19
The ship cut through floorboards, speeding towards Kip and Blackmoor. It lowered itself until the deck was at their feet, the water churning around them.
The magician grabbed Kip and dragged him onboard.
Water flooded the deck, loose pages and water-logged books following the current.
Blackmoor raised his arms and the ship responded. It ground through the floor of the library and then pierced the opposite wall, punching out wooden beams and bookcases until the open ocean was visible beyond. The ship birthed itself from the tower, leaving a broken husk behind.
The shadow of Vorax still streamed from the top of library, flooding a now gray sky like chimney smoke. Dawn was coming. Thousands of eyes appeared in the cloud as it spread. Pairs of purple lights became Shadows of their own, until an army of them moved overhead, Vorax leading them.
The top of the library bent and then rolled to one side, before shearing away. It collapsed, ripping a long hole into the side of the tower as it fell. Books flowed from the wound, fluttering like baby birds leaving the nest.
Kip screamed as he clutched his head. Something so beautiful shouldn’t be destroyed. All its knowledge, all its secrets, bled into the ocean and sank beneath the waves.
The light from the whirlpool broke through the crumbling tower. It shot out of each new hole like a broken lighthouse before the entire structure collapsed in an explosion of water.
Drops of rain spattered the deck.
Kip righted himself as the vision of Dark House became a reality. It no longer bewildered his mind. It felt real. Complete. He knew it waited for him somewhere over the ocean.
He got to his feet, clutching his green bag.
The door to the hold burst open, splinters of wood spinning across the deck, as Shadow, Britten, and Fairfield broke out. Shadow rushed to Kip’s side.
“He made us sleep, Kip. Shadow didn’t want to sleep.”
Blackmoor laughed as he faced them all.
“What a glorious reunion this is! Two ghosts, an up-jumped animal, and a boy. As I told you in Magic House, none of you has the vision for the times to come.” He looked out over the gray sea and to the purple haze on the horizon. “All our answers lie there.”
Amelia Britten followed his gaze as if seeing the purple light for the first time.
“No!” Britten exclaimed. “We can’t go back there. That horrible purple place. That’s where it begins and ends.”
Fairfield was in agreement. He raced to the wheel and spun it towards the port side, causing the ship to lurch and stutter in the water. They were nearly thrown off balance as the rudder fought the sudden change of direction. The sails clapped in the wind above.
In a flash of crimson light, Fairfield was thrown over the wheel and against the railing at the fore of the ship. His back punched a hole in the wooden bannister and he crumpled forward, hitting the deck.
Lord Blackmoor radiated energy as he stood against them, his eyes two red blades again.
“We’re going to the purple fucking horizon,” he barked. “Before it’s too late.”
Even with this show of power, he looked more worn than he had hours before. His skin was like tissue paper moving over bones. Kip imagined it was something you’d see on an exhumed corpse, a silent howl on its face.
“Don’t you fools feel it? Time is speeding by, robbing me of the little I have left. You may want to be errand-boys for Vorax, but I intend to solve the deeper mysteries of this place.”
The ship continued to steer off its course and it angered the sea around them. White caps pricked the surface like small teeth.
Blackmoor raised his hands to the gray sky above and tried to bring forth the stars, the same cold void that had consumed Britten and Fairfield.
The spiritualist looked up in horror like a panicked animal. She was waiting for the black curtain to fall. The star-scape stuttered overhead, moving in and out of focus.
Kip could feel the chill shedding from it, buffeting the ship with frozen air.
He can’t do it, he thought, he’s losing his powers. Kip’s hands roamed frantically through his bag, searching for something he could weaponize.
Decomposition.
I can help the old man along, help him meet the death he fears so much.
The stars above faltered for one last time, then disappeared with a rending crack. They left behind an agitated sky that swirled with thick black clouds. The world above was one giant storm system, rotating in a lazy circle.
The ship was a few hundred feet off its path, coasting into uncharted water. The white caps turned to waves that slammed against the side of the ship; the deck jelly under their feet.
Lord Blackmoor seemed confused by his lack of power. He stared at the sky in bewilderment, his hands still raised; white palms against black clouds.
Kip pushed Shadow behind him and then stepped forward.
He had something in his hand, wrapped in a white cloth. Leaning forward, he flung it at Blackmoor’s feet. Tiny black spheres bounced across the deck, weaving patterns on the wood, before settling beneath the magician.
The coal-like material shattered into a fine dust and swept around Blackmoor, wrapping him in its folds. He made a sound like he’d been struck and his eyes met Kip’s. Was there a look of betrayal there, even after all they’d been through? It vanished in a flash as the red returned, more violent than before. His eyelids closed, the amber light shining through the flesh.
The Decomposition material ate at the deck, dissolving wood and nails and leaving carbon behind. The smoke enveloped Blackmoor, an angry curtain of dust.
His voice stabbed out from behind its folds.
“You think you can hurt me?”
A red flare pierced the smoke and was met with a gust of wind coming off the ocean. It howled over the water, across the deck, and rushed over Lord Blackmoor. It swept the Decomposition material away, excavating Blackmoor like a fossil from the ground.
A red energy moved over his body, in constant battle with the effects of Kip’s alchemy. The potion ate away his skin, a creeping black moved up his arms. It looked like he was wearing black gloves, tattered fabric weaving around his flesh. The blackness blistered and popped, creating fissures in his skin, only to be beaten back by his magic, his pale flesh knitting together again.
Slowly he fought off the Decomposition until his body returned to normal.
He stepped out of the scorched circle on the deck and towards Kip, the weary smile back on his face.
“Did I not tell you that Magic is the supreme force in the world, in this one or any?”
He cast his arm toward the captain’s wheel and tried to correct its course. The wheel stuttered and made a cracking sound before falling apart. The mechanism had broken.
Vorax’s black veil swept overhead, carrying its long train behind. The purple orb-eyes of a thousand Shadows played in its wake, trailing like a meteor shower, some massive heavenly body broken into a thousand pieces.
A hurricane followed them, stabs of lightning at its center. It boiled with anger, sucking up ocean water in great columns and thundering it back to the surface where it pelted the ocean with a thousand knives.
Britten helped a limping Fairfield across the deck and towards the safety of the cabin below. Again, they didn’t seem real to Kip. They truly were two shades, acting out some preordained drama.
Vorax’s laughter echoed down on them, coming in waves like the tide. His eyes gleamed at the head of the black veil, his sweeping robes fading to the horizon.
Blackmoor looked up.
“He doesn’t want us leaving the path. He’s not done with his games. I don’t think I’ll wait for the storm, Master Kip. But I think you deserve better company in my absence.”
The magician looked from the host of Shadows above and then back to Kip’s singular friend.
“Let’s give your friend a little nudge,” he laughed. “Let’s reveal his true nature.”
A purple dagger s
hot from his extended finger and struck Shadow in the chest. Kip’s friend tumbled backwards, his form wavering.
Kip jumped forward to grab Blackmoor. He wanted to hurt him, to wound him in some way, physical pain being only the first step. But the old man had begun to fade, his body flickering like a dying candle.
Kip lost his hold on Blackmoor; his hands snapped on thin air as he tried to grab him. He imagined his hands around the magician’s pale throat; imagined squeezing until all life ended.
Blackmoor moved backwards through the railing and out over the open sea. All Kip could see were his two red eyes speeding across the water.
“Goodbye for the present,” his voice called, nearly lost in the storm. “Thank you for bringing Dark House to me.”
Cursing, Kip looked back to Shadow. His back was turned to him; hunched over, one paw resting on the deck. His form was agitated; tiny ripples floated off its surface and evaporated into the air.
“Shadow?” Kip took a step forward and Shadow turned to face him.
His eyes were purple, a ghastly vivid color that had beaten back the soft blue. Small drops of blue light remained in the center of each pupil, but they were contracting, disappearing to nothing.
“Kip,” Shadow said, his child-echo voice filled with pain. “I’m sorry, Kip. Shadow fought it as long as he could.”
“No! There’s something I can do. There has to be something. Hold on, my friend.” Kip reached for his bag, his fingers outstretched, as something hit the ship. The first wave of the storm was on them, accompanied by the wall of Shadows.
The deck heaved sickly, slamming them both to the port side. The ship’s railing cracked Kip in the ribs, pushing the air out of him. Shadow moved more fluidly. A piece of him punched out, scurried up the railing, and clawed at Kip’s hand, drawing thin slivers of blood.
Kip gasped and brought his hand to his chest. He stared into his friend’s eyes, eyes that had now surrendered to purple.
“I can help you!” Kip yelled as the squall hit them. A million cold knives of rain cut him, battering his face and drowning his voice.
I’m sorry.
Kip heard the voice in his head as Shadow lunged forward. The Shadow army in the air followed his lead, descending on the ship. Blurred purple light cut through the storm, moving in wide arcs before attacking. A wave of Shadows sped toward the sails and shredded them. They came apart like ruined and tattered flesh, the ghostly fabric was caught by the storm and moved in a whirlwind around the ship.
And Vorax laughed. He spiraled above the ship, above the storm, to watch his handiwork. The hurricane had caught them and sent its lightning down in fierce blasts, illuminating the world with blinding light. In-between the blasts Kip saw his friend turned to a fierce beast. Shadow lunged forward.
His body covered Kip’s with a suffocating closeness, his spectral-shape always so curious, was now a threat, a weapon. The darkness swelled around him and lifted him into the air. Kip reached out a desperate hand and grabbed the loop of his bag a split second before it was out of reach.
Lifted over Shadow’s head, he looked down into the blaze of purple. It was tipping to a hot white, his power amplified by the storm. It swelled in the darkness; cut down by each lightning strike, only to come back stronger.
Kip’s mind had no time to catch up, no time to process. He was suddenly airborne, tossed by Shadow, lifted by the storm, and thrown nearly the length of the ship. He hit the deck, now slick with rain, and slid the rest of the way before hitting the stern. The splintered boards grabbed at his clothes and cut any bare skin.
Shadow ran towards him, darting from one dark contour to the next as he came.
Tears and diluted blood ran down Kip’s face. His voice was lost in the storm but he screamed anyway, screamed to his friend and to the world and to things beyond. He reached into his bag mindlessly. There was no time to think, no time to be clever, only to react.
His hand slipped inside a leather pouch and the powder inside. He grabbed a handful and threw it into the air in front of him. It flowed out in spidery lines, dancing in the wind, caught in the tight columns of air that battered the ship.
The substance hit the sheets of water that thundered against the deck and turned them to a solid mass. They froze into heavy stalagmite shapes, making thick bars between him and Shadow.
Congelation crystalizes a liquid into a solid.
Shadow clawed at Kip’s new cage, his purple eyes glowing through the solidified water.
“I’m sorry!” Kip yelled. It was all he could think to say.
I brought us here. I fashioned the world to be this way.
The ship rocked again, this time tipping towards the starboard side as the wind hammered it. The port side cracked under the pressure of the storm and Kip heard the rending sound of splintering wood, like the breaking bones of a giant. The railing gave way and hung uselessly like a broken arm.
Vorax and the Shadows lingered overhead, circling in the eye of the storm. Kip thought he could hear laughter piercing the tempest, dancing between thunderclaps. He thought he could hear Vorax mocking, always mocking. He wanted Kip back on the path, but he wanted to cause pain in the process, to use those around him and then cast them away.
The structure formed by the Congelation still grew, spreading its branches upward like a tree made of ice. Its weight dragged down the back of the ship, sending frigid water onto the deck.
With each lightning strike, the structure blazed to life like a prism overloaded by light. Shadow disappeared with each blaze, then came back more strongly, his claws tunneling through the ice. He was making sounds that Kip had never heard before, animal sounds that were painful to hear.
The wolf at the zoo reared up in his mind again; the void of its eyes, the pain in its voice.
The stern of the ship dipped fully into the water just as lightning struck the Congelation tower. It shattered like crystal and then collapsed, shearing off like a falling ice shelf and burying Kip and Shadow in its debris. Thousands of ice slivers hit Kip, some bludgeoning, some cutting, each more painful than the next. Shadow, too, squealed as they pelted his body. Even still, he tried to reach Kip, his small arm outstretched and his teeth gnashing.
And his purple eyes.
A wave came from the right and hit Kip with a blast of briny water. It took the jigsaw pieces of ice with it, and pulled Kip’s bag from his hand.
He reached for it too late, his fingers grasping the rough wood of the deck. The wave sent the bag over the edge and into dark water.
The bag was his only weapon, and it was gone. What was an Alchemist without his tools? A writer without a pen?
A weight landed on Kip’s chest, punching the air from his lungs. He thought of a demon settling on a sleeping man’s chest, extracting every ounce of breath. Shadow grabbed Kip’s collar and pulled him up to a sitting position, his burning eyes filling Kip’s vision. The creature that had been his friend opened its mouth, showing his blunt but deadly teeth, and the depths of his gorge.
He’s going to bite my head off, Kip thought wildly. He wanted to laugh at the thought, laugh and never stop; laughing as Shadow digested him. Blackmoor had unleashed something in him that couldn’t be stopped.
“I’m sorry,” he said again as he brought his hands up, trying to push back against Shadow’s form. Feeling his strange skin for maybe the last time.
Shadow’s mouth widened.
The deafening peal of the bell struck the air, another gong marking his time here, cataloging each broken piece of it. The world froze. Kip again heard a voice as the rolling clang of the bell vanished.
Kip, is that you? I’m here! I never left!
Then it faded as quickly as it had come.
The bell changed the movement of the Shadows above. They coalesced around Vorax, drawn to his power, finding the folds of his cloak like children clutching for their mother.
His Shadow stopped too, commanded by something unheard. He craned his neck to look up at the storm, s
earching the sky for some new command. His hands released Kip and he fell back onto the deck. Shadow looked down at him for a moment, his purple eyes blank and lifeless, then leapt into the air.
He moved over the ship in a wide arc then rose upward until he joined with the rest of his kind, lost in a sea of black and purple.
Vorax’s floating shape sprung to life and sped away from Kip and the boat, dragging his long train behind.
Kip crawled forward on the deck.
“Shadow! Don’t you leave me, too!” he screamed. “Don’t leave me all alone!”
But they were gone, retreating to the purple cloud far off on the horizon. Kip made it to the prow, his fingernails digging into hard wood. He pulled himself up to face the storm. He wanted to scream again, but bared his teeth instead, like a feral animal withstanding pain.
I will lash myself to this prow, Kip thought. I will withstand whatever comes.
The storm strengthened. Its only purpose was to destroy. It hit the ship and cracked it in half. One mast went down like a felled tree, sheared in the middle. As it sped towards the deck, Kip wondered if he could count its rings. How many years had that mast stood, what would be the final count that marked its end?
He was thrown into the air as ocean water slammed his face. As he tumbled, he saw the sky and the water flipping past, one replaced by the other with terrible speed.
I’m flying, he thought.
The last thing he remembered was the purple glow in the distance.
It was calling him, always.
20
Kip and Enos took a hansom back from Academy Tower, staring out the window at the darkening city. The last sliver of sunlight made a world of orange and blue, cobblestones and rooftops. The trotting horse kept time with heavy footfalls.
Kip was the master of Alchemy House now.
The rabble had had their say. They’d screamed and yelled. They’d called him names. But in the end, he was accepted into the order.
Kip’s fingers were linked with Enos’s across the cushion of the hansom. He turned to him.
Kip & Shadow Page 15