Scar Night Page 0,125

eyes. He screwed them shut but it made no difference. Everything was black. With every heartbeat he was falling deeper into death. He opened his eyes again and let the tears flow freely.

“Rachel!” he cried. The void swallowed his voice before it even reached his ears.

Fear begged him to stop. The abyss couldn’t go on for ever; he would hit the bottom sometime. But he had no choice. If he stopped he’d be just as alone in the dark and Rachel would surely be lost. And he couldn’t go back—not without her.

I trust you.

In his mind he saw her face. The image stirred in him a desperate hatred: hatred of himself, hatred of the Battle-archons who had gone before him. Hatred of everything they had been and he wasn’t. He screwed his eyes shut again.

He dived and dived, and screamed and screamed, “Rachel! Rachel!”

The abyss sucked him under like tar; it filled his lungs, leached into his flesh and his mind until it became everything. Dill’s terror was absolute.

Catch me.

How could he catch her? She was falling somewhere below, or above, or a foot to his left or right. How could he expect to find her in this? He was blind. And she was dead. She had been dead the moment she threw herself into the abyss.

I trust you.

Those words were wrapped around his heart and wouldn’t let go. They would still be wrapped around his heart when he died. Dill opened his eyes, tears trickling from the corners, and stared into nothing. Rushing air forced his lips open and he screamed again. An army of ghosts waited for him below. Would her spirit already be among them? Would he see them before he felt the slam of rock that ended his own life? And then?

What then?

There would be no priests to bless his corpse. Ulcis would offer him no salvation, no place in his army. Would the Maze come for him? Could it reach into the city of Deep to claim him? Or would he lie for ever in the darkness, broken and forgotten?

He would never see his father again. The thought struck him like a fist. Dill furled his wings even closer to his back and extended his fingers and dived and dived.

“Rachel!”

Above the torrent of air he thought he heard a distant voice.

“Rachel!”

Had he heard anything at all? How close was he to the end? Had he merely heard the wails of ghosts, warning him? Calling to him to stop his descent?

“Rachel!”

A voice called back from below. It might have been calling his name—but he wasn’t sure—somewhere off to his left. He checked his dive, banked in that direction. One hand moved to the storm lantern at his belt, the other gripped the hilt of his sword until it stung.

“Rachel!”

“Dill.” The voice seemed to echo across eternity.

He swept towards the sound of it, not daring to hope, his mind full of the pounding of blood and mocking darkness.

“Dill, here, below you!”

Dill flexed his wings to ease his descent. Air dragged at his feathers. He didn’t understand. She couldn’t still be falling; she couldn’t possibly see him to call out. But it sounded so like her.

Or her ghost? Am I already dead? Did I hit the bottom?

“Dill, left, above you, thirty yards.”

Above?He snapped his wings open and let the uprising air pull him to a stop.

“Rachel?”

“Above you, to your left.”

“Where are you?” he pleaded. His voice disappeared into the dark.

“Light your lantern.”

It took an age to locate the lantern at his belt. Then he fumbled for the spark wheel, beating his wings to keep him level, not even knowing if his eyes were open or closed. After three tries the lantern brightened. His hands, belt, and trousers became illuminated. The sword guard gleamed gold. Rusted steel links glistened at his chest. But there was nothing else visible. All around him the blackness of the void stretched on, untouched by the light, and seemed even denser than before. His chest began to tighten; his breathing came quicker. “Rachel?” he called.

“I see you!” she cried. “Above you, not far. I’m here.”

In a daze, Dill followed the sound of her voice.

Rachel had one arm around Carnival’s shoulders, the back of her knees supported in the crook of the angel’s scarred arm.

Carnival’s wings thumped with sluggish force. She bobbed slightly, supporting Rachel as though she weighed nothing. “Turn down the lantern,” she hissed.

For a moment he was too shocked to comply. He just stared.

Carnival’s jaw clenched. Her lips drew back from her