The Tower of the Forgotten (10 page)

"
You
made
the rift engine?" Portia was flummoxed.

Kitty preened. "Yep!"

"Why?"

"Why
not? I was asked, and nicely, too. Plus, it isn’t
like I have anything better to do here. The other side was dull. And scary."

Even
Radinka was stunned. "I didn’t think you’d… I mean, I was hoping you could help us with it…"

"Help
you do what?"

"Destroy
it," Portia said.

"Oh. I mean I
could,
I
guess. I know how it all goes together."

"Is there a reason you wouldn’t?"

She
looked up into Portia’s face. "Ma’am, I don’t know what you are or where you come from, but you gotta
know, Insinori don’t destroy something they’ve created. It’s like murdering your
own children!"

"We
need you to do this, Kitty." Radinka offered her the
wrench. "And we mean to make it worth your while."

The
young mechanic licked her lips. "Are you offering what I
think you are?"

Radinka
nodded. "It all hinges on all of us getting back
home to Penemue safe and sound, but I can give you back your anchor."

"And
no one could use it to control me ever again?"

"Never
ever."

"But… I’d still be a ghost,
wouldn’t I? I can’t go on."

Radinka
shook her head. "But you’d be your own mistress."

Portia
spoke up, "I think I might have a solution for you.
We could install you as a guardian of the house. You could be the heart and
soul of the Insinori."

Her eyes lit up. "Really?"

"Can you help us?"

"Sure I
can
…"

"
Will
you, then?"

Kitty’s gaze never left the wrench. She
nodded. "Okay. I’ll do it. But we’ve got to go now."

Portia nodded. "Yes, first let me—"

"No!
Now
! Can’t
you hear it?"

Imogen glanced between Portia and Kitty. "Of
course we can. What does it mean?"

"It means the doorway is opening."

—
7
—

TWO ROADS LED FROM THE CEMETERY, one a silver-grey packed
gravel road not unlike a street in the living world, and the other a narrow
track that began beneath a latticed arch covered over with sinister vines.

Kitty motioned to the archway, a hazy fog
oozing toward them. "It’s a shortcut."

Unconvinced,
Portia and Imogen exchanged a worried glance, but Radinka reassured them. "I’ve been this way before.
It isn’t pretty, but it’ll take us right to the tower."

Kitty
nodded. "Lord Alaric had it created to get there
easily. His sister, wasn’t it?"

"Yes, Lady Analise, from the convent."

"She’s here, too?" Portia’s heart fluttered.

"Well, not right now. She’s gone with him to the
tower. What’s left of her has, anyway."

"Lovely."

Kitty
shrugged. "I was honestly surprised he didn’t wake me, but he was in a terrible rush. So much so I could
hear him in my sleep."

"I wonder what’s happened," Imogen said.

"He wasn’t ready for the gates to open. That’s all I know."

"We’d better get out there." Portia looked at the
hairpin in her hand and sighed, tucking it into her own bun. "Let’s go."

Kitty
led the way with Portia at her side. Radinka and Kendrick flanked Imogen as
they followed the narrow path beneath the arch. The fog enclosed them almost
immediately, snuffing out all sound where there had been little to begin with.
They saw nothing around them except the swirling fog, but had the sensation of
crossing a very high, very narrow bridge.

Then
the mist cleared, and they found themselves on the edge of the cast circle not
far from Portia’s pavilion. On the
spirit side, the circus grounds glowed with an intensity that kept even Portia
from looking directly at it. She squinted around the brilliance and looked
toward the tower; the shadow of something hung in its corona.

The
engine growled beneath the ground and the waves.

"Let’s go around." Portia led them past
the edges of the circus, keeping to where the midway had once been. She passed
Aseneth’s little shanty but did not stop to
investigate. They descended the steep and crumbly cliffs that melted into dunes
before sweeping into a wide beach that reached the sea. Before them, the bridge
glimmered. In the living world it was a garish thing of iron, rope, and wood,
strung with sodden ribbons and tattered prayer banners. Here, it rose
effortlessly above the surf, held aloft with what looked like spider web. The
shrine that had been created around the spring remained, but the spring itself—a shining fountain of sweet water bubbling up from the
opalescent stones on one side—oozed a strange mix of
sickly soul-light and ichor.

Imogen
gagged. "So many people have drunk from that
cursed spring!"

"That’s the least of our concern, presently." Portia pointed toward the shifting darkness of the sky. A
large zeppelin hung behind the tower, bathed in its bluish light. Mooring ropes
draped down from it to a post near the roofline. The hum of its engines could
barely be heard beneath the din from the great machine below.

Kitty
cocked her head to one side and frowned. "Something’s not right down there. They’ve
got it out of tune. Someone’s been messing with it."

Another
rumble sounded and a paper-thin fissure of light raced up the tower’s side. Portia swore and Radinka gasped. Kendrick interposed
himself between Radinka and the tower, standing at the ready beside Portia.

"Do you think it’ll blow?" he asked her.

"I think that’s the point. Well, to break open at any
rate. That tower now straddles three planes: the living realm of
Capitola-by-the-Sea, this shadow-side version of it, and the scraps of Salus
deep in the underworld. The plan was to open a doorway from one place to the
other, and it only made it halfway."

"But who’s controlling it now, Alaric or Nigel?" Imogen asked.

Radinka
answered, "I don’t know. Neither, I suppose. Both of them think the other is changing the game."

They all turned to look at her.

"What do you mean?" Portia’s hand tightened on the axe handle.

The
girl shrugged. "I mean it was easy to
play their ambitions off of one another, especially since Alaric took away
Nigel’s ghostly companions. It makes Nigel weaker but
it robs Alaric of his spies."

"You did this?"

"No.
I just made sure they each thought they were being betrayed, which does have
the added bonus of being true. They’ve not taken care of all
the pertinent details—this isn’t complete, it’s only half working." She shook her head. "Who did this?"

Portia
and Imogen exchanged a glance.

"You don’t remember?" Portia asked.

Radinka paled. "No…"

Imogen stepped closer to the girl, her arms open to embrace her, but Radinka pulled
away.

"I
am not a child, no matter that I look all of fourteen." Radinka shook with emotion. "And
those who underestimate the likes of me are sloppy with their opinions and even
less careful about their secrets."

"We’ll make it right," Imogen promised.

"We’ll make him pay," Portia said, growling.

She
felt for the girl, in that insensible and passionate way that occluded any
thoughts of suspicion or ulterior motives. Portia wanted nothing more than to
keep the girl safe, even if she was somehow complicit in this heinous doing.

"If
we want to stop them, we should hurry," Kitty said. "One of two things will happen if we tarry too long: either
one of them is going to get that engine functioning like it should and finish
opening the gate, or the whole thing is just gonna blow up and who knows
what-all will end up where." Without waiting for
them, she rushed around the base. Her small fingers were digging under a
rectangle of metal when the others caught up.

With
some levering of her wrench, Kitty propped open the hatch. "I’m not asking for anyone
to follow me, but you’ve got to understand
that I might not come back."

"Kitty…!" Radinka took a step
forward, but the engineer held out her hand.

"You’ve been a good friend, Rads, I appreciate everything you’ve done for me." She hefted the wrench
proudly. "And I’m not afraid. I’ve died a couple of times now. It ain’t that bad. And I think I’d like to clear my name.
This all ended up to be such bad business. I had no idea… A girl can’t help herself, y’know? Something that’s broken has got to be
fixed; it sings to you, making you utterly mad until you heal it. And it sure
is singing now." She jimmied the wrench
free and the hatch fell closed behind her.

Portia
caught it. "Wait. Can the upper
levels of the tower be accessed from here?"

"They
sure can. I guess you’re coming with me after
all."

The
passageway was narrow and dim. More than once they stumbled on the stairs,
which wound down into the belly of the tower. In this warped space, she knew
they were beneath the scraps of Salus and that the tubes and wires and
corridors could lead them as far away as the ruins of Belial’s palace. The city of the dead was both whole and destroyed,
one reality layered atop another.

"This
is where we part ways, my friends." Kitty had stopped at a
junction that looked like a dozen others they had already passed.

Portia
felt the bitter taste of doubt crawl up the back of her throat.

Radinka
nodded, confidently. She touched Kendrick’s shoulder. "Go with her, please."

He
hesitated, then bowed, gently kissing her as he did so. "I’ll do my best to protect
her and then come back to you."

Kendrick
turned crisply and began to follow Kitty. Portia grabbed his wrist.

"If you can get passage to the
outside, where the way would lead you into Salus, the Herders were gathering a
cache of weapons for me. You might still find something of use there. But be
careful, the black metal is very,
very
dangerous."

"I know where some of that stuff is. And I
suppose some weapons might be good, huh?" said Kitty.

Kendrick
nodded. "I hope we won’t need them, but I’d rather not go without."

Try
and keep up, we don’t have much time for a
field trip." Kitty ducked through
the archway and Kendrick raced after her, sparing one last glance at Radinka
before he, too, disappeared around the corner.

Radinka
sighed and blessed herself. "Keep him safe," she whispered.

Portia
gave her a moment before leading them into the passage Kitty had indicated. The
long, industrial corridor sloped upward, then joined with a stairwell at a
sharp angle.

Onward
and upward." Portia and Imogen kept
Radinka between them, even though the stairs were plenty wide to let the three
of them nearly walk abreast. The dimness subsided little by little as they
climbed, although the growl of the engine below was near-constant. The stair
rose steadily in a series of right angles. Occasionally, a landing would appear
with a door or another corridor leading off into darkness. Portia leaned into
one or another, letting the glow of her axe illuminate these hallways or, most
often, some kind of empty storage room.

After
several flights of steps, the walls took on a slight shimmer, as if they had
begun to enter the tower proper. At least Portia hoped that was what it meant.

Does
any of this look familiar to you?" she asked Imogen.

Imogen
shook her head. "The maidens never came
down here. I didn’t even know these levels
existed. I doubt even Celestine knew."

"Celestine
knew more than she let on." Portia scanned for any
presence of the woman, but there was none. Which was a good thing, really.
Portia had been careful to take her power but not consume her soul.

"But
I think we are going the right way."

"Why
is that?"

"Because
with every step I take, the terror looms larger and stronger inside of me."

Portia
stopped and turned to her. "Why?"

But
it was Radinka who answered. "Because Alaric has the
Lord of Fire with him."

"The
who of what now?"

"The
Lord of Fire. That’s what he likes to be
called. His name is Adramelech. He’s a soul-bound demon
prince that serves Alaric, and he isn’t too happy about it."

Portia
glanced at Imogen, who had gone frighteningly pale. "That’s the one, the one you
told me about. The one that killed you."

She
nodded. "He was blessed with every charm
imaginable to make sure you failed against him."

"Good
thing I’m not me anymore, isn’t it?"

They
advanced another flight and encountered the faint odor of brimstone. Portia
inhaled, testing the scent. It was strong, more sulphurous and salty than the
smell of a fiend. Although the odor was dilute, that had more to do with
distance than strength. Even at this low concentration, Portia knew what they
would find was truly a powerful creature, possibly on par with Belial. If not
stronger.

She
was wondering just how Alaric had come into such a pact when a gasp from Imogen
let her know they had arrived at their destination.

The
steps continued up, no doubt joining with the elaborate spiral stair that
climbed the interior walls of the tower. But at this landing a door waited,
ajar. They could see wisps of brimstone smoke curling around the jamb like the
threshold of an opium den. Imogen wavered on her feet, and Portia wrapped one
wing around her.

"My
love, I don’t want you anywhere near
this creature. I don’t want him to even know
you’re alive, much less here. You and Radinka keep
going up, at least until you reach the main floor of the tower. See if you can
find any weapons, or anything that would be useful. I have a feeling this isn’t going to come to an easy end."

"I’m not a coward."

"Of
course not—don’t be ridiculous. You are
also not bait, and I don’t intend to use you to
distract the Lord of Flames."