Echo City by Layla Lawlor

Author:Layla Lawlor [Lawlor, Layla]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2020-08-10T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 16

The tunnel ran straight for about a hundred yards, then curved sharply to the right. Although made of earth, the walls were very smooth and regular, meeting the floor at a sharp angle. The air was dry and dusty, and held a hint of the crisp autumn-leaf smell of Shadow New York.

"I am aware this sojourn was partly my idea," my grandmother said, limping along between the two of us, "and therefore, as I believe Charles Darwin once remarked upon suffering terrible seasickness on the Beagle, 'I got myself into this of my own free will.' However, I don't think I'm up to walking all the way to New York City."

"I don't think any of us are," I said. "And hopefully we won't have to. I doubt Lily-Bell hiked all the way. If this isn't some kind of shortcut—"

I never had a chance to finish the sentence, because something glinted far down the tunnel, like a chrome reflection at the farthest edge of our flashlight beams. Fresca brought up the shotgun, so apparently she saw it too. We all three waited for a moment, but nothing moved, and Creiddylad trotted ahead of us with no sign of nervousness, all the way to the edge of the flashlight-illuminated region of tunnel before stopping to wait.

"Hang on," I said quietly. I closed my eyes and did my best to put myself into a relaxed, second-sight-enabled state, hoping it would be more help than hindrance this time.

Even without the second sight, I can see things that most people can't. I can see right through glamours. I can see ghosts. It's very hard for magic to trick me or hide things from me. This is why I have the sword in the first place—I saw it, while most people wouldn't have been able to.

But with my second sight fully open, I can see a whole lot more.

It was still inconsistent and hard to put myself into that state on purpose. I used to mainly do it while I was painting, as a kind of accidental meditation. These days, I was learning to do it intentionally, but I still had a ways to go.

But I was getting better.

The last time I was in these woods, I got that eyeball-searing, flashing display. This time, the whole tunnel lit up shockingly bright, the same electric blue-white as the sword when it was in full fighting mode. Fresca and Geraldine's blue and green auras were all but invisible against that brilliance; even Creiddylad's lurid red was subsumed into the light around it.

I squeezed my eyes shut, but even my eyelids didn't block it entirely. It was dimmer, though, like seeing through sunglasses, and now I could see that the blue-white light was pouring from dense, complicated patterns all over the walls and ceiling and floor. It didn't seem to form letters or runes or anything recognizable, just a complex and repeating pattern, chaotic yet organized.

A fractal, I thought. It's some kind of fractal.

We were standing on some

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