Winter Tide Read online

  “So my colleagues at Miskatonic always tell me,” Trumbull said dryly. “But I’ve checked, and overstudy hasn’t yet made me completely masculine.” Charlie and Spector colored, and even Caleb raised his head.

  “I assure you she’s been at Miskatonic for some time,” said Spector, recovering. “And with no reports of abrupt personality shifts, I gather…” This last said with less certainty, but she nodded firmly. It was true that while Skinner had made nasty intimations, none suggested any loss of memory or nervous breakdown that might have cast doubt on her qualifications. I would have to ask how she had managed that.

  “Anyone who knows me can confirm that I’m much as I’ve always been,” she said. “I’m afraid your detective abilities are not all that you might have hoped.”

  As the rest of us failed to support Upton’s near-panic, he seemed to doubt his own senses. He subsided in his chair, muttering to himself. I was grateful when Spector started to make our excuses.

  As we reached the door, Upton craned his neck to follow us. “Funny you should come asking this now,” he said abruptly.

  “Why is that?” asked Spector.

  “Well, twenty years and more with no interest. And then a year ago, those ‘scholars,’ and now you. Something must be happening out there.” He shivered. “It makes a man glad to be inside someplace safe. I hope it’s safe, anyway.” He grinned suddenly, incongruously, ghoulishly. “It’ll be waiting for you, too, when it gets to be too much out there. It always waits.”

  CHAPTER 10

  We weren’t able to get any useful description of Upton’s previous visitors from the staff—nothing that couldn’t describe any random handful of gentlemen dressed for business. Spector seemed disgruntled, and begged leave for an immediate private errand, so Charlie and my brother and I squeezed into Trumbull’s car. She moved papers from the back seat to the trunk to make room for us. Caleb rebuffed my attempts to converse, not with his usual sullen anger but with a rawness that encouraged me to give him what space I could.

  Charlie twisted around from his seat, and I leaned forward. “Miss Marsh—are you well?”

  It took some doing to get such a direct expression of concern from him, although less than it once had. “I’m just…” I tried to put words to my roil of emotion, and failed. “Irked at my family.”

  That brought Caleb out of his silence. “They were trying to protect us.”

  “They could have done any number of things. Gained his promise of silence, or blackmailed him. Brought him to live in Innsmouth where they could watch over him. Instead they left him imprisoned, when he’d done nothing but the justice the law required.”

  “And thought it a sign of all our corruption, not just Waite’s. You know as well as I that it was outsiders living in town who brought the raid down on us. Don’t be absurd, sister dear.” The usual wry term of endearment turned against me like a slap, and he dismissed me in favor of the countryside racing by out the window.

  “I suppose we are all human,” said Charlie. I nodded mutely, grateful for the reminder that he at least thought so.

  “Sapient,” said Trumbull. Charlie and I both started. “No thinking, feeling being survives by being entirely gentle. Your family is in a greater company than humanity alone.”

  Charlie looked at her sideways, but said nothing. It was no surprise that she’d picked up on his awareness of her nature. I found our shared imperfections more reassuring than I would say, but: “I still question their judgment.”

  She nodded, not arguing.

  “Did you get what you were looking for, this morning?” asked Charlie.

  Trumbull nodded again, eyes fixed on the road. “Oh, yes. And then some.”

  It occurred to me to ask her, “Are you all right?” In the same breath as I said it, I felt extremely foolish. Of course she wouldn’t answer such a puerile question.

  “Yes—although somewhat disturbed to discover that my grasp of this body is so noticeable. I must explore the connection more carefully.”

  “From the records,” I said, “people often notice discrepancies when your people make a switch—or simply find the results inexplicably disturbing.”

  Trumbull snorted, unladylike. “Some of my people have no subtlety. If every one of our visits were taken note of—outside of the people we deliberately make aware, of course—then such records would be considerably more common.”

  I checked Caleb for signs of an oncoming diatribe, but while he glowered a little he didn’t seem inclined to argue. This was a far more comfortable conversation than the previous topic, and I therefore gave in to the question that had piqued my curiosity earlier. “How did you hide the amnesia? I’m sure Dean Skinner would have said something if they’d noticed.”

  She chuckled, seeming equally eased by the change of topic. “None of the people here actually know Trumbull, or care to know her. Her family disapprove of her studies and take no interest. And I was fortunate enough to arrive during the summer intersession, so that no classes were interrupted and I had ample time to study her notes and her journals. There was only one servant to witness the faint, and one discreet doctor. I reassured the doctor that even I am sometimes prone to feminine weaknesses, and dismissed the servant with a generous allowance so she need not notice the inevitable changes in habit and personality that might be visible in intimate quarters.”

  It was a clever answer, but one particular aspect stood out for me. Ignoring his mood, I grabbed Caleb’s hand, and he turned to me, startled. “Journals! I didn’t think to ask for private journals, but they’ll be right there in the collections. Not just the spellbooks and theology and philosophy, but records of our lives.”

  “Oh.” He gaped, and then leaned close into my arms. So quietly I struggled to hear, he murmured, “You keep reminding me that we haven’t lost everything.” I felt my shoulder wet, and held my little brother tightly.

  * * *

  The librarian very nearly demanded that I give the full name of every person whose journal I wished to read. However, he surrendered with surprisingly little argument. Perhaps it was our eagerness—or Trumbull’s, which was palpable—or that Miskatonic never inculcated its staff against our private diaries as it did against our more overt theology. He brought us an eclectic stack: pocket daybooks and easel-sized sketchpads, bound in cloth and leather and paper. Some were carefully inscribed with their authors’ names; others went entirely unlabeled.

  The collection was not well-sorted, and I got the impression that Miskatonic’s historians had not yet so much as organized them by common script. Charlie took on this task, looking inside covers or reading a few pages and sharing with us the names he found. Trumbull, of course, delved in without shame, which I did not this time begrudge her.

  Caleb had been squinting at the same page for several minutes, marking his place with a finger and a fixed glare. “Can you read that?” I asked gently.

  He turned his mute glare on me. I came round the table, abandoning my own journal to share his. “We’ll look at it together, if you like.” He grimaced, but moved his chair to the side.

  What he held was a thin, factory-made notebook bound in cheap leather. Memory washed over me: the five-and-dime where our mother had taken us for school supplies every August, the smell of dusty tools and crisp paper and the jar of salt taffy by the register. Stacks of neat lined notebooks like this one, alongside pencils and nibs and ink and chalk, and a disordered row of used novels tucked incongruously at the end of the aisle.

  The handwriting was not that of a child: it had the confidence and irregularity of someone who no longer labored over penmanship. Caleb had barely started his cursive when they forbade us the written word altogether; of course he wouldn’t be able to interpret. I read to him quietly. The entries were dated from autumn of 1903, and belonged to a cook for one of the Gilman households—there have been many Patience Gilmans with fisher husbands, so it was impossible to know which one. Still, the household’s rhythms made me ache with familiar
ity. Meals and tutoring sessions and children begging sweets, shopping at that selfsame grocer and the other markets that lay behind the dunes. Saturday evening services, where distinctions of mistress and servant fell away in the glimmering darkness.

  Reverend Eliot spoke to me again after services last night, asking of my visions. I was fearful to confess that I’ve had none since before last Winter Tide. He was quick to reassure me on the matter, but still I fear that disappointment will attend my metamorphosis. Perhaps I am trying too hard to force the gods. When Alydea Bardsley’s air-born lover ran away with their son, I prayed all night for a glimpse of the boy’s whereabouts and received not so much as an allusive dream.

  I must try to do as Archpriest Ngalthr bids, and focus on the duties of the land. Yet this morning while picking herbs, I was struck near as strong as vision by imagining what bolder and stranger duties might attend my life in the water. It is not right or proper, and I must put such dreams aside until it is time—if these half-fantastic abilities strengthen with my blood.

  Caleb put his hand over the passage. “I know who she is! Do you remember Archpriest Ngalthr’s acolyte? Who helped with the midsummer ceremony when I was five? Chulzh’th was her water name, but someone said she’d been a servant on land, and she put up with old Charis Gilman being very familiar.”

  I wracked my mind, but to no avail. I could recall the archpriest easily, but not the woman attending him that one year. “I don’t remember. I’m sorry.”

  “She had almost black scales all down her back and legs, but with purple highlights like quahog shells. And a sort of spiky crest.” He traced its outline in the air over his scalp.

  I shook my head. “I’m sorry. I don’t think I paid her much attention. But I’m glad to know who this is, anyway.” And to know too that she’d changed young, before the raid. I dropped my voice. “We’re going to have to talk with them, I think.”

  Caleb lowered his voice as well. We knew from long experience the safe range between our hearing and that of ordinary men. “So you can complain to them of Upton’s treatment?”

  “Possibly. But we’ve been talking about getting our books back, and we still don’t know how. And these journals—no one at Miskatonic is even reading them. Maybe the elders will be able to help. I’m scared too, but we literally can’t avoid them forever.” And beyond that—though I wasn’t sure how Caleb would respond to the idea now—they needed to know how dangerous the wars of the land might become. When last they’d been involved, poisonous gases and torpedoes had been the gravest threats armies could muster.

  Caleb let out a breath and nodded. “We’ll need someone who can drive. Trumbull, I suppose, is the best option we have. I wish there were some way to distract your…” He failed to find a suitable term. “… Mr. Spector. Or maybe we ought to introduce them.” He bared his teeth.

  “That sounds like a terrible idea. But it might be best to tell him outright that we’re visiting our family. It’s not as though he’s ignorant of their presence. And we could bring Neko and Mr. Day. The elders ought to know that we’ve found kind people on the land as well as cruel.”

  “Huh. Yes, they’ll want to know the Kotos. And I suppose it’s best to get their approval of your students before you start a whole school. Are you going to bring your newest devotee, too?”

  It was surprisingly tempting. Sharing my ancestry felt less terrifying now that I’d done so with Charlie. And unknowing, she would hold our studies back even further. But when I thought of telling the elders I’d revealed them so casually, I quailed. They might still question my knowledge of Charlie’s integrity after a mere two years’ intimacy. I did not care to think how they would judge someone who learned after two days. “No. It’s too early.”

  Plans made, I was about to return to Chulzh’th’s journal when I heard footsteps at the doorway. Audrey herself leaned against the frame, a little out of breath but apparently pleased. I got up to meet her, hoping—now that I’d made my decision—that I could dissuade her from inquiring too closely into our reading material.

  “I’m sorry we didn’t come to Hall today,” I said. “Something new came up—we had another errand in the morning, and then some specific volumes we needed to look at here. We should be back there Sunday, or Monday at the latest.”

  “I know you’ve got some deeper goal here,” she said. She straightened and brushed off her skirt. “Though I wish you’d tell me how I could help. I was hoping I could still join you for lessons tonight?”

  I withheld a sigh: imagined hours of summoning practice, much needed before an Innsmouth visit, would have to be saved for later in the day. I toyed with the idea of refusing her—but I had promised. I wanted to be a good teacher, not the sort who put off my students until convenient times that might never come. I remembered the urgency of my own first days of study in Charlie’s back room, and could not bring myself to leave her so frustrated. “Yes, I think we could do that. I can spare you an hour or two.”

  I glanced at Trumbull, and considered advantages to getting an early start on our studies. She still sat immersed in a diary, a small pile of those she’d read through set to one side and a larger stack waiting at the other. She turned the pages steadily, capturing each with avid eyes before flicking to the next. While she remained here, her house would feel a more relaxed place to work.

  Charlie needed little persuasion. When I asked Caleb if he cared to join us, he hesitated. At last he nodded fractionally. Trumbull passed me her house key without looking up from her reading.

  * * *

  Neko and Dawson sat at Trumbull’s dining room table, notes spread around them.

  “You’re back early,” said Neko. She paused. More gently: “Did you find what you were looking for?”

  “We learned many things,” I said. “How are you doing with the notes?”

  “We’re learning many things.” They shared a smile—Dawson’s a fleeting thing, quickly hidden.

  “In that case, we’ll just go upstairs to study,” Caleb said. His cheeks flushed. “So everyone can keep learning.”

  That drew a real smile from Neko. “I’m glad. Call us if you need us!”

  As we went upstairs, Audrey asked him, “So they’re your … are they both sweet on you, or have you been making up to both of them?”

  Caleb blushed. “Audrey!” I said. She flinched a little, but seemed to have mostly gotten over seeing me as an unapproachable priestess. Opening the door to Trumbull’s study distracted her nicely.

  “Wow. This is just … wow.” She peered closely at the diagrams on the walls and craned her neck to read titles on Trumbull’s bookshelf. She leaned over the half-built machine, but sensibly pulled back before I could warn her not to touch it.

  Caleb stood by the door until I pulled him inside.

  “Audrey,” I asked, “do you want to help me draw the diagram for the Inner Sea?” I’d told her what to expect during our previous session, but had given her little preparatory reading. I knew I was rushing her. When we finished in Arkham—however that happened—she might be able to gain access to Miskatonic’s stacks, but would no longer have teachers with practical experience.

  And if I sated her desire for wonders swiftly, I could send her downstairs with one of the easier books so that Charlie and Caleb and I could practice more advanced and urgent arts.

  I drew out the lines slowly and carefully, explaining their logic as best I could. Caleb knelt across from us. When I offered him the chalk, he drew one tentative sigil from memory before handing it back. My face heated, and I corrected his effort with as little fuss as I could manage. Audrey surprised me with a couple of accurate guesses and a fine hand—she had apparently picked up something amid the dross of her friends’ studies.

  “This is the simplest of spells, and foundation to all others. Magic seeks to better understand, and eventually to build on, the connection between minds and bodies. Even to calm a storm, you treat the wind and rain as if they were alive and corporeal. That i
s why blood is part of the spell, along with words and symbols.”

  “So that we may better know that even the cosmos, vast and seemingly eternal, is in truth a mortal form,” said Caleb. “I remember that.”

  “Yes,” I said. “All things fade and die. Magic makes their momentary glory tangible—but it also makes it impossible to hide how small and temporary they are. How temporary we are.” I would not insult Caleb by asking—mortality was one lesson he had well learned—but I asked Audrey: “Do you still wish to go on?”

  “Of course I do.”

  “All right, then. Today we’ll look more closely at our own bodies. You’ll only be able to see briefly, at first—when you come back to ordinary awareness, just wait for the rest of us. Don’t try to touch anyone else.” I’d forgotten that last instruction when I first tried this with Charlie, and remembered belatedly the effect of physical contact. He’d been too pleased with his first taste of magic to properly interpret the difference between my blood and his, but I didn’t want to take the chance with Audrey.

  For this ritual, I did play at priestess—and Charlie at priest, for we were the only two who knew the necessary chant by heart. I washed the blade, pricked fingers, and we each let our blood into the bowl. My confidence grew with the rhythm of my words. Even as I settled on my heels to let the spell take hold, I found my awareness stretched as it had never been with Charlie alone.

  There was my own blood: my river, swift and sure and wild. But beyond that—even without physical contact—Charlie’s familiar trickle and the aching love I felt whenever I touched it. I knew its courses, and knew too how to read the unwelcome signs they carried of my friend’s mortality.

  But then there were other waters. Caleb’s torrent ran twin to mine, so similar that it took a moment even to see it. I wanted to dive in, to revel in the truth of another like myself. It was ridiculous, for I’d been beside him a week now, but I did not fight the absurdity.