Trent Jamieson - Roil

And it was glorious.

“On with you, lads!” he roared at his men feeding the steamer. “On with us all, to the heat and the dark and the cities what dream.”

Heat. They had to keep their bodies hot. Here, they were in a fortunate situation, but those behind, in the carriages. So new to this, and having to deal with the comparative cold, he pitied them a little, poor, new-sprung things.

If worst came to worst, body heat was enough, but the hotter the better, and the closer one came to the Roil: the easier it was to think clearly. The easier it was to hear the Roil’s voice.

One day all this would be theirs. In his mind, he could see the land as it had been and would again, swallowed and warmed by the Roil, its glorious croon echoing, echoing in his skull. But, for now, they could only visit, briefly and madly, this chillier Roilless place.

It was just too far away from the Roil itself. The Dreaming city’s commands were too fractured: nonsensical.

From the cabin behind came a growl, then something else snarled in reply.

“Settle,” the driver whispered. “You will get your run, in the dark and in the heat.”

The snarling stopped, though it took its time about it.

The driver stared into the rain. The Roil two hundred miles south, roared in his blood, a violent glorious siren song.

Faster, he had to drive the engine faster.

DOLOROUS GREY, 170 MILES NORTH OF THE ROIL EDGE

Was the train running faster? It took a corner and jolted, David stumbled through the door to the dining room hall, ready to shout out a warning.

He stopped, mouth agape.

Maybe this had not been such a bright idea after all.

It was the poetry that disturbed him, and the music, utterly unlike anything he had ever heard. No, everything about this room disturbed him. It was off in the way the world was off after a day or two straight without Carnival. Two fiddlers played loudly, and in an odd tempo, coming to abrupt halts and sudden bursts of quiet and crescendo.

Fiddlesticks, toothpicks, drown ’em in sweet

Shadows are singing. Shadows are singing

Buried in me from my nose to my feet

‘orrible ‘orrible cascading shoes

‘orrible ‘orrible singing with youse.

Moths in the cradle. Served with a ladle.

Shadows are singing. Butterfly’s eaten eaten my brain.

The smoky dining room was, like the rest of the train, far too hot and almost airless. Bodies pressed together here, too close; almost the entire population of the train had to be in this long room. There was something almost insectile about them, as though he had just opened the top of an ants’ nest.

Popular place, David thought. Odd as it was, he should be safe in here. There were plenty of witnesses.

He took a couple of steps into the room. The music ground to a halt, every eye in the dining carriage trained on him: as though he just might be dinner.

“My eyes, but he isn’t one of us,” someone chortled.

“Soon will be.” The crowd took up the call. “Soon will be.” Men, women and children their lips edged with darkness, crowed. “Soon will be.” And around them all, in spiralling streams, the moths moved, from eye to eye and mouth to mouth. Then they lifted into the air and dipped, crashing towards him.

Tiny wings made a soft soughing noise like the first breath of wind. One brushed him, burning his skin. David stumbled back to the door.

The Porter stood there. Moths slid from his lips, bearding his chin with fluttering darkness. His eyes were more focused now, sharp and cruel.

“Not so fast,” the Porter said, and walked towards him. “Much warmer here.”

Another moth touched David’s arm. He yelped, brushed it away.

“That’s it, give ’em room to fly into that mouth of yours. Let ’em kiss your blood.”

David clamped his mouth shut.

“Don’t matter they’ll find a way in.”

The dining car door slammed open, and with it a whip crack of cold. The whole room chilled.

Moths tumbled around David, a rain of ash-veined shadow, blasted back. People, who were no longer people at all but something else – something monstrous that David did not understand – shrieked.

“Well hurry up, lad.” Cadell was bent over, his face curiously pale and dark as snow. Cadell’s arms were raised; blood streamed from his nose. From where the Old Man stood, frigid air howled as though he were a portal to another frozen realm. The glass in the windows nearest him had cracked; so swift had been the change from heat to cold.

“Hurry.” Cadell breathed

David bolted towards the Old Man.

Someone grabbed at him, their boiling fingers curled to claws. The Porter. Its fingers tightened their grip around his arm.

“No. You’re staying here,” he said. “With us. You’ll like it.”

David lashed out with an elbow and the Porter groaned and fell.

The room warmed. David’s heart pounded in his ears, and his only thought was, out.

Out.

Out.

Out.

He reached the door and was through. Cadell slammed it shut behind them and pressed his hand against the panelling, ice sheathed the door at once.

“What was that?” David demanded.

Cadell waved the question away, his fingertips blistered, blood oozing from one dark nail. “No time now. Just run.”

The door behind them jumped in its frame, and David jumped with it.

“Hurry.”

The ice cracked. The door creaked. They sprinted down the aisle.

“They’ll all be back in there, or in the engine room where it’s hot,” Cadell said. “Those bound by Witmoths do not like the cold. And thank goodness for that, this far from the Roil, and this newly sprung, they’re confused.”

“Witmoths?” David asked, looking back at where they had come. There was another loud crack, and the doors panelling fell away. But they were in the next carriage, and Cadell was locking the door and sheathing it in ice as well.

“Witmoths, moth smoke, it goes by many names. But it’s what happens when the Roil gets inside you,” he said as he worked on the door. “Haven’t seen its like in a long time, and then it was the desperate gambit of a desperate enemy. It’s as though I’ve stepped into a corridor of ghosts.”

They crashed down the carriage, the door behind them already taking hits. Boots slapped on the roof above, people cackled and screamed.

They worked their way back through the carriages until they reached their own. Cadell grabbed his bag, gesturing that David leave his where it was, and then they continued on.

“Where are we going?” David demanded, his heart pounding in his ears. “Where will we be safe on this train?”

Cadell stopped at the last exit, leading outside, and paused, panting. “Nowhere,” he said, his hands working the bolt on the door. He tugged at it and the metal creaked then cracked. Behind them a window smashed, a people howled and laughed.

Cadell flung the door open with an ease, despite his breathlessness, that David would not have credited but a few hours before.

The rain-smeared world rushed by, lightning flashed in the murky distance and thunder followed. David didn’t like the look of that darkness, of all that space, but he felt it pulling him. Or was it the nightmare things coming after them, the cloying heat driving him out?

“On the count of three,” Cadell said.

“One.”

Back down the aisle, they rushed towards them, a knot of angry cackling flesh, moths running from their chins like blood.

“Two.”

Moths and smoke boiling and billowing before the crowd. Cadell raised his spare hand and the air cooled again, the moths and the smoke scattered, and tumbled, and all along the aisle men and women screamed, but this time they did not stop their pursuit. A hand reached down over the exit, Cadell touched it, and it jerked back, a scream coming from above.