The Providence Rider by Robert R. McCammon
“Listen well,” Minx whispered as they stood at the edge of the dense thicket that protected Fell’s powderworks. “I don’t know what’s in there. Probably there are men up on watchtowers hidden in the trees. There may be bogs and quicksand. We don’t dare show a light. The guards would be on us like blood-hungry ticks. We have to move silently and cautiously, and if one of us gets into trouble there can be no shouting for the sake of both our necks…or heads, as you say. If we are separated and one is captured, there can be no talking even if it means…you know what it would mean.”
“I do,” said Matthew. His nerves were on edge, but his resolution firm.
“All right. Let’s go.”
Two words that meant: this is the point of no return. Matthew and Minx entered the thicket together, and within sixty seconds were facing a yellow-moonlit wall of leaves and thorns the size of a man’s thumbnail, on coiled stalks that snaked out in every direction. They spent some time trying to find a way around this obstruction, and yet had to enter the portion of it that seemed the most penetrable. Even so, it was a torment on the flesh and a hazard on the clothing. Matthew felt that if his coat snagged one more time it would fall in shreds from his shoulders. His stockings were ragged and his legs streaked with blood by the time they reached more hospitable forest, which wasn’t saying much. The ground became soggy, held together by massive clumps of tree-roots. Even Minx, for all her sure-footed confidence, tripped and fell into the muck several times, and as the bog deepened Matthew’s boots were almost sucked from his feet.
They had to stop and rest, for the exertion of travelling through this sticky slop was extreme. “Ready?” Minx whispered after a few minutes, and Matthew answered that he was. On her next step Minx sank into brackish water nearly waist-deep. She continued on, and Matthew followed with one hand guarding the cotton in his tinderbox from being soaked.
The moon descended. From the trees of this ungodly, fetid swamp there croaked, trilled, shrieked and buzzed the insects of the night. As Minx and Matthew progressed, great bubbles of noxious swamp gas bloomed up beneath them like hideous flowers and made such explosive sounds they feared it would be heard by any listening ear. But no torches showed in the darkness nor were there voices, and the two determined travellers slogged onward.
“Careful,” Minx whispered, “there’s a snake in the water to your right.”
Matthew caught the movement of something over there, but it veered away. One snake seen, probably dozens lurking around their legs underwater. What use was there to think of that? Matthew looked up and could see a few stars through the thick treetops. New York seemed as far away as those. But here he was, waistdeep in muddy filth with snakes aslither around his ankles, likely tasting the blood on his shins. Delightful. What he must concentrate upon was not falling into the water, and keeping the tinderbox dry.
The ground began to rise and the water shallowed. Minx and Matthew got out of the muck onto sandy earth wild again with vegetation, and as Matthew brushed a low tree branch something made a noise like the clicking back of a pistol’s hammer and—whether exotic bird or treefrog—the thing jumped for its life into the thicket.
“Stop,” Minx whispered, and Matthew instantly obeyed.
She reached out into what appeared to be another wall of vines and thorns. She pulled some of the foliage aside and pressed her hand inward.
“Stones,” she said. “We’ve arrived.”
Matthew felt for himself. It was, indeed, the fort’s outermost wall. Looking up, nothing could be seen of how high the wall was in the overhang of trees. But all was silent save the croak and hum of frogs and night-sprites, and in the distance the note of a bird making a sound like the fall of an executioner’s axe.
Now came the problem of finding a way in, and the problem-solver was in the dark. He followed Minx to the left, her hands entering the vines to search the stones. There were no windows, barred or otherwise, and no gate to be found. At last Minx stopped, pulled on a sturdy-looking vine that snaked down along the wall, and said, “This will have to do.”
“I’ll go first,” Matthew volunteered, and Minx let him. He started up along the vine, which swayed precariously but did not give way. Matthew’s boots afforded him traction on the stones, and after a climb of some thirty feet he reached the top and hauled himself over onto a parapet. Minx followed with admirable agility, and together they took stock of where they were.
The parapet was deserted, but a single torch burned in a wooden socket on the left about fifty feet away. Beyond that another fifty feet, a second torch flamed. And on and on, around the fort’s huge perimeter. Below them stood several buildings of white stone with roofs of gray slate. Far away, toward the center of the dirt-floored enclosure, was a larger building with a chimney, where the gunpowder’s chemicals must be cooked and combined. So far there was no sign of any human occupancy though an occasional torch was set out and burning. Matthew looked for what he thought might be the powder magazine. Over on the right there was a long white building with wooden shutters closed over the windows and, telltale enough, banks of dirt built up about six feet high on both sides to act as blast walls. That would be where the powder was kept until it could be shipped out. But where might the fuses be found? Matthew reasoned there had to be fuses here, as the bombs that had destroyed the buildings in New York were fashioned here and if not directly fitted with fuses in this location, then fuses ought to be on the premises somewhere. Unless they’d been made aboard the Nightflyer, but Matthew thought the raw materials must be stored here in a safe place. The question being: exactly where? It had taken him and Minx over two hours to cross the thicket and swamp to reach the fort. They were quite simply pressed for time, as the Nightflyer would fly at first light with or without them.
Minx said, “I want you to wait here.”
“Wait here? Why?”
“In this case,” she answered, “one is better than two. I can move faster than you. Trust me when I say…you will do better to let me be your…” She frowned under her hood, searching for the words.
“Providence rider?” Matthew supplied.
“Whatever that means. You stay here. I’m going to find out where the guards are.”
“You can do that and I can’t?”
“I can do that,” she said, “without getting us both killed. Stay,” she said, and then she turned away and strode purposefully off along the parapet.
Matthew eased down on his haunches alongside the wall. This was a damnable thing to let her take such a risk, he thought; yet he had the feeling Minx Cutter was perfectly capable of getting in and out of places he could not, and it might be the ungentlemanly act to let her go alone but it was probably the most sensible.
He waited, listening to the night and watching the torches flicker in the same breeze that stirred the forest’s treetops.
He waited longer, and sat down on the stones.
After what seemed like twenty minutes he decided he could wait no more. He was keenly aware of the passing time and the lowering moon, and if Minx had been caught he was going to have to do something about that. He stood up and started along the parapet in the direction she’d gone, and in another moment he came to a stone staircase leading down. He descended to the dirt floor, passed two empty wagons, and continued on beneath a stone archway into an area not quite fully revealed by any torchlight. He moved through a territory of shadows with his back against a wall. It seemed to him his back had been against a wall now for many months. His heart was beating hard and the air felt oppressive. He could smell the bitter tang of chemicals and cooking vats. He came to a corner and paused, peered around and found the way forward clear and so he started off again. He passed under another archway and on between two stone walls leading him somewhere though he had no idea where.
And just that fast, a figure turned the corner before him, took two strides in his direction before he realized Matthew was there and then stopped.
“Who are you?” the man asked.
“The hell you are.” A wooden whistle was lifted to the man’s mouth.
Before Matthew could kick the man either in the stomach or the groin, which he was considering, there came a solid-sounding thunk and the man shivered like a leaf in a high wind. The whistle dropped from his hand, to hang about his neck on a leather cord. The man took another step toward Matthew and then his knees crumpled. As the body toppled forward, Matthew saw the hatchet buried in the back of the man’s head.
Minx Cutter was standing behind the now-fallen guard. She put a foot on the man’s back and pulled the hatchet loose. The man thrashed on the ground as if trying to swim through the dirt, and Minx hit him again in the right temple just behind the ear.
This time he was still.
“I told you,” Minx said as she pulled the weapon free, “not to leave there, didn’t I?”
“Yes, but I was concerned about you.”
“Hm,” she said, and she put the blood-wet hatchet’s blade up under Matthew’s nose. “I entered the professor’s employ as an assassin. I killed three men before I decided the job wasn’t to my liking. Lyra Sutch trained me for that role. She was as near a mother to me as I could find after my family threw me out.” The blade dripped blood upon Matthew’s shirt. “I understand you killed Lyra, who helped me grow from a confused girl into a confident woman.”
Matthew said nothing; he could not say that at the end of Lyra Sutch’s life she was a wretched, demented sack of broken bones and axe-torn flesh.
“But,” said Minx, as she lowered the hatchet, “I’m all grown up now. And you are an impatient and foolish milksop.” Her left arm emerged from the folds of her cape. Wrapped around the wrist were several gray cotton cords. “I found a storehouse unguarded and unlocked. The hatchet came from there. Also these three fuses, from a crate. The longest should give us fifteen minutes, the shortest about six. Or they can be knotted together as one.”
“Excellent,” said Matthew, who still had the coppery smell of blood up his nostrils.
“I doubt the magazine will be so easy to get into. I’ve seen four other guards making their rounds, but they’re in no hurry and they’ve gotten lazy. There’s a barracks building where the workers must be sleeping. The professor has done us the great favor of not making his men work all night long like slaves.”
“Christian of him,” said Matthew.
“Sharpen your blade,” she said, correctly judging that Matthew’s senses were reeling due to her cold-blooded killing of the guard and her revelation of past mutual acquaintances. She knelt down and went through the dead man’s pockets, presumably searching for keys to the magazine. She came up empty, and stood up. Her gaze was both fierce and frigid. Looking upon her frightened Matthew to his core. “You should follow me,” she said, and she set off to the left without waiting for him to exit his trance.
The first step was difficult. The second a little easier. Then he was following her, and Minx continued on looking right and left but never glancing back.
They came to the magazine, the long building of white stone with the gray slate roof. A distant torch gave enough light to fall upon two locks on the door. Minx broke one with her knife’s blade, but the second resisted her. She told him, “Keep watch!” as she struggled with the more intricate mechanism. “Damn,” she said through gritted teeth, when it still defied her. “Hold this,” she commanded, and she gave him the bloody hatchet the better to concentrate on her lock-breaking.
Matthew heard the voices of two men raised in conversation. It was coming from somewhere off to the left. There was a bray of laughter; something obviously had hit one’s funny bone. Minx continued her task as Matthew turned himself in the direction of the voices. He could see no one, but the men seemed to be coming closer. Minx’s blade worked at the lock, the sharp tip digging at the stubborn innards. Hurry, he wished to say, but she knew what she was doing. The knife jabbed, the voices came closer still, and Matthew thought he might have to kill someone with this hatchet, to burden his soul further with death.
But then the men took a turn away from the magazine, for the voices began to diminish, and a moment afterward there came a metallic click and Minx whispered, “Ah. Got the bastard.” The lock fell to the ground. Minx pulled a latch and pushed the door open.
It was utterly dark within. She took the hatchet from him and said, “Light your tinderbox.”
Matthew took a moment fumbling with the thing. He got a spark in the wads of cotton and from that touched the wick of his candle. He looked to her with apprehension, wondering if the merest flame in that enclosure would set off the powder, but she motioned him in and he gathered his balls from where they’d shrivelled up into his groin and crossed the magazine’s threshold.
She closed the door behind them. “Impressive,” she said, as Matthew’s candlelight showed barrel upon barrel of—presumably—Professor Fell’s Cymbeline. Matthew counted fifteen just in the realm of the light, and beyond it were dozens more. A shipment must be imminent, he thought. The place looked to be nearly full.
He hadn’t realized he was holding his breath. He had the same feeling of dangerous pressure as he’d experienced upon the stone seahorse. If two small Cymbeline bombs could have blown that house on Nassau Street to splinters, what would dozens of barrels of the powder do?
“I’m counting sixty-two,” Minx said. “I hope you’re ready for a brilliant bang.”
He let his breath out, thinking that he’d already had one of those last night.
Minx strode toward the first barrel. She lifted her hatchet and quite readily bashed in the top of it with three blows. Matthew winced at the noise; surely that was going to bring someone running. Then Minx put her shoulder into it, overturned the barrel, and light grayish-white grains began to stream out upon the dirt. She repeated this action with a second barrel, and again the gunpowder poured out of it onto the earth. “I think,” she said, “that will be enough.” She uncoiled two of the cotton cords from her wrist and placed them in the grains of destruction, stretching them out toward the door.
“Light them,” she suggested, sweat sparkling on her cheeks.
Matthew bent down, picked up the end of one fuse and touched the candle to it. His hand was trembling, but at once the red eye opened and the fuse began to sizzle. He did the same to the second. The nitrate-saturated cord began to burn steadily toward its target. There would not be time nor opportunity to destroy the actual chemical works, but no doubt this would be a monstrous explosion and might serve to blast everything in the fort to pieces.
“Now,” said Minx, with just a trace of nerves in her voice, “we get out.”
They closed the door and latched it behind them, just for the sake of tidiness. Then Matthew was following Minx as she ran the way they’d come, seeking the stairway to the parapet. There were no guards in view, but no time for undue caution. They were both aware that very soon a little part of Hell would open on Pendulum Island.
Once up the steps, they sought the vine that had brought them here. It was like searching for a peg in a haystack. Everything from this height looked flimsy, unable to support either of them. In a few minutes they would have to learn how to fly.
“Hey!” someone shouted, from ahead. “You there!” For the want of anything else, the guard began to blow his whistle and then he came at a run toward them with a drawn sword.
His run was stopped by a knife that entered the pit of his throat, thrown from a distance of nearly twenty feet. He gagged and grasped at the knife’s handle to pull it out, but then he was staggering off the edge of the parapet like a clumsy drunk and he toppled into the darkness below.
Another voice, further away, began shouting for someone named—it sounded like—Curland. Minx leaned over the parapet, seeking a way down. Matthew looked back toward the magazine. If the guards got in there, they might yet stomp out the fuses. “I’m here!” he shouted toward the other shouter, just to
“We’ve got to go over,” Minx said, and now her voice did quaver for even her tough spirit quailed at the thought of those fuses burning down to their merry damnation. “Right here,” she told him, and motioned toward thick vines and leafy vegetation that had melded to the stones. Without hesitation she swung herself over the wall, gripped hold of whatever her fingers could find, and started down.
Matthew caught a movement to his left. A heavy-set man carrying a torch was coming up the steps. The gent looked big enough to be a match for Sirki. Minx was almost to the ground. Matthew couldn’t wait. He climbed over, grasped vines and leaves and found places to put his boot-toes into. Halfway down there was a cracking sound and Matthew felt the vines start to pull away from the stones. At the same time the man with the torch leaned over the wall and thrust the flame at him to get a better look.
“The magazine!” the man suddenly shouted over his shoulder. Matthew saw that horror had rippled across the craggy face. “My God! Check the magazine!”
Matthew reached the ground with help from the vines pulling away from the stones. Minx was already slogging into the swamp. Matthew followed her, thinking that if the guards put those fuses out all this had been for nothing. The water rose up past his knees, then over his thighs to his waist, and snakes be damned. He heard shouting from the fort, which filled him with fresh alarm. Damn it! he thought. The fuses should have burned down by now! Where was the—
His thought was never finished. It was knocked from his head by the roar of a thousand lions mixed with the shriek of five-hundred harpies and carried along by the burning breath of sixty dragons on the wing, and he was thrown insensible into the muddy drink, sinking down into the realm where the reptiles coiled and twisted safe from the evils that men did.
Thirty
A HAND gripped the back of Matthew’s coat and jerked him up from the water. He sputtered and coughed, spewing liquid from mouth and nostrils. Night had turned to day, and he had to squint against its glare. Hot winds rushed through the swamp, bending trees and tearing leaves loose in green flurries.