The Drawing of the Dark

This deeper set of stairs was a long, steep ramp rather than a spiral, but Duffy had by now lost all sense of direction, and he had no idea of their position in relation to the city that lay somewhere above. The walls were still close, but the stone ceiling was a good deal higher in this section, and the Irishman was able to stand up straight.

Here too the stairs were worn down to low ridges, but the incline wasn't quite steep enough to make it dangerous. The arched mouths of side-tunnels yawned in the walls at intervals, and the deep drum-beat throbbed a little more noticeably each time the two wayfarers shuffled past one. It seemed to Duffy that the going was warmer on this stretch, as if the draft sighing out of the black tunnels was a long exhalation from the lungs of the earth, and the slow drum the beating of its molten heart.

Passing one of the openings he head a soft, slithering rustle, and he started convulsively, his hand leaping to his dagger hilt.

Aurelianus jumped too, then after glancing roundabout turned to Duffy with his white eyebrows raised in annoyed inquiry.

'What sort of things live down here?' the Irishman asked, remembering to whisper. 'Snakes? Trolls?'

'I suppose there may be snakes,' the sorcerer answered impatiently. 'No trolls. And no man has entered these tunnels since the Church took over the brewery, in the twelfth century. All right?'

'All right!' snapped Duffy, irritable now himself. After all, he thought, it wasn't my idea to go for a romp in a rat warren. They plodded on in silence.

After perhaps a hundred more yards the Irishman noticed something ahead - a hammocklike bundle slung from the ceiling, dimly visible in the flickering yellow light. Aurelianus nodded to show he saw it too, but didn't slacken his pace.

My God, Duffy thought as they drew closer, it's a mummy, wearing a sword, hung sitting in a sling. A poor idea of a joke, especially in a setting like this.

Then the thing opened its eyes, which brightly reflected the lamplight. Its pupils were vertical slits, like a cat's. Duffy yelped and jumped a full yard backward, fell, and regained the ground in a sitting slide. The sorcerer just eyed the sitter speculatively.

Its mouth spread open in a glittering yellow grin, making its face seem to be nothing but eyes and teeth. 'Halt,' it said in an echoing whisper, 'for the toll.'

Aurelianus stepped forward, holding the lantern low, as Duffy got back to his feet. 'What price for passage?' the old man asked.

The thing spread long-fingered hands. 'Nothing exorbitant.' It hopped down from its sling, agile as a monkey, and caressed the hilt of its short sword. 'There are two of you.. .I'll take the life of one.'

Duffy had wearily dragged his dagger out now - dreading the exertion of hacking this unwholesome creature to death - but Aurelianus just raised the lamp so that his seamed, craggy face was clearly visible. 'Do you think you could digest my life, if you took it?' His voice was flat with contempt.

The thing shuddered with recognition and bowed, casting its ropy colorless hair over its face. 'No, Ambrosius. Your pardon - I didn't know you at first.' A glowing eye looked up from under the hair. 'But I will have your companion.'

Aurelianus smiled, and raised the lantern to show Duffy's face in sharp chiaroscuro. 'Will you?' he asked softly.

The creature - which, a part of Duffy's mind had time to reflect, had probably once been a man - stared for a full minute, then whimpered and abased itself full length on the stones of the tunnel floor.

Aurelianus turned to the Irishman and, waving a hand forward, stepped around the would-be toll-taker. Duffy followed, and heard the degraded thing mutter, as he edged past, 'Pardon, Lord.'

For the next dozen yards they could hear it whimpering behind them, and Duffy shot the old man a venomously interrogative look. Aurelianus just shrugged helplessly.

When the stairs finally came to an end, widening out into a chamber whose walls and roof the lamp was powerless to illuminate, Duffy thought it must be dawn in Vienna, or even noon. And, he told himself grimly, there's about a mile of tangled tunnels between you and your bed.

Aurelianus was striding forward across the chamber floor, so Duffy wearily followed, and saw ahead of them the coping of a well wide enough to drop a small cottage into. The old sorcerer halted at the edge, fumbling under his gown. Duffy peered down over the stone lip, wrinkling his nose at a faint smell that was either spice or clay. He could see nothing, but the deep pounding seemed to emanate upward out of the well.

Aurelianus had produced a little knife, with which he. was carefully cutting a gash in his own left forefinger. Reaching forward, he shook the quick drops of blood into the abyss for a few moments, then drew his hand back and wrapped the finger in a bit of cloth. He smiled reassuringly at Duffyand folded his arms, waiting.

Minutes went past. The Irishman had again begun to confuse his own pulse with the barely audible bass vibration, and so his stomach went cold when it abruptly ceased.

The lean hand of the sorcerer clamped on his shoulder.

'Now listen,' he breathed into Duffy's ear, 'I am going to recite some sentences to you, quietly, a phrase at a time, and I want you to shout them into the well after me. Do you understand?'

'No,' returned the Irishman. 'If you're the one that knows the words, you shout them. I'll stand by.'

The warm draft from out of the well was stronger now, as if something that nearly filled the shaft was silently ascending.

'Do as I say, you damned idiot,' Aurelianus whispered quickly, his fingers digging into Duffy's shoulder. 'They'll recognize your voice - and obey it, too, if our luck hasn't completely flown.'

The well-draft slowed to what it had been before. Duffy got the impression of something poised and attentive. He kept his mouth resolutely shut as long as he could bear it

- perhaps thirty seconds. Then, Very well,' he breathed weakly. 'Go ahead.'