Alchemy, Book Two of the Mercian Trilogy (12 page)

She laughed and said, “No, I didn’t mean that, I just meant … it’s shocking, I guess, spending year after year, twenty-four hours a day, never sleeping, never having anyone to talk to.” She was sidetracked by that thought and said, “What’s the longest you’ve ever been awake?”

“Between 1501 and … no, there has been one longer. I emerged from hibernation in 1813 and did not return to the earth again until 1911.”

“Nearly a hundred years, that’s unbelievable.”

“But it’s true.”

Eloise realised he was teasing her this time and they both laughed, but she looked at him intently then and said, “When did you start filing your teeth?”

“I don’t remember the year exactly, but many centuries ago. It was a gradual realisation that without them I looked almost normal, and that in turn would allow me to move with less suspicion about the city.” It had not been enough though, Will thought, to prevent Arabella being horrified by the sight of him that night in 1742.

“Interesting. And when you … sorry, I don’t know what’s got into me. Suddenly I’m full of questions again, like I’ve just realised there are hundreds of things I still don’t know about you.”

They had rounded the stand of trees and were walking towards the new house now. Will gestured towards it.
“Perhaps you’re asking because of what we’re about to do, because this might be the end of it.”

She held his arm, urgent as she said, “Don’t say that.”

“Eloise, we face dangers, both of us, and the best hope we have of seeing another day is to be prepared, to acknowledge that this might be our last.” Even as he spoke, Will couldn’t accept the possibility of this being Eloise’s last day, much as he was prepared to accept his own fate. “I am about to attempt to open a gateway, at the very least to evil, possibly to the underworld itself, and I would think no less of you if you decided not to come with me on this part of the journey.”

“Are you serious? I mean, thanks for the reality check, and I appreciate there might be bad things down there, but we’re in this together, remember?” She took hold of the broken medallion hanging round her neck and held it out as if to show it to him, a movement so identical to his mother’s that he stared at her in wonder. “What?”

“Nothing.” She looked at him searchingly. “You just reminded me of someone else, that’s all.”

“Who?”

“It hardly matters – she’s dead now.”

“Well, that narrows it down.”

Will laughed, as did Eloise, and they reached the house. They headed directly to the library where they retrieved the sabre and torch and entered the first
passageway. Will opened the wall as he had before and stepped inside to the top of the steps. The lights were still on and he was about to explain to Eloise that this was part of Wyndham’s trickery when he was interrupted by the sound of the wall slowly closing again behind them.

He turned and looked at it, and then responded to Eloise’s expression by saying, “I’ve closed it myself each time previously. It didn’t close on its own before.”

She looked at the wall, then down the lit steps to the tunnels below. “Maybe we’re expected.” The first hint of nerves appeared in her eyes, but she smiled through them and held up the torch. “I’ve got this, you’ve got your sword, we’ve got each other, so really, what have we got to worry about?”

“Nothing.”

He looked into the faultless blue of her eyes, as captured by her gaze as other people were by his. There had been other fleeting companions, it was true, but he was full of love for this girl, her beauty and her bravery, above all the sense that in some way they had always been together.

Eloise moved towards him, a little uncertain, and looked about to speak, but stopped. Will could feel her breath hot on his face. He leaned forward, fearing the worst, and kissed her lightly, his lips pressing against the softness of her mouth.

With just that briefest touch, he felt his synapses locking on to the scent of her blood, a brief twinge of pain shooting across the inside of his skull, yet it was worth it because the pain would subside, but the memory of her lips on his would sustain him.

Eloise smiled, an odd mixture of happiness and disbelief, as she said, “You kissed me.” He nodded. “But … didn’t it hurt you to do that?”

He nodded again and laughed and lied, “Not as much. Sometimes I like to think each day I spend with you I become a little more human.”

“You are human, Will.”

“You know what I mean. It almost feels as if, were I to spend long enough in your company, I’d become a sixteen-year-old boy again. That I’d be able to live and breathe and love you as I should. To grow old with you. It’s foolish, I know.”

She looked emotional and was unable to speak for a moment, but smiled and put her fingers on his cheek. Then she took a deep breath and said, “To the underworld then?”

“To the underworld.”

And they started down the steps, not knowing what they would find there. Only one thing was certain, if there was a gateway, Will had to open it, no matter what lay on the other side. There was no turning back
on this journey, and if he faced damnation in the hours ahead, he would take one consolation with him – he had kissed her, a simple intimacy, but one which could never be taken from him.

T
he tunnels were empty and they moved quickly. Having explored them thoroughly and then having seen the maze, Will would have been able to walk them with his eyes closed. Perhaps because of her own familiarity with the maze, Eloise was also more confident, anticipating the turns as they got to them.

And then they stopped. They had reached a junction in the labyrinth, passing from an outer circuit to an inner one, and they had turned left, only to be met by a dead end.

Eloise looked mildly puzzled as she said, “Oh, I could have sworn the passage continued this way.”

“It does,” said Will. “Or at least it did. This wall has been moved.”

He put his hands on the stone, his palms and fingers pressing against the inscriptions and paintings that covered every part of the surface. There was nothing to suggest a mechanism inside.

“Will, this whole place looks like it’s been carved out
of the rock, so how could a wall be moved?”

He didn’t know. Perhaps the labyrinth looked carved, but had actually been constructed, like a puzzle. His mind raced through the possibilities, all of them coming back to Wyndham.

Wyndham knew from Marcus that they’d been exploring the maze. He’d no doubt realised that they now understood the labyrinth’s true secret. Perhaps he also knew that they were there, with Will alerting him when he opened the wall.

And yet Wyndham was not here! If he would only show himself, Will could confront him, challenge his motives, fight him to the death if need be. But Wyndham refused to appear, and summoned the dead to fight for him, and moved walls with his remote powers, just as he’d probably shut the wall at the top of the steps.

One thing alone was in Will’s favour. Wyndham had the power to intimidate, to cajole and threaten, and he had the power to frustrate, one he used to irritating effect, but he had not yet found a way of destroying Will, and until he did, Will would not be stopped.

Will turned to Eloise. “Trust me, no wall was here before. This is Wyndham’s work, but he’ll have to try harder than this if he’s to stop us. We can still find our way through the labyrinth – it will just take a little longer.”

“I agree,” said Eloise, still remarkably cheerful. Was it the kiss, he wondered. Could so simple an act have made her as happy as it had made him? He could hardly believe that to be so.

They had tried to turn left and found the way blocked, so they doubled back and turned right. After another four or five turns, they found another wall that should not have been there, as if the entire labyrinth had been rotated about itself, but still they found another route and worked ever closer to the centre.

Yet despite Will’s attempt to brush off the rearranged layout, there was something else troubling him. As they walked, it was as if the walls, the floor and the ceiling were all vibrating at some impossibly low frequency, not even clear enough for him to pick up, but filling the air with energy.

When they finally reached the pentagonal chamber the strange pulsating energy was obvious enough that even Eloise could feel something of it and she stared round the room, trying to locate its source. For a moment, she looked at the bronze relief on the floor and Will didn’t bother to tell her that it wasn’t originating from a single point, that the whole labyrinth seemed to be the source.

She pointed and said, “So the tunnel isn’t dark any more.”

“No, I thought I told you about the lights coming
back on.” He took a couple of steps towards the tunnel, but stopped, feeling the vibrations coming up through his feet now, developing into a rumbling. He turned and looked at Eloise.

She said, “It sounds like an earthquake. I was in one once – it sounded like …”

She fell silent as a loud clacking noise approached rapidly, like a row of huge stone dominoes knocking one into the other. It got closer, the floor of the chamber beginning to jump with each percussive thud. Then Will heard a thundering crack and spun round to see that the tunnel to the circular chamber had closed in on itself, the two sides of the tunnel slamming together, a plume of dust filling the chamber, sparks from the severed lighting cables.

This was the only way into the chamber, he knew that much. It was unsporting of Wyndham, he thought, to let them come this far when he’d had this final trick in reserve all along. Will turned back to Eloise as the vibrations reduced once more to a background hum and the dust settled.

She was shocked, but still managed to make light of it, saying, “OK, so the walls can be moved after all. But how do we get in now?”

Will responded by walking to the point in the walls where the passage had been. He put his hands on the
stone, once again reasoning that there had to be a mechanism involved. He stood there for a second and felt the stones stirring into life beneath his fingers. For a moment, he felt triumphant, but with his thoughts taking a sickening lurch, he realised he wasn’t opening the tunnel up again – the walls were certainly moving, but it wasn’t Will who was moving them.

“Eloise, run! Into one of the tunnels – keep running!”

He leapt backwards from the wall as it slid inwards and left. He turned, saw Eloise heeding his advice, darting into the tunnel they’d just used to get here. He started after her, but all five walls moved now, as if the pentagon was being twisted in on itself, and he realised the gaps in each of the four remaining passages were already too small for him to escape.

“Will?”

“I’m fine, keep going!”

The pentagon of the chamber seemed to twist again, the five walls sliding over each other, the pentagon becoming smaller, the earth beneath him still vibrating. Another turn of the screw, and now the walls had almost reached the hilts of the bronze swords in the floor.

There was no mistaking the intention. At some point these walls would meet, crushing him in the process. Will found himself oddly distracted by the question of whether that would kill him, or just leave him
imprisoned and maimed for all eternity.

But he had his sabre in his hand. If necessary, and while he still had space, he could attempt to sever his own head, at least ending things on something resembling his own terms. It sickened him though to think that Wyndham, who as far as Will knew had no reason to hate him, would succeed in destroying him this close to what Will had hoped was the end of his journey.

“Will?”

“I’m fine,” he called back, his anger building. He was angry with himself now, for always being so quick to embrace the idea of an easy death, for behaving as though Eloise meant nothing to him. He would not allow it to end like this.

The walls started to move again, and this time he ran and leapt at one of the walls as it slid towards him, planting his feet on it. The stone shuddered as he fell to the floor, another cloud of dust spitting into the room, the stones crackling and crumbling. He was swiftly back on to his haunches. The wall alongside kept moving, and for a second, a gap appeared between the two. Will didn’t hesitate, diving for the opening, rolling through it, hoping only that a tunnel still lay beyond.

“Will, where are you?”

He heard the walls grinding into place behind him,
then realised the narrow tunnel he was in was also closing in on itself. He jumped to his feet, sword still in hand, and ran forward, the stones crunching together behind him, and he kept going until the section of the labyrinth he was in felt and sounded stable. He could still hear the creaking and grinding in the distance as the pentagonal chamber was consumed by its own walls.

He called out, “Eloise, I’m here. Call back to me.”

He could hear a rumbling coming from elsewhere in the complex, but he was certain he could hear her voice beyond it. He walked in that direction, no longer trying to follow his memory of the maze now that it had been redesigned before their eyes – instead he walked instinctively, making turns when he needed to, heading for the sound of her.

“Call to me again!”

“I’m here!”

He walked on and after a few more minutes, he shouted, “Call …”

“Will, I’m here.” She was close, the other side of a dead end he’d been about to walk away from.

“Thank God.” The walls had stopped moving now, the energy no longer apparent, and he sighed and put his hand on the stone and said, “I’m on the other side of this wall. We’re safe.”

Her voice was close when she responded, and he
imagined her own hand pressed on the other side, almost touching his.

“I thought you’d got trapped.”

“No, I’m fine. Now stay where you are and I’ll find my way to you.”

“You can’t, Will. There’s no way in. It closed around me.”

“How much space have you got?”

“It’s as wide as the tunnels were, and …” There was silence for a moment and her voice was a little more distant as she said, “About six paces long. I’m OK, but there’s no way out.”

He put his sabre on the floor and said, “Then I’ll get you out. Stay away from this wall for now.”