I realized that there was no more time for words. So putting down my bag, I turned my back on Mab Mouldheel and started to descend the steps, trying to make as little noise as possible. Once I reached the bottom I walked along the aisle, heading towards the black throne. Despite all my efforts, the noise of my boots echoed back loudly from the arched ceiling. I wondered if the sleeping Ordeen was guarded – I glanced right and left at the shadowy alcoves beyond the pillars, but nothing moved. There was no threat there.
The nearer I got, the more I was aware of the intimidating power of her presence; an intense cold rose slowly up my spine. Mam said that I'd to do my best to hold the attention of the Ordeen until she was ready to come to my aid and destroy her enemy. But what if she attacked me on sight? So, readying myself for danger, I switched my staff from my left to my right hand, then eased my silver chain out of my breeches pocket and thrust my left hand beneath my cloak to conceal its threat.
Now that I was closer, a stench wafted towards me. The Ordeen had the appearance of a woman but there was something of the wild animal about her – a fetid, musky odour that almost made me retch.
I halted before her throne. Her eyes were closed and she still seemed to be sleeping. Was this my chance to strike before she awoke to her full strength? Why not use my advantage? But would any of my weapons prove effective?
Silver was usually a powerful tool against servants of the dark, but I wasn't dealing with a mere witch – this was one of the Old Gods, a much more powerful being. Could a silver chain bind her? It seemed unlikely. My staff, with its blade forged from a silver alloy, could hurt her. But I would have to spear her heart and she would be fast and strong. I might not get the chance. I still had the blade that Grimalkin had given me, but I'd used the dark wish. Even though Mam had understood that I'd needed it to save Alice, I'd sensed her disappointment at its loss. The blade might hurt the Ordeen, but my best chance of damaging her badly was now gone.
I decided to employ my weapons in that order: chain, staff and then blade. But first I would attempt to bind my enemy with words. I would use everything at my disposal to delay her until Mam was ready to attack.
Yet even as those thoughts whirled around within my head, the Ordeen opened her eyes and looked straight at me before sitting upright on her throne. Her lips began to suffuse with blood, becoming swollen and bright red; her eyes were the dark blue of the sky an hour after sunset.
She was awake.
CHAPTER
21
A SHARP TOOTH
The Ordeen came to her feet and glared down at me angrily, her expression wild and arrogant.
'An insect creeps into my domain,' she said softly. 'I sense it shiver and shake with fear. All I need do is stretch out my finger and smear it against the cold marble floor. Shall it be done?'
It was then that I noticed her jaws. The lower one was particularly powerful and wide, the muscles bunched below her ears. When she opened her mouth, I saw that her teeth were very sharp – the canines particularly. They weren't long like those of a water witch, but they were curved, and once she bit into flesh there'd be no escape from her terrible jaws. I glanced down at her hands. They were very large for a woman and the veins were prominent. And instead of fingernails she had sharp talons.
I knew that she was trying to terrify me, so I took a slow deep breath and attempted to control my fear – always a spook's first task when dealing with the dark. I felt it subside and then, as my trembling eased, I took a step towards her. She didn't expect that, and I saw her eyes widen in surprise.
'Who are you, insect?' she demanded. 'I feel that I know you somehow. I sense that we have met before. How did you get here? How did you pass by my servants and the traps and barriers to come so close to me?'
'I crept in like a little mouse,' I replied. 'I'm too small and unimportant for anyone to notice me.'
'Yet what is that staff you hold in your hand? A staff of rowan wood that hides a fang within! A metal blade impregnated with silver.'
'Do you mean this?' I asked calmly, pressing the recess in my staff so that the blade emerged with a loud click.
'That's a very sharp tooth for a little mouse,' she said, descending the first step of the dais. 'But still you are a mystery. You're a stranger to this country. Where is your home?'
'Far across the sea in a green land where rain is never very far away.'
'What is your parentage? Who begat you?'
'My father was a farmer who worked hard to bring up his family and taught us right from wrong. He's dead now but I'll never forget him. And never forget what he taught me.'
'I feel I know you. You could almost be my brother. Do you have sisters?'
'I've no sisters but I do have brothers—'
'Yes! I see it now. There are six! Six! And you are the seventh! And your father before you was a seventh son. So you have gifts. The ability to see and hear the dead. The facility to block the long-sniffing of a witch. You are a natural enemy of the dark. Is that why you are here, little mouse? To slay me with your staff? However sharp, you'll need more than one small tooth to destroy me . . .'
How did she know these things? Was she reading my mind? It was frightening, because within moments she seemed set to learn who I was. And through me she'd become aware of Mam. Immediately my fears proved well-founded.
'Wait! There's more,' she continued. 'Much more! You have other gifts. Gifts from your feral mother. A speed that mocks the tick of time. The ability to smell the approach of death in those afflicted by sickness or injury. A long moonshadow that shows what you'll become. But what mother could give you such things, little mouse? I see her now! Through you I know her. Your mother is Lamia, my mortal enemy!'
I saw the intent in her eyes. She was going to slay me on the spot. Quickly – quicker than ever before – I slid my silver chain onto my wrist and withdrew my hand from my cloak. She didn't react. I was moving but the Ordeen wasn't. She was just staring at me, anger creasing her brow.
The moment expanded. Time flickered and froze. I felt strange. I was the only thing moving in an utterly still world. I wasn't breathing. My heart wasn't beating.
Was this what the Ordeen had meant by 'a speed that mocks the tick of time'? Had I really inherited it from Mam? Was it something similar to what the Fiend used? That same trick had allowed me to pluck a blade from the air the previous summer when Grimalkin had hurled it at my head.
Taking very careful aim, all my focus on the target, I cracked the chain and hurled it straight at her. I had no fear at all that I would miss. Moving targets are always difficult to hit, but she was as immobile as the practice post in the Spook's Chipenden garden.
The chain fell in a perfect spiral over her head and tightened against her body. Her eyes widened and seemed to bulge in her sockets and she slumped to her knees, in obvious pain. She screamed before arching backwards, the veins in her neck distending. Then she convulsed, pitched forward and landed hard upon her chin, her neck extended, her face still towards me. I'd heard a sharp snapping sound. Was it a bone breaking? Was it her neck?
I was breathing again, my heart now thumping in my chest. Whatever had happened as I prepared to cast the chain was over; time was now ticking along normally.
The Ordeen seemed to be gazing in my direction, but her eyes were unfocused and glassy and she certainly wasn't breathing. Was she dead? If so, I couldn't believe how effective the chain had been. I stared in astonishment. I was elated but still wary. I was confronting one of the Old Gods. It had been too easy. Far too easy . . .
I took a step backwards – just in case it was a trick – and studied her carefully. She was totally immobile, showing not a single flicker of life. Had the contact with silver alloy killed her? Surely not?
Then I spotted something, the first warning of danger to come. Steam seemed to be rising from her body. The air above it was shimmering too. There was a crackling sound and a sudden acrid stench of burning flesh. I watched as her skin began to scorch, wrinkle
and blacken. She was burning! Flames were leaping upwards!
Her head gave a jerk. I looked at the powerful lower jaw and saw it widen and lengthen, the head lifting. Still she didn't seem to be breathing, but I could see the side of her throat convulsing even as it charred. I took another step backwards and readied my staff. Her head had become an orb of fire and there was a tearing, snapping sound; her jaw suddenly dislocated and the blackened skull shattered and fell away like shards of broken pottery. But there was something else still there within. Something inside the flames, very much alive and dangerous! Something slowly emerging from the burning, blackening human husk. She was like a snake easing off her old skin. I had to strike now, before it was too late.
I stepped forward quickly, shielding my face with my arm and lunged with my staff, aiming at the point behind her shoulders where I judged her heart to be. The blade struck something hard – far harder than bone. It jarred my hand painfully: the shock went right up my arm to my shoulder so that I lost my grip on the staff. But my dismay gave way to relief.
It was fortunate that I'd relinquished my hold on the staff; otherwise I'd have lost my arm – because the next second the staff went up in flames with a loud whoosh, consumed by a heat so intense that it disintegrated into white ashes. I backed away as something emerged from the flames on four clawed legs, sloughing off the blackened skin of what had been a human form, shaking itself free of my silver chain.
It was a large lizard-like creature, mottled green and brown and covered with warty protuberances. It had the shape of the salamander, the most potent and dangerous of all the fire elementals, which Seilenos had told me about. But, if so, this was no ordinary example. The Ordeen had now taken on her true form, it seemed – that of a creature that basked in fire and ruled that element.
She scuttled towards me out of the ashes of her previous form, her mouth opening to reveal two rows of sharp, murderous teeth. There was a loud hiss as she breathed out, and a large plume of hot steam erupted from her nostrils straight towards me. I stepped to one side and it just missed me, passing close to my face so that I was forced to close my eyes against the scalding heat.
I had just one remaining weapon: the blade that Grimalkin had given me. With my left hand I reached over my shoulder under my cloak and shirt, tugging it from its sheath. Then I faced the Ordeen and concentrated. Again I felt time slowing. I breathed deeply and steadied my own heart, trying to calm my nerves, and took a slow step towards my enemy.
The Ordeen didn't move but her salamander eyes, the pupils vertical red slits, regarded me intently, her claws splayed as if she was tensed to spring. I focused on her long lizard-like body and the place behind the neck where I intended to bury the blade. But would I be able to drive it home? Would it burst into flame like my staff? I had no alternative but to risk it, though I would have to get very close if I was to be successful. Much closer than when I'd used my staff. And intense heat was still radiating from her body.
Her jaws widened slightly, then extended quickly to reveal the ruby-red oval of her open throat. That was all the warning I got. This time, rather than scalding steam, a jet of orange-yellow fire speared directly towards me.
Again it missed me by inches. Now the Ordeen suddenly stood up on her hind legs so that she towered above me, her head beginning to sway from side to side.
I concentrated again, locking my eyes on a new target – the pale throat beneath the long jaws. This was softer. More vulnerable. That was the spot to aim for. Almost immediately, the Ordeen stopped moving.
Was that it? Concentrate and time slowed . . . almost stopped? Yes, it had to be. It was a result of focus and concentration.
But asking myself that question and reaching that conclusion almost cost me my life. It had disrupted my intense focus. The Ordeen's lizard head swayed from right to left, and another tongue of flame surged straight at me. Just in time I dropped to my knees and I felt my hair crackle and singe.
Concentrate! I told myself. Squeeze time! Make it stop!
Once more my focus began to do its work and I came to my feet, readied my blade and took a tentative step towards my enemy. That was it. Focus on the task.
Take one step at a time. That was the way. And I remembered what Mam had once told me:
When you're a man, then it'll be the dark's turn to be afraid, because then you'll be the hunter, not the hunted. That's why I gave you life.
Well, I wasn't a man yet, but suddenly I did feel like the hunter . . .
I was less than an arm's length from the Ordeen's open jaws now. Too close to escape if another plume of fire erupted. I tensed, then struck upwards into her throat, burying the blade to the hilt and releasing the weapon instantly. A wave of despair washed over me as I watched the blade melt, dissolving into globules of falling molten metal.
I staggered backwards as burning heat radiated towards me. Time was moving again and I could do nothing about it. But I saw that I had hurt her after all. Boiling black blood spouted in an arc from the Ordeen's throat to fall onto the mosaic floor, where it instantly turned to steam, forming a thick mist that obscured my view. Surely I had weakened her at least? The stench of burning was so bad that I retched and choked, my eyes stinging and watering, momentarily blinded.
But when the steam cleared, the Ordeen was still standing. The wound in her throat had healed and now she fixed her pitiless eyes upon me. I had no weapons left. She came straight at me, faster than I could run. In seconds I would be reduced to ashes.
Then, just when I thought I was finished, as good as dead, it happened . . .
My ears gave me the first warning. There was a sudden silence. That utter stillness – as when an owl swoops towards its unsuspecting prey. A silence so intense that it hurt. I looked up and saw something plunge down from the balcony above as the Ordeen twisted sideways and upwards to meet the airborne threat.
It was Mam. Her transformation was complete, but she was nothing like I'd expected. There were wings, yes, and outstretched claws, ready to rend and tear her enemy. But they were not the insectile wings of the vaengir. She was more angel than insect, and her wings were feathered, white as freshly fallen snow.
She fell upon the Ordeen, bearing her down onto the marble floor, and the two locked together fiercely. As I rose to my feet, my heart lurched in agony, for Mam's feathers were beginning to singe and burn, and I heard her cry out to me in an agonized voice: 'Leave, Tom! Go while you can! I'll hold her here!'
My instinct was to go to Mam's aid, but I had no weapons left, and as I watched them tearing each other apart, blood spraying upwards, feathers crackling and burning, I realized there was nothing I could do. If I approached them, I'd be dead in seconds. All that remained now was to obey Mam. And, although it tore at my heart, I snatched up my chain and fled that place. It was the hardest thing I had ever done; the darkest moment I'd ever faced.
CHAPTER
22
LAST WORDS
Churning with emotion, I raced up the steps, only halting to pick up my bag and the lantern. I thought Mab would follow me but she gave me a nod of farewell.
'I can't go that way because of the barrier, Tom. I'll get out the way your mam opened up and see you later.'
I said nothing. I didn't trust my voice. I knew that if I spoke to her, the pain and tears I was holding inside would come cascading out.
I quickly descended the spiral staircase and began to cross the vast dark empty space, hoping I was heading in the right direction, towards the invisible barrier.
When I finally reached it, I was relieved to see the shadows of Alice, Arkwright and the Spook beyond it.
I quickly stepped through.
'Oh, Tom!' Alice exclaimed, rushing towards me. 'You've been so long. We couldn't find another way in so we came back to wait for you. But we've been here ages. I thought you weren't coming back – that something terrible had happened to you.'
She halted suddenly and looked into my eyes. 'But something really bad has happened, has
n't it?'