TR: 41

Chapter Forty-One: A Hole In The Wall

Kade lay impatiently on the mattress, one leg drooped over the edge of the bed, swinging back and forth like a pendulum ticking down the time until his sanity expired. As he lay, he stared up at the stuccoed ceiling, attempting to count each individual formation formed by the bas relief patterns.

“Three hundred and sixty four, three hundred and sixty five, three hundred and…wait, which one was I at…um, that one, no…hmm…”

He mulled over the section on which his eyes had come to, trying to tease out the structure which he had last been focusing on. His eyes began to blur and the whole lot of it began to combine in one big wash of embossed plaster, his mind becoming lost in a maze of pointlessness.

“Ah, forget it!”

He slammed his fist against the soft mattress top in frustration and rolled over onto his side in a fetal position, closing his eyes. He began to pick at fragments in his mind like a child selecting different rocks from a beach shore. The image of the painting and the sister facing that abominable monstrous cloud of blackness–and their likeness in the dreamscape–flashed through his mind. He revisited his fall through space eternal, remembering what it felt like to not know when or if it would ever end. He couldn’t be sure if he was superimposing the memory or not but, strangely, he also recalled the sensation of calm as he fell, overlaid with the abject terror. If it had been so, perhaps, it had been his mind letting go, about to accept its demise. But, of course, it hadn’t been; the whole thing had been nothing more than a dream.

Hadn’t it?

The memory of the void gave way to that terrible creature…man…beast…or whatever it was. All Kade knew was that the thing had been pure evil incarnate, as if all horrible and tragic things in life stemmed from that very spot on which it stood. And those eyes; pits of eternal fire, always burning, never ceasing. Looking into them had been like seeing one’s past, future, and nonexistence all at the same time, like portals to each and every realm in which one concurrently existed, except they all ended in the stuff of nightmares. There was no light to be found in those places, only fire and suffering. Kade shivered at the memory, wrapping his arms tighter around his body as the room suddenly seemed colder by a margin.

A dull scraping sound pulled him out of his nightmarish reverie, the sound of wood shifting against wood, coming from somewhere across the room. Kade opened his eyes and sat upright, listening. He turned to the room and looked around but he could not see anything out of the ordinary. After a moment, the sound came once again, this time a hollow thud from behind the far wall. He slid his legs over the bed and stood up, his socked feet near silent against the soft carpet as he walked across the room. He crouched down in front of the wall, squatting as he listened to the strange noises coming from within. He leaned towards the wall to listen closer but, suddenly, a panel in the wainscoting shifted, as if someone were turning it from the other side, and Kade lurched backwards several steps, not knowing what to expect. He watched in mixed wonder and fear as the panel began to rotate around in its place, until the thing popped off, flopping onto the carpet like a dead fish. A vacant hole stared back at him like a square, cynical eye. Kade slowly crept back toward the wall, leaning over to investigate what had happened. A small head a third the size of a man’s popped out from around the corner, startling at the sight of Kade.

“AH!” the little man screamed, his head disappearing back into the hole.

Kade stumbled backwards onto the bed, flopping down onto the mattress. His heart thumped violently in his chest.

“Who’s there?” He shouted, trying to sound bigger than he was.

After a protracted moment, a small yellow hat poked back out and a familiar face stared out at him with saucer-like eyes. A look of recognition on Kade’s face.

“Scrubby? Is that you? How did you get in here?”

The gnome’s terrified expression transformed from one of frowning disapproval to outright irritation. He pulled himself out of the hole, stepping into the room.

“Do you humans always have to be so dramatic?” He said in an embittered tone, as he brushed dust off of his tunic with his tiny gloves.

“And I already told you a hundred times not to call me Scr…oh, never mind; you humans are so thick you wouldn’t listen anyhow. Well, if you must know, I followed you all the way from the Leviathan–which wasn’t a walk in the park, I might add. Hiding in a place with this many humans around is no simple task, even for a master of stealth like me…”

“Leviathan? What is that?”

Scrubby looked taken aback. “You know–the ship that you–we–were just on, for almost a bloody week, no less.”

Kade rubbed the back of his head, frowning down at the carpet. “I…I don’t remember…”

Scrubby didn’t look impressed. “Of course you don’t–you were having yourself a nice snooze the whole time. Which is exactly why I followed you here, to make sure you were…”

Scrubby caught himself, the sympathetic statement that followed all but dying on the tip of his tongue.

“…er, rather, to make sure that you didn’t kill yourself. Or something…”

Kade smiled wanly. “Thanks, Scrubby.”

The gnome’s face flushed and he grunted. “But forget that…” His expression lightened up to one of near excitement. “Kade, you have to come see what I’ve discovered; it’s the most wondrous thing! I’ve never seen anything like it, and I’ve seen a lot of amazing things.”

Scrubby looked around the room. “Though I can’t say the same for you. What are you doing in this…place?”

Scrubby’s eyes settled down on the carpet beneath him. He made a disgusted face, lifting up one of his feet as if he had stepped in excrement.

“Dis-gusting. Only humans would enjoy walking on dead animals.”

Kade didn’t seem to be listening to the gnome’s diatribe; instead, he was looking past Scrubby as if waiting for something to happen behind him, a half-expectant look on his face.

“What? What are you looking for?” The gnome looked over his shoulder in confusion.

“Where’s Brian? I thought he would be with you.”

The gnome’s expression flushed as if he had seen a ghost. His shoulders drooped and he removed his hat, placing it against his chest. Scrubby looked around as if searching for the right words to appear in the air but no such soliloquy presented itself. His back straightened and he inhaled deeply, as if about to plunge himself into unknown depths.

“What is it? Did something happen?” Kade’s voice began to take on a concerned edge.

The gnome nodded with reservation. His eyes met Kade’s gaze with the utmost of effort.

“I don’t know how to put this lightly, Kade but… Brian is…gone.”

Kade frowned. “Gone? What do you mean gone?”

“There was a storm and…one of the masts fell over. We would have been done for if it weren’t for him. For his sacrifice.”

“Sacrifice? What do you mean sacrifice? And what storm? What aren’t you telling me, Scrubby?”

Scrubby swallowed, shuffling the toe of his boot against the carpet, averting his eyes from Kade’s prying gaze. “He… he fell overboard. There was a gale, or a rogue wave maybe. We couldn’t be sure, it was so dark out. One minute he was there and the next…well, I think you get the point.”

The words seemed to hang in the air with a dead weight. Kade said nothing, he only stared at the gnome with an unreadable look on his face. The two sat there, marinating in the awkward silence that filled the room. Scrubby winced up at Kade, a half-hopeful look on his face.

“If it helps any, that witch-lady, uh… Cindene? No, that’s not it. Anyhow, she tried her best to save him but it wasn’t enough. But she did try. They all did, Kade.”

Kade sat on the edge of the bed, looking dejected as ever. Try as he may, Kade couldn’t remember the last moment he had seen Brian, and he certainly did not remember anything about a ship, being at sea, or running into any witches. Despite his best efforts to contain himself, his eyes began to water.

“No.” He shook his head. “No, he would find a way to survive–’cause that’s what people like Brian do; they’re survivors.”

He wiped away the tear that streamed down his cheek with the sleeve of his jacket and he looked up at Scrubby, a look of renewed determination.

“We have to go looking for him. He might need our help.”

Kade grabbed his shoes on the floor by the foot of the bed and slipped them on.

Scrubby’ s jaw dropped, a look of disbelief on his small face. “You can’t be serious? He fell into the…”

“Where does this passage lead to, Scrubby?” Kade interjected, brushing past the gnome, knocking him aside.

Kade squatted down at the empty hole where the panel had fallen out, sticking his head in. Scrubby frowned at the youth’s back.

“Obviously, it’s a secret passage. At least, that’s what it is now. Maybe once it had been a fire escape or something of the sort, but from the look of it no one’s used it in ages. It runs underneath this building–whatever it is–and eventually connects underground into… well, I can’t explain it. Let me show you. Follow me!”

Now it was the gnome’s turn to push Kade aside as he shouldered his way into the passage. Kade watched as Scrubby’s small figure turned to shadow then, before long, disappeared into darkness. Whether intentional or not, the passage was just large enough for a small person to fit through–perhaps, a woman or child–though Kade had to hunker over inside to avoid hitting his head. He made a move to hurry after his estranged partner but, remembering the panel, he stopped and reached back through, replacing the wooden piece so that they left no trail for potential pursuers.

***

He crawled through a dusty wooden corridor, cobwebs and dried rat droppings at regular intervals. Scrubby hadn’t been kidding when he said it didn’t look as if it had been used in some time. There was no internal lighting in the passage but Kade could see some kind of light source shining from around a corner not too far ahead, illuminating enough to make a traversable path. As Kade neared the corner, Scrubby popped his head around it, an impatient look on his face.

“Hurry up, will ya?”

Kade grumbled to himself, doing his best to move faster in the awkward position, to little avail. The gnome disappeared once more and it wasn’t until Kade rounded several more corners that he came to the end of the passage, Scrubby waiting by an opening which looked out onto a different area. When Scrubby heard Kade behind him, he motioned for him to come to him, holding a finger to his mouth.

“Shh. Be quiet or they’ll hear you.”

Scrubby motioned past the grate at which they waited. Kade leaned his face against the grate, looking out into a large room that seemed to be a reception area or lobby of some kind. The polished granite floor gleamed in the sunlight that shone down through circular glass skylights in the arched ceiling. The place had a regal feel to it, as if only really wealthy or important people stayed there. Were they in some kind of hotel? The two gawked at the room in silence, taking in the sight before them. To their left there was a large carpeted staircase so high it seemed to ascend into infinity, though in reality their vantage point restricted the periphery of what they could see. Fine furniture and antiques could be seen all around the room, further suggesting that the place was some kind of accommodation or sanctuary, though even close to it existed in Hollow. Thinking of home flooded Kade with emotions, from worrying about his mom, to his coach and team and his missed Up tournament, Tobor and SFR-8 and his other mechs…and then Kade realized he didn’t even know what city he was in. It certainly wasn’t Hollow, that much he knew. His eyes meandered around the room, settling on a small movement at the center of the room–a great desk with a woman leaning over a pile of neatly-stacked paperwork. No one else seemed to be in the room.

“Where are we?” Kade whispered.

The gnome held a finger up to his mouth, indicating silence. Scrubby pointed across the room, making a series of hand gestures that Kade didn’t follow.

“What? What is it? Is someone coming?”

“Shh! They’ll hear you.”

He continued to make gestures but Kade just frowned, growing frustrated.

“Why don’t you just say what you mean!” Kade whispered coarsely.

“Ah! Stupid human. The grate–the grate!” Scrubby hissed under his breath.

Kade looked back across the room, his eyes panning over the foyer until he made out the point of interest that Srubby had been trying to relay; almost parallel to their position, across the room on an adjacent wall, was a nearly identical grate to theirs at knee level.

“I see it! But what about the screws. We will have to…”

Scrubby held out a gloved hand, four small screws resting in the center of his palm. A knowing grin on his face as he silently removed the grate from the wall, placing it against the passage.

“Whoa, how did you do that so fast? Scrubby, do you have a super power you’re not telling us about?”

The gnome raised an eyebrow. “Yeah, it’s called stupid humans who don’t pay attention. Now, pay attention this time; wait for my signal and then we cross. No sooner, no later. Understand?”

Kade nodded. They waited until the woman turned away from their direction, he focus shifting to some other task, and then Scrubby nodded his head, bolting out into the open room, silent as a mouse, until his back was against the far wall, standing beside the other grate. Kade cast a questioning look the woman’s way but she didn’t seem to notice. Kade watched in awe as Scrubby worked silently on the new grate, plucking screws almost immediately, as if his fingers harnessed impossibly strong magnets.

So, he did have a superpower after all.

Once the grate had been removed in good order, the gnome disappeared into obscuring darkness, along with the grate. Kade looked at the woman once more, her back still turned to him, and he shuffled out into the room, crawling along the polished stone on his knees as to not make a sound. Compared to Scrubby’s nimbleness, Kade felt like an oxen oaf as he blundered slowly but surely along the floor. He only wished he could move as fast as his heart did. Luckily, he made it to the other side without a hitch but when he entered the hole, one of his shoe laces became snagged on the edge of the frame.

He glanced back over his shoulder, kicking his foot as he attempted to dislodge the lace. Scrubby’s head poked around a corner Kade didn’t even know existed.

“Come on! What are you waiting for?” He snapped in a hushed but brusque voice.

“I’m stuck!”

Kade continued to kick his foot but he couldn’t manage to get the snag undone. The woman at the desk raised her head from her work, the small raucous arousing her attention. She turned toward the sound. Kade kicked violently and, with a small snap, a wood splinter broke loose and his foot was released. The woman’s eyes landed on the spot where the sound had come from but nothing stirred near the wall, only a small wooden chip on the floor near one of the many ventilation grates in the room. She shrugged to herself and returned to her work.

***

The passageway continued on for some time, meandering along in no apparent direction. A breeze wafted in from somewhere ahead, which the only thing telling Kade they were making progress. Scrubby’s small form was but a shadow ahead, barely perceptible in the poorly lit tunnels. It wasn’t until they rounded a corner that light finally greeted them–sunlight pouring into the passage from a grate above. Scrubby had stopped at the grate, peering through raptly.

“What is it?” Kade said as he came up.

“Look!” Scrubby replied with a hint of exasperation.

They looked out into a courtyard enclosed by a stone wall several stories high. They could see several women milling about, all wearing colorful dresses of varying colours–red, yellow, white. Some stood around in groups conversing, others stood off to the side working at some task or other. They proceeded along to the next grate, not far off, and peered through. There was one of the women–this one in a yellow dress–hardly three hands away from their position, with her arm raised in front of her as if to strike an invisible opponent. Her attention seemed to be directed ahead of her, a look of rigorous concentration on her face.  Kade craned his neck to get a better look through the slats of the grate and was able to make out what looked to be a straw dummy near a wall, planted into the ground with a wooden stake. Suddenly, an orb of glowing pink light formed in the center her palm and, with a sharp yell, the ball of energy flew towards the straw dummy, colliding in an explosion of fantastic prismatic light. When the smoke cleared all that remained was a charred stick and tufts of straw raining slowly down to the ground like sad confetti. Kade gasped and hurried after Scrubby who was already long gone. As he ran hunkered over, he could hear other woman firing blasts from behind, the soft pop of explosions as the straw dummy genocide continued.

As the sounds from the courtyard disappeared, the tunnels grew quiet and dark once more. Just as Kade began to fear that they would be stuck in the veritable catacomb forever, an opening appeared ahead. They came out in an alleyway, the tunnel exit inbuilt into the stone wall several blades above the ground. Scrubby hopped down onto a rusted dumpster directly below them, bounding off and on to the ground in one smooth motion. Kade swung his legs around, sitting on the ledge as he looked down either side of the alley. The ground was made of large flagstones that had been tarnished over time, likely not cleaned in the last decade. They were between two old stone buildings which formed the alley, though there were no signs on either indicating what they were. By the state they were in, they were likely condemned, slated for demolition in the near future. Wherever they were, they were not in the posh side of town.

Kade couldn’t recall ever coming to a city; the last thing he remembered was leaving the gym with Brian but that had been days ago, according to Scrubby. He didn’t like the feeling of living a half-life, not knowing what had transpired around him–to him. It was as if he were still in his dream, his mind a partial fog, blocking out information like a clogged filter.

Kade let himself slide out of the tunnel, the sound of fabric tearing behind him, landing on the dumpster with hollow thwung. Scrubby jumped, scowling over his shoulder. Kade looked down at his torn jacket and saw a string of unravelled threads leading from a frayed edge to a snag back up around the lip of the hole.

“The twelve be damned! It’s like this place eats you up, piece by piece.”

He cursed and yanked on the threads, severing them like a unwanted umbilical cord.

Scrubby shook his head. “Be more discreet, will you? This isn’t a parade.”

Kade walked up beside Scrubby who had his face pressed up against a chain-link fence.

“Why? Who are we trying to avoid?”

“Trust me, if you saw what I saw, you would be as inconspicuous as a mouse hiding from a hawk.”

Kade looked through the fence, out to a scene beyond.

“Whoa!”

He pressed his face against the fence, gawking out in kind with the gnome.

“I don’t see any hawks but I do see a whole ton of people.”

Kade watched in awe as he stared out a vast mezzanine sprawling outward into a distant cityscape. Vehicles of all sorts–terrain and aerial alike–zipped and zoomed about, blue Glo trails fizzling in their wakes. A huge number of people milled about along the interlinking footpaths, some coming and going, moving with importance, others lingering on benches with their devices, or standing around in groups conversing. The earth rumbled around them and suddenly a trolley whizzed into sight twenty blades above them, speeding along the rail like a metallic, segmented insect suspended along a wire. In seconds it had come and gone, swallowed up by the towering skyscrapers and commercial buildings. Here and there giant holos flashed to life on the sides of buildings, along the walks, but all in all the vibe was too laid back for it to be a commercial district. Kade got the distinct impression that it was some kind of thoroughfare. In addition to the surrounding architecture there was a great multi-tiered fountain in the center, water cascading down in triumphant arches that matched the curves of the statuesque buildings towering over the city. The cobblestone walks branched out around it as if the fountain were a cul-de-sac, like a many-legged creature, connecting all of the different districts to each other like a fine network of capillaries. Beyond and to the right, Kade could see a monolithic palace on the far end of the court, enclosed with a superfluously large wall with wrought-iron spikes atop. On the other side, three giant ivory towers glowed white as polished bone in the sun, bronze archtops reflecting the sun in such a way that they looked to be forged of fire and not metal.

“Wow! Where are we?” Kade mooned.

“Where do you think? The city.” Scrubby grunted, working at something behind them.

Kade turned around and saw the gnome attempting to pry off the lid to a garbage can amidst a heaping pile of other trash and refuse.

“Well, I can see that much. But I mean which city is this?”

Scrubby continued to grunt and groan as he pried at the lid but it did not budge. He stopped, taking off his hat and wiping sweat off his brow with it. He glowered at Kade.

“Brazen City. The nation’s capitol, in all of its crude cren glory. Now, are you gonna help me with this or not?”

Brazen city. Kade almost stumbled backwards when he heard the name. That was over one hundred kaldar from Hollow! He had never been to the big city in his life. He had always dreamed of going as a young boy–meeting his Up heroes, watching a match at Cogmast Stadium, or even getting to play there one day himself. Now that he was finally there, a mix of emotions flowed through him; he badly missed his home–his mom and his mechs–and he hadn’t planned on coming there in that fashion–but there was still an undercurrent of excitement about it. His adventure had not yet come to an end. But first thing was first: he need to let his mom know he was safe. She was probably worried sick about him, had probably already issued a bloody Amber Alert.

Kade shook himself out of the rosy cloud that surrounded his thoughts. “I need to get to the nearest comm, or a charging station. I can recharge my Holomate there and get in touch with mom.”

Scrubby crossed his arms in front of him, raising an eyebrow. “I have no idea what you are talking about. You are talking to a gnome, remember? I have no idea what you humans do in your own time.”

Kade grabbed Scrubby by the wrist, his expression growing frantic. “You must have seen something on the way in! You know, blinking lights, holos with a comms sign. There would be lots of people with their devices hooked up, waiting around.”

Scrubby swatted away Kade’s hand and scowled at him. “You just described pretty much every corner of this city. Might as well have asked me if I saw a tall building.”

Kade groaned. “Come on, you’ve gotta know something! What were you doing this whole time I was out?”

The gnome sneered. “If you must know, when I wasn’t trying to hide from some gnome-hungry human, or run away from someone’s foul tempered dog, I was either struggling to get food or find a warm place to sleep. This isn’t exactly the kind of lifestyle I’m used to.”

He went back to trying to tugging on the trash can. “I’m not the one to ask about these things. All I know is that some fat human brought us out of one city, and a bunch of sailors took us to another.”

“Sailors? Okay, well that’s a start. Maybe I could ask around the docks. Someone there might recognize me, right?”

Scrubby shrugged. “Sure, if you don’t get lost in the marina. The place is like a city in itself. And then you’d be doubly lost. I don’t see how that is any better than where you’re at now.”

Kade’s back stiffened. “This is stupid. After all this time there’s sure to be a missing kid report filed for me. All I need to do is walk into any shop or cafe and someone will help me get in touch with the authorities, and they can get me back to Hollow.”

“If that’s what you really want, go for it.” Scrubby said nonchalantly, continuing to pry at the can to no avail.

“What do you mean? Of course it’s what I want. I’ve been gone for over a week, Scrubby! I can’t just…ignore my mom. She’s probably losing hair as we speak.”

Scrubby stopped, bending over with his hands on his knees as he huffed. “I’m not saying don’t reach out to her, I think you should. I just thought you wanted to find out what happened to your friend first.”

Kade balked. “I… I do, of course! If Brian’s alive then I want to be the first to know. When I get home then I can file a missing persons report and…”

Scrubby held up a small gloved hand. “I’ll stop you there, Kade. There’s something you should know–something I didn’t mention before about Brian.”

“What do you mean? You said he fell overboard on this…Leviathan ship.”

Scrubby nodded. “He did. But I think there could be more to it than that.”

Kade frowned. “How so?”

“Well, remember how I said he was trying to repair one of the masts–a sail actually–well, everything was going as well as it could have in the storm, until a bolt of lightning struck nearby, knocking him off.”

“Brian was hit by lightning?”

“Not directly but, yeah, it hit close enough to knock him off.”

“What are the chances of that?”

“It gets worse.” Scrubby said dourly. “When he fell, that witch lady…what was her name? Shelina? No that wasn’t it. Um…Sabrine? No, No…”

“Celine.” Kade said. “Celine. That was her name.”

Scrubby looked confused. “How could you possibly know that?”

Kade looked just as surprised as the gnome. “I…don’t know. But somehow, I do. I can…see her face. She’s kind. And…pretty.”

“Er….yeah, sure. Anyhow, Celine was able to stop Brian from falling, holding him suspended in the air with her powers. It was a sight to see, I’ll tell you!”

Kade swallowed, looking glumly down at the flagstones. “I don’t think I would have wanted to see that…”

Scrubby bit his tongue. “That’s not…I, uh…I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it like that. What I meant was that she used magick to help Brian, Kade. But then something stopped her, cutting her spell off.”

Kade raised his head slowly, wrinkles forming on his forehead. “Stopped the spell? What could possibly do that way out in the ocean?”

“There’s only one thing I can think of that can mess with magick: other magick.”

The two shared a knowing pause, a breeze whistling eerily past them down the empty alley.

“You think…you think someone tried to kill Brian?”

“I don’t know. But don’t you want to find out?”

There were so many things to think about–so many questions to ask. Kade didn’t know what to say.

“How?” was all that he could conjure.

“Well that’s just it, isn’t it? How does one go about sticking their nose into something they know nothing about?”

Kade raised an eyebrow. “Is that a rhetorical question?”

“Of course, you dolt! Neither you nor I knows magick from our rear ends, so then it falls on logic to eke out a clue.”

“What’s logical about magick? Isn’t it the opposite? Like…unscientific?”

“Don’t forget, you’re talking to a gnome–not an elf. I don’t have any opinion on the matter. We gnomes stay as far away from the stuff as we can. It’s real, that much I can tell you, so if that makes it scientific then, sure, it’s science. But that’s beside the point; what matters is who cast the spell, not whether or not the spell was make-believe or not.”

“So who then?”

“Isn’t it obvious, Kade? We were all sequestered on a ship, hundreds of leave from any kind of land and any other people. Where does that leave us?”

Kade’s eyes widened as the realization struck. “It must have been one of the crew!”

Scrubby nodded. “Either that or a stowaway, but I would put my money on someone on the ledger being our culprit.”

“Why? Why not the stowaway theory.”

“Trust me, I’ve had a lot of time to think about this. Why would some random want to do away with a nobody like Brian?”

“Hey! Watch your tongue.” Kade snapped.

Scrubby lurched back. “Ahhh…that’s not what I meant! I mean, someone unimportant like him…”

Kade crossed his arms. “That’s hardly any better. Remind me to never let you go into diplomacy.”

Scrubby groaned. “Whatever. You know what I mean. Brian isn’t anyone high-profile, so that means there had to be a reason to want to off him.”

“But you’re assuming you know everything about him. I don’t even know very much about him. We practically just met before you came along.”

“Right, but all we have to go on here are assumptions; if Brian is leading some kind of secret double-life then we might as well just start assuming every other far-out conspiracy about this, and then end up right back to where we started: with nothing but our imaginations.”

“Okay, then, what do you propose?”

“What if… what if it had something do with you?”

Kade was taken aback. “Me? Why me? I’m even less interesting than Brian. He can knock down doors with his fist; I can hardly do a pushup.”

“It’s not your body they would be concerned about–it is your mind.” Scrubby tapped the side of his head.

“I’m not following…”

Scrubby sighed. “When I tell you that there was not much to do to pass the time aboard that wretched ship I would be grossly understating the point. So, for fun, sometimes I would drop in on peoples’ conversations here and there, see what I could learn.”

“You mean you were eavesdropping.”

Scrubby’s face flushed. “I was listening in. Anyhow, most conversations were boring–more dull than the nothing-burger time I was hoping to pass. But then I happened across your cabin one night, and you had a visitor. A very special one, I might add.” Scrubby smiled.

“What? Who was visiting me?”

“Celine–the witch lady. I don’t know what she was doing to you but, whatever it was, it seemed to be helping you–whatever you were going through.”

Kade frowned down at the stones beneath his feet. Try as he may, he couldn’t recall much from his dream state, other than fragments here and there. The whole thing had become a hazy jumble–becoming more so by the minute, like sand slipping through a sieve.

“I don’t remember her. If she was there, it’s gone now.”

“It doesn’t matter. All that matters is that she saw something special in you. That much I can be certain. And if she sees that, well…what’s stopping someone else from wanting whatever it is you have? What’s stopping them from killing to get it?”

Kade looked up. “You think…you think that someone killed Brian because of me?”

Kade’s eyes glistened, utter despair on his face. “I couldn’t…I couldn’t bear that, if it were true. What…what could I possibly have that someone like that would want? And why would they kill him, just to get to me?”

A tear streamed down Kade’s cheek. Scrubby sighed. “I don’t know, Kade. But I know where to start.”

“Where?” Kade asked, doing his best to hold back a sob.

“Right here.”

Scrubby pointed to the trash can that he had been so diligently applying himself to, to no avail. Kade wiped his face with his sleeve, frowning from the can to the gnome.

“This is not a good time for a joke, Scrubby.”

Now it was Scrubby’s turn to look indignant. He stomped his little gnome foot. “This is no joke. Through there is another secret passage, and I think at the end you might find an answer. It might not be the exact answer you are looking for but it could lead to someone who who knows who has it.”

Kade walked over to the trash can and eyed it suspiciously. “Someone with magick went into…a trashcan?”

Scrubby let out a groan of frustration. “I know how it sounds, okay?” He snapped. “Listen, while you were off in a lullaby land, I was trying to find away in to that compound where they had you stashed away. The place is a veritable fortress so I had to look for alternate options. When I was perusing the perimeter, I came across this alley”, Scrubby pointed up to the hole in the side of the building from whence they had come, “and that underground passageway. But just as I got into the tunnels, I heard something from behind, so I hid inside and waited.”

“What did you see?”

“Not what but who. A man in a cloak landed in the alleyway, and showed a very keen interest in this very can here.”

“Wait…did you say he landed in the alleyway? You mean like…from above?”

Kade looked side to side down the alley. About half a bout down the far end, the alley terminated in a dead-end, butting up against an adjacent building. At the other was the gate which looked out onto the city, through which Kade had gazed in wonder at the sights beyond. His eyes travelled up the lengths of the metal bars where they ended in rusty coils of barbed wire, no less than five blades off the ground.

“That’s impossible. No one could jump over that; it’s way too high.”

“I don’t think he jumped–he landed, as in came from the sky.”

Scrubby locked eyes with Scrubby. “Are you trying to say…he flew into the alley?”

Scrubby shrugged. “Would it be the weirdest thing we’ve seen?”

Scrubby had a point. Kade wrinkled his brow, looking up at the sliver of sky in between the buildings above them.

“I guess…it’s possible. I mean, some of those guys you watch on the holo–they can use air spells to, like, levitate themselves. But I’ve never heard of anyone outright flying before. You think if that were possible we’d see more people selling their AEVs and more superheros zipping through the air…”

Scrubby crossed his arms. “And yet I saw one. Right there, where you stand now.”

Kade nodded thoughtfully. “So…if this guy really can fly, that means he’s probably pretty powerful, right? And if he’s that gifted, then he’s probably dangerous. So remind me again why we are following him?”

“Because, in my experience, where there’s one of these creeps there’s another. The whole lot of them all know each other, like some kinda…cult family.”

Kade didn’t look very convinced. “Right…so that means more danger. Am I missing something here?”

Scrubby’s face flushed with anger–something Kade noticed happened a lot.

“Ah, do I have to spell everything out to you stupid humans? Don’t you see? Whoever this person is, they know their stuff. That means they’ll know more than most people about these kinds of things, and a heck of a lot more than we do, that’s for sue. I would be willing to bet my bottom dollar that sniffing this guy out will lead to something juicy.”

Scrubby pointed to the trash can. Kade eyed it with a resentful look. “I think you could have used any other metaphor in this case.”

“Whatever. All I know is that we have no answers and, even if this guy doesn’t either, it will at least put us that much closer.”

Kade’s shoulders slumped at the thought of digging through a dumpster to find his next clue. “Really…there’s no one else we could ask?”

“Do you know any other gifted? ‘Cause I sure don’t. I try and avoid them.”

Kade shook his head.

“Exactly. So…” Scrubby motioned at the can with his head.

Kade sighed, approaching the can. He wrapped his fingers around the lid, cold to the touch but, surprisingly, there was no slime or anything else untoward covering it. He pulled on it but it barely budged, as if fastened in place. He tried several more times but it wouldn’t come loose, though he could feel something shifting beneath the lid, as if it were trying really hard to comply with his movements.

“I can’t get it to move. What did the other guy do?”

Scrubby shrugged. “I don’t know. One minute he was lingering around this trash can, lording over it like a vulture to the kill, then he looked back my way so I had to make scarce. Once I reemerged he was gone. It was if he vanished into thin air. At first, I thought maybe he flew back out the way he came in, but then I realized that didn’t make any sense at all; why go somewhere to just turn back around and leave right away?”

Kade scratched his head. “Maybe he was lost?”

“Maybe. But then I found this can here left slightly ajar, and when I inspected it further, I knew that’s where he went.”

Kade frowned at the trash container. “You mean…he went in…there?”

Scrubby nodded. “It’s not what you think though. It’s actually a secret passage! I think he meant to lock the lid behind him but he seemed in a rush so maybe he forgot.”

Kade looked back at the can with a newfound wonder. “A secret passage, huh?”

He felt around the lid with his hand, searching for a hidden switch or anything else the likes, and then his chest brushed against the lid, shifting it slightly against his weight. Kade stopped, leaning back.

“Did you see that? It moved!”

Scrubby leaned in as Kade grasped the lid, this time attempting to turn it like a dial. Sure enough, the lid rotated in place, metal screeching lightly against metal, then, PLONK, it came off with a small pop, Kade holding the lid freely in his one hand. The two of them looked down into the can-that-was-not-a-can, to find a hollow with a built in ladder attached to the can from the other side, leading down into darkness.

“Whoa!” Kade exclaimed, leaning over the rim, peering down into darkness.

Scrubby smiled as he peered over the edge with Kade. “This reminds me of one of the secret entrances we use back at home, a door that opens up under a compost heap outside a small human village. Smelly as all hell but you can get to Laccaria Lane in no time. This guy thinks like a gnome; I like him already!”

Kade cast Scrubby a wry look. “Of course you do. Well, up for a bit of dumpster diving?”

“You don’t have to ask me twice!”

Scrubby shouldered past Kade, hopping over the ledge and, somehow, managing to land perfectly on the rungs of the ladder, quickly descending out of sight. Kade looked back over his shoulder down the alley, a slight breeze blowing in from the city beyond, carrying with it a portent note, somehow. He looked up once more at the sky above, wondering how someone could have come from up there, his imagination running rampant with the possibilities, many of them terrifying. He shivered, zipping up his jacket another pinch then followed after his gnome friend.

***

“Whoooooa!” Kade exclaimed, shining his torch around the dim-lit cellar.

The massive cellar was one of many they had passed by, adjoining the main tunnel but, despite its forlorn majesty, it had fallen into a state of marked disuse. Cedar-carved floor-to-ceiling shelves held boutique casks, whatever was once in them probably long turned to vinegar, now more cobwebs and dust than liquor. Oddly enough, the torches had all been lit, suggesting someone still used the place. Kade held his flame over one cask, inspecting it.

“Hey, come take a look at this.” Kade called to Scrubby.

The gnome sauntered over from whatever had distracted him previously.

“What is it?”

Kade rubbed away a patch of dust on one of the casks with his hand. A symbol had been branded into the cask–a coat of arms depicting a serpent wrapping itself around a sword.

“What do you think it means?”

Scrubby leered at the strange etching. “I don’t know, but whatever it is I don’t like it. Runes never mean anything good–that much I can tell you.”

“Do you think it has something to do with magick?”

Kade panned the torch around the room. “Do you think this place does?”

Scrubby’s eyes went wide as they scoured the shadows around them, the air seeming to grow cold with meaning. He shivered.

“I don’t know but I don’t want to stay and find out. Let’s keep going.”

As the two made their way back down the main hall, Kade shone his light around the room, the flames casting ominous shadows around them. The entire place had been carved right out of the earth, the only mark of man the torches and sconces and the occasional wooden support to hold up the ceiling. A large rat scurried across the path in front of them, disappearing into darkness.

“What is this place?” Kade asked, his voice echoing softly down the stone halls.

“I have no idea but, whatever it is now, it’s abandoned.”

“That much I can see.”

“I think it must have once been used to serve someone. A lot of people by the look of it. Up ahead are where the kitchens and larders are. I tell you, Kade, we have throne rooms back home that are smaller than these things. Whoever this place was built for was someone special, that much you can be sure of.”

“Like…an emperor, or something?”

Scrubby shrugged. “You’re the cren, not me. I have no idea who or what humans worship.”

“Well…I can’t imagine it’s much different than gnomes. There are important people who some worship, and there are all kinds of religions…”

Scrubby made a disgusted sound. “Ugh. Can’t have too few of those.”

“Not my cup of tea, either. But…a lot of people need stuff like that. The world can be a tough place.”

Scrubby stopped, placing his hands on his hips. “That’s why we gnomes try and avoid it. Do you know what the national slogan of my hometown is? Life is better underground.”

Kade looked around them, looking slightly dejected. “I don’t think this place helps your case at all.”

Scrubby shook his head. “Agreed. Ironically then, this is where we resurface.”

He nodded his head at the ceiling, Kade shining his torch on a wall and a set of stone handholds impacted into the earth that he hadn’t even noticed were there. Kade held his light up as his eyes traced the holds up to a square of light in the ceiling, revealing a wooden trapdoor.

“Where does it lead?”

“You wouldn’t believe it if I told you. You need to see it for yourself. Come on!”

Scrubby leaned his torch against the wall and began to climb up the holds, the flickering flames causing his shadow to jump around against the opposing wall. He pushed up against the wooden door, creaking in agony against the force, and light bombarded them from above. The sounds of birds and the wind rustling through the trees seemed to come at them as if a filter had been removed. Scrubby let himself out and Kade emerged just after. He rested his arms against soft manicured grass as he gawked in amazement at the colorful tapestry around him.

He looked upon the most vast, elaborate garden he had ever seen in his life. Ivory towers and battlements loomed in the backdrop, glinting like porcelain in the light while bronze-plated domes and spires were aflame, as if made of the golden sun itself. A cobblestone path meandered throughout immaculately kept topiary and hedge work, alive with vibrant colours from flowers and insect alike. He span in a slow circle, taking it all in. They appeared to be in some kind of massive courtyard, hemmed in on all fronts by a superfluously high white wall seemingly made of the same stone as the palace beyond. Whoever the wall was meant to keep out, surely it did its job. And whoever that person was, they must have been important to warrant such a thing, let alone the cost to maintain a property such as that.

Kade slowly treaded along the path, aimlessly, taking in all of the wonder. Though he could not see any immediate pattern to the layout of the grounds, Kade could tell that the design of the path was intentional, perhaps, forming some kind of symbol that only from high above could ascertain. Whatever the case, the paths all seemed to adjoin unbroken only around the perimeter, where they snaked inward among the gardens, each diverging along their own course. In the middle, they seemed to all converge at one great, tiered fountain, in which flowed the most pristine, cerulean water Kade had ever seen. The water was so turquoise, in fact, Kade suspected that dyes may have been employed. Kade made his way toward the fountain where he scooped up a handful of the stuff, inspecting in his hand. Interestingly, the water looked completely normal against his skin. Bland, even. He let the remaining water run off his hand back into the source, shaking off the remaining droplets. He looked up at the carving in the center of the fountain, depicting a humble maiden in ivory, emptying her vase into the pool, out of which ran the main source of the fountain’s continual flow. The statue’s expression was one of permanent lassitude. Kade found himself envying her.

“Must be nice.”

He turned and made his way back through the gardens, looking over his shoulder at the palace beyond. A great set of ivory steps led to a massive veranda enclosing a great set of ornate bronze doors which, unless a giant lived within its walls, were superfluous in every aspect of their design. Adding to the bombast of the place, balconies radiated out all along the facade, hardly a window or bifold without one. Why a place needed so many balconies Kade could not surmise, but he had begun to get the impression that function was not the primary goal of the architect here. But Kade knew the sort; likely, those were all guest rooms, rooms which, he imagined, were larger and more luxurious than any to be found in an average household. For this was not a household for the meek and meager–this was upper crust at its finest. Or worst, depending on how one looked at it.

Kade’s eyes trailed upward, tracing along the vaulted arch of a bronze spire and past to a distant battlement adjoined by two massive, sweeping buttresses which connected to a larger main structure behind–a massive central tower which protruded out of the center, circling upwards as other buttresses connected to it, snaking along the curves of its structure as they wound corkscrew fashion around its length. Two slightly smaller sister towers sat parallel to the main, connected by great floating parapets held only by the strength of their arches and the network of fine ivory webbing–cables–splayed out beneath them. Kade had never seen anything like it before. Judging by the silence of his gnome friend, neither had Scrubby. Thinking of the gnome, Kade looked down to his side.

Scrubby was nowhere to be seen.

“Scrubby?” Kade called but there was only the sound of a gentle breeze and birds chirping in the distance.

“This is no time to play games! Come out now or you’re on your own.”

There was no response. Kade bit his lip as his rage began to boil up.

“Fine! I’m leaving.” He shouted.

He turned to go back to the trapdoor but a hooded figure stood barring the way, looming over him.

“So soon? But you just arrived?” He said, his voice as sharp as a sword.

He whipped his hand out and grabbed Kade by the throat, raising him off the ground. Kade gasped, struggling for air against the man’s iron grip. The man seemed to have no trouble holding his weight.

“H…how did…how did you find…” He struggled to speak as he gasped for air.

The man held up a familiar looking piece of brown fabric in his free hand; it was a piece of shredded fabric from Kade’s jacket–a discard which he must have left back in the alley. Kade’s heart thrummed in terror, panic setting in.

“If a rat wants to cover its trail, it makes sure to leave no crumbs behind.”

The man threw the piece of cloth aside, pulling Kade closer to him. From what little of the man’s face Kade could see, he showed little emotion.

“Who are you and why are you following me? Speak!”

He squeezed harder around Kade’s throat. Kade choked against the brute force, unable to form words. The man jerked him violently into the air, holding him silhouetted against the blazing sun, as if he were trying to press him into its scorching embrace. The angle and the glare from the sun caused the man to turn and shield his eyes with his free hand which, now that it was in between them, Kade noticed was covered in a metallic gauntlet. The cloak fell free from his head, radiant spikes of electric blue hair stuck out from underneath a golden circlet, a single red gemstone glistening in its center. Kade gasped in horror as the familiar face of a nightmare met his gaze.

It was then that Kade knew that destiny had him by the throat.