Neverwhere

"And the key?" The angel's gentle voice seemed to come from all around them.

"Hanging around her swanlike neck," said Mr. Croup, a little more anxiously than he intended to.

"Then enter," said the angel. The oak doors swung open at his words, and they went in.

It had all happened so fast. The Beast had come out of the darkness, Hunter had snatched the spear, and it had charged her and disappeared back into the darkness.

Richard strained to hear the Beast. He could hear nothing but, somewhere close to him, the slow drip, drip of water, and the high, maddening whine of mosquitoes. Hunter lay on her back in the mud. One arm was twisted at a peculiar angle. He crawled toward her, through the mire. "Hunter?" he whispered. "Can you hear me?"

There was a pause. And then, a whisper so faint he thought for a moment he had imagined it, "Yes."

The marquis was still some yards away, standing stock-still beside a wall. Now he called out, "Richard—stay where you are. The creature's just biding its time. It'll be back."

Richard ignored him. He spoke to Hunter. "Are you . . . " he paused. It seemed such a stupid thing to say. He said it anyway. "Are you going to be all right?" She laughed, then, with blood-flecked lips, and shook her head. "Are there any medical people down here?" he asked the marquis.

"Not in the sense you're thinking of. We have some healers, a handful of leeches and chirurgeons . . . "

Hunter coughed, then, and winced. Bright red, arterial blood trickled from the corner of her mouth. The marquis edged a little closer. "Do you keep your life hidden anywhere, Hunter?" he asked.

"I'm a hunter," she whispered, disdainfully. "We don't go in for that kind of thing . . . " She pulled air into her lungs with an effort, then exhaled, as if the simple effort of breathing were becoming too much for her. "Richard, have you ever used a spear?"

"No."

"Take it," she whispered.

"But . . . "

"Do it." Her voice was low and urgent. "Pick it up. Hold it at the blunt end."

Richard picked up the fallen spear. He held it at the blunt end. "I knew that part," he told her.

A glimmer of a smile breathed across her face. "I know."

"Look," said Richard, feeling, not for the first time, like the only sane person in a madhouse. "Why don't we just stay very quiet. Maybe it'll go away. We'll try to get you some help." And, not for the first time, the person he was talking to ignored him utterly.

"I did a bad thing, Richard Mayhew," she whispered, sadly. "I did a very bad thing. Because I wanted to be the one to kill the Beast. Because I needed the spear." And then, impossibly, she began to haul herself to her feet. Richard had not realized how badly she had been injured; nor could he now imagine what pain she must be in: he could see her right arm hanging uselessly, a white shard of bone protruding horribly from the skin. Blood ran from a cut in her side. Her rib cage looked wrong.

"Stop it," he hissed, futilely. "Get down."

With her left hand she pulled a knife from her belt, put it into her right hand, closed the nerveless fingers around the hilt. "I did a bad thing," she repeated. "And now I make amends."

She began humming, then. Humming high and humming low, until she found the note that made the walls and the pipes and the room reverberate, and she hummed that note until it felt like the entire labyrinth must be echoing to her hum. And then, sucking the air into her shattered rib cage, she shouted, "Hey. Big boy? Where are you?" There came no reply. No noise but the low drip of water. Even the mosquitoes were quiet.

"Maybe it's . . . gone away," said Richard, gripping the spear so tightly that it hurt his hands.

"I doubt it," muttered the marquis.

"Come on, you bastard," Hunter screamed. "Are you scared?"

There was a deep bellow from off front of them, and the Beast came out of the dark, and it charged once more. This time there could be no room for mistakes. "The dance," whispered Hunter. "The dance is not yet over."

As the Beast came toward her, its horns lowered, she shouted, "Now—Richard. Strike! Under and up! Now!" before the Beast hit her and her words turned into a wordless scream.

Richard saw the Beast come out from the darkness, into the light of the flare. It all happened very slowly. It was like a dream. It was like all his dreams. The Beast was so close he could smell the shit-and-blood animal stench of it, so close he could feel its warmth. And Richard stabbed with the spear, as hard as he could, pushing up into its side and letting it sink in.

A bellow, then, or a roar, of anguish, and hatred, and pain. And then silence.

He could hear his heart, thudding in his ears, and he could hear water dripping. The mosquitoes began to whine once more. He realized he was still holding tight to the haft of the spear, although the blade of it was buried deep within the body of the immobile Beast. He let go of it, and staggered around the beast, looking for Hunter. She was trapped beneath the Beast. It occurred to him that if he moved her, pulling her out from under it, he might cause her death, so instead he pushed, as hard as he could, against the warm dead flanks of the Beast, trying to move it. It was like trying to push-start a Sherman tank, but eventually, awkwardly, he tumbled it half-off her.

Hunter lay on her back, staring up at the darkness above them. Her eyes were open, and unfocussed, and Richard knew, somehow, that they saw nothing at all. "Hunter?" he said.

"I'm still here, Richard Mayhew." Her voice sounded almost detached. She made no effort to find him with her eyes, no effort to focus. "Is it dead?"

"I think so. It's not moving."

And then she laughed; it was a strange sort of laugh, as if she had just heard the fu

"Yes." He could feel it, cold and sticky.

"Take the knife. She's yours."

"I don't want your . . . "

"Take her."

He pried the knife free from her fingers. "She's yours now," whispered Hunter. Nothing was moving, save her lips; and her eyes were clouding. "She's always looked after me. Clean my blood off her, though . . . mustn't rust the blade . . . a hunter always looks after her weapons." She gulped air. "Now . . . touch the Beast's blood . . . to your eyes and tongue . . . "

Richard was not sure that he had heard her correctly, nor that he believed what he had heard. "What?"

Richard had not noticed the marquis approach, but now he spoke intently into Richard's ear. "Do it, Richard. She's right. It'll get you through the labyrinth. Do it."

Richard put his hand down to the spear, ran it up the haft until he felt the Beast's hide and the warm stickiness of the Beast's blood. Feeling slightly foolish, he touched his hand to his tongue, tasting the salt of the creature's blood: it did not, to his surprise, revolt him. It tasted utterly natural, like tasting an ocean. He touched his bloody fingers to his eyes, where the blood stung like sweat.

Then, "I did it," he told her.

"That's good," whispered Hunter. She said nothing more.

The marquis de Carabas reached out his hand and closed her eyes. Richard wiped Hunter's knife on his shirt. It was what she had told him to do. It saved having to think.

"Better get a move on," said the marquis, standing up.