At the bottom, Arla lands behind me and flips a switch, sending up a glow of warm lights. They’re spaced well apart, but the basement reveals itself in chronological layers of shadow. We’veentered at the backside of the building. I can make out the same brick walls seen at street level, but here with old pipes crosshatching overhead, and a concrete floor ringed with water stains. It’s more or less a carbon copy of the floor above, without Medusa’s fanciful decor and separate rooms, even down to the bricked-up window frames arching on the far, street-facing wall, an odd feature for a basement.
What stands out is the strange, square chamber in the center of the room, composed of the area’s typical 1800s brick with sandstone trim, but stopping just shy of the ceiling, the roof, if it even has one, as flat as the floor. A layer of blackened soot encircles three-quarters of it. The wall facing the stairs is set with an unusually low but formidable door of hand-forged metal. Paradoxically, a gigantic latch and bolt hold it closed. The door is unlabeled, inconsequential but for the contrasting proportions of it, the apparent age, the crude makings, the squat, Gothic shape like something from a castle dungeon. It looks more like a European relic than a fixture of America’s modern Emerald City, making the bricks of the chamber appear more worn than those of the building around them.
Despite the architectural fatigue, the chamber emanates a forceful energy that takes up the whole room, squeezing us out and making the air buzz with invisible presence. It reminds me of parking too close to a transmission tower, the electricity sparking in your teeth. The fine hairs at the back of my wrists rise, and my pulse thrums in my veins.
I slowly move toward it, fingers outstretched, feet sloughing across the concrete as if afraid to lose connection. Everything within me throbs in response to this mystery, to the history wrought into its trappings and the power it suggests, filling the basement with castaway atoms like fresh paint off-gassing.
I reach for the iron straps that grid the door and realize the smell I first noticed is coming from behind it.
“Don’t,” Arla says before I can make contact. “That’s not for you. Not today.”
I pause, frowning, and turn to her. “What is it?”
“This way,” she says instead of explaining, and extends an arm.
Reluctant, I let my hand drop into hers and follow her around to the other side of the basement. But not before I feel the heat coming off the metal door. Heat that shouldn’t be there. It’s chilly down here in Medusa’s underbelly, like the bowels of a cold-blooded creature. But that door was warm as fresh blood.
The dragon tries by fire,I can hear Twig saying under the flash of Medusa’s lights. As we pass the chamber, I cast my gaze back. The old bricks stack mercilessly to the top on this side with no door or window to interrupt them, concealing their secret within. The centuries-old masonry, plain but steadfast, gleams dully with damp. But lines of razor-thin script—an alphabet I don’t recognize—flash between the bricks as if light is passing over them, one moment etched vibrantly into the mortar and the next gone, leaving me to wonder if I truly saw the writing at all.
Arla leads me toward the far wall where an empty doorway, a gash in the wall, opens into darkness. Whatever doors it once held are long gone, and a rusty, retrofitted iron gate guards it now, spears jutting along the top. She produces another key from her brassiere and slips it into a small dangling padlock. It opens easily and the gate swings wide, the others filing through into shadow, their laughter echoing back.
Arla takes a camp lantern from a nearby hook and the LED bulb blazes to life inside it. “We’ll take this. The lights don’t extend beyond the building.”
I freeze. “What is this? Where does this lead?”
“Come,” she says without answering. “I want to tell you a story.”
I hesitate but follow her into the corridor, leaving the basement and its strange chamber behind.
A rough, gray wall lined with discarded wood and debris stretches along our side, and we move slowly, picking our way over trash and around junk. Soon, I see another brick facade emerge beside us, its vertical windows blown out like pulled teeth,the original door tilting on frozen, half-open hinges as if drunk. A shabby wooden chair lies on its side, cane seat busted through.
Arla pauses and holds her lantern high, shadows sliding across her face. “This, kitten,” she says, “is Seattle. Or at least a version of it. The second version, to be precise.”
“What?” I watch the light coast along the brick, and a rat scurries ahead of us. Stooping, I bend down and pick up an old brown bottle, the letters embossed still visible through the grime—RAINIER BEER SEATTLE USA.
“The original version of our fair city burned down in a grand fire in 1889.” She gives me a pointed look. “Power like that isn’t always easy to check.”
My mouth opens mutely. Does she mean the fire? Or something else?
When I don’t reply, she continues. “This is what took its place. They built here knowing the streets were going to be filled in and leveled up to combat the terrible flooding that kept happening, the tide spewing out of their toilets every evening. For a time, two Seattles existed, one atop the other with rickety ladders to ferry citizens between. But people kept falling into the openings, splitting their skulls like walnuts on the walks below. And then the rats thrived and multiplied and bubonic plague broke out. So, they finally sealed this off, leaving what we know of the city above.” Arla takes a few steps forward and lights the remains of a dated sign, faded but still in one piece. It readsMERCHANT JIM’Sin block lettering. “Of course, that didn’t necessarily keep people out. When prohibition came along, these areaways were put to use. They’ve been storefronts and gambling dens, speakeasies and private storage, and pretty much everything in between. But they’re mostly forgotten now except for the odd tour and ne’er-do-well.”
We carry on, over busted-up furniture and barricades, around an old cash register and some barrels, stones piled like rubble. Up ahead, just before the tunnel makes a sharp right, checkered rays of light filter down. The others stand beneath them, facesupturned and expectant. When we approach, Brennan points. “Look up.”
Above our heads, the crumbling stones have fallen away, revealing a pattern of grimy purple glass tiles diffusing the sun, casting everyone and everything in a lavender glow. Resurrection ferns sprout from the crevices, determined and miraculous.
“They put these in for light when both levels were in use,” Arla informs me, awash in the color of flowers. “Many old cities have them. The manganese dioxide in the glass turns violet over time when exposed to the sun. There used to be more, but most have been covered over rather than maintained. People are too crude to appreciate magic,” she says with ire.
“Does everyone know about this?” I’d seen the sidewalk tiles from above, where dirt and water spots turned the purple a funny blue-gray, obscuring the beauty beneath. But somehow, despite how long I’d lived here, this subterranean world was new to me. I’d kept my head down for so many years. This city was probably full of things I’d never bothered to discover.
“Oh sure,” Arla says. “They write about it in the history books, give tours, fold it into the city’s tourism revenue. But not this part. This is ours.”
I look at her. “What do you mean?”
She shrugs a shoulder, a sultry grin on her face, and suddenly I realize where the satisfaction Cadence smelled was coming from. It was Arla. Not her joy, but something else. Something smug. “I mean that I own the building and everything that comes with it. Select parts of the underground are open to the public, but no one knows about this part but me, them, and now you.”
“And the other property owners? Do they come down here?” I inquire.
“They know about it. Technically, like the basements, the areaways in front of them are theirs to use, but most avoid this level. The tunnels are monitored by the city, but safety isn’t guaranteed. The Department of Transportation even had to put a ban on vehicles over ten thousand pounds parking or driving nearthe sidewalks. It’s been a bitch keeping Medusa stocked since that happened.”
