Spliced

Coal moved fast through the hallway. He was fitter than she’d have expected for an aristocrat. But when he paused at a cross-way she realised he was breathing heavily.

“Which direction did you last say you saw the others in?” he asked.

“Um...” Indi was about to answer when an inhuman roar sounded from nearby.

Both of them froze but there was no sign of the source of the sound.

“There’s a door here,” Indi remarked eventually. It was hidden, blended against the wall, just a thin line and small knob that looked just like another piece of the wall. She’d only noticed it because they had stopped.

The door kicked up a layer of dust so thick Indi couldn’t help but cough. Her breath caught in her throat when she saw the room and what it contained, which caused her to accidentally suck in a cloud of exceptionally woolly dust spurring an almost full on choking fit.

This prompted Coal to whack her on the back helpfully a few times as he stepped past her into the room.

The action was effective and Indi managed a mumbled, “I’m fine,” in a squeaky voice.

Coal chuckled at her optimistic tone as he poked a life-sized antelope gently with the tip of his sword. It didn’t move so he gave a soft “hmm,” and continued warily forward. He glanced back quickly to check that Indi was following.

He didn’t need to tell her twice. As creepy as it was to venture forth into an obsessive taxidermy collector’s den she wasn’t about to become separated from him now that she’d finally found someone in this freaky deaky hellhole.

She shivered. There was something not quite right about all the eyes. And given they sort of resembled that thing that had chased them earlier she was half worried they were going to come to life any minute, just like the statues. Coal seemed to be thinking the same thing.

He stopped in the middle of the room. It was so fast and Indi was following so closely that she walked right into him.

“Sorry,” she mumbled, but he paid her no heed. “What is it?”

“I can’t see a door, an exit.”

“Perhaps it’s hidden.” Indi peered around the room, hoping they could find a different room soon. The gaze of an entire forest and even a couple of fish were on her.

“Maybe.”

Then Indi spotted it, half hidden behind a standing grizzly. “There.” She pointed.

Coal nodded and started toward it. Indi was close enough to him that she could see his main focus was on the bear, so to help out she kept a look out for anything else that might pose a threat.

As Coal stepped past the bear his foot accidentally knocked down a stuffed hare. There was a small crash as it caused a domino effect.

That was when Indi saw it coming for her, mouth and eyes wide, it’s skin a blood red on white. Without thinking and with a strangled yelp, Indi turned and fled back the way they’d come, out through the little door and continued through the intersection they’d been considering. She ran as fast as she could. The sound of footsteps beat hard in pursuit.

She heard Coal shouting after her and a part of her knew it was just him behind her but she couldn’t make her legs stop. Eventually she ran past a ladder. She reached out and grabbed a hold. It was enough to slow her down. She spun behind it, still holding on, and looked back to see that it really was just Coal and not that thing. Taking deep gasping breaths, and with her sweaty palms still gripping at the wood of the ladder, she slid down to the floor, and pulled her knees tight up against her chest.

“Indi?” She felt warm hands clutching gently at her wrists. Coal’s concerned voice asked, “What’s wrong, what did you see?”

She was breathing too hard to talk.

Just like earlier, Coal summoned an inhaler and held it out for her.

She shook her head and waved it away. She was fine. Her puffing was just from having run so fast. She did notice that it was a different one from the one he’d summoned earlier.

Coal was frowning. Every now and again he’d glance back down the hall to check nothing had followed them.

“I didn’t see anything. The noise was just me knocking over a bunch of stuff. It wasn’t alive,” Coal told her.

Indi shook her head.

“What? You did see something?”

Indi shook her head again. Finally once she’d gotten her breath back she asked, “Where are you getting all these things from?” She pointed at the inhaler he’d summoned.

Coal pursed his lips and gave her a strange look as if amused that was what she was asking.

“I hope they don’t belong to people.”

Coal gave a non-committal shrug and slight tilt of the head. “I’ll return them.” At the sight of her expression he added “They won’t be needed, trust me.”

Indi eyed him suspiciously, or at least she tried to, suspicion had never been her strong suit, and it merely seemed to result in Coal giving her an amused look in response.

“You’re shivering,” Coal noted.

“I just, I just...” Indi nodded, noting that he was right. She wasn’t cold though. “That clown?” she finally asked before daring a look up at Coal.

He raised an eyebrow. “That was just a toy. A creepy one but ..., it fell over when I kicked the hare.”

“I don’t like them.”

“What? Clowns?”

Indi shook her head and pulled her knees closer. Then she buried her face in them ready for the laughter that inevitably followed that sort of admittance.

No laughter came.

When she finally lifted her head she saw a thoughtful looking Coal switching from a crouch to a more comfortable seating position against the other wall.

His gaze traced the ladder upward briefly. When it reached the ceiling he took in a deep breath. Then he looked back at Indi. “You know when I was younger we used to have this full set of armour stationed at the end of the hallway. It terrified me. I always felt like there was something evil inside.”

“Was there?”

“No, just empty armour. I destroyed it with an axe when I was thirteen. But for a long time before that I was so frightened by it, I wouldn’t go in the back two rooms of the house because I had to walk past it to get there.” He looked back down the hall. “I’m pretty sure that clown was just a toy, probably filled with stuffing or paper mache. We could go back and stab it with my sword if you like?”

Indi thought it was a sweet offer but she couldn’t stand the idea of facing it again. She shook her head.

“Mmm, okay, how about up then?” Coal nodded at the ladder.

Indi nodded. “You know, we had a toy clown that sat at the end of our hall. Mum liked them for some reason. One summer a boy from the neighbourhood, just a year older than me thought it’d be funny to animate it. I hid in the shed and when he snuk in after to scare me I hit him with an ore, from our row boat. I didn’t mean to. I thought he was the clown.”

“Sounds like he deserved it.” Coal reached out a hand to help Indi to her feet.

“Mmm, Sly was livid at the boy, and I couldn’t sleep for a week.”

“Sly? Your brother?” Coal asked.

Indi nodded. “Sly eventually convinced mum to hide it away somewhere or something, I’m not sure. She loved it so much I could never bring up the courage to tell her how much it terrified me. Sly always looked out for me though...” Indi trailed off as she saw a figure appear down the hallway. The taxidermy goat thing was back. “Coal...” she whispered as loud as she dared.

He had one foot on the ladder ready to climb but the second Indi drew his attention to the goat, which hadn’t appeared to have quite registered their presence there yet, he stepped back down, grabbed Indi by the hips and lifted her as high up the ladder as he could. “Climb!” he instructed in and equally low voice.

Indi’s last glimpse of the goat thing was of it starting to break into a run. Then she grabbed the ladder and climbed.

Indi burst through a trapdoor onto yet another wooden dust-covered floor. Coal followed close behind, kicking out at the thing beneath him. As Coal slammed the trapdoor shut Indi was already wondering where in hell they’d arrived at now.

This room was dark but as her eyes adjusted Indi could make out some shapes. She saw the outline of a cord hanging from the ceiling; an old-fashioned light switch. She gave it a tug and was surprised to find the lights worked.

She glanced at Coal who was blinking from the sudden light while trying to take in their surroundings.

It was another bedroom. Only, this one actually looked like it had been lived in, once upon a time. Clothes lay scattered on the floor in a corner, some hung haphazardly out of a nearby hamper. The patchwork quilt spread across the bed was half pulled back, as if someone had just gotten out of bed. The faded sheets that were revealed where the quilt had been pulled back obviously had a layer of dust. If someone had lived here it hadn’t been for sometime but they had definitely left in a hurry.

Something banged into the trapdoor from below. Indi gave a jump but was pleased to see that there was a latch which Coal had secured, and so far it seemed to be holding.

Coal stood with his sword out pointing down at the trapdoor. They both stood silent for sometime but no more bumps came.

Indi glanced at the main door to the room and then back at Coal. He gave a nod. For a moment there Indi thought he almost looked more relaxed. Well, she supposed, they seemed to have put that taxidermied monster and the statues behind them and they were now back in the main part of the house. Indi was eager to find the others and get out of here. She thought whimsically of Falco’s warm arms. How she longed to return home to him and curl up in those arms.

She reached the main door to the room and held out a hand, hesitating briefly at the doorknob. Then slowly she pulled the door open and stuck her head around the corner.

She was confronted with the view of a brilliant purple-red sky through several large windows. They’d evidently reached the end of the wing. The sun was out of sight by this point, tucked below the trees. There was enough light to still see but it was fading fast. Indi estimated it would be completely gone within 20 minutes.

“I don’t have a torch,” she lamented.

“Here.” Suddenly the entire landing was lit in a bright white light. Coal was carrying a round almost globe-like thing which gave off light in all directions. A small handle was tucked in one side of it so it wrapped around the fist.

“Is that magic or..?”

Coal nodded. “It was a gift, very expensive, a torch would be more useful.”

“You couldn’t summon a torch?”

Coal shrugged. “I wanted to see if it would work. Like I said, it was a gift. A gift from someone who prefers I don’t have any fun, or anything useful.” Coal mumbled the last bit but Indi’s sensitive ears picked it up.

Indi frowned and studied his face.

He gave her a smile, unreadable. Then she attention switched, drawn to something behind him.

“There are stairs there,” Indi said pointing.

Coal turned. “Indeed there are.”

With Coal leading they traipsed down the flight of stairs only to find a dead end at the bottom. No doors, no windows. Just a wall.

Coal tried his trick from earlier and attempted to see if there might be a secret door but to no avail. They were forced to return to the second floor.

Indi paused at the top to check Coal was still following fearing for one terrible moment that he wouldn’t be there. But there he was. She glanced at the sword we has still holding. “How come you don’t summon a gun?”

“Gun’s are more complicated, harder to summon, plus you have to summon the right bullets too.”

“You can’t summon them in the gun?” Indi asked as she and Coal started to make their way down the only other option, the long second-floor hallway.

“You can, it’s just harder. But that’s not the only reason, a sword is not only simple and thus easier to summon, it’s also better at short range and if you’re not at short range well it’s generally safer to run than to stop and try to shoot back.”

“So it’s actually better to bring a knife to a gun fight?”

“Well, a sword technically, more reach than a knife, but yes.”

“What if you’re cornered but still at a distance?”

“Well then I could summon a cannon or a tank or a rocket launcher.”

Indi stopped with a frown. She turned back to look at Coal “A roc...do you have a tank?”

Coal just gave her one of those smiles.

“Wouldn’t a tank be really complicated?” Indi wondered.

This time Coal didn’t answer and when she glanced back she found she couldn’t read his expression at all.

Feeling somewhat calmer surrounded by the glow of Coal’s lamp Indi’s curiosity came back to her and she stopped briefly to try one of the handles of the doors along the hallway. It was locked.

“There’s no point trying rooms,” Coal told her. “We should find the others.”

“I was just... “ but truthfully Indi wasn’t sure what she was doing. It just felt wrong to walk past so many doors and not see what was inside. Even though she did want to get out of this place there was also something about it that drew her in. She gave a small nod and continued down the hallway.

Musing at the softness of Coal’s encouragement to keep moving, combined with the kindness he’d showed earlier, Indi blurted out without thinking, “I don’t believe the rumors they say about you.”

“Don’t believe what rumors?” Coal asked in the same calm tone, no hint that the statement had bothered him at all.

“What they say about you killing your parents.”

Coal gave a soft, almost surprised laugh. “Why’s that?”

His voice was further back now. Indi turned to find he’d stopped. “You’re too nice.”

Coal laughed again, more of a scoff this time. “You don’t know me at all.”

“You saved me before. Twice,” Indi replied adamantly. Both stood stopped facing each other now.

Coal shrugged. “Maybe I think you’ll be useful.”

Indi frowned and tilted her head to the side. She had expected him to say something like ‘most people would,’ but he hadn’t. There was something about his statement that felt more honest although she wasn’t sure why that would be nor why it would be a good thing. Still she had a gut feeling. And something about it feeling more honest just convinced her more. “Not just that, I know it.”

Coal studied her for a bit.

Indi spoke again. “Amanda thinks it was an accident, and you just let people think you killed them for your reputation.”

“Amanda thinks that huh?”

Indi nodded.

“But she’s too polite to ask.” Coal spoke as if more to himself, a small smile tugging at his lips, but Indi didn’t miss the jab at her.

It was at that point that Indi finally considered if these questions might be too personal too ask. She was posturing on continuing with the line of questions when Coal broke the silence for her.

“Well she’s right, in a way, but so are the others.” Coal nodded down the hallway and started to take a step forward as if that were the end of the conversation.

“What did happen?” Indi blurted out.

Coal paused, placed his foot back on the floor, turned to face her, and then smiled. This one was a sad smile. He didn’t seem mad at her for asking but the expression on his face did make Indi feel a little guilty. He looked down at his hands held out in front of him. “You ever had that experience where you think you’ve come up with something new but really it’s just something you’ve seen before, maybe even in a dream?”

Indi nodded.

“I was angry with my parents.” He shook his head and gave a short sad laugh. “I don’t even remember why. What the reason was. All I remember is being angry. I imagined a creature coming out of the nowhere and attacking them, taking my revenge. I was very young, not so young that I shouldn’t have known better but the kind of young where there’s a disconnect between action and consequence. I imagined this creature hurting them, killing them even, but I never imagined what that would actually mean. I imagined them coming to me afterwards and saying sorry, realising what they’d done and everything being alright again. It doesn’t make sense but of course this was all imaginary.” Coal paused for a moment there. “Except it wasn’t. There are creatures that live in the darkness. Real and summonable. I must have seen them in a dream or past life,” Coal laughed at that. “I don’t know. I got my wish but it wasn’t quite what I wanted.”

Indi was about to tell him that it wasn’t his fault when he suddenly pushed her aside. She hit the wall hard and for a moment was confused. But then she saw something shiny and bloody pull back from where she’d just been. There was a clang and when she looked down to see what it was a dagger lay on the floor. Further along the lamp globe came to a stop.

Coal was clutching at his side, doing somewhat of a poor job of stemming the obvious blood flow since his own weapon was still in the same hand trying to fend off something unseen. He grabbed Indi with his free hand and pulled her along.

“Move,” he commanded. Indi didn’t ask twice. She let him pull her down the hall and into a room. He shut the door behind them. The windows were boarded up and the place smelled musty. It appeared to be an office of some sort. In front of the windows a large solid wooden desk was covered in newspapers and old books. It reminded her of Wolf’s place a little. The air was stuffy and it made it almost hard to breathe. She focused on not panicking and gasping for air least it bring on an asthma attack. Once she felt that she was okay she turned to Coal who had his shirt unbuttoned and was inspecting the wound.

The last rays of light coming through the gaps in the boards on the windows was minimal and Coal hadn’t resummoned a new light but there was just enough visibility for Indi to make out the cut that pierced his lower left side. There was a lot of blood but Indi had read enough of her brother’s medical text books as a curious teenager to know that things often initially looked worse than they were. It was seeping rather than gushing and the flow already looked like it was slowing.

“Are you alright?” Indi asked, feeling slightly guilty for her thoughts as she couldn’t help but note how toned his stomach muscles were. For all the suits he wore she’d never thought he would also be so fit.

Coal didn’t look up from his inspection. He nodded. “It didn’t go in too deep and I don’t think it got anything vital. Managed to shift back just in time.”

“You should put pressure on it.” Indi instructed.

Coal nodded, held his hand out flat. Immediately a dark towel appeared in his hand. He placed it to the wound.

“What was that thing?” Indi asked as she looked around the room warily, half expecting another attack.

Coal shook his head. “Don’t know, it just appeared out of nowhere. There was some movement in the air, like there was something there but I couldn’t see what it was. It was like looking at an incoming wave without the foam. That and a glint of steel.”

“Do you think it will be back?”

He looked up at her. “Don’t know. We probably shouldn’t hang around too long to find out.”

Indi nodded. “What about the others?”

“Where did you last see each of them? Run me through it.” Coal asked in a quiet voice as he gave a quick cautious glance at the closed door before focusing on her.

Indi explained from the start, how they’d split into two teams. How her team of four had found the portal door. How she and Wolf had gone up the ladder.

“You know, now that I think about it, he seemed really unsettled for some reason.” Indi explained as she thought back on Wolf’s reaction to the cupboard in the wall.

“Unsettled?”

“Yeah, like, like he was afraid of something. But Wolf’s usually pretty calm.” As she spoke, Indi couldn’t help noticing how calm Coal was. Even with the blood on his clothes he still had poise. It felt more like they were having a conversation at a party. She hoped whomever had made that suit had charged a pretty penny for it. They deserved every cent. Whatever the fabric was it didn’t seem to crease or hold dirt at all. Then again the dim lighting probably helped. She found his demeanour reassuring. She had the vague impression that someone else might have found it an uncanny calm but for her it was perfect. Even the way his eyebrows knotted, he could have been the stock photo for a man mid-thought.

His gaze slid sideways to look at the door again.

They were silent and so was the house. It was during this silence that Indi realised there was something wrong about the light. She walked to the dusty window and rubbed away the dust so she could peer out. Somehow they were up three stories now. The disorientation made her head spin and she put out a hand on the pane to steady herself.

“Are you alright?” Coal asked.

“Did you..., wasn’t the sun lower before?” she asked.

He was silent and for a moment she feared she would turn around and he would be gone but then she felt breath on her neck.

“That is interesting,” Coal said from right behind her.

She turned but he’d already moved away. He was pacing the room, studying their surroundings. “What do you know about this house?” he asked.

“Not much, an old lady lived here, apparently she was crazy. That’s not the elementals doing that to the sun right?”

“No,” Coal replied.

“I didn’t think so, I was pretty sure they couldn’t control the sun.”

He paused his pacing. “No but a luminary can, at least locally. The light we see isn’t necessarily the light that is given off. There are plenty of other powers that can warp perception as well.” He walked to the window and peered out. Then he turned and she noticed him wince a little.

“You really didn’t research this place before coming in it?” Coal asked.

“We researched it. There just wasn’t that much on it. Some crazy lady who liked to keep adding bits to her house. And none of the kids want to keep it. There was supposedly another will and Kass has been trying to find it. We thought we’d help. How did you end up end here?”

“A little birdy told me. You thought you’d find a will in a house this size?”

“I mean...” Indi was about to say that a lot of rooms probably could be ruled out, but as she paused to look around this one, she realised they’d already seen a few potential candidates. “Yeah okay.”

Coal nodded at the door. “We should keep moving?”

“Are we going to look for the others?”

“No cell service right?”

Indi shook her head, wondering how he knew. Maybe he had checked.

“And we have no idea where they are?”

“I mean, Amanda, Kass, and Wolf are probably somewhere in the north-east wing...” she trailed off as Coal raised his eyebrows at her. “We can’t leave without them.” Indi finished.

“I wasn’t planning on it. We know where you last saw Wolf but we barely escaped there with our lives. Amanda and company are in the other wing but they can probably take care of themselves for now. So I suggest we go back to where you lost Cat and Zeph then head down to the basement.”

“The basement?”

“When we were in that courtyard, just before we left, I noticed a rune partially uncovered in the sand. I suspect the basement is where Wolf has ended up.”

“Then why don’t we go there first?”

“a) the most straightforward way we know to get there is back through that courtyard. b) did you happen to notice which floor we are on right now?”

“Oh. Yeah, right, sorry, that makes sense.”

Coal gave her a sympathetic look and then leaned back against the table again.

Indi was about to ask him if he was alright when the door to the room suddenly burst open.