Penult (The Liminality, Part Four)

Chapter 41: The Cracker

I found myself prostrate and naked in a walkway in the middle of the warren next to the vacant plinth where I had faded. Little strips of glowing root had been placed here and there to mark certain entryways, but it was way too dark for me to make sense of this maze and find my way to my quarters.

Something slithered against the paving stones across the way where it was too dark to see. I noticed my sword glinting on the plinth. I grabbed it and hopped to my feet, stalking the critter before it could get away. I pounced and impaled it with my sword.

“Gotcha! You fucker!

It was my hoodie, which had half reverted back to roots and was crawling around the corner, attempting a getaway. I snatched it up and went a little farther down the alley where I found my pants attempting to climb a wall like some octopus trying to escape a fishing boat. I wove both back into submission with a few twirls of my sword tip and pulled them on. With the chill breeze and all, I was grateful for some clothes.

I left the warren and skirted its outer wall, heading down towards the rim and the main stairway. Down there would be the mats that Olivier had set up for me to nap. I could catch a few winks and then choose a saddle for my new dragonfly in time to meet Urszula up at the meadow for my flying lesson.

I was looking forward to riding Tigger, but also a little nervous about what would come next. The sooner I learned to fly the sooner we would leave for Penult, the place that spawned all these Cherubim and Hashmallim and Seraphim that were tearing up this place. I couldn’t help but feel a little bit afraid.

My glimpse of Karla in that Singularity dream—if indeed it was a dream—still unsettled me. I should have felt relieved that she seemed healthy and uninjured, that she was free, not under any kind of threat, but I couldn’t help but be unnerved.

What was she doing? Where was she? Had she been taken and escaped? Was she looking for me or running from me?

Something about it made me all queasy inside. I felt somehow betrayed. Why was I risking my butt going to Penult? She had wanted me here and now here I was. Why hadn’t she come and found me? Was she too happy now for the Liminality? Being away from me? I mean, what the fuck? How was that supposed to make me feel?

This was one of those times that made me relate to those lonely young men in those train stations. No place to go. No one coming to meet them. No one awaiting their arrival.

I was feeling as low as I ever did in this place. If I could have crawled into a pod and fed myself to a Reaper, I would have at that moment.

The Old Ones manning the stony fortifications at the rim barely glanced at me as I passed. Their stony silence should not have surprised me but it spooked me nonetheless. These souls had ways of communicating with each other that went beyond words. I could feel the probing of stray wisps of consciousness, but I was not quite receptive enough yet to engage them.

A detachment of Frelsians guarding the stairway to the lower terrace were more receptive to my presence. They were clad in that soft and clingy armor of theirs. Their root lanterns were dimmed to near imperceptibility, a mere suggestion of light than any functional radiance.

“And where might you off to at this hour, young man?” said a barrel-chested man with a weapon that looked like a cross between a pole axe and a ridiculously long shotgun.

“Grotto,” I grunted, almost inaudibly.

One of the guards nudged his comrade. “This is the Moody fellow, mate,” he whispered.

“For true?” said a third guard. “The James?”

The first guard clasped my shoulder.

“So good to have you with us, son. You take care down below. Word is the Pennies are sending bands of infiltrators up the cliffs. Cherubim. Hashmallim. Snipers and raiders and such. The armory is well guarded and we have patrols all through the viny woods, but some still manage to get through. That’s why we’re here. Can’t always depend on those Old Ones. Doesn’t seem like they’re awake much. What’s your business down there? If … you don’t mind me asking?” He scrunched his brow.