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A Soundtrack to Daydreams
by Christopher Jones

1 GHOSTS i

           

I

t should have been a dark and stormy night, but it had been a long time since it had rained. Atticus stood in the middle of an aqueduct, the long tail of his coat whipping around his ankles as he stood and waited. He checked his watch – she should have been here by now – and turning on the spot, he contemplated leaving it all to rest, to let the girl find her own way. Atticus was growing tired, in various senses of the word, and checking his watch once more – it’d only moved a couple of seconds – he stuffed his hands down in his coat and started back down the aqueduct. Debris blew in the direction he travelled, his back against the wind, and looking up to the streets above, he watched a lone, dark squad car following him.

A single red glow came from the car, a cigarette being smoked, and Atticus felt his heart explode in his chest. Whomever this cop was, he was following him, and with a single move of his hand, it fell from inside his pocket and a metal clink resounded through the aqueduct. Spiralling through the darkness, the cigarette butt landed with a shower of embers, glowing red hot, and as it struck the cement, the red and blue lights ruptured in the darkness, flooding the aqueduct with their acrid glow. The engine revved and the cop tore off into the darkness, into the night, to the heart of the city.

Atticus dropped to his knees and into the shadows, pressing his body against the arched floor, the cold burned his exposed arm, the sleeve of his heavy coat having been pushed up in the dash to reach the darkness. He listened as the siren trailed away into the dead of night, into the hum of the city, and as he removed himself from the hollow, he saw the girl.

 

 

Her eyes were transfixed upon his visage, emerging from the shadows, black on black, and they smiled at one another. Cautiously, warily, and meeting one another at the centre of the aqueduct, they shook hands – brief, yet cordial. Atticus smiled a toothy smile, and his teeth glinted in the moonlight, a little too sharp; a wolfish smile set in his grey flesh.

 

“Hello,” he said.

Glancing down the girl’s body, she was draped in white, a sunspot in the iniquity of night, she seemed to be aglow.

“Yes, hello. Do you have my parcel?”

Her voice was cold, a razorblade as luminous as his teeth.

“Well, the funniest thing – I”

“What did you do, Atticus? What happened?”

Atticus could hear the venom rising in her voice.

“I heard the siren, Claudia, and it –“

“What, Atticus?”

Her teeth were bared in a malicious smile.

“It fell.”

He stammered and bowed his head.

It was fast, he didn’t even process the movement until he was pinned against the wall of the aqueduct. It was cold, her fingernails were sharp, and fire blazed in her eyes. He could see the devil there. Claudia may have been small, may have appeared frail, but as he looked down at her in the darkness, an angel of destruction, he saw the blade shine like an explosion and suddenly rest against his exposed throat. It was cold, it was deadly, and in the haze of tears, he swallowed and felt a warm bead of blood trickle down his neck.

“What?”

She asked again, her voice strained.

“It fell. Down the drain, miss. The cop, he startled me.”

His voice was frail, constrained, and he saw her hand twitch. The shock of silver danced in the moonlight.

“Did he now?”

“Yes, miss. He did. I didn’t know what else to do. You hadn’t shown, so I started back home.”

“Did you now?”

She pressed harder against his throat.

“Yes, miss, and I saw him. Thought he was following me, miss.”

“Is that so?”

The straight edged razor blade twitched once more, another nick in his throat.

“Yes, miss. When the siren went on, it startled me. I dropped the parcel down the drain.”

His eyes moved to the drain behind her, and saw the muscles in her forearm flex.

“I see, Atticus. Now, I’m sure you’re going to be retrieving it for me, aren’t you?”

Atticus nodded, swallowing. The pressure of the blade had relinquished enough that this time, he did not bleed.

“Very well.”

And Claudia released the grasp on his throat. Atticus fell and gasped for air, he looked up at her and his eyes streamed.

“Thank you, miss.”

Atticus rose to his feet and looked up, once more, beyond the peak of the aqueduct, to the barren wasteland of the city sprawled out around them. It looked like a well-oiled machine from this angle, glistening in the pale light of the moon.

“Tell me, boy – have you ever danced with the devil in the pale moonlight?”

She asked in a sing-song voice, eyes glaring up at the man in the moon, his omniscient smirk glaring right back down.

“If you dance with the devil, the devil don’t change. The devil changes you.”

“So I’ve heard, Atticus. Now, shall we begin the search for the parcel?”

“In the dark?”

“Yes, boy. Yes. I need it, now.”

“Very well, then.”

He conceded, and she could hear it dripping in his voice. The broken back of a man forced to do others bidding. Claudia almost felt pity for him. Almost.

Atticus crawled to the grate, and drew his feet up under him; crouching down, his hands flat on the cold wrought iron. Fumbling with a large silver coin, he made to undo the industrial screws mounting it to the cement. The screamed as they came up, wailing through the silent night, high pitched like nails on a chalk board, only a little less penetrating. One screw, then two, then three and four, and his fingers were fumbling down into the grating, and achieving a hold. He lifted with his strength, but the grate did not want to move. It did not budge, and he strained harder, feeling it begin to give from the moorings.

Claudia stood over and watched him, a satisfied smirk playing across her face.

It pulled free and he stood, dropping it onto the cement beside the hole. It clattered down, deafening, and rolled along the edges like a quarter whose spin was dying. Atticus huffed oxygen back into his lungs and stared down into the deep, dark hole. The depths it reached felt limitless, and looking to the girl, he waited for the next command.

From the depths of her own pockets, she produced a small flair, a half-stick, and ignited it with a subtle flick of her thumb. It exploded red and sulphurous, and burned across their faces, casting her white coat, blouse and slacks in the iridescent red. She smiled at Atticus and let the flare fall to the catacombs below.

“There you go, boy.”

“Yes, there I go.”

Again, the words were hollow, and he shifted out of his coat. It fell in a heap upon the ground and his eyes rose to the man in the moon, pleading for help, for understanding from the forgotten deity. He bit his lip and looked once more to Claudia.

“Must I?”

Again, the blade flitted into view from her palm.

“No, I suppose you don’t have to, but it would be in your best interests, boy.”

“There’s no knowing what’s down there.”

“There’s no knowing where you’re going, the rowers keep on rowing, but believe me boy, you must set forth and conquer new lands. It is the way of the sword, boy. It is the way it must be. You fumbled the parcel, you must retrieve it. It’s the way it must be.”

“Thank you, miss. Thank you.”

He breathed a deep sigh and looked once more to the man in the moon, then back to the girl. Perhaps they were cousins in the light they emitted, and as he crouched down once more, he stared into the depths, barely able to see the spark of the flare. It was so far down, twenty feet, he guessed, and looking up to the girl with a pleading in his eyes, he knew it was the way it had to be, and he heaved a foot over the edge and onto the first iron rung of the ladder descending.

 

 

       

 

2 Ghosts I

 

D

epths unknown, and his mind wandered down below his feet and into darkness. Any manner of things could reside down there, he thought, as he descended, and the girl had left his view. Either he was down that low, or she had moved back. He was not sure, nor did he have the stomach to call up and ask. The fear clutched at his heart, his lungs and pushed him down further. The way out was through, and he continued down onto the darkness, his feet and hands slipping here and there on the greasy ladder. It felt like chicken bones, he thought, and remembered his childhood. Picnicking in the countryside with his family on their farm and amidst the fields, under a tree with a tire swing – he’d never forget the tire swing. It was his only source of hope anymore, in the city.

He clambered down the ladder, well past line of sight of Claudia, and his nerves were beginning to calm. Once he was down there, it should not take him long to find the parcel. A second, a flash, and he’d be on his way back up. He’d made it past the point of no return, and he continued down, almost smiling. He was almost done, and soon, he’d be returning to the comfort of his own bed. This was the way it had to be, but it’d work. He glanced down and saw the flare burning inches from his feet. He stepped into the muck of the sewer, and his eyes searched for the silver package.

Atticus knelt down and waded through the quagmire, the flare burning hot and bright in his hand, covered with slime, but still alight. He reached into the bog and pressed against the rough floor of the sewer, searching. Okay, he thought, maybe it would take longer than suspected, but he’d find it soon enough. It could not have gone far.

Something hard and sharp brushed his palm, and he pulled it from the depths of this funk.

 

Claudia leaned against the edge of the aqueduct and glanced all around her, her eyes surveying the surroundings, and looking down at the pocket watch, cold against her palm, she frowned in thought. From behind her, the sun began to rise. The sky grew light in shades of blue bleeding to purple and crimson and to pink, all stemming from the pink prick of yellow so bright it burned white as it kissed the horizon.

She returned to the edge of the hole and looked down; looking for sign of Atticus, for the flare, but nothing was below, only darkness. She had been standing there for the better part of two hours, and ten minutes into the vigil, she saw the flare disappear. Where had he gone? Where had the parcel found itself in the labyrinth of the sewers?

“Goddamnit.”

She said it under her breath, with a sigh, and crouched down, peering over the edge.

Atticus had ventured off somewhere, she could not see, and with a shake of her head, she threw her leg over to catch the ladder with the toe of her boot. Her leg caught the edge and swiped a dark streak of grime across the white fabric. She cursed to herself again and shimmied down the ladder. By the time she reached the bog of the sewer, her clothes were unrecognisable, and as she dropped into the depth of the filth, she felt it crawl up over her boots, slushy and disgusting.

Claudia made a noise as she moved away from the ladder, and stared around her, into the darkness. She reached into her coat and removed another of the handheld flares and touched the ignition switch – it burned the tunnel red and blinding, and her eyes sought for the potential direction of Atticus’s departure.

“Atticus!”

She called, her voice resounding in all directions.

“Logic.”

She said, looking once more in all directions, thinking.

“The current heads that way. It could have been carried that way. He’d probably go that way.”

It made sense in her head.

“That’s logic.”

She grumbled to herself and draped her long white coat over a rung of the ascending ladder, to keep it from further damage more than as a marker.

 

“There are children here, somewhere. I can smell them.”

Jackdaw said to his large companion, Boidae. His voice was weedy, a frail voice from disuse, and as he scurried amongst the debris of the sewer line, he sniffed and waited. The large man lumbered behind him, slow and sluggish, his feet splashing heavily in the slop.

“Come, Boidae. Come. Let us find the other.”

Jackdaw continued to sniff and follow the sewer around, to the ladder. In the darkness, his wet, beady eyes caught the clash of the white coat and drew down upon it. He snatched at the tail and sniffed the fabric, smelling the subtle perfume of Claudia. Jackdaw memorised the odour and continued down the path, following the subtle traces of her scent that lingered upon the cement walls.

“Jackdaw, don’t you think the other will come for the boy?”

“Probably, why else would she be down here? But that’s not important, no. No, what’s important, is that we have her before she contacts anyone else.”

He said, peering at his behemoth over his shoulder. Boidae hung his head and followed Jackdaw without another word. The small, bird faced man lead the brute with an invisible chain and collar. He had the power here, and as he followed the scent of Claudia, lingering to the banisters of their catacombs. His lips were moist with his hungry saliva, and his eyes danced around the darkness. They would see her before she saw them – they could already taste her, even the dullard, Boidae.

Their heavy, handmade cloaks billowed out behind them as they scurried along the line of the sewer. Jackdaw’s fingers trailed the cement, feeling the ambience of the girl, the spectral trail, and as he felt her warmth growing nearer, he snickered silently to himself.

 

It was dark, but his eyes were beginning to adjust. Atticus twisted his body, and his wrists inside the manacles, looking at the subtle green iridescence of his watch. It was morning. How long had he been here?  He groaned and went slack against the cold stone of the wall, trying to piece together the events in his head. It was all a haze, and he wondered if he was lucky to even remember his name at this point. There was a deep throbbing in his skull, radiating from the temple and spreading to the deep tissue of his brain, and as it trickled down his face, from his hairline to his lips, he could taste the sickening salty taste of blood.

All he could make out of his surroundings were the stench, the cold, and the dark, heavy silhouettes inside the room he awoke to.

For a few moments, just after regaining consciousness, he heard scurrying and hushed, hoarse whispers barking orders. A masculine voice; irritated and impatient. The man spoke, and all Atticus could make out was one word, another. As he remembered this word, he felt his stomach fall out. For the first time, he knew true fear. The other must have been Claudia, and he was worried what would happen if they found her. If they caught her. What they might do to her, and as he fought the restraints, he knew it was a fruitless effort. No man could fight iron and win, it just wasn’t the way the cookie crook crumbled, and as he fell back against the stone wall, his body curving against it, he felt the weight of the world land unceremoniously upon his shoulders. He was useless, and he bit his lip hard enough to draw blood. There was nothing to be done, but to wait here for their imminent return with Claudia. She would not win. Oh, he knew that given the chance, she’d put up one hell of a fight, with a better chance than his against the iron bindings, but he knew it was all fruitless.

His chin hit his chest and he looked down into the darkness, to the invisible floor. All for naught, he strained again, lifting his feet and trying to either pull his hands through, or the bolt through the chain from the wall. He hoped, and he felt the metal tear into his flesh, drawing the sting of an open wound. Atticus flinched and dropped his feet once more to the floor with a clatter of something against the smooth stone. It clanked and echoed in the hollow room, hard and metal.

Once the din died down of whatever it was, he heard something else, something organic. The dripping of water, and something else further down. His ears became pricked, and without sight, he could hear clearer, more distinct. He had heard of blind people developing extrasensory abilities, and he wondered if that was what was happening to him. It was unlikely, but he had hope. It was all he could have, here. It was something to keep his mind occupied, fixated, but nonetheless, he heard something in the distance. The shuffle of feet, the slosh of muck in the sewer line – two feet, not four, and his hope began to increase. It was one person, not two, and they were growing louder.

Atticus closed his eyes and listened harder, for some semblance of recognition, and in the dark, he heard the static pop of extreme heat landing in water. It was the sound of a flare burning away, its embers landing in the quagmire. It was Claudia; he could feel it in his bones. She was drawing near, and any moment now, she would be entering this berth.

With a moment of curiosity, he shuffled his feet and heard his own scraping. Wherever he was, he was on dry land, or at least, not wading through the decay of the sewers, and he remembered the clattering of whatever that was on the floor, how it echoed so loud. He bit his lip against the forthcoming agony and threw his body about from the wall. Kicking and pushing, wailing his feet about to knock anything else over, to give her some sign where he was. He did not trust his own voice, did not know if it would work, and was worried that if it did, it would carry more obvious than the noise he was making. He was worried it’d be more distinct, and in the darkness, at the end of a turn, Atticus saw the red glare drawing closer.

 

Claudia stood at a crossroads in the depth of the sewers. It was a labyrinth, and she was growing irritated with the sense of disorientation. The only plus, she could find, was that she had not come across her coat yet, which meant she must not be walking entirely in circles. She grumbled and searched her pant pockets for a pack of cigarettes. They were in the back pocket, and pulling one from the pack with her lips, she returned it with gratuitous force, and removed the cold metal lighter. It clicked open, and with a soft thwump, she brought it toward her face and lit the cigarette. The rush of nicotine filling her lungs soothed her nerves, and she continued the trek through the underground.

She took a left turn and heard something cold and metallic clatter in the distance, and her feet began to carry her toward the disturbance. It was close, she thought, and looking around to the edge of the red glow, she followed the curve of the walls.

 Sucking the acrid smoke into her lungs, she found herself glad that she was a smoker. The deadened sense of smell was a godsend in this hell of odours, and shuffling her feet through the swill, she made her way toward the opening she could barely make out in the dim light of the flare. It was the darker spot in the sea of black, and as she drew closer, she heard all manner of thrashing about.

Her feet carried her faster, the flare stuck out as far in front of her as it would go, and she stumbled for a second. She knew that whatever beast was being restrained, it had to be Atticus. It was the only path that made sense. That’s logic, she told herself as she clambered through the last stretch of the catacombs and into the room.

The red glow fell upon the walls in a wash of watercolour, and Claudia’s jaw dropped. Oh, there he lay against the wall, his hands bound in wrought iron shackles and oozing blood, dark black in the light and dripping copiously down his arms, but there was more. More than Claudia could fully fathom. His body was not the only, but it was not the lone still alive. The rest were decayed, flesh sloughing off from the bone.

“Oh my god…”

The whisper was hoarse, in shock, and nothing could overpower the odour radiating from the bodies.

“What?”

Atticus asked, having not looked to either side of him, or to any of the debris he had kicked over, but amidst it was a human skull with a great hole from the contact of the toe of his boot.

Claudia dropped her cigarette to the floor and stubbed it out with her toe and stood straight and tall.

 

 

3 ghosts I

 

A

tticus and Claudia stared at one another for a long moment before she approached and examined the manacles that bound him to the wall. She cursed to herself and began searching amidst the debris of this antechamber. There was no key to be found. She set the flare down on its end and searched more thoroughly, discarding the fact that she was desecrating the dead. No, there were no keys here, but she did find a portion of pipe and a brick that had come lose.

Claudia returned to Atticus and looked him in the eyes. The fear she saw there was insurmountable, and she could think of nothing of comfort to say to him.

“Remember when you were young, you shown like the sun.”

Was all she could come up with, and she wedge the jagged edge of the pipe into a chink of the chain holding his dead weight. Her own nerves were increasing. She knew that whatever had abducted him would be returning, and she drove the mass of the brick into the pipe, into the chain and the impact resounded through the antechamber. Again and again she pounded the brick into the pipe, and she saw the chain begin to give way. The last hammer split the chain in two measures, and as the brick came down with a sigh of relief, it contacted with his hands, his wrists, and sent Atticus screaming, a low, muffled scream.

“Thank you, miss.”

He said, rubbing his wrists.

“Do you have the parcel?”

She asked, staring down at him in the red glow off the flare.

A sudden memory seized him and Atticus began searching his pockets, with a manic gleam in his eyes. Their glassy sheen evident in the harsh red fire from the flare. It was still there and he smiled as he removed it from the pocket of his jeans. He pressed it into Claudia’s hand, and looked about the room, noticing the decaying bodies; mouths agape and eyeless.

“They will be coming back.”

He said, and continued.

“I heard them leave. To look for you. They’ll be back, and soon. We should go out that way, I’m sure they were behind you. They’d be making their way back to the centre. Let’s go, Claudia.  That’s logic.”

“Quite right, sir.”

Their voices were barely over a whisper, and his was hoarse, strained, his mouth parched and cracking.

“Move, now!”

 

From the mouth of the room where she had entered came a clattering noise, and snatching up the flare, Atticus pushed Claudia in front of him and they scurried from the room. The small man and his bodyguard were on their heels, the leader’s nostrils flared and sniffling. He needn’t see them; he could smell them, heady in the dank air. He hissed something to the bulk and pursued the pair as the other hung back, surveying the damage done within the walls of the antechamber.

Two pair of feet pounded through the sewer, the one behind sounded more like that of a rat scurrying, and the light frame of the tail caught up with Atticus and Claudia soon enough. His bony and muscular hand clutched at the back of Atticus’s shirt, pulling him back. Atticus fought and turned on his heel to face the man, and pushed his fist into the bony chest. Atticus swore loudly and drew the flare up in front of the man’s face to see him, and in the blinding glare, he saw the milky white eyes stare back at him. The flare sent the man recoiling, down to his hands and knees with his face away from the glare.

It happened in a flash. Atticus stepped back in shock, in horror at the man that had been following them, who had evidently abducted him. His face was scarred and lacked pigment, and Atticus wondered if the man had ever seen daylight. It was this moment of repose that gave the man time to recover from the blinding flash of light. He turned and ran for Atticus, teeth bared and glistening white and black, and aimed for his exposed arm.

They sunk in, the remaining teeth in the man’s skull and the long, jagged fingernails that dug into Atticus’s stomach. The flare fell into the slop and Atticus wailed in agony, but in the dark, he saw the glare of silver slip under him and disappear into Jackdaw’s chest, between a pair of ribs – Atticus heard the rupture of lungs and expulsion of oxygen. The low hiss echoed through the cavernous expanse, and standing in shock, Atticus and Claudia stared at one another in the dying light of the flare. It sizzled and they were cast in darkness.

A low howl tore through the silence, and the blood drained from their faces in unison. As their eyes acclimated to the sudden darkness, they saw their moon pale faces and hurried from the spot. Atticus could hear something to his side, Claudia was doing something, but he did not know what until the small flame flickered to life in her palm, casting the nearest wall in a faded orange glow.

 

Boidae lumbered down the hall of the sewer, his feet splashing noisily and resounding throughout. He knew he had heard the sound of trouble, and sniffing his way through the corridors, he found the source at his feet. He knelt down in the sludge and reached blindly amidst the sewage, his scarred and tattered hands finding the weight. It was Jackdaw, and Boidae lifted him from the filth, carrying him bodily like a new husband with his wife, over the threshold of their sanctuary. He laid the body to rest on an altar and returned to the catacombs, a thirst for the blood of Jackdaw’s assailants smacking at his lips.

The behemoth swelled to his full height and size, and bounded down the corridor, his shoulders scraping the high ceiling of the sewers.

 

“You should not have come here!”

The voice exploded behind Atticus and he turned to look, pushing Claudia up the ladder, her coat slung over her shoulder as she ascended. He followed her up a few rungs, eyes fixed on the giant behind him.

“Damn.”

“Go, Claudia. Just go!”

Atticus barked, and followed her up the ladder, stopping shortly after it reached into the heavy cement ceiling on the sewer. He was a few feet up and looking down, the sun burning down the rabbit hole, illuminating the brute. His shoulders were too wide to fit up the hole, and a hand was scraping at the heel of Atticus’s heavy boots as he stood on the ladder, and watched Boidae intently.   He could not understand what was happening, the events of the past few hours were lost on him, he could not wrap his head around them, and looking back up to the early morning sky, he ascended the rest of the way and clambered onto the floor of the aqueduct, snatching up his coat.

“If you don’t have the parcel, Claudia, it’s on you this time. You can go and fetch it.”

His voice lacked humour, and his burning eyes stared through the back of her head.

“I have it, Atticus. Not to worry.”

She answered, pulling the smooth silver box from her pocket and examined it in the light; it was caked with grit and grime, but it was still whole and in tact, unmarred. It glinted in the sunlight as she wiped it close to clean on the torn sleeve of her once-white blouse – it was now a dark shade of grey, and her pants were black patched with brown. Their faces were covered in grime and great streaks of black, soaking downward with their sweat and the water from the sewer.

From behind them, deep set in the earth, they listened to the scraping noise of Boidae, his words were unintelligible but reeked of seething hatred and pain, the pain of loss. Atticus approached the grate and replaced it over the hole, screwing the bolts back into place with the sliver of steel coin. It vibrated against the timbre of Boidae’s voice crying out, and as he stood up, Atticus asked:

“What the hell is that?”

“Atticus, some questions are best left unasked.”

Claudia turned and walked away from the man in black, straightening his coat in the morning light. It still glistened with its crisp angles, while the rest of his dark ensemble was streaked with brown and grey, shades of green. None of the colours he wanted to identify their source, and he hurried to catch up with the lady in white, her pale blonde hair ratted and sticky with sweat.

“Do you know?”

“No, Atticus. Go home.”

She sounded beaten, her voice sullen and bruised.

“But…”

“No buts, Atticus. Go home. Now.”

“What the hell?”

“Don’t ask questions.

Go home, go to sleep.

Forget what happened.”

 

“God damn, women.”

Atticus said as he stopped and watched her stagger down the aqueduct, rolling the silver parcel in her hands, absentmindedly examining it – it shown in the sunlight, bright and blinding, a sunspot burning through his vision.

He turned and walked away from Claudia, his curiosity nowhere near sated, but he would survive, and as he pounded his way through the aqueduct to his home, he found a cigarette in one of the many pockets in his voluminous coat. No, he was not a smoker, by rule of thumb, but after the events from which he just walked, he wasn’t going to be stringent.

The tobacco tore through his lungs as he inhaled it, and as he stepped back over the grate leading to the sewer, he heard naught but silence.

 

Boidae climbed down the latter, back to the sewer floor and meandered through the sewer, deflated, his head hung low in memoriam for his fallen brother. The underground curved around and he crossed the threshold into his abode, Jackdaw still laid where the brute had placed him upon the altar.

He sat upon an old chair and stroked the frail forms face before covering him in a black shroud.

“I’m taking you to see The Magus.”

The words had too many syllables to be understood by anyone but their own, and Boidae stood tall and took Jackdaw over his shoulder, carrying him to the back of the room, where a deep depression sat, steel set in the cement, and with the hand that was not around Jackdaw’s legs, he turned a great metal dial until he heard the click that resounded through the entire network of cavernous pipes. He bowed his head, as if in prayer and pushed with his hand, bathed in a low golden light of flickering torches in brackets set in rough hewn stone walls.

Solemn and grey, the long corridor had no bright spot to speak of, and Boidae’s feet carried him down to the end. He knew what was there, and he knew that he’d find The Magus, eventually. He knew he’d be amongst his own kind, and that he would owe The Magus dearly, but it was all worth it to have Jackdaw back. Without the small, rat-faced man, Boidae knew he would not survive long, would not, could not. He sniffed and rubbed his eyes with the free hand, caked with dirt, his fingernails the colour of beetle wings.

Jackdaw was light as a feather and just as flexible as Boidae carried him down the corridor, barely cognizant of the weight. He continued to sniffle down the passageway and wipe the fat tears away with his gnarled hand – Boidae kept his head bowed and felt the hot tears run down his nose.

The torches flickered madly as he neared the end of his trek, the chaos of his destination creating a breeze that drifted down the way, that he was beginning to feel against the small bit of flesh exposed to the dead, dry air. He paused and looked from the floor, from his feet, and saw the pinprick of light at the end of the tunnel and readjusted the dead weight to the other shoulder, the feeling of Jackdaw’s hollow bones barely registering in the giants muscles, and as he neared the end of the journey, Boidae held his head high.

The colossus stepped foot upon the hard caked soil, and looked to the high dirt ceilings of this town beneath the earth. Low, ramshackle dwellings stood in close knit flocks, with dirty, expectant faces peering from the shadows therein. Boidae had family here, as did Jackdaw, and as he stepped down the streets and around pillars holding the earth from the earth, he began to search for a familiar face. Any familiar face would do.

It had been a long time since he had step foot here, more than half a decade, but few of the faces had changed. There were new ones, young ones, but on the whole, he recognised many, but not enough to ask for help.

“Boidae!”

A voice called out from a cadre gathered around a fire, followed by the parting of the sea of bodies, and a scurrying woman approached him, her face curious and worried.

“Teiidae.”

He spoke, solemn and guttural, barely more than a whisper.

“Why’re you here?”

“I need to see The Magus.”

“What? Why?

What’s that over your shoulder?

Where’s Jackdaw?”

“Under the shroud, Teiidae. He was killed. By an Uplander.”

“Oh. God. No.”

The words came out slow, heavy, and her face contorted with sadness.

“Come, I’ll take you to The Magus, Boidae.”

And together, they set out through the Grotto toward the centre.

Reviews

[S. J. Fisk]

I believe I will write a much more comprehensive review later, as we're discussing this as I read, and you already know how I enjoy how Claudia and Atticus play against each other, and how nicely you show they're differences with their individual styles. Again, well done on using 'aglow' in a sentence and not sounding corny.

The unique names with the appropriate meanings is done very well. Some people may have used more obvious names, but I like how you pull things from multiple venues to get your imagery across. I find it interesting that your underground society initially appears behind "normal" society here. I'm not certain how that will play in later, but I am already certain that it WILL play in later. You are one of those writers that I just know will not only meet my expectations, but completely blow me out of the water.

I want to know what's in the package. Badly...well done.

[♥ Courtney &hear..]

Wow, that was amazing. The story was so descriptive! I felt like I could see every single thing clearly as iF I were watching it in real life. Your characters are believable, and I feel like i know them already. You have written quite the addictive story so much to the point that its going to kill me if you dont post again soon! Brilliant! Just brilliant!

-Courtney