The Nightmare Garden

nothing.

Or until the Proctors burn every last reasonable person on earth alive. I don’t know which we’ll get to first.

Archie’s handwriting started to skid off the page, his pen blotting and leaving long dribbles of ink that obliterated entire words.

Coming home. That’s what I want. I want to see green hills and blue skies again. Even that vile smoke over Lovecraft would be preferable to the endless days cooped up here with these old men in the Bone Sepulchre. I want

After that, the words were blotted out, until the very end.

hold you again, smell you and feel you next to me.

I love you, Valentina. I hope you understand why I can’t be a part of this farce the Brotherhood has become anymore. Say you’ll stay with me. Please.

I crumpled the letter and tossed it across the room. It landed in the corner, with a flutter rather than a satisfying bounce.

I’d found out something useful. The rest of it shouldn’t matter.

My resolve had hardened.

The Brotherhood was going to help me, whether they knew it or not. The Iron Codex would have answers, and I was going to have to go and find them.

I laid out my plan to Dean, Cal, Bethina and Conrad, because I needed their help. They took it about as well as I expected.

“You’re cracked,” Conrad said. “You heard what Dad said. We have to lie low, and we have to wait until there’s more of us together to try and fix the Gate. In the meantime, there are Proctors everywhere, and creatures coming through the broken Gates. Have you thought about how you’re even going to get to this … what’d you call it?”

“The Bone Sepulchre,” I said, matching his testy tone. “And stop calling me nuts, Conrad.”

“I’m sorry, but when you say something that’s nuts, I’m not gonna lie,” he said. He looked at Dean. “Please tell her she’s being crazy.”

“It’s a bad idea,” Dean said. “But if you’re going, I’m going with you.”

“No,” I said firmly. “I don’t know how they’d react to you, Dean. It’s bad enough that I have Fae blood. I can’t put you in that position.”

“Have you ever thought that your father might be right?” Bethina spoke up. “The world isn’t the same at all. Ghouls everywhere, stone knows what crawling out from under every rock.” She shivered. “Mr. Grayson has good sense, miss. Maybe you should listen to him for once.”

Cal nodded agreement, and I shot him an annoyed glance. He was only doing that to impress his girlfriend, and I kicked him under the table when he glared back. Boys and girls got silly when crushes and love came into play. I hoped I didn’t come across as that irritating when I was with Dean.

“I’m going to try,” I said. “So don’t even attempt to change my mind.”

Cal grumbled, and I spread my hands. “If it were your mother missing in this mess …”

“All right, all right,” Cal said, throwing me a murderous shut up glance. As if I’d spill his secret in front of Bethina. “We’ll help you, but for the record, I think this whole plan is going to come to a bad end.”

“Well, I’m not helping,” Conrad announced. “Your running away is just that—running. You’re afraid of what might happen if you let Archie be in charge and fix this the right way.”

“And what exactly are you doing besides nothing, Conrad?” I asked. “What exactly did you do before, besides pant after Archie’s trail like a puppy and almost get yourself killed? Thank goodness you had your Weird,” I said, and then snapped my fingers. “Oh, that’s right—yours hasn’t shown up yet.”

“You’re being a bitch, Aoife,” Conrad said, his brows lowering and his eyes going angry.

“And you’re being a dunce if you think we can just sit here and expect everything to be fine,” I snapped back. I shouldn’t have picked on Conrad’s lack of a Weird, but he could be so infuriating. “Archie’s not perfect, Conrad, and he doesn’t always have a plan. He did just leave us in Lovecraft.”

“You know our mother, Aoife,” he cried, slamming his hand on the table in frustration. “I would have left too.”

“You leave wives,” I said. “Not children.”

“She’s got a point,” Dean murmured.

Conrad stood up, shoving back his chair. “Fine. You two run off like delinquents, and drag poor Cal and Bethina with you. I’m out of this.” He left, and I stood up to go after him, to do what, I wasn’t sure, but Dean pulled me back.

“Forget it,” he said. “You’re not changing his mind.”

I sank back in my chair and pressed my face into my hands. I thought I’d lost Conrad over a year ago when his iron madness made him go for my throat with a knife, but to find him alive and sane and now to see the gulf between us getting even wider—that, I couldn’t handle.

Nor could I blame Conrad entirely for being such a jerk. I wanted a father again as badly as he did. He was just more willing to accept Archie’s demands for obedience.

“He’s right, though,” I muttered. “I don’t have a plan for how I’ll get out of here, never mind how I’ll get to the Brotherhood. We don’t even know where the Bone Sepulchre is.”

Cal cast a look back at the door. As a ghoul, he had much better hearing than Dean and me, and I’d entrusted him with keeping watch. “Is there some way we can figure it out?”

“Well, Archie’s letter talked about the top of the world,” I said. “The Arctic Circle somewhere would make sense. The Proctors steer clear of there.” The accepted story was that great viral creatures flourished under the polar ice, but I didn’t know the real truth. Regardless, there was something there that kept the Proctors out of the cold, unclaimed waters and led them to keep everyone else out too, with blockades and patrol boats. It made as much sense as any other location on earth.

“Not to put a damper on the party,” Bethina said, “but you can’t just grab a skiff and row up to the Arctic Ocean. That’s a long journey, and you need an ironside boat. I saw a lanternreel on the subject when I was a girl. About the expeditions and such.”

“I guess I’ll figure it out when I get to the Bone Sepulchre.” I shrugged, feigning a confidence I didn’t feel in one iota of my being.

“There’s a submersible that runs from Innsmouth,” Dean spoke up. “Usually up to Nova Scotia and beyond, ferrying fugitives into Canada.” He took out his pack of cigarettes and tapped it against the table. “But I wager that for the right price they’d go all the way to the top. The captain’s a tough nut—not afraid of going under the ice.”

I looked at Dean, pained. “You know I don’t have any money.”

“There’s things other than money,” Dean said. “But they’re not pirates. They won’t take you unless I vouch for you. And if I vouch, I’m coming.” He took out a Lucky and stuck it behind his ear, and I could tell by his posture I wasn’t going to get to argue.

I didn’t want to appear scared, but I did want Dean along. Without him, I’d be alone, at the mercy of whatever cropped up between here and the Bone Sepulchre. “That’s fine.”

“Getting out of the house isn’t going to be easy,” Cal said. “Neither your dad nor Valentina is exactly asleep at the wheel.” He cocked his head and then jerked a thumb at the door. “Speaking of. Someone’s coming.”

“Don’t worry,” I told all three of them. “That part I’ve got covered.”

Valentina was in the library, and for a minute I thought Archie was with her before I realized she was seemingly talking to herself.

“No, I don’t know when.” A pause. “Stop it. Stop pushing. It will happen when it happens.”

I knocked twice, softly.

There was a clatter from inside, and then Valentina yanked the door wide. “What, Aoife?”

“Listen,” I said. “I’m sorry about what happened before. I shouldn’t have fibbed. But I really would like to use the Munin.” I wrapped my arms around myself and shivered in the ever-present drafts