Page 23 of Come Tumbling Down

He found he had the strength to run after all.

“Cora!” he howled, and dove toward the edge of the cliff. Too late, too late, too late.

She was already gone.

11 UNDER THE EAVES, WHERE SWALLOWS SLEEP

THE TOWN WAS oddly familiar. Christopher snapped his fingers as the gates swung closed behind them.

“I knew I’d seen this place before!” he said. “Didn’t Vincent Price film a movie here?”

“Not everyone who visits the Moors decides to stay,” said Jack.

“Are you saying Vincent Price—?”

“I’m saying there are a great many channels of cultural exchange between the worlds, and I’d prefer not to discuss them here, as drawing attention to ourselves is unwise.”

“Says the girl with the skeleton horse,” said Sumi.

Jack laughed.

The town really did look like something out of a black-and-white horror movie, for all that it was far from monochrome. The houses were painted in brilliant, eye-searing colors, making Sumi the only one who really matched the surroundings. There were little shops, public houses, even an inn with a sign advertising rooms to let. People walked along the narrow sidewalks flanking the street—if they could still be called “sidewalks” when they were made of wood instead of concrete. Christopher thought they might be boardwalks, or maybe promenades, but he wasn’t sure. The nomenclature of architecture had never been his focus.

There was something faintly off about the people. Their eyes were too big and their fingers were too long and when they stopped to watch the wagon rolling by they were too perfectly, profoundly still, like predators lying in wait for their next meal. Sumi stared them down, and one by one they looked away, no longer willing to meet her eyes. She snorted.

“Not so brave after all,” she said.

“Not under these circumstances,” said Jack. “I advise against walking alone down any alleyways. I’m told the public house nearest the docks serves excellent chowder that practically never contains human flesh. I’m also told that ‘practically never’ is not the same as ‘never,’ and it’s better not to gamble with such things. Anyone hungry?”

“I’m good,” said Christopher hurriedly. Jack laughed. It wasn’t a happy sound, not exactly; it was the sound of someone clinging to the last vestiges of sanity and stability with all their might. It was the sound of slipping.

Christopher shivered. No one who sounded that close to the end of their rope could hold on forever. It simply wasn’t possible.

The road led through the middle of town toward a towering edifice that appeared to be part cave and part cathedral. It had been carved from a single spire of blackened rock. Bells tolled in the distance, loud enough to have an almost physical presence.

And there, sitting on the edge of the wooden sidewalk, elbows on his knees and head bowed, was—

“Kade!” Sumi leapt down from the moving wagon and half-ran, half-skipped over to him, her oddly rollicking locomotion carrying her forward with startling speed. She stopped a few feet away, looking at him with a wide-eyed brightness that almost—almost—hid the wary caution in her eyes. “You ran away! Bad boy. Where’s the mermaid?”

“She fell.” He raised his head, looking through her more than at her, like he was staring at some distant, indescribable horizon. “She ran right to the edge of the world, and then she stepped off, and she fell. She didn’t scream. She just went.”

“The Drowned Gods called to her,” said Jack, flicking the reins and urging the horses to a halt. “It was always a possibility. It’s very sad, but we don’t have time to sit around grieving when there’s a monster to be defeated.”

Kade stared at Jack for a single long, frozen moment. Then he lunged to his feet, grabbing her by the front of her shirt and yanking her off the wagon. She didn’t fight him or resist. She just allowed him to pull her toward him, legs dangling, expression cold.

“I warned her,” she spat. “I told her there were shadows in the sea, I told her the Drowned Gods might know her name, and she came anyway, because she didn’t want to be left out of an adventure. This isn’t an adventure to me. This is my home, my life, my future. I warned her and she came anyway. Break my sister’s jaw if it makes you feel better. But be aware that there are worse things in the Moors than the sea, and all of them will come for you if I can’t state my own challenge.”

Kade grimaced. “You really are a monster,” he said, and let her go.

Jack caught herself on the edge of the wagon, barely avoiding a tumble into the dust, and straightened up, adjusting her collar with unshaking hands. She kept her eyes on Kade the whole time.

“I never claimed to be anything else,” she said, before climbing back into the driver’s seat. “Come along. We’ve much to do, and time is short.”

Kade and Sumi climbed into the back with Christopher. Jack flicked the reins, and they were away, continuing toward that blackened spire.

Red-robed acolytes appeared as the wagon neared its destination. They melted out of the nearby rocks with an air of casual, implacable menace. Hoods hid their faces, and their hands were empty, which was somehow worse than them being filled with weapons. Weapons, at least, were predictable; weapons made sense. A sword was just a knife with delusions of grandeur. A trident was a really big fork. This …

“What are they going to do to us?” asked Christopher.