Balor walked up a slight incline and lowered Will to the spongy ground.
“This is it,” the Captain said.
“This is the Undercroft?”
“It’s the entrance to the Undercroft. Where’s yer flashlight?”
Will fumbled in his backpack until he found it. The light revealed a rusted wrought-iron gate running from the ground to the ceiling. A thick dimpled chain with two locks held the gate shut.
“How are we going to get in?” Will asked.
Balor ran a pointy gray tongue along his jagged teeth. “We’re not going in. Yer going in. Let me help yeh with the gate. Stand back.” The Captain approached the forbidding wrought iron. He clenched his fists and took a long drag of air. Lunging, he grabbed the chains with both hands. “Aaaaarrrr!” he bellowed. The Captain pulled with all his might. His great arms shuddered and his back buckled as if it were about to rip apart. Will noticed smoke coming from the chains.
“Are you okay, Captain?”
He answered with an anguished cry of pain but did not release the irons. “Aaaaaaarrrr!”
The loud snap of the links filled the cavern. Broken bits of chain fell to the floor. The Captain’s knees went weak, and his great bulk crumbled and slunk toward the water’s edge. He thrust both his hands into the river.
“Captain?”
“Be fine in a minute, Will,” he wheezed, exhausted.
“Can’t you come in with my friends and me?”
“No, lad, we daren’t go any farther. Yer the Wilder, not me. But we’ll be waitin’ here when ye come out.” He turned a teary, pitiful yellow eye to the boy. “Counting on yeh, lad. Counting on yeh.”
Outside, Will could hear Andrew and Simon yelling his name.
“Can you help me open the gate? It looks pretty heavy.”
“Can’t do it, Will,” he panted. “Ye boys will have the strength for it. Just be sure to bring us the relic when ye come out. Only need one touch of it—and oh, the wonders we’ll see.”
“It’s a deal, Captain.”
Balor offered a weary smile, touching the brim of his rain hat in a tired salute.
Will stuck his head outside the murky rounded opening to find his friends. Andrew and Simon were already wading through the marsh.
“Who were you talking to?” Simon asked, his sports-goggle glasses making him look like a nerdy space alien.
“Captain Balor,” Will said nonchalantly, gesturing with an open palm toward the Undercroft entrance. “Come on, I’ll introduce you.”
Andrew and Simon exchanged concerned looks. “Captain who?” Andrew asked, stepping into the mouth of the tunnel.
Will flipped his head right and left and back again. “He was right here. He popped the chain on the gate open for us.”
Simon shone his flashlight on the shards of rusted links littering the floor. “And your ‘Captain’ did this with his bare hands?”
“Yes. He’s really strong. He was just here,” Will said, still looking for Balor. “Captain?”
“Are we going to stand around looking for your imaginary friend, or are we going in? I don’t got all day,” Andrew complained.
“We’re going. We’re going,” Will assured them, pulling the green notebook from his book bag. He opened the book and told Simon to shine a light on the first pages describing the Undercroft. Simon leaned in close to inspect the notebook as the river’s waters began to lap into the Undercroft entrance.
“The first chamber looks pretty easy. It’s just a drainage pit,” Will said, moving a finger over the page. “There is a stone incline on the right and another on the left side of the room. You see this writing over here? My great-grandfather says there is only ‘one way to rise from the waters.’ That would be the incline—I think.”
Simon pointed at the pencil-drawn lines in the illustration running upward along the wall, next to the stone ramp. “What is that?”
Will pushed his pith helmet back and stared hard at the notebook. “Probably just a stray line or a decoration.”
“It’s on the opposite wall too,” Simon said, pointing to the angled thick line traveling up the wall above the incline on an adjacent sketch.
Will slammed the book shut. “We’ll figure it out when we get inside. There’s also some scribbling about St. Paul that I don’t quite get.”
Andrew was already pulling at the wrought-iron gate. It was stuck in the mud and refused to give. “How are we going to open this thing?” Andrew asked.
“Together,” Will said, sealing the notebook in the ziplock bag.
He, Simon, and Andrew heaved on the old gate with little success. After about ten minutes of sustained effort, the gate began to inch open by degrees.
“We’re getting there,” Will yelled.
“The only place I’m getting is to the chiropractor,” Simon carped, grabbing his lower back.
After much more tugging, they had created a twelve-inch opening. Simon easily slipped through the gap. So did Will and his pith helmet. Andrew got half his chest through but couldn’t move any farther. And the water was rising.
“Simon, you’ve got to help me push the gate open,” Will demanded.
“He’s stronger than we are. Let him pull the gate and we’ll wait for him inside.”
“When I get in there,” Andrew seethed through gritted teeth, “you’ll wish you’d stayed home, bug eyes.”
“Leave him,” Simon said.
“We can’t leave him. Get over here,” Will said, ramming the gate with his shoulder.
Simon reluctantly joined in, positioning himself on the other side of Will to avoid Andrew’s reach. The river water began to cover their feet. Low tide was over.
“Wiggle the gate back and forth,” Will ordered. The water helped to loosen the soil holding the gate in place.
But Andrew was not happy. Strawberry blotches broke out on his cheeks, and his features twisted. “You’re going to break my ribs.”
After repeatedly wiggling the gate, it finally sprang open. They pushed it so wide that the bottom jammed in the mud of the entryway. Freed from the metal grip, Andrew staggered toward the boys.
“If you’d lay off those burgers, you might be able to pass through a perfectly ample opening,” Simon teased.
Andrew swatted the goggle-faced, thin boy with the back of his hand. “If you’d keep that trap shut, you might have more friends.”
“Guys, guys. Focus on the adventure.” Will turned and shone his flashlight down the pitch-black tunnel before them. “The first chamber is this way.” Will tapped the top of the pith helmet with his palm and started moving forward.
“Are you going to wear that old helmet the whole time?” Simon asked.
“Always,” Will said without turning.
“Should we close the gate?” Andrew yelled ahead to him.
“Nah,” Will’s voice echoed from inside the tunnel. “Leave it.”
Simon and Andrew shrugged and followed his silhouette into the darkness.
In the river, two gray-green scaled creatures slithered toward the entryway of the Undercroft. Their reptilian bodies stretched on for twelve feet. Two pairs of rounded yellow eyes sat unblinking atop the surface of the rising water. Once the creatures reached the water’s edge, they remained perfectly still, drifting, floating, waiting for the tide to take them where they had been commanded to go.
“Can you slow this thing down, Loo-ceele?” Bartimaeus hollered from the passenger seat of the Stella Maris. “Going this fast makes my head all cloudy.”
Lucille Wilder’s boat tore through the waters at a furious clip. She clutched the steering wheel with both hands as if racing for her very life. Trees and occasional homes blurred by on the right side of the boat. On the left, Wormwood, a dark forest the locals called the Rooky Wood, hid any signs of life. “We have to get there to see what we’re dealing with, Bart. We may already be too late. They may have scattered.”
“What are you talkin’ about, Lucille? Don’t matter when you get t
here. The devil is the devil is the devil. He may change his shape, but the stink and the death are always the same. So what are we rushing for?” Bart wore sunglasses and leaned back in his white upholstered seat. In his mismatched brown tweed jacket and bright green pants he looked like a passenger on a hobo pleasure cruise.
“Those children and the swimmer were attacked by something supernatural, Bart. Gareb Pier was structurally sound—it doesn’t just fall into the river one day. Ships don’t simply overturn. There is an intelligence at play here. What is lurking out there?” She turned her squinty blue eyes to Bartimaeus, who seemed to be drowsing. Lucille kicked the side of his seat, giving him a start. “Well? What is out there? Focus! I need your help.”
“You’re driving so fast it’s a wonder my poor brain ain’t scrambled by now. Focus? You focus on applying the brake,” Bartimaeus said, jabbing a finger in her direction. “Don’t tell me about focus—I focus just fine. I was the one who told you I felt the creep of something dark the other day. ‘Give Will that book of prophecy,’ I said. But no…‘He’s not ready yet.’ Don’t be lecturing me about focus. My focus is always where it should be—right on target. Uh-oh.” He fell silent and frantically reached down for one of his crutches on the deck.
Lucille slowed the boat’s speed. “What’s wrong, Bart?”
“Oooooh, something’s near, Lucille. Something is very, very near. Give me my other crutch.” Lucille handed it to him. Bartimaeus moved to the back of the boat, balancing his forearms on the crutches, his open palms facing the water. It was as if he were trying to feel the air itself. Aunt Lucille stood directly behind him.
His eyes closed behind the dark glasses, and Bartimaeus groaned, a pained expression covering his face. He shook his head as if saying no. Then, in a husky whisper, he warned, “They’re circling us, Lucille. They’re right round this boat. Three—uh, I’m wrong—six, maybe.”
“Six what?” Aunt Lucille pushed her loose silk sleeves to her elbows. “What are they?”
“Hmm. Thought your daddy got rid of ’em all. But I think they’re back.” His voice dropped into its deepest register. “Fomorii. It’s the Bottom Dwellers. I’ve never seen them so big and powerful. The blood of the innocent hangs on their lips—and they know we’re here.” Before he could say another word, green claws dug into the railings of the Stella Maris.
The clatter of the creature scaling the back of the boat caused both Bartimaeus and Aunt Lucille to seek shelter in the center of the vessel. The monster’s claws crushed the brass rails as it pulled itself up. Others could be heard pounding against the sides of the Stella Maris beneath the water, tossing the boat to and fro.
The green beast with the pointy face of a dragon and round fish eyes expelled a guttural hiss. It opened its protruding mouth, not unlike that of an alligator, and exposed three rows of serrated teeth. Only it was double the size of an alligator, with the lethal advantage of long legs and a razor-tipped tail.
“I can’t see too hot with these corneas, but I know that thing is ugly,” Bartimaeus whispered.
Lucille moved Bartimaeus behind her. She stretched her arms out, placing her index fingers and thumbs together to form a triangle.
The creature threw its front legs over the railing and began to flail, attempting to propel itself onto the deck.
Lucille closed her eyes and pulled her hands toward her chest. Then, extending her arms, a fiery ray of red-and-white light shot from the triangle of her digits. The twelve-foot-long beast was thrown backward over the water and dissolved into a foul gray ash.
“Remind me to call you when my furnace light goes out,” Bartimaeus laughed. Suddenly he bent his head down and went into the deep voice he used when relaying one of his visions. “So, we got more coming. You take the two on the port side. I’ll wallop the one on the starboard.” He spun around, a crutch over his head.
Aunt Lucille inhaled and directed the light shooting from her fingers to the left side of the boat. She could hear the awful scratching of Bottom Dwellers climbing the Stella Maris. Just as the first claws of the two slithering savages presented themselves, Lucille projected her red-and-white ray. The eyes of the beasts bugged out as they were thrown into the air and reduced to an ashy mist. Behind her, Bartimaeus faced another creature already over the railing, its blood-coated mouth wide, ready to lunge.
Old Bartimaeus swung his crutch like a baseball bat. He cracked the monster squarely in the lower jaw, dislocating it. Wailing in anguish, it gouged the glossy white wood beneath the railing with its talons. Aunt Lucille calmly turned and projected her hands to finish the creature off.
“Oh, no, you don’t. He’s mine,” Bartimaeus said, slamming his crutch into the creature’s sleek skull. After one more strike to the front of the snout, the thing lifelessly slumped over the railing. “That’s what you get when you mess with a boy from the Lafitte Projects. We better get moving. So I’ll hold them off, and you do your speedboat routine.”
Aunt Lucille hustled to the steering wheel and gunned the engine. Bartimaeus used a crutch to pry the monster into the churning waters of the Perilous River. He then hobbled over to Lucille.
“Now, I know you’re gonna be angry. But we got no time for pride.” He reached into a cloth satchel he had hidden under his tweed coat. “I knew ya wouldn’t listen, but you know old Bart. So I used my emergency key.” From out of the satchel he pulled the olive-colored Book of Prophecy. The metal filigree adorning the cover twinkled in the sunlight.
“Why did you bring that here? Those Bottom Dwellers will kill us for it.”
“I had no choice. The boy needs to hold this book now. It’s time, Sarah Lucille. You can’t stop this. He’s all that stands between us and the Darkness. Now take it to him.”
Aunt Lucille flared her nostrils in anger. Her hands trembled as she gripped the steering wheel. “How dare you. You should have left that at Peniel. It’s not safe out here. It wasn’t yours to take, Bart.” She wanted to cry.
In that moment, her fears for the future collided with her concerns for Will. She anguished over the burden that she would be laying upon the shoulders of a boy—a child—and an unpredictable child at that. But deep down she knew Will’s fate was bound up with that of Perilous Falls and perhaps the fates of others far beyond the town’s borders. She understood what she had to do.
“I know it’s not my responsibility.” Bartimaeus dropped one arm out of his tweed jacket and lifted the strap of the satchel over his head. He gently placed it around Lucille’s neck. “It’s your responsibility. So take it to the boy. We have no choice, Lucille.”
She laid a hand over the cloth satchel. Through the fabric she fingered the chunky locks along the edge of the book she had spent her life protecting. This was her life’s mission: to fulfill the prophecy, to protect her family, and to realize her father’s vision. Relinquishing the book would surely usher in the final act she knew she could influence but not ultimately control.
Bartimaeus’s voice again fell into that deep monotone, as if he were in a trance. “Take me to Dismal Shoals. Then get the boy. You’re gonna need him.”
“Why Dismal Shoals? It’s a Hell Mouth. It’s too dangerous, Bart.”
“It’s all dangerous.” He smiled, returning from his momentary vision. “The Bottom Dwellers are nesting in the Shoals, and so is whatever’s controlling them. I won’t go inside the old temple, but I’ll need to get a fix on what’s in there.”
Aunt Lucille said nothing. She jammed the boat’s throttle, and the Stella Maris steamed forward with great speed. Around the slight bend in the river, they could see the remains of Gareb Pier, its fragments bobbing atop the water like abandoned rafts. Along the shore, rescue crews finished their work. Wheelchair-bound teens were wrapped in towels or caught in the embrace of grateful parents. Reporters stood at a distance under the watchful eyes of deputy sheriffs who had blocked off all traffic along the road leading to the river’s edge.
Nearing Dismal Shoals, the boat’s passage was s
talled by huge rocks protruding from the river. Aunt Lucille slowed the boat’s advance. It was not only the rocks that caused her delay, but the mangled bodies of the Bottom Dwellers she saw upon them. More surprising was the frantic movement on a large stone in the middle of the river, just in front of the Stella Maris’s bow.
A man in a gray uniform, with unrelenting speed, smashed the Fomorii one after another as they rose from the water around him. He hurled them to nearby rocks or plunged them into the waters with only a stick and his keen instincts. Twisting the long pole in his hands, a winded Tobias Shen dropped two Bottom Dwellers on either side of him.
Lucille instructed Bart to hold the wheel. She moved to the bow of the boat and unleashed the powerful red-and-white ray from her hands. It exploded on the waters surrounding the rock Tobias Shen stood astride. She swept the ray back and forth like a searchlight, destroying all the creatures in its path. Ash bubbled up from the water like magma. The gobs of molten black matter were pulled downstream by the current.
Tobias Shen, stoop-shouldered and exhausted, leaned on the long pole, drenched in purple liquid. He breathed deeply for the first time since he had arrived. “You’re good friends. But you’re very, very sloooow.”
No more Bottom Dwellers floated to the surface, and their strange hisses had faded from the river. “I think we got ’em all,” Bartimaeus barked out to Shen.
“I certainly hope so,” the white-haired man said, surveying the twisted carcasses of Fomorii piled on the rocks surrounding him.
Aunt Lucille slowly accelerated the boat’s engine, sailing the Stella Maris near the rock Tobias Shen dominated. With his blood-soaked stick, he could have been one of the bronze war memorial figures in the park.
Bartimaeus sat in the copilot’s chair, drained from the excitement of the last few minutes. He closed his eyes tightly and once again extended his hands as if trying to feel for something just out of reach. “Yeah, I think we got ’em all.” Then he rose to his feet. “There’s something else! Something dark and strong. It’s not the Bottom Dwellers. What do you see, Lucille?”
Will Wilder Page 10