The Dickens Mirror (48 page)

Shite!
His head went airless, and he thought,
That’s all right, Doyle. Go on, pass out now, boy-o. Take a bit of a kip. Been a long day
.

“Five pieces for a fadge.” When the hag leaned close, the blank of her face churned. “
Hate
if you’ve an—”

Let me, poppet
. Black Dog’s massive head flickered out of the corner of Doyle’s eye as it leapt. Quick as a lick, the hag was on her back. There came a ripping sound of wet cloth, and then a spume of purple blood.

Horrified, Doyle’s jaw unhinged, and he might still have screamed except for something he noticed that gave him pause.

They were in a crowd—and yet no one stopped. The stream went on, with no more care for him or Black Dog or this dead
hag than if they’d been boulders around which the crowd had to part in order to be on its way. In this small eddy, this transparent pocket about which the outside world—if this was a reality at all—flowed, time was at a standstill.

There we are
. Black Dog held the ragged, dripping meat of the hag’s throat clamped in its mouth. Then, with a flip of its head, it swallowed the steaming, bloody chunk in a single gulp as, all around, the crowd swarmed. Turning, Black Dog threw Doyle a wink.
Not to worry, my darling
. It set off, oiling around the hag’s still-twitching body, threading the needle of a path through the faceless swirl of bodies.
Follow me. I know the way
.

I see Black Dog, really
see
it
. How? Why? Bending against a slash of wind, he plodded, leading the faceless horse. Sweat leaked from his scalp to soak into his high collar.
I
see
it now when I ain’t never truly
done
before
. The scream he’d stoppered simmered at the back of his tongue.
Whatsat mean?

Either Black Dog didn’t hear or felt no need to reply. Perhaps all for the good, that.

Time … passed. Or maybe it hadn’t, and only his surroundings had streamed past in an amorphous blur, like riding a carousel spinning so quickly the world smeared. Whatever the case, at some point they were just
there
, at the asylum’s wrecked front gate, with its ruined guardhouse. That, at least, hadn’t changed. Then another gap in time, and he was traversing the rear grounds. Ahead, the broken edifices of the derelict criminal wings loomed, and then the wide bore of a subterranean entrance seemed to pull apart like a gigantic maw … so he
had
descended … and he seemed to
fade
into this place. Because there were no corridors, no door, no openings carved from stone. Everything—walls, ceiling, floor, even the instruments—was indefinite, hazy,
out of focus. Unformed, as if some god had yet to fashion them from black mud, like the flat fronts on the street, the blanks of the crowd.

And yet, when Doyle thought about it: aside from the wobble and shimmy, Bedlam now seemed the only real, solid thing.

Well … and Black Dog.

“
DO
SOMETHING!” IT
was the little girl, the supposed mute. “If Rima draws any more from Tony, it’ll kill her.” The girl glared up at the woman in black, who stood just beyond the bars. “Do you
want
Tony to die?”

“In this instance, what I want is immaterial.” The woman in black was willowy, with chestnut hair done in a neatly coiffed chignon. Rapt as a vulture, she gave the younger girl a keen look. “What Rima
chooses
is what matters. That’s the way of
all
binding, child, no matter what you call it. It is about free will.”

“Oh,
riiight
.” The golden flaw in the girl’s right eye flashed. “You came after me with an
ax
.”

“Do remember that I didn’t use it on you.”

“Yeah, you only killed the door.”

“As I said.” The woman raised a hand to a nasty purple-black splotch of a bruise just beneath her right eye. “I still want to know how you did that, what that was you went through. And that
cat
of yours.” The woman angled her head in a speculative look. “Quite an interesting creature. Positively Cheshire. Does it often slip in and out of blind spots like that? Do you know where it goes?”

“Blind spots? I don’t know what you’re talking about. I …” The little girl’s grip on Tony tightened as he shivered and
groaned. “Please, he’s
dying
. Why won’t you help him? Do you just want to see what happens when you get too many Tonys in the same place? How’d we even get here anyway? The last thing I remember is those …” The little girl’s lips trembled as new tears leaked over her cheeks. “Those squirmers crawling all over us and you, floating on the snow, just
watching
. You didn’t try to grab me that time, I don’t think. It was the fog, wasn’t it, because it’s energy and somehow you can use it to get around. So did it swallow us after we passed out? Is that how we got down here?”

Ah, poppet, there’s a bright one
. Black Dog’s muzzle brushed Doyle’s fingers.
That talk about too many Tonys, she might be onto something. Could it be that the Tonys are making one another ill? Remember how our Tony was when we first saw him at Bedlam’s gate?

Yes, the boy had been quite sick even then. Did that mean this other Tony
—Future Tony
, he decided—had already been taken prisoner? So draining each other, perhaps? Why? Because there was only so much Tony to go around? Or, as the girl said, too many Tonys in one place? Or had spiriting in a Tony who didn’t belong here, in London, triggered a slow unraveling in both? Yes, but by that logic—Doyle transferred his gaze to that man and woman in the far cell—that woman ought to be ill, too. So it couldn’t be just the mere fact of one too many Tonys.
Has to be something else at play here
.

Perhaps
. Black Dog’s breath was hot on his neck. (God, the animal was huge now.)
Or that woman’s only just arrived, or somehow different from the Tonys
.

“After what happened on the snow, I’m very interested in why you’re
not
infected,” the woman in black said to the little
girl. “Something in your blood, perhaps? Perhaps I ought to dissect you and find out.”

“L-leave her alone.” Drawing in a halting breath, Rima lifted her head. A crimson ooze leaked from a nostril to drip from her jaw. Her bare arms undulated, rife with squirmers, though it seemed to Doyle that their eel and slither over the cliffs of her cheeks was slower, weaker, not as pronounced.
They’re dying?
A part of his mind wondered how she was doing that; maybe some natural resistance?

“You want to s-see how much more I can draw?” Choking, Rima spat, backhanding a gobbet of coagulated blood from her mouth. “I w-will. Just n-need to rest a bit, that’s all.”

The woman let out a small laugh. “That boy needs much more than
you
can muster, girl.” Squatting, the woman brought her face close to the bars. Her mouth curled to an avid half-moon. The way she crouched, the woman was like a hungry tarantula or a black widow spider ready to sink its fangs into that plump, hapless little fly. (And Doyle thought,
Yes, Black Widow
. As good a name as any.) “Although I am as intrigued by that ability of yours as I am about why little Emma seems to have left a bad taste in the squirmers’ mouths.”

“So this is just some stupid experiment? We’re
lab rats
or something?” More tears chased down Emma’s cheeks. “You could
help
.”

“You give me too much credit, child. Don’t you think if I’d discovered a cure for squirmers and rot, I’d have used it? Do you think I
enjoy
living in this
Now?
Trust me, if not for my daughter, I would find my way to a
Now
I could seal in some fashion so I might not be swept back.”

“Seal? Swept … swept back?” Snuffling, Emma gave Black
Widow a long, penetrating look. “You don’t have a choice, do you? You keep getting yanked back here, or maybe the fog … the Peculiar … can only go to certain places, like a bus with only so many stops on its route. Otherwise, you’re stuck, aren’t you?”

“Very perceptive. You’re partially correct; I can’t go hither and thither, and yes, I must return. But there are more … stops than before. It is how I finally found you”—a wave of the hand at Future Tony and the rat-faced blond, neither of whom spoke—“and these others and another Rima’s
Now
.”

Another Rima. Two Tonys
, Black Dog mused. Doyle could imagine that devil tapping a paw to its muzzle in thought.
The Nows must be worlds. Given what we’ve seen—and what’s in those sacks, poppet—perhaps there are many more Tonys and Rimas. Since there’s only the one Rima here, that might explain why she’s not taken ill in the same way that our Tony has
.

Perhaps, but that couldn’t be the sum of it all. Doyle’s eyes traveled back to the far cell, and that couple. By the same reasoning,
that
woman should be sick, too.

Unless she is put together differently, like little Emma
.

Put together?
Doyle’s eyebrows tented. He really was getting interested now. What an odd turn of phrase.
And what’s that about Emma?

Listen to her, poppet. Her
accent
.
So different. Where did she come from? How did she get here?

“Well, let us say that our little Rima
had
a doppelgänger. I can’t find her anywhere, and the
Now
is a shambles, the occupants only so much goo. I
believe
this means that
Now
’s Rima was essential. Without her, the
Now
disintegrated and … 
ohhh
.” Black Widow put a finger to her lips. “I wonder, Emma: without you,
will
all
you know fall apart?” She tossed a look at the two boys in the adjacent cell. “Or your
Nows
? Tony there, perhaps; you seem quite important. But you”—lifting her chin at the shaggy blond—“could it be that you’re nothing but a bit player, a vaudevillian of no importance whatsoever?”

“Who cares what you think?” Thin but knotty with muscle, the scruffy young man was quite,
quite
twitchy in a way Doyle recognized. “You think I’m scared of
you
? Put you in a tunnel with a couple gooks, see how you do.” Scrambling to his feet, the young man banged an already torn and bloodied fist against iron. “Who are you? Where am I? Why’d you bring me here?”

“Save your breath.” Inhaling long and tortuously, Future Tony said, “You won’t get answers that make any sense. Just be glad there isn’t another one of
you
here. Goes worse when there is.”

“He’s right,” Emma said. “That’s what Meme told Bode.”

“Bode?” The scruffy boy’s head whipped up. “He’s
here
? Last I saw, he was running.”

“And he got away.” Black Widow’s mouth was a thread above her chin. “But I’ll find him again, probably more easily than before, now that you’re all linked.”

“Linked?” Emma echoed. “By what?”

“So if Bode got away,” the blond said, “who are you talking about?”

“She’s talking about the Bode from
here
,
our
Bode, in this … this
Now
?” Emma looked up at Black Widow. “That’s right, isn’t it?
He
knows Bode’s double?”

“Yes.” Black Widow glanced askance at the far cell, and Doyle saw how she and the man with the black hair and glasses locked gazes before Black Widow returned her eyes to Emma. From the
corner of an eye, Doyle saw the man in the far cell whisper into his wife’s ear. When her head moved in a fractional nod, he slid his hand from her mouth to rest on her shoulder. “And quite possibly there’s more than just the one double,” Black Widow said.

“What?” The shaggy blond scowled. “I don’t got no twin.”

“I bet you do,” Emma said to the boy. “What’s your name?”

The young man dug at a sore pocking the corner of his mouth. “Chad.”

Stirring, Rima pushed up on her arms. “What?”

“Right. If we’re all linked, then it makes sense that you’d know him, Rima,” Emma said. “Where’s
your
Chad?”

“Dead, oh … years back. Drowned by the old Battersea Bridge.”

“What?” Chad’s frown deepened. “What the hell you saying?”

“She’s speaking of your doppelgänger in this
Now
,” Black Widow said. “Well, if he’s dead, less work for me. Be grateful, Chad. It explains why you’ve not taken a turn for the worse as the Tonys have.”

“Hey.” It was Future Tony. Drawing a slow hand across his mouth, he said to Emma, “This
Now
stuff … she’s talking multiverses, right? We just studied that in school. So she’s snatching versions of us from different universes or timelines?”

“Versions?” Black Widow snorted. “A good a term as any. You’re not a person. You’re a faint replica. You only
think
you’re living a life. None of you are even from a proper
Now
.”

“A proper
Now
?” Emma echoed. “What’s the difference?”

“I feel pretty damn real,” Chad said. “This cage is real. What I want to know is, how’d I start the morning in ’Nam and end up here?”

“The fog,” Emma said. “Like I said, she travels in it, or becomes part of it … I’m not sure.”

“But how …” Future Tony coughed red mist, cleared his throat, then spat. “How’d she find us?” he said, breathlessly. “How are we linked?”

“Did you have a dream?” Emma asked. “Before she showed up?”

“Yeah.” Future Tony’s face clenched. “A real bad one.”

“It was all about a valley, wasn’t it? With a lot of snow?”

“Hey,” Chad said. “Wait a goddamned minute.”

“And monsters.” A shudder grabbed the Future Tony for a long shake. “One of them got me,
hurt
me and … 
Jesus
.” The boy squeezed his head as if trying to keep his skull from exploding. “
This
is the nightmare.”

“If only,” Black Widow said.

What
is
that thing he’s going on about?
What was this … this
dream
? Was it an illusion, a fantasy? Maybe a mirage, or a product of the mind’s most macabre imaginings? Doyle’s eyes fell to the examination tables and what lay hidden, cocooned in blankets and snugged in burlap sacks.
Is that what
you
are: nightmares?