Page 117 of Blackwicket
In the time it took me to sprint for the stage, William’s Drudge had reconfigured Coppe into its monstrous shape, smaller than Victor’s by a significant margin, crippled in the legs with knees that bent the wrong direction, a barreled chest, and impossibly long arms, thick as railroad ties. This body composition should have made him slow and easy to outmaneuver, but he moved with a berserk determination, a juggernaut.
He stormed toward me, smashing tables out of his way as he went, jolting corpses from their positions where they fell onto the floor and against each other. Victor caught the thing by one backward leg, dragging it away.
When I reached Thea and Jack, I found Thea dazed, as though she’d had too much alcohol. Fortunately, the boy seemed none the worse for wear.
“He made her do too much magic,” Jack said.
The mighty din of the battle continued as I helped Thea to her feet.
“Everything’s sealed,” she muttered drunkenly.
“We go through the portal,” I said to them, buzzing slightly. “The Fiend may be there, but you two are safe. No curses. If something happens to me, you keep going. Thea, you know which Narthex it is.”
It wasn’t the optimal time to ask how I’d discovered that, so she only nodded.
We took off; me supporting Thea with one arm, and her holding Jack’s hand in a vice grip. Victor and William’s monstrous forms were still locked in conflict, each a leviathan. As they clashed, William somehow gained the advantage, taking hold of Victor’s face with a hand the size of a bear trap before its mouth opened into a wide cavern, attempting to devour Victor’s magic.
“Keep going!” I shouted, and Thea and Jack complied, vanishing down the back corridor. I quickly rounded the bar, grabbing the first heavy bottle I came to, slamming it forcefully onto the counter. It took me two swings before it shattered, spilling a wave of acrid-smelling liquor onto the floor where it seeped along the black tile, the grout stained with red. Cora’s blood.
My plan was slapdash, unlikely to work. I’d only shaped magic with this intention as a girl, in a much smaller way, when I’d given my pill bug just enough speed to win a race. I lamented never learning what my magic could really do. I’d used it only for tricks and amusements in Dark Hall before repressing it, pretending it didn’t exist. My lack of practice had abandoned me with unstructured energy, formless and confused, capable only of being swallowed by Victor’s ravenous needs, or released in violent, formless bursts like a scream—exactly what I was going to do now.
I sprinted toward the dueling Drudge, gathering momentum. Drudge were harder to injure, but a distraction was better than nothing. I came upon them in a flurry of furious power, and with a thrust of my arm, I expelled the magic, which acted as a hammer to a firing pin. I stabbed William’s Drudge just below its distended ribs with the thick, shattered end of my improvised weapon.
My strategy worked, and William thrashed, letting Victorgo even as I was knocked off my feet, falling across the lap of a corpse before tumbling to the floor, the body on top of me, a thick black bile dribbling from its mouth onto my neck. A dry retch twisted my insides and I struggled from beneath the weight of the horrid cadaver as Victor kicked Williams’ knock-kneed form over. It had been busy trying to remove the glass and careened sideways. Understanding the odds, Victor sped towards me on all fours, grabbing me up in one arm as he passed, Drudge form tremoring as it struggled to maintain itself.
We reached the dressing room just as Victor shuddered back into his human body, releasing me. We stumbled to where the portal still wavered from Thea’s use of it, her magic not yet completely withdrawn. The awful sound of William’s Drudge clawing its way down the hall, scrabbling to get to us, propelled Victor to shove me into the Narthex. For an agonizing second, I thought he was staying behind. But as Dark Hall materialized around me, he appeared at my shoulder.
“Go!” he bellowed, and I obeyed, frantically attempting to drag the remnants of Thea’s magic along to close the Narthex. But William, Coppe—whoever the monster was—erupted through right behind us as the portal solidified.
The influx of corruption in the magical byways was blood in the water. The Fiend materialized, a ghastly reckoning for our trespass. It took pursuit, its many limbs and faces tumbling over each other, crashing against doors and walls, shaking the foundation of this in-between where worlds had once touched. The gravity of it was terrifying, a force complicating momentum, dragging us closer. My panic erupted, a squall of magic pouring into my plea to Dark Hall, begging it to yield to my will, as it once had long ago when I’d explored and played in its passageways unburdened.
In response, the corridors undulated, corners merging, doorways disappearing with the creak of lumber as it stole theNarthex to the tower ever closer. The portal opening flew towards us, and we were caught up in it like fish in a net.
“Close it!” I shrieked as we emerged on the other side.
Fiona was in Thea’s arms, her reaction too slow. As her magic lashed back, Coppe had already materialized, along with part of the Fiend. It was caught in the portal, half shut, raging against the accidental trap, stretching the edges with pure might, trying to pull itself free.
Fiona had already driven Thea and Jack out of the tower door, begging them to flee.
William stood dressed in Coppe’s body, only a few feet from the grasping tentacles of the Fiend, unbothered. His left eye was a gory hole, bruises spread from his nose beneath both sockets, but the most horrifying aspect of him was the way his skin sat wrong on his skeleton, as if it had been removed then draped back into place by a careless hand.
“Well,” he breathed, pleased with himself, just as two ear-shattering gunshots sounded.
Coppe stumbled backwards, clutching the new set of holes in his chest, blood pouring between his fingers.
He looked up at my sister, who held Victor’s gun in front of her, pulling the trigger repeatedly, though there were no more bullets.
“You bitch,” he gargled.
The Fiend took its opportunity, grabbing hold of Coppe, crushing him back against the wall of the portal, beginning its vicious rending, dragging him through an opening far too small. As the shape of him began to collapse into the hole, his mouth opened, jawbone fracturing as the Drudge roared free. It surged forth, a demon, its many lipless mouths gnashing and drooling curses, teeth long and gray.
The last time I’d seen this horror, its mouths had only been two, but now there were three, a sphere of misshapen howlingmaws. The remainder of its figure resembled what Victor had grappled with at the Vapors, distended and bent. But now that it had no material body, the physical world no longer hindered it, and as Coppe’s remains disappeared, it moved swiftly, engulfing Fiona in a cyclone of nightmares. The Drudge snatched her from the ground where she dangled like a rag doll, gorging on what meager magic still clung to her. It all happened so quickly, I had no time to react other than to reach uselessly as she was pitched aside, her body crashing upside down against the windowsill, feet shattering the panes. She slid down through the glass, lying prone and motionless.
I bolted toward her, tripping on the coiled carcass of a vine, tumbling forward. I was forced to crawl the remaining distance. She was trying to move, her breath ragged. I tucked my arms beneath hers, helping her onto her back, where she coughed, blood rising over her lips in an awful spray. There was no respite, the seething vortex plunging towards us.
Victor stepped into its path, ravaged by what he’d already endured at the hands of his brother’s madness. The Drudge didn’t slow, but changed intention, striving to infiltrate Victor’s defenses, but with paltry results. I realized Victor could do nothing for us but stand there, distracting the Drudge, which seemed obsessed with making a meal of the man who’d matched it.
When its attempted rivening made insufficient headway, it changed tactics, rising into a thunderhead near the arch of the roofline, giant and looming. The Fiend had spread where it could, eager for the influx of cursed magic, just out of reach.
