The Cold Beneath Read online

  “Only this time it wasn’t Baugham. It was Hart. The man was dead only an hour or so before, but now he stood in the center of our makeshift camp, sifting through the ashes of our pitiful fire, screaming his lungs out. I thought I had gone mad from the cold. But no, there he was, pale as death itself and still soaked in his own blood. Johnson called out to him, and as soon as Hart caught sight of us, he attacked! He went for Johnson, who was unarmed, as was I. I curse myself for not seizing my weapon, but the scream was one of torment, not of attack. We didn’t expect it. Though we should have, I suppose, after the incident with Baugham.

  “In the time it took for me to gather my own weapon, Hart tore at Johnson, ripping him to shreds. I returned and fired upon Hart, but not in time to rescue his victim. When I pushed Hart’s body free from Johnson, the man was bleeding all over, most of all from a wide gap in his shoulder. Even as I tried to tend to his wounds, he waved me off. He told me to flee, to return to the ship and alert the others. To tell you all of how two surely dead men rose from their graves to attack us. I didn’t want to abandon him, but he begged me. He knew he wasn’t long for this Earth. So I did as the dying man asked. I packed the remaining supplies, and I ran back. Only the chasm was more of a barrier this time; I knew I couldn’t cross it on my own. So I took off for one end of it. Turns out the chasm tapered to a smaller gap only a few miles’ journey away. If we had only known, then perhaps we would have avoided all of this to begin with.” He chuckled softly, but there was no humor in it.

  “And you made it back without trouble?” I asked.

  Albert stopped his laughter to stare at me. “I ran for what seemed hours, resting in small bursts. As soon as my energy returned, I would pick up my race again. When I crested a small hill and saw the Fancy resting in the distance, I was overwhelmed with joy. The sight of the ship was like looking upon Heaven itself. I fell to my knees and wept, laddie. I’m not ashamed to admit it. I pushed myself until I got here. Only …”

  “Only?” I asked.

  “Only when I first saw everyone, I didn’t know how to explain it. I was sure no one would believe me. I saw the dead get up and walk. How could I expect you to believe me?”

  I was speechless at the question. Believe him? No, if I hadn’t lived through it, I probably wouldn’t have. And I could guess the others would have had a hard time themselves if they hadn’t heard my story first. I wondered if Albert knew. And why did they believe his tale so readily, yet when I told the same story I was abused and threatened and thrown in the brig?

  As if sensing my question, Lightbridge spoke. “We believe you, Albert, because you are our friend, and have been for many years. We trust you and love you.”

  I shot a burning look to the man. There was no need to insult my integrity. I may not have known them for as long as the Scotsman, but I was always a man of my word.

  Lightbridge continued, saying, “Then there is the interesting fact that our Mr. Syntax here has a similar story.”

  Albert snapped his face to me. “You do?”

  “I’m afraid so,” I said. I gave him an abbreviated version of what happened, which Geraldine gasped in surprise to hear. I had forgotten that she hadn’t heard my full tale, though I suspected, by the way she and the men changed in their treatment of me, that Lightbridge gave them some sort of explanation.

  After I was done, Albert said in a whisper, “Then it is already too late.”

  “It would seem that way.”

  “But a blow to the head kills them?”

  “Yes.”

  “That would explain both Baugham and Hart. You see, I shot Hart in the head when he was on Johnson. It was a lucky shot. Messy at the time, but now I see it were lucky.”

  “But what of Blackman?” Lightbridge asked.

  I was wondering the same thing. Why would one man not rise when so many others had? The answer struck me as I glanced about the room to the remaining men. There were four burn victims, but the other was gone. “What did Blackman die of?”

  “He had a concussion,” Geraldine said. “A beam struck him on the head; he lost consciousness and did not return. I speculate that his brain swelled to bursting. There was nothing I could do.”

  “Of course,” I said. How could I have been so stupid?

  Geraldine nodded her understanding. “The one man not to return died of a head wound. Whatever this is, it stems from a fully functional brain. As long as the brain is intact, the body will reanimate.” She sounded more intrigued than surprised.

  “Just as Morrow did.”

  “Morrow?” Lightbridge asked.

  Geraldine flinched at the name. It was a small reaction, but I made due note of it.

  “Yes,” I said. “I think he was dead when we stored him in the larder. And dead when he returned. I believe that knife severed whatever component in the brain that drives us on after death, letting him come to a final rest.”

  “Then are we all doomed to this fate?” Albert asked.

  No one answered aloud, because in our hearts we already knew. Geraldine returned to patting Albert’s beading forehead. He might have survived his wounds thus far, but there was no telling how long he would last.

  I went to Lightbridge’s side and asked in as low a voice as I could manage, “How much do the men know?”

  “Almost nothing,” Lightbridge said. “Though I am sure they are curious.”

  “They should know. They have a right.”

  “And what, pray tell, should I tell them? That their friends died, then returned to attack you two? They won’t believe us.” He stopped to ponder his own words. “I hardly believe us.”

  “They will believe if they hear Albert’s tale from his own lips. They know him and they trust him. You said so yourself.”

  “Yes, then what? What happens next? Philip, there would be panic. Chaos. These men will not take kindly to such information. Especially when they learn it might apply to them as well. No. We must keep this among the four of us. Ignorance is a bliss of which I will not rob my men. Not until it is absolutely necessary.”

  I remembered the way the men outside the room regarded me with a cautious suspicion. I wondered if they hadn’t been eavesdropping the whole while, if they knew more than Lightbridge gave them credit for. It would serve the old goat right. But at heart, he was sacrificing a great deal to keep them in the dark about the occurrences. It was a tremendous act of kindness to lie to such a trusting crew. What I wouldn’t give to be as uninformed. To be blissfully unaware.

  Yet even ignorance cannot survive in this cold wasteland of unending death.

  ****

  back to toc

  ****

  Twenty-Six

  Blood on the Snow

  Lightbridge got to his feet and announced, “I will gather the men and tell them that wild wolves have set upon us. That explains both of your unfortunate circumstances without burdening the men with too much.”

  “Gideon,” Albert said. “Do you think that’s wise?”

  “I think it is the best course of action for now.” Lightbridge excused himself, making his way to the door and his grand lie. Before he could take a single step, the door flew open and Collins burst into the room.

  “Sir!” he shouted. “Someone is approaching from the south!”

  The room lit with joy as each person shared the same excited thought.

  “The rescue party?” Lightbridge asked.

  “We aren’t sure. There are two of them, and moving very slowly.”

  “Only two? There was a crew of at least twenty waiting for us out there.”

  “We only spotted two, sir. But there could be more on the way. Perhaps they are an advance scouting party?”

  “What I wouldn’t give for a functional spyglass. Two, you say? Show me.” Lightbridge pulled on a heavy jacket and gloves as he followed the man from the room.

  I pulled on my own jacket and took to his heels. Geraldine stood to follow as well, but I warned her away.

  “Stay here
with the wounded,” I commanded. “Albert needs your attention more than we do.”

  “Of course,” she said, then returned to the man’s side.

  Her piercing gaze stayed on me as I left the room to follow the other men. It was so much like her to need to be in the center of the action, as well as attention. But not this time. She would stay here, where it was safe. My Geraldine would survive this nightmare. I would see to that.

  When we emerged from the ice tunnel, the glare of the sun left me wincing. I no longer knew if it was day or night; my body was too tired to care either way. Just outside of the tunnel stood Lent and Bryant—again, God forgive me, I knew only their surnames. I followed their gazes out across the snow, and saw two shapes moving toward the ship, as well as two moving away from us.

  “Gabe and Alexis are going to greet them,” Lent explained.

  As I held my gloved hand over my brow and stared into the white distance at the shapes of rescue moving toward us, I mulled over Albert’s story. It was so similar to my own that I felt as though I had lived it with him. It must have been so terrible to be thrust into that awful climate, even with the compound helping us to cope with the cold. And to awaken from the dead of sleep to such screaming and find the dead lurching through the snow? What a horrible notion! Little by little I stripped his story down, until I concentrated on but a loop of his words, and within them some trouble came to mind.

  “But a blow to the head kills them?” Albert had asked.

  He felled Hart with a lucky shot to the head.

  Baugham tumbled to his second death.

  Baugham and Hart, both laid to rest by head wounds, of that we were assured.

  But what of the others? Albert never said what became of them. What of Pearson and Johnson? What of the two Albert left behind him, presumably dead in the snow? What kept them from rising? From returning?

  Nothing.

  Nothing prevented them from rising because Albert didn’t dispatch their corpses. He didn’t even know that destroying the brain was the key to silencing them. My mind was on fire with the idea of it. Logic turned, and with it answers came to me. None of them pleasant.

  It was then that a wail reached me, that high-pitched keen the dead made when seeking a source of warmth. And what was warmer than the giant furnace parked in the snow behind us? No wonder they found their way back to us. The Fancy was like a beacon of heat, calling those things to our warm front door.

  “Lightbridge,” I said in a calm voice, despite my rising panic. “Call your men back. At once.”

  “What?” he asked. “What are you—”

  “Just do it,” I said in a brusque tone over his questioning.

  I could feel Lightbridge’s glare, assessing my sudden insanity. I turned to meet his gaze and explained, “That’s not our rescue. That’s our death approaching.”

  Lightbridge snapped his focus to the distance again. “Nonsense. That is a scouting party.”

  “Then why do they stagger like that? And where is their equipment?”

  “They lurch because they are weary, and they traveled light so they could cover the distance more quickly.” Even as he spoke the words, I could sense his reticence. He believed it no more than he believed my story the first time I told it.

  I narrowed my eyes at him. “Just listen. That’s not the howl of the wind, Gideon. That’s them.”

  He took a moment to listen, at which he whispered, “Damn it all.” He then returned his attention to the men in the distance, cupped his gloved hands over his mouth and yelled, “Ahoy there! Men! Come back!”

  The two men, Gabe and Alexis, stopped and turned in place, but they didn’t come back as instructed. They merely waved at us, pointed at the oncoming pair of revenants, and resumed their stride toward certain doom. The revenants, however, were spurred by this shouting. They ceased their howl as well as their slow march, and broke into a staggered run toward the men.

  “No, no, no,” Lightbridge muttered. He cupped his hands about his mouth again and shouted, “Come back here! Men! Come back!”

  But again the men ignored Lightbridge. Encouraged by the increased speed of their supposed rescuers, the pair picked up their own pace to a light trot, getting further from our warning yells and closer to their own deaths. Lightbridge and I both screamed for the men’s attention, to no avail.

  Lightbridge whipped about to Collins, asking, “Are they armed?”

  “What’s wrong—” Collins began.

  Lightbridge snarled over him, “Are they armed?”

  “No,” Collins said. “I don’t think so. We didn’t think we would need weapons against our own rescue party.”

  “Go!” Lightbridge yelled at the men on either side of us. “Get your weapons and bring them here. Fast! Hurry!”

  All three men started as if shaken from a dream, then hurried into the tunnel to do as asked. Lightbridge, to my surprise, spun on his metal heel, pulled a sizable pistol from the depths of his jacket, and took off for the fight brewing in the distance.

  “Where are you going?” I yelled after him.

  “I have to stop them!” he cried.

  I ran after him, uncertain of his plan but unwilling to let him go alone. The man must have sensed me on his heels, for he allowed me to catch up with him. I said between gasping breaths, “You’ll never reach them in time.”

  “I won’t have to,” he assured me. He waved his pistol for emphasis.

  We crossed a considerable distance in a small amount of time, but it wasn’t enough to keep the men from reaching the revenants first. Or rather, the other way about. The revenants were as fast as lightning when the notion took them, and the notion was on them at that very moment. They moved with breathtaking speed, closing in on the pair of men like hawks swooping upon tiny rabbits. Just as hungry. Just as calculating.

  By the time we were close enough for them to hear our shouts more clearly, the men were distracted by the oncoming revenants. They stopped in place, staring at the pair rushing to meet them in the snow.

  “Hey!” I heard one of the men yell. “It’s Joe. Joe! Joe Johnson! Hey Joe!”

  “Get away!” Lightbridge shouted.

  “It isn’t Joe!” I yelled.

  The pair ignored us, waving excitedly at the dead men instead of heeding our warnings. We were still several yards away, but even at that distance, I could spot the corpses’ wounds, the bile and blood trailing behind them in thick blots. How could the men not see the grisly truth? Perhaps I was just accustomed to it, even expectant of it. Perhaps I was looking for signs of death whereas the men saw but their old comrades rushing to rejoin them.

  Lightbridge, however, was not as easily fooled. He stopped in his tracks, took aim and fired a round. The shot was too low, striking the closest revenant in the chest as it continued its bull-rush forward. As before, it neither flinched nor recoiled. It just kept on, ignoring the blow as if it never happened, focused on the living men and nothing else. Lightbridge cursed under his breath as he reset his pistol for another shot, but not before the two pairs met. I kept my pace, racing past Lightbridge and leaping into the fray, where I grabbed one of the creatures by the throat.

  Crimson sprayed the ice as I pulled the monster away from the man, leaving a burst of wet garnets scattered over the snow. The man—later I would learn his name was Gabe—grabbed his own flayed throat, gurgling a swan song as his trachea slid past my hand, down the creature’s gullet in a single, swallowed lump.

  The throat. Why did they seem to always go for the throat?

  Or was it the throat? As Gabe’s blood sputtered and arced across the white between us, it occurred to me that it wasn’t the throat itself the monsters were after. It was the jugular. One of the largest veins in the human body, so close to the surface, throbbing and teeming with life. Warm life, mere centimeters under such tender skin. Easy for the taking. The tearing. The swallowing.

  The thing writhed in my hands, wriggling to escape. It was then that I wondered what in God’s
name I thought I was doing! I was no match for these monsters! But I had one by the throat and had no intention of letting the thing go free. For lack of a better course of action, I held on.

  Thankfully, Lightbridge’s second shot was better placed. A loud report sounded to my right, followed by the revenant’s head bursting open in my very hands with the consistency of a spoiled tomato. In an instant, I was covered in gore once again, as bits of brain and skull and old dead blood dripped down my face and clothes in cold, wintry lumps. It was more akin to being showered with a bucket of slushy ice water than to being splattered by human remains. In those first few moments, I could still sense the echoing whistle of the bullet as it ripped past me. One inch more, the smallest of degrees to one side, and the very same shot that saved me would have laid me down dead.

  As I sit listening to the bays of those things at my door, I find myself wishing Lightbridge had mislaid the shot and killed me instead.

  In the time it took Lightbridge to reset his pistol again, the second creature tossed the remains of his meal—Alexis was the poor lad’s name—to the snow-covered ground, and set his sights on the weapon bearer. The thing snarled and made a dash for Lightbridge, who but calmly raised the weapon and shot the creature in the head. I lowered my gaze as he did, unwilling to watch the gory display. I had seen enough of such things for ten lifetimes. Though it was far from the last such scene I would witness.

  His shot rang out, clean and clear. We stood quietly in the aftermath of the attack for a moment, the lingering echoes of the men’s screams and the weapon’s reports still ringing in my ears. Lightbridge stared down at the two dead men. Two more victims of his trusting crew. All at once, the man looked his age. He was weary, so tired, and had a distinct air of defeat about him. This was too much for the old man to bear. The weight of what had just transpired wore greatly upon my friend, but there was an even heavier burden for us to take on before this episode could come to a close.