The Nightmare Garden

I looked up the ladder at the dark, arched mouth of the entrance to Windhaven. The lump of fear in my chest hadn’t dissolved, and in fact felt like it had grown. “Is this in any way a good idea?”

“No,” Dean said. “Probably the opposite, as a matter of fact, but I don’t see that we’ve got much of a choice on this one.”

I didn’t either, so up I went. As we climbed, we went from breathless open space to a tiny tunnel. Skip was waiting at the top of the ladder, snapping the cuffs back on Conrad, and as soon as we were all on our feet on the platform, we marched down the tunnel to a hatch leading to Windhaven proper, marked with a symbol in the shape of a wheel and spokes with wings attached.

More Erlkin dressed in uniforms like Skip’s waited at the hatch, and he handed Conrad off to them before turning to me. “We’ll keep your friends in holding until we determine their status. You too. Nails, you’re free to go.” He gave Dean a look I couldn’t identify. Not anger, not contempt, but not pleasure, either. “I’m sure Shard will want to see you.”

An Erlkin even taller than Skip took my arm. “You come with me, girlie.”

I glanced back at Dean as they led me away. I was smart enough to know that I had to stay calm and passive with this many edgy Erlkin around, so I didn’t fight, but it was hard to take my eyes off Dean. Dean was constant, and he was safety. Separated from him, I didn’t know how long I could hold off the madness dreams. Besides, I didn’t want to leave him and the gleam of his silver eyes, the blush that sat on his lips, full for a boy’s, and the feeling of his strong hands gripping mine.

Dean didn’t look at me. He was staring into the middle distance, and I could tell he was seeing something I couldn’t see at all.

I didn’t get to view much of Windhaven as the Erlkin marched me to my cell. They kept me belowdecks, and we passed through a series of hatches lit by spitting aether globes, the walls pitted with rust and painted with more of the strange pictograms like the wheel-shaped symbol that marked the entry. I reasoned it was the Erlkin language, and these must be shorthand for directions to the various levels of the city-ship. I tucked them away in my memory to write out and puzzle over later. I was good at symbols and riddles, and the sooner I didn’t have to rely on an Erlkin to translate, the sooner I’d be able to escape Windhaven if I had to.

I hoped it wouldn’t come to that, but I had the bad feeling it was going to, and rapidly. The Erlkin didn’t seem overly friendly now, when they thought Conrad and I were only human. Who knew what would happen if they ferreted out our secret?

The cell wasn’t nearly as cell-like as the one the Proctors had shoved me in when they’d caught me, after I’d escaped Lovecraft. It was more like a deserted classroom, plain metal tables with stenotypes arranged around the perimeter of the room, and a chalkboard with numbers—latitude and longitude—written on it. It looked as if the room’s rightful occupants had just stepped out.

The Erlkin pulled out a chair for me and sat me in it with a hard push. He dropped my bag next to me, after searching it and removing my engineer’s toolkit and anything else I could use to escape. Luckily he didn’t find my notebook, which I’d tucked away in a hidden pocket.

“Stay put,” he said. “Someone will be in after a while.”

“How specific,” I muttered. “Will it be before my hair turns gray?”

The Erlkin sneered at me and closed the hatch. I heard a rumble and saw the rods at the top and bottom lock into place. It would take a blast to dislodge the door now. I was stuck in here until they decided to let me out. If they ever did. Unless I used my Weird.

I had discovered in Lovecraft that I could move machines, that they responded to my blood as my blood responded to iron. But to use my Weird was to invite pounding headaches, hallucinations and nosebleeds. I drummed my fingers against the nearest desk. The Erlkin hadn’t actually hurt anyone yet. I had to save my strength for when we were really in danger. Being on the run had taught me that, if nothing else.

Windhaven moved slowly, but it did move. I could feel the barest vibration of motion from where I sat at the bare desk, spatters of ink coating the pale surface.

I searched the drawers and found a mechanical pencil. It would have to do. I flipped open my battered notebook and sketched out the symbols I’d seen from memory. Underneath I scribbled Erlkin symbols as seen at Windhaven.

My father had never run into the Erlkin, except once. They’d taken him into the Mists, like they had Conrad, before the Fae could get to him.

But were they the same smugglers who had gotten Conrad into trouble? Or had it been someone else, someone who had allowed my father to escape the Fae? I didn’t know, nor did I know where my father was now.

I started an entry on the next page. Writing at least gave me something to occupy my mind, rather than fretting over what would happen when the door opened again. Fretting rarely did anyone any good.

Third entry:

The Erlkin seem hostile at best, but they helped my father escape so the Fae couldn’t force him to do what they eventually made me do—break the Gates, allowing the Fae and their nightmare creatures to flow freely through the Iron Land and attempt to eradicate the iron, then annex the land to the Thorn. And they helped Conrad, or at least a certain group of them did.

They don’t love the Fae any more than they love humans or other trespassers, that much Dean told me. The enemy of my enemy is my friend. Straight out of Proctor propaganda, when it encouraged us to inform on each other, to collude to send heretics to the castigator for punishment.

Who’s worse? The Proctors or me? They fought the power beyond their understanding with lies and terror. On the other hand, I’ve read enough from my father’s books about the Brotherhood of Iron to realize that at least I’m not entirely alone in my struggle. The Brotherhood was my grandfather’s cadre of scientists, magic users and scholars. They fought that same power by keeping their society absolutely secret, accepting the occasional casualty and adhering to ancient rules that neither the Fae nor the Proctors are playing by any longer. My father himself fought it … or did he? I still don’t know why he broke with the Brotherhood, only that Draven has a score to settle with him.

And then there’s me. I didn’t even try to fight the power. I set it free, and in the process I shattered the world.

Not shattered—cracked. I’ve cracked the mask, and the true face is showing from underneath, and it is horrible, ugly and crawling with maggots, something no human eye should be forced to look at.

Where is my father? He got me out of Lovecraft, but he could be dead now, for all I know. If he didn’t get out before the blast, before the cataclysm, he could be gone, like all the other poor souls.

Gone. My mother can’t be gone. I can’t have unwound things that badly. I’ll get out of Windhaven and go back and find her, no matter what Conrad says. I’ll do what I have to.

Somehow.

* * *

The sound of the hatch wheel spinning alerted me, and I jammed the pencil back into the drawer and my notebook back into my bag. When the hatch opened, I was sitting primly, my ankles crossed and my hands folded, like the star of any comportment class.

A single Erlkin entered, and I tried not to stare. She was nearly as tall as Skip, with twin braids running from her temples down her back, thin and tight as bullwhips. Her clothes were a simple olive drab jacket with a double row of silver buttons and tight military pants tucked into steam ventor’s boots like the ones Dean wore, steel toes gleaming and the leather spit-polished.

“Aoife Grayson, I gather,” she said. She gestured at me with a long-fingered hand. “Stand up.”

I raised an eyebrow at her, more in surprise that she was being so businesslike about taking me prisoner than anything else. “Why?”

Her lip twitched, and I could tell she wasn’t used to being questioned when she gave an order. “Get up, you wretched girl,” she said, and grabbed my arm, hefting me easily out of the chair. I wasn’t big, and she was, and strong besides. “I just want to get a look at you.” She took my chin between her thumb and forefinger and turned my head from side to side. “Skinny,” she said, “but not too skinny. Not a pale-faced wreck, either. That hair—that hair is most definitely human.”