Lockwood & Co. Book Three: The Hollow Boy (37 page)

What had George said about the history of the prison? How it ended up being more of a hospital than a jail. The final inhabitants were lepers and people with other terrible illnesses. No one
went there, everyone despised it. In the end the Tudor kings had driven them out and razed the place to the ground.

Driven them out…

I looked at the ring of broken skeletons.

Only they hadn’t actually bothered, had they? They hadn’t driven them out at all. They’d just trapped them underground and sealed them in, and pulled the prison walls down on
top of them. Left them in the dark to die.

Simpler. Tidier. Solved a couple of problems at once. They were criminals and they were infected. Who was going to care?

Was it any wonder that this little room was the source of so much energy and rage?

“I understand,” I said again.

The shapes flickered, their dark eye-notches fixed on me, unblinking. I projected my sympathy outward as best I could. Whether they would comprehend the emotion; whether—if they
did—they would readily
accept
it, after so long lying buried and forgotten, was impossible to say. So many hundreds of years, with no one any the wiser as to their existence….

Well, I wouldn’t blame them either way. I looked down past the dying candle and caught sight of something on the floor. I squatted down, not without a stumble (if only the floor would stop
spinning!), and glared at it. It took me a moment to realize what it was—and that the skeletons were not themselves the deepest mystery of the room.

The flagstones where I crouched, unlike the corridor I’d come up, did not have dust on them, though dust was piled up thickly in and around the bones on either side. On the surface of one
stone, not far from my left boot, something was lying, a cylindrical fragment, both white and brown. At first I thought it was a piece of bone, but as I lowered my candle close, I realized the
truth: it was a cigarette end.

A butt from a modern cigarette….

I stared at it, frowning, head throbbing, trying to make sense of it.

Around me, movement. When I looked up, the ring of pale white shapes had moved inward toward me. I held up an impatient hand.

“All right, all right,” I said. “Give me a minute. I’ve just got something here.”

I stood up. Now that I thought about it, I could see that the whole center of the room was remarkably clear—of bones, of dust, of debris of any kind. It was like it had all been swept out
to the sides. Someone was very keen on housekeeping. You’d think Holly Munro had been at work.

The thought made me giggle, and the giggle instantly woke me up. I frowned at the incoming ring of shapes. “You need to give me some space here,” I said. “You’re putting
me off. Stand back a little, please.”

I went into the middle of the room, and after a moment to steady myself—everything was swaying in front of my eyes—bent down to scowl at the flagstones. I saw scratch marks in the
stone, and here and there what I thought were splashes of candle-wax. I put a finger out to touch one of them, and almost fell over.

“You are seriously annoying me now,” I said. The glowing shapes had drifted closer and were no longer hovering above the mess of bones. Now they formed a circle around the edges of
the cleared area. I could feel the force of their attention, the anger directed at me. “I’m not supposed to talk to you,” I said. “And I certainly won’t do it if you
don’t step back. Go on!” The shapes retreated. “That’s better. What have you been doing here,” I said, “with all this wax and stuff? What are these circular
scrapes? And this black burn mark here, right in the center? Have you been naughty? Have you been setting fire to something?”

The shapes said nothing, but echoes of the atrocity that had occurred here rose up black behind them; I could feel it welling above us, seething and dreadful, like a sandstorm about to snuff out
a desert town.

“I’ll get you all a decent burial,” I said. “Proper coffins, proper rites. None of that furnace stuff. Don’t worry—I’ll talk Lockwood into it.
He’s a little cranky when it comes to your kind, but I can fix it. Don’t worry. Lockwood will sort you out….”

At least he would if he was actually alive and well.

Out of nowhere, the thought came suddenly that he wasn’t. More than a thought—a conviction. What was I
doing
? What was I doing, talking to ghosts when Lockwood had been
pulled away into the storm? Pain lashed through me. My head pounded; I almost sank down to my knees.

Was he back there, under the rubble? Maybe he was! He would have come for me ages ago, otherwise. My fear lapped out against the edges of the room in great almighty swells. All at once I could
hear the figures whispering together again.

“You’ll have to speak up,” I said sharply. “Like I told the old guy in the armchair, this is your big chance! People like me don’t come along that often. Speak up
and speak
clearly
….”

It was then that I saw that my candle was burning low.

That was okay. I had another in my pouch….Only, actually, I didn’t. Somewhere, back at the fall of rubble, maybe, I’d dropped it. No—I remembered setting it carefully down on
the floor. I rolled my eyes at my own stupidity.

It was okay. I’d have to go back and get it.

When I turned around, the shapes were blocking the way.

“Now,” I said, “you need to just let me—Ow!” Hot wax had burned my fingers. The candle was so low, the molten stuff was sloshing out. I set it on the floor between
my feet and reached for the match box. Striking another match, I looked around for something else to light. Maybe the ghosts had candles. They’d clearly been using some recently.

“Do you want to move back, guys? I can’t see where you keep your—Hey!” One of the shapes had swept forward, more decisively than before. I got a glimpse of pale ribs
within the shining body and outstretched arms; the eyes were flickering black flames—then I pulled a tin from my belt, ripped off the lid, and scattered salt in a blazing emerald arc to keep
the form at bay. I’d done it so fast I hadn’t even thought about it; it was the old agency training kicking in.

“I’m sorry!” I said. “I’m on your side. You just need to keep back, that’s all.”

A ripple of disquiet ran through the shapes; their glow darkened, their outlines seemed to grow, become more angular and jagged. I cursed, threw my match down and, with shaking fingers, lit
another. The candle at my feet was almost out. Light was dimming in the chamber. I held the match low, and over its bulb of radiance glared around at the encircling ghosts.

“What is it with you?” I snarled. “I want to help, and you always just end up trying to kill me….”

Another splash of salt, a ring of bright green fire; again the shapes drew back, whispering sadly to themselves. I could feel my panic rising; it was no good. I couldn’t control them.
Individually they were weak, and I could bend them to my will; collectively, no: their anger was too strong.

What did I have? A bit of salt, hardly any iron—all used up in Aickmere’s. Just one magnesium flare. I scrabbled at my belt and, in doing so, dropped the match. By the last light of
the candle, I reached for the match box, but my fingers shook too much; the matches spewed out of the box, spilled uselessly on the floor. I gave a cry, bent down to retrieve them—and saw the
ghosts come sweeping in toward me.

That was the moment when the nub of candle chose to finally go out.

I
would have thrown the flare then, just chucked it out at random and blown a few of the shapes to smithereens—the act would have given me a final spark of
satisfaction, even as the others fell upon me and bore me down. But I did not throw the flare. Because though the candle’s light had gone, another now replaced it—a pale encroaching
light that stole out of the passage I had not yet entered, spreading across the slimy stone. It was not a light of the living, but a corpse-light, cold and faint, that gave no nourishment to what
it touched. Still, it made me pause, and the effect it had on the ring of ghosts was no less definite. They at once stopped their advance, hesitating, looking back toward the oncoming glow. Their
outlines grew tremulous and disturbed.

The light spread out into the chamber, pouring like milk through the heaps of tangled bones. Blood pulsed in my ears. The quality of the air had changed. The ghosts began to shrink back toward
the walls.

The passage seemed to distort; the walls flexed and fluttered. A cold breeze blew toward me, carrying that same soft dry voice I’d heard in Aickmere’s.

It called my name.

The ghosts sank away, flowed down into their heaps of tangled bones, and vanished.

I waited, clutching my flare.

From the darkness, of the darkness, untouched by the other-light through which it passed, a shape was crawling toward me down the corridor.

Up in the store, I’d run from it, but there was nowhere for me to run now.

The flare was slippery in my palm. I held it without hope or expectation. More even than the fearsome energies of the Poltergeist; far more than the twittering prison ghosts tied to the
skeletons, I knew this apparition emanated from the very center of the Chelsea outbreak. Powerful as a flare might be, this thing was more potent still.

The cold breeze died away. I stood at the center of a bulb of silence. The shape came out into the chamber, and there was nothing between it and me.

As when I’d seen it near the elevators, it crawled awkwardly, in rolling leaps and jerks, as if its joints were misshapen or put on back to front. Its head was bowed; long hair—at
least, I
thought
it must be hair, despite the way it waved and coiled so oddly—fell down across its face, so that it was hidden. But I could see enough to know how painfully thin it
was, the skin black and shrunken on the bones, like those mummies they used to have in museums before DEPRAC closed them all down. It was tight and dry and desiccated-looking; you could hear the
fingernails clacking on the flagstones, see the skin on the arms shearing tight with every swing, the wrinkles creasing so deep, you’d think they’d split in two.

Ahead of it, an advance guard of spiders: shiny black and scurrying.

The figure drew close and, with a single mysterious fluid movement, raised itself; now it shuffled forward on its back legs, arms twisting and jerking as if still pushing it along the ground. I
couldn’t see the face, but teeth glinted beneath the lankly swirling hair. The outline was hazy, almost fibrous, like the rough edges of an unfinished mat or carpet. As I watched, these
fibers sank away; the shape grew solid, its edges more defined. And as it swelled and altered, I felt a corresponding opposite sensation. It was like the inward suction of a bellows, or a hatch
opening beneath me—I felt my strength drain out. It poured away.

My head spun; everything went black. I closed my eyes.

“Lucy.”

And opened them.

I was still on my feet in that same forgotten place. The other-light had faded, and a different shape stood before me in the dark. I stared at it, frowning.

“Lucy.”

And all at once my legs buckled with joy. Because I knew it! I knew the voice. It was the one I wanted to hear more than any other. I felt I would dissolve with relief. My heart leaped within
me. I had the flare still in my hand. I lowered it and stumbled forward.

“Lockwood—thank goodness!”

How could I have been so stupid as not to have recognized him instantly? The shape at first had seemed so dark and oddly insubstantial. Yet now I saw the slim, high shoulders; the curve of the
neck, that familiar buoyant flick of hair….

“How did you find me?” I cried. “I knew it! I
knew
that you would come—”

“Ah, Lucy…Nothing could stop me from doing that.”

I could tell from the outline of the face that he was smiling, but the voice was so sad that it brought me up short.

I peered at him, trying to pierce the darkness. “Lockwood? What is it? What’s the matter?”

“Nothing could keep me from you. Nothing in life or death….”

A cold shaft opened inside me. It was a well, bottomless and black.

“What—?” I said. “What are you talking about? What does
that
mean?”

“Do not be scared. I cannot harm you.”

“Now you’re
really
frightening me. Shut up.” I didn’t understand; even so, I felt my bones turn to water. I could barely speak. My tongue felt tied to the roof
of my mouth. “Shut
up
….”

The figure stood there in the shadows. Now it said nothing.

“Come closer,” I said. “Come into the light.”

“It’s best I don’t, Lucy.”

It was then that I saw how frail and wispy his substance was. How—though solid seeming at the head and torso—the legs were faint as gauze, and tailed off into nothing. He hovered
above the flagstone floor.

My own legs gave way. I sank to my knees. The flare cracked against the stone.

“Oh, no,” I whispered. “Lockwood—no….”

The voice spoke softly, calmly.
“You must not be sorry.”