Deep Roots

by Ruthanna Emrys

  “That’s one of the names they’re known by,” said Mary. “Outer Ones is another. Old Folk. They’re supposedly behind the legends of fairies, but they don’t look much like Elsie Wright’s photographs. Mr. Peters, would you mind finding one of the illustrations?”

  Peters didn’t look pleased, but he took a clothbound volume from one of their stacks, and opened it to a marked page. There lay sketched my childhood recollection: crablike claws, overarched with bat wings fading to fog at the edges, and an eyeless head covered with irregular protuberances like some exotic fungus. Barlow retrieved a folder from across the room. Inside, another drawing in a more formal style: where the book showed the creature poised for flight and clutching some device in its foremost claws, the folder showed it splayed as if ready for dissection. I suppressed a shudder. The two figures could have been drawn from the same verbal description, but the details were all different: the folder showed the head rounder and the protuberances more varied, the placement of the claws completely different and more lobster-like than crab-like.

  “This one’s a composite,” said Barlow, tapping the folder. “From reports a few years back of bodies seen in a flooding river. No corpses were found, of course, and it was dismissed at the time as mass hysteria.” Mary’s eyes tracked his finger. Her gaze passed over the drawing and back to us.

  “Mass hysteria,” she said, “usually means someone’s worked hard to convince people that they didn’t see anything.”

  The scene in front of me slipped further into focus: Barlow, trying to pretend that he and Caleb were in charge; Mary and Deedee, trying to let him. That might be the best way to get work done, but I couldn’t imagine keeping up the pretense. Innsmouth women might deck themselves in gold for a man’s pleasure, recite passages of lore to show off their learning, or cultivate an interest in stories about fishing expeditions. But my mother had never taught me how to efface myself to bolster male self-importance—nor had my father taught any need for it. Kezia Marsh was born from one of the family’s foremost branches, and Silas Marsh’s branch, though distant, had honor of its own. When one of them deferred to the other, they gave precedence openly and honestly.

  “We’ve had an uptick in sightings over the past couple of months, all along the Berkshires and White Mountains,” said Barlow. “Clusters in the vicinity of disappearances, cutting off after each one. Even a few possible cases here in New York, though they’re pretty vague.”

  “I hate this city,” added Peters. “One of these monsters could walk down Fifth Avenue, and people would only report if it stopped traffic.”

  Barlow shrugged. “Once we dig a little, we’ll find more. Speaking of which, Mr. Marsh…”

  Again, Caleb bent his head in my direction—this time with the slight smirk that suggested he was on the edge of swooning against me and calling me “sister dear.” So he’d seen it too. I toyed with the idea of explaining the concept of “eldest-on-land” to Barlow’s team, just to forestall my brother’s mockery. But then, Caleb’s way of playing into assumptions might be safer than forcing them to see their error.

  “I’ll tell you about our cousin,” I said. “And what little we know about these creatures.”

  I spoke, balancing safety and the need to share our knowledge with every word. Some judgments were easy: even Spector acknowledged that it would be disastrous for them to know about the Yith, so I glossed over the source of Trumbull’s insights. The Lavernes were harder. Spector had already mentioned their existence, and I couldn’t blame him. Their situation might offer clues to the other missing people. It seemed less likely, now, that Freddy had holed up somewhere to let his gills grow in. But his family’s history, as much as we knew, cast Innsmouth in poor light. We’d bled for such stories.

  Among my own people, I’d happily criticize the ill treatment of air-born lovers. But I said only that the Lavernes were long-lost cousins. And that we wanted, very badly, to bring Freddy back to his mother.

  Then there were the Outer Ones themselves. The Yith were legends to my people, something close to gods. Their archives would preserve Earth’s memory long after the sun burned out. And for the sake of that preservation, they destroyed entire races and stole their own children’s lives. They cared little for the petty politics of centuries, but would casually wipe out anyone who tried to restrain their field expeditions—or who simply made themselves inconvenient. Barlow’s team, though they didn’t recall it, had escaped with relatively light wounds.

  But the Outer Ones were sketches and rumor. I didn’t know what they held sacred, what goal could have motivated these disappearances, or whether the creatures would care about attention from human authorities. I had no idea what kind of threat they might pose. And so nothing told me whether the greater danger came from Barlow knowing less, or more. I shared what I could, and hoped it wouldn’t bring disaster.

  As I finished, Barlow tapped an arrhythmia on the table, frowning. “Is that all?”

  “That’s all any of us can recall right now. If we were at Miskatonic, we could do better research.” And in a day, two at the outside, we’d consult with our elders. But I hadn’t mentioned their impending arrival.

  Peters prodded the book. “This says they’re from ‘space that is not space.’ I suppose we could ask Dr. Einstein what that means. But it’s probably why they don’t show up in photos—unless they just break cameras to avoid anyone getting a clear shot. They supposedly have outposts in deserted hillsides and mountains around the globe. And somewhere called ‘Yuggoth’ on the outskirts of the solar system, which everyone assumes is Pluto.”

  “I’ve heard of Yuggoth too,” I said, and then wished I hadn’t. I knew Yuggoth only from poetry and mysticism, irrelevant to our search and inappropriate to share with this company. But they looked at me expectantly. “Just stories. It’s where the gods first came to our solar system, before settling on Earth.” Strange towers and curious lapping rivers, labyrinths of wonder and low vaults of light, and bough-crossed skies of flame …

  “We don’t need legends,” said Barlow. “We need descriptions of what they’re made of. Something unique, like blood type or chemical composition.”

  “I still think I could track them without that,” said Mary. “We could tailor a talisman to search for anything outside the normal material range for this area.”

  “I’ve seen your ‘general’ spells,” said Caleb. “You’re not trying that again with our cousin in the way.”

  To my surprise, Barlow nodded. “Mr. Marsh is crass as usual, but we still don’t know what went wrong with that inventory, or how vulnerable any generally targeted equation could be to interference.” He cast a perfunctory glare across Trumbull. “Leaving aside, for the moment, the question of where such interference might come from.”

  Peters followed Barlow’s gaze, and his expression turned predatory. “Ah, Professor. Maybe you could find a creature from another world with one of your mental tricks? Compel them to cooperate?”

  “That’s not how it works,” said Trumbull. She kept her expression bland. Yet another thing I hadn’t considered: of course Barlow and his team would want to make use of her demonstrated abilities. Or rather, the abilities her Yithian guest had taken back to the Archives when they left. Barlow’s team still didn’t know, and would hopefully never know, that the woman in front of them wasn’t the person they’d sparred with at Miskatonic. I sought a distraction both from the question of Trumbull’s mentalism and from Mary’s dangerous taste in spell design.

  Our own magic was rooted in self-knowledge—good for understanding and affecting others, but not for finding people yet unmet. Summoning without a clear target, in addition to being wildly dangerous, was useless against an unfriendly subject. An unwelcome call could usually be refused. Even an irresistible call couldn’t prevent friends and allies from following behind to firmly discourage future summons.

  I thought again of the cryptic presence I’d encountered my first night in the city. I still had no evidence tha
t it was an Outer One—but if it was, it meant that they made their mark across dimensions. Even if I was wrong, anomalies well-camouflaged in the waking world might still be easier to track in others.

  “Do any of you know how to dreamwalk?” I asked.

  CHAPTER 5

  Mary did know something about dreamwalking, it transpired, though it wasn’t an art she’d practiced with her team. Barlow and Spector disagreed about whether the two of them had ever done so; after listening to their description I couldn’t judge whether the drugs forced on them by a German captor had facilitated and shaped an astral journey, or merely caused vivid and coincidentally informative hallucinations.

  But they liked the idea, and their files offered at least speculation that Outer Ones traveled easily between dimensions. Mary and Trumbull quickly fell into a reverie of mathematical discussion, with Barlow and Peters throwing in occasional questions and suggestions.

  I listened for a few minutes, following only a little, before saying, “But picking out something strange in the dreamlands—we already know how to do that. You don’t need anything new to make this work.”

  Mary tapped the edge of a pile of papers, absently straightening them. “How long can you stay out? It sounds like you have more experience than me.”

  “I’ve done about fifteen minutes, so far. I could probably go a bit longer if I were careful.”

  “Travel is easier, dreaming—but could you scan the whole of New York City in twenty minutes?”

  I felt foolish. I could probably cross Innsmouth, small and well-known, in that time and miss little. New York was on a different scale.

  “I’m not trying to find a way to stay out longer,” she assured me. “Though it sounds like an excellent area for research. We need to focus our search, and make the best possible use of the time we have. Virgil, I think that mahogany box with the knot on the cover has what we need.”

  Peters brought her a case filled with tiny cloth-wrapped bundles. I’d seen the teams’ talismans before, and wasn’t thrilled to be in their presence again. This batch, at least, felt relatively benign.

  “Who should go?” asked Mary.

  The dreamlands have predators, and the best way to survive them is to avoid attracting their attention. A large expedition, full of scent and weight, would be lucky if it drew only a flock of nightgaunts. Two or three people could slip through the shadows unnoticed.

  “It sounds like you and I have the most experience,” I said, cringing inwardly. Mary’s designs had both put my life at risk and saved it, and I did not want to face the dreamlands with her alone. And the idea of leaving my unconscious body here, no matter how many friends stood guard, made me queasy. I didn’t want Barlow and Peters seeing me so vulnerable, but there was no way around it. We needed to find Freddy, and this was the best chance we had.

  “Charlie should go too,” said Audrey. “He’s worked with you longest. I can stay on the edge and help anchor.” I nodded; Audrey’s awareness of my fears eased them, if only a little.

  “I don’t like you going out alone.” Barlow told Mary. He sounded tentative, in a way that surprised me. No, not tentative. He was asking her rather than ordering: sometime in the past five months, he’d learned to respect her skills.

  “I need their experience,” she said.

  “More than you need someone you trust at your back?” demanded Peters.

  “Yes,” she said firmly. “Watch my body. Let Miss Winslow know if there’s a problem with my heartbeat or breathing. I’ll be careful.”

  I drew the diagram with special care. This was no brief foray to ensure a safe place to sleep—we needed guidance and support beyond the structures of our own minds. And Mary must see that I was working in good faith. She checked my preparations, then Charlie and Audrey did the same. Neko watched, arms crossed, frank curiosity on her face. She rarely participated in our spellwork—more often doubted our sanity in pursuing it so deeply—but took advantage of opportunities to observe. And I saw, gratefully, the way her eyes turned cold as they passed over Barlow’s team.

  Fear scars, and I knew full well that my stomach turned as much from remembered vulnerability in the camps as from my unpleasant experiences with the present company. Neko knew every ridge of tissue beneath those scars, all the half-healed wounds. She might well be the weakest person in the room, but her quiet watch reassured me most.

  Mary handed me a talisman, strung on thick silken string. Running my fingers along the cord, I felt a brush of static and smelled warm beeswax. Touching the cloth bundle itself released a puff of frustrated avidity. I imagined a shortfin mako shark, like the ones elders sent leaping after prey, and felt a burst of irrational affection.

  “What’s it hunting?”

  “I do think of them as hound-like,” she said. “It hunts whatever seems furthest from the local physical norms—within bounds. Assuming the safety protocols work, it shouldn’t pick up anything like the creature that killed poor Sally. I did learn something last winter.” While I tried to figure out how to respond, she added, “I am sorry. I know that was my mistake.” Peters looked at her sharply, and Barlow patted her hand. It was clear that they neither agreed with her culpability nor acknowledged any in themselves.

  Mary’s magic was a thing of equations and geometries. She inferred new methods from half-guessed principles, and tested them at great risk to life and sanity. Whether because of her newfound caution, or her recent interest in learning about older and more stable ways, she let us take the lead this time.

  I cut my hand and traced blood into our symbols. The familiar sting of the knife was a comfort by now; my breathing slowed, body ready for ritual. My travel companions, in their turn, offered their own sacrifices to the pattern we were about to enter. I began singing. Charlie joined in, and after a moment Mary hummed along with us. I was glad the lyrics were in R’lyehn, which she understood only a little. There’s something intimate about a lullaby. In the words, I imagined my mother’s hopes and anxieties for her infant children, and my grandmother’s before her, back to the oldest Chyrlid Ajha in the depths of R’lyeh, waiting millennia to meet their descendants.

  Dreamwalking is an old practice, simple and powerful. I lay on the chemical-scented carpet, surrounded by people I could not trust, and I slept.

  It was late morning, but the hotel must have harbored patrons sleeping off midnight business trysts. Around me swirled the scraps of a dozen ordinary dreams: faces dimly recognized as lovers, an emerald green sink that invoked visceral fear, a cat butting my ankles fondly with miniature goat horns.

  Charlie bent to rub its forehead. He looked much like he did in the waking world, save that he didn’t carry the cane. Mary, hair loose but primly dressed, appeared beside us.

  “One layer deeper?” she suggested. I nodded, and let go my hold on the fringe of our own world’s thoughts, letting the current pull me through to our neighboring dimension.

  We stood on a marble balcony. A city stretched before us: not New York itself, with its close-crowded townhouses and skyscrapers, but its mirror in spiderweb and fairy-light, classical columns and domes and narrow needles of steel that seemed to pierce the sky rather than scrape it. Thunderclouds gathered, a comforting shadow beneath which the city glowed like a hearth. One sunbeam knifed through a gap in the cover. In its spotlight I saw the spark of driving rain; dark shapes flitted among the drops. I smelled clean wet rock and ozone. From far away, I felt the gentle tug of my connection with my body, reassuring but easy to resist.

  “Good boys,” said Mary approvingly.

  At our feet, the talisman hounds had taken on further form. Iridescent swirls of mist, vaguely bestial, twined around her ankles. Something about them suggested tongues and teeth, and nostrils straining for a hint of prey. One of them brushed my leg, ghostly cold, and I flinched unthinking.

  They unwound from their mistress, and slipped toward the insubstantial-looking bridge that stretched from the balcony’s far end.

  “This way,�
� said Mary.

  “It doesn’t look like there’s any other,” said Charlie. He looked out over the view. “I can see why the first people to come here thought they must be traveling in dreams. It’s … impressive. And seems tailor-made to make anyone worry about falling.”

  “Or flying,” she said. “Dreams are as good a metaphor to start with as any, I suppose.”

  I stooped to examine the bridge before I dared step on it. The material was impossible to discern: woven of a thousand narrow strands like a massive fishing net, glossy black as onyx. Touching it produced a shock of bright and undifferentiated emotion; after the first prod I tried to avoid skin contact. As I followed Mary onto the expanse, it felt as if I struggled for balance on a great cat’s cradle. It drooped and swung beneath my weight.

  The hounds led us swiftly; distance here did not seem to work according to familiar laws. The landscape beneath our feet shifted with every step, giving a new glimpse of the glittering alleys below. It was convenient, but a reminder that we walked the boundary of the rules permitting our own blood and breath. In further dimensions, physics became even stranger, and human minds and bodies would both fail.

  The bridge led to another building, a needle of sky-blue stone. A narrow ramp spiraled its outer wall to another arch, slick and steep. I couldn’t help but lean toward the safe inner wall; where my fingers brushed I felt again that shock, and this time the pounding behind it, the rhythm that Spector rode in the waking city. Perhaps the shock was the myriad emotions of millions of New Yorkers, cascading over their manmade cliffs into the dream city. I shrunk from every unintended touch. More than a moment of that torrent and I would have been washed away, my own petty thoughts crushed.

  Yet creatures lived here. They scuttled along the canyon streets below, too distant to make out forms. Something butterfly-bright landed on the lapis wall and dug its proboscis into a crack. As it drank its wings sparked tiny blue lights, faster and faster until it leapt away into the air and its flicker became a steady glow. Charlie stopped a moment to watch, lips parted.