“Hmm?” Nylarthotep cocked his head. “Oh, that’s right. I forget you give each other names. Odd. Like cockroaches naming each other.”
I tried to keep calm. If my heart had a beat, it would have been thudding. “I know you rule the Deadlands. That’s why I’m here. I just want you to give me Dean.”
“Rule the Deadlands?” The laughter came again, louder this time. “Girl, I do not rule this place. When the ancients cast me out, they cast me into a void, a place where all the dead came to their own final rest, be it good or ill. There was no unity, no collecting point for souls. What you see around you? This is a manifestation of my will. Of my boredom, of my wrath. I saw the souls, some happy, and I saw that they were weak and could be controlled.”
My mouth dropped open. It was worse than I had suspected. “You don’t rule,” I repeated, letting it sink in. “You … you
“They sprang from my hand. And when the first soul became entangled, I was curious, so I allowed it to exist rather than snuffing it out. Then another, and another. No more happy deaths or simple endings. All souls continue to exist and act as fuel for my world, my land. And I do with them as I see fit.”
I felt like I would faint. Before that, I’d vomit, and fall to the ground, because this revelation was the worst thing I’d ever heard.
“So there really was just a void before,” I said, “where souls could do as they liked.”
Nylarthotep nodded. “There was nothing of greatness. Until me.”
“Then what harm would it do?” I said. My voice was shaking, but I managed to stay upright, and decided to count that as a victory. “You have all this, by the power of your own mind. What difference would one soul make?”
“Because it would not be my will,” Nylarthotep said. “I do not grant requests. Everything that happens—the city, the Faceless, the monsters that live in the wilds beyond, even the Walkers—happens at my will. And when this place ceases to amuse me, I will crush it and make it anew, a sculptor at his clay. The void and the dead are mine to use, forever.”
I had to think fast. I could tell he was almost ready to boot me down one of the rifts and dump me into some airless vacuum.
“A bargain, then,” I said. I’d been expecting it.
Nylarthotep grinned. I saw a flash of white teeth shaped like a shark’s under his cowl. “Now we’re getting somewhere,” he said. “Sit, little human, and tell me of your so-called bargain with the Yellow King.”
I watched as another black throne materialized. The Yellow King beckoned me. “Don’t look so shocked, little human. There was a time I could create entire worlds with a flick of my wrist. I was worshipped by the primitives as a god.”
“But you’re not,” I said. “You’re just drifting through the universe like the rest of us.” I didn’t know what possessed me to back-talk something like Nylarthotep. Maybe I was tired of being treated as if I were small, to be wiped off the map as he saw fit.
Nylarthotep sat forward. Where he gripped the arms of his chair, I saw long, blood-encrusted claws. I didn’t know what he’d been using them for, but I drew back as far as I could without seeming like a coward.
“I am not flotsam. I am eternal,” he snarled, and I did flinch then, as if he’d raked me with those claws.
“All right,” I said quietly. “I’m sorry. I was mistaken.”
“Tell me the terms of this bargain or leave before I make you an amusement,” Nylarthotep grumbled, slumping back.
I took a breath and said, “You can have something from me. And in return, you let Dean go. I know you said no soul would escape you, but those are my terms, take it or leave it.”
“Really.” He leaned forward and licked his lips. “Tough talk. I’m intrigued. Be more specific, dear.”
“I have a Weird. I have the gift that you need.” I couldn’t believe I was about to do this again. “I could get you a way out of here.”
Nylarthotep didn’t laugh or mock me this time. He simply tilted his head and considered my words, and that scared me more than anything.
“No, you can’t,” he said. “Tesla couldn’t, and neither can you.”
I sighed. It was my only bargaining chip, but I didn’t want to use it. If Nylarthotep thought I was useless, at least he wouldn’t imprison and torture me.
“But you do have something I want,” he said. “You are a living soul in the Deadlands, and I’ve never come across that before.”
I raised my chin, already not liking where this was going. “I’m listening.”
“I grow weary of this place,” said Nylarthotep. “I grow weary of my own creations. Let me test you. Let me see exactly what the soul of a Gateminder can endure, and then if it pleases me, I’ll let your insignificant little friend fly free.”
This was a bad bargain. I knew it, he knew it. He also knew I didn’t have a choice, and so did I. Though this way, at least I wouldn’t run the risk of setting him free. Because something like Nylarthotep could never be free, not ever. That would truly be the end of the world, the culmination of the second Storm. What I’d started was bad enough, but to let something like this monster into the Iron Land would mean the end of everything, and this time I’d be well and truly to blame.
So I nodded, and said, “I’ll do whatever it takes. I just want to go home.”
I knew now I was beneath the Deadlands, where no one could find me, not Chang’s machine, not even a Gate of my own creation.
“As do we all,” Nylarthotep said. “Come with me.”
He led me to the edge of the swirling space that he lived in, and it resolved itself into a long hallway, industrial as anything in the Iron Land, flickering bulbs caged with wire, and iron doors stretching as far as the eye could see.
I twitched reflexively, waiting for my Fae blood to react with the iron, but it wasn’t real. Nothing stirred in my blood or in my mind. That was a relief. Dealing with a bout of iron poisoning and the associated hallucinations was the last thing I needed right now.
“What’s behind these doors, only you can know,” said Nylarthotep. “Did you know that I used to slip into minds while asleep? That I used to pick apart dreams and nightmares?” He snorted. “Of course, that was before they sent me here and that foul upstart crawled out of the mud and took over the dreams, made them a refuge rather than what they should be.”
“And what’s that?” I said. Screams echoed from behind some of the doors, and even worse sounds, scratching and hissing, from behind others.
“The most terrible thing in all the universe,” the Yellow King said. “Because your own mind is the thing you should fear most. It is the originator of nightmares. Without the fear, things like me would not exist.”
He gave me a small shove forward. His touch sent shivers down my spinal cord and running through my entire body, borne on my own nerves.
“Go on,” he whispered in my ear. “This is what I found in your mind, Aoife. Let’s see what kind of fear lives there.”
I stepped into the hall. Not because I wanted to, but because I didn’t have a choice. If I wanted to get out of here, and with Dean, this was what I had to do.
Knowing it was my only choice didn’t make it any easier to face what was behind the doors. Nylarthotep had been right. I was terrified of what was inside my own mind.
And now I was going to meet it face to face.
14
The Dark Corridor
I USED TO PLAY in the hallway of the Lovecraft apartment that Conrad and I shared with our mother. It was a terrible place. It smelled musty and the carpet was damp no matter the season or the time of
