Soon after the stone tunnel abruptly changed to one of black dirt braced with rough-cut wood, like something out of an old mine. Nikha’s fears of running out of light were assuaged when she passed the first gas lamp. it burned a pale yellow-white, not so clean or steady as a phlogistic arc but miles better than relying on her lantern.

She traced a finger along the walls, scraping away a bit of soil- the dark, loamy earth was packed uncomfortably loose. The floor was dirt as well, but smoothed and compacted as if by the passage of many feet. The gaslights were widely spaced, their feed lines running haphazardly over nails and through hooks. Soon she came to the first split in the path, but the choice was an easy one: the right-hand passage was collapsed completely, heaped dirt spilling from its entrance. Nikha frowned and glanced nervously at the ceiling as she moved on leftward.

A few seconds later there was a noise, a crunch of earth like a footstep. Nikha yanked up her rifle and froze, eyes darting every which way. Nothing ahead. And behind- her gun’s long barrel making the turn awkward- the same. A few seconds passed, silent but for the faint trickle of water through some buried sluice. Finally, she relaxed and lowered the gun’s hammer. She stepped forward-and stopped again as the same noise hit her ears. It was close. Again, she found nothing. She growled and kept the rifle ready. Something was messing with her. Another step, another noise. It seemed to be coming from above.

Mindful of the last dilapidated tunnel she’d been through, she quickly moved aside (once more, a phantom footstep) and looked up at the tunnel’s roof. There wasn’t anything there. Watching closely, she moved her feet- and her mouth fell open. Just as her boot touched the ground, a footprint appeared- on the ceiling. Nikha sighed and shook her head. It was like this place- she was no longer thinking of it as her house- was trying to drive her mad.

Onward, then. The rasp of phantom footsteps followed her for the next several minutes as the tunnel bent and slithered and bore gradually downward. Even when she knew where the sound was coming from, it still made her nervous. She kept wanting to turn around, expecting someone just behind her. Combined with the fact that she couldn’t be sure if she was still on the right path, Nikha found herself on edge. Her cut hand and arm throbbed with dull pain. They ached enough she had to sling her rifle, though she wished she could keep it in her hands.

After a timeless period of walking, the sounds of water in the walls grew louder. Sucking sounds accompanied each step, the floor having grown muddy. The phantom footfalls had stopped for as little reason as they’d started a minute or two ago, for which Nikha was glad: judging by the condition of the ceiling, they’d be knocking clods of mud onto her head. The gas-lamps hissed and spat as water dripped onto their housings.

The dirt tunnel ended at a rotten-looking door set between two mildewed beams. The thing was so swelled in its frame it wouldn’t budge. Nikha pulled her bayonet and began chopping at the door with its heavy blade. The wood was so decayed that after a few strikes, she could pull it apart with her hands. As it fell away the water-sound got even louder, accompanied by the smell of wet decay and mold. Nikha gave the bayonet a few strokes on her field-sharpener, fixed it to her rifle, and stepped through.

She found herself on a brick walkway beside a canal. More brick went overhead, forming an arched ceiling. The canal was maybe two feet below her catwalk and twenty or so feet across, extending to the opposite wall. There were arc-sconces here, and their dim light reflected strangely off the surface of the water. It was dark and opaque, and looked to Nikha’s eye too still, too viscous. She eyed it warily and decided falling in would be a bad idea. To her right was an iron grate across the tunnel, the canal extending into pitch-darkness beyond it. To the left, a line of sconces marched around a long bend, dim and fitful but casting light nonetheless. The choice was obvious, so she got to walking.

The bricks were old and rough, stained the brown-black of rotten teeth by mold and age where they weren’t mottled with white niter. They rattled under Nikha’s feet, the mortar crumbling audibly beneath the sound of flowing water. Some were missing, revealing the now-familiar solid holes. Several times she stepped over grates, below which flowed sluices. In other places rusting pipes in the walls dumped water into the canal with a muted splashing. The catwalk was treacherous, often wetted by leaking pipes crossing above it. She dodged beneath these quickly, trying to get as little of the water on her as possible. Once there was a clang from up above, and she jumped before realizing it was another upside-down footstep. They came back fitfully, only sounding every four or five steps. It was much more annoying than every time.

I wonder if this is the place Zent was talking about, she thought as she walked. Once she’d asked the old groundskeeper if he knew anything about the basement, to aid in her explorations. He told her there was a whole subsurface canal down there, left over from Eldergrave’s beer-brewing days. It had been used to move casks from the cellars out to town to be shipped. After beer fell out of favor and brewing ceased, it had been filled in or closed off, Zent wasn’t sure. Seemed like in this version of the house, it was still quite wet. Though it was cool, almost chilly, she found herself sweating uncomfortably in the damp air. Have to clean my gun soon, she decided. Otherwise the powder residue would collect moisture and rust out the barrel.

Just as the thought of taking a rest crossed her mind, Nikha encountered another door. It was round-topped, barely six feet tall and set deeply into the brick. She glared at it in trepidation, but decided she’d rather try finding a better spot within than start unpacking so close to the water. The walkway was too narrow to point her gun at the door, so she drew Papa’s war-knife instead. Standing to the side of the door, just in case something burst out at her, she reached over and pressed down the latch. When nothing happened she toed the door open and peered round the frame. All her tension flowed out with her sigh. It was just an old storeroom.

I wasn’t being stupid, she reminded herself as she crossed the threshold. It might have been another pit or something. She glanced around warily, wondering if the little room was trying to trick her into thinking she was safe. The walls to the left and right were lined with half-collapsed shelves, their contents scattered and rotten unto anonymity. A small desk was directly across from the door, with a chunky, crude wooden stool to match. Nikha went over to it, her boots scattering shards of glass and grimy pewter cups. Centered on the desk was a massive ledger-book, with a limp quill and pot of dried ink off to one side. The ledger’s pages were waterlogged, unreadable beneath blooms of red and black mold. The air was dank and still.

Nothing jumped out to get her, even when Nikha gave the place the most withering glare she could muster. Satisfied, she scraped the ledger away from the desk. It trailed nets of fine mycelia like corpse’s hair as she flopped it onto the floor. She set the driest piece of shelf she could find atop the desk, and her pack across that. Her gun she leaned up against the wall, and finally, finally, she sat down and rested her legs.

She ate more deer jerky for lunch, along with some hard cheese and water. Or was it dinner? Nikha tapped one toe softly on the floor as she wondered. She truly had no idea how much time had passed since she woke, though it felt like the early afternoon. Maybe whatever was twisting the geography could alter the passage of time. And if it could do that…was it changing her as well? A chill went down her spine at the thought. She felt normal, though a bit exhausted and in pain. Nothing for it but to get to Papa. It seemed he might have something to do with whatever happened, though she didn’t really want to consider why.

The circumstances not being conducive to a relaxing meal, she ate quickly and packed up. With a grunt of effort, she grabbed her rifle and slung it once again. Cleaning it could wait until she was somewhere drier, which was hopefully soon. Nikha stretched her legs and got to walking.

The course of the canal meandered, mostly in long and gentle arcs rather than straights. The phantom steps came in their fits and starts, clanking on pipe and slapping against brick. They were joined by curious regions where trickles of condensation ran up the walls in apparent contradiction of gravity. There were even a few small puddles on the ceiling. Nikha touched the wall at one of these spots and thought she could feel her fingers lighten, or even pull upward a tiny bit. Well, it doesn’t make any less sense than anything else. She gave the spot a well-deserved scowl for not working correctly and moved on.

After a few minutes more, she began to hear splashes from the canal that didn’t come from one of the sluices. They were infrequent, one or two every minute, a sound like someone slapping their hand through the water’s surface. Each time she heard one Nikha looked, and each time she saw only smooth ripples. Something- or some things- was in the water.

She tried the doors she passed as well, faintly hoping to find supplies, spare ammo, or maybe even a map- though that last hope seemed stupid for multiple reasons. One opened onto a small, cave-like room, entirely unlit. From the door all she could see was a huge chair of ancient, crudely-carved wood. A rusty sword was thrust deep into its back, sap leaking from the cut in a long, dribbling streak. Recalling her recent arboreal experiences, she shut that one quickly. The next one she slammed even faster: it was full of purplish fire, to the apparent exclusion of all else. The knob hadn’t even been hot. She almost tried cracking it open a sliver and using the heat to dry off, but decided not to tempt fate. Another opened onto a strange, groin-vaulted hallway. It was walled with carefully arranged bones, skulls and femurs and scapulae carefully interlocked, and led off into pitch-darkness. No, thank you. She slammed it shut.

The constant noise was beginning to get on Nikha’s nerves. The slosh of water, the trickle-drip of leaky pipes, the irregular clanks from the ceiling and most of all the splashes from the thing in the canal, almost mocking. Once one came from just abreast of her and she thought she caught a glimpse of what caused it, a grayish flat shape that reminded her of the rays she’d seen illustrated in books. The condition of the tunnel was deteriorating as well. Once or twice she leapt sections of walkway that had collapsed into the water, and in a few spots the ceiling leaked so badly it was like a rainstorm. Getting wet was unavoidable, and the water felt slick and grimy on her skin.

It was just after passing through one of these curtains of water that she came upon an obstacle. Spitting and sputtering, Nikha wiped her face with her sleeves, which had grown quite dirty. Maybe a white blouse hadn’t been the best choice for a journey like this, but how could she have known? Lowering her hands, she went a bit further around the curve and found her way blocked by a wall of rusty, pebbled iron. When she got closer she saw another one maybe twenty feet back, though this one was in two halves folded open like a gate big enough to seal the whole tunnel. It’s a lock, she realized. Papa had told her about them when she’d asked how the famed Empress Taliya Canal could run over the mountains. They shut off lower water levels from high and allowed a boat to transfer between the two.

The closed lock gate sealed breadth of the tunnel, even the catwalk. Maybe it was meant to stop floods? It looked like there was meant to be a man-door lined up with her walkway, but the handles had corroded away and the rest was rusted solid. Nikha peered at the seam but couldn’t even find a spot to stick her knife in. She would have to operate the whole lock to get through. There was a bronze depth gauge bolted to the opposite wall, furry with verdigris. Based on that, she was on the top end.

The controls were set in a small, sconce-lit alcove off the walkway, and seemed simple enough. One panel with levers to run the gates and pumps, and a second one to control the engine that powered them. Nikha eyed this one up, frowning. It looked similar enough to what she knew- Papa said steam power was going to grow very important soon, and had encouraged Nikha to learn about it. She’d asked Tarasov to teach her, and it was the only time she’d seen the man get excited about something. The labels had been smeared away by time, but one spigot-like handle obviously controlled phlogiston flow. “Martyrs, please let this thing still work,” she muttered and opened the valve.

Her prayers were answered, or perhaps she was just lucky. Swirling blue-white power hissed through the panel’s sight glass, and soon after a pressure gauge began ticking up. She crossed her arms and tapped one foot, staring hard at the needle as it slowly bounced towards operating range. Matron Fulgin said a watched pot never boiled, but how would you know if it was boiling if you didn’t watch?

After several minutes it was topped out. Taking her best guess, Nikha flipped another valve and was rewarded with a wheeze as pressurized steam flowed to the engine. A deep, rhythmic thud sounded from some chamber within the wall, then another and another until they built up a steady rhythm. She had power. Quickly she yanked the tall lever that would seem to control the open gate. There was a clash and squeal of straining gears, the engine bogged and loaded up until it shook the brick beneath her feet-and with a deafening clang the open lock broke free of its rusted position and ground slowly shut on screeching hinges.

The gate moved slowly and made a tremendous amount of noise in this echoing space. Nikha grew even more impatient, hoping the racket would not attract the notice of things she’d rather avoid. After what felt like forever, the gate slammed shut with a clash of steel that made her ears ring. She shook it off, then moved the center lever, the one that ought to run the pumps. It did-but water began flowing in, not out! Hurriedly she jerked it the other way, cursing as it stuck and nearly sent her flying into the water. The pumps ground away and the water level slowly, slowly lowered, revealing bricks black with slime and algae. It was still dreadfully loud, but the gates were shut, now. Nothing could come in and get her.

There was a splash, bigger than any she’d seen so far. “Why would I say that?” Nikha spat at herself as she grabbed her gun.