Page 41 of Katabasis
A trio of bone-things crouched in formation before her, as if gearing up to take her head and shoulders both at once. It felt suicidal to turn her back on them, but instead of standing her ground she dashed up to the water. She tried not to overstep, but the Lethe’s waves surged unpredictably. Icy water brushed her ankles. She felt a pang in the back of her skull. A sharper pain in her upper arm. Memories fleeing? She could not tell what she’d lost, nor did she have time to probe. She unscrewed her Perpetual Flask, bent down, and scooped as much water as she could. Then she spun about and sprayed it around her in an arc.
Droplets hit the bone-things with a loud sizzle. Instantly they backed away. The water kept on sizzling where it had landed. At this sound even the creatures attacking Peter left off and shrank back, yipping and whimpering in unison.
“Yes,” she panted. “Don’t like that, do you?”
The remaining pack clustered in a huddle. The Lethe water was effective beyond her wildest hopes. She saw whole limbs dropping off, joints disintegrating. The waterdidsomething to chalk, melted and corroded it so that the entire algorithm turned black, withered, impotent. Could it be this easy?
“Back.” She brandished the flask. “Back where you came from.”
All at once the pack coalesced and flung itself at Alice.
She had only time to throw her arms above her face. They landed everywhere else; teeth sinking into her clothes, her shoulder, her side, her legs. Peter shouted her name. Through the mess of bone she glimpsed him back on the shore, hand stretched for hers, but it was too late. Something sharp nipped her hip. She jerked round, and her ankle twisted. Her balance gave, and she and the whole teetering mass splashed backward into the water.
Chapter Ten
Are you all right?” Peter patted frantically at her cheeks. “Alice?”
Alice blinked her eyes open. Peter had pulled her onto the shore. The bone-things were scattered across the shallows, and water fizzed as it sloshed round the chalk. Some bone-things were still moving, trying to get out, but their legs came loose at the joints, and their spines disintegrated vertebra by vertebra. She watched as disembodied fragments kicked, twitched, and then sank below the surface.
Peter grasped her shoulders and shook. “Alice?”
She startled. “Oh. Yes?”
“What’s my name? What’s the date? What is your favorite Beatles song?”
“I’m fine.” Alice frowned. She supposed if she’d lost her memories, she wouldn’t know in the first place. But she at least felt no confusion about who she was, or what she was doing here. She reached for her staircase and found it. She was Alice Law, postgraduate at Cambridge; she studied analytic magick. And Peter was Peter. “Murdoch. Peter Murdoch. Aboveground, it’s—October second. Third, maybe, I’ve lost track. ‘Mister Postman.’” She shook her head. “How do you know my favorite Beatles song?”
Peter slumped back with relief. “You listen to it all the time at the lab.”
“But I use headphones.”
“Your headphones are very loud.”
“You should have said something!”
“It’s all right.” Peter put his hands under Alice’s back and helped her sit up. “You have very repetitive tastes, however. I wish you’d put onAbbey Roadsometime.”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake.”
He stood; she took his hand and hauled herself up. She felt a dizzying rush of blood to her head, but nothing else, nothing to suggest she might have lost some crucial part of who she was. Her temples throbbed, but even worse was the sharp pain in her upper arm. She glanced down, saw the blood tracks and bite marks all down her front, and reeled. “Lord. Oh.”
“Come on.” Peter slung her arm over his shoulder and wrapped one hand around her waist. “Let’s get out of this rain.”
Leaving Desire was very hard going.The storm did not seem to want to let them out. The winds whipped at enormous strengths, and the rain hammered so fiercely that breathing felt like drowning. It took great effort even to stand still, for unless they dug their heels hard into the ground, the gusts kept buffeting them toward the doors of the court. Alice could hardly see where they were going; everything was a howling, wet wall. All she could do was dip her head against the rain and press forward one little step at a time, clutching Peter’s arm for guidance. But then it passed, just as quickly as it had come on. The winds died, the rain lightened; a few more steps, and the sky cleared completely. Alice could still see those thunderous clouds above, divided from dusky light by a neat, straight line.
There they made camp, safely in sight of the Lethe, on the border of Desire and Greed. Peter got a fire going. Alice sat shivering madly, drying herself until she felt like a person again.
She coughed. “Could I have some of your water?”
“Oh—sure.” Peter passed over his Perpetual Flask. “I don’t have rabies, or anything.”
“I don’t think you get rabies from water bottles.” She unscrewed the lid. “We’ll have to share from now on.”
Her own flask had been submerged in the river. Lethe water had gotten into the Pentagrams in its cap, and it wouldn’t replenish any longer.
“That’s all right, so long as we keep together.” Peter cleared his throat. “So. Now that you’ve had a breather, could I just ask some—”
“No, thank you.”
