Shades of rust and ruin, p.18
Shades of Rust and Ruin, page 18
It’s almost like they’re being eradicated …
Maybe this is why some of the denizens are no longer playing the roles I wrote for them, why they seem so absentminded.
Studying the muddy offshoots in the walkways, I’m reminded of the creeping vines sold at Juniper’s boutique—innocuous plants like wisteria and honeysuckle—that come with a warning to sow them in an isolated patch of ground due to their tendency to overtake a garden.
Jaspar said imagination was like a garden. Is this rust and corrosion the weeds he was referring to?
“Maybe they’re in on it, too.” Clarey gestures to all the wandering fey that step out of our path, as if trying to shake me out of my quiet reticence. “I mean, why else are they clearing the way?”
I frown. “Perish wouldn’t petition the common populace for help. Maybe they think we’re from here.”
As we walk on, a couple of human-size fey with metallic torsos connected to organic legs and arms—long and hinged like those of a cricket—move aside.
“We have metal bits.” In demonstration, I tip my chin at the creatures, and they tip theirs in passing. “Flannie’s leg, my zippered and pierced face, your BAHA. Even your shoes. The pack rats saw the toe tips and called you ‘tinker.’ ”
Clarey nods. “Oh yeah, I didn’t make the connection. The blacksmith gnomes, they’re called tinkers in your stories.”
“Exactly. So everyone here thinks we belong. But this little critter”—I gesture to the pack-rat-faerie-size lump moving around under the cover of his pocket—“no longer does.”
Clarey snaps his fingers. “Right. Because it’s bona fide.”
“Bonbon?” The eensy fae’s voice slips out from the other side of the fabric. The tip of its wings appear, trembling. “Me, Bonbon!”
Clarey and I exchange tentative smiles. “So it has a name now,” he says.
I drop my final piece of scone into his pocket, and the faerie jabbers contentedly. “I couldn’t have thought of a better one myself.”
“As for us looking like them,” Clarey continues while polishing off the rest of his scone, “I’m guessing my mask helps, too. Makes me appear piecemeal like they are. But once your zipper glue wears off or I use the solvent on my prosthetic, the jig is up. So do we have to keep our costumes on the whole time we’re here?” He raises his dark eyebrows, furrowing the latex skin around them.
My stomach crimps. Enough is enough. I have to tell him—though the shock might make him completely unravel.
Our quartet arrives at Eveningside Street. There are only two shops along the sidewalk, unlike in the real Astoria. Both Enchanted Delights and Wisteria Rising stand three times wider and taller than our hometown stores, and both are depreciating at the hand of dribbles that ooze out from the wood panels and bricks like reddish-brown sap. The same sludge that’s beneath the sidewalk and streets.
Clarey starts toward the bakery door.
“Wait.” I drag him into the shadows of the dead-end alley at the side of the building and push him against the brick wall so we’re face-to-face. Placing my gloves on his shoulders, I lean in to look him in the eye. “There’s something I have to do now, because I don’t know when I’ll get another chance.”
One side of his prosthetic lip quirks upward in surprise, and his eyes fill with the daring mischief that always makes my pulse pound. “Seriously? Now?” He shrugs. “I guess we don’t have time to waste, huh?” He grips my elbows and pulls me so close I smell the ginger from his scone on his breath. “Like I told Flannie. Let me take my mask off first so we can do this properly.”
“Oh, Clarey.” I groan, putting space between us so I can fish the glue solvent from the duffel. “That’s exactly what I’m hoping this will do.” I squeeze the tube, aligning the nozzle with what were once the mask’s edges along his chin and jawline.
Nothing changes. Just by looking I know. It’s still a part of him. Defeated, I step back, leaving Clarey to tug at the mask.
“Ow!” he screeches when it won’t release. “What’s going on with this thing?” His hands pause, then in an awful light bulb moment, he trails his fingertips along his features—a blind person feeling their way to illumination. “No. Oh god, no!”
motherboard
We watch. We wait. And we wonder. We turn our ears to listen, lapping up the boy’s cries, gorging on her pain. We gobble their emotions, fill our bellies to brimming … supping on the flavor of life. Uncertainty reigns the closer they gain: no rust rots his toe tips, no sparks light his eyes. He seems familiar, like one of our own, yet we do not know this face. It is a deception, and he belongs because of it. To us, and to her. He has a role to play. Test his mettle; force her hand. She bathed our world in soft summer sands, now let her baptize us in autumn storms. Let the skies cry, and seal the fates of the soulless. For should the clock strike midnight and the world still stand, our battle will be lost.
18
feels like rain
Flannie whines and Bonbon slips from Clarey’s vest pocket to hover beside me, frowning at the rising pitch of his screams.
“Clarey.” I stop his hands where they’ve started yanking at the mask again. “You’re not alone, okay? Just … watch.” I swallow hard, then catch the zipper’s tab on my forehead. It’s something I’ve been afraid to try, but if what I suspect is true, it may help soften the blow for him. My twiggy gloves pinch tight, tips curling like a tree’s offshoots as I tug the metal teeth open. I wince, feeling the air sear my raw, wet flesh.
Clarey’s astonished expression confirms my fear: underneath the hardware is an open wound, oozing with blood. Which means the same is true for the other two zippers on my face. I seal it closed again and shiver against a wave of nausea.
Emotions blink across Clarey’s carved features, ones I’ve already faced myself: disbelief, revulsion, then finally, horror.
“We’ll fix this. I swear. Once we find Uncle, we’ll get back through the portal before it’s gone, and everything will be real again … we will be normal again. I’m sure of it.” I hope I sound more convincing than I feel; my dad’s watch keeps ticking away, as though to mock me.
“Right-o. Right.” Clarey takes a few gulps, then leans forward and braces his hands on his thighs to calm himself. “Until then, you’re a walking piece of luggage, and my head is a jack-o’-lantern.”
The moment he quips the sarcastic words, the orange latex pales and he presses his spine against the wall. Then he’s sliding to the ground and holding his knees to his chest as he shudders with laughter. At first, I’m shocked by how well he’s taking the news. So much better than I expected.
Then it hits me he’s not laughing. He claws at the buttons on his vest, opening and closing his thick latex lips like a fish gasping for water. He’s having trouble breathing.
Sweat beads on his forehead. “My … heart …” He rolls from the wall, flat on his back, still gripping his chest.
I drop to my knees and peel off the gloves. I’ve never witnessed a panic attack; he’s held himself together remarkably well since he’s been back. Now I understand why he feels so vulnerable while having one.
I’ve done research to try to be prepared. I know the symptoms: it can feel like his heart is stopping; there’s sweating, shortness of breath, chills, and so many more. What I don’t know is how to help, because everyone’s different. Why haven’t I ever asked him?
Am I supposed to touch him? Will that make it worse?
“Clarey, tell me what to do,” I say, plucking at the frayed holes in my jeans to keep from reaching out, from doing the wrong thing. “What do I do?”
Bonbon flutters around us, its tiny whiskers quivering in concern. Flannie’s the only one who’s proactive. She pads up to him and lays her body over his, front paws rested atop his hands where they clutch his sternum, bellies aligned. Next, she tucks her cold, wet nose in the groove of his collarbone and whimpers a soothing tone.
I wait, tense and nervous. We need to be finding Uncle, getting out of here before we’re locked inside. Each missed minute stretches out too long, like taffy folding over us and expanding—a sticky discomfort that makes my jaws clench and my teeth ache.
At last, Clarey comes back to himself, nuzzling Flannie’s ears and praising her. What she’s trained to do … what she remembered without hesitation … it was amazing and beautiful. And most importantly, effective.
I sigh with relief. “I’m so sorry I couldn’t help.”
Clarey shakes his head. “You … didn’t know how to.”
“So, is that what you need? To be hugged?” I’m determined to learn, in case it ever happens when Flannie’s not with us.
He sits up, shuffling Flannie’s ears affectionately as she wags her tail.
“I don’t always want to be touched. She has a way of knowing when I do; animals’ intuition or whatever. But her nose, the coldness … it always helps. My therapist used to have me hold an ice pack against my chest. Keeps me from falling into bad memories. Keeps me in the here and now, you know?”
“Okay. Something cold.” I pause, trying to cover my awkward ineptitude. “So all those times I used to pound you with snowballs, I was actually doing you a favor?”
He laughs. It triggers a wonderful moment of acceptance between us—and a calm that’s unfortunately too short lived. Because it’s then I notice Clarey tense up while looking over my shoulder at the eldritch creatures that were ignoring us earlier.
I turn to face them. Drawn by either our emotional outbursts or Bonbon’s agitated hovering, they’ve stopped on the street and sidewalks. They stare our way, grumbling among themselves. The flocks in the sky drift down like falling ash, settling on the gnarled wooden shoulders and metallic antlers of the tallest faeries, the dryads. There they perch—vultures gathering among stark winter trees in anticipation of a feeding. A collective sound begins to emanate from the masses, a chittering hum that evolves to something loud and unwieldy, eerily similar to the giggles of hyenas—yet synthesized and robotic.
Lowering my fingers, I curl them in invitation to Clarey. “Can you get up?”
He fits one hand to mine and holds Flannie’s thick scruff with the other. Trembling, he stands. “This is bad,” he says, his voice steady, considering what just transpired. “You know what happens to pumpkins when the pranksters come out.” He cringes at the maniacal laughter. “They get smashed.”
“Go!” I shout.
Before we can dart around the corner and duck into the bakery, two trolls rush into our path, chomping broken-glass teeth and penning us in the alley. Behind them, more creatures advance from every direction. There’s nowhere left to run.
Then I remember: they’re not just creatures. They’re my creatures. I tamp down the knots in my stomach, reminding myself that I dreamed up everything here; sketched these things to life with pencils, ink, and markers. Gave them breath. Surely there’s some way for me to control them.
I hold up one bared hand, relying on the power it can wield. “Stay back!” When they keep moving, I squat and flatten my palm where cement meets asphalt, to light the world up beneath their feet and throw them off our scent.
“What are you do-ing?” Clarey sing-songs the question nervously as nothing happens. The fey keep inching toward us, heads cocked and teeth gnashing.
“I was trying for a magical distraction.” I peel my hand off the concrete. All that’s left is a rainbow handprint, like a slap of neon graffiti. The effect isn’t widespread as it was with the sands of the beach. All I’ve managed to do is apply a bit of color.
I just can’t figure out the rules here.
The eerie cackles grow louder as the creatures overtake the far side of the street. My pulse skyrockets. In just a few more steps, the first line will be crossing the sidewalk to our alley.
“I hate to rain on your parade, Gandalf”—Clarey grips my elbow and forces me to stand—“but your wizardry isn’t working.”
“I can see that, genius.” I crinkle my nose; even the familiar tug of my piercing doesn’t comfort me now.
Behind us, Flannie growls. The trolls latch onto her fur, holding her in place as she twists and turns, trying to snap at them.
“Scram, you ghouls!” Clarey shouts.
I use my bare hands to jerk one loose. Knocked off balance, it rolls onto the ground in front of me and screeches as if in torment. Within moments it’s transformed by my touch like Bonbon: crinkly aluminum hide reshaping to colorful bony platelets. The scales shimmer red, orange, and blue, as bright as a school of rainbow fish leaping from the water and catching sunlight along their fins. The flesh-and-blood troll scrambles to stand just as its biomechanical counterpart totters toward it. There’s something unsettling and sad in the way they look at each other, perfect reflections, yet not. It’s too much like how I feel when I look in a mirror and see Lark.
The rusted, metallic version beats its chest—a gorilla challenging an interloper. The altered one displays white, sharp teeth. Bonbon drops down, attempting to mediate, only to get waved off like a bothersome bee before the cyborg troll catches its transformed comrade around the neck. The duo tumbles to the ground and wrestles, blocking any chance for us to make a break for the bakery door.
In the same instant, the hyena cackles surrounding us shift to something much more terrifying: utter silence. A feral glint blinks through each oncoming creature’s eyes—fragmented electrical sparks that home in on the altered troll and Bonbon. I can’t decide if they want to capture them, eat them, or punish me for changing them. Whatever the case, Clarey and I are stuck in the middle and it can’t bode well to be in their path as they march forward in sync—like a gruesome parade.
I glance at the sky, catching the orb through sheets of smoke. It feels for a moment as if it’s looking right back at me; and then, an idea lights up my brain.
“A parade … so all we need is rain,” I say, drawing inspiration from Clarey’s earlier mockery. I cast a sidelong glance in his direction as we tighten our flanks with Flannie secured between us. “Time to use your magic, Merlin.”
“What are you talking about?” Clarey backs another step toward the dead end behind us, and I follow—toe to heel, toe to heel.
“I’m not the only one who has power here.” I point at my zippers, reminding him how his creations have become as real as my own. It must mean his imagination works like mine. “You don’t just create masks and costumes. You create music. Use your harmonica.”
He frowns. “These aren’t field mice. They won’t fall for the Pied Piper bit.”
“You’re right. That’s why you’re going to make it rain. Metal and water don’t mix. Now, get your harmonica.”
Dragging the small instrument out from under his shirt, he holds it up by its string. He looks beyond rattled as mere feet away, our fey assailants start across the sidewalk. Shimmery metal tusks, teeth, and fangs snap in rhythm to the click and whir of gears alongside clomping hooves and clacking claws. The winged creatures flap their appendages, still perched on the dryads, but threatening to take flight any minute. The tattoo along my shoulder thrashes wildly, as though the inky lark is desperate to escape my skin’s chains and join them.
Flannie growls low at the approaching masses, and Clarey stands there, watching the harmonica swing in midair, bewildered. “Any requests?”
“Play the song by that Bud guy. That blues guitarist. Play his song about rain.”
Clarey has the audacity to look exasperated. Like I’m the most vexing thing he’s seen tonight. “You mean by Buddy Guy.”
“Really? We’re about to be faerie fodder, and you’re going to quiz me on a stupid name I can’t remember?”
“It’s Guy.”
“Yeah, that guy.”
Clarey groans. “Whatever. You want me to play ‘Feels Like Rain.’ ”
“Yes, that’s the one!” I growl.
“Okay, okay. I’ll try.”
I’m not sure what he means by try. He’s quizzed me with his accompaniment to that song uncountable times over the past couple of years. He never misses a note. He’s a master of the mouth organ.
Then I see him work his lips back and forth, and I understand. It’s something I hadn’t even considered, his needing to adjust to their meatier latex shape—like me trying to draw with gloves or swollen fingers.
“Play it for your mom, Clarey,” I whisper. We’re at the end of the alley, backs against the brick wall, with creatures stepping off the sidewalk in our direction.
Pressing the harmonica into place, he blows. The first effort is shrill and off-key; too airy to carry a tune, but it makes our attackers pause.
Taking advantage, Clarey readjusts his mouth along the harmonica’s holes and begins to learn how the metal fits his new lips. Within moments, his hands and fingers shimmy along the grooves, and he inhales and exhales to push the familiar strain through the brassy reeds—pitch perfect this time.
He taps a metal-toed shoe, becoming engrossed in the melody, just like he always does, just like I hoped he would. He stands at the end of the alley, eyes shut, head tilted to one side, cupping the harmonica in his hands lovingly. He releases his song into the sky, as if sending it up to his mother. The notes bend beneath his mastery, rhythmic and throbbing; they plunge and rise, mimicking the pattern of droplets pinging off rooftops, pelting velvety leaves, and skidding down umbrellas.
And that’s when it happens: each arpeggio and ambling octave becomes a tiny, fluttering thing, like transparent butterflies that disappear into the smoky haze overhead. There, the notes liquidize then fall back down, at first clear like water until they hit the ground and leave glowing, colorful smears behind.
The droplets hiss when they bombard Mystiquiel’s denizens, the polychromatic streams fizzing along their metal parts. The fey crowd backs away, wailing and frightened. Some shield their heads with paws, others spread wings or fan out feathery tails to form makeshift canopies, but it doesn’t stop them from getting wet. Several fall to the ground, left crippled by appendages and limbs that have rusted solid, and though I’m grateful they’re no longer a threat, I can’t help but feel sad for their sickly state.
