Mr Wicker Read online

  The cataract of light poured forth before him and he prayed to the few gods who remained that it would carry her back to him.

  Chapter 24

  “SHIT!”

  Despite Alicia’s attempts to reroute the elevator, which involved hitting every button below the psych ward floor, the doors slid open four floors up.

  At the children’s trauma ward.

  Alicia.

  The whisper of a little girl’s voice drifted into the elevator from the corridor.

  A cold needle of dread danced up and down her spine as she stood in the elevator, doors wide open to the half-lit floor. No one seemed to notice her and the elevator doors did not close.

  Alicia.

  Drawn by the child’s whisper, she stepped out. The nervousness of escaping the ward dissipated and freedom mellowed her movement as she wandered the hall, passing the nurses’ stations. She passed a cleaning crew stuffing plastic bags of trash into a bigger trash can on wheels; a male nurse pushing the rumbling floor cleaner back and forth; a flashing light above one room that attracted the attention of a young Hispanic nurse; and several dark rooms with darker television screens that caught gobs of glare from the hallway lights.

  She wasn’t sure why she didn’t turn around and go back into the elevator, but no one stopped her.

  The hallway darkened a shade as she closed in on the little girl’s room. Thinking the room was closer to the center of the floor, she made a couple of false choices, then realized that the correct doorway lay two or three farther downward, around the corner toward the dead end of the hall. The room swarmed with soapy, antiseptic smells mixed with a sour thrush of antibiotics farming her delicate flesh. The teddy bear had tumbled face-first into the footboard of the bed. Alicia plucked it from peril and tucked it under the child’s hand. She was breathing on her own, but still feeding from a tube to her stomach as she remained unconscious. If the sleep crust had been cleaned from her eyelashes, the hard flakes had returned. A colorless antibiotic drip disappeared into her left arm. A second operation had been performed around her ear, the surrounding area swollen, sallow and purple. Alicia stroked her thin forearm and sighed, wishing good things for the precious one who had been so tragically hurt. The voice-activated tape recorder sat in the brackets mounted above her pillows. All Alicia would have to do is speak to trip the recorder. She could say what he wanted to say to Dr. Farron before she disappeared, and only he would hear it. Alicia smiled widely at the notion, and prepared a brief farewell-but-only-for-a-bit speech. The more direct the better, she decided. Screw it if he got scared, thought she was crazy, was embarrassed. She had to let him know how he had affected her and that the choice to escape was conflicted, not clear. Just as she leaned toward the recorder and opened her mouth to speak, the child spoke. Or, rather, sang:

  “In a time and out of time, in time the ink shall sing.”

  The tape recorder gears ground as they snatched the tune. Her desire to connect with the Library blazed so fiercely that she recognized the profound danger. Another miracle, but not the save-me-Jesus sort that preachers waved at with palm fronds. Mr. Wicker’s was a brimstone blessing that defied everything the world had ever taught her about sanity, about reality. She stepped back from the bed, transfixed by her otherworldly utterance, first sung to her by him when she entered the Library in death. But as soon as she reached the doorway, more tiny voices flooded the hallway in a nightmare chorus from the sleeping children:

  “Love and trust, they turn to dust, each secret that they bring.”

  Every mounted tape recorder snapped on above their heads, a wave of mechanical clicks, as the children’s voices reached an astonishing crescendo. Alicia stepped into the hallway, unsure which way to turn without stumbling into the abyss.

  “Brooders weep and brooders keep their misery at hand.”

  And then the lights died throughout the hospital floor, leaving Alicia gripped in the black hand of insanity.

  “Let Mr. Wicker wash your sicker memories in sand.”

  If anyone was panicking over the loss of power on the floor, Alicia could not hear it over the blood roaring in her ears. Her normal fear of darkness was amplified by the hell of lost bearings and potential psychosis.

  You came here because you loved the darkness.

  The Voice. She’d heard it on the 9-1-1 call recording. Basso profundo.

  The dead end of the hallway cracked with a pinprick of light, a bright rivulet that grew steadily as it dripped down the wall. Awestricken, Alicia reached up and let the brilliance slice her palm with its warmth. The prickling of her wrist wounds was subdued as soon as she felt it. More and more pinholes broke through the wall and the dead end was rapidly eaten by knives of light slicing through from the other world. A child giggled somewhere beyond and others shouted to one another in some distant game.

  Marco!

  Polo!

  At last the wall broke open and incandescence flooded the hallway, spilling into every child’s room. A raven glided into the hospital hallway over Alicia’s shoulder. As she glanced back to follow his inky trail, the effulgence swept beyond the hallway as if to herald his arrival into this world.

  Heavenly. Breathtaking.

  Alicia pressed into the radiance.

  Chapter 25

  Alicia emerged into a train tunnel much like the one after her death. However, this time the lights danced over her as she ran, the souls of children calling to one another as she chased after them down the tracks:

  Marco...Polo!...Red rover, red rover, send Leesha right over... James be nimble, James be quick. James jump over the candlestick...

  The exhilaration of release drew her deeper into the other world, oblivious to the miracle of transmigration. As the lights kissed her hands and cheeks, picking at her long strands of hair to splay them about her head, she stumbled toward a ragged hole of half-eaten wallboard with pieces dancing in the breezes. When she reached the blasted wall at the end of the tunnel, she leaned inside. The opening was lined with hundreds of books.

  Reaching out to the book stack on either side of her, she let her fingertips brush the spines as she stepped between them, awe and wonder stinging her eyes. She did not doubt for a moment that she was not unconscious or dreaming, but that she had crossed some fearsome barrier. Something supernormal had happened in the hospital, she the focal point of the phenomenon. How could she not embrace it with her whole soul?

  She had entered the Library of Lost Childhood Memories. And she was alive.

  Not a single flame burned among the tables and shelves, but rather an eerie lavender light filled the place. Molten glass slithered upwards over the desk as the shattered pieces sculpted themselves back into a seamless pane. Alicia held her breath as she watched the spectacle; she started at the rustle of feathers.

  Caw! Caw!

  “Are you here?”

  A thick white candle sunk firmly into an iron candlestick holder burst into a single flame in the center of the Library. Alicia’s smile was so big her face almost broke with joy. “I want to see you.”

  Drawing veils of cool air over her body, the ravens darted to and fro in the rafters above. Then, another candle burst into flame. And another. A decadent silver candelabra on the centermost table gracefully lighted. One, two, three. All the while, the ravens swooped into an alcove that remained dark as the rest of the Library lit up. Were they fleeing? Had she spoiled their home by entering with her living body?

  Before she could ruminate on the exodus any further, the abyss of the alcove erupted with a roar of black wings and hoarse shrieks. He emerged with a steady step. King of Shadows. Lord of Secrets. A raven sat on his right shoulder, while another landed on his left hand held aloft for the creature’s perch. Every step he took closer to her freed her from the world she knew. She studied his body without shame. Magnificent broad shoulders hoisted arms so thick they could break a lion’s neck, and his torso flared with smooth pectorals under the tattered robe. His stature reminded her of the Vi
kings in her childhood encyclopedias. But unlike the thick manes of the Nordic conquerors, not a hair graced his body. That lush char coated his lower legs, cheeks, arms.

  He stopped only a few feet in front of her. “You are back. At last.”

  Alicia could not speak.

  Without taking his eyes off her, he flicked his hand toward a book on the table. The cover flipped open and invisible fingers rifled the pages. The imperious scrawl of ink wavered on every page with a fiery waltz of piano, harpsichord, and strings. With his other hand, he reached out to her and the two ravens fled.

  She took his hand, his velvet fingers grasping hers. He pulled her close, placing a hand on the small of her back. He moved one of her hands around his waist and the other up high on his shoulder. Her fingers and palm pressed into the dusty nothingness, yet she leaned into him just as securely as if he were true flesh. With the music’s crescendo, he led her in a waltz about the Library. Her feet moved tentatively with his—back, side, forward, side. She had never waltzed before. The movement felt both foreign and familiar. Alicia was soon hypnotized by the music and his liquid movements.

  He smiled fiendishly and drew her ever closer to him as they moved. “We’re waltzing to someone’s nightmare. Exquisite, isn’t it?”

  It was perhaps the most exquisite music she had ever heard. The clarity of the notes contrasted with the angelic tongues and the foreign lyrics. “Someone’s nightmare?”

  “The music of the ink that recorded their trauma—a trauma so severe they had to bring it to me.”

  “So, only the very worst memories come here.”

  “Correct.”

  “But there are people who live with some pretty shitty memories. Why didn’t they bring them to you?”

  “I don’t know,” he said. His sea green eyes softened to a willowy shade. “Their soul decides. Not me. And even then, I’ve turned away many.”

  “Why would you do that?”

  His eyes twinkled. “I think you know why.”

  Alicia shuddered. An enchanting yet sadistic bastard who enjoys the misery of others.

  “I’m pleased you came back,” he said. “It’s quite a surprise.”

  “Indeed,” Alicia replied. “This was not where I planned to go.”

  “Where then? To Rome? Perhaps to the ruins of Pompeii or the cafés of Paris?”

  “Home actually.”

  “Yours, I suppose, not mine. Were you not terrified when you saw the light?” he continued. “Did you not worry where it would take you?”

  She shook her head. A big lie.

  He raised an eyebrow. “We have to stop meeting like this.”

  They both laughed. He swept her around the main table, which stood over as many books as were stacked on top of it. The candelabra were balanced precariously among the books. Alicia worried about that for a moment before wondering if anything—the candles, the books—was even real at all.

  “You’re deathly curious about the Library. It haunts your dreams.”

  “Perhaps.”

  “I know it does,” he replied. The waltz slowed. “I give you those dreams.”

  “Why not give me my book?” she asked. “I will never need to dream the rose garden again. It will only torment me until you do, and you know that.”

  “I cannot give you your book,” he said. “Not unless you are ready to pass on.”

  “Then why am I here?” she asked. “How did I get here?”

  “You are here because you wanted to be here. Here is where the most terrifying stories live. True pain and suffering for you to enjoy.” He continued, sotto voce, in her ear. “Stay here with me.”

  “You send me tormenting dreams, and now you want me to stay with you?” Why did the bad ones heat her southern regions like a branding iron? She pressed her fingers into the silky warmth of his back. The char clung to her now, grinding into her sweater arms and t-shirt, smearing her hands. “I don’t even know you and you want me to shack up. Tsk-tsk.”

  “If I told you who I am, would you stay?”

  “That would depend on who you are and what sort of place this really is. And even then, I’d have to consider it. I sort of prefer make-believe pain to real pain, after all.” That was a lie. The idea of staying in the Library was so weird that she couldn’t get her head around it, much less consider it.

  “You were eager to trade your life for the unknown a few days ago.”

  “Because anything was better than the pain,” she replied. “But I’m not in pain any more. Things have changed.”

  “Because of this place. And because of me,” he said, smug.

  “In part...yes.”

  “Or because of him?”

  Alicia nearly fainted at the reference to Dr. Farron. “Him?”

  “You know who I mean. The Celt. He has been trying to divert the children from me. And now he wants to divert you, too.”

  “How do you know about him? And why do you call him The Celt?”

  “The children,” he said. “They tell me everything.” As the enormity of the statement stooped into Alicia’s already shaky frame of reference, Mr. Wicker continued. “Georgeta tells me about you. You think because she is unconscious she is therefore unaware, and that is not true.”

  “Georgeta? That’s her name?” Alicia added.

  “She adores you, you know.”

  The idea that that poor damaged baby adored her touched Alicia. “The last time I saw you, you tried to seduce me because you wanted to steal my skin and take my life for your own so that you could escape this place—”

  “I wasn’t serious. I couldn’t really do that.”

  “Oh, really? Well, you want something from me and I don’t think you’re being honest about what it is.”

  “I am being as honest as I’ve ever been,” he said. “And that’s saying quite a bit given who I was when I was human.”

  Mr. Wicker looked away from her, as if catching a stray thought or sound. Alicia didn’t believe him, but she succumbed to the hypnotic effect of his voice. She let go of his shoulder and touched the finely sculpted sinews of his neck, starting at the wide bone of his jaw, drawing her fingers down to his collarbone. They stopped dancing, and he motioned to the book with the singing ink. The pages closed and the music stopped. Alicia could hear nothing but her breathing and the flickering of oily wings somewhere in the alcove. Even the clocks had stopped. Mr. Wicker placed his hand behind her head and guided her to rest against his sternum. At first she was startled at the heavy beat within. She then realized it was not his heart but rather a distant war drum echoing across a valley.

  She closed her eyes, and behind her lids, cornfields burst into flame.

  HELVETIA, GAUL—58 B.C.

  As his wagon approached the chaos, Drunos watched the twisting, spitting flames roll over the cornfields, the wind driving the fire across the valley. The roiling waves stretched to the feet of the hoary-headed Jura mountains and surely even to the silvery Rhine river. His eyes watered with the smoke and ash spinning in the sky like a blackened snow flurry. Hundreds of villages burned in the wake of a massive migrating caravan. Thousands of wagons, chariots, and horses rumbled west with his people, away from the land Drunos knew as a child.

  “Stop!” he called to his slaves. “It’s time to ride.”

  One of the slaves dismounted and, untying the mare from the wagon, he helped Drunos out and onto his beloved horse. The mare had carried him throughout the Isle of Briton during his druid training. It returned home with him, festooned in the ornate designs and complex wards of the druid school.

  But instead of feasts and festivities, hostile Helvetii warriors soon greeted Drunos and his two slaves. Brass torques curled around their necks and bronze bracelets wreathed their wrists. Men and women alike wore brass helmets and brightly colored cassocks. They threatened Drunos with short lances, rattling a piece of tin at the base to intimidate the intruders. Long, flat shields covered in skins were slung across their backs.

  “What
is your business, stranger?” one of the female warriors demanded. “Tell us and be truthful or we will kill you now.”

  Drunos drew up in his saddle, angry. “I am Drunos, your druid returned from the Isle. In the name of Teutates, I demand to see Vercetillos or whoever is now the vergobret.” If anyone should have greeted him, it should have been Vercetillos, as it was Drunos and his old mentor, Litugenalos, who had personally chosen him to be the tribe’s high magistrate.

  Unconvinced of Drunos’ identity, the warriors pressed their captives onward, closely guarding them, while two riders separated to find their superiors. The other warriors returned after some time. Smoke darkened the horizon behind them, making breathing difficult. The blinding eye of the thunder god, Tara Nis, hung in the hazy sky. A mounted figure broke through the circle. Like Drunos’, his white druid’s cloak was spattered lightly with blue, red, and green.

  “Hail Drunos. Old friend.”

  The rider pushed back his hood. It was not Vercetillos, but rather Litugenalos, the elder druid. He was a striking man, old enough to be Drunos’ father yet still strong. At Litu’s signal, the warriors apologized to Drunos, who in turn praised them for their vigilance.

  “You almost missed the caravan,” Litu said. “You chose a fortuitous time to return.” He seemed different. Cold and distant.

  “It was not my choosing,” Drunos replied bitterly. “The Chief Astrologer said that Tara Nis had flung a fiery wheel across my sky. My studies were over, he said, and I must follow the wheel home.”

  “You were not initiated then?”

  Drunos pushed back the sleeve of his robe to reveal the swirling brand of the oak tree on his forearm. Litugenalos’ cheek twitched. Drunos drew his sleeve back over his arm and hunched under his cloak. His blood had thinned without the icy breath of the Jura on his cheek for the last five years.