Dreams of Shreds and Tatters (22 page)

D
ARKNESS EBBED
,
WASHING
Liz ashore like so much driftwood. Her limbs were heavy, her head soft and dull and dream-sticky. Cold stone gouged her shoulder blades and leeched the warmth from her flesh; her hands and feet were numb. Her skin was tender and sunburn-raw. The rush of her pulse deafened her.

No, not her own blood. A much vaster tide.

She pried her eyes open and moaned in wonder at the sky. Green as glass, green as poison, strewn with unfamiliar stars. Low and heavy and crushingly close. Clouds raced overhead, dark and purple as bruises, moving fast enough to dizzy her. She shut her eyes tight, tearing her nails on the stones as she fought for balance. The world was moving too fast, would shrug her off into the void.

No, she told herself, rolling onto her side in a fetal ball. She had to get up.

One by one her limbs uncurled. Every muscle ached, like the aftermath of a bad flu. Fighting nausea, she swallowed spit and waited for earth and sky to right themselves. Her mouth tasted of sour sleep and copper; a crust of dried blood itched against her cheek and upper lip. She scrubbed it away with the neck of her T-shirt as she sat up.

She sat on a stone quay. Black waves churned against the seawall, each breaker misting the air with a harsh chemical smell that stung her nose and throat as she breathed it in. Rust red fog rose from the water, thickening to bloody clouds on the horizon. Liz thought she saw the outline of a city in the distant haze, but staring too long only made her head ache. She turned to face the city behind her instead.

It sprawled like any city, the seawall lined with smaller buildings that might have been warehouses or shipyards—though she saw no boats in the water—or houses. Further in, the skyline swept up into the sky-piercing towers she’d seen before. No shining glass or steel here, no sharp modern angles. Grey and yellow stone, green and ivory-white, all sinuous curves and twists. Buildings sleek as bare bones, rooftops ridged like vertebrae, mosaics and roof tiles slick and pebbled as a lizard’s skin. Organic. Skeletal. Visceral.

Carcosa. She had done it. She was here. Pride was lost to her stomach’s seasick roll.

Twilight shadows filled the empty streets, and the poison sky rinsed everything with verdigris. Liz was glad not to face the angry red star, but without its heat the air was damp and algid. Not Vancouver’s sharp-toothed winter chill, but enough to make her bones ache. She wore the T-shirt and underwear she’d fallen asleep in. Tourists never knew how to dress for the local weather.

“I won’t be here long,” she whispered, and winced as her voice carried through the still, damp air.

The street was paved with ochre stone, unwinding into the fogshrouded heart of the city. To the palace. Towers loomed overhead, leaning together to whisper secrets, watching her with dark windows. Ivy and other vines clung thick to the walls, their leaves rasping a soft susurrus though no breeze stirred them. Streetlamps grew from the pavement, hissing with purple flames.

Liz walked carefully, but the stone still chewed her feet. She glanced at Blake’s ring, but it was disinclined to be a compass or a key right now. Or a pair of shoes.

The fog thickened the farther she walked, and tiny flames flickered in the mist. Shadows passed in front of the lights, and running footsteps and distant voices echoed between the buildings. Liz never saw the runners and thought better of trying to follow them. Her neck and shoulders twisted stiff as rebar and her legs ached to run, but panic would only leave her lost and bleeding worse than she already was.

Were these the revelers she’d seen before, the ones who’d met Blake at the shore? They hadn’t seemed shy then. Did Carcosa have inhabitants besides shadows and disembodied voices? Did she want to meet them if it did? Her right hand clenched until the ring carved an angry line in her flesh.

At the next crossroad she heard water—the splash of a fountain instead of the ocean’s pulse. The violet light burned brighter in that direction. A trick? A mirage? Maybe, but she had to find something but empty streets and whispers or she’d lose her mind.

She rounded a curve and the street opened into a circular plaza lit by tall lamps. A fountain played in the center of the courtyard, a statue of a nude woman rising from the water. Her face was lovely and serene and spotted with lichen. Tubes and shunts jutted from her limbs and torso, trickling dark water from breasts and womb. Liz grimaced but moved closer, fascinated all the same. The lip of the fountain was thick with ivy; beneath the vines, a graceful looping script traced the stone, no alphabet she recognized.

As she leaned in to study the letters, movement flickered in the corner of her eye. She spun and nearly fell. Her heart lodged in her throat, and panic scalded her already-raw nerves.

A figure stood in the shadow on the other side of the fountain. He took a step closer, into the light, and her heartbeat roared in her ears. Deafened, she could only read the shape of her name on his lips.

“Blake?” She choked on his name.

He moved toward her, vines curling around his boots. The light washed his face a deathly grey, bruised his lips blue as anemones. “Liz? Is it really you?

It’s a trick—
But he reached for her and his hands were clammy and callused, solid and real. A sob bubbled up in her throat and he wrapped his arms around her and held her close.

“Blake.” His name was a prayer on her lips. The softness of his hair, the fit of her cheek against his shoulder, the dry autumn scent of his skin. He brushed his lips against her hair and she sobbed harder.

“I heard you calling,” he whispered. “I thought I was hallucinating.”

“I dreamed of you. I saw you drowning. I saw the thing at the bottom—”

He hugged her tighter. “It’s okay. It’s over now.”

She drew back, smearing tears across her cheeks. “We have to get out of here.”

The corners of his mouth turned down. “I don’t think I can.”

“Of course you can. We’re dreaming. We have to find a way to wake up.”

He touched her face. “Liz, I don’t think I can wake up. I don’t think there’s anything for me to wake up to.”

“You’re still alive!” She swallowed a lump of doubt. How much time had passed here? What might have happened in the waking world? Her head throbbed; her hands throbbed. “You’re still alive,” she whispered. “And we can’t stay here. That thing wants to eat you.”

“Liz. It did eat me.”

He laid cool fingers against her lips before she could protest. “I drowned, and He was waiting at the bottom. He ate me, and spat me back onto the shore. This is my home now. I can’t leave.”

He raised a hand, and she saw the vines clinging to his wrist. Growing from him. Tendrils sank into his skin, binding him to the fountain.

Fresh tears blinded her and she shook her head. “I won’t leave you here.”

“No.” He pulled her close again, pressing his lips against her forehead. “I know you won’t.”

Vines stirred around her feet, prickling against her calves like insect feet, twining slowly up her legs. She wanted to scream, but the sudden pain in her hands stole her voice. The left throbbed with her pulse, and the right burned so hot she thought her flesh must have already blackened.

“It’s all right,” Blake whispered, still holding her. All she could smell now was sap, and the bitter moisture from the fountain. “You can stay here with me. Isn’t that what you really want?”

The vines reached her knees now, feelers pricking at her skin, searching for a way in.

“Just us,” he continued. “No more fear, no more pain.”

“You can’t live without pain.” But oh, how she wished she could. Just for a little while.

“Not out there, maybe. It’s different here.” His hands rested on her shoulders, the leaves on his wrists shivering against her neck.

Rest,
they whispered.
Peace.

“No.” She drew back, knocking his hands away.

His smile faltered and grew sad. “Do you think you have a choice?”

She recoiled, but ivy trapped her feet and she fell. The jolt jarred both her hands and she screamed. The ring glowed. Silver melted, spilling across her hand to encase her in a gleaming glove, burning where it touched. With a shriek of pain and fear, she tore at the vines with that shining gauntlet. Leaves browned at its touch, tendrils shriveling.

“Liz!”

Blake—or whatever wore his face—reached for her, and she slapped his hand away. His skin blackened at the blow, withering like the vegetation.

“No,” she said again, stronger this time, and ripped away another handful of vines. Beads of blood welled on her legs.

“No.” With the third denial she was free, scrambling back across the stones. The vines retreated with an angry hiss, and the shape that had been Blake curled and crumbled into dust.

The ring was a ring once more, and the pain in her hand cooled and faded. With a sob, she pounded her fist against the ground to bring it back.

“You needn’t go out of your way to injure yourself. This place is dangerous enough already.”

She didn’t startle at Seker’s voice. Her nerves were worn through.

His sandals slapped softly against the stones. Liz straightened, wiping salt and snot from her face. She stared up at him for a moment, then took his offered hand and let him draw her to her feet.

“Did you see?”

He nodded, his face grave. “That was just a little treachery. The kind that grows throughout the city. Did you think it would be easy?”

“No,” she said with a sigh. “I really didn’t.”

“W
HY ARE YOU
here?” she asked as they left the fountain behind. The words came out harsher than she intended. “You said you wouldn’t stop me again.”

“And I won’t. I’m here to help you.” Her eyes narrowed and he lifted his hands in a shrug. “I warned you, and you wouldn’t be deterred. Now your presence here widens the breach between Carcosa and your dreamlands, your waking world. The damage is already done, and if you fail here, if you fall, the King will have two more souls for his retinue. So it would be best for everyone if you succeeded. And the sooner the better; your friend has been here too long already.”

She lifted her chin and lengthened her stride, despite her bruised and bleeding feet. Seker smiled at her bravado.

She meant to stay stern and silent, but the hush grew too deep around them. “Is it always so deserted here?” she asked.

A breeze stirred, fluttering Seker’s robes. “I don’t think so. I imagine your friend’s arrival is keeping the locals busy.”

The wind picked up, thinning the smothering fog but worsening the cold. Liz clenched her jaw to stop her teeth from chattering. She stumbled on feet grown numb and Seker caught her elbow.

“You’re not well,” he said with a frown.

“I’m fine.” She tried not to lean on him, not to fall in a heap at his feet. “Just c-cold.”

He glanced at her bare, bloody legs. “I shouldn’t wonder.” He unclasped his linen mantle and wrapped it around her shoulders. The heat of his skin enveloped her, along with the scent of myrrh and oranges. The gold and lapis scarab glittered as he pinned the cloth in place.

“Thank you,” Liz whispered.

Black eyes blinked. “Thank me when this is over, if you still feel the need.”

They walked on. Her feet bled, her side stitched, and still they walked. Liz felt like Sisyphus without the stone. Maybe this was Tartarus after all.

“Who is the King?” she asked, anything to distract herself from the cold.

“Something very old, and he serves a power older still. The Yellow King was human once—his master never was. Carcosa is dead and hollow, filled with shades and echoes. He wants something new, something fresh.”

“The dreamlands? Earth?”

“Either. Both. He’s never been particular.”

“Why Blake?”

“The King fancies himself a patron of the arts. But he’ll take anyone he can, anyone talented and foolish enough to find this place. He offers them visions; if they survive that, he gives them power. In exchange for service.”

She couldn’t imagine Blake offering to serve anything. But vision... Yes. That might tempt him.

“You know him. The King, I mean.”

“I do, him and his master. I served once, too. No longer.” Liz glanced up. Seker’s face was a mask, cold and grim. He didn’t meet her eyes.

She tried to think of other questions, but she was so cold, so tired. Her shoulders slumped, and then her head, until she watched her feet shuffle one in front of the other. That too faded into grey. Seker’s hand on her arm roused her from her fugue. She stumbled, stubbing a toe on the pavement, and nearly fell.

“I—” She sagged in his grip. “I ca—” She bit back the word
can’t
. She could, or all this had been for nothing.

“It’s all right,” Seker said, drawing her up. “We’re here.” He lifted her head with gentle fingers, turning her to face what lay ahead.

The castle rose before them, a phantasmagoria of pale stone. Bone-white and cream, yellow as old ivory, towers branching like fingers from a cupped palm. Some dripped with intricate reliefs, so many shapes that they blurred together like softening wax; others were honeycombed with windows—dark shapes crawled between the openings, tiny as ants with distance. Clouds shredded on spindle peaks.