The Prophecy Machine

36

Even as Julia said, it was no great effort to make the very small hole large. She was also right about bringing the whole wall down upon his head.

“I would say I told you so,” Julia croaked, and rattled off into the dark, “but I'm fairly sure I did.”

“I am grateful for your help,” Finn said, wheezing, gasping through a cloud of dirt, rot and old debris. “I don't know what I'd do without your good advice.”

Letitia appeared through the gloom, holding a candle high, a pale and dusty apparition with wide and anxious eyes.

“I don't care for this, Finn. I'm not sure it's a good idea.”

“We haven't even started, dear. I don't think we should judge it quite yet.”

“I've started. I've started to itch. I don't like it in here.”

“I don't either, but I don't see anything for us back there.”

Letitia didn't answer. She followed Julia, whose lizard eyes could penetrate the dark far better than any human or Newlie born.

As Julia had warned, insect life of every sort abounded in the maze behind the walls. It was heaven for spiders, a termite delight. There were bugs that crawled and flew, bugs that liked to bite, bugs Finn couldn't even name.

Once, ducking wooden beams, bending nearly to the floor, Letitia cried out, stood and cracked her head. The candle flew away and rolled across the floor, the wick still lit. Finn crawled across to get it, stopped in his tracks. The dusty floor was teeming with roaches. A swarm of thousands of the ugly, writhing creatures, frantically running from the light that intruded on their dark, unwholesome world.

They moved like the undulations of the sea, wave after wave, one mass scrambling atop the next, another and another after that. Worst of all, the thing that made Finn's skin begin to crawl, was the color of the things. Neither brown nor black, like their ordinary kin, this dreadful mass was deathly white. Pale, swollen, disturbingly fat.

“Here's your candle,” Finn said. “You ask me, that was not a pretty sight. If you'd like, I'll trade places and carry the light awhile.”

“So something can find me in the dark? No thanks, Finn. You're not getting away with that.”

Before he could answer, she turned away again. Finn let her go. This was clearly not the time to speak of anything at all.

It all made a certain kind of sense, Finn thought. The outside of the house set the theme: every room, every hall he'd seen, was cockeyed, leaning, listing left or right. Why shouldn't the spaces in between be as peculiar as the rest?

Sometimes Julia took them ways so narrow that Finn could scarcely squeeze through. Sometimes they climbed, sometimes they crawled between floors. Once, Finn pulled his way hand over hand, under a set of stairs. When he reached the bottom, a section of roofing blocked his way. When there was finally room to pass Letitia, he brushed a mess of cobwebs aside and told Julia to stop.

Letitia looked alarmed. “Where are you going? Is something wrong, Finn?”

“Not a thing. I'm going up to see Julia.”

“Don't, please. Stay right here.”

Finn reached out and touched her. “You feel rather cold. Are you all right?”

“No, I'm not. Thanks for asking, dear.”

Julia's eyes were dim points of light against the dark.

“I have to ask. Are you certain you know what you're doing, are you sure you got out this way?”

“No, I'm quite sure I did not.”

“What?”

“If I went the way I did before, you and Letitia would never get through.”

“But you know where we are.”

“You put a compass inside me, remember? I couldn't get lost if I wanted to. That flooring, just below the stairs? The one that slants forty-two degrees? The one where you saw the mottled centipedes? Where you-”

“All right, I remember. What's the point here?”

“You asked me where we are. We're just below the hall outside our room. Where we were was directly beneath that heavy object Calabus set before the door. Did you notice how much the floor sagged? I'm surprised it didn't come right through …”

Finn drew a breath. “You're telling me that's as far as we've gone? We're on the same floor, out in the hall?”

“Below the hall, to be exact, not in it. If we were in it now-”

“Bogs and Frogs.” Finn wiped a sleeve against his face. “Why didn't you tell me that? You never tell me anything I need to know.”

Julia hesitated. She lifted herself up slightly, flexing her silvery legs.

“I saw no reason to alarm you. There are unusual conditions here-vibrations, emanations in this house. They come from that machine down below.”

“I know that. I nearly threw up down there.”

“Yes, but it isn't just down there. I can sense them all the time, you can't. I've been trying to get us out without getting too close to that thing. It affects my parts to some degree, but I've seen what it does to humans and Newlies. It's best to take the long way.”

“Fine, then, if it doesn't take forever.”

He tried to swallow, but only managed to stick his throat shut. He wished he had a mug of cool ale to cut the dust.

“You did the right thing, Julia. But I wish you'd told me. Calabus could find out we're gone anytime. Then what? Letitia's wearing out, and I'm getting there myself. One more roach parade, one more spider-”

Finn was suddenly talking in the dark. He turned, quickly, back the way he'd come.

“Letitia? Letitia, are you all right? Just stay there, don't move, I'm coming back.”

“Finn. She's not there.”

“She has to be there.”

“I can see, and she's gone. She's not there.”

“Letitia!”

Finn felt the hairs tingle on his neck. “Say something, please. Answer me, love!”

“Hold it down, Finn. That won't do us any good.”

Finn searched for an extra candle in his pocket. Drew it out, found a firestick in his vest. His hands were shaking so badly he could scarcely get the thing lit. At once, he saw Letitia's candle. There was still a wisp of smoke rising from the wick.

When he turned again, Julia was gone. He caught a blur of copper as she scrambled to the right, under a row of crooked joists. Finn made himself follow, leave the spot where Letitia had disappeared. He felt drained, empty, terribly frightened, terribly alone.

He followed Julia on hands and knees, squeezing through the narrow space between the walls. A splinter sliced his palm. He winced but didn't stop.

She's all right, nothing happened … a spider startled her, she dropped the candle, the candle went out … she tried to find me, took a wrong turn somewhere …

“Why didn't she call out? Why didn't she make a sound?”

When he caught up to Julia, he found her rigid, perfectly still. Her lizard snout twitched, tasting the air. Finn wanted to yell, tell her to hurry, damn it, they didn't have time.

Finally, she moved, off to the right with a glance back at Finn. He tried to hold his candle low, away from dusty walls, the timbers just above his head. If a flame ever licked that dry and rotting wood …

At the end of the crawlway, he was able to stand and stretch his legs. Holding the candle high, he saw a wide shaft crossing his path just ahead. Six, maybe eight feet across. It started somewhere above, dropped into smothering darkness far below. A place for a chimney, perhaps, a project that never got done. In a house like this, he thought, there must be a number of things that ended before they were even begun.

“Finn.”

“I'm here.”

Julia's eyes blinked. “I know that, I can see you there. There's a ledge around that pit. Come that way.”

“I see it.”

“I think it ought to hold.”

“You think?”

“It will. And Finn …”

“What?”

“There's a strong emanation and a smell. You'll know it easily enough while you're crossing the shaft. I'm telling you so you won't panic and run across. It's a very long drop.”

“I'm not going to panic, I've never fallen in a pit in my life. Did she come this way? Do you have any feeling about that, anything at all?”

“Come over, Finn. Don't look, don't think. Do it right now.”

Finn took a breath, let it out and held it again. He walked across the narrow stretch of timber, his back pressed to the wall. Halfway there it hit him. It didn't help to hold his breath, it was too strong for that.

He gagged, feeling the bile rise up in his throat, feeling the undulations in his bones, in his muscle, in his flesh. His stomach heaved. The nausea nearly brought him down. He felt as if his head might swell up and split.

“As I said, take it easy. Don't panic. Which is exactly what you did.”

“Stones and Bones, Julia, what in all hell was that? Letitia, where did she-”

“I've lost her. I don't know where she is, but I know what's making you sick. As I said, the emanations from that machine have always been evident in the house, but they're awfully strong here. We're very close to it. By my reckoning, we shouldn't be, but we are.”

“And that's what's causing the smell?”

“What? Oh no, that's excreta, waste and flux. Dribble, sweat, foul urination and such. And, if I'm not mistaken, Squeen William's cooking lunch. Don't be concerned about that, it's the throbbing and the pulse, the rumble and drumming and the thrum, that's what'll bring you down.”

Finn was scarcely listening at all. The back of his neck still tingled, and he couldn't make it stop.

“When we were down there … that thing had a strong effect on Letitia. I should never have taken her there.”

“I have to tell you, Finn. If we get any closer, I doubt you can stay in a conscious state for long.”

Finn shook his head. “I have to. I've got to find her and get her out of here.”

“What good will it do if you're stricken by this-wave, this radiation, whatever it may be? It's better if I go on, discover where she is.”

“Forget it. We're wasting time here. If I have to throw up, I'll do it on the way …”