Deosil, page 10
A titanic lightning bolt cracked from the sky, so near and loud I was all but deafened. The lumina that had the misfortune to be between it and the ground exploded into charred goo, bits tumbling from the sky to the roofs below.
Even though the two foremost lumina were now too close to strike without risking the umbrae and us, the second wave was still a good distance away. I turned my attention to them, summoning and directing the wind so it sent them tumbling. Another lightning strike, and more wind, and my shirt sleeve smoked as pain hollowed my bones. The Fideles had done this, had made monsters of umbrae, and I howled my rage in time with something ancient.
Then the umbra shifted beneath me, heading rapidly down. I cried out in shock and narrowly grabbed hold of the extruded handholds before I tumbled off. My head ached and my arm hurt from channeling so much arcane energy, but elation thrummed through me. I would destroy them—I would take back my town—I would slam the gates closed before the masters and make their servants pay.
No. I had to think clearly. Storming into Whyborne House while ranting like a badly written stage villain would surely get Father killed.
By the time we reached the small attic windows, I’d managed to calm myself. I looked down, expecting to see cultists rushing outside in response to the obvious display of magic in the heavens. But the streets remained as empty and silent as before.
Griffin slipped open one of the windows and entered the darkened attic. Christine and Iskander followed, and then my umbra took its place by the window. I felt rather unsteady, sliding over its jelly-like flesh to reach the opening. Fortunately, Griffin leaned out, caught my hand, and helped me inside.
The attic was ferociously hot from the long summer day, and sweat instantly dampened my shirt and hair. Griffin took the small lamp from the bag he carried, and I lit the wick with a word. Excess furniture, draped in sheets to keep off the dust, occupied most of the space. We had a mansion crammed with expensive furnishings of every kind, and yet managed to have more than we could ever use. It summed up my family, or at least the Whyborne side, perfectly. Too much is never enough could have been our motto.
Flawed as he might be, Father needed my help at the moment, not my condemnation. I silently pointed in the direction of the attic door, and Griffin made for it, the rest of us following carefully after. Or as carefully as I was capable of. I winced every time the floor creaked beneath my weight and nearly tripped over a covered ottoman.
Christine steadied me. “Honestly, Whyborne,” she whispered, “you can summon lightning to smite your enemies, but you can’t manage to walk in a straight line.”
“It isn’t my fault! It’s dark!”
Griffin shushed us with a glare. The attic door opened onto a steep, narrow staircase, which I knew let out in the servants’ hall. Griffin cracked the lower door open, a thin sliver of light spilling inside, then froze. The rest of us froze along with him. There came the sound of another door opening and shutting, and Griffin relaxed.
“I just glimpsed a maid going along the hall,” he whispered. “There are servants here.”
“The Fideles must have brought their own,” I said. Father had demanded complete loyalty from those who worked in Whyborne House. Most of them had lived in Widdershins for generations and served our family for just as long. “Or perhaps some were captured along with Father and agreed to continue working, so long as he’s being held hostage. If so, and Mrs. Creigh trusts them, she’s a bigger fool than I believed.”
“Should we follow the maid?” Iskander asked. “Anyone working here would know where Niles is being held, most likely.”
Griffin nodded. “Whyborne, what’s through that door? The last one before the stairs?”
I peered past him. I hadn’t set foot in the back halls in years, but I’d occasionally been allowed to play in the attic as a child, and old memories struggled to the surface. There were three doors; I didn’t know what the first opened onto, but the second led to Miss Emily’s quarters, so she could come and go without disturbing Mother. Or, rather, it had led to her rooms before my brother Stanford murdered her.
God, my family was terrible.
“It led into Mother’s room, when she was sick,” I said. “After she went to the sea, Father turned it into a gathering place for the old families to confer. Probably any contacts he retained among the Brotherhood as well. Meetings he didn’t want to take in his study, at any rate.”
“What would a maid be doing in there this time of night?” Christine wondered.
I shook my head. “Tidying up, if Mrs. Creigh is using it for the same thing Father did?” Unless Father was being held there, but that seemed unlikely. The wine cellar would be far more secure.
Griffin took his revolver from inside his coat. “I don’t mean to harm her, but if she’s loyal to Mrs. Creigh, hopefully this will keep her from screaming long enough for us to get some answers.”
We followed him down the hall to the door. “We’ll need to move quickly,” he whispered. “I’ll go in first. Whyborne, after me—if she’s one of Niles’s servants, she’ll likely recognize you.”
Griffin flung open the door and stepped inside in a single, fluid move. “Don’t make a—” he began, then fell silent.
I stepped in after him, then froze as well.
Mrs. Creigh sat at the head of the long table that dominated the room. The maid stopped in the process of opening the curtains to let in the night breeze and turned to us, her face the waxen mask of the Perfected.
A third figure stood at the head of the table, in the act of pouring wine for Mrs. Creigh. He finished, apparently undisturbed by our appearance, then stepped back. At the sight of his familiar features, my heart sank.
It was Fenton, Father’s butler, driver, and confidante. But the years had been wiped from his face, the wrinkles about his eyes and mouth erased, the liver spots removed, the sagging cheeks lifted. Every scar, every imperfection was gone, and his eyes were as bright and empty as glass facsimiles.
As a child, I’d been terrified of Fenton. As a man, I’d never particularly cared for him. But I couldn’t suppress the gasp of horror that escaped my lips at the sight of someone I’d known for my entire life, his humanity removed and something horrible put in its place.
“Hello, Dr. Whyborne.” Mrs. Creigh took a sip from her wine, a gleeful smile on her face. “Welcome home.”
Chapter 21
Whyborne
“Welcome our guests, won’t you?” Mrs. Creigh said to Fenton and the maid.
The two Perfected moved toward us. Griffin dropped his revolver with an oath and snatched out his sword cane. Christine and Iskander had crowded in after us, and she readied her cudgel as his knives gleamed in the candlelight.
It would be a bloodbath. Even if Fenton and the maid grabbed up makeshift weapons, they had no chance against us.
“Stop!” I cried. “We can’t hurt them!”
Griffin shook his head. “Look at them, Whyborne. They’ve been completely turned. Just as with the cinereous in Fallow, they’re too far gone to save.”
Rather than attack us, however, the Perfected merely pulled out four chairs, two on either side of the long table. The maid then retreated, while Fenton fetched wine glasses from a cabinet and put them one at each seat.
“Join me,” Mrs. Creigh said. “I have no interest in fighting you, Dr. Whyborne. I will if I must, of course, but our previous alliance proved you can be reasoned with.”
My hands shook, but I forced myself to walk across the thick rugs and take one of the proffered chairs. Fenton filled my glass, but I couldn’t bring myself to touch it. My companions silently took their seats; out of the corner of my eye, I could tell Griffin and Iskander were both on high alert. Waiting for the inevitable treachery to come.
“What have you done to them?” I nodded at Fenton, who had taken up position against the wall behind Mrs. Creigh’s chair. “This is an infection like the rust, is it not?”
“I told you when we met in Fallow that the rust was but one tool of the masters.” Mrs. Creigh took a sip of her wine and smiled at me. “This, however, was a gift directly from them, passed to us by Nyarlathotep itself, after you destroyed the rust. It’s much improved, don’t you think? The avatar was a weak point in the design of the rust, just as the queens were in the umbrae, and the dwellers with the ketoi. Now, each individual is under our direct control, not ordered through an intermediary.”
Bile rose to my throat. “It’s monstrous.”
She shrugged. “I tried doing this the easy way. The rust would have been so much simpler for us all. But you forced us to do things the hard way, and, well, here we are.”
Christine sat across from me, her face white with fury. “Oh yes, it would have been so much easier to let you turn us all into terrifying fungus creatures.”
“Compared to what will befall you when the masters return, yes.” Her glance flicked to Iskander. “I’d heard Dr. Whyborne succeeded in freeing you. Pity.”
“Shut up,” Christine snarled.
I didn’t trust Mrs. Creigh’s motivations for talking to us. Were there other Fideles on the way? Perhaps Nephren-ka himself? “Enough of this. Where is my father?”
“He’s here,” Mrs. Creigh said. “Cooperate, and I might even let you see him.”
From behind her chair, Fenton gave a slight shake of his head.
My heart beat faster. Was he trying to warn us? Could he try to warn us? Or had it merely been some spasm as the last of his nervous system was overtaken by the infection?
If it was a deliberate signal, it surely meant that Mrs. Creigh was lying. About letting me see Father if I cooperated?
Or was Father not here at all?
My face remained the neutral mask I’d spent so much of my early life hiding behind. “I’m going to require some proof Father’s still alive and whole.”
She leaned forward, staring at me as if fascinated. “Do you really think you can still win this? We’ve taken your town. Your place of power belongs to us now.”
The distant howling trembled on the edge of my hearing. I balled my hands up to keep my fingertips from scorching the table. “Widdershins belongs only to itself.”
“Even now, the maelstrom’s power fuels our magic. Nephren-ka’s original purpose may have been thwarted, but now he has the bottomless power of the arcane vortex to draw upon.”
The howling I’d been hearing was a cry of impotent fury, the maelstrom’s rage at being used to feed the machinations of the Fideles and ultimately the masters.
Christine perked up at the mention of Nephren-ka, but she knew enough to stay silent and not betray our ignorance. Griffin sat tense at my side, alert for whatever trap was set to spring around us. Iskander remained as impassive as a bronze statue.
“We haven’t been idle since taking your father’s house.” Mrs. Creigh waved vaguely. “All of his notes, his plans to raise your so-called ‘army of the land’ against us, are in our hands. The homes of your precious old families have been likewise raided, with the exception of the ghūl, of course. Trapping some of the Fideles in her own house, then burning it to the ground, was a bold move. And one she’ll regret, once we catch her.”
Miss Lester was free, at least, but it was small comfort. All the planning Father had done was for nothing. The Fideles had the names of everyone in his confidence, from Police Chief Tilton to the agents of the Brotherhood who still remained loyal even after its dissolution. The secrets hoarded by the old families were laid bare, to be used against them.
“You cannot win,” Mrs. Creigh went on. “You must see that now. Be reasonable, as you were in Fallow. Death is not—has never been—my goal. Wholesale slaughter is abhorrent to me. I want to help you save as many people as possible. Your friends. Your family. Yourself. But the only way to do that is to join us.”
“And become like Fenton?” Griffin asked. “Is he one of the ones you’ve saved?”
She frowned. “Who?”
Of course she didn’t know the names of those she’d harmed. She likely hadn’t known the names of the cinereous in Fallow, either.
“So the offer is join you or die.” I took a deep breath and met her gaze squarely. “You’re not the first to make such an offer. I believe you were familiar with the last person to do so. Its name was Nyarlathotep, and things ended very, very badly for it.”
I spoke with a confidence I didn’t actually feel. We’d barely survived the encounter. We’d barely survived so many encounters, and our luck was bound to run out eventually. Especially if Nyarlathotep had spoken truly, and Persephone and I were doomed by the maelstrom’s own plan.
“So you claimed when we spoke on the telephone.” Doubt flickered in Mrs. Creigh’s eyes, and she moistened her lips. “I will admit, Nephren-ka has been…unsettled…at Nyarlathotep’s absence. But he believes you’re bluffing. The Man in the Woods is simply waiting Outside, to return alongside the masters. You cannot have killed a god.”
They didn’t know. Which meant they didn’t know how we’d destroyed it, that our plan would never have worked here in Widdershins. Or anywhere save for Carn Moreth, for that matter.
I leaned forward, resting my hands gently on the table. Lying about my own prowess didn’t come easily to me, and I half-wished I had the power of the maelstrom surging through me, that I might deliver an unhinged rant to convince her. “I am the fire that burns in the veins of the world,” I said, trying not to cringe as I did so. “I bested Nyarlathotep, and I’ll best the masters as well.”
The color had drained from Mrs. Creigh’s face. “Nyarlathotep created you at the behest of the masters. You can’t be greater than them.”
“Morgen created me.” As I’d guessed, the unfamiliar name caused another line of worry to appear on her brow. “And if I’m lying, then where is Nyarlathotep now? Why doesn’t it answer the call of Nephren-ka, the pharaoh who enshrined it as a god and opened the path for four-thousand years of human sorcerers to summon it into our world?” When she made no answer, I nodded and sat back. “You proved yourself reasonable in Fallow, Mrs. Creigh. We can save humanity without bending knee to the masters. We can fight. Help us to do so.”
Silence. No one spoke or moved. The maid and Fenton might truly have been the wax statues they appeared. And for a moment, I let myself hope my words had convinced her.
Then she sat back, and I thought her eyes held regret. “You are a monster the likes of which the world has never seen, Dr. Whyborne,” she said, almost gently. “As is your sister. In any other circumstances, you might prevail. But the masters are coming, and there is only death awaiting you on this path. I fear I must decline your most generous offer.”
The discreet servants’ door swung open behind us. On the other side stood footmen, maids, the cook who had created so many of the meals that sustained me as a youth. When I was a child, Miss Emily would invite me to eat at the servants’ table whenever Father was away on business, and I’d stuffed my belly there as I’d never been able to do under his disapproving gaze. Some of the faces were new, but so many had sat there with me, no doubt later whispering amongst themselves about poor Master Percival. Father would never have approved, but none of them had betrayed me to him.
And now all were waxen, perfect. The burn scars on Cook’s hands had vanished, the elderly laundress sported no limp or wrinkle. No expression of joy or sorrow distorted their smooth faces. In their hands they carried kitchen knives, fireplace pokers, irons, and more. The tools they’d once wielded with pride to keep Whyborne House functioning smoothly, now turned into weapons.
Griffin and Iskander snapped to their feet instantly, Christine not far behind. But I sat paralyzed, my heart pounding, my lips numb. “No. Don’t hurt them!” I cried, though I didn’t know whom I begged.
One of the footmen took a savage swipe at Griffin with a poker. He barely parried it with his sword cane. “We have no choice!”
Iskander’s knives ran red with blood. Christine wielded her cudgel with grim determination. But most of the Perfected were through the door now, and we’d soon be overwhelmed if I didn’t do something.
Mrs. Creigh began to chant in Aklo.
I surged up, chair flying to the floor behind me. She’d risen as well, her eyes locked on me, focusing her spell—
Tears stinging my eyes, I spoke the true name of fire, and the curtains behind her erupted into a blaze.
* * *
The curtains went up in flames, far faster than I’d anticipated. Within seconds, tongues of fire licked the ceiling, and sparks fell to the carpet where they began to smolder.
It was enough to break Mrs. Creigh’s concentration. With a cry of dismay, she turned to the fire, no doubt intending to use sorcery to smother it before it could spread.
Fenton’s arm went around her throat, dragging her against him. A screech of rage escaped her, and she clawed at his waxen skin, blemishing the unnatural smoothness of his face. He said nothing, but his eyes darted in my direction.
Then he hurled them both into the flames.
Mrs. Creigh’s dress went up like a torch. She screamed and struggled, but Fenton held fast, even as his own clothing began to catch.
Horror swamped me. I took a step toward them, but Griffin’s hand closed around my arm. “Ival! We have to get out of here!”
Something snapped within me. Fenton, the other servants, they were beyond my help. But my friends weren’t.
I turned to the main door, leading to the grand staircase. Some servants had moved to block it, but I cleared them out of the way with a blast of wind. Christine and Iskander darted through instantly. Even as the heat of the fire began to scorch me, Griffin dragged me through the door and out.
Smoke stung my eyes and set me to coughing. Sparks and flames followed us, carried by the swirling currents of air. We raced to the head of the stairs, then Christine stopped and turned to me. “We have to find Niles before the whole place burns down around us. Where could they be holding him?”
