The Collected Christopher Connery (11 page)

They went down until Gail was pretty sure there couldn’t
be any more down left. Worse, the stairs were getting narrower and more uneven
with every step.

“Are you sure we’re going the right way?” Arthur
whispered. Gail didn’t blame him. Normal speaking voices rang weirdly down
here.

“Of course it’s the right way,” Nia replied, but there
was an edge of… maybe not quite doubt, but definitely not undoubt in her voice.
“This spell should guide us straight to the basement.”

“Well, it’s just the one stair,” said Gail as
optimistically as she could. “So we’ve got to get there eventually…” She
trailed off as the solid wall beside her changed to a long twisting hallway,
lit by the same type of floor lamp found in every room in the hotel. Judging
Arthur’s muttered cursing, the same transformation had taken place on his side.

Then the stairs in front of them split apart as though
they were no more solid than paper. One half twisted back on itself, scuttling
back the way they had come while the other continued down into the dark.

Gail sighed. “Me and my big mouth.”

But Nia didn’t seem annoyed. In fact, she was watching
the transformation with fascination. “This is incredible!”

“What’s so incredible about it?” asked Gail. “I mean,
besides the lamps. That’s a nice touch, I guess.”

“Labyrinths are static by nature. No matter their
complexity, they must be designed, built, and then left alone. Any tampering
after the fact could undermine the entire structure, but Connery seems to have
found a way to create flexibility without compromising stability. A labyrinth
that can respond to internal stimuli! I couldn’t even begin to explain how he
did it without further –”

She was interrupted by a roar from somewhere below them.

“What the hell was that?” Arthur gasped, stumbling back a
step.

“It sounded like someone doing unbound magic,” Nia said
softly.

“ – a waterfall.”

“ – a huge rat.”

They all looked at each other.

“Well, whatever it sounds like, I know it makes me want
to get the hell out of here.” Gail pulled back on Nia’s hand.

“It might be just a trick,” said Nia, though she was now
holding on to Gail with a grip that would have put even the most cautious
children’s home guardian to shame. “Connery may be trying to scare us away from
his hiding place.”

“Connery’s a showman, but he doesn’t go in for bluster.
Whatever’s down there means business.”

“But –”

“Shhh!” Arthur said suddenly. “Be quiet! Can you hear
that?”

Gail listened hard, but all she could hear was the buzz
her own ears made to counter the sudden silence. She was about to say so when –
footsteps. Heavy footsteps. Coming up the stairs.

For a moment, Gail was sure she knew that tread. They
belonged to Mr. Johnson, a “teacher” at the children’s home who mostly taught
the kids how to be afraid of his heavy hand and, judging by the way the teenage
girls and boys shrank from him, other things as well. The one bit of luck Gail
had in that place was that he had fallen down the stairs and broken his neck
before she’d been old enough to catch his eye. But it looked like her luck had
run out at last.

Then she blinked and the sense of familiarity vanished.
The steps didn’t sound anything like Mr. Johnson’s. They didn’t sound like
anything specific at all. Sometimes they were chaotic and pounding like the
footsteps of many running children and the next they were soft and measured
like a woman with a stately confident stride. And something else too. Singing?
Then they were just the dragging and stumbling tread of a dying animal.

“Huh,” she said. “That’s weird. What do you think that’s
supposed to – hey, are you two all right?”

Stupid question really. Arthur was slumped on the stairs,
his free arm bent over his head and Nia was standing absolutely still,
half-leaning toward the sound and half-twisted away like a startled bird.

We’re not hearing the same thing.
Maybe it was
because she was a layman and the illusion couldn’t get into her head as well as
it could the magician’s, but the moment the thought crossed her mind, she was
sure she was right.

And whatever was making those noises was coming closer.

“Okay, new plan,” she said, reaching around Nia and using
all her strength to drag Arthur to his feet. “We’re getting the hell out of
here and finding another way.”

Arthur stared at her, a terrible dark fear in his eyes,
but something of what she said must have gotten through to him because he
didn’t resist when she pulled him toward the corridor nearest to her. Nia,
unfortunately, was another matter entirely. When Gail tried to pull her with
them, she balked and nearly slipped her hand free.

Gail grabbed her wrist. “Hey! I don’t know what you think
is down there, princess, but I am sure you don’t want to meet it.”

Nia didn’t answer and she didn’t move.

Cursing, Gail pulled Arthur around until he was standing
in the hallway, under the light of one of the lamps. “Hey, doc, doc, do you
hear me, doc?”

For a second, Arthur just gaped like a rat frozen in the
glare of a flashlight, but then some sense drifted back into his eyes. “Can you
stop calling me that?”

Gail almost laughed in relief, but something was still
coming out of the deep and Nia was trying to twist out of her grip again.
“Look, I’ve got to get your sister. I need you to stand here and not move. I
don’t care what you hear or see or taste. You need to stay
right here.
Got
it?”

Arthur’s eyes sharpened. “Nia’s in trouble?”

“Yeah, and I’m going to get her, but you need to stay
here. I can’t be looking after both of you.”

A deep breath was the only answer she got, but then he
obediently sat against the wall and covered his head with his arms. She figured
he was about as safe from Connery’s head-screwing as he was going to get.

Not letting herself worry, Gail turned to Nia and caught
the Illuminator around the waist. Nia tried to elbow her – not very effectively
– and for a second Gail was sure she was about to get a faceful of fire or
whatever magicians threw at people they didn’t want touching them. But then Nia
went limp like a wind-up doll with a broken key.

“Nia, I don’t know what you’re hearing down there, but
it’s not real, okay?”

“I know.” The voice was so small and trembling that for a
moment Gail wasn’t sure she’d heard right. “But…”

“But you wish it was?”

Nia didn’t answer. Instead she twisted around and crushed
herself against Gail.

“Whoa, okay, look, you’re fine, okay? You’re fine.”

“I know it’s not real,” Nia choked out. “It’s
not,
but
it’s still…” Her voice broke and Gail realized she was crying. The same woman
who had faced down a murderous gutted woman without so much as a tremor was
crying into her shoulder because of some sound in the darkness.

What the hell are you hearing? What the hell
happened
to you?

Realizing that standing there like an idiot probably
wasn’t helping, Gail moved her hands up over Nia’s ears and started babbling
about the first thing she could think of, hoping she could block out the worst
of the sound from below. Of course the first thing she thought to say was, “So
you believe me about Connery being an asshole now?”

Nia laughed through her tears. “I never doubted that,
thank you very much.”

“Okay, but I think I’m required to keep saying it. I’m
pretty sure that’s why they hired me to come with you.”

Nia lifted her too bright eyes to Gail’s face. “They sent
you with us so you could regularly remind us that Mister Connery is an
asshole?”

“It’s a full-time job.”

This time Nia’s laugh stumbled over a shuddering breath.

“Are you okay?” Gail asked, though she had no idea what
she was going to do if the answer was no.

“For the moment.” Nia looked around. “Where’s Arthur?”

“Waiting for us.”

“We should go. We should be together.” But still she
hesitated, her hands white-knuckled in Gail’s shirt. “Detective, do you think
you could… I fear that if I…”

Gail thought she knew what Nia meant. “Here.” Pulling
Nia’s head against her shoulder again, so whatever she was hearing would at
least be muffled by Gail’s batshit terrified heartbeat, she grabbed the
tattered sleeve of Nia’s dressing gown and tore off another strip of fabric.

“Oh, my poor dressing gown,” Nia said through a hiccup.
“That was handmade, you know.”

“It’s doing you more good this way,” Gail replied as she
helped Nia wrap the cloth over her head and down around her ears. “Anyway, you
could still wear it without the sleeve.”

“I would look ridiculous.” After the second pass around
her head, Nia took the ends of the cloth and knotted them beneath her hair.

“It already looked a little ridiculous,” Gail told her in
a deliberately quiet voice.

“What?” Nia eyed her suspiciously, but it seemed the
makeshift ear muffs were doing their job.

“Nothing,” Gail replied more loudly. “You look great. Now
let’s go find your buddy.”

“Thank you.” Nia’s voice was still distrustful, but she
smiled when she took Gail’s hand again. “Yes, let’s hurry. I doubt this will be
the last danger we face before we find what we’re looking for.”

“You know the best thing about you, princess? You’re such
an optimist,” but Nia was already pulling her into the hallway where she had
left Arthur.

Nia no longer remembered her mother’s face. At least, not
how it had looked outside of photographs. That stiffly smiling or deliberately
pensive woman captured in ink and paper hadn’t been her mother. Her mother had
been sharp dark eyes, which Nia remembered because they were so unlike her own,
and an even sharper tongue. Nia had lived for her praise and gone in fear of
her disappointment. She remembered Mother’s strong graceful hands, capable of
drawing any spell with precision and skill. She remembered her love of
beautiful hats.

But most of all Nia remembered her voice. Mother had
possessed few frivolous habits. Her life had revolved around her work. The
hours she wasn’t teaching or laboring in the laboratories were spent
researching and writing her many articles and books. But sometimes, when she
was hard at work practicing spells or organizing her notes, she would sing.

Nia remembered that.

Her mother had taken charge of Nia’s education early, as
soon as her potential had been recognized. Nia attended normal classes with the
other young magicians during the day, of course, but Mother wanted to make
certain that she received enough individual attention. So every night, Mother
would take time from her work to hone Nia’s drawing skills. Most children
didn’t start drawing in earnest until they were five or six, but Nia was
tracing shapes and lines by the time she was two and a half. Her motor skills
hadn’t been up to the task, of course, but her mother had displayed
uncharacteristic patience, guiding Nia’s small hands with her own. And
sometimes she would sing then too. Never entire songs, just snatches of whatever
came into her head, but Nia had loved the songs almost as much as she had loved
the drawing, almost as much as she had loved sitting in her mother’s lap and
being the center of her world for just a little while.

Next to that, the finer details of Mother’s face hardly
mattered.

As the memories – and the song from the depths –
threatened to overwhelm her again, Nia made herself to focus on the warm grip
of Detective Lin’s hand and her need to see Arthur. This place was even more
dangerous than she had guessed. She thought she had been careful. She thought
she had blocked off every avenue into her mind, but she was quickly learning
that her definition of “careful” wasn’t careful enough where Connery was
concerned.

They found Arthur huddled against the wall, his head
between his hands. Nia dropped to her knees in front of him.

“Arthur.”

His head jerked up. At first he stared like he didn’t
know her, then he blinked and his eyes cleared. “Nia? You’re okay?”

“I’m fine.” It was a lie. There were still tears drying
on her cheeks and if she tried, she could still hear the faint strains of –
don’t
try.

Arthur’s eyes narrowed as he looked at her. “What’s
this?” he asked, plucking at the cloth tied around her head.

“Something to help me focus. We should probably make one
for you too.” She looked sadly at what remained of her dressing gown sleeve
then held her arm out to Gail. She got the feeling that the detective was
laughing at her, but at least she kept her head down to hide it as she tore
away the remaining material. Now Nia’s left arm was bare to the shoulder.
Perhaps if she cut off the remaining sleeve, the dressing gown could be
salvaged as some sort of fashion statement, but she didn’t think she could
bring herself to do it. She had become rather attached to her surviving sleeve.

A minute later, Nia finished tying Arthur’s earmuffs
under his chin. She looked at him for a moment then covered her mouth to stifle
a giggle.

“Shut up.” Arthur rubbed his head through the fabric. “It
does help.” He made a face. “As does that terrible spell you did. Honestly, did
you have to choose
aniseed?”

“I couldn’t think of anything stronger. I suppose I could
have used vinegar or bile or –”

Arthur held up a hand. “Never mind. Aniseed is fine.”

“If you two are ready, we’d better keep moving.” Gail
pushed herself to her feet and began walking down the hallway. Without letting
go of Nia.

Nia had to sit back hard to stop the detective from
dragging her off. “Wait! We don’t know if that’s the right way.”

Gail looked back at her. “We don’t?”

“No, I’ll have to redraw the spell and even then –”

“But the basement’s definitely that way.” Gail pointed
down the hallway. “I mean, you can see the stairs from here.”

Nia leaned to the side to peer past Gail’s legs, but all
she saw was a seemingly endless line of floor lamps.

“I don’t see anything,” Arthur said for her.

Gail looked back down the hallway. “You don’t? They’re
definitely there. I mean, I think they are.”

“I wouldn’t trust everything you –” Nia stopped herself.
Gail’s eyes looked clear and her grip on Nia’s hand was warm and firm. Not once
did her gaze wander toward the stairs while it was all Nia could do to keep
from running back to her mother’s song. Arthur looked similarly on edge, his
hands pressed to his ears over the makeshift earmuffs. It seemed Gail was the
only one of them who wasn’t affected. It was as if –

“What do you hear?” Nia asked her.

“Huh?”

“Down there, at the bottom of the stairs.”
Don’t try,
don’t try.
“What do you hear? I mean, unless it’s too…”

To her surprise, Gail smiled at her. “I’m not hearing
what you two are, that’s for sure. I don’t think it works on me.” Something sad
darkened the curve of her grin. “I’m pretty sure I know what I would be hearing
if it did.” She shrugged. “All I hear is the footsteps of something we probably
don’t want to meet. Mostly because I think it’ll try to eat us.”

Arthur looked sharply back at the stairs.

“So,” Gail continued. “I think we’d better get going
before it gets here.”

Nia had no idea why the illusion was suddenly failing for
Gail, but she would be an idiot not to take advantage of the opportunity. She
took hold of one of Arthur’s hands and together, they got to their feet. “Lead
the way, detective. Our lives and the success of our mission are in your
hands.”

Gail pulled a face. “You had to put the pressure on,
didn’t you?” But she turned and started down the hall again, occasionally
walking straight
through
lamps. Finally, Nia just shut her eyes to block
out the confusing visual input and told Arthur to do the same.

But even as they left the staircase behind, she swore she
could hear Mother’s song floating up from the blackness, now accompanied by
soft heaving sobs.