Chapter Twenty-Six
The Annwyn was vivid. I don’t mean my experience of it—but the actual colors of the realm. The woods were strangely deep and intense, as though the whole forest had been painted by artists who refused to temper their vibrant hues. I spun around, taking it in. The leaves might as well have been cut from actual emeralds. Purple buds on the nearby bushes were so brilliant they almost seemed to glow, and even the sky above us was less of a robin’s egg blue and closer to that of a ripe blueberry, although I could see only a few glimpses of it through the foliage.
The light filtering through the branches danced across my skin in patches of turquoise, flickering suddenly with the flap of wings high above us. All around, the chirps and squawks and constant rustle of wildlife layered into a steady, droning hum. If we had come looking for the land of the dead, it seemed as though we had taken a wrong turn. I had never been anywhere that felt so alive.
Finstern had already wound out of sight, and I hastened to keep up with Jackaby as we hurried after him. The forest was dense with ferns and ivy and all manner of brush, but there was a trail of sorts, where the plant life had been beaten back over time. I read a book once about an explorer in the islands who followed just such a path right into a den of angry wild boars. The only defense at my disposal was my employer’s slim, ivory-handled silver knife, which was tucked in the pocket of my skirt, its sheath slapping lightly against my leg as I ran. The weight of it was a faint comfort, although it began to feel more and more like a letter opener and less and less like a real weapon the longer I thought about the sharp tusks and gnashing teeth that might lie ahead.
Here and there massive red stones littered the landscape. Some of them stood twenty feet tall, tilted upright like great crimson monoliths. As we passed by one of these, a glimmer of something white as snow just behind it drew my attention. I looked again, but there was nothing beyond the stone but the darkness of the forest. Another hint of white danced in my peripheral vision, but vanished the moment I turned my head. I shook my head. The forest was playing tricks on my eyes.
Gradually the trees thinned and the ground grew thick with a tapestry of roots. Braids of living wood wove like heavy ropes in and out in inscrutable almost-patterns, overlapping and widening until each was so thick my fingertips could not have touched had I encircled one with both arms. At the center of it all was the largest living thing I have ever seen.
The roots spun around and around each other, coiling upwards until they melted into one trunk. It was a yew, though no ordinary tree had ever grown so massive. Its bark was a rich, raw umber, and the base of it was wider than a city block. Its branches stretched forever, until they seemed to fade away into the deep blue sky.
“They’re like conduits,” said Finstern from directly behind us, his Welsh accent colored with unmasked awe. “A battery of living cables. The earth as a single power cell. Genius, really. The principal is so simple. Can you not feel the energy field, Detective?”
Finstern climbed forward, stroking the bulging red-brown roots like a stable master might pet a prize stallion. Jackaby did not respond right away, but I had to admit there was an intangible energy about the place that sent prickling goose pimples up my arms like static electricity.
“There.” Jackaby pointed toward the base of the impossible tree. A hundred meters off, nearly enveloped by the roots, two of the mighty red stones we had seen along the way stood like roman columns on either side of a deep knothole in the trunk. “That’s where we’re headed.”
We clambered over the curling, weaving landscape. Jackaby was struggling over a root nearly as tall as he was when I caught sight of a patch of milk-white fur near the edge of the surrounding forest. It vanished again the instant I locked eyes on it, but I was certain I had seen it this time, a solitary shock of pure white in an oversaturated canvas of colors.
It occurred to me that spotting wildlife in a forest was not so peculiar. What was peculiar was not spotting any. The clamorous buzz of animal life had gradually died away as we neared the tree. Aside from that skittish beast, the fauna seemed to have given this tree a wide berth.
I was peering into the shadows in the underbrush and not watching my footing when my next step abruptly landed on nothing at all. I half dropped, half slid almost straight down, landing on my backside in a deep valley in the roots. The gap appeared to be natural, the coils of the yew simply having grown around the space, rather than showing any signs of having been cut or trampled. It formed a clear, straight path of dry earth, leading directly toward the crimson pillars.
Jackaby and Finstern joined me with slightly more finesse, and together we walked the last few yards toward the red pillars at the base of the tree. It was difficult to tell just how deep the knothole between them went. The wood formed a slit about three feet across at its widest and nearly as tall as myself. If it weren’t for the red rocks on either side, my eyes might have dismissed the opening entirely as just another dark shadow in the unfathomable mess of intertwining roots.
“Watch your step,” said a deep, dry voice.
I froze. Jackaby and Finstern drew up on either side of me. A little trickle of water snaked along the path, disappearing into the shadows at the base of the tree. I squinted.
There, amid the sprawling roots, sat a man. He wore ragged, red-brown robes and was leaning on his elbow; his back was hunched over the little flowing stream. We stepped forward cautiously, careful to skirt the trickle as we neared. The man was gaunt and almost as pale as Pavel. He held a bright green leaf in his slender fingers, lifting it over and across the water. His fingertips never quite reached past the edge of the shadow, but the sun shone bright on the very tip of the leaf. He touched it to the earth for a moment, and then brought it back, lowering it to the ground again on the shady side. He repeated the motion rhythmically.
As we closed the gap, I could finally make out a long line of ants leading up to the rivulet. With each pass, the thin man scooped up one or two ants and helped them over the trickle to the shaded side of the water, where an identical line was already marching steadily into the darkness of the tree.
“Why are you doing that?” Finstern asked.
“Because,” said the man, his voice deep and rough, like the grating of heavy stones, “it gives me purpose.” He pushed himself up with great effort and stood. He was bone thin, with eyes shrouded in black shadows that only added to his skeletal countenance.
“Charon, I presume?” Jackaby stepped forward. “It’s an honor to meet you.”
“Not especially,” replied the man. “Everyone does. Eventually.”
“Yes, well,” Jackaby said. “Expected or not, it’s still a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for most of us, isn’t it?”
“The end of it,” the man agreed.
“With just a few exceptions, of course. I imagine it’s been a long time since anyone chartered a round trip, though. Who was the last mortal you met who hadn’t shuffled off the old mortal coil? Herakles, Orpheus, Persephone?”
“Jack.”
“Ah. Also good. I expect you’ve met a few of those, haven’t you?”
“There are rules.”
“Rules?”
“The four of you seek passage. There are rules.”
“Three of us, Mr. Charon, sir,” I said, instantly wishing I hadn’t spoken. “Sorry—Charlie stayed behind.”
“Four,” repeated Charon. He looked at Jackaby meaningfully. “The bag.”
“What?” Jackaby stumbled for a moment, but then caught on. “Oh!” He retrieved Jenny’s brick. “Oh, this? I’m afraid we had a bit of a rough situation earlier. I don’t think Miss Cavanaugh will be joining—”
“She is here.”
As he said it, the roots around the gap seemed to quiver in the same way the pipes on Jackaby’s boiler rumbled when it was bubbling to life on a cold morning. In a blink, Jenny was suddenly standing beside Jackaby. She gasped, looking as surprised as the rest of us.
“Jenny!” I said. “Are you all right?”
“Where on earth . . . ?”
“No,” Charon answered her flatly. Finstern gaped and stared at the ghost, peering at her this way and that as a jeweler might a rare diamond. She was still translucent, the faintest outlines of the roots beyond her visible through her silvery features, but she looked more whole than I had ever seen her. Charon’s haggard head cocked to one side. “What else is in the bag?”
Jackaby’s eyes darted to Finstern and back to the robed figure. “Odds and ends,” he hedged. “Some odder than others.”
“It is a wrong thing.”
“Which is why I’m keeping it out of the wrong hands.”
Finstern, whose mouth had been open since Jenny’s arrival, finally made use of it. “Wait. My machine? You have it?”
Jackaby frowned and sighed. “Yes. And my abode has suffered greatly for its safekeeping.”
Finstern eyed the satchel suspiciously. “It can’t be. Your bag is much too small.”
“You said you studied Welsh folklore. Ever heard of Rhiannon? You see, she had a sack—”
“Gentlemen,” I interrupted. “I believe we’re getting a bit off topic, don’t you? You have very nice toys, both of you, but we are at the gates to the great abyss right now.” I turned toward Charon. “Or knobby wooden hole to the great abyss. You were saying something about rules?”
“No second chances,” he said. “That is the first rule. You may ask for time, you may ask for favors, you may ask for mercy—but you are given what you are given. Make the most of it. It is all you will get.”
“Understood,” said Jackaby.
“Nobody enters the gate. This is the second rule.”
“You might have opened with that one,” Jackaby said. “Why have a gate at all, then?”
“Doesn’t everybody enter?” I asked. “Like you said, eventually?”
“No. Everyone enters. Every soul, but no body. If you enter, you must leave your flesh behind you.”
“Well then,” said Jenny. “For once I think I’ve got a leg up on the rest of you.”
“You may enter if you wish, Jennifer Cavanaugh,” Charon’s voice rumbled. “But if you do, you may never return to the land of the living. You belong below. You are a soul without a shell. Heed the first rule. This is your chance, your reprieve. You will not be given another.”
“It’s fine,” said Jackaby. “You stay topside. I’ll bring the answers back to you.”
“Only mortals may pass. This is the third rule.”
“Yes, that’s all right. I am mortal,” said Jackaby.
“You are, but a part of you isn’t. Within you dwells a force unending. You may pass. You might return. Your gift will not. You cannot take it with you.”
“I wouldn’t be the Seer anymore,” Jackaby said. “I would be technically dead. The sight would move on to its next host.” It was hard to read my employer’s expression, but some part of him seemed to be legitimately considering the notion. “I would be free.”
Charon pointed a long finger at the inventor, who flinched. “For you it would be less pleasant. You too possess a spark of immortality, Owen Finstern, but it is woven through your core. The fair folk cannot enter. Should you attempt to cross over, your soul would be torn in two. I do not know if any shred of you would survive.”
“I wasn’t volunteering,” Finstern replied.
“It’s me, then,” I said. My stomach fluttered. I had occasionally felt inadequate in the company of my extraordinary friends—like a rough stone among gems. I had always felt boring. Normal. Now it seemed my normalcy was what we needed. “I’ll go.”
“Abigail,” Jenny said.
“No,” said Jackaby. “It’s too dangerous. I won’t allow it.”
“You don’t have much choice, though, do you?” I said. “It’s me or it’s nothing. They’ve killed so many people already—more than we know, Pavel said—and a lot more might be coming. We need to know who’s behind all of it. I can find out.”
Jenny floated close to me. She reached her hand to my face, and I felt the faintest cool breeze on my cheek. “You’ve already done so much, Abigail. We can’t ask you to do this, too.”
“It’s good that you don’t have to, then. I’ve been digging my way into the ground my whole life, looking for that profound discovery that no one else has ever seen. Doesn’t get much deeper than this. It’s my choice. It’s my adventure. I can find us the answers we need. I’m going.”
“No,” said Jackaby.
“No,” said Charon.
I turned back to the ferryman. “Wait. No?” I said.
“You may not enter until you have severed your ties. This is the fourth rule. You may carry over no tethers connecting you to the world of the living, neither physical nor metaphysical.”
“That’s ludicrous,” I said. “Of course I have ties to the world of the living. Everyone I know lives in the world of the living.”
“You are permitted your emotions, Abigail Rook. You are not permitted a channel.”
“A channel?”
“Your pocket.”
I drew the silver dagger from my dress. “This isn’t a channel. It’s just a knife.”
“Your other pocket.”
“I haven’t got anything in my other—” My fingers closed around a cool, round stone etched with simple, concentric circles. I drew it out. “Oh! How curious. I don’t even remember bringing this.”
Jackaby stepped toward me. “Where did you get that?” he asked.
“Pavel gave it to me when he gave me the sketch of Mr. Finstern. I must have already shown it to you—didn’t I?”
“You most certainly did not.” He produced a little red pouch out of the inner pocket of his coat and opened it. The lining on the inside glistened like silver, but it was empty. He held it toward me at arm’s length. I plopped the stone inside, and he pulled the strings taut quickly, as though he were capturing a live squirrel and not a lifeless rock.
“Why? What is it?” I said.
Jackaby scowled hard.
“It has to have come from the council!” I said. “Charon says it’s a channel. A channel to what, exactly? To whom?”
“I don’t know,” said Jackaby. “But I would very much like to.”
I swallowed. “All the more reason to get those answers. Don’t worry. I’ll find Lawrence Hoole. He was at the heart of the council’s project. He’ll know more about those villains and what they’re building than anyone.”
Jackaby tucked the stone—the channel—away into his coat. “Wait.”
“Sir, I appreciate your concern, but you can’t fight every battle for me.”
“No, I can’t. But I can give you this.” He took my hand and pressed into my palm a little leather purse. It was a dull gray-brown.
“What’s this?”
“Four obols. They’re ancient Greek currency. A number of cultures have traditions about paying the ferryman. Also, I packed the most appropriate relic I could find on short notice. You’ll find a small length of petrified string inside. Sheep’s gut, really. It has been passed down for a great many generations under the assumption that it was once a piece of the last lyre Orpheus ever played. I can’t verify that, of course, but it does have an aura of divine contact, so it’s entirely possible.”
“Thank you, Mr. Jackaby.”
“One more thing,” he said. “The dead don’t generally keep things in their pockets. It’s traditional to . . .” He gestured to my face.
“To what?”
“You’ll need to hold it in your mouth when you cross over.”
“Lovely,” I said, eyeing the faded leather.
“Do be safe,” Jenny said.
“Don’t worry. I’ll be careful.”
I tucked the pouch into my mouth as I stepped forward. It tasted like a salty strap of used boot leather. I tried very hard not to think too hard about the shriveled strip of gut inside it.
“Are you prepared?” Charon asked.
I nodded.
“Then come with me.”
I stepped across the little trickle of water, moving out of the warm sunlight and into the cold shadows. Nothing happened for a moment, and then my legs buckled beneath me.
It was suddenly dark. I was falling.
And I was dead.