Iron Codex 2 - The Nightmare Garden by Caitlin Kittredge Page B

whispered. My dreams would never cease, and the weight of my guilt would never be lifted, until I was able to look at what I’d done to Lovecraft with my own eyes, until I had at least tried to get my mother out of the iron city that had turned her into someone my brother and I didn’t recognize.
    Conrad sighed and then dropped my hand, shoving his through his unruly black hair, so much like mine.
    “All right,” he said at last. “Say I was insane enough to go back to the Iron World—where I can’t even remember my own name once the poison takes hold—risk using the Gates now that they’ve been breached by the Proctors and stone knows what else, travel overland with ghouls on the loose, and go back into the
very same
city I barely escapedfrom a year ago—what then? How are we even going to find Nerissa if she’s not still in Christobel Asylum, never mind get her in shape to walk out of there on the kind of rough journey we’ve had? How would we evade the Proctors and Draven?”
    I chewed on my lip for a moment. The sting wasn’t worse than the pain through the rest of my body, but Conrad’s questions were. “I don’t know,” I told him. “But I will by the time we get to Lovecraft.”
    I filled Dean in on the plan—if you could call it that—while we walked, and to his credit, he reacted better than Conrad had. “I can’t say what I’d do if Shard and I were in the same situation,” he said.
    “You are,” I said. “Draven was boarding Windhaven. He’s not inclined to be kind.”
    Dean sniffed. “My mother can take care of herself. And a city full of Erlkin is a far cry from some scared, sniveling humans hiding in a basement.”
    “I hope so,” I said. “You know I feel terrible. I thought he’d never find me in the Mists.”
    “Not your fault,” Dean said shortly. “Draven’s a pit bull. He’ll hold on till he’s dead or somebody else is.”
    “He doesn’t want me dead,” I muttered. “He doesn’t want me at all. He just wants bait for my father.”
    Dean stopped us at the crest of a hill, behind a half-collapsed stone wall. We had come out of the dead forest and were standing on the outskirts of a ruined village, small white stone cottages topped with rotting thatch, the only thing stirring in the breeze.
    “Wait here,” Dean said. I looked down the slope toward where the cottages disappeared into the ever-flowing mist.
    “Why? Where are we?”
    “The Mist Gate,” Conrad said, nearly making me jump out of my skin. Cal joined us, and his nostrils flared.
    “Humans are down there,” he muttered, out of Bethina’s hearing.
    “Draven’s, likely,” Dean said. “He’ll have guards to make sure his bread crumbs don’t dry up and blow away.”
    “How did he even come through?” Conrad said. “Humans can’t pass into the Mists, not even members of the Brotherhood. Not without help.” He shifted, obviously remembering the “help” the Erlkin slipstreamers had given him, crossing him over like so much contraband.
    “He might have it,” I said
    He jerked his thumb down the hill. “So what do we do about them?”
    Cal’s tongue flicked out. “Leave that to me.”
    “Cal, no,” I hissed, glancing behind me at Bethina. “What about her?”
    “Keep her busy,” Cal said, shrugging. “We need to get out of here, and this is the quickest way.”
    “Cal,”
I snapped. “Don’t be ridiculous.” I turned and pointed at Conrad. “You and I.” We were the only ones besides Cal who had the ability to defend ourselves, even if my Weird was unreliable and my fighting skills nonexistent. At least I didn’t have to turn into a long-clawed, fanged monster to tap into my particular talent. I didn’t relish confronting the Proctors again, but I had to think of the group, not just myself.
    “Me?” Conrad squawked, but I grabbed his arm andtugged him along, keeping to the shadows of the ruined cottages.
    We crept down the hill, and before long I could hear low conversation