The prayer gave me strength, perhaps enough to gird myself against mushroom-scented dreams. It occurred to me that I should also make obeisance to Nyarlathotep, whose patronage the Outer Ones claimed. Better to call to the Thousand-Faced God directly than have near only the face he showed the Outer Ones. But a warm draught stirred the air beside my cot, and I opened my eyes as Audrey sat heavily beside me. The air was warm, but she shivered. Charlie already lay on the next bed over, deep in meditation, but Neko joined us. She put her arm around Audrey.
“We’re all monsters here,” she reminded her in a whisper.
“What am I going to do?” Audrey kept her voice low. “I thought I had it all figured out—how I needed to handle my … my ancestry. I never expected to meet one of them, let alone one of … of our creators. I’m afraid to ask anything, and I’d be an idiot not to. Or maybe I’m an idiot to talk to her at all. Suppose she tells me how their magic works before I can stop her? If she says the wrong thing I could turn into … I could end up as mad and cruel as them, just from hearing the wrong thing.” Her head drooped over her knees, and she wrapped her arms around a pained laugh. “Oh Aphra, your cousin has the worst taste in girls.”
I should have been able to sense Audrey’s heart and breath as they followed the rhythm of her anguish. Should have been able to share with her the little comfort I’d gained from praying. But in my exhausted state, the threads binding the confluence echoed distantly. Even my control over my own body was frayed.
“I know you,” I told Audrey. “And you know yourself, better than anyone else I’ve met on land. Even when the black rose in your blood, you saw it coming, and we had time to react. I don’t think she can force you to become anything just by talking.”
“Did you listen to her?” asked Neko, her tone strangely gentle. “She may sound frightening—but from what you’ve said, the K’n-yan are crueler to each other than to any outsider, and it sounds like she got pretty close to the bottom of the heap. Everyone else joined the Outer Ones because they want to travel. She’s here because she wanted to live free, because she wanted to control her own mind—same as you. Why would she take that from you, when she said you should be grateful for it?”
“I did listen,” said Audrey. “She may say she likes being sane. But she doesn’t sound sane.”
“When I’m scared my English gets very precise and I add Nihongo no tango, like Mama. And Aphra sounds like a Victorian lady who gargles when she swears. If Shelean grew up around people who talk that way—if madness is her cradle tongue—she’s going to sound mad even if she learned sane dialects later.”
“Huh,” said Audrey.
“I think,” I said with effort, trying not to sound Victorian, “that Audrey and I should take a quick look together at the local dreamlands, see whether Charlie’s started on the wards we need to sleep here safely, and help him finish up. And then we should all sleep. This is a terrible place for it, but these are the beds we have.”
“We’ve slept on worse,” said Neko.
* * *
Audrey Winslow—March 1948:
“Secrets passed down from ancient civilizations,” says the boy. He pauses dramatically, and shifts his hand from my arm to my thigh. The pause lingers anticlimactically as he waits to see if I’ll object. Finally he continues: “Pre-human civilizations. Even some of the professors believe it. Researchers in math and physics—they find insight in old texts that are supposedly folklore.”
I lean into his touch, and run my fingers down his arm. “I heard that the Pnakotic Manuscript drops hints about atomic warfare. But our librarians at Hall claim the book doesn’t even exist.”
The disused lab glitters around us. Fluorescent light reflects off glassware through a mist of cobwebs. The boy swears he nabbed the only key from his professor. Whether that’s really the only copy is anyone’s guess; the danger is part of the fun. Like the pleasure of touch, the little pockets of freedom opened by the Hall School’s imperfect chaperonage. But the occult pillow talk is the real point of the exercise.
Shirts are shed as he spins tales of volumes hidden deep in Crowther Library’s restricted stacks. So far, no one’s even gotten me in the door. It’s fun to talk about powers that men know not, but the powers forbidden to women are more mundane.
I want these things to be real: the intelligences from beyond the Earth; the cities that rose in golden splendor millennia before our own histories begin; the scholars who consort with dark forces, who sacrifice air and light and their human forms in exchange for unimaginable secrets. I want to see them. I want to talk with them, to decide for myself whether that deal is worth taking.
But if those deals are anything like these furtive exchanges—touch for touch, safety for whispered rumor—then I think they must be well worth it.
* * *
The shallows around the Outer One lair were safe, and shiveringly strange. I discovered that the riotous spectrum of fungi that girded the place were a deliberate ward, better than any we might set ourselves. Within them lay a well-tended garden. Ribboning walls rose eel-like to mark clearings and grottos; swift lines of light darted along the paths between. The whole structure was bound through by multicolored filaments—I suspected the root system of the mushroom ward, and carrier of the alarm Mary set off when she took her sample.
Strange creatures followed those lines: serpents with hominid faces, crystalline spiders with too many legs, a spike-backed tadpole, a musk-scented blob that clung to a single point of air for long moments before writhing into blurred speed. Outer Ones walked here as freely as on our own plane.
“They’re not dreaming,” suggested Audrey. “They’re in both places at once.”
“Maybe more,” I agreed. I felt my own mind’s limits keenly, able to perceive only one aspect of reality at a time—at best.
New York’s heartbeat was a distant rhythm, passed through a single thread of the Outer One’s wards. My mind hewed close to that root, and waited for dawn.
* * *
“Aphra! Child, wake up.” The voice, a low, hoarse whisper from a throat not meant for whispering. A muscled hand on my shoulder, scales dry and rough against my neck.
Grandfather crouched by my cot, crest wilted, eyes veined red and dilated wide.
I sat up fast. “Don’t shout.”
His laughter was as muted as his voice had been, too low for air-born ears. “I wasn’t, but thank you for the warning. I have more self-control than you seem to think.”
My cheeks warmed. “You attacked Nnnnnn-gt-vvv. It gave you reason, but…”
“S’vlk attacked. I joined in rather than let her fight alone.”
“S’vlk?” My own voice rose in shock.
He put a finger to my lips. “Old fears can be the deadliest. S’vlk has honed her hate for millennia—and though she’s met them more often than I, it’s been a long time since she needed to do so. I’ve dealt with them face to face all too often and all too recently. I remember the forbearance needed to come out with any advantage. We must practice it now—and convince S’vlk to do the same when their enchantment releases her.”
S’vlk slept with her head in Trumbull’s lap. Trumbull dozed over her, head shifting as she threatened to overbalance. Audrey often found her drooped so over her desk.
“They haven’t threatened to hold us here,” I said. “Do you think they will?”
“Not unless they have cause. But—” He lifted my hand, examined my palm, pricked it with one sharp claw. I winced, but didn’t pull away. He sketched a quick sigil on my skin with the blood, murmured softly, then tasted the remnant on his fingertip. He nodded. “You seemed yourself, but best to check. The Outer Ones are artists of flesh, but they cannot change the nature of your blood.”
“They can look like us?” I whispered.
“I doubt even an Outer One has enough artistry to make itself appear human. But I once spent two hours with a man I thought my ally before learning he was one of their thralls, wearing a mask of my fri
end’s face and taught his manners of speaking and standing.”
I looked around the room. I’d know, surely, if Charlie or Audrey were not where my eyes told me they lay. Trumbull had been in my sight until I fell asleep, then held down by S’vlk’s weight. Neko … mistaking an ally was one thing, but I’d spent more time with Neko than any living being other than my brother. I knew every shade of pain and hope that shifted her shoulders, how she whimpered in the throes of nightmare. Surely no deception could be that good. But Grandfather …
He bared teeth in recognition of my realization, and pricked his own palm where the scales were thin. He drew the sigil on his own flesh, and offered me his claw-tip. Uncertain, I tasted. For a moment, I saw nothing, heard nothing, but felt around me the vast pressure and monstrous currents of the deep ocean. A sense of belonging suffused me, of connection with something huge and inhuman, and with schools of tiny human things that shared that connection.
The feeling faded, and I looked again on my grandfather. “A simple test,” he said, “but it takes more study than you’ve accomplished on your own. As you learn more, you’ll be able to taste more—health and age, even traces of memory. But if nothing else, you can be sure I’m an elder.”
“Yes, Grandfather.” I leaned against him and took comfort in his strength. The others were beginning to stir on their cots. “I want to get out of here. But the FBI agents will arrive soon, and we’ll need to watch them as well. If they start trouble, I need to know.”
“Agreed.” But he stiffened against me. “Aphra Yukhl, do I recall that our cousin introduced us to a Mad One?”
“Yes. She says she’s here to escape her body’s madness. But she helped perform the experiments that created Audrey’s family. Audrey’s terrified of her, and I suspect she’s right to be. I don’t know what to do.”
He snorted. “Gods save us from all creatures who can’t keep to one shape. If we find the ghosts of ancient dragons down here, and a worm grown fat on a wizard’s flesh, we’ll have a full menagerie of dangers.”
I blinked at the list of half-remembered legends. “Was that advice?”
He cuffed me lightly. “I think you’re right—hopefully Khur S’vlk can be persuaded to stay here until nightfall. Then we’ll need to find our way back to the ocean, not by the route we came. I don’t trust Nnnnnn-gt-vvv’s patience, nor S’vlk’s. Can Caleb help? Is he somewhere you can reach him?”
“No—except through the most basic connection of our confluence. That’s what I wanted to tell you. George Barlow and his team are in town, investigating disappearances that turn out to be the Outer Ones’ doing. Virgil Peters insulted Miss Dawson, and Caleb wouldn’t put up with it. We’d been arguing anyway, about whether to work with them or investigate separately. They left to get a hotel room on their own; that’s all I know. I haven’t even been able to tell them that we found Freddy.”
“Tch. That boy needs to learn to make better use of his temper. But I’m glad he’s elsewhere. Outer Ones swim in murky waters.”
“Meigo, they are called.” S’vlk rose from where she’d slept, and her glare was venomous. “Where is the slime-grown corpse-creature that tried to steal my mind?”
“Nearby, and well-protected,” said Grandfather. “Sheathe your talons until the current holds us up.”
“S’vlk.” Trumbull’s slender hand seemed too small to restrain the elder’s muscled forearm. “Please don’t attack it again. The result was terrifying enough the first time. I need—we need you here and whole.”
S’vlk’s whole body shuddered as she closed her eyes and drew a slow breath. Another then, slower and seeming equally painful. But she opened her eyes and nodded. “You’re right. I’ll control my temper until it’s wise to show it.” She sat on the nearest cot. Neko, stirring awake, curled her legs out of the way. She rubbed bleary eyes and examined the black-crested storm, clouds still roiling gray, at the foot of her bed. She bit her lip.
Even for me, it was hard not to see S’vlk in this mood as some natural force, a small god whose wrath I should sensibly cower from. But there was something younger in her eyes when she said, in R’lyehn, “My eldest daughter loved to clamber through the scree of the foothills. The elders swore them haunted, and forbade her to explore alone, but still I could do nothing to keep her in the camp. She always brought back fruit or nuts or a brace of game as excuse—until one night when we saw the sky full of wings. She would never hide from what she didn’t understand. My brave, foolish child.
“The elders went with me to negotiate, and I saw her body still as death. Her mind was beyond any star we’ve named, and they swore I’d go into the water before she returned. I saw her again many years later, unaged, and when I tasted her blood it was bone dry. She was no longer a child of the water. She claimed her journey worth the cost.”
Grandfather knelt before her, and took her hands. “I mourn with you. I share your desire to avenge lost daughters. The sleeping god’s lesson lies heavy, sometimes.”
“Patience.” In R’lyehn, the word was half-sigh: yrahl. “You’ve lived the blink of a mortal’s eye, and you’ve never had to wait more than a few decades for anything.”
In the hunch of Grandfather’s shoulders, I saw my own bristling irritation at an elder’s rebuke. But he said: “It’s not my place to judge the difficulty of your wait—only whether we can afford a fight in this place and time. If you seek your vengeance now, you’ll find death or enthrallment instead.”
Trumbull understood R’lyehn better than she spoke it. In English, she said, “Your daughter is recorded in the Archives.”
S’vlk released a softer breath. “Yes, she is. And in the Archives, my own life covers a few scant pages. I’ll follow your counsel.”
“Good.” Grandfather rocked back on his heels. “For now we’ll watch, and learn.”
I heard shuffling in the hall, turned to see Freddy in the doorway. Amid all the strange noises down here, I couldn’t be sure how much he’d heard before catching my attention. At least he didn’t speak R’lyehn. He’d be unlikely to approve of either S’vlk’s mourning or her desire for vengeance.
“Your G-men are here,” he said.
CHAPTER 12
My scalp prickled. I wouldn’t have chosen to greet Barlow’s team red-eyed and sweaty, wearing the previous day’s rumpled dress.
Fortunately they were distracted. I’d missed Barlow and Peters’s first encounter with the Outer Ones—though it must have gone well since both seemed cognizant of their surroundings. (Would the talismans that protected them against the Yith also defend against the Outer Ones’ mental arts? I made a note to ask Mary if we might bargain for extras.) But I did get to see them gape at the elders. Spector, who knew my grandfather already, nodded at him easily and proffered a bulging paper bag, smelling of yeast and fish.
“Thank you,” said Charlie fervently. I took a bagel thickly caked with poppy seeds and garlic, and a slice of smoked salmon, artifacts of a sunlit world above where bodily needs were treated as commonplace.
Grandfather extended his hand and waited while Barlow made up his mind to shake it. Green scales enveloped pink skin. Talons scraped close. “I’m Obed Marsh. I’ve heard much about you.” He bared his teeth. “You were impolite to my granddaughter, this past winter.”
Barlow glanced my way. “I apologized.”
“And so you should have.” A gentler smile, though Barlow might not recognize it as such. Peters, he pointedly did not address.
“My grandfather and S’vlk came here last night,” I told them. I hoped the others would follow my lead in omitting S’vlk’s title. “They also wanted to meet the Outer Ones’ companions.”
“And learn more about this expansion of their territory.” S’vlk wasn’t trying to be menacing, but the men stepped back anyway. Kvv-vzht-mmmm-vvt and Nnnnnn-gt-vvv—I assumed, I still couldn’t tell them apart—watched this interplay. They drew nervous looks, but never that easy dance of body language, negotiating for space and status. For
all the difference between air and water, we apes understood each other.
“You gave us twenty-five names,” said one of the Outer Ones. “Of those, twenty-three are among our companions, and seventeen are here today. We’ll introduce you to them, and they can assure you of their well-being.”
Our route avoided the room where the bodies lay, and I was grateful. In the conversation pit, the agents split up to speak with several humans, some accompanied by Outer Ones and some on their own. The room dampened noise, so that I heard only the occasional voice raised in anger or enthusiasm. One of the Outer Ones found me near the lip of the bowl.
“Speak with me,” it said.
I looked for the elders, wondering why it would choose me when more experienced negotiators were available. I fell back on etiquette. “What can I do for you?”
“You understand the cities of the sea. Humans there live, if not in peace, then with the moderation and adaptation needed to preserve themselves in the face of change. You believe you’ll survive so long as this world remains habitable, and it seems plausible.”
“We know we will.” But of course the Outer Ones didn’t trust the testimony of the Yith—and, if they never went to the Archives, would never read the firsthand testimony.
“But you’re also working with these state agents. You understand the drives that push them toward extinction.”
“We know something will.” Understand was too strong a word. “It doesn’t seem fair to blame them for those drives. All species pass, sooner or later.”
“We endure, because we change.” A soft chitter, underscoring the ubiquitous buzz. “You don’t recognize me, do you? I’m Kvv-vzht-mmmm-vvt.”
“I’m sorry. I’m trying to learn to tell you apart.”
“Yet you cannot bear to look at our wings.”
There was no answer but to look at them. It felt like staring at an eclipse, too bright and too dark at once. My vision blurred, and I had to look away. “If there are clues there, my eyes aren’t made to see them. I’m sorry.”
“You haven’t decided to be ready. But you needn’t pretend—just ask who you’re talking to. We’re all different people, and I’d like to think that matters to you.”
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