Bradley, Marion Zimmer - Shadowgate 02 Page 2

  Like all the others. Just like all the others.

  It began with pigeons. Pigeons and squirrels and mice; she'd found the tiny bloodless corpses everywhere she went until each new discovery had been almost beyond bearing. When she'd gone to Fall River there had been no more for a while, but then the bodies had begun appearing again, and when she'd sworn she had nothing to do with the deaths, Dr. Atheling said he believed her but none of the others did. They said she was doing it herself—that she was the one responsible: catching and hurting and killing. . . .

  And so she had run away, praying that if she ran far enough, hard enough, she could outrun that vengeful shadow. And for a while she'd thought she'd succeeded.

  Until today.

  Winter was restless all the rest of the day, as if the appearance of the tiny shattered body had brought with it a summons that could no longer be denied. Winter spent that night sleepless before the old fieldstone fireplace, feeding the last of the woodpile to the greedy flames.

  With the morning light came the certainty that she could hide here no longer. If she was sane, she could test that sanity in the outside world. If it failed, she'd . . .

  What?

  / can't go back there, Winter told herself, although Fall River Sanatorium was not a bad place—not like some she'd heard of, where malice was disguised as concern and sadism took the place of care.

  It's just that Fall River is a place that should help people—and it can't help me.

  Even without knowing where the conviction came from, Winter trusted it—even though she no longer trusted herself.

  / guess the world—and I—will just have to take our chances.

  The morning was spent in a thousand delaying chores. Even though each strengthened her confidence in her ability to function outside the safe refuge the farmhouse had become, they were also a form of escape from the consequences of her decision. She washed the dishes, and made a list of the things she would need to replenish her larder in town, carried the rest of her clothes downstairs and put them away in the large red cedar armoire that shared the kitchen parlor with the woodstove and the white iron bed, and even went through her purse and Coach briefbag, alternately amazed and baffled by the contents. There were a fistful of unopened monthly statements, forwarded to her at Fall River from the accountant who paid her monthly bills. Winter glanced at one of them, but the rows of numbers, of transfers and debits, were a meaningless jumble.

  More real were the wads of twenties and fifties crammed at the bottom of the bag—enough to take care of any conceivable immediate expense-— crumpled loose in the bottom of the purse like so much play money.

  Play money. That's what it was to us. We were like kids with a Monopoly set—none of it was real to us, she thought, clutching the small pink stuffed elephant that had been at the bottom of her Lexington brief, along with a Wall Street Journalwdch last year's date and clutter of things almost unfamiliar to her now. Her years at Arkham Miskatonic King were solid but curiously distant, as if out of a particularly vivid book she'd read and enjoyed. She'd lived fast and high, bought the usual toys and paid for the usual perks, and none of it was unique to her, somehow. It was the sort of life that any of the traders could have had, as unindividuated as the life of a drone in a hive.

  And we thought we were so special, and all along we were just a funny kind of money-making robot. Wind us up and we'd trade, and trade, and trade, until...

  But Winter still wasn't sure what had taken her from the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, to Fall River, to here. Maybe she'd just gotten . . . tired? People did, after all. Burnout was the commonest reason for leaving the Street.

  But not Winter's reason. Even if she didn't know what her reason was, she knew that much.

  At last she could delay no longer without acknowledging to herself that she was running away from the outside world. She changed her scruffy jeans and worn-out sweater for something more suitable to an appearance in town. Although Glastonbury isn't much of a town, as far as I can remember.

  The fashionable, expensive woman in the gray cashmere sweater and Harris tweed skirt who stared back at Winter from her bathroom mirror was gaunt and hollow-eyed until Winter painted the illusion of health into her skin with cosmetics labeled Chanel and Dior. Expensive accessories for a lifestyle she had once worshiped with all her heart, that now more and more seemed a silly and expensive sort of mistake. But the rouge, and the Paloma Picasso earrings, and the thin sparkle of Elsa Peretti "Diamonds By The Yard" all helped disguise the sleepless nights filled with fear.

  This time Winter made it all the way to the woodshed, although the open space around her seemed vast and threatening and she felt as if the sky would fall and crush her. She ducked into the shed with a tiny cry of triumph, and rested her forehead for a moment against the BMW's white lacquered roof.

  Maybe Chicken Little was right. It's a possibility. Her heart was beating far too fast, and for a moment Winter considered turning back—she'd done enough for one day; no one could ask her to do more. . . .

  Except me. I can ask me to do more. . . .

  And she was running out of time.

  Winter wasn't certain where that conviction came from, but it was enough to galvanize her into unlocking the car and settling inside. When she put the key into the ignition, she had one wild pang of panic—suppose it didn't start? suppose something terrible happened?—but fought past it. She had to know if she could survive out here in the real world. If she could not manage as simple a task as going into town for supplies, then she had better call Fall River and tell them where to find her.

  And learn to live surrounded by the baffling and terrifying deaths.

  Winter turned left out of the driveway almost at random—if Glas-tonbury wasn't this way then she'd retrace her tracks—-and drove to the bottom of a hill, where one sign identified the crossroad as Amsterdam County 4 and another said GLASTONBURY: 6.

  As she followed the winding two-lane road, Winter got intermittent glimpses of the river, and more information floated to the surface of her battered memory. The grandiosely named little town of Glastonbury, New York, dated from the nineteenth century, and served the local college as well as Amsterdam County locals such as herself. There was a supermarket, a post office, even a small movie theater, though most people preferred to drive to the multiplexes in the malls south of here.

  It was the sort of thing that anyone might know, particularly anyone who had rented a farmhouse and come to stay for an extended period, and the ability to remember such trivia was obscurely comforting. She was dressed, she was driving a car; if she really were . . . sick . . . she wouldn't be able to do these things, would she?

  When Winter reached the town, she found it had a haunting familiarity, as if she'd been here before, but the memory was elusive. County 4 had turned into Main Street, and as Winter drove down it, she saw bright posters in the windows of the business: FREE WILL—AN EVENING OF SHAKESPEARE SCENES AND SONGS BY THE TAGHKANIC DRAMA DEPARTMENT.

  Students from the nearby college were everywhere at this time of day, identifiable by the universal symbols of age and backpack, trendily pierced or equally trendily grungy, but carefree in a fashion Winter could somehow not associate with herself. While stopped for a light, she watched one pair wistfully as they proceeded up the street holding hands. The boy's hair fell to shoulder length and the girl's was shaved to a spiky buzz; both were dressed identically in work boots and overalls that seemed about eleven sizes too big, and they were obliviously in love.

  Winter watched them until they rounded the corner, and then forced herself to concentrate on the signal and the other drivers. This outing was as much to prove she could cope as it was for anything else. She could not afford to daydream.

  The supermarket was right on Main Street; and she pulled into the lot and parked with a sense of relief and growing triumph. She climbed out of the car—remembering to lock it—and stood in the warm afternoon sunlight, looking down at the list of errands in h
er hands.

  Groceries first. And then . . . the butcher, the baker, the candlestick maker. . . Winter thought giddily.

  Her destinations were not quite that archaic, though it hardly made sense to buy grocery-store bread with an organic bakery right up the block. Half an hour later, the first part of her self-imposed assignment completed, Winter emptied her grocery cart into the BMW's trunk: crisp clean brown paper bags containing cans of soup, fresh fruit and fruit juice, and all the other household necessities she'd only realized she needed when she'd seen them on the supermarket shelves. She felt almost jaunty as she locked the trunk again and headed for the bakery; it was just around the next corner, the cashier had given her directions, speaking to her as if it were a perfectly normal thing to ask for such directions. As if everything were all right.

  On impulse, Winter stopped at a liquor store as she passed it, debating between Bordeaux and Nouvelle Beaujolais as though such questions could really matter. She finally settled on a bottle of white Burgundy and a trendy California Zinfandel, and proceeded up the street with her purchases cradled in one arm. She found the bakery without trouble, and bought a dozen raisin scones and a round loaf of seven-grain bread that looked as though it contained enough vitamins to nourish the entire Mighty Morphin Power Rangers. Echoes of her old life—her self-sufficient life—rose up to bolster her determination as she made her purchases. She would be fine. She would make herself be fine.

  As Winter came out of the bakery, the bright colors of a display across the street caught her eye, and she went to look. There were three clear-glass amphorae in iron cradles, their liquid contents dyed bright blue, red, and green: It was a drugstore, its window used to display a collection of antique patent medicines and pharmacy supplies.

  Winter dawdled by the window, looking. It was truly amazing what people had been able to buy without a prescription at the turn of the century: opium and morphine and cocaine, all packaged in pretty blue and amber glass bottles, or wrapped in boxes with labels written in serious Spencerian script. Extract of cannabis. Tincture of arsenic. Asafoetida. Cyanide.

  Winter raised her gaze from the quaint display of antiquated medicines to the shelves behind them filled with their modern descendants. She took a hesitant step toward the door. Was there something in here that would cure her fears and dreams—let her sleep soundly at night and return to her New York life?

  No. Regretfully, Winter shook her head. Nothing she could buy here would help—if the pretty red-and-black pills that had left her disoriented and numb for days after she'd stopped taking them had not helped, how could aspirin and Sominex?

  Even Seconal and Thorazine had not stopped the killing. . . .

  "I don't know how she manages to do it." The memory-voice was irritated; one of the Fall River aides talking to another in the sitting room of Winter's suite. Perhaps they hadn't known she was there, in the bedroom beyond the open door. Perhaps they simply hadn't cared.

  "Foundanother one, eh?" The second voice was knowing; resigned.

  "They're all over the place; Dr. Luty gives her enough junk to tranquilize a horse and she still sneaks out at night."

  "Think so?"

  "Has to be. And 1 know she's not dodging her meds. And we're the ones who have to clean it up, dammit, not Luty or Atheling. You'd think the bitch'd show a little consideration."

  "Nah. She's having too much fun."

  The intrusive memory receded, leaving Winter shaking. Their remembered contempt—she hadn't even known their names—still made her stomach roil. She'd done nothing to merit such hatred.

  Nothing she could remember, at least.

  The trembling didn't stop; Winter clutched her purchases tighter and realized that she'd grossly overestimated her stamina and emotional endurance; she'd better get back to the car and get out of here while she still had the strength to drive home safely.

  She looked back the way she'd come, judging the distance. Too far, but if she turned down that street just up ahead it ought to take her right back to the supermarket parking lot.

  But the street ahead only ran half a block before it made an L-shaped turn onto another street, leaving Winter farther from her car than ever. She felt sick and light-headed, as though she'd been in the sun too long, but the spring sunlight wasn't strong enough to cause anyone distress. Winter stared around herself, hoping to see a familiar landmark or at least a place to stop and rest for a minute.

  She'd managed to detour into the heart of the small riverside town, away from Main Street. Here the streets were narrow and lined with picturesque and old-fashioned shops; old storefronts intermingled with brightly renovated Victorian houses converted to commercial space. Everything was brightly inviting, but all it was to Winter was a hostile labyrinth keeping her from the safe refuge of her car and her house.

  She drew a deep breath, forcing calm against the rising tide of sickness and panic. Maybe the simplest thing to do would be to just ask directions. Anyone along here ought to be able to tell her how to find Main Street again.

  She turned toward the nearest shop. The sign over the storefront was carved and painted wood: a golden full moon riding a skirl of swirling purple clouds spangled with stars. The words Inquire Within were carved to the left of the moon in old-fashioned letters. There was also a crescent moon and a swirl of stars painted in gold on the window itself, and behind them, on the red satin drape of the display window, a "crystal" ball on an ornate stand, a long acrylic tube filled with glitter with a shiny holographic star on one end, and a spill of brightly colored paperbacks with titles like Teach Yourself White Witchcraft and Mind Over Matter. A New Age bookstore.

  Winter recoiled as if she'd confronted a monster out of her darkest subconscious. The sick disassociated feeling she'd been fighting grew stronger; she felt beads of perspiration break out stingingly all over her forehead, and swallowed hard against a wave of nausea.

  The signboard overhead began to rock as if a wind were blowing, though the spring day was sunny and still.

  Winter jerked spasmodically, staring up at it in horror, and began to back away—from the sign, from the store—every muscle trembling uncontrollably.

  A sandwich sign in front of the antique store next door flung itself to the sidewalk with the sound of a pistol-crack. Winter cried out—a sound of fear and anger and despair. The bread and the wine bottles slipped out of her arms, slamming into the pavement with impossible force.

  The bottles did not break as much as disintegrate, wine and slivers of glass spraying fire-hose hard through the tatters of the ruined bag to make a glittering fan-shape on the paving. The glassware in the antique store's window began to shiver and hum in sympathy, with a sweet high keening that filled the street with sound.

  Winter ran.

  She did not know how she reached her car again, only that by the time she did, her body was drenched in icy sweat and she was shaking so hard the keys in her hands made a staccato rhythm as they danced across the lacquered surface of the car door. Red and black blobs floated through her sight, and waves of fever and chill wracked her. Her heart was a fast hard hammering in her chest.

  "Can I help you, lady?"

  Winter shrieked and spun around.

  "Stay back!" she cried, brandishing her keys like a crucifix. They flew out of her hand and fell at the feet of a boy in a Taghkanic College sweatshirt and frayed jeans.

  I'm going crazy. Oh, God, I'm losing control—

  He started to sidle away, then hesitated, staring at the keys on the ground.

  "I just wanted to—" he began.

  "Go away!" Winter screamed. Before something happens. Waves of nausea threatened to drown her; her heart was beating hard enough to make her teeth chatter; she felt as if she were about to have a seizure. Winter clutched at the car's door handle, willing herself not to faint. She had to get out of here before any more accidents happened, because even though Winter Musgrave was accident prone, around her the accidents happened to other people. . . .

&nbs
p; The boy backed off, giving her a frightened look, and Winter darted forward to grab her keys. The gesture unbalanced her, driving her to her knees, and as she knelt on the asphalt, she could see the signs on the buildings across Main Street begin to rock.

  No— No— Not here; not again—/ promised. . . .

  A terror beyond fear galvanized her. Winter clutched the keys so tightly their metal edges were driven into her palm hard enough to bring blood and she staggered to her feet with the determination of the desperate.

  The key left a long scratch in the car's paint before it found the lock, but then she rammed it blessedly home and turned it, and the door— safety, refuge—opened.

  Winter fell across the seat and dragged the door shut, whimpering in torment. Safe—safe—safe—some idiot part of her mind babbled, but it was too late, she had gone too far, and as her finger touched the button for the automatic lock, the display panel of the car exploded in a violent burst of sparks.

  Three hours later Winter stood beside the smoke-blackened remains of her car, glaring defiantly at the last of the gawkers as the fire truck pulled out of the parking lot and headed back up the street. Her hands still ached from battering at the sealed windows and her throat was raw from screaming.

  Someone—probably the kid she'd yelled at—had called the police, and the sheriff's car had arrived to find smoke billowing from beneath the hood and from under the dashboard of the BMW, and Winter, hysterical, trapped inside. Every electrical system in the car—including the windows and the unlocking mechanism of the doors—was dead, and Winter was sealed inside a vehicle whose passenger compartment was filling with poisonous smoke. The deputy had smashed the window and pulled her out through it. Then the fire department arrived to spray foam over the hood and every interior surface of her car, replacing the stink of burning leather and insulation with the rank wet stench of chemical foam.

  The only thing that had allowed Winter to hold onto any scrap of self-control was the repeated pleas of the sheriff's deputy that she go to the hospital so that they could see if she was all right. The thought that she might be sent to the hospital—and by extension, back to Fall River— was enough to crush her spiraling hysteria and drive Winter into a numb emotionless state. She knew dimly that such numbness was far more dangerous than screams and tears, but her frigid self-possession had made them leave her alone, had made them send away the EMTs with their threatening orange-and-white van, had made them all go.