A Breeding Darkness (Complete)

(8)

Heart pounding, Lucy crawled to the end of her bed and peered out the glass of her window and into the street below. She saw nothing, of course, except the pinprick of the few street lamps that Ryba Street had been given by the government after the darkness fell. If anyone was watching her, making sure she stayed within the confines of Koshmar's new laws, she couldn't see them. She gripped the piece of thin cloth she'd tacked to the wall above the window, and flicked it down so that it covered the glass. It was filled with holes and threadbare, but hopefully no one out on the street would be able to pick out exactly what she was doing.

As casually as she could, she climbed out of bed and walked to where a kettle, a pitcher of clean water, and a tin sat on a rickety shelf. She didn't have any matches to spare on a fire in the pitifully small range, not when she needed them to light her lantern any time she left the room. But she had taken Sleep Briar plain before. Ignoring the useless kettle, she opened the tin to reveal a pile of dried leaves and flowers. The smell of the Sleep Briar immediately filled the room, already making her feel slightly dizzy. She poured herself a cup of water and sprinkled a pinch of Sleep Briar into it. Stirring it with her finger, she edged over to where her coat and scarf hung on the back of the chair.

After wrapping up, she came back to her bed and slid under the covers, squeezing her eyes shut as she imagined Koshmar's guards ramming down her door and hauling her off to prison. Her family would be given the criminal fine, which would surely cost them their house and anything of any value. Sneaking into Zerkalo meant possibly destroying her family forever. But sitting still while the eternal night made invasion from An Qi possible would do the same.

Tipping her head up, she downed the water mixture, and settled down as her eyes shifted out of focus and she felt her brain detach. The feeling of her small, damp room drifted away, and she felt the rush of ice as she launched into Zerkalo.

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Lucy stood on shaky legs in the village, coughing and rubbing her arms to try and dispel the initial freeze. She scanned the area, and immediately saw that the darkness had pushed forward, touching the very edge of the last houses in the village. The black wall almost surrounded the quaint cottages, and only a small sliver that led to a few of the Dreamwalkers' territories was still untouched.

Unhooking her lantern from her belt, Lucy turned her attention to the swath of black that had once been a beaten path she'd made traipsing through her territory in search of Findings. At the other end of her field was the unclaimed woods. When she'd first seen the darkness, it had seeped out from between the bare gray trees. A shiver scuttled down her spine as she remembered the way it oozed forward, so slow that she wasn't sure it had moved at all until minutes later.

As she lit her lantern, she reached a hand into her coat to make sure her penknife was still there. The memory of the giant bird, with its flaming red eyes and horrible screech, still stuck with her. If it was still out there, she wanted to make sure she was ready to escape.

As she started across the cobblestones toward the grass, the corner of her eye caught sight of a dark gray blur. Memories of oil-slick feathers and red eyes flashed into her mind as her breath caught in her chest and she startled hard enough to shake her lantern. She jerked to a halt before she could slam into a wavering figure that seemed almost ready to blink out of existence.

Relief washed through her. "You scared me!" she exclaimed, placing a hand over her heart and laughing. "You know better than to sneak up on a Dreamwalker like that! I could have panicked and sent myself back."

It was a Denizen, one of the creatures that lived in Zerkalo. Vaguely humanoid in shape, it was more of a shadow than anything of substance. When it stood still, it had no arms or legs, and the only features on its face were two blank white smudges that were most likely eyes. When the Denizens wanted to offer something or receive, a section of their misty gray body would split away into a passable arm. But otherwise, they hovered and floated, and looked like a child's drawing of a ghost.

Lucy bit her lip as she looked at the Denizen floating silently in front of her. They never talked, but she still wondered if it knew more about the darkness than any of the humans did. It lived in Zerkalo, so surely it must have noticed the darkness before the Dreamwalkers? Surely it saw what happened in the hours and days that no human was around?

"Do you know what this never-ending night is?" she asked. "That dark thing that has eaten everything else up?" She motioned to the black wall that surrounded the village.

The Denizen made no move or sound that indicated that it knew what she was saying. It merely bobbed gently in the air, the white smudges of its eyes glowing faintly.

"Can you tell me where it came from?" When the Denizen again gave no sign of hearing her, she sighed in frustration. "This darkness is very dangerous. The Findings, the things you bring us sometimes, they have been made into evil things. Bad things. I think the darkness is tainting them. It may be tainting all of Zerkalo."

The Denizen remained quiet.

"You like the Dreamwalkers, right? You always like to help us and follow us as we work. But we are not allowed here anymore, because that darkness is spreading into our world. It is spreading here too. If you don't help me, you may be in danger. It may take over the entirety of Zerkalo, and who knows what will happen after that."

The Denizen floated around Lucy in lazy circles, its white pinprick eyes still boring into her. A shapeless arm lifted from the lump of its body and waved as if indicating that she should follow it. Without waiting for her to acknowledge it, the Denizen floated away toward the village border and Lucy's territory. The Denizen didn't even hesitate as it plunged into the darkness and Lucy was forced to quicken her pace to follow it. Being dark gray, it melded into the darkness so that Lucy could only see it when it turned every so often to guide her with its glowing eyes.

The Denizen took the normal path through her field, but after only a minute in the darkness, even that turned confusing. What had once been so habitual to Lucy was now foreign. she was lost in her own territory. The small sphere of light around her lantern did little more than illuminate her boots and the soft gray grass, and gave no indication of where along the path she was. With an uneasy shudder, Lucy realized that she was now relying entirely upon the Denizen as it stepped away from the path and led her out into the open field.