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He will go into the dark.
He will sacrifice his life for you.
I was standing in Tufnell’s Marvels, reading the two lines; each printed neatly on its own bit of paper. Those predictions, held tightly between my fingers, suddenly burst into flames. I dropped the paper and jumped back and away from the sharp burn of them. I stared at the blackening paper, willing myself to forget the words. I stamped out the dying embers, no doubt leaving blackened scorch marks on the floor. I willed myself to breathe, to slow my heart rate before my panic attracted the Visitor.
I closed my eyes to shut it all out, just for a moment. When I opened them again, the entire room was alight in brilliant yellow flames. They twisted and flickered around the aisles of amusement machines in their glass cases. The traveler’s caravan in its field-set scene was ablaze, the caricature melting like wax, dripping down the sides of the glass case. I hurled myself away from the exhibit in search of the door, but my path was blocked by another exhibit melting into itself. The London Eye was no more than a gray pool, dripping down the case and onto the floor.
It suddenly became very hard to breathe as I concentrated on finding an exit through the roaring flames. I began running towards where I thought I had entered, the exit that would take me to the hallway that led to the main lobby and the grand theater beyond. I jumped over puddles of hot, bubbling wax and ducked and dodged burning embers falling from the ever-climbing columns of flames. The aisles of exhibits and amusements became a maze and seemed to shift and rearrange themselves around me until I was utterly lost.
The heat of the fire all around me blistered my skin. I needed to find a way out. I turned around in an attempt to go back the way I came, but as I did so, the beautiful, shimmering apparition of La Belle Dame Sans Merci rose out of the flames at the end of the aisle. The heat was becoming unbearable, and I wasn’t sure if I could fight off her ghost without collapsing in exhaustion. I regarded her warily, waiting for her to make the first move. She reached out her arm to me, but didn’t speak. She didn’t move any closer. I felt a presence behind me, and it occurred to me that she might be trying to communicate something to me.
I steeled a glance over my shoulder, and I was met with a dark shadow at the other end of the aisle. A stark contrast to the brilliant flames that encased the room, now licking at the ceiling in all directions. I dared to turn my back on La Belle Dame Sans Merci to face this new ghost. Only, when I turned, it was only Lockwood standing there. His black coat was untouched by the flames as I was swatting embers off my own jacket.
“Run, Lockwood! Don’t look at her!” I started running towards him, ready to drag us through this maze once more and out of Tufnell’s Marvels for good. While my strides weren’t as long as Lockwood’s, I was fast. Yet no matter how hard I ran, the row of burning exhibits kept elongating, distorting my sense of direction even more. I was no closer to Lockwood than I had been when I first spotted him. A peek over my shoulder told me that the ghost had not moved at all. Her arm still outstretched, pointing directly at Lockwood. I came to a stop and screamed again.
“Lockwood!” But as I really looked at him now, I could see that his deep, dark eyes were unseeing, looking towards me but not at me. His face was paler than normal, and his shirt, usually crisp under his coat, was bloody and torn.
I gasped as, suddenly, a pitch-black pool, sort of like a door, emerged out of the flames behind him. It was as if this portal had been there the whole time, me running past it all the while, with the flames parting only to reveal it to me now, as I coughed and choked and my eyes watered. Lockwood furrowed his brow, but his eyes still weren’t quite right, as if he were in a trance. I watched as he took a hesitant step back, then turned on his heel towards the black, shadowy arch. I tried calling after him once more, but my throat was thick with smoke, my mouth dry, and the fire threatening to envelope me. Lockwood didn’t turn around. I watched as he walked steadily through the shadowy arch under the flames and disappeared into it.
As soon as he was through, the flames closed up again, and in an instant, the fire was out. The exhibits were no longer waxy puddles dripping onto the floor, but intact as they once were, with all their worn paint, coin slots, and years of grime. The flames and the shadow were gone, and Lockwood along with it. I turned in a wild circle, expecting to see the shimmering apparition of La Belle Dame Sans Merci, but she too was gone. I was alone.
Frantically, I raced toward the exit, exactly where I had thought it to be. The hall back to the lobby was where I expected it to be, too. I hoped to find the others near the stage. The Visitor was getting stronger, and I felt that the time for us to split up was over. I was desperate to return to the iron circle and regroup. Lockwood would have a plan, and Holly would undoubtedly have chocolate for us all. The close encounter with a strong Type Two had taken its toll on me.
I was hesitant to call out to the others as I made my way through the grand theater. Emotionally strung out, I trudged up the stairs to the stage, towards the iron circle and relative safety. Only, as I reached the last step, the iron chains were nowhere in sight. Only Lockwood stood in the center of the stage, waiting for me.
“Lockwood! I’ve seen her. We need to gather George, Kipps, and Holly! Have you moved the chains?” He didn’t answer me. He didn’t even look at me. His eyes were fixed on something beyond. I approached him quickly, desperate to be by his side against whatever he was focused on, when I realized he was transfixed. He was wearing the same expression as his apparition had been when La Belle Dame Sans Merci conjured him in the room of marvels. I went to grasp his shoulders and shake him out of the effect she was clearly having on him. But where my hands should have met strong shoulders, there was only a mirage. My hands swiped through his body, meeting no resistance, and in their wake, wisps of distorted smoke swirled until they landed back in their place. Lockwood wasn’t really there at all.
His ghost, I realized, stepping back in dread. I really took him in now, the faint other-light emanating from where he stood. His face was pale gray, his frame frail and wispy. I noticed the gaping hole in his torso, just visible under his slashed and tattered coat. Tears welled in my eyes as I realized who he was while also willing it not to be so.
Suddenly, his attention turned towards me. There was recognition in his pained eyes as he gave me a sad smile. As if sensing my dread, he turned away from me, the Hollow Boy, disappearing into the dark wings of the stage. A voice enveloped me, not the clear, airy voice of La Belle Dame, but something deeper, echoing:
He will go into the dark.
He will sacrifice his life for you.
I woke with a start, breathless and perspiring, in my attic room of 35 Portland Row. I ripped off the quilt and ran for the light switch, bathing the room in fluorescents, making me blink like mad at the contrast. I sank to the floor and drew my knees in, making myself as small as possible, as if doing so would hide me from the nightmares threatening to overtake my sanity. This one was particularly nasty and had visited twice this week already.
I crawled over to where I ditched my jacket early this morning, knowing what I would find still crammed inside the pocket. I pulled out the two small fortunes on their crumpled slips of paper. I stared at them, not for the first time, hoping to unearth a different meaning behind them. I could find none. How long I gripped those horrid words, I wasn’t sure. But the first rays of sunshine peeking over the roofs of the houses on the street opposite and the crackling of the ghost lamps powering down for a new day broke me from my thoughts.
This won't be his fate. I can keep him safe. I had the power to keep him from the dark. I stuffed the papers back into my jacket and threw on a sweatshirt over my pajamas. I quietly padded down from my attic room, grabbing the sneakers I’d kicked off on the landing on the way. I stole silently through the house, avoiding the creaky steps which I knew like the back of my hand. Down, down through the kitchen and the winding iron stairs to the training room, where I picked up a spare rapier and took up a position across from Floating Joe. I would be prepared. I would do everything now to be ready to face those coming for us. I was going to save him.