Threshold

Table of Contents

 

“A distinctively modern tale that invokes cosmic terrors redolent of past masters H. P. Lovecraft and Algernon Blackwood. . . . A finale that veers unexpectedly from a seemingly inevitable display of supernatural fireworks to a subtly disarming denouement only underscores the intelligence behind this carefully crafted tale of awe-inspired nightmare.”—
Publishers Weekly

 

“
Threshold
is a bonfire proclaiming Caitlín Kiernan’s elevated position in the annals of contemporary literature. It is an exceptional novel you mustn’t miss.”

—
Cemetery Dance

 

“[Caitlín R. Kiernan is] the most singular voice to enter the genre since Neil Gaiman popped up in graphic novels and Stephen King made movies live inside books. . . . Beginning with the instant classic
Silk
and continuing through her short fiction to this extraordinary new novel, Kiernan hasn’t missed a step yet. . . . If you haven’t sampled her work yet, you haven’t really been reading the
future
of horror and dark fantasy, only its past.”—SF Site

 

“Kiernan’s prose is tough and characterized by nightmaish description. Her brand of horror is subtle, the kind that is hidden in the earth’s ancient strata and never stays where it can be clearly seen.”—
Booklist

 

“
Threshold
confirms Kiernan’s reputation as one of dark fiction’s premier stylists. Her poetic descriptions ring true and evoke a sense of cosmic dread to rival Lovecraft. Her writing envelopes the reader in a fog concealing barely glimpsed horrors that frighten all the more for being just out of sight.”—
Gauntlet Magazine

“Lyrical and earthy,
Murder of Angels
is that rare book that gets everything right. . . . The darkness is poetic, the fantasy is gritty, and the real-world sections are rooted in deep and true emotions.”—Charles de Lint

 

“The story is fast-paced, emotionally wrenching, and thoroughly captivating. . . . Kiernan only grows in versatility, and readers should continue to expect great things from her.”—
Locus

 

“
Low Red Moon
fully unleashes the hounds of horror, and the read is eerie and breathtaking. . . . The familiar caveat ‘not for the faint of heart’ is appropriate here—the novel is one of sustained dread punctuated by explosions of unmitigated terror.”—
Irish Literary Review

 

“Effective evocations of the supernatural . . . a memorable expansion of the author’s unique fictional universe.”

—
Publishers Weekly

 

“A debut novel of a level of accomplishment most young horror/dark fantasy writers could not begin to approach. [Caitlín R. Kiernan’s] tightly focused, unsparing, entranced gaze finds significance and beauty in the landscape it surveys.” —Peter Straub

 

“A remarkable novel. [Caitlín R. Kiernan] tells a powerful and disturbing story with creepy intensity and a gift for language that borders on the scary. Deeply, wonderfully, magnificently nasty.”—Neil Gaiman

 

“A daring vision and an extraordinary achievement.”

—Clive Barker

 

“If the title alone doesn’t make you want to read
Silk
, the first page will do the trick. Kiernan’s work is populated with the physically freaky, mentally unstable, sexually marginalized characters who have caused so much consternation in conventional circles—but Caitlín R. Kiernan is headed in an entirely different direction. Her unfolding of strange events evokes not horror, but a far larger sense of awe.”—Poppy Z. Brite

 

“[Kiernan] has what it takes to excite me as a reader. . . . Think of Poppy Z. Brite with slightly more accessible prose and characters who aren’t quite so outré. . . . I just loved this book and can’t wait to see what she writes next.”

—Charles de Lint

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Published by Roc, an imprint of New American Library, a division of Penguin
Group (USA) Inc. Previously published in a Roc trade paperback edition.
First Roc Mass Market Printing, January 2007

Copyright © Caitlín R. Kiernan, 2001

All rights reserved

REGISTERED TRADEMARK—MARCA REGISTRADA

Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

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eISBN : 978-1-101-03447-7

—J. R. R. TOLKIEN (1947)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

T
HE girl named Chance is standing in the rain, plain and skinny tall girl shivering beneath the April night sky pissing rain like icywet needles, and she can’t stop giggling. She’s been giggling for almost half an hour now, at least since they left Deacon’s apartment where the three of them finished off a dime bag of pot, Chance and Deacon and Elise getting stoned while they listened to Billie Holiday and argued about whether or not they’d all wind up in jail if they broke into the old water works tunnel on the mountain.

“Jesus, Deke,” Elise says, “will you
please
hurry the hell up? I’m freezing my ass off out here,” shaky, stammered words because her teeth are chattering so bad, and Chance is trying very hard to stop giggling, doesn’t want to laugh at poor Elise soaked straight to the bone, drowned-rat Elise. She tries to imagine the cops pulling into the little lot at the bottom of the park, a dozen Birmingham cops with their strobing cop-car lights and blaring sirens, guns and shiny silver handcuffs.

“Well, don’t you worry about that,” Deacon says, and then he drops the bolt cutter in the mud and has to bend over to look for it. “There’s every reason to believe we’ll all drown first.”

And that’s it for the scary cops, and Chance is giggling again, laughing until her stomach hurts and Elise is glaring at her. She sits down in the wet grass and the sticky red mud, sits down before she falls down, and “At least hyena girl here’s having a good time,” Elise mumbles between her chattering teeth.

Deacon has the bolt cutter again, fumbles around in the dark for a moment before he manages to get its razor jaws over the hasp of the rusty padlock, and then he slices through tempered steel like it was butter. The lock falls off the gate and lands with a loud splash in a puddle at his feet. “Oh ye of little faith,” he says, pulling away the heavy chain looped through the bars to hold the wrought-iron gate closed, and Elise claps her hands, slow and sarcastic applause as the gate swings open with an ugly, grinding noise. Rust-on-rust creak and squeal like the hull of a ship ripping wide, violated, shearing sound, steel and ice, and Chance is lying on her back staring up at the raindrops plunging towards her, kicked out of heaven and plunging towards the soggy earth.

“ ‘Down, down, down,’ ” she says, kindly quoting Lewis Carroll for the rain, “ ‘Would the fall never come to an end? I wonder how many miles I’ve fallen . . .’ ”

“You want to just leave her out here?” Elise asks, but Deacon is already hauling Chance to her feet. She shivers and leans against him, stealing the warmth off him, and kisses his stubbly chin, the arch of his long nose. “C’mon, girlie girl,” he says, “shake a leg,” one arm around her tight as they step through the low, square arch leading into the tunnel. “Time to go forth and explore the Stygian bowels of the world.”