Mike Shevdon - Sixty-One Nails

My hands were still covered in grey ash. I felt fine. I felt better than fine. I felt invigorated, full of life and ready to take on the world. It was unreal. Staring down at the heap that had been Fenlock, I denied to myself that I had killed him. It must have been his fault. He brought it on himself. He must have caused it. I looked around for some other reason, some clue as to what had happened there.

As I glanced up towards the opening at the end of the alley, there was a silhouette. It was Blackbird.

"Blackbird, it's me!" I raised a hand to attract her attention, but the silhouette moved away. I trotted towards the opening and then remembered my wallet. I skidded to a halt and went back for it, snatching it from the ground, stuffing it into my pocket and trotting back out of the alley. I glanced back at the heap of dusty clothes. The light breeze that flicked though the alley stirred the ash from the clothes into a dust devil, scattering the remains. I turned away.

When I reached the side-street, she wasn't there. I looked up and down and then spotted her on the crossroads where the road met the side-street. She turned towards the tube station.

I ran down the street to the junction. "Blackbird! Wait!"

I reached the crossroads and stumbled into a pair of Japanese tourists who politely shrugged me off with repeated apologies. Muttering excuses, I barged past them and ran headlong after Blackbird. I caught a glimpse of her coat, turning into the station entrance and I thought I knew where she was going.

I ran up to the tube station, panting and out of breath. I was so flustered that I slammed into the barrier and then had to search for my wallet under the watchful eye of an Underground attendant. My card registered with the barrier and I went through, smiling apologetically.

A lift was ready to descend and I rushed forward to press myself between the closing doors before they shut. The few other passengers in the lift gave me cold looks as I shoved my way into the car, the door juddering closed behind me. The car jolted, and I got my breath back as it descended.

At the bottom I had to wait until the other passengers filed away. I used the method I had used in the alley to make everyone ignore me and headed for the doorway between the corridors where we had gained access to Gramawl's domain. The door was slightly ajar.

I pushed it open to find the passage and stairway in darkness, the light from the corridor illuminating only the top of the stair. There was no sign of a light switch, nor could I remember seeing one anywhere in the Underground. The lights were probably operated from a control room somewhere. Still, I had my own light.

The door thudded closed behind me. Standing in the darkness I let the wish to be ignored drop away and concentrated on summoning my glow, feeling the temperature in the enclosed stairway drop suddenly as light spilled out onto the stairs. It was getting easier to do this. Was that practice, or was it getting stronger?

I stepped down the stairs slowly and cautiously, wondering why Blackbird hadn't waited for me. Hadn't she heard me? Then another thought occurred to me. Perhaps it wasn't really her, but merely the semblance of her meant to draw me here? If it wasn't Blackbird, was it Carris? Had she seen what happened in the alley? Could she make herself look like Blackbird to lure me down here and take her revenge?

I took the stairs slowly, the swaying light making it more difficult to judge my footing. At the base of the stairs the corridor led on into darkness. I took a hesitant step forward into the gloom, allowing my glow to swell and throw back the shadows in its shifting, dancing light.

"Gramawl? Are you there? It's me, Rabbit. I came with Blackbird yesterday, remember?"

My voice sounded hollow and empty in the darkened passage. There was no answer.

"Gramawl?"

I walked forward a pace or two, my arms spread to show peaceful intent. Still there was no sign of him. I walked a few paces more. The light moved with me and the stairs gradually faded into the dark until it was just me in a length of illuminated corridor. I made slow progress. The passage angled left then right, as before, but when I came to the place where the stairway went up to Kareesh's den, there was no trace of the stairs.

How could they not be there? We had climbed those steps. I was sure this was where they had been. I felt along the wall where I recalled the opening, looking for some clue. There was only a blank wall with a smooth expanse of tiles. I stood in the dark wondering whether Blackbird had somehow got inside and was even now laughing with Kareesh at my expense. Then a tiny sound came to me from further down the corridor, like a scuff or a stumble.

"Gramawl?" Was he lurking there?

I remembered him appearing without a sound, and figured that either he'd wanted me to hear him or it wasn't Gramawl that was moving down there. Perhaps Blackbird had not found a way into Kareesh's den after all.

A row of fluorescent lamps marked the roof of the tunnel, though none of them offered the least glimmer of light. As I sidled along the tunnel it sloped downwards. I found the passage to be much longer than I had initially thought. Once I heard the tumbling flow of water but couldn't identify where it was coming from. Several times there were distant rumblings, whether from passing tube trains or irritated trolls I couldn't say. At one point I stopped, half deciding to head back to Covent Garden. Then I heard a distant echo of footfalls ahead and moved quickly to pursue it, only to be greeted by the empty walkway. Nothing entered the pool of light around me and I met no other soul.

At one point I shouted down the corridor. "Blackbird! I've had enough of this wild goose chase. Show yourself!" There was no sound, no light, and no answer. The light swung and shifted around me, disturbed by a wind I couldn't feel, rippled by a hand that didn't show, leaving me alone in the half-light.

I began to feel she wasn't down here, that she'd tricked me into following the tunnel and locked the door behind me, sealing me in to pursue the endless passages until I expired. I began to imagine the tunnel had no end and that it would go on, featureless and unlit, until I wore myself out or turned back.

At such points I would hesitate and wait, and after a short pause a small sound, some token of presence, would echo from the tunnel ahead, telling me the person I followed went before me. Was it an illusion, meant to tempt me on? Was it really Blackbird or something darker and more sinister?

I continued on down the passage. Occasionally there were marks of some previous human presence, whether a piece of graffiti or a discarded paper, but mostly these were old and yellowed. Once I came upon a smear of oil, smelling of minerals and machinery, with no remnant of the machine it had come from. These reassured me that I wasn't walking in a circle. A little further on an empty mineral water bottle proclaimed some more recent occupation. The tunnel began to bend and angle from its course and I got the feeling it was coming to an end.

Finally I reached the base of a circular stairway, similar to the one I had started on. As I stepped onto it I heard a door thump shut above me. I was meant to follow upwards.

Setting a steady pace, I climbed the stairway, convinced now that whoever was ahead of me was waiting above. The stairway wound round and around until I reached a steel-clad door on a landing. I took hold of the handle, half expecting it to be locked. It yielded easily and the door swung open to daylight.

I released my glow and let it die, emerging into a passage. On each end of the corridor, heavy doors blocked the way, but steps led upwards in the other direction with faint daylight indicating the way out.

The heavy door swung shut behind me with a thud, echoing the earlier sound.