Tim Lebbon - Echo city

"Where are you taking us?" she asked, moving close. He was not used to such proximity; most people shied away from him. He smelled her breath, stale and spicy.

"Trust me," he said. "It's around the next corner. You'll both know it, though you might have forgotten."

"Forgotten what?" Peer asked.

"Just another part of the city passed into Echo," he said.

The streets were busy here. A market was set up in the center of the wide road, with food stalls hawking their produce to those trying to make their way home before the sun set. The smells that vied for supremacy were mouthwatering, and Nophel realized that he had not eaten since leaving Dane Marcellan early that morning. But though his stomach rumbled, now was not the time. He walked past the food vendors and breathed in their promise.

The building on the street corner was a tavern, its drinkers spilling out onto the sidewalks, where they sat at rickety tables talking loudly about fighting and fucking. Occasionally there were whispers of Dragarians. Two women were arguing, four men watched, and a tall fat man seemed to be asleep in the middle of it all. He wore the Scarlet Blades uniform, but he'd removed his sword and laid it across the table before him. Drunk though he was, scruffy, pathetic, and apparently sleeping, still no one dared approach. The Blades were truly respected, and Nophel felt a frisson of fear over what he had done.

They'll hunt me, he thought. They'll find out who lived in the barge, and they're probably already hunting all of us. But as they passed the tavern and he saw the entrance to the alley farther along the street, he realized the truth: The Scarlet Blades were the least of their worries.

He turned down the alley and walked quickly into the shadows between two buildings, one a three-story rooming house, the other a shop selling jewelry and trinkets. Malia and Peer followed without question, and that was good. They had to act quickly.

"Follow me," Nophel said. "We can't be seen, and these entrances are checked by special troops within the Scarlet Blades."

"What entrances?" Peer asked.

"Follow." Farther along the alley, Nophel kicked aside burst trash bags, spilling rotten food and thousands of broken and crushed trinket beads. They skittered across the alley floor, some dropping into drains, others gathering in cracks in the paving. Beneath the bags was a metal cover, and Nophel curled his fingers into the recessed handles. He pulled hard, straining, then the cover broke free from its surroundings with a wet sucking sound.

"Down," he said.

"The Echoes?" Malia asked. "You're taking us north through the Marcellan Echoes?"

"Nowhere near as deep," Nophel said, and he almost smiled. "Trust me, I know what I'm doing."

Malia and Peer swapped glances, and he saw an acceptance there, though unwilling on Malia's part. I have them, he thought. The sense of power was not altogether unpleasant.

"What's down there?" Peer asked.

"Bellowers," Nophel said. "Quickly now. I'll explain on the way." He glanced back at the alleyway's entrance, expecting at any moment to see the scarlet blur of soldiers rushing them. His heart thumped, and he followed Peer into the hole.

Nophel heaved the cover back over them and shut out the last of the light. It was as black as the Chasm. They waited for a minute, breathing heavily in the darkness, until Malia spoke.

"So I suppose you can see in the dark as well?"

"No. I can only turn invisible. Behind you to the left, there should be oil torches on a wooden shelf." He heard Malia rustling and then the sound of metal against stone. Moments later a flint sparked several times and a torch came alight, its diffused glow filling the small corridor. Malia passed torches to Peer and Nophel, then stared him in the eye.

"This way," he said. She's staring at me. What does she see? But he knew what she saw: a deformed man with pustulating growths on his face and one good eye, who had worked for the Marcellans most of his life. She saw someone whose arrival had led to the death of her friends Devin and Brunley, the destruction of her home, and her being on the run from the Scarlet Blades. The only thing she can't see is who I really am.

He had not been down here for more than a decade, yet the corridor still felt familiar to him. It was dark and hidden, damp and musty, and it smelled of older times; most of the places he had spent his life were like that. It curved left and down, and though they passed several doors standing ajar, he knew to continue onward. These doors led to empty rooms, where once people were supposed to wait while the Bellowers were primed. I hope they're still alive, he thought. After all this, if we find them dead and the pods smashed, the women will not be pleased. Displeasing Malia was not something he wished to do.

The corridor ended at a wide metal door. Nophel worked the handle, pleased to feel it move. It squealed open.

"There's a lamp system," he said. "I'll try to fire it up." That also worked. With a series of soft pops, seventeen lamps fixed to the walls of the large chamber came alight one after another, each giving off thick black smoke for the first few beats as the flames scorched away dried oil. That worried Nophel, because it meant that no one had been down here for a while. But as long as the fluid tubes and distribution systems had maintained their integrity, he hoped that the Bellowers would still be alive.

"I'm not feeling happy about this," Peer said. "What is this place?"

"Yeah," Malia said, "enough of the fucking mystery."

"It was built while my mother was still alive," Nophel said. He headed across to a wide channel in the floor in which a large tubelike apparatus sat. "You're aware of the Scopes?"

"Of course," Peer said softly.

"They weren't the only commissions the Marcellans gave the Baker. There are other things in this city even now, and many more that have died out. I know most of them. I've visited some. They… interest me. And these are called the Bellowers." He pointed at the wall behind them, glad that the heavy curtains were still in place. "I'll show you one."

Malia and Peer stood behind Nophel as he drew the curtains open. He sensed their fascination and their fear; he still felt both those things himself. It would be unnatural not to in the presence of such a creature.

As the curtains slid aside, the Bellower awoke.

Peer gasped and stepped back into Malia, desperate to run but not wishing to turn her back. The Watcher woman grasped her arms and held her tight.

"Wait," she whispered into Peer's ear. "Let's give the ugly man a chance."

It was huge. Perhaps it had once been human, but all facets of humanity had been chopped away by the Baker. The Baker's mother, Peer thought, not the Baker I've met. But she was becoming confused over such matters, wondering whether there had ever been any real distinction between the two.

"It looks like it's been dormant for some time," Nophel said.

The thing's face was huge, the height of three people and just as wide. Shadows around its bristly head indicated a deep hollow behind it. And how large is the body on a thing like this? Peer thought. Do I really want to know? Could I even comprehend? It had two small eyes-perhaps the size of her fist-which remained closed, though she could see their leathery lids moving as its eyeballs rolled in dreamy sleep. Its skin was wrinkled and hard like old dried mud, and small creatures dashed across it, trying to escape the light in crevices or up the several large nostrils that dripped slick fluid to the floor. Its mouth was a wide closed seam, almost as wide as the head. Peer dreaded to know what was inside.

"It's monstrous," Malia said. "Just…"

"It's genius," Nophel said. "I hated her, but she was a genius."

"Hated?" Peer asked. He looked back at her, his face dark, the single eye glittering with what might have been anger, or tears, or both.