up and aiming downwind at the shadowy figure.

  The children scarpered to safety behind his back.

  He wasn’t much of a talker. He cocked the gun with his thumb and let fly a shot.

  The gun began to tick.

  Niclas peered round the side of the Witchhunter’s greatcoat to see where the shot had landed. When the smoke cleared he saw the figure, unhindered, take a step forward in front of his dogs.

  The gun clicked…

  …cocked…

  …fired again.

  This time Niclas saw the shot dash the shadowy man’s shoulder, staggering him back a step.

  He regained his stride and continued forward.

  The dogs were barking.

  The gun was ticking.

  The shadowy man was nearing.

  Cassandra, too, curious as to where the shots were going, poked her head round the other side of the Witchhunter’s coat, just in time to watch the third shot flick the man’s head to the side. But it didn’t stop him; he snapped it back into place and began to laugh. It started as a snicker and grew into a chuckle, a sound that echoed throughout the Narrows. Then his laughter ceased abruptly and he stepped out of the shadows.

  Cassandra looked away. Niclas couldn’t.

  The Witchhunter reloaded urgently.

  He didn’t have time to load three shots, just the one and rushing to do so spilt the gunpowder over his hand and onto the floor.

  ‘Mister!’ said Niclas tugging at his coat. ‘Mister!’

  The man was getting closer and the very sight of him was too much for Niclas to take.

  His clothes were old and torn. His leathery flesh much the same. His skin, where he still had it, was a pale blue. His feet were bone, and Niclas would have guessed that his legs were too, but hidden behind baggy trousers. From his stomach to his throat, there was no skin or muscle, just the sight of rotting organs throbbing away like organic clockwork. But it was his face that was the worst of it. The upper half, hairless, had the pallor appearance of a drowned corpse. The lower half had no fabric to it at all, but for a few strands of tissue-thin flesh stretched over the throat and cheeks. And where his mouth should have been, a permanent skeletal smile housed a putrid green tongue.

  Clanging in his hands was a long chain, which split at the end into two separate leads. Collars for the dogs, thought Niclas.

  ‘She expects you,’ said the undead man, in a splintered, inhuman voice.

  The Witchhunter gave up on the gun and reached for his short sword. The two dogs barked loudly as his fingers touched the blade’s handle, and calmed to a growl as he removed them.

  The undead man rasped wordlessly and tossed the chain at the feet of the Witchhunter.

  ‘For them,’ he croaked.

  It was then Niclas realised, after the usual delay, that the chain wasn’t for the dogs at all.

  Canal water isn’t drinkable. You’d have to boil it at least three times to be safe and even then, it’s still a risk. But the canal water of the slums is worse. If bottled, it can be passed off as a dark, bitter ale, until of course it’s been sampled and induced an episode of the most violent vomiting imaginable. It smells pungent, repugnant – stagnant, like sewage, and in areas of Bog End not frequented with the passing of boats, a gelatinous skin clings to its surface.

  The boat had floated to such a part of the network. It found a home underneath one of the many arched bridges and came to rest out of reach of the cobbled path on either side. Balthazar could swim. It was the germs he had a problem with. Water like that was crawling with them. Whole universes of organisms and parasites looking for their next big gig. He had discussed his options with himself and decided it was much better to stay put than to try and swim for it. Even if he was in the water for ten seconds, who knew what he could catch. King Cholera, typhoid, syphilis. No, it would only be a matter of time, he reasoned, before someone further up the canal opened a lock and got things moving again.

  Or, until someone found the boat. It was a small boat. A merchant rowboat. The kind of boat that drew attention in a place like this.

  He just had to wait…

  …he didn’t have to wait long.

  ‘This little bugger’s ’eavy considerin’ ’e ain’t eaten for weeks.’

  ‘It’sth justht that you’re not as thstrong asth you fink you are.’

  ‘Funny. If you fink you’re so strong, why don’t you carry ’im by yourself.’

  There was a pause, followed by a thud.

  ‘I thsaid nuffin’ ’bout me bein’ thstrong, Clyde, you got to learn to thstop comin’ to conclusthionsth. Now, ’ere, ’elp me pick ’im up.’

  Balthazar peered out of the boat and observed two familiar faces on the bridge above. They were carrying what looked like a small body wrapped in linen.

  ‘One. Two. Three. Heave.’

  It splashed into the water.

  ‘Glad that’sth done wiv,’ said Archie, rubbing his hands.

  ‘’Ey look!’ said Clyde.

  The body that had moments before splashed into the water, rose in a secondary splash to the surface, where it floated, face down, the linen cloth pulled away.

  Archie slapped his hand over his eyes and took a deep breath. ‘We’ve only gone ’n’ forgotten the blummin’ weightsth,’ he said.

  ‘I did fink that, right ’fore we tossed the little bugger in, I fawt “summin’s missin’ ’ere”.’

  ‘Too late now. Ah well, no one ever comesth down ’ere, and even if they did, who caresth? Just anuver dead gutterthsnipe.’

  ‘Yeah, just anuver one innit.’

  ‘Exthactly – but to be on the thsafe thside, we bethst not tell the bossth ’bout thisth, ’e’sth proper paranoid asth it isth. You know how he likesth to thsend them into the Narrowsth before they expiresth.’

  ‘Never understood it meself,’ said Clyde.

  ‘Thsimple really. If you thsendsth them there, you ain’t gotsth to disposthe of their bodiesth. Imagine ’ow many corpsesth would be in thisth ’ere canal, if the bossth didn’t ’av’ a thstrict policthy ’bout thsending the thsick onesth into the Narrowsth. It would be outrageousth. You’d ’av’ damsth o’ ’em – a problem like that could attract plenty o’ unwanted attenthion. People don’t mind it thso much when bratsth disthappear, but if they thstart piling up in the water worksth, then questionsth ’av’ got be asthked.’

  Clyde nodded, uncertainly. ‘You know Archie, you’d be best off avoiding words with too many esses…’

  ‘Thshut up.’

  Balthazar heard them walk away above him. Then the steps came back.

  ‘That’s strang
e,’ said Clyde.

  ‘Huh?’

  ‘This ’ere boat – it’s a merchant one. Funny place to park. Got some stuff in it by the looks o’ fings,’ said Clyde, noting the sacks and boxes. ‘Probably summin valuable.’

  Archie perked up at the word “valuable”.

  ‘Valuable,’ he repeated.

  The two headed down to the path and began searching for something they could use to bring the boat nearer. Amongst the furry green stone at the water’s edge, Archie found a rope. He lifted it from the water. It surfaced, covered in algaeous icicles. He pulled it through his hands, loosened a bit off and tossed it at the boat’s stern.

  It missed.

  He tried again.

  ‘Go on, Archie! You can do it! ’av’ another go! This time for sure… no, you missed it. ’Ere, let’s get a go. Oh! Oh! Bravo!’

  They pulled the boat in together.

  ‘Wonder wot’s in these boxes,’ said Clyde, clambering aboard and landing his hands on the nearest crate.

  Archie was busy fastening the boat, when he heard his companion scream and topple over against its decking.

  ‘Wot isth it?’ said Archie.

  ‘Get it away from me! Get it away! It ain’t real!’

  ‘Wot ain’t real?’ Not being quenched with an answer, Archie climbed aboard the boat and saw Clyde trembling against the stern in the tiny, insignificant shadow of a black cat.

  ‘Gentlemen,’ said Balthazar.

  ‘I don’ths believe it,’ said Archie, rubbing his jagged tongue across the roof of his mouth.

  ‘Get it away from me!’ Clyde scurried away.

  ‘Pull yersthelf togever Clyde. Wot a coincthidencthe thisth isth. We bin lookin’ for you, ’n’ ’ere you are. Not talkin’ now are ya, eh? Wot’sth the matter, cat got your tongue.’

  ‘There’s nothing wrong with my tongue,’ said Balthazar, scaring the life into Clyde. ‘Your tongue, maybe, but not mine.’

  ‘Kill it, Archie, moons collide, just kill it…’

  ‘Thssshhhh. I don’t know ’ow you did wot you did. Our bossth didn’t ’alf believe usth when we toldsth ’im. Gave usth a right clobberin’. Thsaid we mustht ’av’ bin drinkin’ the merchandisthe. Thsaid we were mad. But I knowsth we weren’t mad.’ Archie unbuckled his club, and gave it three firm swings into the palm of his hand. ‘Catsth thshouldn’t be able to talk. It’sth againstht the nature o’ fingsth. I’m gonna thsort you out kitty. I’m gonna thsort you out proper.’