Page 92 of The Song Rising

Another corner of hell for the brogues. Scion had let a handful of them flee from the terror of the occupation, only to watch them drain into the gutters and leave them there to rot.

My father must have known that it was only the mercy of Scion, and his ability to hold on to a job in their ranks, that kept us from a life like this one. Even before we had left Tipperary, he had drummed it into me that I should never speak my mother tongue, not even in private; nor should I remember the stories my grandmother had told me, nor sing Irish melodies. I should be an English rose. I should forget.

In his own way, he had been trying to protect me. I might learn to forgive him, one day, but it didn’t mean I agreed with what he had done. There was no reason we couldn’t have remembered our past, and our dead, in the privacy of our home.

Nick touched my shoulder, lifting me from the churn of thoughts.

Warden awaited us in a street that splintered off the Cowgate. I felt his eyes on my face, but I made myself a mask.

“The South Bridge Vaults,” he said. “Sometimes known as the Edinburgh Vaults.”

The entrance was a slender archway. Unmarked. It looked just like the entrance to an alleyway; no one would think it was anything else—but I suspected we would never have found it on the map. The mingled stench of fish and smoke came rushing out. We reeled back, coughing.

“Fish oil. The tenants burn it for light,” Warden said.

The passageway was so dark; it was as if a hole had been cut out of my vision. “Here goes, then.” I bent my head a little and stepped in.

Inside, it was worse than I could have imagined. No daylight pierced these corridors of stone.

The ceiling was curved and low. I kept one hand on the wall, my boots scrunching through oyster shells and rat droppings. Stale drafts raised gooseflesh on my arms, but they weren’t what made this place so oppressive. Every pore of the æther here was choked with old, vindictive spirits.

Water dripped from the ceiling, forming pools in the corners. Every so often, a fish-oil lamp would bring a sickly light to the gloom, giving us a glimpse of the dwellers of the Vaults. The amaurotic homeless, asleep inside cramped alcoves in the wall, curled around their few possessions. Children huddled around a tallow candle, playing games with bottle tops and making cat’s cradles with string.

The ceiling squatted lower with every step. Nick’s breathing was uneven.

“I don’t see any auras,” he said.

The last lamp had long since disappeared. I felt the brick outline of another archway and eased my hand into the blackness. A draft scuttled up my arm, lifting every fine hair.

“Wait.” I moved into it. “There are dreamscapes somewhere below. I think there’s—”

The wall gave way beneath my hand, and my boot plunged into nothing.

Some merciful reflex made me twist instead of toppling forward, sparing my head as I crashed on to a slope. I was slithering into an abyss, heels and hands tearing at smooth walls, gasping the air that rushed up to meet me. Rough stone nicked my cheek. More grazed my hip and thigh before my left side smashed through wooden boards. I fell with them, slammed into a rock-hard floor, and rolled to a painful halt among the fragments.

For a long time, I didn’t move for fear that I had broken something—then the golden cord vibrated, shocking me enough to make me breathe again. I gritted my teeth and pushed myself on to my elbows.

“Dreamer!”

Nick’s voice was somewhere above me, echoing in the pitch-black. Dust shot into my nostrils, and I sneezed. As soon as I got to my feet, my head cracked against stone, buckling me again.

“Bloodyshitting fuck—”

“It sounds as if she is alive,” Warden said.

I directed a dark look toward the ceiling. “I’m fine,” I called. My hand scraped against a wall. “But I can’t see a thing.”

A shard of light flashed past, giving me a glimpse of the boards I had come through. A sign readingTYPE E RESTRICTED SECTORlay among them.

“Perfect.” I leaned against the wall. “I always wanted to die alone in a Type E Restricted Sector.”

“What?” Nick shouted.

“It’s a Type E—”

“Paige, you know that means the structure is unstable! Why aren’t you panicking?”

“You’re panicking enough for both of us,” I sang.

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