The Wealding Word (9 page)
Authors: A C Gogolski
The creature screamed like an insane horse, tossing its head wildly. Just as Nell tried to fling herself into the grass, one of the
sharp antlers caught the back of her coat and tipped her in the wrong direction. Her collar suddenly snapped free of the barb and she teetered, for a frozen moment, on the lip of the well. The gray beast reared, its three-fingered tail whipping toward her but it was too late. Arms flailing, Nell slipped into the well. The darkness gripped her. Her hands and feet beat frantically at slick walls all the way down the stone shaft. In a heartbeat the frenzied fall ended, and Nell found herself in water up to her knees. For a long time she stood unmoving, unwilling to look up for fear the gray beast’s head would greet her from above – and haunt her every second thereafter.
She drew a shuddering breath, trying to steady her heart as her eyes adjusted to the murk of the well. Water trickled around her feet and legs, moving to some unfathomable place. She remembered the big well in her village. Once she heard that all waters were connected beneath the earth. She might even find her way back home if she knew which way she was facing. But
the dark!
a voice inside her screamed, and Nell knew the truth of it. How could she brave the black tunnels of the earth alone?
She finally looked up and saw the opening of the well high above: merely a circle of dismal cloud, veined by the branches of a nearby tree. Of the beast, there was no sign.
Slimy beards hung from the stones over her head. Nell stared up at the tiny window of sky for a long time, but her fear of the darkness stopped her from calling out. No one would help her if they didn’t know she was there. Then again, the terrible things lurking in the dim might slither near if she made noise. Weeping silently, she stood craning her neck, witnessing the sky deepen to night above her.
Nell could no longer tell if her eyes were open or closed. Her neck ached, and she was cold and hungry. The frog had started croaking again, belching its morose call just a few feet from her in the darkness of the well. Sola said it was a giant frog, and down here in the depths, its voice was truly thunderous. Strangely, terror did not reach Nell, just a sad recognition that she needed to do what every fiber of her did not want to: grope into the black, unknown regions of the earth, and surrender all hope of light.
She was about to take her first step in the direction
away
from the frog when a light glimmered overhead. Was it a torch, perhaps a candle? Someone had come! She managed to find her voice, cracked and small, calling “Help… help! I’m in the well, down here!”
The candle above wavered and disappeared, then returned and seemed to be passed over the opening. Perhaps there were two people up there. For an instant, she wondered what type of person would wander the woods at night, with only an uncovered candle for light. What did it matter though? Being rescued by
anyone
would be better than floundering alone through the endless black. The candle hovered over the well again. Nell cried, “Hello? I’m stuck!” The thought of being freed made her choke with relief.
But what were they waiting for? “Hello?” she said, more hesitantly this time. Why weren’t they answering?
The small flicker changed color, shifting from white to blue. It sailed away and returned a third time. At that moment, a terrible recognition dawned upon Nell. She husked, “Oh no! No no no.” The blue candlelight wavered directly above the well, and then, ever so slowly, began floating down the long, slimy shaft.
Nell tripped through the muck at the bottom, falling against slick stones and splashing about in a panic as the candlewisp bobbed into the cavern. She clutched the wet stone wall, trembling from fear and cold. The uncanny blue flame illuminated a narrow cave, uneven and open to the right where the water trickled. Nell stood watching the spirit, panting small breaths and wondering how such a small thing would devour her.
The spook-light guttered and blew itself over her head with a swish. After a few heartbeats, it changed from blue to pale green, flickering toward the opening where the stream flowed. In desperation Nell looked about her, unsure what to do. It was the first time she was able to glimpse the shape of her prison, and by the retreating light of the candlewisp she could finally see the frog. It was bigger than Sola, booming another questioning croak as she stared at it. Then, just for an instant, Nell caught sight of something next to the frog – an apparition of sorts. Its shape was that of a stooped creature with pincer-hands crossed over its belly, and a pig-like face staring down at the water. Suddenly it jerked its head upward, consuming Nell with smoke-pink eyes. Unlike the frog, which was solid, Nell could see the stones of the well behind the pig-specter.
By now the bobbing spirit was almost out of sight, and the dark threatened on all sides again. No matter how much she dreaded the candlewisp, Nell knew the pig-creature was worse. “Wait, wait,” she cried, and the pale spirit wavered. Nell splashed her way toward the little spook-light, fleeing the swirling pink gaze of the creature. The thing made no move to follow, except to lower its snout and grab at some invisible web.
Now that she was away from the specter beneath the well, the life returned to Nell’s arms and legs. It was easier to make her way through the water with candlelight to guide her – even weird green candlelight. She found that there was never any level path to follow, just the obtuse hollows of the earth. At times she had to crawl through mud, with granite bones pressing against her on all sides. Sometimes she followed the spirit into wide, accidental vestibules of stone, with ceilings, walls and floors tilting at uncomfortable angles. Other times she clung to cracked shelves, with nothing but yawning blackness behind and below – one misplaced step away. And always she needed to scale, crawl, and squeeze quickly, for the candlewisp was swift and indifferent to all obstacles.
Bizarre mineral deposits like sagging sculptures, crystalline castles, and stony icicles appeared unexpectedly along the way. So magnificent were they that when she looked upon them, Nell could almost forget the danger she was in. Everything glittered and glistened by the light of the candlewisp, but there was little time to gawk at the marvels of the underground realm. The spirit led her tirelessly on through labyrinths of hanging rock and flowing water. There was no sign of life in the stillness – no insects spun webs or burrowed down there. Yet something thrummed deep, deep below her. She could hear a pulse of life within the earth, slow and massive beyond imagining. It came to her in her belly, a frequency so low it could only be felt.
As she wondered at the sound, the glowing candlewisp finally slowed its flight. Having followed it for so long, Nell forgot the thing might be taking her somewhere she didn’t want to go. Stories of people drowned by the treacherous spook-lights flooded back into her mind.
The creature beamed a steady green, blinked once, and then darted through a fissure. “I guess I have to follow,” she said, standing once again in darkness. If the candlewisp left her, she knew all was
lost. There was no telling where she was now in relation to where she started.
Nell took a deep breath and felt her way down into the narrow cleft in the rock. She soon exited into waist-high water with a gasp. Panic set in as she waded into the midnight depths, but she soon caught sight of the green flicker, sailing quite a distance away to her left. There were two of them now, or rather, it was the candlewisp’s reflection, seen from the edge of a still lake.
She took another cautious step toward the spirit and in a moment she was swimming through cold water. It was then a faint, tinkling sound came to her. Solemn, lonely, and filled with an unnamable yearning, the melody touched a feeling in Nell that she had never experienced before.
As she splashed further out, she noticed other lights. Below the surface, tiny flames winked into being. Whites and pale blues, lavenders and delicate greens, the candlewisps softly illuminated buildings and lanes submerged within the clear subterranean lake. Soon there were hundreds of flickering globes beneath her. As she swam on, she began to see the forms of people take shape around the candles – little troll people, like Tomkin – pale shades reliving the scenes of a drowned civilization.
When she was about half way across the water, a number of the spook-lights wobbled up to the surface to waver over her head, each sounding a low and melancholy chime. Their dirge echoed about the cavern while she treaded water, and the city of ghosts bustled with eerie life below her feet. She glanced from the wavering scene beneath the water, and back up at the lights, feeling as though the creatures were trying to convey some message.
In the distance, the pale green candlewisp suddenly flamed, tiny sparks sizzling from it to illuminate the far shore. The spirits above her head brightened as well. Twice, three times they all sparked and
dimmed in unison. And behind their sad melody, the ancient song of the earth thrummed on, deep and slow.
“I don’t understand,” Nell said to the spirits above her. She thought maybe if she was smarter, or remembered more stories she had heard about candlewisps, she might know better. But her arms ached and there was still half a lake to swim. She didn’t have the strength to linger. “I’m sorry,” Nell told them. With that, she pushed her head forward and swam hard for the distant shore.
Her body quivered from exhaustion when she reached the other end of the lake. Sick in the stomach, Nell crawled out of the water to sit beneath the whistling green light of the candlewisp. “Is this your home?” she asked through trembling lips. Speaking seemed to help steady the nausea washing over her. She panted, “It’s beautiful.” The creature made no answer, but simply bobbed off in a new direction. “Rest,” Nell moaned, “I need a rest.”
She noticed, however, that this side of the lake was oddly flat: a paved road of sorts. Even and neatly placed cobblestones surfaced from the water not far away, forming a ramp winding its way upward. Nell guessed it stretched to the floor of the lake below, but where did it lead above? Hope soon replaced exhaustion as she watched the spook-light climb higher and higher on the road. Dripping, she got to her feet and staggered up the ancient avenue, toward what she hoped was a brighter place.
Nell had long since stopped feeling the wet clothes clinging to her back and legs. The cracks that sometimes gaped in the darkness no longer held any horrors for her. She had left some part of her behind in the endless tunnels: a tearful, quivering part. During the long hours of solitude, she climbed over rocks and chasms without thought or fear. Her only objective was keeping up with the candlewisp. Everything else was unnecessary. “Swst,” she named the creature, for the whistly sound it made whenever it sailed near.
“Swst, when are we going to get out of here?” she asked at one point. Now that she was walking on what resembled a road, hope buoyed her spirit – enough to try chatting with a candlewisp, at least. The creature made no reply, of course. She continued, “Do you really make people drown in the swamp? I mean, why would you do a thing like that?” Swst guttered and fizzled, bobbing ahead in the darkness. They climbed the old road until Nell thought the air smelled different – fresher, less old somehow.
The dancing flame halted for a moment, darting back to make three circles over Nell and littering the air with a shower of sparks. She opened her mouth as the stars fell around her, wondering what the strange change in the spirit’s flight could mean. In an instant, the pale green flame turned back to blue and whipped upward, far up into the impenetrable black.
“Swst!” Nell called. “Come back!” There was only silence, but she could almost taste the crisp freshness of springtime, even here in the dark.
There was only one thing to do. Nell took a step forward, feeling her way toward source of the air. She stumbled a few feet, hands waving in front of her, when a voice broke the stillness like a hammer through glass. “A little girl. Quaint. Very quaint.” The words came from up above.
“Swst? Is that you?” Nell whispered.
Two pinpoints of light, too well defined to be the candlewisp, blinked open. They widened into globes, sending a pair of orange rays wherever they moved. Nell stood illuminated in the fell lamplight.
“What… what are you?” she asked, unsure what to expect, yet hopeful still.
“I will ask the questions,” the high voice behind the eyes said. Slowly Nell could pick out a tall shape, like a thickly coiled pillar. The serpentine form began to crackle and glow as though made of dying embers. A dragon! Nell’s jaw dropped.
“Now, let’s have a look at you.” The dragon’s flat-nosed head swiveled around to inspect Nell from top to bottom. Heat from his eyes made her damp clothes steam as he sniffed her over. “You smell like a frog, did you know that, little girl?” He sniffed again, then swiftly withdrew. “And you have the stench of a Malady about you. Ahch, I hope you didn’t bring the beastly thing here.”
Nell didn’t answer. She had no idea what he was talking about anyway. The burning serpent sneered, “I’m sure those pitiful Groomlanen are pleased as pinwheels that you got to see their graveyard. Pray tell, did you listen to their sad tale?”
Again, Nell said nothing. Instead, she looked down at her shadow, shrinking and flowing in the dragon’s fierce gaze.