Taltos (Lives of the Mayfair Witches 3)

"You killed others in our name," said Enzo. And there was his brother beside him, repeating in a maddening echo the very same words.

"You besmirched us in the eyes of others," said Hollingshed. "You did unspeakable evil in our name!"

"I confess to nothing," said Tom

my.

"We don't require you to confess," said Elvera.

"We don't require anything of you," said Enzo.

"Aaron died believing your lies!" said Hollingshed.

"God damn it, I will not stand for this!" roared Tommy.

But Marklin could not bring himself to be indignant, outraged, whatever it was he ought to be, that they were holding him prisoner, forcing him now towards the doors.

"Wait a minute, wait, please, don't. Wait," he stammered. He begged. "Did Stuart kill himself? What happened to Stuart? If Stuart were here, he would exonerate us, you can't really think that someone of Stuart's years ..."

"Save your lies for God," said Elvera softly. "All night long we've examined the evidence. We've spoken with your white-haired goddess. Unburden your soul of the truth to us, if you wish, but don't bother us with your lies."

The figures closed ranks tightly against them. They were being moved closer and closer to this chamber or room or dungeon, perhaps, Marklin couldn't know.

"Stop!" he cried suddenly. "In the name of God! Stop! There are things you don't know about Tessa, things you simply don't understand."

"Don't cater to them, you idiot!" snarled Tommy. "Do you think my father won't be asking questions! I'm not a bloody orphan! I have a huge family. Do you think--"

A strong arm gripped Marklin about the waist. Another was clamped around his neck. The doors were being opened inward. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Tommy struggling, knee bent, foot kicking at the men behind him.

An icy gust of air rose from the open doors. Blackness. I cannot be locked in blackness. I cannot!

And finally he screamed. He couldn't hold it back any longer. He screamed, the terrible cry begun before he was pushed forward, before he felt himself topple from the threshold, before he realized he was plunging down and down into the blackness, into the nothingness, that Tommy was falling with him, cursing them, threatening them, or so it seemed. It was quite impossible to know. His scream was echoing too loudly off the stone walls.

He'd struck the ground. The blackness was outside him and also within. Then the awakening to pain throughout his limbs. He lay among hard and jagged things, cutting things. Dear God! And when he sat upright, his hand fell on objects which crumbled and broke and gave off a dull ashen smell.

He squinted in the single shaft of light that fell down upon him, and looking upwards, he realized with horror that it came from the door through which he'd fallen, over the heads and shoulders of the figures who filled it in black silhouette.

"No, you can't do it!" he screamed, scrambling forward in the darkness, and then, without compass points or touchstones of any kind, climbing to his feet.

He couldn't see their darkened faces; he couldn't make out even the shapes of their heads. He'd fallen many feet, many, perhaps thirty feet, even. He didn't know.

"Stop it, you can't keep us here, you can't put us here!" he roared, raising his hands to them, imploring them. But the figures had stepped back out of the lighted opening, and with horror he heard a familiar sound. It was the hinges creaking as the light died, and the doors were closed.

"Tommy, Tommy, where are you?" he cried desperately. The echo frightened him. It was locked in with him. It had nowhere to go but up against him, against his ears. He reached out, patting the floor, touching these soft, broken, crumbling things, and suddenly he felt something wet and warm!

"Tommy!" he cried with relief. He could feel Tommy's lips, his nose, his eyes. "Tommy!"

Then, in a split second, longer in duration, perhaps, than all his life, he understood everything. Tommy was dead. He'd died in the fall. And they had not cared that he might. And they were never coming back for Marklin, never. Had the law, with its comforts and its sanctions, been a possibility, they would not have thrown either one of them from such a height. And now Tommy was dead. He was alone in this place, in the dark, beside his dead friend, clinging to him now, and the other things, the things round which his fingers curled, were bones.

"No, you can't do it, you can't countenance such a thing!" His voice rose again in a scream. "Let me out of here! Let me out!" Back came the echo, as if these cries were streamers rising and then tumbling back down upon him. "Let me out!" His cries ceased to be words. His cries grew softer and more full of agony. And their terrible sound gave him a strange comfort. And he knew it was the last and only comfort he'd ever know.

He lay still, finally. Beside Tommy, fingers locked around Tommy's arm. Perhaps Tommy wasn't dead. Tommy would wake up, and they would search this place together. Perhaps that's what they were supposed to do. There was a way out, and the others meant for him to find it; they meant him to walk through the valley of death to find it, but they didn't mean to kill him, not his brothers and sisters in the Order, not Elvera, dear Elvera, and Harberson and Enzo, and his old teacher Clermont. No, they were incapable of such things!

At last he turned over and climbed to his knees, but when he tried to rise to his feet, his left ankle gave out from under him in a flash of pain.

"Well, I can crawl, damn it!" he whispered. "I can crawl!" He screamed the words. And crawl he did, pushing the bones away from him, the debris, the crumbled rock or bone or whatever it was. Don't think about it. Don't think about rats, either. Don't think!

His head was suddenly struck, or so it seemed, by a wall.

Within sixty seconds he had traveled along that wall, and along another and another, and finally another. The room was no more than a shaft, it was so small.

Oh, well, don't have to worry about getting out, it seems, not till I feel better and I can stand up and look for some other opening, something other than a passage, a window perhaps. After all, there's air, fresh air.

Just rest awhile, he thought, snuggling close to Tommy again, and pressing his forehead against Tommy's sleeve, rest and think what to do. It is absolutely out of the question that you could die like this, you, this young, die like this, in this dungeon, thrown here by a pack of evil old priests and nuns, impossible.... Yes, rest, don't confront the entire issue, just yet. Rest ...

He was drifting. How stupid of Tommy to have utterly alienated his stepmother, to have told her he wanted no further contact. Why it would be six months, a year even ... No, the bank would be looking for them, Tommy's bank, his bank, when he didn't draw his quarterly check, and when was that? No, this couldn't be their final decision, to bury them alive in this awful place!

He was startled wide awake by a strange noise.

Again came the noise, and then again. He knew what that was, but he couldn't identify it. Damn, in utter darkness, he could not identify even the direction. He must listen. There was a series of sounds, actually, picture it, try to picture it, and then he did.

Bricks being fitted into place, and mortar troweled over them. Bricks and mortar, high above.

"But that's absurd, absolutely absurd. It's medieval, it's utterly outrageous. Tommy, wake up. Tommy!" He would have screamed again, but it was too humiliating, that those bastards up there would hear him, that they'd hear him roaring as they bricked up the bloody door.

Softly, he cried against Tommy's arm. No, this was temporary, a contrivance to make them miserable, contrite, before turning them over to the authorities. They didn't mean for them to remain here, to die here! It was some sort of ritual punishment and only meant to frighten him. But of course, the awful part was that Tommy was dead! But still, he'd be glad to say that this had been an accident. When they came, he'd be entirely cooperative. The point was to get out! That's what he'd wanted to do all along, get out!

I can't die like this, it's unthinkable that I should die like this, it's impossible, all my life forfeit, my dreams taken from me, the greatness I only glimpsed with Stuart and with Tessa ...

Somewhere in the back of his mind, he knew there were awful flaws in his logic, fatal flaws, but he continued, constructing the future, their coming, telling him they had only meant to scare him, and that it had been an accident, Tommy's dying

, they hadn't known the drop was so dangerous, foolish of them, murderous, vengeful liars and fools. The thing was to be ready, to be calm, to sleep perhaps, sleep, listening to the sounds of the brick and the mortar. No, these sounds have stopped. The door is sealed, perhaps, but that doesn't matter. There have to be other ways into this dungeon, and other ways out. Later he'd find them.

For now, best to cling to Tommy, just to snuggle close to him and wait till the initial panic was gone, and he could think what to do next.

Oh, how foolish of him to have forgotten Tommy's lighter. Tommy never smoked any more than he did, but Tommy always carried that fancy lighter, and would snap it for pretty girls lifting cigarettes to their lips.

He felt in Tommy's pockets, pants, no, jacket, yes. He had it, the little gold lighter. Pray it had fluid or a cartridge of butane, or whatever the hell made it burn.

He sat up slowly, hurting the palm of his left hand on something rough. He snapped the light. The little flame sputtered and then grew long. The illumination swelled around him, revealing the small chamber, cut deep, deep into the earth.

And the jagged things, the crumbling things, were bones, human bones. There lay a skull beside him, sockets staring at him, and there another, oh God! Bones so old, some had turned to ashes, bones! And Tommy's dead, staring face, red blood drying on the side of his mouth and on his neck, where it had run down into his collar. And before him and beside him and behind him, bones!

He dropped, the lighter, his hands flying to his head, his eyes closing, his mouth opening in an uncontrollable and deafening scream. There was nothing but the sound and the darkness, the sound emptying from him, carrying all his fear and his horror heavenward, and he knew in his soul he would be all right, he would be all right, if only he did not stop screaming, but let the scream pour forth from him, louder and louder, and forever, without cease.

Twenty-two

A PLANE RARELY ever fully insulated you. Even in this plane, so lavishly upholstered, with its deep chairs and large table, you knew you were in a plane. You knew you were thirty-eight thousand feet over the Atlantic, and you could feel the small ups and downs as the plane rode the wind, rather like a great vessel rides the sea.

They sat in the three chairs grouped around the table. At the three points of an invisible equilateral triangle. One chair had been specially made for Ash, that was obvious, and he'd been standing by that chair when he had gestured for Rowan and Michael to take the other two.