Abarat: Absolute Midnight (7 page)

Chapter 11
Severance

C
ANDY TOOK FOUR CAUTIOUS
steps into the darkened trees, each step delivering her into an even profounder darkness. On the fifth step, however, a flying creature appeared at the periphery of her vision. It buzzed like a big insect, and the brightness of its colors—turquoise and scarlet, speckled with flecks of white gold—defied the darkness.

It darted around her head for a while then sped away. Candy took a fifth cautious step, then a sixth. Suddenly the creature reappeared, accompanied by several hundred identical beasts, which surrounded her with so much color and movement that she felt faintly nauseated.

She closed her eyes to seal off the sight, but the chaotic motion of the creatures continued behind her eyelids.

“What’s happening?” she said, raising her voice above the noise of the buzzing cloud. “Covenantis? Are you still there?”

“Patience!” Candy heard the boy say.

He’s frightened,
Boa said, a distinct undercurrent of amusement in her words.
This isn’t an easy thing to do. If he messes up, he’ll sacrifice your sanity.
She let the laughter surface; there was undisguised malice in it.
Wouldn’t that be a pity?

“Covenantis,” Candy said. “Stay calm. Take your time.”

“He never was very good at that, were you, brother?” said Jollo B’gog.

“Stay out of here!” Covenantis said. “Mother!
Mother!
”

“She was the one who said I could come and help,” the Bad Boy replied.

“I don’t believe you,” Candy said, opening her eyes again.

As she did so she saw the Bad Boy run through a wall of the colored creatures, who had assembled ahead of her in an intricate jigsaw of wings, limbs and heads. He yelled as he ran, scattering the assembled creatures. They rose up in front of her, the motion of their wings causing a gust of wind to come at her face, tasting of metal on her tongue.

“Stop that!” Covenantis yelled, his voice shrill with anger.

The Bad Boy just laughed.

“I’ll tell Mama!”

“Mama won’t stop me. Mama loves everything I do.”

“Well, aren’t you lucky?” Covenantis said, unable to entirely disguise his envy.

“Mama says I’m a genius!” the Bad Boy crowed.

“You are, darling, you are,” Laguna Munn said, entering the space as little more than a shadow of herself. “But this isn’t the time or the place to fool around.”

All it took was the sound of Laguna Munn’s voice and the creatures that had been scattered by the Bad Boy’s cavorting came back down on the instant, knitting themselves together—wing to claw to beak to coxcomb to fanning tail—forming a small prison around Candy.

“Better,”
Laguna Munn said, her voice all-forgiving. “Pale Child?”

“Yes, Mama?” Covenantis said.

“Have you secured all the locks?”

Oh yes,
Boa said.
Got to have plenty of locks. I like the sound of that.

“What are the locks for?” Candy said aloud. “What are you keeping out?”

“Nothing’s being kept out—” Covenantis said, stopping only when his mother yelled his name, and dropping the last part of his reply to a whisper. “It’s you she’s keeping
in.
”

“Covenantis!”

“I’m coming, Mama!”

“Quickly now. I haven’t got much time.”

“I’ve got to go,” the Good Boy said to Candy. “I’ll be right outside.”

He pointed to a narrow slit of a door in between the wings and claws of the big bugs, and for the first time Candy realized that a solid little chamber had formed around her. The walls were draining of color even as she watched, and every last crack or flaw in the knitted forms sealed. What had been a colorful room made of flittering wings was becoming a silent concrete cell.

“Why are you locking me in?” Candy said.

“Conjurations this strong are unstable,” Covenantis said.

“What do you mean?”

“They can go wrong,” he whispered.

“Covenantis!”
Laguna Munn shouted.

“Yes, Mama!”

“Stop talking to the girl. You can’t help her.”

“No, Mama!”

“She’ll probably be dead in under a minute.”

“I’m coming, Mama,” Covenantis said. He gave Candy a little shrug, and slipped out through the door, which closed, leaving no trace of its presence, not a crack.

Well . . .
Boa said softly.
You got us here. Better finish it. If you’ve got what it takes.

“I’ve got what it doesn’t take,” Candy replied, without hesitation.

Oh? And what’s that?

“Don’t be stupid,” Candy said.
“You.”

And suddenly, the fear drained from Candy and she turned on the spot, addressing the cold, gray walls.

“I’m ready,” she told them. “Do whatever you have to do. Just get it over with. If you can avoid spilling blood, that’d be great. But if you can’t, you can’t.”

She didn’t have to wait very long for the cell to respond. Six shudders passed through its walls, ceiling and floor, like tides of life moving in its dead matter, resurrecting it. She understood now why she’d been given a peripheral glimpse of what the cell had been in its last incarnation: the flock of winged beings. She saw them haunting the gray walls still. One life inside another.

Was the lesson here that she would have been gray and lifeless as the walls if Boa’s soul had not come into her? Was she being warned that the life she was choosing would be a cell: gray and cold?

She didn’t believe it. And said so.

“I’m more than that,” she told the shimmering gray. “I’m not dead matter.”

Not yet,
Boa crowed.

“
Are you ready to do this?” Candy said and thought to both wall and Princess. “Because I’m getting bored with all these stupid threats.”

Stupid?
Boa raged.

“Just do it,”
Laguna Munn said, her voice quickening the powers in the walls.
“Quick and clean.”

“Wait!” Candy said. “I just wanted Boa to know I’m sorry. If I’d known she was there I would have tried to set her free years ago.”

If you’re looking for absolution,
Boa said,
you won’t get it from me.

“Then that’s an end to that,”
Laguna Munn said, her response making Candy realize with a shock that the old woman had been listening in on her thoughts from the beginning.
“Let’s get this done, one way or the other. Candy! Palms to the wall. Quickly!”

Candy lay her palms on one of the walls. Instantly she could see the creatures dancing in the solid air beyond. Their wings and bodies shed the flakes of white gold that decorated them. They converged on Candy’s palms, the fragments flowing together into two gilded streams.

She felt them against her palms, breaking into deltas, spreading along the dry watercourses of the lines upon her hands, and then sinking deeper, dissolving her surface in order to flow into her veins. Her hands became translucent; the brightness inside her flesh was so intense she could see the strong simple lines of her finger bones, and the complicated design of her nerves.

The brightness quickened once it got to her elbows, like a fire blown by the wind into a thicket many summers dry. It raced up her arms, and across her body.

She felt it, but it didn’t hurt. It was more like being reminded that
this was her.

She was real:
and being real, and her, was—What? What was it? Who was it?

That was the big question, wasn’t it? When all the fireworks were over: Who was she?

You’re nothing,
Boa said quietly.

Candy wanted to counter Boa’s insults. But her energies were focused elsewhere: on the rush of awakening that was passing through her body, down from her neck, over her torso, and up, filling the twice-souled vessel above.

Did you hear me?
Boa said.

“Keep your petty insults to yourself, Boa,” Laguna Munn said. “You may have suffered a little, trapped in the child’s head. But Lordy Lou, there are worse deaths to suffer. Such as the real thing. Oh . . . and while we’re talking, I know what you’re thinking: that once all this is over you’ll have my sons running around doing your bidding!”

Boa said nothing.

“That’s what I thought. Well, forget it. There’s only room for
one
woman in the lives of my beautiful sons.”

Please,
Boa protested.
I’d never try to compromise the sacred relationships between you and your sons.

“I don’t believe you,” Laguna Munn replied plainly. “I think you’d try anything if you thought you could get away with it.”

I wouldn’t dream of it. I know what you’re capable of.

“You might think you do but you don’t have the first idea, so be careful.”

Understood.

“
Good. Now, I should leave this chamber.”

“Wait,” Candy said. “Don’t go yet. I’m feeling dizzy.”

“That’s probably because I’m still here gabbing. I should leave you to give birth to Boa.”

The image Laguna Munn’s words conjured was grotesque. It made Candy feel sicker than ever.

“It’s too late to feel queasy now, girl. This is dirty magic we’re doing. It’s not the kind of work sanctioned by the Council of the Yebba Dim Day. If it was, you wouldn’t be here. Do you understand?”

“Of course,” Candy said.

She understood perfectly well. It was the same in Chickentown. There was a Dr. Pimloft whose offices were above the Laundromat on Fairkettle Street. He’d do certain operations people were too embarrassed to talk to their regular doctors about. Sometimes that was your only choice.

“I’m going to get out of here,” Laguna said, “before I throw the conjuration off balance.”

“Where will you be? In case there’s a problem?”

“It’ll be fine,” Mrs. Munn said. “You want to be separated, after all. So . . . here comes the conjuration. I designed it to do what you require. So let it do its job.”

There was a sound like someone chopping with axes from behind Mrs. Munn, and a shadow-bird—or something like it—rose from the darkness and flew in and out through the intricate pattern, wall to wall to wall to wall, before disappearing into the darkness behind Mrs. Munn.

“What was that?” Candy said.

“The chamber is getting impatient,” she said. “It wants me gone.”

The phenomena occurred again, exactly as before.

“I should go,” Laguna Munn said. “Before this gets any worse.”

Candy suddenly felt weak and her legs buckled beneath her. She tried to make her legs respond to her instruction, but she realized she was no longer the mistress of her body. Boa was.

“Wait . . .” Candy started to say, panic rising in her chest. But even her tongue wouldn’t do as she instructed. And it was almost too late. Laguna Munn had turned her back on Candy, preparing to leave.

It’s over now,
the Princess said.

Candy didn’t waste energy trying to reply. She was seconds away from losing herself forever. She could feel rhythmical thundering that no doubt Boa had set to work. It was eating at the corners of her world, consuming her consciousness with ever-larger bites.

Through a haze of white noise she saw Laguna Munn open up a door in the wall.

No.
Candy tried to say. But no sound came out.

This would be a lot easier if you just gave up and gave in. Let go of Candy Quackenbush. You’re going to die. And you won’t want to be alive when I start feeding.

What
? Candy thought.
Feeding off me? Why?

Because I’ve got to grow myself a body, girl. That requires nourishment. A lot of nourishment. Did I forget to mention that?

Candy wanted to weep at her own stupidity. Boa must have shaped these plans no more than a few thoughts away from where Candy had been hiding her own thinking. But she’d hidden her intentions totally. There hadn’t been a moment when Candy had been suspicious.

But you know now,
Boa gloated.
If it helps, think of this as punishment for stealing my memories of magic. I know death may seem a very strong punishment, but it was a terrible thing you did.

I’m . . . I’m . . . sorry?

Too late. It’s over. It’s time you died, Candy.

Chapter 12
One Becomes Two

F
AR OFF, SOMEWHERE IN
the darkness, Candy Quackenbush thought she heard the sound of Laguna Munn’s voice.

“Covenantis? Did you lock the chamber?
The lock, boy!
”

There was no answer from the child. All Candy heard was the chorus of strange noises her dying body was making. Her heart hadn’t stopped entirely. Every few seconds it still managed to beat; on occasion it even managed two or three beats strung together. But what little life her body still possessed was more like a memory than the real thing: like a vision of the Abarat even as it slipped away. All gone now. All forgotten.

No, not
entirely
forgotten. Some portion of her eyes’ ability to form images still existed. Though she could no longer see the walls of the Separation Chamber, she
could
see, with eerie specificity, a stain of smoky gray air appearing in front of her face. She knew its source. It was coming from her own body.

It was Boa’s soul she was looking at. At least the haunted shadow of it, finally liberated from the cell into which the women of the Fantomaya had put it. Freed from Candy. And now gaining strength.

It was pushing itself, spreading itself, extruding rudimentary legs from its torso, and something that had the potential to become arms, while from the top a single thread of gray matter sprouted. From this fragile stalk, two leaves had formed and on them, the undeveloped shape of a mouth and nose. And above the leaves, two white, slim petals grew, each with bursts of blue and black upon them, as if blessed with sight.

It was a simple illusion, but it quickly gained credibility as new stalks sprayed upward in their dozens, forming intricate laceries of vein and nerve that began to conjure to shape of their possessor’s face. Though it was still little more than a skinless mask knitted of pulsing threads, there was a glimpse, even there, of the young woman who would soon come into being. She would be beautiful again, Candy thought. She would break hearts.

Candy hadn’t lifted herself up off the ground since her knees had buckled beneath her. She still knelt in the same spot, watching the vestigial form of Princess Boa attract to it the detritus of the life-forms shed by the chamber walls: withered flower housings, leaves, living and dead, all adding their sum to the patchwork that was slowly giving the Princess more substance. The surrounding flora and fauna were nourishing Boa’s body, and it was by their sacrifice alone that Candy’s life had been spared. But the process was going too slowly.

Candy could sense Boa’s frustration as she received these pitifully inadequate contributions to the body she was trying to grow again.

She opened her lips, and though her throat and tongue were unfinished, she managed to speak. It was light, more than a quiet whisper, but Candy heard it plainly.

“You look . . . nourishing . . .” she said.

“I’d make bad eating right now. You should find something healthier.”

“Hunger is hunger. And time is of the essence. . . .”

This time Candy forced her throat to form the question, though it was barely audible.

“Why is that exactly?” she said.

“Midnight,” Boa said simply. “It’s almost upon us. You don’t feel it, do you?”

“Midnight?”

“Midnight! I can feel it. The last darkness is coming, and it will blot out every light in the heavens.”

“No . . .”

“Saying no will change nothing. The Abarat is going to die in the dark. Every sun will be eclipsed, every moon blinded, every star in every constellation extinguished like a candle flame. But don’t worry. You won’t be here to suffer the consequences. You’ll be gone.”

“Where?”

“Who knows? Who’ll care? Nobody. You will have served your purpose. You had sixteen years of life, going places you would never have gone if you hadn’t had me hidden inside you. You have nothing to complain about. Now your life ends. And mine begins. There’s something quite pleasing about the balance, isn’t there?”

“I’m not done living . . .” Candy murmured.

“Well, I’m sorry,” Boa said, mocking Candy’s gravity.

“You don’t . . . understand,” Candy said.

“Trust me. There’s nothing you know that I don’t.”

“You’re wrong,” Candy said. Her voice was gaining strength as she drew upon the clarity Laguna Munn’s gift had given her. “I know how you played Carrion along all those years, making him think you loved him, when all you really wanted from him was the Abarataraba.”

“Listen to yourself,” Boa said. “To hear you, people might think you actually knew what you were talking about.”

Candy sighed.

“You’re right,” she said. “I don’t know much about the Abarataraba. It’s a book of magic—”

“Stop! Stop! You’re embarrassing yourself. Don’t waste your last minutes worrying about something you’ll never understand. Death has come for you, Candy. And when it leaves it’s going to be taking you along with it. You, and every thought you ever had. Every hope, every dream. All gone. It’ll be like you never lived.”

“The dead don’t disappear. There are ghosts. I’ve met one. And I’ll be one, if necessary. I have energy and power.”

“You have nothing,”
Boa said with a sudden burst of rage.

She reached out and seized hold of Candy. The effect, in both directions, was immediate. Now, as she drew power out of Candy directly the smoky air began to solidify into gray bone behind the latticework of veins and nerves that had first defined her features.

“Better,” Boa said, smiling through gritted teeth. “Much better.”

Every part of her body was speeding toward completion now. The fluids in Boa’s eye sockets bubbled like boiling water. Even in her diminished state Candy could still see the bizarrity in the sight before her.

“Oh, I like this,” Boa said, luxuriating in the bliss of her reconstruction.

This time there was enough of her flesh and bone in place that Candy could see a hint of the beautiful woman whose image Finnegan Hob had kept above his bed. But every sliver of Boa’s recovered beauty was being purchased at the expense of Candy’s life. Each time Boa’s greedy fingers touched Candy they left her more impoverished, more exhausted. And this was not the kind of exhaustion that she could sleep off in a few quiet hours. This was the other kind: the sleep from which there was no waking.

Death has come for you
. Boa had uttered the words just a few minutes ago.

She hadn’t lied.