Page 4 of Cloudfyre Falling - A dark fairy tale

  Part of the stone bridge had collapsed and its beam-braces gone down with it. Between where Melai now stood and the remaining span of standing bridge, there were a gulf that must’ve stretched up to a hundred feet. Without braces to support the railcourse, the beam thinned and eventually became nothing but a waving, wispy green tendril on the wind. When Hawkmoth returned to the driver’s compartment and switched off the garetrain engine the beam sizzled and spat and faded slowly to nothing.

  From here, their garetrain would go no further.

  3

  Far below, a misty river wound through rocky stacks where foaming rapids crashed and roared. The ravine walls were sheer, too steep to climb, and impossible to scale for those such as their steeds; and the opposite wall would have proven particularly challenging for any soul for it were curved inwards and climbing it would have potentially brought down the overhanging lip.

  ‘An interesting dilemma we have before us,’ Hawkmoth spoke, gazing out to where the bridge edge hung in the fog.

  ‘Can you not summon some beast of the air?’ Locke enquired of Hawkmoth. ‘To lift us all across?’

  Hawkmoth grinned. Perhaps at the childlike innocence of the request, a belief that he, Hawkmoth, could move mountains on a simple command. ‘I’m afraid I cannot.’

  Gargaron looked eastways and westways as the ravine ran. Steep chasm walls met his gaze in either direction. He fetched his map from his pack. Searching for an alternative crossing point. ‘Perhaps we might walk either that way or this, and see if we do not come to another bridge,’ he recommended. ‘Or someplace where the cliffs are not so sheer.’ On his map the ravine were marked by a small, meandering blue line. There were not even the bridge in front of him marked here. But instead one marked perhaps a hundred miles to their east. He glanced up at Hawkmoth. ‘If this map be accurate, there be a second bridge in that direction.’ He pointed.

  ‘Aye, Choner’s Crossing. And two day’s travel we will have lost reaching it,’ Hawkmoth warned.

  Across the ravine, as the fog thinned out, they saw a tall statue of what Hawkmoth claimed were the depiction of Pukaya, the river nymph. And beyond her, the railcourse line-braces wound up into the lower foothills of the Bonewreckers; so close and yet so far. The sky roaming slopes of the mountains themselves were still hidden beyond cloud banks but here were already an altitude where trees were becoming scarce and the few that had settled amidst the shale and slate and stone looked thin and crooked and lacking in foliage.

  In the end it were Melai who voiced a solution. ‘Why do we not construct a skywalk from here to the standing portion of the bridge?’

  The others looked at her. Gargaron were about to ask where she proposed to source materials for such a span when she pointed at garetrain.

  ‘The carriages?’ she asked. ‘Can we not break them down and utilise their materials?’

  4

  Hawkmoth may not have had an ability to summon flying beasts of the mountains but his staff had a keen knack of being able to dismantle things neatly; or at least it could melt rivets and bolts and welds without too much disruption to the various panels that made up the garetrain’s carriages.

  Gargaron and Locke lugged as much as they could to ravine’s edge and as they worked Locke broke into song; it helped pass time and helped distract his team from their labour.

  ‘So, you do sing?’ Gargaron said to him.

  ‘Aye. And mostly without a lute.’ His were songs of the sea, he told them, songs from days when workers would haul nets in from the surf, singing as they plucked spine fish from nets.

  Gargaron smiled. No-one berated Locke for singing. Despite what he claimed about his singing prowess, he were not bad of voice, and his stirring tunes helped elevate group mood as the cold mountain air did its best to dent their morale.

  5

  Once they had dismantled much of carriages two and three, their next conundrum were how to go about suspending the various pieces above the span. Locke suggested sending his Zebra across. He pointed at the rope coiled and strung from rear of Razor’s saddle. ‘She could slither down slope with your rope in her jaws, and up pylon,’ he explained.

  ‘Does she know her knots?’ Hawkmoth enquired.

  ‘Knots? Are you pulling my leg? You ever seen a serpent tie knots?’

  ‘Exactly my point then. How will your dear Zebra tie off the rope?’ Hawkmoth wanted to know.

  ‘Ah,’ Locke said. ‘I see. Fair point.’

  The simpler solution, as Melai saw it, were to have herself fly the windy gulf between ravine’s precarious edge to the remaining portion of bridge, carrying with her the length of rope. ‘We shan’t need to tie the rope to bridge,’ she told them. ‘If I simply loop it through and bring the end back here and we teather both ends of rope together, we’ll have a crude pulley system.’

  The others eyed her, impressed.

  ‘That way we can simply use the rope to heft yourselves or materials across the span.’

  They still looked at her, impressed.

  ‘I may be of the forest,’ said, ‘but I do know some tricks of the outer world.’

  So it were agreed upon. And Melai flew across, the wind buffeting her as she fed the rope through a segment of bridge. Here she took up rope’s loose end and carried it back to her companions. One end were now pulled through the iron grill of the garetrain, and the other through the bridge. Once both ends were knotted to one another, a vast rope loop had been established.

  Hawkmoth now prepared to climb across to the bridge, testing first the rope’s integrity. Then, with his staff strung across his back, he sat on edge of ravine, and clasping the two lengths of rope he swung out over the drop and arm over arm pulled himself across to the bridge.

  He were panting by the time he climbed up onto platform and sat there, his legs dangling over the ironwork, catching his breath.

  The others watched him. He were almost lost from their view beyond the green mist; naught but a ghostly figure.

  And they were naught but wraiths to him. He called back. ‘I am ready here.’

  Gargaron and Locke secured the first segment of dismantled carriage via metal hooks (hooks that Locke had fashioned from carriage scrap) to the rope. And once done, with Hawkmoth hauling rope hand over hand from his end, and Gargaron hauling hand over hand from their end, they pulleyed the steel panel across to bridge.

  And so began construction of Melai’s skywalk. It took much of the afternoon for the pieces to be lifted and pushed into place, for Hawkmoth to meld them together with either bespoke metal clamps, or by melting the edge of one segment to the other through superheated flame squirted from Lancsh, the demon face on his staff. The final touch were to add support struts beneath their skywalk, two held in place by bridge’s stone pylon, and two more dug in against the rocky ravine wall, Hawkmoth hanging precariously firstly from the bridge pylon to weld the struts in place, and then hung from the ravine side of the footbridge to dig the strut into the cliff face. Then he imbued the entire construction with a strength enchantment.

  When Hawkmoth tested the skywalk, he did so with the reclaimed rope tied about him.

  Gargaron stood back from the cliff edge, his boots dug into the grass, gripping the rope’s loose end, ready to haul in the sorcerer in case their skywalk should collapse. But Hawkmoth walked its length and their little footbridge held steadfast. Locke went next with no trouble at all, refusing to be tethered. When Gargaron walked it, tethered, it shook slightly, but ultimately he crossed without incident.

  The concern now were for the larger brutes: Razor, Grimah and the serpent. And how their weight might affect the skywalk. Locke eliminated some of the problem when he shouted a command and his Zebra promptly slithered down the rock wall of the chasm, splashed around the rapids and then coiled her way up the furthest bridge pylon to the northwun side of ravine.

  ‘If only we were all but serpents,’ Gargaron commented.

  6

  Gargaron prepared Grimah for his crossing of
the skywalk, tying the rope about his steed’s broad chest. Once done he tugged it to test its grip. He then pushed his forehead against the horse’s heads, trying to project a sense of calm, hoping his dear horse would not fret on its crossing. ‘I go first. You follow. Be calm now, I have you tethered. If you fall we will catch you.’

  He then turned and made his way back along the skywalk to the stone bridge, trailing the rope out behind him, the makeshift span beneath his feet groaning and creaking.

  ‘You hear that?’ he asked as he reached Hawkmoth and Locke waiting on the stone bridge.

  ‘Hear what?’ asked Locke.

  ‘The skywalk protesting.’

  ‘Heard nothing,’ Locke claimed.

  ‘I heard it,’ came Melai’s concerned voice from where she were perched on the stone rampart that ran along the side of the bridge.

  ‘Thank you,’ Gargaron said. ‘Hawkmoth?’

  ‘I take it the skywalk be merely settling,’ the sorcerer said.

  ‘Settling?’

  ‘Aye.’

  Gargaron sighed. ‘I hope you be right, good sorcerer.’ He turned now to face Grimah.

  His steed stood back near ravine’s southern edge. Behind him Razor paced back and forth. And behind Razor, the garetrain cut a ghostly image in the fog.

  ‘Right then, shall we do this?’ Gargaron asked Hawkmoth and Locke at his back. Both had gripped the ongoing length of rope—the idea were to combine their strength, along with that of Gargaron, and catch Grimah’s fall should the steed’s weight prove too much for their skywalk.

  Yet as Gargaron were about to call Grimah across he felt the stone bridge shift beneath him. He slackened his grip on the rope and turned to study the expressions of his friends.

  ‘Tell me you felt that?’

  The looks on their faces told them all he needed to know.

  ‘I felt it,’ Melai said, standing now, as if the bridge were about to tumble out from beneath her.

  What followed were a brief discussion about how their combined weight might very well end up compromising the bridge. ‘We don’t need the rest of it plummeting down into those rapids,’ Gargaron said.

  Once this were pointed out, Hawkmoth and Locke crossed to the far end, uncoiling the remainder of the rope as they went. Once on firm ground, they anchored the rope to Zebra. Melai stayed where she were.

  7

  Gargaron glanced around at Hawkmoth and Locke. ‘You ready?’ he called

  Both spaced out along the far end of the rope, gripping it, digging their heels into dirt and thick grass. Zebra were backed up behind them, anchoring the line.

  ‘Aye,’ Hawkmoth called back.

  Gargaron turned and faced Grimah once more where he stood over there on the southwun edge of the chasm. And gripping his segment of rope, coiling it around his fists, he said, ‘Right then, Grimah. Let us get you across.’

  Grimah, who had been standing there watching Gargaron, looked keen to get on with this. And needed no words of encouragement from Gargaron to set out.

  Gargaron eyed his steed step out upon the skywalk, surprised that their narrow makeshift bridge held as well as it did. There were a slight sag beneath Grimah as he reached middle part of the crossing, though Gargaron, pulling in the slack of the rope as his steed advanced, were confident Grimah would make it the rest of the way without incident.

  Though, as soon as he’d had that thought… things went sour.

  8

  Grimah took three further steps before a noise of protesting metal cut through the air like the squeal of a cat and the footbridge lurched. Grimah dug his hooves against the steel and Gargaron gripped the rope with white knuckles.

  Gargaron heard Melai gasp and hold her breath.

  For the moment, the skywalk held, albeit on a slight angle.

  Gargaron did not relax his grip on the rope; behind him Hawkmoth and Locke dragged in the slack that he’d collected. ‘Easy now,’ Gargaron called gently to Grimah. ‘Easy. Easy.’ He eyed the footbridge, watching for even the slightest movement. But for the moment, it had steadied.

  ‘Right then, Grimah,’ he called. ‘Come again now. Nice and slow. I have you.’

  Grimah, trusting Gargaron, walked two further paces… and that’s when the skywalk collapsed.

  The strut against the ravine wall buckled; the other struts held for a sunflare but would not absorb the sudden weight. The skywalk bent sideways.

  And took Grimah with it.

  9

  Gargaron braced himself, gripping the rope, and leaning back. But when the rope took the horse’s weight, it hauled Gargaron over the lip of the bridge. Melai leapt into the air, half expecting to see Gargaron go plummeting to his death, following Grimah down onto those spiny stone stacks far below.

  But when she reached him, she saw him hanging to life from the rope.

  Forty feet below him Grimah dangled, squealing in pain, the rope coiled tight below the armpits of his forelegs, digging into his skin, constricting his ribs. And back there on the northwun side of the ravine, gripping the far end of the rope, Hawkmoth and Locke hefted and grunted and tried to keep their boots grounded against rock and gravel and grass.

  Melai swooped down and braced herself against a builder’s rung on the pylon, holding Gargaron with her tiny hands. ‘Don’t you fall!’ she scolded him. ‘Don’t you dare fall?’

  Hanging there, he looked across at her, smiling. ‘I shan’t… If I can help it.’

  He looked around for something to grab onto. The bridge itself were over twenty feet above him; below him, the remains of their footbridge had smashed and disintegrated, strewn around rock stacks and rapids. Gargaron’s hands, his knuckles white as bone, were beginning to slip. He considered the builder’s rung, the rung put in place during construction in order to aid workers to scale pylon from ground up; but just looking at it he knew his fingers were too big to gain sufficient purchase; it would’ve been like a bog troll trying to get its huge fingers through the handle of a tiny tea cup.

  ‘Pull!’ Melai screeched. ‘Hawkmoth, Locke, pull damn you, he’s slipping.’

  ‘Should have tied myself on,’ Gargaron grunted, grimacing, the pain in his hands ratcheting up.

  ‘Shoosh,’ Melai told him. ‘Shoosh now. Concentrate all your strength. I order you.’

  Over on the southwun lip of the ravine, Razor, watching this, were in obvious distress, trotting back and forth, making noise, fretting.

  Melai would not let Gargaron go, she had one arm wrapped around his sword belt, the other clasped to the small rung. She feared if she let him go, he’d fall, that even her tiny effort were helping to keep him there.

  She gazed down at Grimah, who kicked occasionally; the rope were digging into his flesh, his forelegs jutting up awkwardly. Gargaron tried looking down. ‘Be Grimah fine?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes.’ But for how much longer Melai could not tell. She looked back in the direction of sorcerer and crabman, although she could not see them for the pylon and the bridge. She called out again. ‘Haul them up!’ she yelled. ‘Gargaron may not hold much longer!’

  There were a dilemma in giant’s mind. If Locke, Hawkmoth and Zebra were having trouble pulling him and Grimah to safety, well, ought he to just let go, fall away to whatever fate awaited him at ravine’s rocky base and have Grimah saved?

  You have work here first.

  Or… there were his knife. He could have Melai cut the rope beneath him.

  No. How would he live with himself to have his steed plummet to death?

  He grimaced, and grunted.

  ‘Hold on,’ Melai told him sternly. ‘I do not care how much you’re hurting. Do you think your Veleyal would have you giving up on her if your holding on meant her life? No, she would not. So hold on damn you.’

  ‘Melai. I fear it be me or Grimah.’

  Again Melai yelled to the others. ‘What be wrong with you lot? Pull before you have death on your hands!’

  Gargaron had a new thought then. One that migh
t save him and Grimah both. Shimmy down the rope, climb passed Grimah, reach rope’s end and survey how far the drop to the river from there might be. If it were not too great he might perhaps survive the fall. If he were unlucky he may break a leg on rocks. Maybe both legs if things did not entirely go his way. Perhaps some ribs. At worst his back. But surely the sorcerer would have some nifty remedies to put him back together.

  He opened his mouth to ask Melai if she could catch sight of rope’s end, to tell him if she could gauge how far the drop were to the river rapids when suddenly the rope yanked upwards five feet and the sudden jolt made Gargaron slip down the rope’s length, friction burning his fingers, dragging off skin.

  He had barely a moment to appreciate what were happening when again without warning, the rope hauled upwards. With all his remaining strength, Gargaron clung to it and he were drawn headfirst into the chin of the bridge, catching him beneath the overhang, the sound of the dragging rope zinging against edge of bridge harsh against his ears.

  Gargaron kicked himself free of the overhang and were pulled up rough and unceremoniously onto the stone bridge. Still the rope did not stop, continuing to slide up and over the edge, beginning to fray now, almost smoking.

  Up came Grimah snorting. Despite his burning fingers, Gargaron grabbed hold of his steed’s front legs and put his weight behind his efforts, dragging horse up onto the bridge. Once Grimah were safely on the span, Gargaron dropped to his back and lay there panting.

  10

  Melai fluttered up and landed beside the giant. He gazed at her, looking relieved. She reached out and held him, her small face against his huge, rough, unshaven cheek. He put his enormous arms around her, like a father clasping a wee babe. ‘Thank you, Melai,’ he murmured. And then he laughed through sheer relief. ‘I were about to fall. No doubt about it. You gave me the strength I needed.’

  As Gargaron lay there catching his breath, Grimah bent low nuzzling his neck, leaving a thick wet slick of slobber across his neck and chin. That both he and horse were safe, Gargaron were too relieved to care, and simply laughed, rolled his face to the side and gently warded his steed’s mouth from his neck. ‘Grimah,’ he said laughing. ‘I am glad to see you too, but hurry and fetch yourself to yonder bank before this bridge should tumble beneath us.’

  11

  Attention turned now to the problem of getting Razor across. Though Gargaron felt his first duty were to bid sorcerer and crabman his thanks. As he and Melai made their way to the northwun side of the ravine he did just that.

  ‘Thank us not,’ Hawkmoth told him. ‘It were the serpent who pulled you to safety.’

  Gargaron eyed Zebra, where Locke were unhitching the rope from around its wide girth. Gargaron stepped over to the snake beast, and reached his large hand out to it. She let him scratch her scaly neck. ‘Thank you, Zebra,’ he said. ‘I shall fetch you more of those apples you like once we are done here.’

  ‘Oh? What be this about apples?’ Locke asked with a suspicious grin. ‘As far as I know, Zebra enjoys no such thing.’

  Gargaron clapped the crabman on his shoulder. ‘Mine and Zebra’s little secret then.’

  12

  Hawkmoth strode along the stone bridge, communicating with Razor via hand signals.

  ‘Are you talking with him?’ Melai enquired intrigued, as she flew up behind him.

  ‘Aye, and he is being stubborn,’ came Hawkmoth’s reply. ‘I tell him to head for Choner’s Crossing, to find us at Sanctuary. He will be two days catching us up if he leaves now. But the stubborn brute won’t have it. He claims there be monsters on their way.’

  Melai frowned. ‘Monsters?’ She looked back at the deserted trail as it wound up into cloudy mountain slopes.

  ‘From which direction?’ Gargaron asked.

  ‘From over there,’ Hawkmoth said pointing.

  Behind Razor there were but the garetrain lingering like a spectre in the mists.

  ‘Let me fly the rope to Razor then,’ Melai said. ‘I could tie it around him. He can leap from edge of the ravine. You lot can reel him up.’

  ‘Aye, an action I have considered,’ Hawkmoth said. ‘Though my fear be that he may swing headlong into the pylon. I would not want him to snap a leg.’

  ‘We must try,’ Melai demanded, flying off and grabbing the rope from Locke.

  Though as she did, Razor grew more and more skittish, bolting back and forth along the ravine’s edge. And here Melai heard something… Some noise from beyond the garetrain. She stopped flying and now turned and gazed southways.

  ‘Something comes,’ she called out. ‘I hear it now.’

  ‘Are you certain?’ Hawkmoth called back.

  ‘Aye.’

  Gargaron heard it now. A howling. A wailing. Something lost to the fog beyond the garetrain.

  ‘Hawkmoth,’ Gargaron called to the sorcerer. ‘Do you hear it?’

  Hawkmoth had reached the spot where their skywalk had dropped into ravine—between he and his faithful steed lay a hundred foot gulf. ‘I do,’ Hawkmoth murmured to himself. ‘Though I know not what it be.’

  13

  From the mists trundled a colossal brute. A Hillcrusher, as Gargaron knew them. One of the docile giants from the distant southwun reaches. A being of such bulk and height, Gargaron himself might well have been but a mere boy.

  Pursuing it were Harbingers. Dark Ones.

  The Hillcrusher failed to notice the ravine. Perhaps blinded by fear, it surged toward it with complete ignorance. Taking much of the cloddy grass bank with it, it fell howling, scrabbling its limbs desperately in the air for something to grab on to.

  It smashed headfirst against one of the rock pinnacles, crushing it, but another pinnacle punctured its torso, thumping through its ribs in an explosion of meat and blood.

  Impaled there, it died painfully, pitifully, crying like a babe for its mother.

  If not for the Dark Ones, Melai would have sent it an arrow of Dreamnight, to quicken its passing. But the Dark Ones veered toward Razor. Thus Melai let loose a volley of arrows to defend the steed and Hawkmoth signaled his horse into evasive action.

  ‘Yes, call him away,’ Melai asked. ‘Give me a clear shot.’

  ‘I am not calling him away,’ Hawkmoth called back. ‘I have ordered him to make a jump for the bridge.’

  ‘Jump?’ Melai asked. ‘He can jump so far?’

  ‘No,’ was Hawkmoth’s simple answer.

  Razor were already galloping toward ravine’s edge, the Dark Ones hot on his tail.

  Melai flew out into the gulf above where their skywalk had hung and began firing her arrows at the Dark Ones. Her first few volleys did nothing, swallowed into the dark forms of her targets without effect. She then blew holes in the ground before them.

  This slowed them but failed to stop them.

  Hawkmoth conjured spells; there were too many Harbingers to take down individually using fire bursts from his staff, and summoning a concussive force to blow them all to bits would have curtailed Razor’s charge. Thus from his staff came a wave that could’ve been naught but a simple sheet of water. It swept from Rashel’s gaping mouth, flying rapidly across air between bridge and the far ground and struck just as the charging creatures leapt for the steed.

  The Harbingers piled headfirst into this strange sheet of “water”. It stopped them instantly, like a fly stuck to web. And afforded Razor crucial sunflares, galloping toward Ravine’s edge, too fast now to pull away from the jump.

  Hawkmoth knew Razor had not the leap in his legs to reach the bridge. Nor could his steed hope to fly without wings. With the Hillcrusher still wailing and dying down there beside river, its guts spilled out and streaming like worms down the rapids, Hawkmoth knelt and concentrated his mind.

  Razor leapt before Hawkmoth had pulled his intended enchantment from his staff. And plummeted fast toward the stone pinnacles.

  14

  Hawkmoth did not flinch. And would not be distracted as he channeled his thoughts, waking Lancsh and R
ashel both. Slowly over the ravine where the skywalk had stretched, where the original span of the bridge once sat, a glowing ball of light appeared and hovered there. And as Razor fell toward his death the aura of light grew rapidly.

  Gargaron and Locke watched from the far side of ravine and Melai soared upwards and away from the anomaly. The aura were distant but Gargaron believed he saw a ghostly apparition of the old bridge, he believed he saw Razor, back there again upon the southwun side, galloping toward ravine’s edge and galloping out across the phantom bridge, while another Razor continued falling toward rapids.

  Then in a burst of light, as of something thrusting through a wall of fire, Razor appeared, suddenly racing across the bridge proper toward them. And the Razor plummeting toward rapids and rock became suddenly a wispy thing of nothingness, crashing about the stone stacks with all the solidness of river silt. And then like pipe smoke, what remained of it flurried about the rocks and vanished upon the air.

  15

  The Dark Ones broke free of their “web”, and came scrambling after the steed. But here, just before he collapsed, Hawkmoth terminated his spell. The ghost bridge faded to nothing, the aura vanished with it and as the Dark Ones plummeted into the canyon, the green mists twirled and spiraled in their wake.

  With that, Hawkmoth tipped face first onto bridge’s surface. And from there, he did not move.

  TALES OF CHIANAY

  1

  SNOW fell amidst the mountain mists as they climbed their way through tracks of slate shale. It were not easy going, but Gargaron guessed the sorcerers who claimed the Bonewreckers as their own were a private lot and did not enjoy visitors; thus they had not bothered building roads nor even cared for maintaining these treacherous tracks—anything that would discourage outsiders were most likely welcome.

  Withered old trees grew from sheer mountain slopes and layers of moss clung to stones. The colours up here were predominantly grey. And not since they had left the craggy foothills had Gargaron, Melai or Locke glimpsed the sky, for the skies, and mountain peaks for that matter, remained constantly choked and hidden beyond thick drifts of fog and cloud.

  Hours after leaving the ravine, the stony path leveled out at a large clearing. Anywhere beyond fifty feet in any direction were swallowed by mists. And as Gargaron surveyed the area it were quickly evident that numerous paths sprouted off in any number of directions. There were also a thick drift of snow carpeting the ground here; in all likelihood the track to Sanctuary were hidden beneath.

  Gargaron called for his company to halt. As both steeds pulled up, as Locke tugged back on his reins and brought the hissing Zebra to a standstill, Gargaron sighed. ‘Melai? Once more, I beg of you.’

  She were seated atop Grimah’s shoulders, huddled beneath a thick blanket. And as she had done for much of this trek into the mountains, she shivered, and her teeth clattered. She did not wish to be away from the relative warmth of her blanket. But knew she had no choice.

  She shrugged off her covers, fluttered her chilled wings and flew across to Razor’s shoulders.

  By this stage of their journey through these labyrinthine mountain passes Hawkmoth had remained in some sort of unconscious state. He’d been that way for almost five hours now. It seemed like days ago that Gargaron had fetched the sorcerer off the bridge and carried him to safe ground, where he had lain him down amidst the grass. There they had spent most of an hour attempting to rouse him. Talking to him, feeding him drips of tea and other tonics through his lips. When he failed to awaken, both Melai and Gargaron had tried their individual techniques at mind delving, hoping to discern what the matter were. Melai’s method left the usual nick of blood in her subject’s forehead but both’d had no luck in learning the nature of the sorcerer’s condition.

  Yet, it were Melai who realised she could “see” the route they were to take through the Bonewreckers.

  ‘Our route?’ Locke had asked her. ‘You see it?’

  ‘Yes. I believe so. From some part of Haitharath’s mind. I believe it be the way to this Sanctuary.’

  It were thus group decision to heap sorcerer up into Razor’s saddle, belt him in lest he slide off, and continue their trek.

  Now here they were at yet another junction, with Melai, as she had done at numerous junctions behind them, digging her thumb into Hawkmoth’s forehead.

  This time however there came no mental pictures.

  She withdrew her thumb, looking puzzled. ‘This time I see nothing. It is blank.’

  Gargaron feared the worst. That the sorcerer had passed on. He pulled Grimah alongside Razor, slipped off his woolen glove, reached out and touched the sorcerer’s cheek and neck. It were cold, but from climate not from death he discovered for when he ran his hand down collar of sorcerer’s thick robes he felt a warmth on his chest.

  ‘He has not perished,’ Melai told him. ‘But his mind be no longer there.’

  2

  Locke built a camp fire, lighting it with Gargaron’s vial of Helfire. And Gargaron hefted Hawkmoth from his steed, laying him upon his own bedroll and layering him in blankets.

  They sat around fire, huddled. Even Melai. None spoke. Each of them lost to his own thoughts. Each of them sullen and tired. Though you would not have known it with Locke. For he marveled at the quiet falling snow, and at the ever drifting fog banks. ‘Beautiful,’ he would murmur. ‘So beautiful.’

  Melai barely heard him. Her focus were on the fire. She could at last appreciate Gargaron’s claims that a fire could be a central point for social gatherings, and a marvelous source of warmth. She would not have believed it had she not found herself in such a relentlessly chilled region of Godrik’s Vale. She had never felt so bitterly cold in all her life. But this fire were chasing that infernal chill from her bones, as if someone were lovingly caressing it from her limbs.

  Gargaron wondered what time of day it were. The last occasion they had experienced some semblance of night were those hours before they had trekked to Appleford Terminus. Their railcourse journey alone had taken much of the day. Dusk should have transpired when they were busy constructing their footbridge. Yet it had not. Now they were some hours since Hawkmoth had performed that strange incantation to have Razor saved, (a spell that perplexed them still) and there were yet no sign of night.

  It ought be beyond midnight, thought Gargaron. Though the air be grey with fog, not black with night.

  He gazed sleepily at Hawkmoth who slumbered still. And did not intend it, but as he gazed back into the flickering flame, his mind drifted and his eyes began to shut. He told himself to stay awake. Then his head lolled slowly forward… And into deep slumber he fell.

  3

  Gargaron opened his eyes. He found Grimah curled up behind him and Razor lying with his head beside Grimah’s. Locke’s serpent had coiled itself close to fire, and purred like a cat as it slept. Melai were snuggled in beneath Gargaron’s jacket. He watched her a moment or two, searching for her breathing. He relaxed when he saw her chest slowly rise and fall.

  He sat up slowly, careful not to wake Melai. From habit he attempted to tap into his Nightface. Of course nothing came of it. He sighed. He spotted Locke, sitting there, toking on the sorcerer’s pipe. The crabman coughed, his face a grimace. He looked around at Gargaron, his eyes red as berries, his jaw hanging loose. He went to speak but for once the crabman were without words. He tipped his head at Gargaron and grinned lopsided. Drool ran down his lip.

  Gargaron pulled blankets over Melai, then stood, stretching, looking about, searching the heavy cloud. Locke pointed to something above their heads, spoke some silent words, laughed almost soundlessly. As far as Gargaron saw, there were naught there but hefty fog.

  Gargaron spotted Hawkmoth then. The sorcerer were some distance away, seated there in the mist with his back to campfire. Snow fell heavy. Gargaron felt relieved that the sorcerer were at last drawn from his unconscious state. But to sit over there in the cold, his back turned to his companions… it struck Gargaron as odd.
r />   He started his way over. Slowly. He came up around Hawkmoth’s right side, giving the sorcerer a berth of several yards. He were not certain why he did this. Perhaps he were anticipating a surprise that never came.

  He found Hawkmoth awake and lucid, searching foggy skies. When Hawkmoth’s eyes found him he said, ‘Oh, giant, you are awake at last. Two sets of eyes be better than one. Come sit with me and help me search.’

  Gargaron frowned, looking at the sorcerer, suspecting now that he too, like Locke, had smoked some weed and his mind lost to its enchantments. ‘For what do we search?’

  ‘A marker.’

  ‘I do not follow,’ Gargaron said, ringing the cold from his fingers.

  Hawkmoth indicated the shrouded landscape before them. ‘It has been many years since I have been this way, giant. In my youth I could negotiate these mountain passes in my sleep. However, the exact route to Sanctuary has since caused itself to fade somewhat from my memory. Yet, I do recall a particular crag, known by some as the Witch’s Beak. On sunny days you will see it from the lowlands. It be a mountain peak that looks to have been melted by some dragon fire and drooped over. If I happen to spy it, I should know where we are positioned, and thus understand which direction we must head.’

  Gargaron sat, crossing his legs, pulling his jacket up about his neck, searching through the mists, hoping to spy this crag. ‘Might you have had two sets of eyes on it already,’ Gargaron said, pointing back at Locke. ‘You do know our good Sir is at your pipe?’

  The sorcerer simply smiled. ‘Aye. He claimed he had never smoked and were curious about it. Thus he requested a toke. I warned him that the weed I enjoy be not for the faint of heart. He insisted, saying he had never been more keen for new experiences than he has in these days of the Ruin. Perhaps it were lack of judgement and foresight on my part…’ He shrugged. ‘You must admit, he certainly looks to be enjoying himself. And who am I to deny folk their small pleasures in such times when we have all lost so much?’

  Gargaron begrudged no-one their small pleasures. But he hated to think how they would fare if suddenly they were ambushed by Dark Ones, or some other such critter; they were essentially now one fighter short of a full compliment.

  If he were not still distracted by events that had taken place hours earlier he may have questioned Hawkmoth’s reasoning and emphasised his concerns so that it might not occur again in future. As it were, he sat there surveying the drifting cloud banks with his mind still back there on bridge… and to the question of exactly what had happened. One Razor had fallen to some sort of strange ghostly fate, while a second had galloped across a phantom bridge. That particular Razor, as far as he knew, lay over there beside Grimah. And Grimah, judging by how comfortable he appeared in the other horse’s presence, did not seem to sense a difference.

  Hawkmoth studied for a moment his chronochine. And gazed again about the fog banks. ‘A stroke beyond midnight,’ he declared.

  Which means Cloudfyre’s orbit be again out of sequence, thought Gargaron, as there were certainly sunlight beyond the fog, not darkness. And it felt more like midafternoon than middle of night.

  ‘While we sit and search for this marker,’ Gargaron said, ‘do you mind if I ask what happened back there at Pukaya’s bridge?’

  Hawkmoth were silent for some time. Deep in thought. As if he had forgotten such an incident and were having some fight to recall it. In the end he said, ‘Aye, I thought you’d want an explanation.’

  ‘Well?’ Gargaron breathed in of the chilled mountain air, waiting for the sorcerer to go on.

  ‘You recall the story of my Eve? How I brought her back from death.’

  ‘Aye, I do.’

  ‘Well then, now you have witnessed my method.’

  Gargaron were puzzled. ‘You brought Razor through time?’

  ‘Aye. As I did Eve.’

  Gargaron were thoughtful. ‘Yet, I do not follow. When you recounted the tale of your wife, you told me that you had brought her through in pieces.’

  ‘I have somewhat perfected the process since, you understand. Still, the spell remains more a curse than gift.’

  Gargaron eyed him, curious. ‘How so?’

  ‘Did I did not tell you how I came to learn the trick?’

  ‘No, you did not.’

  ‘Hmm. I thought I had. Well, would you like to hear it?’

  ‘I would, aye.’

  4

  Hawkmoth stared distantly at the ground, taking his mind back. ‘I gained knowledge of this curse from a witch I had set out to capture. A particularly venomous witch known as Chianay. I were part of a contingent of Sanctuary Brothers who rode after her for days, through swamp and mountain and desert. We on our steeds. She on her wingless Skink, Firebird. We arrived in a town called Ulchurch, through which she had passed some hours prior, and to which her Firebird had lain waste. We found naught but incinerated bodies and countless burnt cottages. Still, a handful of shell-shocked survivors told us what she had done and which way she had fled. Though the stories were conflicting. According to them she had fled in several directions. There were five of us. We decided to split and each trail a separate route. Should we find her, we would summon the others via war horns.

  ‘My path lead to an abandoned monastery on the Blasted Hills. Razor were on some scent by then and so carefully I set about searching the ruins.

  ‘To carve a long tale short, that’s where I found her, cornered and hiding in one of the northern halls. She were injured I saw. Her Skink nowhere to be seen. Before she could muster any magic against me I bound her with Wood Feet, an incapacitation enchantment.

  ‘She looked frightened as I dragged her back to Razor. And were much younger than me, I noticed. Strange, for we believed we had been chasing a far older witch. It were a youth enchantment, I convinced myself, for she wept and tried selling me a story that she were but a young girl stolen from her family and recruited into Vantasia against her will, used as a witch’s pawn and sent out to fight unjust causes for which she had no fervor. She said her family would be tortured if she disobeyed her orders, and her family killed if she absconded, that she’d had no choice but to carry out her missions against sorcerer folk and their sympathisers.

  ‘At first, I listened to her not. For resolute I were and ambitious and single minded in my youth. But while we travelled back to Sanctuary she offered to teach me, for her freedom, a special enchantment from a branch of magic I’d had only a vague awareness. Temporal magic. I were a far younger soul in those days. Blinded by youth and ambition. I once sought the glory of my brethren’s seat of power in Sanctuary. I thought the gaining of knowledge, to have power over and above that of my Order, would help put me there. And so, in exchange for Chianay’s liberty, I told her to teach me this magic.

  ‘I had used it but once before I performed it on Eve. But have learnt its dark secrets in the days that have followed. What you saw earlier… well, I opened a doorway into the past and plucked Razor from his position seconds before he went down into ravine. At the same time I summoned the standing bridge from the days before its collapse, hoping no garetrain were running its course at that particular moment. For a few sunflares, three separate rivers of time were but one. Thus Razor completed his escape from the Harbingers and made ravine’s crossing in relative safety.’

  5

  It were fascinating to Gargaron, that someone had such an ability. To corrupt time. To revert events that had already transpired. And once again, it took his thoughts all the way back to the day he’d been fishing on Buccuyashuck River, the day that first shockwave hit and for him this Ruin began.

  Hawkmoth searched Gargaron’s eyes. ‘Something troubles you, giant.’

  ‘Aye. Why must my family die when there are those such as yourself who might simply pluck them from a time before their demise?’

  ‘I have answered this, giant, if you recall. Were I to pluck them from an old time stream and deliver them to this one, this blight would still have killed them. That see
ms to be the way of it. I can be no more blunt than that.’

  ‘Could you not have delivered them to a time when this blight has been chased off?’

  Hawkmoth shook his head. ‘Sadly, no. I have but the ability to bring them only to the present, to me. Not cast them into the future. If there be a way then I know it not.’

  Gargaron stared into the falling snow. I need accept they are gone, he told himself forlornly. It will eat me up if I do not. There were a lump in his throat as he pictured his daughter’s dear smiling face. His thoughts took him to the elven woman he had lifted from Grimah’s saddle. And to Locke’s elven companion. ‘Should one of us perish,’ Gargaron said aloud, still staring into the falling snow, ‘would you enact this strange magic and bring us back?’

  ‘Depends on the manner of death. If it be a result of the blight, then no.’ He eyed the giant. ‘You must remember, giant, this temporal magic be a curse. Every time I use it, part of me turns to stone. Ultimately it will kill me.’

  Gargaron looked at him. ‘Stone?’

  ‘Aye, giant. Stone.’ Hawkmoth shuffled in his robes, lifting them up so that his ribs were exposed. A huge slab of his pale skin were blackened and course. He scratched his nails against it and tapped it to demonstrate what he meant. There were a sound as though his fingers interacted with rock. ‘I let Chianay go, believing she had bestowed on me a great power. And I returned to Sanctuary feeling like I could conquer the world. I spoke nothing of my time with her to my Brothers. But I were soon to learn that certain field reports had been received telling of captured witches trading cursed magical lore for their freedom.

  ‘I were young and arrogant. I refused to believe it. Yet when I tested my new skill on a deceased canine I discovered the truth of it. I managed to bring bits of the dog through time but for my efforts I were struck down with stoneskin. I were furious. I tracked down Chianay and demanded she reverse it. She laughed at me and said it could not be reversed, that it were mine now forever, a keepsake to help remind me of my greed and avarice.

  ‘My rage would have had her killed that day. For I were quite bad tempered and irrational in my youth. But I were chased away by her sisters. For years I sought revenge but alas, time has a way of teaching you introspection. I began to look upon life in a new light. I had once believed I were untouchable, a kind of immortal for all the magical powers I possessed. But Chianay, for better or worse, opened my eyes. And in fear of my mortality I refrained from pursuing temporal lore.

  ‘Many years later however, after meeting my dear Eve, I were convinced, with Eve’s help, that I could utilise this magic for good. We stumbled upon a combination of herbs that helped dampen the stoneskin curse. Yet, it remains a spell I must use most sparingly. For obvious reasons.’

  Gargaron looked at length at the sorcerer.

  ‘I see the pain in your eyes, giant. But none of us can escape death. Those who live, die. It has always been this way.’

  ‘Aye. But often, loved ones are plucked from us far before their time. That part of life be unfair.’

  Hawkmoth nodded. ‘Yes. You are right. That part of life be most unfair.’

  6

  They were interrupted by Locke’s drawling, weed affected voice. ‘Thaaat therrr look a bitty lark a haaag’s beak t’meeee.’

  Both Hawkmoth and Gargaron turned and saw the crabman’s pointing fingers. Through a break in the fog banks, high up and far off, there appeared to hang a peculiar formation of stone. Black and glistening. Hawkmoth smiled. ‘Aye, that be it, my good fellow. And with it comes my bearings.’

  Hawkmoth hefted himself to his feet with what looked to Gargaron like a decent struggle. As if he had taken a knife to his ribs. Hawkmoth noticed Gargaron’s look of concern. ‘I be fine, giant,’ he told him. ‘I be fine. My stone skin shan’t kill me today.’

  SHADOW GUARD

  1

  THE final push to Sanctuary took another two hours over rough, rocky terrain. The scenery did not change much, although as they drew higher into the mountains the trees and shrubs became ever smaller and more tortured looking and the covering of snow on ground grew thicker. Locke were mostly sobered by then, yet although he smiled, he spoke little. When Melai asked if he were alright he said simply, ‘Aye, and enjoying this chilled air on my skin.’

  Gargaron wondered if he were not suffering some interminable headache.

  Not long after, Hawkmoth could be heard muttering, ‘We should have encountered snow beasts by now.’

  ‘What’s that you say?’ Gargaron asked.

  ‘Snow beasts,’ Hawkmoth said aloud. ‘Up in these reaches of the Bonewreckers, they form a natural guard against any encroachers.’

  ‘Snow beasts?’ Melai asked.

  ‘Aye. Monsters. Big shaggy brutes. They amble about on all fours and you’d probably think them docile to lay eye upon them. But they are quite adept on two legs, and can run like a gale. Their speciality is devouring creatures far bigger than themselves.’

  The others looked about, searching the fog banks now with a no small amount of disquiet. Gargaron laughed without humour. ‘You did not think to warn of us these creatures earlier, sorcerer?’

  ‘Well, giant, I have had a lot on my plate.’

  ‘As have we all,’ Gargaron reminded him.

  Hawkmoth conceded with a dip of his head. ‘Yes. Quite right. Though, it be the Bewitched we ought be concerned about. More so than the Snow Beasts.’

  ‘The Bewitched?’ Gargaron asked.

  ‘Aye, the Bewitched,’ came Hawkmoth’s reply as if obvious.

  ‘And what pray tell be the Bewitched?’

  ‘Witch puppets. Dolls. They walk taller than me and possess not a soul amongst their number. They are made of wood and metal and some peculiar material known as plasteec, a material devised and used only by the witches. They possess vacant eyes, and without flesh nor heart they feel no pain. They are fearsome creatures and I have often seen them match the might of Snow Beasts.’

  Gargaron pulled Grimah to a halt. He glanced around at Melai and Locke before turning his gaze upon the sorcerer. ‘So we face potential dangers up here in these Bonewreckers the likes of which far outnumber and outmuscle us,’ he said. ‘I might have felt a tad better about these tidings had you informed us before now.’

  Hawkmoth looked scolded. ‘Oh, perhaps I am not explaining myself. Snow Beasts are not our enemy, giant. I were master of beasts during my time at Sanctuary. I coexisted with them for close on a year. That were some time ago, of course, but they are long lived and I’d wager the older ones among their ranks, should they still live and be not perished like almost all else, would recognise me and hold off attacking us.’

  Gargaron searched the fog banks. ‘Well, let us hope upon that then, shall we.’

  2

  They pressed on and had been going for several minutes more when a wall of rock, shaped somewhat like an enormous frozen wave, loomed up out of the mists before them. Beyond it, like grey wraiths, mighty stone towers could be seen amidst the shifting fog banks; towers unlike Gargaron, Locke, and most certainly Melai, had ever laid eyes upon.

  ‘We have arrived,’ Hawkmoth said, pulling Razor to a halt. ‘I give you all, Sanctuary.’

  The place were not how Gargaron had imagined. He had expected a blocky mountain fort constructed of square stone bricks, with a large barricading wall, possibly even a moat. He’d imagined guard towers soaring to dizzying heights and numerous battlements packed with sorcerer folk ready to fight off would be intruders.

  What he saw instead were beautiful bizarre, organic structures; structures more like that of rounded, elongated, domed cacti, structures that looked simply to have grown rather than put together by some builder’s hand. And as tall as hills they were, soaring out into misty skies. Gargaron counted seven or eight of these rounded spires, not one of them with a flat edge. And there were no sign anywhere of sentries. No sign of sorcerer folk.

  ‘Why do we hesitate?’ Locke asked.

  ‘Before
we proceed, we need open the gate,’ Hawkmoth explained.

  ‘Gate?’

  Hawkmoth pointed at the wall directly ahead of them with his staff. ‘That be it.’

  There were no gate there that any of them could see. Naught but a rounded series of grooves gouged out of the rock wall. ‘I see no such thing,’ Locke said.

  ‘Oh, it be there, trust me,’ Hawkmoth said. ‘Though getting to it be the first trick.’ He dismounted and told the others to wait where they were.

  ‘Getting to it?’ Gargaron asked.

  ‘Aye,’ Hawkmoth said. ‘There be the small matter of slipping by the Shadow Guard.’

  Gargaron sighed. ‘Shadow Guard? Let me guess. Another undeclared beastie out for our blood.’

  ‘Of a sort,’ Hawkmoth admitted.

  ‘Where be this Shadow Guard then?’ Locke asked, his hand on his blow-flute.

  Hawkmoth dismounted. ‘Wait here,’ were all he would say.

  3

  The rock wall stretched away into fog in both directions. Where it vanished, Gargaron could only guess—it were reasonable to assume that it enclosed the entire complex. Hawkmoth walked toward it. But he halted his stride some twenty yards from its base. What lay before his feet now were a curious covering of ice that looked much like a garden path trailing the passage of the wall in both directions. It were of a metallic hew. As though it may not have been ice after all, but some sort of metal.

  ‘Sanctuary has been invaded but once in over a thousand years,’ Hawkmoth declared. ‘The marauding Hordes from the south stormed north during the summer solstice of Grenxk Seven-Two. In the days before the Snow Beasts made the Bonewreckers their home. Having stormed the crags they took Sanctuary by surprise. Those sorcerers who did not escape were captured and slaughtered. The lore and beliefs of my kind were abhorrent to the southland marauders. But this place be the spiritual home of Vhada, the great entity who sat by the fire to pass on Her knowledge to Ravenblack, sorcerer and first of our kind. It were he who retook Sanctuary. Once he had turned the marauders to stone and tossed them from the clifftops he used his divine powers to establish sentries that would never wane, never sleep, never stray from their post. The Shadow Guard.’ Hawkmoth pointed. ‘This trail you see here… be molt-metal. No outsider may cross it. Not by foot, not by wing, not by invisibility, nor by any enchantment.

  ‘Now, here be my predicament. There were a time when I could come and go from this place as I pleased. But a long time banished I have been. I must test if my past standing as one of the Order still holds any sway.’

  4

  He had not told his companions this but beneath his cloak Hawkmoth gripped a small incendiary device. He hoped he would not need deploy it. It were something he had developed in secret long ago, a device meant for a day such as this, a day where he returned to Sanctuary uninvited, where the Shadow Guard were likely to target him as a traitor, an unwanted, an outsider. If they looked as though they might rise up and slay him, well, his device would not let them have their way so easily. He would detonate his grasket bomb the moment he suspected even a skerrick of animosity from his former protectors, skewing their attack and leaving him free to leap unscathed from danger.

  At least, that were his plan.

  ‘Right, best you all back up a tad,’ he said, staff in one hand, grasket bomb in the other. ‘Fifty feet ought be safe.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘These sentries, if they deem me an intruder, they will carve me up. And you lot too if you are within their reach. And trust me, at this moment you are all well within piercing range.’

  ‘Piercing range?’ Locke asked with a curious smile.

  ‘Aye. Shadow Guard steel cuts through any armour, any enchantment. So I urge you, back up.’

  Gargaron and Locke obeyed, pulling their steeds around, drawing Razor with them, taking up position out of harm’s way, Melai seated still upon Grimah’s shoulders.

  Happy with their distance, Hawkmoth took a breath. ‘Right then,’ he murmured to himself. ‘Let us see how this goes.’ And with that he stepped onto the pathway.

  5

  In a second, the Shadow Guard rose up about him.

  Four of them. Sheer and smooth, and glistening like polished steel. Taller than he they were, by several feet. And there they loomed over him, like graveyard specters, lumps of tall metal approximating the humanoid form, faceless, without limbs, their heads bent down, regarding him.

  He did not kneel. He were their master after all. Or at least he once were. He stood straight, shoulders back, chest out, hoping to portray an air of confidence and authority.

  There were no words spoken. But the verdict were quick. The sentries swished aside, as if simply pushed by some wind. And seemed to form a guard through which Hawkmoth could pass. And beyond him, the circular grooves cut into Sanctuary’s tall curved perimetre, now spread wide like ripples on a pond.

  Watching, Gargaron were not certain if he were witnessing some optical illusion. For the “gate” seemed to vanish, the circular perforations widening and overlapping until eventually there were more perforation than actual physical structure. It were as though the wall were formed from some liquid material. That it flowed into itself with each successive ripple. And soon all that were left were a wide corridor through which Hawkmoth and his troupe could pass.

  ‘Come now,’ Hawkmoth called to his companions. ‘Quickly.’

  His friends hurried forward, filing through the formation of Shadow Guard, the horse hooves leaving behind short lasting imprints in the molt-metal.

  Hawkmoth watched carefully, in case the invitation were open to him only. Yet the Guard allowed his friends to pass freely.

  It were only once Hawkmoth’s party were through the gate, that the sentries lowered back into their peculiar realm, like spectres slipping effortlessly into calm water, and were gone.

  Hawkmoth followed his friends onto Santuary grounds and behind them the gate seemed to form up once more, solidify, ripple back into position until the view back beyond the wall were shut away.

  SANCTUARY

  1

  SANCTUARY’S grounds looked abandoned. Though there were definite signs of unrest; some attack had most certainly taken place here. At ground level, sections of the rounded organic towers had been blasted open, from outside in it appeared. Frozen bodies lay scattered hither and thither in the snow. Those of sorcerers, Hawkmoth observed, and of witches too. And there were the customary signature of witch mischief: decapitated sorcerer heads prod on tall pikes.

  The corpses of other creatures lay here too, Gargaron noticed. Shaggy brutes of such immense proportions they were equal in bulk and height to that of Grimah and Razor. And they might have been camouflaged against the snow had they not been betrayed by dark frozen pools of yellow blood.

  ‘Be these your Snow Beasts?’ Gargaron asked, pulling Grimah up to study one lying in the snow.

  ‘Sadly aye,’ Hawkmoth said gazing down at it from his mount, wondering if he had once known this particular individual.

  It disturbed Hawkmoth, seeing the deceased Snow Beasts and witnessing the general state of this place. He’d had his detractors here but he’d also had friends, Brothers, with whom he’d maintained a secret correspondence with all these years of his banishment. It pained him to think they were all likely deceased. And did not wish to look too closely at the decapitated heads mounted on spikes for fear he should recognise them.

  ‘Let us all keep a keen sight,’ he said. ‘The witches have beaten us here. And I fear they have set their Bewitched upon the place. They may still be present, hidden, and watching.’

  Gargaron had already withdrawn his great sword. And Melai her bow, and Locke his blow-flute.

  ‘Where be Mama Vekh then?’ Melai asked.

  Hawkmoth drew in a large breath of chilly mountain air and when he exhaled, a huge flurry of vapour fogged about his face. He pointed. ‘The Citadel at Sanctuary’s centre. She were housed there. Granted she may since have been moved b
ut it ought be the first place we search.’

  ‘Right then,’ Gargaron said. ‘Let us find her, fetch her, and be away from here.’

  2

  They pushed forward slowly, the hooves of Razor and Grimah leaving deep prints in the snow, the belly of Zebra forming neat swishes. Sanctuary remained quiet. Eerie. And the mists persisted; they could see not one end of Sanctuary from the other. And the air chilled Gargaron to the bone. Why anyone would want to live out their days here he could not fathom. There were also a hideous smell on the air, the whiff of rot.

  Soon however, there appeared from the grey mists a large dome shaped building. And with it a new image of Sanctuary as a whole formed in Gargaron’s mind. If it were a clear day and he were suspended somehow directly above this complex, it may have looked to him like an upturned hand with fingers curled high into the air, and the citadel sitting somewhere on its palm like an enormous domed growth.

  Gargaron heeled Grimah and took the lead, if only to hurry the others. ‘Be not brash,’ Hawkmoth called.

  ‘Aye,’ Gargaron replied, ‘I hear you, but I also wish not to be snails. Snails get stepped on. Now let us move with some purpose.’

  3

  The Citadel were bordered by a snow laced garden bed from which grew thorny vines that had woven their ropey branches over much of the outside surface. High bevelled windows had begun to gather with drifts of snow. So had many of the intertwining vines. A tall rounded opening in the Citadel’s eastwun wall whirled with mist. Beyond, there were relative darkness. And no interior detail to be glimpsed from Gargaron’s vantage point.

  Gargaron had planned to lead Grimah straight in, but he halted now, sensing some corruption inside. Melai, huddled there beneath cloak and shawl, gazing silently forward as Hawkmoth drew Razor up on Grimah’s left flank, and Locke, his serpent on Grimah’s right.

  None spoke for a time. Not until Melai asked, ‘Sorcerer, do you sense witches within?’

  Hawkmoth answered, ‘I do, aye.’

  Again silence. Gargaron readjusted his grip on his great sword. Hawkmoth pulled his stone casket from his side-pack.

  The silence were broken suddenly by Locke who yelled, ‘Hey! Slimy toad lovers! Come out and face us!’

  Melai and Hawkmoth both started, and Gargaron winced. They all looked around at the crabman seated there upon his serpent; even Grimah’s two heads regarded the crabman with a look of unease.

  Locke noticed them all regarding him. ‘What? Too insulting?’

  ‘Ah, if anything, too loud,’ Gargaron reported.

  Locke gave him a look as if to suggest that were the idea.

  ‘Might be best to keep your voice to yourself for the time being,’ Hawkmoth advised.

  Locke shrugged.

  Hawkmoth opened his stone casket and, as he had done outside the Appleford terminus, he released his little insect spies. Off they flew to do their spying.

  Much time went by. And they did not return.

  ‘Something be amiss here,’ Hawkmoth said. ‘Something has incapacitated them.’

  ‘Right then,’ Locke spoke up, hefting his blow-flute into his hand. ‘So something indeed awaits us within.’

  Melai shrugged off her shawl and leapt for the air.

  ‘Melai,’ Gargaron asked, ‘what be on your mind?’

  She hovered there, her beating wings a blur, falling snow flurrying about them. She pointed. ‘Those there windows. I might fly up and peer in. See what I can see.’ Before anyone could object she were off, circling upwards, flying toward Citadel’s domed roof.

  They all watched her rise away from them; Hawkmoth taking his staff into hand as she went, as if he expected Melai’s excursion to stimulate some attack from within. But as Melai lit upon the roof none came.

  They watched as she knelt there, her small hands against the rim of one window. She gazed in, her small green nose pressed against the glass pane, her wings beating slowly, keeping her buoyant.

  When she were satisfied she flew back to them, landing upon Grimah. ‘There be folk inside,’ she reported. ‘But none alive.’

  Gargaron looked across at Hawkmoth. ‘What detains your flies then?’

  Hawkmoth were ruminating on this. ‘One thing comes to mind. The air within may have been poisoned. This be one of Citadel’s defences against invaders.’

  ‘Poisoned air?’ Gargaron queried. ‘Another aspect of this place you did not warm us of.’ He were beginning to think the sorcerer had suffered more than stoneskin after saving Razor from death. He had lost parts of his mind.

  ‘It has been many a year since I were here, giant. Forgive me if some aspects of it have slipped my thoughts.’ Hawkmoth aimed his staff up at the high Citadel windows. From Rashel’s mouth came a narrow beam of searing blue light. First assaulting one window before the next.

  Gargaron waited for both to shatter in an explosion of glass. Yet, no such thing transpired. Each pane instead seemed to melt. And with a tug on each light beam, like a fisherman pulling trout, Hawkmoth hauled the warped slabs of glass from their housing. He lifted them quietly into the beds of snow beside the building. There they lay, melted lumps of glass slag.

  ‘Wait here,’ Hawkmoth told his friends and nudged Razor forward. As Citadel’s large rounded opening loomed he aimed his staff into the darkened interior. He spoke a short incantation, and without warning, a cyclonic gale roared from the mouth of Lancsh. Moments later, from Citadel’s roof, twin blasts of air squealed out into the cloudy atmosphere, gushing away with tremendous ferocity any and all toxic gases.

  Hawkmoth waited some moments before he waved his companions on. With some trepidation (or anticipation, on Locke’s part) they pushed forward.

  4

  The Citadel’s interior were spacious. A vast rounded hall lay at its centre with a covered walkway running around its rim. Tall columns stood, sporting curling glass lanterns. None were currently lit. Illumination came from the diffuse grey light pushing in through the window recesses in the citadel’s roof; through these recesses fresh snow now fell. Spaced around the edge of the walkway were chambers shaped like enormous hollowed eggs (as if creatures of great size had once hatched from them).

  As Melai had reported, the place were scattered with the dead. Witches and sorcerers both, fallen in battle along with their animal companions and protectors: wolves of the sorcerers, harpies of the witches. No signs yet of the Bewitched, Hawkmoth saw, if at all they had been here.

  Hawkmoth took Razor to Citadel’s centre. Here there stood a high statue. He pulled Razor to a standstill and bowed his head. He pressed his fingers into his forehead and then made a gesture with the same fingers, as if offering his mind to it.

  ‘Who be the beauty then?’ Locke asked, indicating the statue.

  Hawkmoth briefly explained. ‘The entity, Vhada.’ Her mighty wings were outstretched, and the world of Cloudfyre held within her palm. The figure beside her were a depiction of Ravenblack, Hawkmoth told them. Bearded and cloaked and stern of face, holding aloft his Wolven staff, with Thorn, great wolf of the stars, depicted there at his side, with fangs as long as sabers.

  If they had been here on a more casual visit, Gargaron may have questioned why the sorcerer order, a male bastion founded by this Ravenblack, had been essentially given birth to by a female entity. If Hawkmoth cared to tell him, Gargaron may have been surprised to learn that the witches called the same entity their founding mother, though to them her name were Vudha.

  Beyond the statue lay something on the floor that did not seem to fit with the rest of the Citadels’ aesthetic. An object Gargaron took for an enormous clouded slab of glass.

  Hawkmoth and his companions approached it now.

  Gargaron noticed that it were surrounded by yet another circle of metallic Shadow Guard. Each of them stood as still as stone. Though something were amiss. A number of them were splintered, shredded, knocked over at awkward angles like old bent nails. And parts of them had been blown out across the cold stone floor.

&
nbsp; Hawkmoth told his companions to stay back. Yet, as he dismounted Razor and stepped forward with his staff gripped in both fists, none of the Shadow Guard moved. It were as though whatever enchantment had given them life in days before this one, had been lifted.

  Cautiously, Gargaron, Melai and Locke dismounted and trailed Hawkmoth.

  They reached the glass block, its edges smooth and rounded. Hawkmoth could see her now. Within the mighty glass ampoule in which she had been interred for nigh on two hundred years were the daughter of Vudha herself: Mama Vekh.

  5

  Hawkmoth knelt to inspect her. Gargaron, Melai, Locke all crowded around.

  ‘Here lies witch goddess, Mama Vekh,’ Hawkmoth announced, bowing his head. Though he wasted little time on ceremony and set himself to work extracting her from her prison. He prod his staff upon the glass slab and he murmured, ‘Riliss Ma Veekus frumss dees conteensmahnt.’

  The outer portion of the giant ampoule remained a solid mass while inside it turned to liquid. Before the others had time to understand what were happening, the wet, wrinkled body of Mama Vekh were suddenly birthed from one end of the giant ampoule. Out onto the floor she splashed.

  Gargaron and Melai took a step backwards. Locke though took a step forwards, hoping for a better view, his crab feet covered in birth slime.

  Hawkmoth knelt to receive her, his robes spread upon the floor around him, soaking up the rank water. He took her and lay her against his forearm.

  ‘By Thronir,’ Gargaron murmured. ‘Such a pitiful looking thing I have never seen.’

  ‘Does she live?’ Locke asked eagerly.

  ‘I do not know,’ Hawkmoth said. ‘The Ampoule of Tarr be meant to sustain her. Yet…’

  Her tiny wrinkled body lay there against his arm. She were no bigger than Melai, though she looked smaller for her muscles had wasted. She did not move. Her face were pale and her lips wrinkled and her eyes half open.

  ‘She does not breathe,’ Locke reported.

  ‘Aye,’ Hawkmoth said. ‘That much we can see ourselves.’

  Water and slime spilled from her mouth, dribbled down her neck. Gargaron reached forward and touched her forehead. He shut his eyes. When he removed his palm it were wet. He shook his head. ‘She has not lived for many a year, I feel.’

  Hawkmoth tugged thoughtfully at his beard.

  ‘Were she alive when your lot kidnapped her?’ Melai asked the sorcerer.

  Hawkmoth turned to eye the nymph, pondering the sound of accusation in her voice. ‘Aye.’

  ‘Do the witches know she has perished?’

  He sighed. ‘If they have caused this mess here then I say they have.’ He looked about. ‘Although it puzzles me. Why they did not retrieve her.’

  None had answer for him. Nor had he answer for himself. Perhaps his Brothers had made a pitched battle here and driven the witches off before such an act could take place. Perhaps surviving sorcerers had taken the fight back to Vantasia and were yet to return here either victorious or to lick their wounds in defeat.

  6

  Hawkmoth returned to Razor. He unhitched two things from the saddle: a leather sling, and a rough blanket. He positioned the sling so that it hung down Razor’s flank. Then he spread blanket across floor at Mama Vekh’s side and gently he lifted her wet and wrinkled body onto it. Slowly then, as if preparing her for some mummified after life, he wrapped her.

  Once done, he carried her back to his steed and rest her within the sling. A set of straps held her snug in place. Just as he were finishing, there came a startling noise from across the hall.

  Hawkmoth’s company whirled about, weapons at the ready. They saw to their surprise one of the scattered bodies lift its head from the cold stone floor, as if it were some Undead stirred by their activity.

  In a weak rasping voice, it spoke. ‘Ah, I sssee you. Hawkmoth Lifegiver, I ssseeee you.’

  Hawkmoth turned and stared at the talking corpse. ‘Who speaks?’ he asked sternly.

  ‘Why, you do not recognise me?’

  Hawkmoth drew a little closer. ‘No.’

  ‘Lord Skitecrow, I be.’

  Hawkmoth walked cautiously toward him. Melai had a Crink arrow aimed directly at the thing’s head; the moment it tried something it would find its face crumpled inwards. Hawkmoth reached the corpse and gazed down at it, studying it for several moments, trying to discern this old withered ghoul-like soul from the powerful sorcerer he once knew. ‘Skitecrow?’

  ‘Lord Skitecrow to you,’ it rasped.

  ‘Oh, I think not. You have not been my Lord since the day you ordered my banishment. Though I am pleased to say your face does not look as smug as it did the last time I saw it.’

  ‘Why have you returned after all these years, Hawkmoth, witch lover?’

  ‘I come for Mama Vekh.’

  This Skitecrow spluttered, spit flying up and landing on his cheek. ‘Mama Vekh? Ha, my suspicions have rung true! You return to us a witch’s thrall!’

  Hawkmoth smiled. ‘If I return here of my own free will, then I do not see how I could be named a witch’s thrall.’

  ‘Then why do you come?’

  ‘I have just told you. To fetch Mama Vekh and to deliver her back to Vantasia.’

  ‘You fool.’

  ‘Fool?’ Hawkmoth laughed. ‘Ha, you call me fool? You be fool for keeping her. You be fool for not sending her back years before this day. Now look at you. You reap what you have sewn, Skitecrow. This silly pig-ignorant war with the witches has finally seen the end of Sanctuary. And the end of yourself, I see. This be the legacy you leave, this will be how you shall be remembered, I will see to it. Now, time for me to return Mama Vekh and put an end to this mess that you have helped perpetuate.’

  ‘By conceding, damn you?’

  ‘Conceding?’ Hawkmoth asked. ‘Is that what you believe? And to think I actually once held you up as the wisest of us all. Well, alas, wise you are not. In the end, you are just another sad clown. Look around you, all is lost. The witches have finally had their way with this place. With all the Vale too as far as I have ascertained. Because of your blind arrogance and pride they have lain waste to our world with their accursed boom weapons, doing untold damage, killing untold millions. After all this time, after all these countless years, after all those pointless deaths, this is what it has come to. And for what?’

  The emaciated, dying figure laughed then. But weakness overcame him quickly and he fell silent. For a while he lay there simply breathing, as if that were all that were left to him, his weakened, dying breath. But it appeared he had some final words yet to speak. ‘Hawkmoth. I… I need tell y-you something. You m-must listen carefully to me. For cir-circumstances be… be not what you might th-think.’

  ‘I have heard enough. I shall leave you here to your death.’

  ‘Listen to me, this one last time.’

  ‘I know well your schemes, Skitecrow. You wish to stall me. Nothing more. Are my Brothers due back soon to arrest me?’

  Skitecrow winced, swallowed. ‘Shut up and listen. In your absence, we… we excavated the ancient city of Ghartst.’

  Hawkmoth sighed, done now with this conversation. ‘This I know.’

  Skitecrow grunted weakly. ‘So, you were maintaining contact with Brothers on the inside.’

  ‘Aye, and their names will come with me to my grave. Are we done here?’

  ‘No. Did you not hear what I said? We excavated Ghartst.’

  ‘Yes. What of it?’

  ‘We found something most, most strange. A legend. A portent. A warning. Call it what you will.’

  Hawkmoth looked around. He knew Skitecrow were trying to delay him. But for what? Were sorcerers on their way? To capture and incarcerate him?

  ‘They were buried below ground. In deep secret vaults. Stone tablets we believe that… that predate even that of the Ghartst civilisation. Back to Cloudfyre’s empires of Men.’

  Hawkmoth gazed down at him. ‘Why do you tell me this?’

  ‘I…
I urge you to see them for yourself.’

  ‘Why would I waste my time?’

  This Skitecrow laughed again weakly and coughed, green phlegm dribbling from his cracked, wrinkled lips. ‘What lay waste to Sanctuary were not witches. What lay waste to us were spirits of Cloudfyre. And return they will.’

  Hawkmoth looked puzzled. ‘Spirits of Cloudfyre? What, by Ravenblack, are you talking about?’

  ‘I thought I had read and studied all there were on Cloudfyre’s long history. But rarely do you find anything describing life beyond ten thousand years. And here they were, tablets inscribed in a language I have seen only once before. The language of Ghartst.’ Skitecrow, summoning the last of his strength, went on. ‘This is what they told us: every ten thousand years Cloudfyre’s children throw out the old world. Killing every living thing, be that plant, animal or spirit. We are here on the precipice of the last great age of this Epoch. You shall see, the witches are suffering as much as we.’

  ‘These old tablets tell of this, do they?’ Hawkmoth asked, with a skeptical grin. This were some trap. He felt it more than ever now. The witches were cunning. The real Skitecrow were likely a carcass in a ditch somewhere by now, for all he knew. And this thing on the floor, some imposter.

  ‘They tell it, aye.’

  ‘And where be these mysterious tablets then?’ Gargaron asked.

  ‘In our Halls of Yore. Placed on my desk.’

  ‘Halls of Yore?’ Hawkmoth laughed. ‘How might I access such a place? I were removed from this institution before given access to the Great Hall.’

  ‘All… all enchantments are lifted now.’

  ‘Do not take me for an idiot, Skitecrow. Those enchantments are never lifted. Even I know this. For they are governed by Vhada’s spirit.’

  Skitecrow coughed and lay there catching his breath. ‘Vhada’s spirit has gone. She has left us. Chased off by Cloudfyre’s children. The Great Halls are thrust open, vulnerable now to exploitation and violation. But it matters not anymore for there be naught left to commit such heinous acts. This world be dead.’

  Hawkmoth smiled. ‘Here be some trap to lure me into the confines of Sanctuary, to imprison me like Mama Vekh, for supposed propaganda crimes. I’m aware of the bounty you placed on me, Lord Skitecrow. But I assure you, I have given no falsehoods about this place. I ignore the mistreatment I experienced from your like and defend this place at every argument I encounter. I still have friends here after all. Why would I jeapardise their safety and welfare?’

  The figure on the floor lay there, head down, weak, tired eyes gazing up at Hawkmoth. ‘Your friends are perished. And there be no trap… please, believe me.’ His voice were mostly a whisper now. ‘The bounty be waived. Ra-return the Hag if that be your plan… but I implore you… read the tablets…’

  ‘To what end?’

  Though Skitecrow would speak no more. His last breath crawled from him, a green vapour in the form of a barrow gremlin dragging itself from his cracked and gaping mouth. It resembled something climbing from a grave pit, small clawed fingers pulling itself from within. After it had emerged, it hesitated and looked about, momentarily watching Hawkmoth with its large gloomy eyes before scurrying away. After a dozen feet, while still scurrying, it dissipated upon the air like mist on a plucky wind.

  7

  Outside they stood, Hawkmoth, Gargaron, Melai, Locke, the snow falling heavier now. Mama Vekh were wrapped in her bundle, strapped to the side of Razor, her body concealed, her dignity maintained.

  ‘Who was he?’ Melai asked.

  ‘If it were he and not some witch manifestation, then he were an old mentor.’ Hawkmoth looked distractedly off toward the westwun end of Sanctuary where the towers looked like wraiths amidst the mists. ‘Though not one favoured by myself. He has been Lord and Supreme Brother of Sanctuary for too many years, and drunk by his position of power.’

  ‘What were that grub that squirmed from his face?’ Locke enquired.

  ‘His totem,’ Hawkmoth answered, though still his eyes gazed westways. ‘A life force some sorcerers attain which can keep them alive for a time beyond death.’

  Gargaron kept his eye on Hawkmoth, knowing the sorcerer were caught in two minds about something. ‘What eats at your thoughts, sorcerer?’ he asked. ‘We have what we came for. Let us leave this place.’

  ‘I ponder the Halls of Yore.’

  ‘And these stone tablets?’ Gargaron asked.

  ‘The stone tablets do not exist, giant. If they did, my contacts here would have informed me of such a find from their excavating.’

  ‘Then let us leave this place behind,’ Gargaron insisted. ‘Strike out for Vantasia and end the Ruin now.’

  ‘We shall,’ Hawkmoth told him, ‘nonetheless I intend to conduct a small detour in the Halls of Yore first.’

  The others were confused. ‘But you said it yourself,’ Melai said, ‘these tablets do not exist.’

  ‘It be not the tablets I seek, dear Melai,’ he told her. ‘The Halls of Yore are home to some of sorcery’s most formidable weapons. There are things there that will aid us in our quest. Particularly if the witches prove testy, or take exception to Mama Vekh’s demise.’

  ‘Well, let us have at it then,’ Locke said. ‘My claws are freezing over sitting here discussing it.’

  ‘Aye, have at it we will,’ Hawkmoth said, pulling Razor about amidst the quiet snowfall. ‘Though, bear this in mind. My old lord and master were not a soul in whom I placed much trust. For many a year he has been out to get me so this could be his final ploy to do me in. Thus, we must tread carefully.’

  THE SWARM

  1

  THEY made their way swiftly toward the westwun parts of Sanctuary, Razor and Grimah galloping quietly through deepening snow, with Zebra slithering swiftly, leaving deep zig-zagging trails in her path, her tongue forever flicking, tasting the air. As Hawkmoth lead them toward one of the bending towers they slowed. Parts of its lower walls had been blown inwards, as if some monstrous concussive blast had torn into it.

  ‘Gargaron,’ Hawkmoth called out. ‘Locke. Would you stand guard here?’ He tossed Gargaron a war horn. ‘Blow this if you should spot anything.’

  Gargaron caught it one handed. Shaped like the head of an eel it were. ‘Like what?’

  ‘Witches. Sorcerers. I do not know. But if Skitecrow were leading me here to stall us, then he may have some surprise in store. Oh, and care little should you not hear the horn sound; it be tuned to me specifically. No point alerting enemy to our whereabouts if we do not desire it.’

  ‘How long do you expect to be?’ Locke enquired.

  ‘No more than ten ticks of the clock,’ Hawkmoth replied. ‘Enough time to gather up whatever I am fortunate enough to find.’ He dismounted and began unhitching the bundle of Mama Vekh from Razor’s flank.

  ‘What are you doing?’ Gargaron asked him.

  ‘Take her. If there be some trap I walk into then I would do well not having her with me.’

  It were Locke who offered his serpent. ‘Grimah hefts giant and nymph while my steed has ample room.’

  ‘Very well,’ Hawkmoth said, hitching the witch mother to serpent’s saddle. As he remounted Razor he said, ‘Melai, for you a task if you wish it.’

  ‘Name it,’ she said.

  ‘I need you to prep the westwun gate for our departure.’

  She frowned. ‘So I would if I knew its procedure.’

  Hawkmoth pulled Razor alongside Grimah, extending his arm, touching Melai’s forehead with his fingers; his hand almost engulfed her entire head. Moments passed, mere moments, but for Melai it felt like an entire sweep of the clock. When Hawkmoth withdrew his touch, Melai looked up at him, blinking, her eyes somewhat glazed. She looked then out across the snowy grounds toward yet another tower lingering in the gloom. It were situated on Sanctuary’s most westwun point. ‘That one there is it?’

  Hawkmoth nodded.

  ‘I shall see what can be done.’ She spread her wings, leapt away and we
re gone into foggy sky.

  Gargaron watched her flight path, anxious. He felt Hawkmoth’s hand on his shoulder. ‘Rest easy, giant,’ he urged. ‘She be well. We shall join her soon enough.’

  Hawkmoth turned now for the rounded doorway at base of tower. Before he disappeared into tower’s darkened belly he turned and spoke to crabman and giant. ‘If I am not returned by ten clicks of the clock, do not come for me. The Hall of Yore be a most venomous place for even sorcerers, let alone those with no knowledge of magical lore. Instead, ride to Melai. The tallest point of that tower be the westwun gate. Melai will instruct you on what need be done to get yourselves away from here. Head southways’n’west. Vantasia you shall find inside Dark Wood beyond the southways roads. Return Mama Vekh and pray the witches halt their campaign. My wishes go with you.’

  ‘And ours with you,’ Gargaron told him.

  With that, Hawkmoth were gone.

  2

  It had been some years since Hawkmoth had been to Sanctuary, let alone this tower. But he still knew the way to Lord Skitecrow’s offices. Six levels up, ninth set of chambers along the corridor. He had been invited here a handful of times during his training. He and his Brothers. Through the enchanted Elder Portal and on into the Halls of Yore to learn theory and lore. The Elder Portal though were enchanted with death charms, death charms that could see an intruder or trespasser, were he or she to pass through it, literally disintegrate. Hawkmoth and his Brothers had been witness to its bite. In order to demonstrate its charms, his superiors had tossed a mountain yak through it. Hawkmoth and his Brothers had watched the animal’s limbs drop free, and its head slough from its shoulders, and blood gush forth from rents in skin and flesh, and its organs detach and drop through holes in its torso.

  Only senior members of Sanctuary, those like that of Skitecrow, knew how to disengage the enchantments.

  Hawkmoth dismounted Razor as he entered the tower. And ordered Razor to stay. He would not risk his steed in testing if the death enchantments still held. The Elder Portal were just before him now. A tall ugly archway that once writhed and shifted in tentacles and fingers as though it were living. Now it did no such thing and as Hawkmoth prod Rashel toward it and uttered, ‘showus mee yoos deeth charms,’ nothing of note transpired.

  He regarded it. Then took a deep breath and strode beneath the arch. And he were still intact once he were through. ‘So, Skitecrow were speaking some truth for once,’ he muttered.

  He called on Razor who clip-clopped to his side and Hawkmoth mounted up and took his steed up sweeping staircase.

  On the sixth level Hawkmoth dismounted and gripped his staff, alert for possible strikes by hidden witch raiders or malcontent sorcerers.

  The place rang empty however, nothing but the howl of the mountain gales and biting cold snow and air flurrying through shattered glass windows. (On a clear day, these wondows bragged grand vistas of surrounding crags, but Hawkmoth could not see them that day, not with all the clouds.)

  He were outside Skitecrow’s office here. He took up his staff and stepped through the doorway. The office were deserted. Though a mess it were. The famed Orrery were broken and pulled down across the floor. Ancient tomes had been hauled from book shelves and strewn about. Furniture were upturned and torn. Snow continued to flurry through the widnows. Hawkmoth stepped up to Lord Skitecrow’s wooden desk. He looked about. As he had suspected, no matter where he searched, there were no sign of these alleged Ghartst Tablets. ‘I were right to mistrust you,’ Hawkmoth said as if his old Lord were seated smugly at desk.

  He set to work pulling open wardrobes, drawers, old chests. Fetching out phantom scrolls and arcane gadgets, medicines, rummaging through weapon’s hordes. Hawkmoth loaded as much as his side-pack would carry before fetching himself back to Razor. He thought he might search the offices of other senior Brothers, minding out for further death enchantments, when he heard the strange sounds from beyond the tower.

  They were sounds so faint at first they might have been naught but some moan of the wind. But they persisted. The sounds of some disturbance coming from beyond Sanctuary itself. A screech here. A cry there. A moan. He strode with haste to nearest window and peered out.

  At first he saw naught but snowy grounds stretching out into gloom toward Sanctuary’s curved perimetre wall. Anything beyond the complex were but lost to the mists. Yet, he caught glimpses of faint shadows moving about the fog banks.

  ‘What be this?’ he murmured to himself, leaning closer to window.

  And what he saw put a chill through his bones so cold that for a few moments he were but stuck rigid to the spot.

  Pale-skinned figures. Unsettling entities with plasteec limbs that held neither blood nor feeling. Beings with long matted locks of hair, and plasteec alabaster faces, dark soulless eyes, fixed unmoving lips consisting of bare grubby plasteec, and their clothes consisting of torn dresses and skirts. They did not laugh nor smile, they did not freeze yet held no warmth. They existed only for their masters and hated as their masters hated.

  The Bewitched.

  3

  It had been many a year since Hawkmoth had set his eyes upon these damned creatures and he did so now with a sense of dread fascination.

  He pulled out his spyglass and watched them come. They moved like ghosts. One moment here, the next there. And every voice in his mind screamed at him to flee the tower, to put Sanctuary with haste at his back. But he hesitated, waiting… needing to see this. For, somehow, in the days and hours before Hawkmoth and his company had arrived in the Bonewreckers, the witches had executed a vicious attack upon Sanctuary, infiltrating the stronghold without somehow suffering the wrath of the Shadow Guard. Signs showed they had stormed the complex in a frenzied attack, evidently catching the sorcerers off guard. And judging by the amount of frozen bodies beneath the snow, the sorcerers had suffered enormous casualties. A counter attack had obviously taken place after that, the sorcerers having rallied, no doubt gathering their wolves, perhaps their ranks even strengthened by Snow Beasts, and the witches slaughtered or chased off. But one question still intrigued Hawkmoth above all others: how had the witches found passage into the complex?

  Thus it were here Hawkmoth witnessed it.

  Vast numbers of Bewitched bore down on Sanctuary. The Shadow Guard rose up from their dens to meet them and in an instant, their far reaching spikes shot forth, skewering the dolls through chest and belly, neck and limb. Hawkmoth knew that it would not matter if the Bewitched could feel no pain for the spike of a Shadow Guard could remove limbs, could turn a being to ice, or to flame, or to dust.

  But none of that happened. Despite being punctured and penetrated and stabbed, the Bewitched were not rendered to fire nor ice nor dust, they were not dismembered nor torn apart. Instead they advanced, slowly but surely, a wall of moving pale skin with their vacant, staring eyes, their long grubby fingers void of weapons. And as they bore down on the Shadow Guard, a hundred swords piercing them at each moment, a curious thing took place.

  The dolls appeared to bewitch them.

  The attack of Shadow Guard were suddenly without potency, without speed, as if an extreme fatigue had gripped them, as if they were but ensnared in some temporal trap, where time for them had slowed. It did not affect the dolls; in their ghostly ethereal way they pushed on through the Guard like young women dancing amidst beds of flowers, flitting, shifting, like wraiths. And then as they reached the wave wall, jerking like insects, they began clambering over the top, dropping down into Sanctuary’s grounds.

  At the sound of his blaring warhorn somewhere below, Hawkmoth finally broke from his reverie, turned quickly, remounted Razor and took him galloping down stairway.

  4

  Melai had reached the top of the eighth tower. Its roof were scooped out like an eagle’s nest, though shallow. Here, as if merely nesting, were four giant metallic black birds, their bodies hollowed along their backs like rowboats, each with room enough to accommodate two or three riders of even Gargaron’s
and Hawkmoth’s size.

  Hawkmoth’s instructions had been to prepare but two of them. His thoughts had told Melai that there ought be a steel rack containing vials of chemical matter. Liquids of red, yellow and blue. She were to take the blue chemical, pour it into the yellow. Mix. She were then to pour this mixture into each bird at the same time as she poured the red. As to where to pour it? Hawkmoth’s mind had shown her pictures of a receptacle in the top of each bird’s metal skull. If the birds were still fully functional, once the liquid had been administered, each bird would then come to life. His thoughts had told her that each bird would stand, walk to the edge of the platform, and await further commands. Here Melai would hold her position and wait for the others to reach her.

  5

  Gargaron blew the so-called war horn again, once more looking at it puzzled when it produced no sound. ‘Hope our sorcerer heard it!’ he said, hooking it over his belt and reaching for his great sword. Pale forms were scrambling over the distant wall, rushing toward them. Nightmarish humanoid creatures with long knotted hair and faces like dolls.

  Locke removed his blow-flute. And taking in the situation he said, ‘Right then,’ as if facing the prospect of naught but some fairly robust gardening.

  The attack were almost imperceptible. It were the way the strange pale fiends moved that caught the giant and crabman off guard. For they could shift almost unseen, sweep across a stretch of ground as quick as a gale. Giant and crabman watched the front of the pack surge toward them. And they were steeling themselves for the assault when Gargaron and Locke both felt mouths of teeth at their ear and neck. Garagron turned to brush aside what he thought were naught but pesky bugs when his hand instead hit something solid and cold.

  He gasped and whirled about and found foul doll creatures attached to his and Grimah’s flesh.

  Gargaron snatched at them, yanked them free, chunks of his skin still knotted in their teeth. They hissed, mewled, scrabbling at him with their plasteec claws, dragging skin from his arms and face. He managed to toss them to the snow but they clambered back at him just as quick and he only just managed to swing his sword and cut them to pieces. Yet, he had not the time to catch his breath for they were tearing into Grimah, clinging to his horse’s hide, biting out chunks of meat.

  Grimah squealed and kicked and bucked.

  Gargaron hacked at them, stabbed at them, kicked at them while Grimah himself did a fine job of tearing them from his flanks with his two mouths.

  Nearby, Locke were still well inundated too. Zebra whipped her large body, sending dolls flying. But Locke had been dragged off his mount and his helmet snatched free and he had been set upon like a rabbit by hounds. Buried beneath them Gargaron heard him laugh and yell, ‘Ha, come and have me you accursed fiends!’ and he saw Locke’s moonblade swish back and forth, dicing these creatures to bits and when Locke found his arms pinned down he simply stabbed at his attackers with the spiny tips of his crab feet. Or alternatively he dug his horns into them, head-butting and puncturing them, head-butting and puncturing, repeatedly, whenever he had the chance. There were no blood from these beings save a creamy yellow ooze that seeped from the centre of their limbs.

  6

  Hawkmoth emerged at last from the tower and saw his friends in peril. He snatched a Hornet from his pocket, an item he had only just taken possession of from Skitecrow’s office, and let it loose.

  Gargaron happened to see it. A tiny green fairy. And a mighty squeal erupted from its jaw and a concussive thud swept over all before her, taking Gargaron’s hearing for a moment, and every non-living critter about them blasted away as if hit by a thunderous wall of water. It left Gargaron, Locke and their steeds suddenly free of all attackers.

  With that the fairy crumbled.

  ‘Right then, you pair,’ Hawkmoth called to Gargaron and Locke both. ‘Let us away from here!’

  7

  Melai watched them from the top of the eighth tower. They had several hundred yards to cover. She scoured the perimetre wall. More of those strange pale fiends were clambering over the top. She unslung her bow but she were too high for her arrows to be of any use.

  Hawkmoth, Gargaron and Locke made their charge for the tower. ‘More Bewitched,’ Hawkmoth called. Gargaron had already spotted them. Ahead of them and to their sides, piling over the walls like bugs. ‘Behind us too,’ Locke reported.

  Gargaron glanced over his shoulder and saw a mighty horde a hundred feet behind them. ‘Marvelous.’

  In front of them, the Bewitched were now swarming the base of the eighth tower, surging toward them.

  ‘They shall cut off our path,’ Gargaron observed.

  ‘So don’t lose your pace,’ Hawkmoth called. ‘Charge them, cut them down, bash through them!’

  Gargaron held high his sword, and Locke spat more impotent darts from his blow-flute. Though Razor did something Gargaron had never previously witnessed from the horse: its glowing eyes shot bolts of searing green fire that punched holes straight through the plasteec torsos of those dolls, melting them from the inside out.

  Both fronts crunched into each other: horse, serpent, giant and crabman piling headlong into this horde of Bewitched. And from there it were utter bedlam. The dolls were ravenous, frenzied, cutting, scratching, biting; chewing off chunks of horse flesh and of serpent, of giant and crabman and sorcerer. The horses squealed and kicked and stomped, the serpent hissed and gnashed and sent swathes of fiends flying with wild slashes of her mighty tail.

  They dragged Hawkmoth from his saddle and gone were he in an instant, buried beneath them, his staff torn from his grip. Gargaron, believing Hawkmoth’s magic were likely their best chance of ridding themselves of this mess, struggled getting to him, hacking at the dolls with his great sword, pushing Grimah through the pack of dolls who were like ravenous rats on a corpse. Grimah bit at them with both his heads and kicked at them, rearing up and stomping them down. But broken, or bent or twisted, they rose again.

  Locke slashed his moonblade, measured but frenzied in fashion; at first from his saddle but after Zebra had raked away huge numbers of the Bewitched and Locke were hauled from his mount he found ground to stand and expertly carve up the Bewitched as they clambered toward him.

  Gargaron hauled Grimah as close as he could to where he saw glimpses every now and then of Hawkmoth struggling to free himself from beneath the ravenous dolls. Razor were in a frenzied state of mind, springing about as wild as any horse Gargaron had ever seen, firing off green bolts of flame that were so powerful, so searing hot, they cut through dozens of Bewitched at a time. Gargaron dismounted, his sword hacking at the enemy as they bit at him, their plasteec mouths covered in blood and rent meat. They crowded him but he outmuscled them, throwing them off as he would children, slicing them up with vast two-handed sweeps of his sword. But they were far too numerous and no matter how much he struggled, he got no nearer Hawkmoth.

  He caught sight of the wizard’s staff and dove for it. Grabbing it but losing it again under the mass of writhing fiends piling on top of him. Despite his strength he were being pulled to ground. He grit his teeth and heaved his way back to his feet, throwing off his offenders. Grimah were near him, and Gargaron grabbed a handful of saddle and used the horse’s bulk to help pull him free of the Bewitched.

  But he were leapt upon and clawed at. And Grimah now, despite his brute strength, despite his bulk, were pulled down by both heads to ground. Then he were lost beneath mounds of the swarm, and Gargaron lost the cloudy sky from his sight as a mass of Bewitched closed over him, the sound of hundreds of munching plasteec fangs all about him, like dogflies at meat, a constant noise, eating at him.

  He struggled and kicked and punched but he were tiring and he were outnumbered and ultimately he were outmuscled. He no longer had his sword; lost to the Bewitched it were. He were being turned over and pulled and hit and bitten, he were being dragged across snowy ground, thrown upside-down, tossed this way and that. Still, he were determined not to succumb, would not let
them beat him. He felt his anger rising, felt rage building in his chest. He hadn’t come this far to be eaten alive by this horde of abominations. He hadn’t fare welled his girls at the Great Precipice just to be torn apart here without having done anything to avenge their deaths, anything to reverse the Ruin that had scorched the world’s living. In the mayhem, in all the mass of writhing, ravenous dolls he caught glimpses of Grimah, heard him squealing, saw him kicking his mighty legs. And then he spotted the hilt of Drenvel’s Bane still held in his pack, strapped to Grimah’s saddle.

  Even a hilt be better than naught, he thought.

  With enormous effort he pushed his hand down amidst bodies of monsters. He growled with the effort, his anger giving him strength. If I die here, then I go down fighting, he thought furiously. And I shall take as many of these devils with me! And as he curled his fingers about the haft of Drenvel’s Bane and dragged it free, something curious stole over him.

  Instantly he felt his vitality return. Instantly he felt he were filled with the strength of gods. He felt out of his body somehow. Felt as light as a bird. And most curious of all, he saw the head of Hor’s mighty and legendary hammer suddenly appear.

  8

  Locke were laughing, hurting but laughing. He had heard warriors tell how they had never felt more alive than when close to death. He were feeling it now and he were relishing it. And hoped not to give this sensation up so readily. Still, he wished to know where his Zebra were. For he could see naught, lost beneath this horde as he were. Though every now and then he heard her squeal or hiss. So he fought. He could no longer get his blow flute to his mouth so he cut through these Bewitched with his moonblade. He could hear it humming as it sliced through them, as their burning “flesh” gave off a stink like molten rubber.

  He heard something new then. As of a behemoth descending upon this mayhem. And when he managed a chance he saw it, a brute wielding a mighty war hammer. At first he believed it a mirage, an apparition put out by his dying mind. But dying mind or no, he wished to watch it. For formidable it were, a colossus, awe inspiring, a god walking amongst them.

  It were tall. Double in height of Gargaron. It had no eyes but searing orbs of yellow light. It had a horned helmet and looked clad in the Vyking armour of old, black steel plate. And it wielded a mighty hammer that flamed blue. And it were with this hammer, in mighty sweeping arcs, that it were casting Bewitched aside, dozens upon dozens at a time, to the far corners of Sanctuary.

  It roared as it clubbed them, laughed wickedly in deep sonorous tones as its hammer scattered them, spread them, dozens and more hurtling through the air at any one time. It appeared unfatigued by its actions and godlike in its fury.

  The Bewitched were undeterred though. They did not flee, they did not wane, they showed no fear. They swarmed it. And bit into it. Clambering up its legs. Assailing it with single minded purpose.

  Still, with each stomp of its mighty feet, this godlike thing shook them free as though they were but lice. And it swiped them away in enormous clods. And those that were hit stayed hit; they did not rise again. And for now at least, it began to trim their numbers.

  This afforded Locke more room to fight, finally gaining his feet, slashing his moonblade at Bewitched who still rushed at him, and spitting darts from his blowflute that now cut searing, smoking holes through them. He saw Hawkmoth arise like a resurrected soul from a pile of Bewitched who were still upon him, still assailing him. Without his staff his fingers worked like vast nets of weed, no doubt enchanted by magic, raking his offenders aside in clumps. Razor and Grimah both battered the Bewitched, finding the fight now far easier with the horde thinned out.

  Locke whistled and called Zebra to heel, and he leapt upon her as she slithered by, blowing darts at Bewitched as they alternatively flew at him or chased him. But nowhere could he spot Gargaron.

  Hawkmoth spied his staff and held his arm in its direction and to him it flew and he snatched it up into his grip as it came at him in a blur and waved it skywards, uttering a spell, ‘Makus eet rayn doon wit fyrr!’ and beads of flame spurt by the hundreds from Lancsh’s gaping jaw into the air, shooting out in every direction, digging into the witch dolls before turning them into walking infernos that then blew apart in wild explosive blasts.

  Locke kept Zebra mobile and at speed, lessening the chance of the Bewitched attaching themselves to her. He fired darts, and slashed his blade, and the colossus roared laughter and smashed his way through the soulless dolls.

  ‘More coming!’ Hawkmoth called. ‘We must get to the tower!’

  Locke looked and saw numbers of Bewitched clambering still like bugs over Sanctuary’s outer wall.

  ‘How many be there hiding in these mountains?’ Locke called back.

  ‘More than I imagined,’ Hawkmoth shouted, grimacing, bleeding. ‘The witches must have been amassing them for years!’

  ‘Where be Gargaron?’ Locke yelled.

  ‘I can only surmise that be him,’ the sorcerer called, pointing quickly at the behemoth still thumping and bashing the Bewitched. ‘For that there he wields be Drenvel’s Bane!’

  And still the great colossus dealt with these witch dolls, grunting, and laughing, seemingly no end to his fury. But they swarmed him again, and as Locke raced Zebra for the tower he saw the mighty hammer suddenly glimmer in and out of existence.

  And here the mighty behemoth fell to his knee.

  THE WARDENS THREE

  1

  GARGARON felt his strength falter as he collapsed. And a weakness suddenly enveloped him. He understood none of this. Moments prior he had stood taller than he had ever stood, felt bigger than he had ever been, felt more powerful than anything ever to have lived. He had been wielding a mighty warhammer, he had been knocking the Bewitched hither and thither as though clubbing naught but mere ducklings. And now this… a momentary dulling of his rage and he had lost all of it. As he gazed down at his hammer he saw that it were again but a shaft and naught more.

  He felt Grimah at his side, nudging his ribs, encouraging him to stand and Gargaron held up his hand to his steed’s noses, as if saying Yah, I hear you, give me a moment.

  He heard Locke at close quarters. ‘Seems you threw your blade away, giant.’

  When Gargaron looked up he saw Locke presenting Gargaron’s rescued great sword. He also saw Hawkmoth nearby.

  ‘Oh, and let me say,’ the crabman went on, ‘a fine show you put on just now with that wee hammer of yours. A true spectacle to behold!’

  Gargaron found not the strength to muster a verbal reply. He grimaced and took his sword from Locke and with Grimah’s aid he climbed to his feet. As he slotted his sword into his scabbard he surveyed the grounds of Sanctuary. Masses of busted, twisted Bewitched lay crumpled in the snow. Several hundred. It seemed inconceivable that he had created such carnage.

  ‘Come now,’ Hawkmoth told them. ‘Let us not lose this advantage. More Bewitched are on their way.’

  Through the mists Gargaron saw them, waves of the witch’s devils piling over the walls, scrambling out toward them, their limbs clicking like bone.

  Locke pulled Zebra into motion. Gargaron struggled into Grimah’s saddle; Hawkmoth remained close in case the giant needed his aid. But Gargaron were soon mounted and with his mind still a daze, he and Grimah set off after the crabman.

  From top of tower Melai watched. More monsters rushed for her friends. But something puzzled her: while Zebra and Grimah sped on, carrying Gargaron and Locke, Razor and Hawkmoth were not with them.

  Hawkmoth had remained where he were, posied amidst the snow covered grounds, staff held at the ready, pacing back and forth now as if waiting to take on the coming hordes all on his own. Razor were at his side. Apparantly this had gone unnoticed by Locke and Gargaron for they continued to charge away from them.

  As Melai watched, she witnessed a hooked chain suddenly shoot out from some concealed position not far from the sorcerer. It shot at Razor and harpooned him through his thigh. The horse squealed and
jumped and by the time Hawkmoth realised what had happened, the chain were suddenly pulled taut and Razor yanked violently from his positon, hauled through the air like a puppet, before thumping into the frozen ground, fifty feet or more from Hawkmoth’s side.

  Hawkmoth started after his steed but a second chain shot out, this one from a separate hidden position, harpooning the sorcerer through his lower back, punching through his flesh, and yanking him forcefully in the opposite direction.

  As the Bewitched charged on, as Hawkmoth thumped heavily into the snow, a series of spiked metal poles began to rise from the ground in a wide circular area, trapping Hawkmoth within, and Razor without.

  2

  Hawkmoth’s predicament came to Gargaron’s attention after the giant noticed Locke glance around and suddenly pull Zebra to a halt. ‘What be his?’ the crabman asked.

  Gargaron slowed Grimah and when he turned he saw Razor tangled in what looked a harpooner’s rope and Hawkmoth trapped inside a pen of tall spikes, spikes that were fifty feet from ground to tip, and spaced too close together for Hawkmoth to squeeze his way out.

  ‘Hawkmoth?’ Locke called. ‘What be this?’

  Hawkmoth wore a deep grimace on his face as he pushed himself to his knee. The chain were still hooked into his flesh. He had expected the spiked poles, but not the chains. The chain tethering him were heavy but he managed to stand against its weight. Would be best not to be on his knees, for he knew now the wardens were on their way. He looked around for Razor. And spotted him. Back on four hooves were his steed, and pulled free of his chain, steaming blood coursing down his leg.

  ‘Press on!’ Hawkmoth demanded. Bewitched were drawing ever closer. And Razor were trotting around the corale’s perimeter, angry, anxious, looking for a way in. ‘There be naught you can do. Skitecrow’s little pets come for me now. Wardens of Sanctuary. They shall not permit me to leave here alive.’ It were a message for Razor as much as for giant and crabman.

  Gargaron watched as inside Hawkmoth’s pen, the ground opened up and three separate pits appeared. And from three separate stairways leading down into Sanctuary’s undercrofts they came, three silver, armoured figures. Tall, ominous. They strode out into the snow, one carrying a mace, the other a morning star, the last a far reaching halberd. Here they advanced upon Hawkmoth.

  ‘It be a farewell reception for any Brother who turns his back on this place and has the gall to return,’ Hawkmoth called out, blood dripping from his chin. He reached behind and worked the chain’s hooks from his back. Once done, he cast the chain aside. He bled, but ignored it. He took his staff into grip, holding it before him with two hands like a sword. He took up a defensive stance and carefully watched the three Wardens. They stood so still and so calm. Razor were in a canter around the perimeter, back and forth, desperate still for a way in to aid his master, his leg still bleeding profusely. ‘I have news for them however,’ Hawkmoth said with a grin. ‘I shan’t let them take me down without a fight.’

  ‘You did not warn us of this,’ Gargaron called, his voice croaky and hoarse.

  ‘No. This one I kept to myself. But fret not, giant, I knew this were coming thus used my time in Skitecrow’s offices well. I have some gadgets now that might aid me.’

  ‘What can we do?’ Locke called.

  ‘You can flee!’ came Hawkmoth’s reply. ‘You too, Razor! All of you. Take Mama Vekh. Fly southeast to Dark Wood. If I live through this I shall catch you up. Hurry now!’

  3

  Gargaron took hold of Drenvel’s Bane once more, gripping it two-handed. He would not leave the sorcerer. He would bring down the wall of bars that contained him. Yet he could not summon it.

  ‘Go!’ Hawkmoth yelled at them. The Bewitched were pressing neaer and nearer with every moment.

  Gargaron tried again, concentrating his will. But no matter how much he tried, he could not wake the hammer. He were spent. Hor’s little weapon remained dormant. He slot the handle inside his pack and took his sword into hand. ‘We’ll not leave you here!’ he called.

  ‘This be not about me,’ Hawkmoth called back. ‘This be for the realm. Get Mama Vekh to her daughters. Hurry now and leave, damn you!’

  And it were here the Wardens marched on him.

  4

  Melai still watched from the top of the tower. She saw the coming horde sweep toward her friends. She saw Locke and Gargaron pull their steeds about and ride for base of tower. Razor though remained near as he could to his master. And the hordes of Bewitched were closing fast.

  She could sit and watch no longer.

  She flew down tower’s stairwell and found the lower floor doorway awash with enormous doll-like creatures, Locke and Gargaron hard up against them.

  Melai unleashed a volley of rapid fire Loniyahd acid-tipped arrows into the dolls. On impact, the dolls were riddled with a dozen pockmarks that melted outwards in expanding holes; parts of them dripping away until their forms were so compromised they crumpled inwards and dropped, twitching in the snow, their limbs melting from them. But there were too many for her to counter.

  ‘We need hold this ground,’ Gargaron called, trying to get a glimpse through the horde of Hawkmoth’s status. ‘We need to work out some way to help our sorcerer.’

  5

  The Wardens attacked skillfully, viciously, ferociously. But Hawkmoth knew them, had seen them dispatch forbidden Brothers many times and thus had an advantage over their tactics. Grief, who wielded its mace, were swift of feet, and were deceptive. It made first move, as Hawkmoth anticipated, shifting from its position almost unseen. Hawkmoth knew it’d dart behind him, as he had witnessed it do so many times; both Sorrow with its morning star, and Pain, with its halberd, would attack while he were distracted.

  Hawkmoth also knew that he would be caught short with many of his conventional spells. He had some of Skitecrow’s toys to his arsenal to help him, though if they failed, well he had been a long time away from Sanctuary and a long time away from conventional learning; thus he had picked up an array of tricks in his years banished that he would not have learned had he remained here. And so simply, he went to town on them.

  Anticipating Grief’s movement to the tee he sprung sideways and both Grief’s mace and Sorrow’s morning star crashed together where his head had been but a sunflare prior, giving off a shower of sparks. Thus Hawkmoth danced aside and leapt high into the air as Pain’s halberd struck out at him. He evaded it well and rolled, ducking beneath another sweeping attack by Sorrow, and Hawkmoth threw Rashel out in an arc and she breathed out a breath of iced air, a spell he had learnt from Eve. The Wardens shuddered and stopped in their movements for but a sunflare… time enough for Hawkmoth to pull one of Skitecrow’s Ouppluids into play. He dragged it from his belt, grated it swiftly across his forearm and speared both it and any flesh it carried from his arm into the ground. Instantly Hawkmoth’s doppelganger grew, and were fully formed by the time Grief, Pain and Sorrow kicked back into movement.

  Pain’s halberd struck without warning, but Hawkmoth’s two selves danced away from it skillfully. Sorrow countered well with its morning star, bashing the shoulder of Hawkmoth’s twin. Grief swung its mace at the real Hawkmoth. But he and his twin both leapt aside and rolled and jumped. This is how things went for a little while, the two Hawkmoth’s dancing here and there, evading strikes and hacks, deflecting near strikes with their staffs. Hawkmoth himself were working on catching one of the Wardens off guard. He had to wait his chance, to counter their tactics. They were constantly flanking he and his double, constantly trying to distract he and his copy. Then he got the opening he needed. His doppelganger had run out in front of him, catching the attention of his would be killers and here he seized his opportunity, darting in with speed, striking Sorrow in the neck with his staff and darting out again in the same instant, as Pain thrust at him with halberd. Hawkmoth deflected it with staff and leapt clear.

  The strike on Sorrow had done nothing it seemed, though a blue mould began to grow down its armour
and up its face plate. This blinded it and it swung wildly now at random. Hawkmoth’s twin scampered up behind it and crushed the side of its helmet inwards with a strike of its staff. The assault failed to put the Warden out of action but it were never the same after that, never again at full strength, never again at full fighting capacity, wandering about as of something out of its mind.

  Hawkmoth were free to battle but two of them now.

  He found an opening and lunged at Pain, thrusting the spiked end of his staff into the being’s lower back, and leapt away, springing lithely off the shaft of its halberd. Pain appeared to show no ill effect to begin with and Hawkmoth wondered if the enchantment he had delivered would work. He rolled as he came to ground, narrowly avoiding having his skull cracked open by Grief’s mace which took out Hawkmoth’s twin, crunching the twin’s face into his skull, blood spraying out. The real Hawkmoth leapt and rolled as Grief pulled his mace from one sorcerer and swung it at the other. Hawkmoth slashed his staff at the being’s legs, hissing, ‘Putus hiss leggz tu mush!’ and Grief’s lower left leg crumpled as if molten.

  Hawkmoth dashed for clear space, his twin on the ground, dying. Pain leapt high and swung its halberd around in a swinging arc. Hawkmoth were just in time to duck beneath it, thrusting Rashel at it—she clasped its arm in her teeth. A searing light erupted from her jaws, spitting holes through Pain’s arm, rendering it useless. Hawkmoth wrenched Rashel back and with it came her victim’s limb clenched still in her mouth. Grief, hobbling, gave off a flurry of attacks and Hawkmoth rolled, leapt, dodged, reaching again for another of Skitecrow’s gadgets. He took out a Ploidoos, threw it at Grief. The metal spike buried into its chest plate.

  A moment later Grief began to jerk and its torso suddenly split down the middle, from head to waist. Though on second glance its body had not actually split but grown another of itself, another torso stemming from its own waist, a torso fixed with armoured head and arms.

  As this one became fully formed it began thumping the original’s torso and skull, pulling and twisting its arms. Distracted with its self-pummeling, Hawkmoth once more had but two Wardens to deal with. Sorrow, still blinded, and indiscriminately flailing its morning star. And Pain, with its remaining arm. He kept moving. Not let himself be cornered or backed up against the cage bars. He had seen many a forbidden Brother stand his ground and attempt to fight them off only to find himself conquered and pulverised.

  As Hawkmoth evaded a one handed strike by Pain, Sorrow struck, taking him by complete surprise. It suggested that there were naught wrong with Sorrow’s senses. It threw its sword but what flew at Hawkmoth were a hundred daggers. Hawkmoth countered quickly with a spider’s spell that shot web, collecting all blades except for two or three that shot passed his face.

  Pain ran its halberd across the snowy ground, cutting open some fissure in reality, and twisted grey goblins crawled forth, flying on wings at Hawkmoth. Five or six of them, wielding talons and pointy teeth.

  Hawkmoth had not witnessed these tactics in years passed. This were something new. Still he felt he were slowly gaining the upper hand over the Wardens and he fought off the goblins with wooden shards spat out by Rashel, shards that ripped their flesh and tore their wings. They were easy enough for him to dispatch but he knew they were merely sent as a distraction. Sure enough, Sorrow had darted up behind him but Hawkmoth saw the attack at the last moment, thus he jumped and spun in the air, the morning star missing his chest by an inch. Now he dropped, rolled through snow, remaining goblins diving for him but they took the brunt of the morning star as he had anticipated. Having orchestrated the goblins’ demise he whipped his staff around, leapt from the snow, twisting and then thrusting the sharp point of his staff deep into Sorrow’s ribs.

  He withdrew it and dove, rolled and came to a standstill on one knee, in time to watch Sorrow turn its weapon upon Grief, pummeling its skull. Pain rushed toward him and he made to evade the attack when a cold object pierced his chest.

  Hawkmoth looked down and amidst spurting blood he saw the tip of the halberd poking though him. He turned his head and saw he had been tricked. Pain stood behind him, still gripping the halberd. And as blood poured from Hawkmoth’s chest, the armoured being lifted the sorcerer high like an impaled rabbit on a stick.

  6

  Razor squealed and bolted around the spiked perimeter, bashing through the packs of Bewitched as they swamped him, pelting them with green molten shots of fire. He charged through them, knocking them left and right as the Warden, Pain, hefted Hawkmoth into the air like a trophy and prodded the haft of its halberd deep into the snowy ground, leaving Hawkmoth suspended twenty feet off the ground.

  Witnessing this, Razor became hysterical, squealing and galloping faster and faster around the cage, Bewitched flying at him still, clinging to him. Yet they were unable to halt his charge, unable to drag him to ground.

  With their work done, with Hawkmoth, Sanctuary’s forbidden Brother, dealt with and dying, the Wardens began to depart. And with them, the cage began to lower, the bars slowly retracting into the earyth.

  Razor were determined to get to Hawkmoth’s side, but the Bewitched kept piling up about him now. Still, he used this to his advantage: he kicked them free of his hide and climbed their heaped numbers and managed to clamber over the top of the spikes. On the opposite side he landed heavily, crashing aginst his shoulder in the snow. But he rolled and gathered his feet and galloped to the foot of the halberd, bashing into it and knocking it over.

  It tumbled hard, Hawkmoth plummeting into the snow, kicking up snow dust. And Razor trotted quickly to the sorcerer, nuzzling his cheek. Hoping to rouse him. Yet Hawkmoth did not move. Razor would not be deterred. He keened at the sorcerer’s ears. He bit into his shoulder. He prob him with his hoof. Beyond the spiked perimeter, the Bewitched were heaving up against the bars, creating a small hillock of writhing bodies. Threatening to spill over the top. Razor eyed them with displeasure. But he ignored them and gazed down at Hawkmoth.

  Hawkmoth who had not moved. Who, by all signs, looked dead and gone.

  Razor lifted his head. He watched the Wardens with simmering fury…

  They had halted. They were eyeing he and Hawkmoth both.

  Razor snorted. He scuffed his hoof through the mud and grass. And then he charged.

  As he galloped, he howled like a wolf. The Wardens simply watched him, like folk regarding the charge of a duck. At the last moment they raised weapons. But it were too late. Razor barreled into them, blue streaks of light bursting from between his ribs, his skin splitting, his flesh ripping apart…

  And in an instant, he exploded in a mass of flesh and pulsating light.

  7

  The blast sent Gargaron and Locke and Melai crashing into the tower, crunching the Bewitched every which way, throwing Grimah from his feet, knocking Zebra off her belly, throwing her head and neck against the tower wall.

  After that, everything fell still.

  Gargaron lifted his head from where he lay, dazed, looking groggily about, wondering what by Ranethor just happened. Melai were back against the stairwell of the tower, rolling slowly to her side as if just waking from some deep slumber. Locke were propped against the doorway, the expression on his face one of vacant bewilderment, as if he had just smoked a full bag of the sorcerer’s weed.

  Gargaron struggled to his feet, using the doorway to steady himself. He set his gaze out across Sanctuary’s grounds and saw the snow had been blasted away in the explosion, exposing bare brown earth and straw-coloured dead grass beneath. Swirls of persisting blue light illuminated patches of ground and snow alike, as though it were star dust. He saw that the Bewitched were scattered, knocked to ground, blasted not only from the tower entrance but also from the vicinity around the lowering spikes. Knocked back a hundred yards in any direction where they lay silent and unmoving. But the strangest sight of all were what lay around the spot where he had last seen Razor, Hawkmoth and the Wardens.

  The Wardens still stood, but w
ere unrecognisable from their original forms. While their legs were still firmly planted on hard earyth their bodies had been rent eastways; they looked like frozen flags, like silver streaks of metal smeared out across the frigid mountain air. And Hawkmoth were on all fours in the bare dead grass. His head bowed forward, his face unseen. His arms barely keeping upright. There were no sign of Razor. No sign of the halberd that Pain had thust through the sorcerer.

  Gargaron started forward. He staggered but regained his footing. ‘Hawkmoth,’ he called. ‘Be you well?’

  He moved through the uncovered bodies of sorcerers and what he guessed were witches and everywhere there were remnants of the Bewitched. There were no sound across Sanctuary but the sound of wind, lonely and mournful.

  Gargaron came aware of Grimah trotting up beside him and heard Melai say distantly, ‘Fetch the sorcerer. We need leave here. I fear this place be not done with us yet.’

  Gargaron neared Hawkmoth, certain the sorcerer were hunched there suffering from his wounds. ‘Hawkmoth?’ Gargaron asked. ‘Be you well? Where be Razor?’

  Gargaron noticed something else then. A shimmering figure at Hawkmoth’s knees. It looked a ghost. Some small angelic creature, green of eye. Hawkmoth had his hand upon it. It had but Razor’s horse face and Razor’s eyes and Razor’s horsey snout. But its small ethereal body looked as though it had wings, and arms, a fore set and a rear set, long and loose and clumsy, as if just learning how to use them, as if of some deer calf recently birthed from its mother.

  Hawkmoth looked up and his bleary eyes saw Gargaron. He were bloodied and cut and his face were white, as if all blood were drained from him. ‘I be well,’ Gargaron heard him whisper. ‘I be well. Forgive me, I must farewell my Razor.’

  The statement confused Gargaron. He focused on the thing at Hawkmoth’s feet. Were it somehow Razor? It’s spirit?

  ‘Fly now, little one,’ Hawkmoth whispered weakly. ‘I have brought you full circle. Fly now and away. It has been an honour to be your friend.’

  Distantly Gargaron heard some sound. He looked about, squinting into the misty gloom. He saw faint shapes in the mist, things scrambling, clambering over the wall. Another wave of Bewitched by the look of it. Grimah, at the giant’s side, were beginning to make noise, snorting from both his noses, nostrils flapping.

  ‘Hawkmoth,’ Gargaron said. ‘Hawkmoth. We need leave now.’

  Hawkmoth appeared not to hear. Instead he sat back, almost collapsing onto his back, and allowed the small ghostly thing before him lift itself clumsily from the frozen ground. Its thin transparent wings unfurled and flapped as two lots of arms hefted its small body from the ground. It squeaked as of a newborn, flew about Hawkmoth twice before lifting away into the air.

  The Bewitched were coming now. Hawkmoth remained idle, preferring to watch Razor’s new form fly off than show care for anything else.

  There were no time for ceremony. Gargaron grabbed the sorcerer and hoist him to his feet. Hawkmoth were unresponsive, his body limp, his head hung low. Gargaron watched the oncoming fiends. They indeed were more Bewitched, but a larger breed it seemed, taller than ones that had come before, these with legs shaped like that of deer. Gargaron hoisted the sorcerer into Grimah’s saddle. Then just as the next wave of Bewitched were about to close on them, Gargaron gripped the pommel, hauled himself onto his steed, and Grimah took flight, galloping for the tower.

  8

  Grimah were not need to be told to gain speed, he dug in and picked up pace, his hooves thundering across the fresh blasted ground. From tower’s doorway, Locke and Melai fired off their arrows and darts, taking out Bewitched as the plasteec monsters closed in on Grimah’s flanks.

  ‘Hurry!’ Melai shouted. ‘Hurry now!’

  As Grimah raced toward tower’s base there came a thunderous noise and sections of Sanctuary’s perimetre wall suddenly crashed inwards—fragments of obliterated wall shooting away in every direction. Gargaron looked and saw Dark Ones bashing down the wall, their huge black forms stomping through the fog banks, surging onto the grounds. Like Appleford Terminus these were big brutes, though rather than hammers, these hefted mobile battering rams. And while some continued to batter the wall, others strode out across Sanctuary, smashing anything and everything in their path.

  The wave of Bewitched caught Grimah just as he reached the tower. They leapt at him, and again hung from his flanks. They also clung to Gargaron’s legs, and clawed at Hawkmoth’s robes, biting, scratching, chewing off chunks of meat. Hawkmoth seemed not to notice. Sitting there in saddle as if in some stupor, showing no concern, though around him Gargaron cut and slashed with both his sword and the spiked end of Hawkmoth’s staff. And Melai and Locke both let loose with their projectiles.

  The Bewitched were too numerous though and as Grimah dashed through tower doorway, their combined weight dragged the big horse leftways into the wall. Gargaron and Hawkmoth spilled to floor and Grimah squealed with anger, kicking his legs to get himself upright.

  It were mayhem all over again, Gargaron scrambling toward the stairwell where Melai and Locke had backed themselves up to, dragging Hawkmoth with him as the ravenous Bewitched piled up around the doorway, more coming still, flying at them with a frightening single mindedness. They snapped and bit and gnashed and clawed, Gargaron heaving dolls aside to pull Hawkmoth from beneath the mass.

  ‘Sorcerer!’ Gargaron yelled. ‘I’m sorry about Razor but we need you!’

  He dragged Hawkmoth with one hand and slashed his great sword at Bewitched with the other, the staff clamped in his armpit. Melai sent off continuous volleys of acid tipped arrows, the stink on the air of burning dolls both sharp and acrid. Locke blew his blow darts, causing the Bewitched to smoulder and melt. Grimah snapped and kicked, Zebra whipped her tail and struck out with her jaws.

  ‘Sorcerer!’ Gargaron yelled again. ‘Do you hear me?!’

  Slowly, so slowly, Hawkmoth began to come round. He saw the enormous dolls scratching at him. Though at first he could hear them not. It were some dream to him. Until his pain began to register and his senses return. He gasped a mighty breath all of a sudden and looked about. And struggled to his feet, groggy.

  ‘There you are,’ Gargaron shouted. ‘Here, take your staff.’

  Hawkmoth took it absently and stumbled. Gargaron caught him, cutting a Bewitched in half as it leapt at them. Gargaron shoved the sorcerer up the stairway. Hawkmoth stumbled again and Melai and Locke put themselves before he and their adversaries.

  9

  It were a pitched battle from there to the roof of the tower, but the advantage for Gargaron and his friends were though the stairway up the tower were almost fifteen paces wide, the Bewitched could not flank them, nor attack from behind.

  ‘Do we still hold Mama Vekh?’ Hawkmoth said amidst the din of battle, as if he had just remembered her existence.

  ‘Aye,’ Locke replied, ‘still strapped to Zebra.’

  Hawkmoth, satisfied, took a quick swig of Gemtian, one of Skitecrow’s old brews. He grunted and jammed his eyes shut as if he’d swallowed acid. But its effects were immediate. His mind cleared, and his pain swept aside, and he felt an acute buzz surge through him. Without thinking, he pushed his way back to the battlefront and unleashed Lancsh upon the coming Bewitched. Screeching walls of flame filled the stairwell, near igniting Gargaron and Melai. The giant stumbled backwards, his arm over his face and Melai swooped away.

  Hawkmoth were not done though. Just as one wall of flame roared down stairwell, incinerating a hundred Bewitched, he called on Lancsh to deliver another.

  Gargaron threw himself up the stairs taking Locke and Grimah with him just as the second inferno ignited the stairwell behind him; the heat were so intense it could be felt far up the stairs where Melai had retreated. Even Hawkmoth took evasive action in the end, bounding up the steps away from the flames, his beard singed and smoking.

  He reached the others, panting, wide of eye, his muscles still buzzing from the Gemtian tonic.

 
‘Be you well?’ Melai asked him.

  He looked at her, blinking, as if not comprehending. He did not answer her at any rate. He simply turned, and taking from his robe’s pocket a handful of Duska (relieved also from Skitecrow’s office), he pitched them all at once down stairwell.

  Down there somewhere, hordes of Bewitched could be heard pouring in through the doorway. And piling up the stairway, plasteec limbs clicking and clacking.

  The small rock-like Duskas bounced down the stairs. And came to a standstill. Where they burst open and gave birth to a trillion more small Duska stones that piled up in no time creating a monstrous barricade from stair to ceiling, wall to wall.

  ‘Right then,’ Hawkmoth said, catching his breath, looking around at his friends.

  They all watched him. No-one moving.

  ‘What happened to Razor?’ Melai asked him.

  He bit his lip, gazed at the stairs for a moment. ‘Razor,’ he said as if it had slipped his mind. ‘Yes… Razor. There be no time to explain. We must get ourselves to the Blackbirds.’

  10

  Gargaron lead the way up stairwell, Hawkmoth throwing down a second load of Duska stones, creating another barrier. Behind them, the Bewitched were already tearing their way through the first wall; rocks shifting and rolling and tumbling from their stack as the Bewitched ripped them aside.

  As Gargaron dashed out onto the roof there came the sound of an almighty crash and the tower lurched sickeningly underfoot.

  Gargaron reached for something to hold onto. He retook his footing just as another lurch near knocked him again from his feet. ‘What by Thronir be that?’

  The others were equally as baffled. Gargaron rushed to roof’s edge and peered down. At ground level he saw it: Dark Ones bashing their battering rams against tower. Beside Gargaron, the others watched on.

  ‘Let us not waste the moment,’ Hawkmoth said panting, ‘Into the birds! We have little time. This tower be coming down.’

  They raced across roof toward the metal birds awaiting them and the Bewitched broke through the second barricade and stormed the rooftop.

  Gargaron turned to fight off the coming mass, hacking at the surging enemy with his great sword, buying his friends some precious time to board their birds. Locke fired bolts; Melai, in flight, rained down arrows. Hawkmoth had not yet reached a bird, though he had taken stance and were casting spells where he could, stabbing his spiked staff at the odd Bewitched who managed to break through Gargaron’s attacks. Slowly he and Gargaron backed their way toward the birds.

  Zebra hissed and from where she were coiled around one of the so-called Blackbirds she shot out her fang-filled jaw, knocking Bewitched from the roof. Grimah were in a bird by then but the Bewitched were coming at them from all sides now. The rooftop fast filling up with them, many of them spilling over the sides.

  Another mighty hammer smash shook the tower and this time it began to tip. The birds began to slide toward the edge. They scrabbled around on their metal talons, doing their best to arrest their momentum. Still, one of them kept sliding, Zebra’s weight too much for it. Over the side of the tower it went and Locke leapt for it at the last moment, reaching it before it fell from sight. Then Hawkmoth, pushed up against the edge of the roof had no choice but to leap from the tower, also plummeting out of sight.

  The Blackbird spread its wings and swooped away into the sky, the crabman and sorcerer both dangling from its sides.

  The second bird were flapping its wings in preparation for flight, looking around as Gargaron still fought his way toward it. But Gargaron’s path were swamped with no help now but Melai firing her arrows from above and Grimah awaiting him at the bird. Another crash sent the tower into a shudder, knocking Bewitched off their feet, staggering Gargaron, who went to his knee, Bewitched surging toward him, their weight of numbers dragging him to the edge of tower.

  Grimah wailed. He knew Gargaron were naught going to make it.

  ‘Get to your feet, giant!’ Melai commanded him. ‘Hurry!’

  But he were trapped, he were being swarmed from all sides.

  Grimah snorted and reared up and leapt from the bird, charging headlong into the Bewitched, knocking them flying and another mighty crash made the tower shiver and it now were tilting, falling, great numbers of Bewitched tumbling out into space, over the edge of the rooftop.

  The tower steadied for but a moment.

  More Bewitched piled onto rooftop from stairway, rushing toward Gargaron who swiped at them with his great sword. A voice came into his mind.

  Leave now. I fend off your enemy so you may save yourself. We shall meet again someday. You have work here yet.

  He turned to find Grimah charging headlong into the rampant mass of Bewitched, taking huge numbers of them with him as his momentum carried him from the rooftop. Gargaron were backing away toward the bird. ‘NOOO!’ he roared, ‘Grimah, no!’ But it were too late, Grimah were gone. And this tower were coming down.

  Gargaron turned and charged for the bird just as it slid from tower’s roof, leaping into it. As it took his weight and soared for the heavens, Melai swooped down, stowing herself within its hollow as Bewitched leapt after it in great masses, trying their best to grab hold, only to miss and plummet to ground as the great tower went tumbling down.

  11

  FLIGHT OF THE BLACKBIRDS

  1

  THEY seemed a long time in flight. Too long for Gargaron’s comfort. The air chilled him though he wore his thick blood-splotched yak-spun coat. Melai huddled beneath Gargaron’s blanket. She were quiet for a time not knowing what to say. Gargaron sat there melancholy, speechless. He could help it not, for in his mind, whether his eyes be open or shut (and shut were worse), he saw over and over Grimah’s last moments. Piling headlong into the Bewitched, taking a huge number with him off tower’s roof… and then gone without barely a look back.

  Yet, there had been that voice Gargaron had heard, a voice he had taken as words from Grimah… Leave now. I fend off your enemy so you may save yourself. We shall meet again someday. You have work here yet.

  The Dark Ones had stormed Sanctuary in the wake of the Bewitched. Something the witches had no doubt orchestrated. He had seen them punch their hammers through that wave shaped wall. Had felt their hammers against that tower. Sadly, Grimah must have fallen amidst them.

  Gargaron gazed at the space in the back of the bird. Space where Grimah were to have been, had he made it. But it were vacant except for Gargaron’s bull-hide pack filled with all his belongings, Drenvel’s Bane poking out the top. Grimah had somehow detached the pack from his saddle and dropped it here. It were painful to look upon.

  Melai sat there huddled, gazing up at the giant. She had her chilled fingers on his ankle. She watched him at length.

  The other bird were before them, slightly more elevated. It soared through cloud mass that made the riders of both birds wet and caused them all to shiver. Zebra were coiled up as tight as her body would allow, stuffed inside the confines of the bird, the cold taking the energy out of her. Locke sat near the bird’s shoulders, staring back at the sorcerer; earlier he had called out to Gargaron, offering commiserations at the loss of a fine steed. Gargaron had nodded at him. Other than that, none spoke. At first they had been all too busy patching up wounds and bite marks and scratches. And at some stage Hawkmoth had called out their heading, to perhaps confirm they were flying on a correct path. Then he had partially disrobed to inspect his chest. Other than his bizarre stone skin, there were no hole in Hawkmoth’s chest nor any through his back, nothing to suggest he had been punctured first by the chain barb and then penetrated by that halberd.

  Gargaron, Melai and Locke all noticed this but none questioned it for now, each of them suspecting some magical spell must have caused him to heal.

  Now all were fallen to silence. Though Melai kept her eyes on Gargaron still. And eventually she could hold her tongue no longer. ‘I lament your loss, giant. But I feel somehow Grimah be not perished. Nor even injured. I
cannot tell you how I know this. But I feel it. I see it. A warhorse bolting down the outer side of a far tilted tower and jumping long at its base to avoid those Harbingers.’

  Gargaron knew it were simply an attempt at trying to allay his grief.

  ‘I do, I feel it.’

  He smiled and nodded and gently squeezed her hand in return. ‘Thank you, Melai, I hope you are right.’

  2

  They flew and flew, through chilled, cloudy air and it seemed hours later when clouds parted and Gargaron finally saw land below, lush green meadows and forested hills and he felt they had lost some elevation for the air around them had warmed, no longer did he require his coat. As he shed it gingerly, grimacing as the wounds beneath stung, and stuffed it in his pack, he saw how many bites and scratches and tears in his skin he had actually sustained. His limbs were literally littered with them. Almost no part of him were spared. Most had stopped bleeding at least. Though the Amahlu sap that Melai had provided had not set some of the deeper wounds where the Bewitched had chewed out large chunks of flesh. And they were too numerous and not deep enough to bother with his flesh patches. Thus he asked of Melai for more of her sap and applied great dabs of it to his wounds.

  It were just as he were finishing up, that quite without warning, the birds began to fall.

  3

  Melai noticed the metal ornithens had until then held a blue glow in their eyes during their entire flight but now this glow began to flicker. ‘Do they require more chemical?’ she called out to Hawkmoth, concerned.

  ‘No,’ he called back with a certain frown. ‘Not as yet. But I would not wager them being influenced by some foul witch enchantment. We are over Gwimpen airspace after all. The witches have much influence over this realm.’

  The birds lost height dramatically, dropping more steeply with each passing moment. Hawkmoth called for his companions to brace themselves. ‘Unless I can arrest this fall, we might be in for a solid landing!’

  Pushing Grimah from his mind, Gargaron gripped Melai to him and dug himself down into the confines of their bird. Across from them, dropping faster under greater weight, Locke’s serpent had coiled itself about the second bird, and Locke, smiling, were strapped in tight to the serpent’s saddle, snug beside the bundle of Mama Vekh. Hawkmoth however, stood at the front of this bird, staff held aloft with both hands as if he were having some struggle summoning magic.

  Below them and forward some two hundred yards, standing directly in their current flight path, there protruded from the surrounding landscape, an enormous nub of rock shaped like a gigantic mushroom. It were matted in a vast carpet of grass and vines and stunted trees. And as Hawkmoth persisted with his incantations, a large swatch of this vegetation began to shift, as if it were a bed of vipers rudely awoken. Yet quickly, as if all on its own, it fashioned itself into a pair of mighty arms that writhed and twisted upwards and outwards toward both metal birds, hurtling upwards as if they were but arms of giants stretching out to swat down pesky flies.

  Instead of slapping the birds from the sky, however, they grasped them in long leafy wooden “fingers”, and brought them down to the rock shelf in what were still a rather heavy landing.

  The Blackbirds jolted and bumped along the matted rock, dragging up beds of flowers and grass, snapping twisted snake-vines, splintering withered trees, and then finally settled near the far end of the mushroom-rock’s domed surface. The “arms” of vegetation that had brought them down now seemed to untangle and fall apart and were soon but chunks of wood and huge tufts of grass and detached lengths of purple vine.

  4

  Gargaron and the others took stock of their situation, and the metal blackbirds looked about as might a pair of real birds who had just arrived somewhere new. That were before the blue light went from their eyes and then they sat, curled their beaks beneath their wings and made as if to sleep.

  Only now did Gargaron release Melai, noticing the grimace upon her face. She stretched her limbs, fluttered her wings and gazed up at the giant. ‘I know you meant well, Gargaron,’ she told him, ‘but next time we find ourselves in a falling metal bird, might you let me take my own flight.’

  Where he still sat inside the body of the bird, Gargaron blinked down at her. And couldn’t help a sudden but short burst of laughter. ‘Oh my, I am sorry, Melai. Of course, you can fly.’ He clasped his jaw in his hand. ‘I did not even think.’

  She patted his knee. ‘No. It touches me you would squeeze me half to death to protect me.’ She smiled at him sideways.

  ‘So, sorcerer,’ Locke said, ‘where do we find ourselves? If this be Dark Wood then I see no trees nor any witches.’

  Hawkmoth pointed with his staff as he stepped down from his bird. ‘Indeed, we are some way short of Vantasia. See that dark smudge away west? That be the Dark Woods. Vantasia lies hidden therein.’ Hawkmoth regarded Locke, seeing for the first time something about the crabman’s attire were altered. ‘You have lost your helmet?’

  Locke smiled. ‘Aye, I left it behind as a souvenir for the Bewitched. Something for them to take back to their witch masters to remind them who decimated them.’

  Hawkmoth smiled. ‘Very well.’

  TREK TO DARK WOOD

  1

  THEY left the Blackbirds “asleep” where they were, and took some time taking stock, checking any further wounds, quenching thirst from their gourds. None spoke at all for a while. Gargaron kept expecting Grimah or Razor to appear. Their absence were acute and felt by all.

  ‘Be we all well?’ Hawkmoth asked finally, shedding his robes to once again pay some mind to his chest.

  ‘As best we can be,’ were Gargaron’s reply. ‘What of yourself? Twice you were impaled, yet you sport no obvious wounds.’

  Hawkmoth, chin pressed against neck, were straining to conduct a thorough inspection of his chest. And then of his lower back. The halberd wound showed up as naught but light pink welts. So too the wound where the chain had pushed through him. All else there were, were old battle scars and the various panels of stone skin.

  ‘I cannot explain it,’ Hawkmoth said. ‘I can only guess that in Razor’s final transition, his regenerative powers somehow healed my injuries and kept death at bay. Pity it did nothing to rectify my stone plating.’

  Locke narrowed his eyes with intrigue. ‘Final transition? What, by Ehl Nori, do you mean?’

  Hawkmoth pulled his robes back over his trunk and shoulders. He stepped forward a few paces, gazing out across the surrounding land. He could not help reminiscing for a moment, a sad smile crossing his face. ‘When Razor first came into my life he were not in the form you all know him. Aye, that’s right. He were no horse, but a wee dragonfly. Sounds a daft thing,’ Hawkmoth said, agreeing with the expressions of his friends, ‘but that’s what he were. I bought him as part of a collection of exotic bugs from a traveler who claimed to have caught them on the Northern Cape. Whether the traveler knew he had something special on his hands I do not know, but I felt instantly the energy and magic given off by this dragonfly amidst the seller’s wares. For, a legend did the rounds of Sanctuary in the days when I resided there about an untamed creature that could not die, but that with each passing of its life it would become a creature anew. Thus when Razor passed on as dragonfly his body were but a sugar-glider. After that he were a goshawk for many a year until attacked by tomb serpents and killed, his body then a hound for almost a decade. Beyond that he were Razor my steed. And now, well, it seems he has moved beyond this physical realm to an entirely new existence.’ He swallowed, momentarily empty of voice, contemplating his Razor, saddened that he were gone now from his side. ‘Eve will be most displeased when I tell her,’ he said. ‘She so wished to be there to witness his next phase.’

  ‘Regenerated?’ Locke said, looking about at his companions. ‘Correct me if I am wrong, but to me it seemed your steed erupted like a fire mountain.’

  Hawkmoth shrugged. ‘Aye. Razor possessed powers even unknown to me. His last trick to take down
the Wardens, I’m guessing, were one of them.’

  ‘I am sorry you had to part,’ Gargaron told him.

  ‘As I am sorry for your Grimah, giant,’ Hawkmoth replied.

  Gargaron nodded. ‘Aye. Though I have not known him long.’

  ‘Yet a fine steed he were, and a close friend and ally to us all,’ Hawkmoth told him sympathetically.

  Gargaron nodded. ‘Aye. Thank you. He died a warhorse’s death: in battle, a hero, and saving the life of a friend.’

  ‘I have told you I feel he be not perished,’ Melai reminded him.

  Gargaron glanced at the nymph. ‘And I hold onto that.’

  Hawkmoth nodded, contemplating this news. Then he said, ‘Right then, let us find a way off this rock.’

  2

  Due to its shape, finding a way down from the rock shelf proved no easy task. Even for Zebra who tried for some minutes snaking down over rock’s curving edge and succeeding only in slipping off the rock and falling to ground. Locke frowned as she whumped heavily into the grass fifty feet below. But she were up and about, shaking her head, in a mere daze.

  ‘Maybe you ought to try flying next time,’ he called to her laughing. ‘You’ll have the same result but I dare say it might be less labour intensive.’

  For the others it were the use of vines dangling over the side of the rock mount that were the solution. By use of Hawkmoth’s magic, multiple strands were plaited together for strength. The group then shimmied their way down. All except Melai, of course, who simply sprung from the rock and flew down with an easy grace.

  3

  On flat ground once more, the group gathered themselves. And took a quick inventory of all they had managed not to lose during the attack on Sanctuary. At their backs, the mighty stem of rock were covered in ancient rock paintings; primitive folk telling stories of death and life, towering monsters, and peculiar lights in the skies. And here Hawkmoth warned his friends that here now were the outer fringes of the realm of witches. ‘We must remain vigilant, alert. For we are sure to encounter strange enchantments ahead. Our food may rot, our water may turn to vinegar. And we must keep our eyes and ears open, for witching trolls patrol these lands.

  ‘Trolls?’ Locke asked. ‘Wandering about in broad daylight?’

  ‘The mountain trolls of the Dunhland Range are no fan of the suns,’ Hawkmoth told him, ‘and will stay in their caves till dusk. The coastal trolls of the Skull Coast only emerged from their barnacle encrusted grottos in the dead of night.’

  ‘Aye,’ Locke agreed, ‘and are mighty delicious, I can attest.’

  ‘I’ll take your word for it,’ Gargaron replied.

  ‘But hear me,’ Hawkmoth said, ‘the hill trolls of Gwimpen bear no fear of the suns and those of them beguiled and bespelled by the witchfolk thus roam about in large numbers. If the Ruin has thus far spared them, then they will prove deadly. They are a near unstoppable force when gathered in numbers.’

  4

  As they got walking, Gargaron took a huge draft from his gourd, contemplating potential roaming packs of trolls. Hawkmoth drew alongside him. ‘You look in deep thought, giant. What be on your mind?’

  ‘Much. The trolls. Our steeds. And though I set out on this journey on foot, I feel vulnerable without Grimah.’

  ‘As do I without my Razor. But we have work to do and must not linger on events we cannot change.’

  The sorcerer were right of course but still Gargaron could not help himself but worry himself with these thoughts.

  ‘Still, we are not without some might,’ Hawkmoth told him. ‘Why, Melai with her bow, Locke with his darts and you, well you have your Warhammer, giant. And I personally task you with reigniting it if we happen to chance upon any of those trolls I mentioned.’

  Gargaron looked puzzled. ‘But my warhammer sleeps, good sorcerer…’

  ‘Don’t you recall? With little mercy you battered those Bewitched back there at Sanctuary.’

  Gargaron stared at the grass before him as they marched onward, doing his best to recollect the events of their battle. ‘I… I barely have any memory of that part of our fight… I recall… I recall naught but rage.’

  Hawkmoth considered this with a frown and then a curt nod. ‘Rage? Interesting. Well then, perhaps that be Hor’s secret.’ He clapped Gargaron on the back. ‘Might be we can work on that theory.’

  Further snippets of memory returned to Gargaron as they trudge on, how he had sprayed Sanctuary with Bewitched, knocking great masses of them flying. The thoughts brought a sense of satisfaction, even excitement, though it were tempered with a feeling of misgiving and unease—to wield so much power were near frightening. If such rage could not be controlled, if he turned wild with it and could not be stopped, he did not wish to consider it.

  The blue sun of Melus had tracked halfway across the sky before they spied their first band of trolls. But Hawkmoth and his group did not expect to find them in such a state: there were seven of them and all of them were hanging dead by their necks from enormous gibbets tilted in the earyth.

  Gargaron supposed the prodigious weight of each troll had pulled the gibbets into their lean. But as they neared them, Gargaron judged that each gibbet must’ve been pushed that way, for all were leaning in an eastways direction, as if shoved by a great force or gale.

  Anyhow, the sight of the trolls hanging, confused them all. ‘What be this?’ Gargaron asked Hawkmoth.

  Hawkmoth had no answer except to say that it were most likely the result of a local dispute. ‘Fort Blackstone lies somewhere north of here. Overlooking the valley of Conntt. King Rawsthorn presided over the lands to the north. I know he has suffered troll raids for many a year. Perhaps he finally grew sick of them and hung them here to send a message to the troll clans of the hills. Or to the witches themselves.’

  ‘So the trolls were hung,’ Melai said, ‘before the Ruin came to the Vale?’

  ‘Such is my guess,’ Hawkmoth said, gazing now toward the lands to their west. ‘And by the looks of it, the Boom shocks have almost had the gibbets to ground.’

  5

  They pressed on. And on. Across boggy moors and marsh land, where a million dead bugs littered waterways, where wicker trees were shaped like bowed skeletal people. Where creatures rotted and bubbled and gave off foul green gas. It made the trudging slow and tiresome.

  Hawkmoth took a reading from his chronochine and found an entire day had passed and that again night had not returned.

  ‘Aye. So we have spent yet another night without moon or stars?’ Gargaron said.

  ‘Aye.’

  ‘Could these Boom weapons realistically corrupt Cloudfyre’s orbit in such a way?’ Gargaron asked.

  ‘They must,’ answered Hawkmoth. ‘What other explanation could there be?’

  They trudged along a dried river bed and came to a grassy bank where coracles were moored amidst dank reeds and beyond here the land hardened and they soon approached an abandoned settlement. Here there were trees whose trunks were arched over so far that their crowns were almost at rest upon the earyth. Yet it were in these crowns, crowns shaped as bowls, that small cottages were suspended. A short flight of wooden stairs lead up to each one.

  Gargaron briefly entertained the idea of stopping here for a short while, enough to build a fire, dry out his boots and warm his toes. He were thinking sadly of the fate of Grimah when he felt droplets of water splashing up from his boots against his forearms and neck and chin. He quickly decided he would rather drier land on which to rest. Somewhere not so sodden and boggy. Yet he noticed the water dripped from the ground itself. Upwards. As if gravity were reversed. He stopped and looked about. The others had stopped too. Each of them enthralled by this peculiar occurrence.

  In no time at all it were raining. Though this rain fell upwards and out into the sky. A pall of grey held the settlement as the deluge grew heavy. And a strange silence came with it. Not the usual sound of heavy torrents splatting into mud, or house or grass. No, it were an almost unsettling
quiet as this ungodly upwards rain shot quietly out into grey clouds.

  It were a genuine novelty at first. It were cold and the wetness unpleasant but such a thing none of them had ever seen nor heard of. Not even Hawkmoth nor Gargaron who had both travelled far and seen much in their lives. It pushed thoughts of Grimah’s fate from giant’s mind.

  ‘What be this wondrous phenomenon?’ Locke asked Hawkmoth, smiling. ‘Is this some wondrous enchantment?’

  Hawkmoth simply shrugged. ‘I could not tell you,’ he said with an almost awestruck, boyish smile. ‘There are some things even I have no knowledge of.’

  6

  They continued westways, the rain kept up, and the wetter and more sodden they grew. And faster the novelty wore off. Especially when they realised the rain showed no signs of abating. Gargaron at least knew why the houses back in that village had been constructed in the manner they had: the “bowls” in which they sat acted somewhat like inverted umbrellas, shielding each abode from this peculiar phenomenon.

  ‘I say, Hawkmoth,’ Gargaron said, ‘Do you have no enchantment that might counter this?’

  ‘I have a spell that would evaporate the water, yes,’ he said. ‘But it involves summoning an inferno.’

  ‘I think I’ve had enough of your infernos,’ Melai told him.

  Gargaron shrugged. ‘Though if this goes on much longer, I might prefer one.’

  ‘Am I the only one who be enjoying this?’ Locke asked with a smile.

  Judging by the muted replies, her were.

  They soon met tall grasses that swished against them, and in places, without Razor nor Grimah present to boost their height, both Hawkmoth and Gargaron faced the uncustomary circumstance of having the grass loom high above their heads. But in patches where the grasses grew not so tall, or where they had been trampled flat by some unknown beast, they admired fluttering upon the air to their north the sight of a number of colossal butterflies with brilliant red wings and glistening black bodies; a group of them appeared to be suckling on the juices of dead things hidden in the grasses.

  To see something living aside from themselves after so long stopped Hawkmoth’s group for a short while. And so engrossed by the sight that none of them realised the upwards deluge had finally petered out.

  ‘What be those?’ Locke wondered aloud. ‘I have never before seen such wondrous creatures.’

  ‘Dead Skarlets, be their name,’ Hawkmoth told him. ‘And we would do well to keep our distance. Pretty they may be, but they are also both poisonous and deadly. They exude a corrosive gas when threatened, and if you stray too close, they will thrust their proboscis through you and fire off a high-powered jet of gas into your innards that will blow you apart, inside out.’

  ‘Well, I can’t speak for the rest of you,’ Gargaron said, ‘but I don’t much fancy such a death today.’

  7

  They pressed on but were forced into small detours here and there from their westways path to avoid running into the majestic Dead Skarlets that seemed numerous in number here. Hawkmoth speculated that they were likely in league with the witches, which is why their numbers had been sustained. At one stage they happened by accident to pass in close proximity to one hidden amidst the tall grass. It were suckling on the juices of a two-headed grass serpent. Zebra’s forked tongue flicked in and out rapidly, as if sensing the demise of one similar to her own kind.

  As they pushed onwards they began to see signs of other insects, drawn from the undergrowth by their traipsing; no bug as big as the Dead Skarlets but there were beetles the size of Gargaron’s head. Many had already perished; their corpses lay upturned, legs knotted inwards, unmoving, dead. Colossal sized dragonflies lay drowned in pockets of marsh water, being nibbled at by a small species of water horse Gargaron had never before laid his eyes upon. Some dragonflies still flitted about but mostly these seemed to crash into the grass, untangle themselves, take off, fly away, sometimes upside-down before ditching sickly into the grass again.

  Toward the end of their time crossing this grassy expanse Hawkmoth’s small fellowship watched a flock of black ibis swoop down to peck at dying beetles. These ibis stood almost as tall as Gargaron and watched with beady black eyes the group pass by. Melai in particular kept her distance, or stayed close to Gargaron, for she surely would have proven a tasty morsel to them. Still, observing them gave her some food for thought. ‘Maybe there be hope for us yet,’ she said aloud after they had left the tall wicked looking birds behind. ‘With all this presence of life, maybe all is not lost.’

  ‘It tells me we are closing in on the borders of the witch realm,’ Hawkmoth told her. ‘It tells me these witches are indeed the cause for all the outside death and doom. While they keep their own creatures alive, similar to the enchantment I set upon the hill around my humble abode, they have committed all else to die.’

  ‘How certain are you that if we return this, this thing of theirs,’ Gargaron said, glancing at the bundle strapped to the flank of Locke’s serpent, ‘that it will bring an end to hostilities?’

  Hawkmoth drew in a deep breath. ‘As certain as I can be.’ He looked across at the giant. ‘Or else I would not be here.’

  ‘And should these witches prove difficult,’ Locke said, ‘did you find means with which to coerce them in your Lord Brother’s chambers?’

  Hawkmoth did not reply for several moments. When he did he said this: ‘Aye, I have what I need with me.’

  VANTASIA

  1

  THE forest were an ancient and enchanted place, that much Melai sensed. As they met its fringe and then pushed into it, she felt its ghosts going back thousands of years. The oaks were thick and gnarled and twisted and covered in moss of yellow and green. The ground were damp and grassy underfoot and the smell were wet and muddy, thick with the odours of slow rotting wood, of hidden beetles and slugs. And the sky were not visible above, such were Dark Wood’s deep canopy. They soon found the going were dim and murky and in any direction they could see barely more than two dozen feet.

  At first they stumbled over root and knotted shrub. But then it were as if the woods sensed the presence of Mama Vekh and thus a path looked as if to open out before them. Old, twisted roots seemed to pull up and curl aside, shrubs seemed to move, until a bending, curving trail through fallen brown leaves appeared before the group of travelers.

  Locke, leading the way on Zebra, pulled the procession to a halt. Gargaron and Hawkmoth stood alongside the serpent. Melai, who had been in flight, swooped down and landed upon Gargaron’s shoulder.

  ‘I have never seen a woods move,’ Locke commented.

  ‘The witches know of our coming now,’ Hawkmoth said confidently, watching the Dark Wood slowly part.

  ‘But do they welcome us?’ Gargaron asked. ‘Or do they steer us to our doom?’

  A good point, Hawkmoth knew. Without his insect scouts to fly forth and survey the paths ahead he were unable to ascertain whether or not he and his troupe were being lead unto danger.

  ‘Either way,’ Locke said, with a grin, ‘it should make for an exciting trek forward.’

  2

  As they trailed the strange winding pathways that opened up in front of them Hawkmoth came aware of stick-men, tree critters, hidden in the woods. They were tall beings, spindly, red of eye, green of tongue, witch spies meant to go unseen, camouflaged against the general woodland and difficult to glimpse. Neither Gargaron nor Locke commented on them, so Hawkmoth surmised they had not seen them. Though he knew Melai must have for the strange looks she delivered him, questioning looks, as if asking silently what they were.

  Later though, Hawkmoth realised none were actually alive. A revelation that disturbed him. He had assumed that Dark Wood and its many varied minions and entities had been spared the wrath of the witch’s boom weapons. But here death, like all the lands beyond, had reached out its ungodly hand.

  3

  Hawkmoth’s troupe were upon Vantasia before they realised it. The oaks and elms thinned, and here be
fore the group, were peculiar wicker abodes, constructed from the strange dark wicker wood growing in this area. The wood had not been cut from its mother plant but instead, pulled and fashioned from the long thin living branches, hundreds, thousands of strands, like trussed hair, formed and fashioned into dwellings. Branches of ancient oaks created a ceiling above, and somehow there were beauty to the organic formation of this village. And a peculiar brownish light from the heavily filtered sunlight beyond, illuminated the area.

  The place were also strangely empty.

  Nonetheless, Gargaron had drawn his sword, suspicious of the silence. ‘Where be they?’

  Hawkmoth gripped his staff, as if sensing some imminent attack.

  ‘Hawkmoth?’ Gargaron said. ‘Where be these witches? Be this a trap?’

  ‘I cannot tell. Perhaps due to war, the settlement has been abandoned.’

  ‘Or perhaps the witches lie hidden in wait,’ Melai suggested, her bow ready to fire at the first sign of provocation.

  They waited. Naught happened.

  Hawkmoth began to weave his way slowly through the settlement, staff held at the ready. At darkened doorways into the wicker huts he prod his staff, pulses of intense, searing violet light, flashing from Rashel’s eyes. If it were intended to flush witches from within it did not work. Still, Hawkmoth proceeded to following hut to repeat his actions. And so on…

  As they spread out and moved through Vantasia, Gargaron were reminded a little of home. Here, the village were like Hovel, in the sense that everything encircled a central structure. Where Hovel bore sacrificial megaliths, here in Vantasia the central structure were a large wicker dwelling, a building double in size and height to the dwellings surrounding it.

  It were here, before this larger abode that Hawkmoth took up stance. ‘To the leaders of Vantasia,’ he called out, his voice like a bomb in that silence, ‘I am Hawkmoth Lifegiver, banished sorcerer of Sanctuary. Hear me, I implore. We come in peace. We return to you Mama Vekh in hopes that we may finally put an end to this ridiculous war started by my Brothers. If needs be, then I give myself over to you, where you may hold me for a hundred years as my foolish brothers held Mama Vekh. If needs be, I offer up my life to end this conflict, to put an end to your boom weapons. Too many have died and are dying. Far too many. Hear me now, please, I implore you.’

  His voice echoed off into the gloomy woodland. Gargaron and Melai and Locke looked around, anticipating now either an attack by the witches or some acceptance of Hawkmoth’s offer.

  Nothing happened.

  Melai now regarded Hawkmoth. ‘Tell me you are jesting.’

  All eyes turned to her. But hers were solely on that of Hawkmoth’s.

  ‘You speak to me?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘What you said just now, you were jesting, surely.’

  His brow wrinkled. ‘Jesting?’

  ‘About giving yourself over to the witches. About giving over your life.’

  All eyes now went to the sorcerer.

  Hawkmoth sighed. ‘Melai, the witches dish out justice in the old ways. A hand for a hand. A leg for a leg.’

  ‘So, what are you saying?’

  ‘If it means my dear wife remains alive, that all the animals I have saved shall live on, that you my friends, can set forth from here and eek out some sort of life after all of this, then so be it. I give myself over to the witches so that they may do with me as they please.’

  Melai frowned. ‘No. No, that is folly. You can’t.’

  ‘Dear woods nymph, if they shall not simply accept the return of Mama Vekh, if I must offer myself up for the same type of incarceration we delivered upon her, then so be it.’

  Melai was silent. Just eyeing him. ‘You are serious then.’

  ‘As serious and as honest as I’ll ever be. I am Hawkmoth Lifegiver. Life, in all its varied and wonderful forms, is sacred. If delivering myself to the whims of the witches, if they promise to stop their boom weapons, if life flourishes on Godrik’s Vale once more, then I go unto them a happy soul.’

  ‘But, what we will do?’ Melai asked. ‘You cannot leave us.’ She looked toward the giant. ‘Gargaron tell him.’

  But Gargaron could see in the sorcerer’s eyes the truth of his conviction. And knew that naught could he say that would change Hawkmoth’s mind. ‘Maybe the return of this Mama Vekh will be enough,’ was all Gargaron could offer in that moment. ‘And they shall leave our sorcerer free to remain in our company.’

  Hawkmoth stepped to Melai. He knealt and touched her arm gently. ‘I am touched by your concern, dear nymph of Thoonsk. Truly I am. But no more discussion on this subject. My mind be made up.’ He smiled.

  Melai nodded. Though a sadness were in her eyes. And her own hand she placed upon Hawkmoth’s.

  Locke cleared his throat, loud enough to arrest the attention of his companions. ‘I would not imagine the witches will want you anyway, sorcerer,’ he said. ‘Why they would wish to have a wrinkled old man amongst their number be anyone’s guess.’ He laughed and looked around at Gargaron.

  Gargaron smiled.

  ‘Besides you cannot cook to save your life,’ Locke continued. ‘The bacon and eggs you served me up the first morning we met, I tell you giant and woods nymph both, it were naught fit for pigs.’

  ‘Just as well then that I do not offer myself to them as a culinary chef,’ Hawkmoth responded.

  Locke grinned. ‘No, just as well.’

  Hawkmoth stood again and Lokce looked about the empty village, folding his arms across his chest. ‘Anyhow,’ he said, ‘it be obvious that Vantasia lies abandoned. So, what now, good sorcerer?’

  ­Hawkmoth considered this. Taking in his surroundings for anything he may have missed. ‘Well… in Sanctuary, my Brothers spoke of a fabled place where witches would retreat to in times of war. Dorubudur. A temple. Some place so old it predates all of our civilisations. Somewhere hidden away within Dark Wood.’

  ‘Lead on then, sorcerer,’ ordered Locke, ‘if you know where this place be.’

  Hawkmoth smiled. ‘Oh, I know not where it be, my good shore dweller. But I believe I know how we may find it.’ He took another item from his robe pocket, what looked to be a stick and knelt. ‘Fayn uss diss rannawayss weetchus.’ He then snapped it over his knee. From it there drifted a ghostly blue mist that hugged the dark leafy earyth, swirling softly, highlighting it seemed old footprints. Now it appeared to take on the form of a small being. Some sort of hare that ambled on its hind legs. It sniffed the air, looked about then ran from the settlement. ‘Ah, here we go,’ Hawkmoth said, ‘come on,’ and after it he and his companions promptly trailed.

  CAHSSI OF THE XOORD

  1

  THE blue hare lead them on a meandering path for hours. And as they traipsed on and on Gargaron wished for Grimah, such were the pace of this ghostly entity they trailed. Melai flew effortlessly and kept looking back where Gargaron had begun to lag behind. Hawkmoth were not far abreast of him. Locke, astride his serpent and well ahead of the others would call out continuously, ‘What’s keeping you pair?’ And they would hear his laughter ring out through the wood.

  ‘I shall ring your neck when I catch you!’ Gargaron yelled.

  ‘Oh well, there you are then,’ Locke called back to him, ‘some incentive to quicken your pace!’

  All banter ceased however when the thick set oaks and beeches and elms began to thin all of a sudden late that day and a mighty clearing opened out. Like Vantasia, this place too cowered beneath a ceiling of far reaching tree branch. But here were a place made of stone, not wicker, a place of stone blocks and crumbling mortar, where twisting strangler trees had grown up from amidst peculiar ruins, their roots curling in and out of ancient stonework.

  ‘Where are we?’ Gargaron asked and hushly Hawkmoth told them, ‘Here be Dorubudur.’

  There were signs of recent activity and perhaps habitation. Cat bones hanging from trees, animal skulls, tusked troll skulls, lining the tops of worn, crumbled walls. Some
of the stonework had been painted too. Walls washed red by blood, Hawkmoth felt, and the guts and innards of intruders laid out on the surface of sloping walls in a rough pattern of the individuals they once belonged to, teeth and tongues and eyes completing these macabre portraits.

  No sooner had the traveling group emerged from the Dark Wood, than they heard the march of boots upon rock and there emerged before them an army of skeleton warriors, clad haphazardly in armour, some bearing shields, and nearly all wielding some kind of weapon; maces, swords, morning stars, halberds, weapons and gear no doubt stolen from foot soldiers from kingdoms far afield. Hawkmoth knew that many of these skeleton men were what remained of those fallen foot soldiers; slain by the witches, left to rot, and finally enchanted, their meatless bodies rising and sent out as sentries, guards or warriors to do the bidding of their new masters.

  The foul reek that Gargaron and his friends had detected on arrival grew ever stronger now as the skeleton guard pressed forward.

  Locke laughed. ‘Ah at last, this day begins to meet my expectations.’ He had withdrawn his moon-blade, smiling all the while.

  Hawkmoth motioned for his companions to wait. He stepped forward and spoke aloud to whichever intelligent ears listened beyond this skeleton army.

  ‘Forgive our intrusion, but I am Hawkmoth Lifegiver, banished sorcerer of Sanctuary. I have with me friends from afar. The giant, Gargaron Stoneheart of Hovel. Forest nymph, Melai Willowborne of Thoonsk. Shore dweller, Sir Rishley Locke, of Barnacle-On-Sea. So hear me, if you will. We come in peace, and in hope that we may finally put an end to this war that has raged for centuries beyond count. I return to you Mama Vekh. If you require it, I shall gladly give myself over to your keeping, if you desire it, hold me for a hundred years, for that is how long my foolish brothers held your Mama Vekh. If that be not enough, then let me offer up my life to end this conflict. But I plead, lay your boom weapons to rest. The world is almost at its end, enough blood has been shed. Let those that still live, live out their days in peace. Hear me now, please, I implore you.’

  There were no let-up in the eagerness of the skeleton warriors, grunting, hissing, pushing and heaving against Hawkmoth’s invisible force field. It told Hawkmoth one thing: that the witches had not changed their command, that they believed Hawkmoth were an advanced attack party.

  He sighed, and glanced left and right at his companions. ‘Looks like the witches are proving as stubborn as my Brothers. We have no choice but to fight.’

  Locke grinned. ‘Oh, how sad.’

  ‘So be it,’ Gargaron said, slurping down some strange brew from a blue gourd, a brew that granted him a heightened battle mind. ‘Then let us be done with it.’

  Locke frowned. ‘I say, Gargaron. Might I ask what you are taking there, my friend?’

  Gargaron shrugged. ‘Something of my village druids’ making. Nectre of Newtlilly. A little pain ease is all. I shan’t be caught out again like I were with those damn Bewitched.’

  Locke smiled. ‘Pain ease, you say.’

  ‘Aye.’

  ‘You mind if I sampled a small drop?’

  Gargaron shrugged and tossed the gourd over to Locke who caught it and studied it closely. He then popped off its lid, tilted it to Gargaron before pouring a measure down his throat. And then just to be sure, a second measure…

  ‘Right then,’ Hawkmoth called out to any witch ears that may have been listening. ‘To the leaders of Vantasia…’ His voice seemed to carry loud across the ruins. ‘Have it your way!’

  2

  Hawkmoth slammed down his staff, point first into the ground and the wall of blue light holding the skeleton army at bay pulsed and altered form, taking on the shape of mighty mastodon beasts that then charged into the formation of warriors, knocking a hundred of them flying in a hundred different directions.

  Gargaron, Locke and Melai took this as a command to attack. And attack they did. Furiously.

  Locke heard music. The stirring tunes of the eighteen-string shelled jhotar, and shore horns and the haunting voices of beautiful crabwomen in song. He were not certain whether the song existed simply in his mind but to him it felt as though it rang out through the woodland. That everyone present could hear it. And it inspired him, strengthened him, boosted him.

  Gargaron heard whispers, the voices of the female sprites of the Summer Woods bordering Hovel, voices that warned of an attacker he could not see, and helped him anticipate attacks he did not see coming. Throwing his sword at thin air only to have it deflect a swinging blow by some boneman. Swinging his sword out behind him, out of his range of sight, collecting attacks. He charged headlong into mobs of these bonemen, swinging, slashing, parrying, stabbing, pushing his great sword between their ribs before twisting the blade and tearing the fiends apart from inside out. Either that or he dashed them up against trees, splintering them.

  Hawkmoth used the world around him: enchanting strangler trees, getting them to come to life, their roots like the tentacles of octopus; roots that grabbed armfuls of skeletals, crushing them, squeezing them, grinding them to dust and splinters, branches that swept great masses of bonemen aside in single thrusts.

  Melai used specific arrows, ones containing gooey sap that roped and stuck her attackers to one another, rendering them immobile, to be battered to shards by a graceful Gargaron.

  Locke continued on his crazy berserk frenzy, roaring and skittering out into mobs of skeletons, lost amidst their numbers. The darts of his blowflute proved mostly ineffective; more seemed to miss their targets than hit. So he allowed his moon-blade do the cutting, each thrust sizzling, slicing through the skeletons like molten steel through fat. More than once Melai and Gargaron narrowly avoided being struck by his frenzied assault. But Locke seemed oblivious to it, yelling and laughing and talking to the enemy as he cut them down. ‘Come to the light,’ he yelled, ‘come on!’ and then, ‘Ha, there you go, have at it. Go on, have at it!’ Then when he found himself swamped, or his arms pinned, he drove his head at boneman sternum, burrowing his horns into ribs, and with a violent twist of his head, pulled torsos apart in an explosion of shattered bone.

  Zebra slashed and bit and hissed and tore, and discarded bones flew every which way, like splinters of a wooden abode ripped apart in a storm. At one stage the skeletons of giants emerged and Gargaron told the others they were his. And off he went, battering, slashing, taking on these enormous fiends who wielded morning stars and maces. Once or twice he were clobbered, and his shield were smashed to bits. But he soon had the upper hand, hacking off their arms or legs before relieving them of their hissing, whining skulls.

  In the end there remained but a few scattered skeleton men, giant or otherwise, broken and injured, writhing about the ruins, unable to stand or continue their fight; some with dark vapour wisping from cracks in their skulls, others oozing reeking orange marrow from rents in their limbs.

  Locke stood there wild-eyed and panting, looking about bewildered, as if he had just woken up to what he’d been doing. The stirring music had gone from the world, now just the sound of his breathing, and the irksome scratch of busted bone against stone and ruins as bonemen writhed weakly where they had fallen.

  Gargaron, more accustomed to the effects of his war syrup, simply stood there, taking in water, his muscles fatigued.

  Hawkmoth strode forward, stepping over dying skeletons, climbing up the ruins, clasping his staff. ‘Stay alert,’ he ordered his companions. ‘The next wave I fear will be the witches. And they shall be a far tougher force to reckon with.’

  But as he reached the height of the ruins he suddenly stopped in his tracks. For there they were, watching him. The witches. Thus he froze.

  3

  Something about the scene puzzled him.

  The attack he had anticipated did not come. Mighty vanguards of witches on the backs of lizard steeds did not appear. All he saw, and it left him greatly suspicious, were a handful of emaciated, terrified hags cowering beneath an overhanging rock shelf.

&n
bsp; Gargaron and Melai drew up carefully on Hawkmoth’s flanks. Each of them gazing down at the group of witches. Gargaron could not help but feel both a mixture of fear and anger as he set his eyes upon them. Fear that the formidable beings he had come so far to see were now suddenly right before him, and anger that here were the very folk who had caused the death of his girls, the death of all his friends, his home, the deaths of millions across Godrik’s Vale. Melai too felt anger, but she also felt pity for instantly she saw the witches were in a terrible state.

  Locke did not concern himself with these witches. Still partly jacked up on Gargaron’s war juice, he had taken it upon himself to scurry about on his serpent, taking up skulls as trophies, hooking them to the sides of his serpent’s saddle.

  ‘Do not be fooled,’ Hawkmoth warned Melai and Gargaron. ‘They fool us to lull us. Their attack will come. Of that you can be certain.’

  4

  The attack however did not eventuate.

  The witches remained huddled there, watching their invaders.

  They were ashen skinned beings, Gargaron observed, bony, bug-eyed, black toothed. They wore piercings through their upper arms and legs. And they had bulbous sacks of flesh hanging from the sides of their bellies. Gargaron initially took these to be breasts. But each sack were perforated by a blackened opening, and Gargaron recalled now tales about witches storing and carrying tinctures, poisons and mind altering brews inside them.

  As he watched, one of them, an older more haggard looking thing, squeezed several wisping grey, viscous bubbles from one of those sacks in her belly and threatened to throw them at Hawkmoth if he came any closer. ‘Leave us!’ she howled. ‘You have done enough! Leave us be!’

  Hawkmoth withdrew his staff and held out his spare hand, as a conciliatory gesture. ‘Wait,’ he said, ‘please, do not release your ghost stones. We come in peace.’

  The hag laughed. ‘Peace? Ha! What would you know of peace?! You decimate us, you decimate our armies! Why sing peace when all you know is dealing death?!’

  Hawkmoth frowned. ‘If it be the army of these bonemen you speak of then we decimated them merely as a measure of self-defence. I did herald our arrival and intentions. Did you not hear it?’

  ‘Aye, we heard it, sevuck! But why should we trust the poison from the mouth of one such as you?!’

  Hawkmoth frowned again. He knelt now and unhitched the bundle from his shoulders. He lay it before the witches, untied it, pulled it open and let them feast their eyes upon its contents.

  He stood and withdrew, allowing them time to absorb and study and accept.

  At first their faces were of disbelief, of suspicion, but quickly it turned to recognition and sorrow. Even anger.

  Hawkmoth spoke up again. ‘I am deeply sorry for her hundred year incarceration. I am deeply sorry that my forebears and current overseers of Sanctuary felt the need to firstly take her from you, and then hold her to ransom. I acknowledge that it has caused your kind undue pain, anger and continued animosity toward my brethren. Therefore, what I said earlier, still stands. So hear me: I offer my life to you, for whichever way you see fit to use it. If you should choose to take my life here today then so be it. If it puts a stop to your boom weapons, if it puts a stop to all this dying, then I wish for only that and nothing more.’

  ‘Leave us,’ the hag screeched. ‘Leave us to our Mother now that she be returned. Are you not satisfied?’

  Hawkmoth bowed. ‘I shall give you time to accept her back. But I shall not leave. Not yet. I will return in one hour to hear your verdict.’

  5

  Hawkmoth retreated, calling back Gargaron and Melai, and they climbed down the ruins to where Locke presided over an excessive number of bone trophies.

  They sat to wait out the hour. Though Hawkmoth surveyed all approaches to these ruins from the surrounding woodland.

  Gargaron watched him. ‘Do you expect an attack?’

  ‘I declare that I do not fully comprehend what is going on here. Though, aye, I feel they delay things while the greater number of their kind surround our position.’

  This comment had them all searching the surrounding forest.

  ‘So you really mean to give your life over to them?’ Melai enquired as they sat there scouring the woodland. ‘I just want to be sure.’

  Hawkmoth nodded. ‘Yes.’

  6

  The hag Hawkmoth had addressed fetched him on the hour. Hawkmoth were chatting amongst his friends, ever speculating on what the witches planned to do, when she approached.

  She stood there, looking ill, weak, withered, emaciated. Gargaron had heard the witches were a tall breed, some as tall as his own kind. But this thing were bent over and hunched, and she were all limb and bone. Her ashen skin ran with a map of dark veins, her bulging eyes were a deep, stone blue.

  ‘We have never pretended to understand the ways of your kind, sorcerer Hawkmoth, nor that of your agenda,’ she croaked weakly. ‘We appreciate the fact that you have returned our dear Mother to us. I am glad to have lived through all my long life to reach this day. But now we ask you to leave so that we may die in peace.’

  Hawkmoth frowned. ‘I do not comprehend. Die? Has your boom curse affected you lot too? I offered myself up to you for you to put a stop to your boom bombs. How is this difficult to comprehend?’

  The witch eyed him closely, and it were her turn to frown. ‘What do you play at?’

  ‘Your boom weapons,’ Hawkmoth said. ‘Don’t you hear my words? I offer my life for you to halt the detonation of your bombs. I cannot paint it any clearer than that. I shall not leave here until I have a deal!’

  She kept frowning. ‘There are no boom weapons, sorcerer. The world is in its death throes. You ought to know this as well as any.’

  ‘I haven’t the time for games,’ Hawkmoth warned. ‘Take me or suffer our wrath.’

  ‘Do not threaten us,’ the hag warned.

  ‘Why? If you will not hear me you leave me no choice.’

  It were Gargaron who stepped forward here, his hand on the sorcerer’s shoulder, enough gentle pressure to suggest the sorcerer should step back, calm down, let someone else have a go at diplomacy.

  Hawkmoth hesitated, though retreated.

  Gargaron knelt, his hand on his heart. ‘Hear me please, oh witch. I am Gargaron Stoneheart of Hovel. I am not your enemy nor have I ever been your enemy. But hear me, I beg of you. I saw you up there, under shelter, with your own kin. Sisters, perhaps. Daughters. Mothers. I do not presume to know. But you are with your own kind, your own blood. I have none left. No blood, no kind such as I. Nor does Melai. Nor Locke. Some great blight has killed nearly all beyond these woods. We were informed that those of your kind, and I am not saying it were you nor those up there sheltering, but that witches are the cause of it. I sense now however, you know another truth. Pray you tell us. For the sake of my dearly departed wife and daughter.’

  The witch hardly moved, but her eyes did search him deeply he saw. And in the end she slumped against a rock and weakly spoke. ‘Whatever treachery this is, whatever rolls out across the world killing most and all, be not of our doing. And these boom weapons, I do not know of which you speak. If it be the shockwaves that bombard us periodically then it be naught to do with us. We thought initially that it were these sorcerers of Sanctuary, one final campaign to wipe us out. So with all our remaining reserves we conducted a counter strike upon Sanctuary. Only to find the place decimated and overrun with dark entities unknown even to us. We were forced to retreat. My sisters were beginning to succumb to some mysterious ailment. We assumed it to be some sickness orchestrated by the sorcerers. And the shockwaves kept coming, shaking our home, killing more.

  ‘Sadly, we are all that remain of our kind now. All our mothers have perished. Maychild the Fair. Hyndilla the Sleeper. Chianay Timethief. Pinnezelle Skywitch of Bluefield. None of them with their mighty magic could withstand this dark tide.’

  Gargaron blinked as he heard the names of these witches. ‘Chi
anay?’ he asked. ‘She who distorts time?’

  The hag gazed at him, wondering how he had heard of one of the Revered Ones.

  ‘Aye, even she. All of them perished. And it were not until we retreated here that we discovered what be killing us all. For, now we know there is naught to be done… but die.’

  Gargaron, Melai, Locke, even Hawkmoth now, all watched her keenly, fascinated, intrigued, confused, waiting for her to go on, to tell them the secret of this mystery.

  ‘What be it, pray tell?’ Gargaron asked. ‘What be the cause of this great dying?’

  The witch coughed. Dark green phlegm spluttered over her lips. ‘Return me to my kind, if you will. And I shall tell you.’

  Hawkmoth stepped forward here and this time it were he warding Gargaron back with a gentle hand. Gargaron, who had been about to take the witch into his grasp, looked around at him.

  ‘Please,’ Hawkmoth said. ‘Let me. My kind owe her and hers much. It be a small token, but it should be I.’

  Gargaron nodded and the witch did not object. She even raised her hand to him. ‘Come then, enemy, help me to my sisters.’

  Hawkmoth crouched and shuffled his arms beneath her bony frame and he hoisted her effortlessly into his grasp. Together they returned to the shelter, Gargaron, Melai and Locke all following. The other witches were hunched around Mama Vekh, as if their passing would be eased by her presence. Here Hawkmoth lay down the witch.

  ‘What be your name?’ he asked her.

  ‘Cahssi of the Xoord.’

  ‘And pray tell us, Cahssi, what are we facing?’

  ‘Mortatha. The End Times. Cloudfyre Falling.’

  RECORD OF GHARTST

  1

  ‘THESE are the ruins of cities once belonging to men,’ Cahssi told him. ‘They stood before the last Great Fall. Eons beyond eons lost to time and lore. And may stand here again if those of the Void do not find it.’

  Hawkmoth frowned. ‘Those of the Void?’

  ‘The formless demons that invade our lands.’

  ‘The Dark Ones,’ Gargaron murmured.

  ‘Aye, whatever name you know them, they have crawled from their barrows from where they have lain for ten thousand years. They wreak havoc now throughout our country, and perhaps by now have spread throughout all countries of Cloudfyre. They spread poison on the air and contaminate our rivers and oceans and they pummel the living and leave no trace of towns and cities. Everything be in peril and none can halt their march.’

  ‘Can they be stopped?’

  ‘If there be a way, I know it not.’ She watched them, saw the skepticism in the sorcerer’s eyes. ‘If you won’t believe me then cast your gaze across the paintings in this cave and you will learn their story soon enough.’

  Hawkmoth looked up, surveying the inside of the strange shelter. But could not see much in the lightless parts. ‘What be it we face?’

  This Cahssi breathed hoarsely. But managed to speak. ‘I told you. Mortatha. Cloudfyre Falling. As it is written on these walls.’

  He frowned at her. ‘Mortatha?’

  ‘Aye. Recorded and foretold here by the hands of those of Ghartst.’

  ‘Ghartst?’ Hawkmoth did not comprehend. The tablets Skitecrow in Sanctuary had spoken of were of Ghartst. He blinked, perplexed.

  He stood, hefted his staff about and scratched it against the wall and Rashel’s eyes gave off soft illuminating light.

  Cave paintings became apparent. Ancient beyond ancient. And Hawkmoth had an immediate sense of tremendous age. Twenty thousand, forty thousand, perhaps as much as fifty thousand years these dated.

  And what they showed chilled his veins like nothing had ever in his long life.

  Dark Ones. Harbingers. Those of the Void, as Cahssi had named them. Of many shapes, many sizes. Black, bright of eye. About them there were naught but death, destruction, shockwaves. And every now and then stood depictions of immense bell towers—objects Hawkmoth did not recognise.

  It were all extremely detailed. Set out like a story. Each scene drawn below the other, crude vertical columns of pictographs accompanied by strange Ghartst language characters.

  His companions had crowded up beside him.

  ‘What be this?’ Gargaron asked.

  Hawkmoth tugged at his long beard thoughtfully. ‘How the ancients recorded their tales. There are many such sights in the realm but none so old as this, I feel. And others I have seen are primarily concerned with hunting, with moon worship, with burial of great clan leaders. Some go back two thousand years. Some eight thousand. But none have I ever encountered be of this age.’

  ‘Can you interpret it?’ Melai enquired.

  ‘Some. Not all.’

  ‘What do you read here then?’

  And here Hawkmoth felt the need to concentrate, lest he misinterpret things.

  2

  At first Hawkmoth found it hard to comprehend exactly what he were seeing. There seemed to be countless tales of mass dying, of shockwaves killing people. And of a mysterious virus wiping out entire populations. And folk not knocked off by any of these forces were cut down by legions of Dark Ones. In all so many different shapes and sizes did they come: ones who rode the air, ones who walked the earyth, ones who swam the oceans, ones as small as beetles. The idea seemed that they cleansed, for whatever reason, Cloudfyre of all living things.

  Melus and Gohor, the suns, were also depicted. If Hawkmoth were reading it without fault, it seemed that every ten thousand years Cloudfyre’s orbit kicked off a series of strange catastrophic events. End times, when Cloudfyre’s orbit were pulled violently from one sun’s keeping to the other.

  Last of all, Hawkmoth learned of the Death Bells. The single cause of the boom shocks. Again, if he were interpreting all of this correctly, a ring of these Death Bells, housed at the tops of mighty towers, circled the planet in a north-south band. And their tolling, were primed and activated by Cloudfyre’s orbital phase, namely the commencement of Cloudfyre’s transition from one sun’s gravitational hold to the other.

  When he were done, when he had seen enough, Hawkmoth left the spherical interior of this cave, his chest tight. He wanted fresh air, sunlight, some breeze on his face. None of which he found immediately outside the cave.

  3

  Gargaron remained, studying the cave paintings, trying to glean some meaning from them. He had deciphered some of it. But not all. ‘Hawkmoth?’ he said. ‘What does this mean? Is there still some way here to aid our plight?’

  But Hawkmoth would not answer.

  ‘Three of our kind left for the closest of the Empty Towers, to bring it down,’ the witch, Cahssi, informed them. ‘I believe they have failed. Or perished.’

  ‘What are you talking about?’ Melai asked, fluttering about the cave, studying the diagrams and pictures. ‘What does it all mean?’

  Locke sat patiently outside, trusting that he would be informed of current developments in due course.

  ‘Did you notice Cloudfyre?’ Cahssi called out to Hawkmoth, pointing up at the diagram on the wall. ‘The closest Bell Tower lies north of here… oh so many leagues away. Beyond the Grass Sea. That be where the boom shocks emanate.’

  Hawkmoth did not reply. And would hear no more. He needed space, he needed silence, some place to think.

  Above these ruins a monstrous outcrop of granite loomed like a colossal anvil stretched out above the Dark Wood. Without saying anything he took his leave from his companions and witches and walked off into the woodland. Melai went to go after him, or have someone stop him, but Gargaron called her back.

  ‘Let him go,’ he told her.

  ‘No. Why? Where is he going?’

  ‘Time and space to think things through, I suspect.’

  Melai looked flustered. ‘But I don’t understand. What is going on?’

  Gargaron strolled back into the cave with a sigh. ‘Let us go through this methodically,’ he said. ‘I believe I understand some of it, but cannot comprehend what it yet means for us.’


  ‘It means we all die,’ the witch said.

  Gargaron ignored her and hers all lying there huddled, unconscious, dying. And tried to make sense of the cave paintings for himself.

  4

  Hawkmoth sat at length atop the granite crag, overlooking the woodland and all the world beyond. He did not much else but think of his wife Eve and their little home together and all the animals they kept on their property and all the lives he had saved. It saddened him greatly that he may likely see them no longer, that he had somehow failed them. That his time taken to fetch Mama Vekh back to the witches had taken far too long and had now been wasted.

  He wondered if his Order had known of these Death Bells prior to now. Considering Skitecrow’s claims, maybe they had not. There had long been rumour of mysterious towers, a ring of them at intervals of thousands of miles, that circled Cloudfyre. But they were places none he knew had ever visited. And were said to be impossible to reach; either located in such places that left them difficult to access, or they were imbued with unknown enchantments that could render you dead in an instant, or they were believed sacred and better left alone. Yet, it troubled him that he had lived such a long life on this world and had never known of these Death Bells.

  So, what now? he asked himself.

  Well, there were naught left to do but trek to the closest of these Death Bells, the one that sat atop what Cahssi had named the Empty Tower. It were situated in a perilous place of course, upon an island the cave wall called Vol Mothaak, surrounded by the mysterious Grass Sea. Once there he supposed they would set about dismantling it. The Ghartst diagram appeared to indicate as much. And the final diagram, after the destruction of the Death Bell, showed renewed life, renewed growth, rebirth.

  He supposed that were his last option now. An almost insurmountable task. For, would the destruction of one Death Bell be enough to end the shock and sound waves? Enough to end the disease and dying? Enough to send the Dark Ones back to their barrows? Maybe not for all of Cloudfyre. But perhaps it would be enough at least for Godrik’s Vale. And that were all he could hope for.

  Still, by the time it took to carry out such a task, the enchantment around his home might have fully diminished, and by the time he returned home he would no doubt find his dear Eve perished, if she had not already, and all beasts currently sheltering there dead and rotting.

  Do I send myself on one last errand then? he wondered. Or do I fetch myself home and die peacefully at Eve’s side?

  He sat there and closed his eyes and concentrated his breathing, taking in the sweet, warm air, the sunshine heating his skin.

  5

  When Gargaron found him, Hawkmoth were dispatching his last communiqué to his wife. Gargaron stood back a moment, sensing some sadness from the sorcerer, and watched as Hawkmoth sent his Windracer, that strange wooden boy, on its way.

  Hawkmoth watched it run from there, leap the edge of the outcrop and drop down into Dark Wood, vanished from sight. ‘Right then,’ he said softly. And when he turned to leave he found Gargaron there.

  ‘Be you well?’ Gargaron asked gently.

  They regarded each other for a moment before the sorcerer hefted up his satchel and his staff and walked by the giant. Hawkmoth nodded. ‘Aye. I needed time to think, that is all.’ He stopped and turned to savour the scenery one last time. ‘A lovely view from here don’t you think? You would not think anything were wrong with the world.’

  Gargaron nodded. ‘No, you would not.’ For some moments both of them stood in silence, surveying the vast vista.

  ‘I saw my Eve in my daydreams,’ Hawkmoth said softly. ‘The curse of this Doom chips slowly away at the boundary of the enchantment I placed around my hill and home. Soon it shall be gone and my dear Eve exposed and everything I sought to harbour from this curse will die.’

  Gargaron eyed him, sorry the sorcerer were facing this predicament so far from his wife. He himself could not fathom what the sorcerer were feeling.

  ‘Even her Grey Huntress will fail to protect her, I fear.’

  Gargaron looked puzzled. ‘Grey Huntress?’

  Hawkmoth took a moment to answer, and when he did it were with the air of someone distant in thought. ‘A wraith. Her guardian. One that can swallow foes and render them unconscious or dead.’

  Gargaron thought back to the day he and Melai had arrived at sorcerer’s cottage on Dead Man’s hill. Something had been standing there, behind them. Something his Nightface had detected far too late. Something that had swallowed them, captured them. He remembered this only now.

  ‘She summoned it to her service after I revived her,’ Hawkmoth said. ‘To keep her from harm if I were ever away from home. But I fear it has not the power to protect her from this Doom.’ He sighed. ‘If I left now for home, would I make it back before she dies?’ He smiled sadly and shook his head. ‘I cannot even but hold her. And with all my learned skills I stand here inept and useless.’

  Gargaron stepped to his side. ‘I would not begrudge you if you turned back. If I knew my wife and daughter remained in Hovel alive yet were facing certain death, then… I do not know how I would feel. But I guess I would want to be with them.’

  Hawkmoth smiled ever so slightly. ‘Still, without Razor, without my zeppelin, I would not make it.’ A flicker of pain crossed his face. ‘My best chance is to press on to this Tower. If we find success in bringing it down then that be the best chance for my Eve.’

  ‘Aye, and if not, we die trying.’

  Hawkmoth gave a wan smile. And gripped Gargaron’s shoulder. ‘Aye, giant. We die trying.’ He regarded the giant for a moment longer. ‘I am sorry that Chianay Timethief be dead. I know you had hoped one day to call on her powers. To return to you your girls.’

  Gargaron said nothing, simply drew in a deep breath. ‘Were too much to hope for, I feel.’

  ‘And yet hope be all we have left.’ He clapped the giant on his shoulder. ‘Come now, friend,’ he said. ‘We have one last mission before us.’

  6

  When they reached the round cave again, Hawkmoth saw that the witches had perished. All save for Cahssi. She had draped her kin in the skins of her foremothers, from face to foot, and had emptied their bellies, withdrawing their innards and lying them, still attached, around their torsos. She had also sliced the corners of their mouths to their ears, and removed their tongues, lying these beside their necks. Their mouths, seen faintly beneath the layer of thin transparent skin, gaped wide, large enough now to permit someone’s fist. Hawkmoth had heard of this ritual but one he had never witnessed. They believed the spirits of their ancestors would come to take these bodies, but in order to carry them away, they must be able to fit inside each one, to “wear” them, in order to lift them.

  Cahssi’s hands were blood stained up to her scrawny forearms, and she had painted some of it on her forehead, one stripe for each death it seemed for she had seven stripes in all. She gazed up at the sorcerer. ‘I do not understand it. Why are some of us dying so, when some like yourselves remain so vibrant and alive?’

  ‘I have no answer for you,’ he said sorrowful. ‘But we must leave now.’ He pulled his eyes up from her eviscerated kin. ‘If I read these walls correctly then it tells me we have one last chance of stopping this blight.’ He looked around at Melai, at Locke, hoping all would hear what he had to say. ‘But the land where this Death Bell be situated be sadly far, far away. It will take us some traveling to reach it. Shall we remain alive long enough is something I cannot tell. But if you, my companions, wish to join me on one last quest, then I would be honoured to have you along, but we ought leave without further delay.’

  Cahssi watched them from where she sat upon the rocks. ‘You have returned Mama Vekh to us. For that I am grateful. So… let me assist you now.’

  She went to stand but wobbled, and threatened to fall until Gargaron took her arm. She looked up at him. She squeezed his hand before she allowed him take her weight. There were a sensation of unease, even a stinging feeling in his f
ingers, as she did it. But she looked deep into his eyes. He thought she meant to say something but whatever it were she held it to herself. ‘You needn’t take weeks,’ she said. ‘I will show you a quicker way.’

  SLÜV THE VANISHER

  1

  THE Vanisher were situated in what seemed the deepest part of the Dark Wood, an area where the trees possessed bizarre twisted trunks that cork-screwed from rock and leaf matter and heavy black-purple soil, bending upwards this way and that. The crowns of these peculiar trees seemed intertwined and intricately woven together, as though this place were impenetrable from the air. (Indeed Hawkmoth had heard of such places governed by witches, where you could fall upon the roof of a forest and not fall through, instead snared within its thorny netting, you would be subsequently penetrated by tendrils with tiny mouths that would slowly suck the juices from your body.) Hawkmoth looked up once or twice. The canopy permitted such small amounts of sunlight but here and there he were certain he glimpsed the bony remains of creatures sucked dry, silhouetted against the sky.

  The land dipped away into a vast bowl and the ground became soggy and marshy. There were bugs here still living, flitting about the faces of Hawkmoth, Gargaron, Melai and Locke, though they seemed to leave the witch be, though it were evident they were dying, flying in mindless circular motions, spiralling down into the boggy ground where millions of their kind had already come to rest; the ground here seemed to be alive, writhing, wriggling, buzzing with dying insects great and small.

  Hawkmoth frowned, looking about. Though a diffused yellow light hung about the canopy, it were as if permanent night had descended upon this realm. And there were a strange sensation that the woodland were attempting to bury he and his friends. The trees grew taller and more dense. The ground dipped further. Until in the end Hawkmoth and his fellowship could but faintly see the canopy, so high and so far it hung above them.

  2

  Hawkmoth brought Rashel’s eyes to glow, and Gargaron his lantern, and together they lit a vast swathe of this cheerless forest. Even so, the place were still sapped of colour. Trees, leaves, any rambling brambles were all dark and black. Aside from the light of Hawkmoth’s staff, of Gargaron’s lantern, what little light there were seemed to come from bioluminescent plants; lichen, or toadstools. Even some bark. But a subdued, dark yellow light it were, nothing so bright and cheerful.

  ‘Where do you take us?’ Hawkmoth asked the witch, suspicious that this were some intricate ploy to get rid of him and his company.

  Cahssi had weakened markedly, almost too weak now even to speak. She pointed with a limp, emaciated arm. Forward, it seemed to say, unto darkness.

  It made Hawkmoth and Melai nervous. Locke, astride his serpent, still nursed a splitting headache thanks to Gargaron’s war juice; he felt as though he’d polished off an entire hogshead of strong Coral Coast Ale. Yet he relished the subdued light. And the coolness of the woodland.

  Gargaron however, surged forward where the others seemed reluctant, his boots pushing down in the mud and bog.

  ‘Careful,’ Melai warned him hushly.

  ‘All be well,’ he reassured her, looking from her to Hawkmoth. ‘All be well. I see her thoughts. She speaks true. We face no trap. Trust me.’

  It is not you I question, Hawkmoth thought.

  3

  Finally when it seemed all light had been sucked from the woods, Cahssi of The Xoord rose from her semi-conscious state and looked about. She coughed weakly. ‘Slow now,’ she rasped. ‘She Who Eats All be close.’

  She Who Eats All? Hawkmoth thought. An ambush for certain.

  But he were surprised to hear Gargaron’s voice. ‘Easy, good sorcerer. There be no ambush. She speaks true.’

  And it were here that Hawkmoth frowned as a monstrous shape were glimpsed some distance ahead in the gloom.

  The others saw it too. And the party halted.

  ‘Be that the one of whom you speak?’ Gargaron asked Cahssi.

  ‘Aye, Slüv the Vanisher. Your passage to the Grass Sea.’

  4

  A monstrous demon toad, or a stunted, warted salamander. Gargaron could tell not. It were difficult to discern in the dark. But puffy it were, that much were clear, with fat bulbous limbs, a flabby neck, and its vast lumpy spine nudged the underside of the high canopy. Its enormous, gaping mouth hung ajar, with eyes half open. And there were a cloying stink to it like a million things rotting.

  Gargaron were not alone in wondering how this thing might possibly carry them to a point thousands of leagues away.

  Hawkmoth did not speak aloud his impressions. But Gargaron detected his words like whispers on a breeze: ‘A foul demon if ever I saw one!’

  ‘Take me to her,’ Cahssi asked of Gargaron.

  Gargaron tread forward slowly, this immense creature seeming to grow ever larger the closer he drew to it. How long it had sat here slumped in this stinking swamp, Gargaron could not guess, but it were evident the monster could move no longer, such were its crippling weight and bulk. Still, if Gargaron had not felt some sense of safety being in the company of Cahssi, he would have feared its tongue. The toads he’d known (though nowhere near as big) were adept at attacking with such sticky wet appendages, could suffocate, even strangle with them, could draw prey into their gaping mouths at the speed of a lightning strike.

  Still, Gargaron pressed forward, until Cahssi asked to be put on her feet. He did as requested, as if handling a frail doll, lightly, gingerly, carefully. She stood, swaying; he held her upright for a few moments so that she might gain her strength and balance.

  For a while she simply watched Gargaron. She held out her hand to him. He took it out of courtesy. And as he did he heard her voice in his thoughts once again. We are all children of Vhuda. My time on this world is up. But I give what remains of my life to Slüv, for a life force she must consume before she will send folk across distances. So hear me. I would not have helped you and your friends had you not been the earthchild.

  Gargaron blinked at her, confused.

  Aye, she said, as if he had protested, You be the earthchild. Soon the days will begin to run backwards. And from you, a new world will come. But you have work here first.

  Her words shook him. But before he could ask what she meant she turned to face the mountainous toad. She spoke a harsh hissing, gulping language at it. As she did she snatched a blade from what looked to be a sheath fashioned from hair at her hip, a blade that looked much like a beetle wing carved into the form of a short scimitar with an ebony-black hilt. She jabbed it into the top of her leg, puncturing her skin; bubbling, yellow blood, spat from her, and dripped into the marsh where the muddy water steamed and fizzed.

  The toad, Slüv the Vanisher, She Who Eats All, opened its vast mouth and burped out a hideous croak that seemed to shake the woodland around it. Its tongue shot forth, tasting Cahssi’s foul blood.

  ‘It is begun,’ Cahssi said, falling to her knees. ‘She will take me now, and she will deliver you to Rith Gartha, the shores of the Grass Sea.’

  Gargaron and his companions frowned.

  ‘Take down this blight if you can,’ Cahssi said to them and an instant later Slüv’s tongue flicked out once more… and took the witch into its throat.

  Melai gasped, thinking something had gone wrong, that she and her friends would be swallowed into this repulsive creature. As she moved backwards, cords of white light waved over Slüv, like strings of molten silver. More followed. ‘What’s happening?’ she called, but her voice were lost amidst a growing din, some sound omitted from the light, a roar, a squeal. And suddenly the bands of light were so bright that she could barely see. Faintly she saw Hawkmoth moving backwards. And Locke standing there transfixed. ‘Gargaron,’ she squealed. ‘Get back.’

  In front of her, Gargaron did not hear her. Nor could he see anything now. He called out for his companions. But he could not even hear his own voice. He went to back away when he felt something wrap itself around him. Wet and hot and sticky. The toad’s tong
ue. Yet before he had time to protest, it hoisted him off his feet and he felt a strange sensation, of being yanked forward, and then of being hurled across space. And by then the searing light were gone…

  RITH GARTHA

  1

  GARGARON were not certain, but he felt he had been asleep. Or at least had experienced a period of time where he’d possessed no conscious thought. Then he sensed light, and felt air so fresh and clean, and next he knew he were being burped from the mouth of some immense creature.

  Into stark sun light he poured, rolling out over fat puffy lips, splashing against weed and gravel. Along with mucous and spit, Melai flowed out behind him, followed by Locke; Hawkmoth and the serpent were out last together.

  They groaned and moaned and Locke laughed and the serpent hissed, backing up from the toad, rearing up and lashing out at it. Locke lying there, wiping toad phlegm from his face ordered the serpent to stand down, lest it become toad food. Zebra obeyed, slithering off angrily.

  Slowly the others found their feet, slipping, sliding about in the muck, scraping toad spit from their persons, ringing it from their clothes. They edged back from Slüv’s gaping maw and it watched them dumbly with its puffy, idiot eyes. Bands of light began to circle and snap about it. Everyone backed up. Moments later the toad were engulfed in a burning white radiance… and then it suddenly ceased to be there. What remained in its wake were balls of swirling light and a trillion tiny stars floating like water vapour.

  2

  For a while there were naught but stunned silence. Gargaron and Melai, Hawkmoth and Locke, stood there beneath a cloud blotched sky, dripping smelly toad spit, blinking it from their eyes, raking it out of their hair.

  ‘By Ehl Nori Goddess of the Sea,’ Locke said almost breathlessly, shaking thick gobbets of toad spit from his horns. ‘What marvel just befell us all?’

  ‘Have we been transported?’ Melai said, looking about.

  ‘Aye, we have,’ Hawkmoth answered her. ‘It be arcane transference. I, my Order, and all sorcerers have long speculated on how the witches possess the ability to suddenly appear then vanish without trace.’ He grinned. ‘Now I know.’

  They turned to take in their surroundings, seeing southwun hills and an arid land of dirt and weed and some grass. Then their eyes caught sight of the Grass Sea. At a glance it looked like any other ocean. Except it were green in colour and there were something alien about the movement of its waves. Even Melai thought this, she who had never seen the natural ocean in her life. There were no white breakers. No sea spray. No large swells. These things had been common too on the lagoons of Thoonsk. They seemed not to exist out there. Though one thing this sea did have in common with other seas: it were vast and unending and stretched out to horizon and beyond.

  None, as far as Hawkmoth knew, had ever crossed it to the mysterious islands that lay within. And none could swim upon it. The Grass Sea were not like water, buoyant objects did not float here. Everything sunk to its depths that some claimed were a hundred leagues down in parts. Those who fell in, fell and fell and stayed there, joining the dead who it were said walked its darkened seafloor and you could hear their howls on the high winds and if you were not careful they would reach up and drag you down. None could fly over it either, for some inexplicable force drew all flying contraptions and all birds down to it eventually, claiming all. Some said the fabled city of Xanaathii lay out there somewhere, swallowed—some said a hundred leagues down, others said deeper. No fish swam this ocean. No whale. But monsters lurked at the bottom nonetheless, mindless things, who it was said would reach up and prong your feet with razored talons and drag you down.

  Of their group, only Hawkmoth had ever lain eyes on this particular ocean. Of their group, none but he had ever been this far across the continent. Not even Gargaron who were one so well travelled.

  ‘How far have we come?’ Melai asked.

  With one last look to see that the toad had indeed truly gone, Hawkmoth began to wander toward the shoreline. ‘Were I to walk home from here,’ he said, ‘I estimate I’d be gone more than four months.’ Near the shoreline he stopped in the shade of a handful of Hispida trees, his robes fluttering on a gentle wind. ‘Wow, I have quite forgotten how immense it is.’

  ‘You have been here before then?’ Melai asked.

  ‘Aye, many years gone now. One of our initiation rites took place here. We would be tethered to a rope, a rope that were in turn tied off to a tree or some other rigid shore based structure. We would then have to venture out into the grass waves. Walk the alien floor. Submerged. It were meant to conquer your fears but it sent many a young sorcerer insane. Have none of you been this far?’

  Melai shook her head. Locke simply grinned. ‘Good sorcerer,’ he said, ‘if I’m to visit an ocean then I prefer it to be filled with water.’

  Gargaron were still contemplating the spot where Slüv the monstrous toad had sat, still hearing the strange words of Cahssi echoing faintly through his mind. Though he were not even certain what she had said. Except for one thing: You have work here first.

  ‘What say you, giant?’ Locke called back to him. ‘I dare say you’d prefer water over grass!’

  But Gargaron, feeling spooked, failed to hear him.

  3

  Southways, beyond the low hills, there were deserts that stretched for thousands of leagues in any direction. Parched wastelands of sand and rock as hot as fire. As far as Hawkmoth knew, this Grass Sea were surrounded by these deserts. Yet, there were folk who lived here, Hawkmoth knew. Or at least had. A number of villages were situated along the shoreline; all inhabited by reptilian-skinned folk, folk with lizard eyes and forked tongues, and claws where most folk had fingers. They had found ways to traverse this peculiar ocean. A species of giant turtle inhabited this realm. And their shells, dug out and hollowed, were all that floated upon these grass waves.

  Hawkmoth explained as much to his companions as they stood there gazing out across the vast expanse. There were a sense of desolation to their surroundings. As if they had reached the ends of their world. It concerned Melai that this vast “sea” were their next barrier. ‘What lies out there?’ she asked, trying to conceal her trepidation.

  ‘I’m not certain anyone really knows,’ Hawkmoth said. ‘Mysterious islands. Unmapped lands. But somewhere out there beyond the horizon lies our destination.’

  Melai had grown accustomed somewhat to the realms beyond Thoonsk, their open spaces. But mostly what they had in common with her woodland home were trees, vegetation, pockets of water such as rivers or ponds. Out there she saw no trees, nothing beneath which she might retreat and shut her eyes and listen to the wind through leaves and pretend she were safe beneath her willow tree.

  ‘Do we follow the shore then to our destination?’ she asked.

  ‘Afraid we must cross it,’ Hawkmoth told her. ‘Can you not recall? The land we seek be an island. Out there somewhere.’

  It were obvious that there were no such turtle shelled vessels to be seen on this section of shoreline. So Hawkmoth took up his spyglass and fixed it firstly westways, where he saw naught but barren coastline and a pod of dead turtles floating about jagged rocks. Then he turned his spyglass eastways and his eyes narrowed. ‘A settlement I see.’

  He studied it for a while. Hoping he might spot some sign of life, habitation. But sadly there were none.

  ‘Be it this Rith Gartha of which Cahssi spoke?’ Gargaron asked.

  Hawkmoth handed his spyglass to the giant. ‘Take a look. But I guess we’ll not know until we take ourselves to it. Come, let us set off.’

  4

  The settlement were abandoned. No inhabitants, no rotting carcasses, no bones of any kind. Nothing remained but wind blasted huts made of grass-mud bricks. There were close to two dozen such dwellings spread out along the shore line. At rear of village there were something of a boat yard where enormous turtle shells lay piled about, some left in varying states of being scissored up, used to fashion boat hulls. Here a dirt road
lead away to the hills and perhaps it crossed the deserts beyond to take cured turtle meat to distant markets. A number of masts poked from the flat roofs of some village huts, hung with tattered sails that flapped and whipped in the wind. There were even something of a lighthouse, a mud brick construction, the tallest structure of this settlement, most likely situated there to lead ships home on a dark and stormy night.

  The shoreline on the village’s “waterfront” rose up from the surface of the Grass Sea in stunted cliffs several feet high; stunted trees grew from them, leaning out over the grass waves, roots twisted and exposed. A jetty that looked to be built from turtle shell jutted from the shore line and moored to it were a number of turtle-shelled vessels of varying size. Some were small coracles. But there were a couple of larger vessels. A clipper, damaged, half of it sunk, its nose poking toward the sky. And a carrack.

  ‘I think we may have found our transport,’ Hawkmoth announced, gazing out at it.

  Melai studied the ship. It were a large craft, with spacious decks and a tall central mast, its sails currently unfurled. There were the figurehead of a fearsome frilled lizard poking out from the long prow. Yet, although she were from a watery realm, Melai knew nothing of seafaring vessels. The idea of being out there at the whim of this Grass Sea brought her more consternation. ‘What about the Boom shakes?’ she asked. ‘I don’t much like the idea of being stuck out there having to ride out a Boom shake in that vessel?’

  Hawkmoth sighed. ‘We must be resigned to the fact that we have no other choice, dear woods nymph. We must trust in our endeavour to sail this ship through whatever the crossing throws at us.’

  Melai eyed him. ‘And who, of us, knows how to sail such a thing?’

  There were a pause. And eyes turned to the crabman.

  ‘Not sure why you lot search me,’ Locke said with a humoured smile, scratching his Zebra behind her scaly ear.

  ‘You be from the sea,’ Melai said.

  ‘Aye, that I am but how many fish have you ever seen traveling by boat?’ he put to them. And received naught but blank stares. He sighed. ‘For those of us who are just at home beneath water as on land, well, we barely see the point of waterborne craft. Although, this Grass Sea may prove the exception, of course.’

  ‘I have had some experience,’ Gargaron spoke up.

  All eyes turned to the giant.

  ‘My father and I sailed the Greenbanks off and on when I were younger,’ he told them. ‘Perhaps those skills might come back to me once we set sail.’

  ‘Right then,’ Locke said clapping his hands together and rubbing them back and forth vigorously, ‘here be our captain.’

  ‘I stress though that I do not bring to it a wealth of experience.’

  ‘Well, I have some rudimentary knowledge of sailing from text books,’ Hawkmoth said. ‘So perhaps we might simply combine our knowledge.’

  ‘That settles it then,’ Locke said. ‘Now, before we set out, what say we gather some provisions?’ And with belly rumbling the crabman wandered off.

  5

  They found a small building that had a sign reading Oswetqa’s Cured Meats. Inside they found racks of jerky. And not just turtle meat Locke were happy to point out, but cured lizard, giraffe, dog and harpy.

  ‘Pack what we can,’ Hawkmoth said. ‘Impossible to know how long our crossing will take. But we needn’t starve.’

  ‘Not a green in sight,’ Melai observed.

  ‘Ah, but who needs greens when we have salted harpy?’ Locke said cheerfully as if salted harpy were the be all and end all.

  Melai would happily settle for the growing plants inside her pack: their fruits and fungus, their flowers and their sap.

  They found sealed flagons of ale and some strange juice derived from sea grass. As much of it as they could they carried down the mud-brick stairs cut into the shallow cliffs and out across the jetty.

  It were an unsettling thing being now so near the ocean’s edge, with its strange haunting whispers close on either side. Gargaron could not help thinking of Hawkmoth’s strange tales: the dead who roamed the bottom of this sea who would rise up and grab the unsuspecting and haul them in. His arms were full of provisions so he would have had a task reaching for his sword at a moment’s notice.

  But to his relief, while there were whispers from the grass, naught surfaced to bother them.

  The gangplank to the carrack were lost it appeared, perhaps fallen and sunk, or if it were hewn from turtle hide, perhaps it had dislodged and floated away. Gargaron placed his wares on the jetty, took hold of the mooring rope and hauled the ship into dock. He held it firm as it listed upon the soft grass waves and Hawkmoth climbed aboard. Here Hawkmoth scanned the decks, making sure the ship bore the signs that it were indeed abandoned, at least above decks. Locke, able to do so because of his smaller stature, scurried about below decks to report all were deserted. Gargaron tied off the ship to dock and threw their collected wares up to sorcerer and crabman. As this were going on, Melai flew high but landed heavily on deck.

  Hawkmoth were quick to help her back to her feet. ‘Be mindful, child, flying things and this peculiar ocean do not mix well.’ The look on her face as she accepted the sorcerer’s hand were one of rude shock, even fear. That even she would sink here in this sea if she were not careful.

  Once their goods were stowed, Locke jumped back to jetty, mounted Zebra and heeled her aboard. She hissed as she slithered on deck, her tongue flicking wildly, tasting the air as if none of this were to her liking.

  Finally Gargaron called out, ‘Be we set to sail?’

  ‘Aye,’ came Hawkmoth’s reply.

  Gargaron unhitched the mooring rope, heaved the carrack from jetty and scrambled up the side of the vessel as it floated out into the soft grass swells. He had no need to remind himself that this were the Grass Sea, if you fell in, then that were it, if no-one threw you a line, if you could not grab one that was thrown to you, then you sank. It were a constant fear in his thoughts.

  There were a nervous moment when his hand slipped and he were but suspended there from gunwale with naught but his fingers preventing his fall. And with it came a most disconcerting feeling as his legs dangled freely into the surface of the grass, and an unsettling sensation, whether he were simply imagining it or not, of the grass curling up about his boots, beckoning him, tugging him downwards. Hawkmoth grabbed his loose arm, Locke too, and together they managed to get the giant aboard.

  Gargaron had broken out in quite a sweat by the time he stood there on deck, gazing overboard, down at the waving, hissing grass. Sighing, he straightened and looked around at the others. It had been a close call. None wanted to admit it. Except Melai regarded Gargaron with a look that said, ‘You have to be more careful than that.’

  6

  The carrack drifted away from the jetty with no deliberate heading; the binnacle compass swung around and pointed northways while the boat were veering east. That were until Gargaron and Hawkmoth managed to work out a way to raise mainsail. It seemed no easy task even for those who claimed to have sailing knowledge behind them. Gargaron had to stop and laugh. ‘By Thronir, we have come so far only to be thwarted by this simple task.’

  ‘We are but weary from our travels,’ Hawkmoth offered as explanation for their apparent ineptitude.

  ‘Of course,’ Gargaron said laughing again. ‘I’m glad that is all the matter be. Though, if we cannot operate one simple sail, how is it we hope to cross this sea at all?’

  Hawkmoth gave a wry smile, gazing thoughtfully up at the mainmast.

  Locke, although not from a sailing community himself, claimed to have some rudimentary understanding of roping and the like and it were he who brought on the solution. And once their sail were hoisted, it caught the wind, billowed and the carrack shunted forward, catching its crew off balance. Gargaron rushed to the wheel to bring the vessel around before it careered off into shore.

  The boat tilted as the giant steered its prow north to wide open seas and it were her
e he realised he had no clear idea where this Empty Tower lay. ‘Where be this place exactly?’ he called out to Hawkmoth who had wandered off to the foredeck, surveying the way ahead of them.

  Hawkmoth took a moment or two to answer. ‘Well, I’m embarrassed to admit, giant, but I have absolutely no idea. I have only the Ghartst cave paintings to go on. They suggest a large island lies north of here. How far I cannot say. How many days? Who can tell? For now we would do well to simply follow the compass on a northways heading toward the distant horizon. In the meantime I shall consult my maps to see if anything of this ocean be marked upon them. We shall require a spotter though. I have not witnessed them myself but there have long been tales of troughs opening up on this sea and swallowing ships whole.’

  Melai turned and looked around at Gargaron before turning her eye on the sorcerer. ‘Troughs?’ she asked. ‘What do you mean, troughs?’

  ‘Great dark trenches that appear in the grass without warning,’ Hawkmoth answered matter of factly. ‘They regularly take unsuspecting ships down into the grave of this sea. Fortunately they are relatively easy to spot during the day. So we should not fear.’

  ‘You did not think to warn of this before we took to this boat?’ Gargaron asked with a questioning look.

  ‘It has only just come to mind,’ Hawkmoth said.

  ‘And what about night?’ Melai enquired. ‘If this voyage should take us through the dark hours, how might we spot one of these troughs once the suns fall?’

  Hawkmoth nodded, as if considering this. ‘Well, I have a trick or two to light our way of course. Let us worry about that when we come to it, shall we?’

  Gargaron sighed. Boom shakes and now troughs. Were nothing ever simple?

  SEA SCAR

  1

  IT were Melai who volunteered to take to the crow’s nest. Just as well for she were the only one able to climb the mast and fit up there. Except for perhaps Locke. And instead of the prospect frightening her she found the position exhilarating. She remembered her first days away from Thoonsk, how the vast, open and unbreached sky terrified her—that fear of falling upwards with nothing to contain her had been almost too much to bear. But now here she were, perched in a small housing at top of ship, with nothing above her but the entire unending sky. It should’ve terrified her. But instead she breathed deep the air, enjoying the warmth of the sun on her green skin.

  From there she could watch the patterns of the wind move across the grass ocean. Long lines of waves rippled across the surface… ones that altered direction as quick as the wind. The patterns were beautiful, she thought, mesmerising. For as far as she could see, she watched them, entranced.

  Some fifty feet below her, Gargaron bore similar thoughts. He marvelled how quiet it were out here. The sound of the breezes on the grass, the occasional whip and tug of the sail, the subdued creak and groan of the ship and its ropes. He turned and eyed the small port from where they had launched. Rith Gartha were already a distant sight behind them, the jetty almost indistinguishable from the shore line. The lighthouse, the most prominent feature, were almost lost to the haze. And all around them this strange, shifting, waving, ocean of grass; grass the colour of old dried peas. Yet every now and then there emerged a break in the colour with a bloom of red atop the grass. At first Gargaron thought these were blooms of flowers. But up close they looked more like meaty snags of tendrils, curling and writhing. An irrational fear warned him that they might detach, wriggle up the hull of their carrack and make lunch out of its crew.

  ‘I believe, they be the staple food of the giant turtle,’ Hawkmoth said, leaning over the side of the craft to watch one such writhing bloom drift by. ‘And a delicacy of those who fish these waters.’

  2

  On went their voyage all that long day. And sight of land were long swallowed up beyond horizon. From time to time Gargaron searched the sky. He kept a keen eye open for any discoloration that might indicate a coming shockwave. But it were Gohor and Melus he pondered. While he could not look upon the two suns directly, it did not prevent him from pondering their course. He could not help recalling the cave paintings. Were it true they tussled for possession of Cloudfyre? It were unsettling to consider such a notion. Frightening. And could the orbit of Cloudfyre have brought on the Ruin? Triggered the boom shocks? Awakened the Dark Ones?

  He engaged Hawkmoth in conversation on this topic. And it were Melai who asked what the paintings had told them. ‘I have no knowledge of this thing you call celestial mechanics,’ she said to Hawkmoth.

  So Hawkmoth explained it to her, that the moons swung about Cloudfyre, and that Cloudfyre and her eighteen sister planets circled Melus. And that the cave paintings had suggested that Gohor were wanting to wrestle Cloudfyre from the grasp of Melus.

  ‘But why?’ she asked.

  Hawkmoth shrugged. ‘If it be so, I could not tell you.’

  ‘You do not believe this be what the cave paintings depicted?’

  ‘It seemed as such,’ he said. ‘But they were ancient and their original meaning might well have been lost to all but their creators.’

  Gargaron prayed that were the case.

  3

  The afternoon drew on and they began to see the surfacing of several turtles in the distance. This caused some measureable excitement.

  It were Melai who spotted the first. And the second. Calling them out, pointing; the first several hundred feet off the starboard bow, and the second, considerably closer, off port. They were a marvel to watch, these ocean giants, surfacing, even floating for a few moments, as if watching the passing ship.

  ‘They ought not bother us,’ Hawkmoth called. ‘They be weary of those who hunt them, and, I would think, know this boat to be a threat.’

  Thus far, Hawkmoth’s prediction proved true. The creatures would simply surface, watch the carrack, and ultimately swim away into the depths of the grass, showing no more interest in the ship, much to Locke’s disappointment for he longed to view them at close quarters. Once or twice Gargaron turned the ship in their direction. But the turtles sunk into the depths before the ship strayed near.

  Aside from turtle spotting, Hawkmoth maintained a diligent survey upon of the sky for possible Boom shakes, and also upon the “waters” that abounded the carrack. He were pleased that so far, he had spied no perilous troughs.

  It were at dusk however that the first danger struck.

  4

  It had been mid-afternoon when Melai had spotted the first scar. At first she thought it were a cloud shadow cast long and narrow across the grass surface. But aside from dark thunderheads amassing in the distant eastwun skies there were no clouds to be seen.

  Melai alerted her crew. Hawkmoth strode eagerly to starboard bow, gazing keenly out across the rolling grass waves. The scar were difficult to spot from his vantage. He deployed his spyglass and brought it into view, a great gaping trench in the grass. It were as if the clawing fingers of two opposing winds had pulled aside a pair of grass walls, raking them aside like a barber combing a part in someone’s hair; the “part” in this instance being depthless and dark.

  Locke were at the helm by this stage, happy to assume role of captain for a short while. Hawkmoth called for him to adjust their heading slightly. ‘Track north-north east for a while,’ he called to Locke, ‘open up some ground between ourselves and that anomaly.’ And up to Melai in the crow’s nest he called, ‘Keep us abreast of its movements.’

  She frowned. ‘Is it likely to move?’ she called back.

  Hawkmoth were not entirely certain. Nearly all he knew of this Grass Sea were from text books. Other than his shorebound initiations as a young sorcerer, he’d had no extended experience of this place. ‘I’ve heard some say these scars can shift as swiftly as the wind.’

  As their ship rose and fell on the gentle swells, Gargaron could see the dark gash three or four hundred feet off their starboard bow. His eyes shifted to the waving, whispering grass below their hull. No matter how many times he stared at it, h
e thought how dense it looked, like close packed brush bristles, and it seemed impossible for a vessel as large as this to sink down amidst its long waving stems. ‘How deep are we here would you say?’ he asked Hawkmoth.

  ‘Your guess is as good as mine, good giant,’ Hawkmoth replied, not removing his spyglass. ‘But I’ve heard it told that at its deepest, the Grass Sea may be as much as several hundred fathoms.’

  That idea unsettled Gargaron. Grass so tall and deep. There would be no sunlight down there. Perhaps little air to breath. No room to move.

  They watched the scar as it suddenly swept southways like a blade and vanished on the horizon behind them.

  It were relief to see it go its own way.

  They saw their next at sundown.

  5

  The suns were low in the sky, setting behind clouds and haze and the atmosphere was turning pink, orange, red. By then Locke had somehow managed to climb his way to crow’s nest; his serpent coiled about the mast’s base, gazing up at him, tongue flickering.

  Locke had been enjoying the solitude, the fresh winds tingling the horns on his head, when, close to nodding off, he detected a dark shape appear to their north.

  He sat up, watching it keenly, whipping out Gargaron’s spyglass (which admittedly were a tad large for him) and scoured the way ahead. It were only a few hundred feet from them and he saw it clearly, a chasm cut down in the surface of the grass. A strange but awesome thing to behold.

  ‘Hawkmoth,’ he called out. ‘I see another of your scars. Dead ahead of us. Five hundred feet, angling out to the north-west. I’d recommend a directional change to the north-east.’

  Gargaron and Melai had both been snoozing on the foredeck, watching the distant stars begin to twinkle into existence out there in the late afternoon sky that were still blue but slowly darkening, and watching what looked to be the moons of Syssa and Noo Ka, begin their rise. Hearing Locke’s call they rose and strode to forward bow.

  ‘Aye, take us north-east,’ Gargaron called back to Hawkmoth who were at the helm.

  But that proved almost their undoing.

  The wind had picked up in the last little while, and the Grass Sea were beginning to kick up with some chop. The carrack had become harder to control, but eventually it took the heading that Hawkmoth had asked of it as he spun the wheel to port side. There were a momentary slackening of the sail as it swung around, before the wind billowed up into it and thrust the vessel off on a north-eastern tack.

  But as Locke watched, he noticed with dawning concern the scar moving, the Grass Sea parting, and the great chasm spearing rapidly in their direction. ‘Oh sorcerer, the scar is on the move,’ he yelled. ‘On course to intercept us! Ten sunflares!’

  ‘Mooring ropes,’ Hawkmoth called. ‘Tether yourselves!’

  There were but one course of action to take now. If they continued on their current course they would meet the fast moving trench and spill down into eternal dark. If Hawkmoth spun them on a south-westerly course, a similar fate might befall them. All he could do were spin the craft back on a sharp north-easterly direction with the hope that the scar would slice right by them. He had heard that these scars moved like arrows, in straight lines. He had to hope that would ring true.

  Quickly Hawkmoth and his crew tethered themselves to mooring ropes, and the crevasse bore down on them like some vengeful creature. It were here Locke noticed something else. Another dark scar. This one out to port. Though, this one vanished just as soon as he’d spotted it. His focus were now split: keeping an eye on the scar racing toward them and keeping a watch for the new one.

  When he glimpsed the second anomaly again he were surprised how different it appeared. And as he watched it, he suddenly realised it were no scar.

  ‘Hawkmoth!’ he called. ‘Other than turtles, what beasts swim these strange seas?’

  ‘None I know of,’ the sorcerer called back, straining on the wheel. Gargaron had dashed back to help the sorcerer haul the ship about, dragging his long mooring rope behind him.

  Locke’s eyes were on the new menace swimming their way. He managed only small glimpses of it as it surfaced and dove, surfaced and dove, but some monster it were, serpentine, with a head full of teeth, and arms and legs folded back against its body.

  ‘We have another threat,’ he called out, ‘off the portside bow.’

  Gargaron left Hawkmoth with the wheel, stumbling over to the portside gunwale. When he laid his eye upon the new threat a chill went through him. ‘Hawkmoth,’ he called. ‘Locke be right. Some sea beast comes for us!’

  Hawkmoth nodded, as if to say, Right then, a scar and some beast. Two problems be better than three. ‘So be it,’ he called, ‘brace yourselves!’

  6

  Two things happened then at once.

  Firstly, the scar met them. Until the end of his days, Gargaron would remember standing there on the forward port side bow, gazing down at the mighty trench below them. It were like staring down into a deep, dark mouth, a vast frightening cleft; something that existed it seemed only to swallow them. And for a few moments the ship rode the very edge of it, as if their evasive manoeuvre had been just enough to steer them from harm’s way.

  However, ship’s momentum slowed dramatically on the swell, pushing its passengers from their feet, and the vessel began to tilt over to port. The moving trench seemed to beckon the vessel, pulling it, Gargaron, Melai, Hawkmoth sliding across the deck toward the gunwale, Locke clinging tight to the rails of the crow’s nest.

  And just as the ship began to topple over the lip and into the waiting deep, the sea beast roared up out of the ocean, slamming ferociously into the ship, shunting it back to starboard, saving the vessel from being swallowed up by the scar.

  But the force sent Gargaron toppling overboard.

  7

  For some moments as he fell, all Gargaron saw were the gaping maw in the grass below him, a gaping crevasse that dropped away into the deep dark depths. Then the mooring line which he had looped and cinched around his waist, gave up its slack and he swung and smacked heavily into the hull.

  For a sunflare he dangled there, grimacing, the ship riding the very edge of the crevasse, his feet dangling above the pit. But the swells heaved the vessel high, and the upsurge tossed Gargaron back into the air, and as the ship dropped back to ocean’s surface, Gargaron felt truly weightless for a moment. The ship smacked heavily into the grass swells, and yanked Gargaron’s mooring line, pulling him downwards with great force, and as his line ran out of slack, this time it did not hold. There came a cracking sound as the line severed under the giant’s weight and Gargaron suddenly found himself screaming as he fell away into the depths.

  8

  Waves of grass crashed and slapped over the portside gunwale, its long hissing fingers sliding off the decking, snaring Melai in its grasp and dragging her with them. She were gone in a flash, squealing and then silence, her mooring rope held taught over the side of the ship, slipping back along the gunwale.

  Hawkmoth were running, bringing his staff around, chanting some incantation. He reached the edge where he had last seen both Melai and Gargaron. He looked over the side and saw Melai hanging there, her wings flapping, the grass coiling about her ankles. Below her Gargaron were gone. Quickly he grabbed hold of Melai’s mooring rope and yanked her upward, arm over arm, until she were near enough for him to grab. He reached down, snatched hold of her and hauled her back onto the vessel. But there were no time to waste here. He took up his staff, swished it down upon the deck, dropping to one knee as he did, his robes billowing out at his sides.

  ‘Reliss temporass!’ he whispered harshly. ‘Reliss temporass, vun temporass britheess! Bring iss buk!’ Hawkmoth felt his mind falter. He lurched forward but with his free hand stopped himself falling flat on his face. His thoughts had turned fuzzy, he felt faint. He felt an unwanted sensation surge through his limbs, a hardening, parts of him converting to rock, a sensation he despised. But this time he had acted quite without thinking, as i
f some other force had hold of him.

  The boat rocked beneath him, he could hear the squeal of the sea monster off the bow, or somewhere upon the ship, he knew not where.

  With enormous force of will he pushed himself to his feet. Yet he staggered and fell to his knees. He could hear Melai screaming, yelling out that some monster were attacking, he could see Locke through blurred sight, blow flute shooting off rapid-fire darts.

  ‘Reliss temporass!’ Hawkmoth whispered again.

  He were operating in a state out of mind now, using all his thought to push Lancsh to open a dark temporal doorway, a passage leading into the past. It appeared suddenly in the form of a shimmering cave mouth, an anomaly born of pure energy, sparkling with radiant pulses that looked like tiny stars. They surged inwards, as if trailing some dark passage. And then appearing there all of a sudden, at the opposite end of this temporal corridor, were Gargaron, back there in a time already passed on, on deck just before he were dragged overboard.

  When Hawkmoth saw Gargaron standing there he acknowledged it with a smile. Then he fell flat on his face.

  9

  Gargaron took hold of the gunwale for support. He looked about, confused, terrified. The last he’d known he’d been poised on deck watching the scar rush toward the ship. Then he’d felt himself being thrust somehow forward. In his own time and space, it felt as if some dark ocean wave had folded over him and there he’d tumbled. In his own time he had known this darkness for hours. He assumed he must’ve perished, that the scar had swallowed the ship. But somehow he’d never lost the ship from sight; it had always been there, just out of reach, as if caught in a bubble. Now here he were, as if he’d stepped through some membrane, stepping back upon the boat amidst a pattern of blurred light.

  When he looked around he saw Hawkmoth lying unconscious, his body rocking to and fro as the ship swayed wildly. He heard snarls and screeches and as he steadied himself his eyes bulged as he realised the ship were under attack; some mighty Leviathan were writhing viciously around deck.

  10

  The sheer weight of the beast as it lashed the decks forced the ship to list dangerously, the starboard side were almost submerged, the top of the mast suspended horizontal out over the sea, the sail dipping into the waves as the tips of the grass stalks writhed and wormed, pulling, tugging, threatening to drag ship and all down into its depths.

  Gargaron spotted Melai racing along deck to the forecastle, flying in small bounds, and firing arrows at the creature. Locke were astern, elevated on the aftcastle, blowing darts where he could, trying to avoid hitting Zebra who were currently intertwined with the much larger sea monster.

  Gargaron pulled out his sword, left Hawkmoth where he lay tethered to his own mooring rope, and marched into the fray. He leapt, his sword arm held high, bringing his great sword down into the beast’s belly. It split its hide, squirting blood and an acidic gas, choking Gargaron. He reeled back, shunting aside the monster’s face with his sword as its open jaws swung at him.

  He stumbled backwards. The Leviathan twirled away from him as a barrage of ice arrows fired by Melai bit into it. It screeched and Locke blew his darts. They had no effect.

  The leviathan lunged at Melai. She leapt aside, flapping her wings, just as the beast smashed into the forecastle, wood splinters exploding outwards. Melai landed heavily on deck and tried scrambling away, but her mooring line had become snagged in the monster’s limb. And it reeled her back.

  Gargaron charged forward, and cut the line.

  Here the beast, with a mighty thrust of its tail knocked Gargaron flying across deck. Gargaron smacked his head against the mast as he went, sending all thought from his mind in an instant. He lay there groaning, distantly hearing someone screeching, distantly aware that his body were sliding about this way and that at the whim of the ship.

  He shook his head and pulled himself to his haunches. His sword had been dragged form his grip. Groggy, he looked about. Saw it nowhere. But caught sight of Melai as the ship listed, the grass dragging it further over. Melai were slipping toward the edge.

  Gargaron pushed himself to his feet and scurried after her, his bulk sliding along the deck boards as the ship tipped higher on its side. Behind him, Zebra bit into the sea monster’s face, attacking it repeatedly, while Locke blew darts that suddenly tore holes in the beast’s hide, several rents opening up in its flesh as if slashed by some enormous invisible blade. Still, it were obvious it would not be enough, leviathan and Zebra were both sliding across deck. The ship were about to tip. They would all be sent over the side.

  11

  Gargaron slid heavily into the gunwale; the ship was at such an angle the bulwark were a narrow platform beneath him, the decking of the ship like a wall on his right, on his left naught but a dark drop into depthless sea. He began crawling toward Melai when some mighty force shunted the ship, pulling it back onto its keel, throwing giant and nymph back across the deck as it levelled out.

  On his back in the centre of the carrack Gargaron looked about and saw what had helped right them. A second Leviathan. And a third. All writhing about the boat. Smashing masts, pulling down sails, the bulk of their forms lashing everything.

  Gargaron were hit once more and thrown across ship, again knocking his head. As he shook some sense back into his mind and tried getting up, he were hit again, slammed into the deck and heaved up against the main mast. He felt his anger beginning to bubble up inside him. His blood were boiling. His temples pounding. He seethed as he were knocked again into the mainmast.

  He saw his sack, still hanging there, tied to mast. He saw Drenvel’s Bane. He groped for it. Could not reach it. He were hit again by a Leviathan tail but managed to keep hold of the mast. He pulled himself to his feet, reaching out toward his pack, finally getting his fingers around the hammer hilt, and as he did he felt that unfamiliar sensation return to his body. Of youth. Of strength. And of some fiend bigger than he, stronger than he, quicker and more nimble, with endless reserves of power and vitality…

  12

  Both Locke and Melai saw it. Drenvel’s Bane coming to life, the hammer gracing the end of the hilt. And Gargaron, if it were Gargaron, for the being wielding the hammer were bigger than Gargaron, were clad in black steel armour and helmet. He strode out swinging. They watched him smash the head clean off one of the Leviathans as it lunged at him. As its head flung end over end out into the Grass Sea, its body began to writhe and twist madly, blood spurting from its open neck. Gargaron hammered its body and sent it rocketing against gunwale, damaging the gunwale as its curling body slid overboard.

  He turned for the remaining beasts, as they snapped at Melai. One were being assailed by Zebra who had coiled her body around it, squeezing it while at the same time striking her fangs into its neck. The Leviathan squealed and its strange arms grabbed at Zebra, attempting to strangle her. Locke filled it with darts that tore great reams of flesh from its body.

  Gargaron marched on the other, winding back his hammer and swinging it into its hide. A mighty hole punctured through its bony ribs, and a mighty gush of wind and flesh and blood popped out of it as the hammer sunk deep. Gargaron dragged his weapon from the beast and swung again, slamming the beast across deck while Melai filled its head with arrows that ripped its face apart in an explosion of meat, blood and brain.

  It squirmed in silence, unable to make a sound, thrashing and rolling and Gargaron sent his hammer into it again, catching it against its spine which drove it from the ship and out into the grass waves, a mighty lump of faceless Leviathan flipping away like dead eel.

  Meanwhile, the third Leviathan were having its face effectively eaten off by Zebra. Gargaron turned on it and pulled back his hammer…

  But… his rage faltered… the hammer head clunked into the deck. And he felt his fury wane…

  13

  The Leviathan wrapped its body around the crabman and constricted, coiling Locke in a death grip, his blow-flute and pipe held to him.

  Melai flew to
his aid. She had spent her rocket shots and were left only with ice shards that barely seemed to scratch the Leviathan’s scales. By now Locke were fighting for breath. ‘Ha,’ he panted, ‘do. Your. Best. Beast.’ Each word he spat with a grimace.

  ‘Gargaron!’ Melai yelled. ‘We need you!’

  Hawkmoth were still comatose. And Gargaron knelt there on one knee, his head hung as if it were weighted, wincing at his sudden lack of strength.

  ‘Gargaron!’ Melai screeched at him.

  Zebra did her best but the beast bit back at her and she were forced to retreat. As she did she saw Locke being squished by this creature and she did not need think. As the Leviathan wheeled around at her, its bloody jaws gaping open, hoping to bite her in two, she slithered up the mast, coiled back and thrust herself down into the beast’s mouth and down its throat.

  The Leviathan were suddenly distracted, giving out a strangled, muffled roar. It reared up and back, loosening its grip on Locke who fell heavily to the deck, gasping for air. The Leviathan slammed once into the deck, scrabbled about as if clinging to the ship were now its life line. But then it reared up again and thrashed, snapped one of the stay ropes, recoiled, as if something were eating it from within. It arched its head and squealed one last time before its throat blew out and it flipped and kicked and reeled off the vessel and back into the sea.

  It thrashed about the grass waves, tearing stalks, flicking clouds of grass into the air. Finally its body wriggled weakly, and it lay across the surface of the ocean for a few moments, moving slowly. Another hole were bleeding black blood. And another. And Zebra now pushed hers head victoriously through one of these vents.

  ‘Quick now,’ Locke called to her, still catching his breath. ‘Quick, to the ship before that beast take you with it!’

  But Zebra were in trouble. As soon as she wriggled from the monster she could no more swim these strange seas than fly. She hissed as she wriggled in the thick grass, the Leviathan sinking without trace behind her.

  ‘Throw her a rope!’ Melai yelled. ‘Quickly, Locke, a rope!’

  Locke scrambled to grab one. He pitched it into the waves but it would not reach. She were too far.

  She squawked, trying to keep her head above water, and then she squealed as she tried her best to slither for the safety of the ship.

  ‘Swim!’ Locke yelled at her, hauling in the rope and tossing it out once more. ‘Swim, my little one!’

  But the rope were too far from her, and she were being dragged under and no matter how hard she tried keeping her head above the surface it were no use.

  Before she sunk and vanished forever, she let out a pitiful cry, like a pup calling for its mother… and then she were gone.

  ‘Zebra!’ Locke called. ‘Zeeebraaaa!’ He scrambled along the starboard bulwark, peering overboard, hoping she might resurface, hoping she may have somehow reached the ship and were clinging to it. But she were gone. And naught were bringing her back.

  The grass held the ship for a few moments but the sheer weight of the vessel had it slowly rolling back onto its keel and as the carrack steadied, Locke turned away and he could hold it no longer, tears fell from his eyes and ran down his face.

  GESHA AND OOSHA

  1

  THE ship caught wind again. Snarls of grass hung from the bowsprit. Blood from the Leviathans glistened on deck and were splashed across the starboard bulwark and gunwale. Gargaron struggled to get to the helm to bring their boat round on a northways heading. He felt groggy, his head pounded and ached. He clasped the hilt of Drenvel’s Bane; he had a vague feeling he’d somehow brought it to life again. ‘Melai?’ Gargaron asked concerned, ‘Are you injured?’

  She sat there upon deck, looking shell-shocked, pondering how close she’d come to finding herself swallowed by this sea. Yet she watched Gargaron with intrigue, as if he were some phantom. ‘I be well,’ she said with a grimace. ‘Just gathering myself.’

  ‘What happened to the sorcerer?’ Gargaron feared the Leviathan had bitten him, filled him with venom. ‘Were he attacked?’

  Melai frowned. ‘Can you not remember?’

  Gargaron regarded her. He were still reeling from the fight with the sea beasts. ‘Remember what?’

  Melai pulled herself to her feet, grimacing. ‘You went overboard. Your mooring rope snapped. You were gobbled up by this accursed ocean.’

  Gargaron’s brow held a hundred creases in that moment. ‘No… I were… I couldn’t have.’

  She came toward him. She reached out and touched his leg to see if he were real. ‘I saw it, Gargaron. You were gone.’

  ‘Hawkmoth,’ Gargaron called. ‘Hawkmoth? Be you well?’

  ‘He brought you back,’ Melai said. ‘As he brought Razor back on that bridge.’

  2

  The revelation hit Gargaron like a hammer. He felt his breath leave him. Yet somehow he saw himself dropping down into the depths of the Grass Sea, falling, falling, becoming nothing but a swirling wraithlike mass, breaking apart and disseminating throughout the long smooth grass stalks, splitting into a million tiny droplets of flesh, converted to naught but vapour. A deep shudder passed through him. And he sucked his breath back.

  Melai thought he were about to stumble, as if his legs might give way. He gripped the ship’s wheel to hold himself upright.

  ‘Right then,’ he heard himself saying, taking in a mighty breath. ‘Right then.’ He exhaled long and slow and calm, shutting his eyes for a drawn moment. When his eyes came open he swallowed and looked about and concentrated on his breathing. Exhaling slowly, inhaling calmly.

  He searched the skies. The suns were setting. Night were coming on. They were not out of harm yet. Rumination and reflection could come later, not now. They still had work to do. He looked across at Locke. He knew that Zebra were amongst them no longer, though he had not witnessed her demise. Still, the squeals he had heard as he’d slumped there after the hammer had dissipated were enough to tell him she’d gone overboard with one of those sea beasts. And that she had sunk.

  ‘Locke,’ he called. ‘I am sorry for your loss. Honestly. Though we must mourn our causalities later. Night comes and I fear more of those creatures, and more of those accursed scars. Would you take the wheel for a time?’

  Locke did not argue. But did not speak either. He returned to the aftcastle, his eyes still wet with tears, and took the wheel as asked. Gargaron placed a comforting hand on the crabman’s shoulder. ‘Thank you, my friend. I am sorry for Zebra. Truly I am.’ He felt shallow somehow saying this but he thought of no other words of comfort right then.

  ‘I watched her hatch as a babe,’ Locke said, sniffling. ‘We were bonded for life. I shall etch her passing onto my horns as I marked the passing of my wives and children.’

  Gargaron nodded, squeezed the crabman’s shoulder again, briefly admiring the myriad pictograms etched into the crabman’s horns. He moved away down the wooden stairs to main deck. There the sorcerer still lay.

  3

  Gargaron untied Hawkmoth and carried him to the aftcastle and lay him down on his bedroll. He noticed how stiff the sorcerer were, as though his limbs had hardened, as though his back were become something like ironwood bark. He ignored it. And looked about. The day were fast drawing to a close.

  ‘Hawkmoth?’ he said close at the sorcerer’s ear, ‘do you hear me?’

  No signs of acknowledgement in the sorcerer’s face.

  Gargaron went on regardless. ‘Hawkmoth, hear me, I pray. I know you would probably rather rest yourself than face more concerns but night is drawing on, and we may face more dark threats as the stars rise. You said you had some strategy to get us safely through the dark hours.’

  Melai watched on closely. The sorcerer’s eyes were shut. There came no response to Gargaron’s words. Gargaron slapped him lightly on the cheek. ‘Hawkmoth, hear me!’

  Melai knelt down. Gently she pushed Gargaron’s large hand aside. She smoothed the sorcerer’s greasy fringe from his eyes. And softly pushed her thumb t
o his forehead. ‘Hawkmoth,’ she whispered, ‘hear us. We need help.’

  There were no change to his blank expression. But Melai kept her thumb nail pressed into his brow, her eyes shut as if feeding on his thoughts; a small gout of blood appeared beneath her nail.

  Hawkmoth’s mouth opened slightly. His lips moved as if straining to speak. That proved the extent of his response.

  ‘Hawkmoth?’ Gargaron asked, trying to stimulate him further, ‘can you hear us?’

  Melai put up a hand to shut Gargaron’s mouth. Some moments later she withdrew her thumbnail, droplets of Hawkmoth’s blood dripping to deck. Here she took hold of Hawkmoth’s sidepack, reached in, felt about, eventually withdrawing a pair of objects that looked to Gargaron like old strands of wood, twisted and gnarled. Melai lay these on the deck, regarded them curiously. She pressed her blood stained thumb against a little barb on each of them, drawing off her own blood; green mixed with Hawkmoth’s red.

  It were like waking a pair of hungry pups. Instantly the twisted objects twitched, moved, rolled over, writhing, sniffing out the source of their sustenance. Melai pursed her mouth as she let them suckle her thumb.

  When they were satiated they stood, ugly critters, looking about with large goggling eyes, limbs like the roots of shrubs. ‘Gesha,’ Melai heard herself murmuring. ‘And Oosha. Hear my command, and through my thoughts, understand our predicament. Keep this vessel under your guard till the suns rise and we can see our way again.’

  4

  The bizarre little root fiends appeared to survey their surroundings, to take in the situation. They gazed up the crooked mast that had been battered heavily by the Leviathan attack, and up at the sail. Then just like that, they got to work. One scurried to helm, effectively shoving Locke aside (if that’s what the action could be described: this being that barely came to Locke’s knees, attempting, without any hesitation at all, to heave the crabman away from the wheel.) Humoured more than anything, Locke obliged.

  The creature’s tiny root arms grew first, and then its torso. It gained little in the way of bulk though it did grow taller, until it were of sufficient height to operate the wheel.

  The second root being scaled the mast effortlessly, pulling itself up high and into the crow’s nest where it too underwent a small transformation, growing taller, gaining enough height to allow it sufficient survey of the surrounding seas.

  And there the two of them posted themselves for the night.

  5

  Gargaron stayed up late, shivering in the daunting cold, not allowing himself to sleep, not trusting in the alien critters helming the ship. He kept himself busy by mending as much of the ship as he knew how; tying spare ropes around and around the masts, reinforcing their breaks, and refastening snapped stay lines. The suns had gone and the moons of Vasher, Gorvhald, Veeo, Canooc hung bright and stark in the night sky. And although he did not report it for fear of alarming the others, Gargaron, as he worked, were witness to strange lights beneath the surface of the grass. He wondered many times if it were the coming of another Leviathan attack. But no more such beasts threatened them that night. Locke had forecast as much. ‘I have heard sailors say that if there be Kraken blood spilt on ship then Krakens will stay away.’ Though if he wished to consult the sorcerer on the matter, he were out of luck for Hawkmoth did not awaken.

  BY THE CAT’S EYES

  1

  HAWKMOTH were still in slumber by noon the following day. By then Gargaron began to grow concerned. Locke were at the helm, studying occasionally the various navigational instruments within the binnacle, or inspecting the sextant that hung from the iron gimble. Melai were again in the crow’s nest. She’d been watching Gargaron who paced the decks constantly. Hawkmoth’s two fiends were at the sorcerer’s side, lying, again twisted and shrunk, like old bits of root ready for the compost.

  Melai had spotted islands on the dawn. Due north of their position. A sign, Gargaron hoped, that they may be soon coming to their destination. As they came to them they observed small, compact islands that stuck up out of the sea, each consisting of a single prong of strange white rock, shining brightly in morning sunlight, a mighty curved spire that soared out into sky.

  Hawkmoth did not awaken at all that day. And at dusk Gargaron were the one to try to bring the root fiends to life, jabbing his thumb on their barbs. They awoke, suckling blood from his finger. It were an unsettling sensation, one that Gargaron were not sorry to see finished. Yet like the previous night, the root critters did their work diligently. By then though, Locke had discovered an item of some intrigue.

  2

  He and Melai had been rummaging about the lower cabins for blankets to sew together; Gargaron had berated the temperature drop of the previous evening and quipped how he could not fit below decks to escape the wind chill. (The fact Gargaron would not forsake his post for comfort even if he could fit below decks were beside the point.) Yet other than warming blankets, Locke uncovered a peculiar object.

  Melai helped him lug it above decks and once it lay there in the fading sunlight, Gargaron knelt to see what he might make of it.

  It were a bizarre looking object. And what it were fashioned from were difficult to determine. Wood or bone would have been Gargaron’s guess. Though no-one knew. Primarily it resembled the head and bust of some tortured angel. Her face were strained and stretched, for down her sides there perched small devil creatures with their arms reaching to her face and here they had their hands inside her mouth, pulling her jaw open to what must have been an unnatural limit, so that she looked forever frozen in a silent howl.

  ‘It looks ghastly,’ Gargaron said. ‘What be it?’

  ‘A whale horn,’ Locke said as though it were quite obvious.

  ‘To control whales?’ Gargaron asked, confused.

  ‘To ward them off,’ Locke said, laughing. ‘Honestly, I thought you claimed to have sailed.’

  ‘I were but a wee lad. Though, what need have we of a whale horn?’

  ‘Well, obviously this particular one be not for whales,’ Locke said. ‘I would wager it be for such as those Leviathans that attacked us.’ And here he looked about for a spot where it might be housed.

  ‘There?’ Melai said pointing. All eyes turned to a broken prong on the mast just below the lower hem of the mainsail.

  Locke skittered over on his crabs legs for a closer look, craning his neck. ‘Explains why it were removed. It had been in for repairs. All we need do is find some way to rig it back in place.’

  This task Gargaron took on himself, tying the whale horn there with ropes; he were the only one who stood tall enough to reach the area with ease. Once done he stood back, surveying his work. ‘How does it work then?’ he asked Locke.

  Locke shrugged his shoulders and replied, ‘Don’t know. I’ve never sailed ships.’

  3

  Its method became apparent however some two hours after nightfall. The root imps, Gesha and Oosha, were again at their posts, one playing helmsman, the other in crow’s-nest. Gargaron were pacing the deck, keeping a lookout in the growing dark for any threatening shadows out to sea. He had also been searching for the Cat’s Eyes star constellation. He had just spotted its emergence when he heard a most peculiar mewling sound from somewhere on the vessel. He turned about, looking first at Melai who were seated near the helm, then at Locke who too wore a frown on his face.

  ‘You hear that too?’ Locke said, looking at Melai and then at Gargaron.

  It grew steadily louder, almost to a deep moan. The imp in the crow’s nest began making a chittering noise, pointing at something out to sea, alerting the imp at the wheel who now pulled the ship toward the northwest. Gargaron strode to starboard. And saw it. A dark shadow maybe a hundred feet off their bow. He were about to announce it as another scar when it dipped and vanished below the grass waves and when it surfaced again Gargaron saw in the growing moonlight the glistening of eyes and the glow of fangs.

  ‘Leviathan!’ he called. ‘Brace yourselves.’ He das
hed to mid deck where Hawkmoth were still unconscious on his bedroll. Gargaron secured the sorcerer to a mooring line and suddenly the keening sound lifted in intensity. Kneeling there Gargaron turned and gazed up at the whale horn. He saw that part of it had come to life: the skull with its mouth being pulled open now bore the aura of some ghostly spirit and from this emanated a howl so piercing, so haunting, that it chilled the giant’s blood.

  Laughter from Locke somehow broke through the noise and he heard the crabman yell, ‘Ha, our Leviathan friend turns its little tail! Come and see!’

  Gargaron, gripping his great sword, ran back to the starboard bow and there he saw it, the Leviathan twisting about the grass waves in the moonlight, turning over and over as if it found the whale horn too torturous to behold. And soon off it slithered, retreating and diving down into the depths.

  4

  The islands they had seen were long behind them and Gargaron were afraid they had been going in circles. None of them knew how to operate the sextant but if the compass were in sound operating order then their carrack were held always on a northways heading. At night, the position of the Cat’s Eyes, the burning and ever watchful red stars that were always in the northsky, confirmed their direction.

  A far more pressing matter had arisen however. They had begun to run low on their provisions. ‘And naught have we anything with which to fish,’ Gargaron had said. To which Locke were quick to add, ‘if there were but fish to fish, of course.’

  The lack of any fresh water were also becoming a concern. They were down to but Gargaron’s gourd. One morning, as if in response to their prayers, the sky grew dark with rain clouds and a gusty storm blew up, and the sea grew choppy and thunderous showers set in for almost two days. Gargaron, Melai and Locke placed tubs and jars found below decks, catching as much of the deluge as they could. Then there were naught to be done but wait out the storm, huddled there above decks, navigating via the compass that were housed dry within the binnacle. Gargaron told Melai and Locke to head below decks and out of the elements, but Locke smiled for the first time since the loss of Zebra and embraced the torrents. Melai fetched blankets from the cabins below (she didn’t wish to be below decks on her own) and all three helped stitch them together so that Gargaron might be covered while the storm lasted.

  5

  Hawkmoth did not awaken until mid-morning of their fifth day at sea. When consciousness returned, he opened his eyes and looked about. He saw he were lying on the sundrenched deck of the carrack. He knew not why, but he felt a surge of peculiar relief. The scar had not swallowed them. They were safely sailing upon the grass ocean. But there were no-one else about. No giant, no nymph, no crabman. None but his Eve standing before him on the decks of this empty ship.

  She smiled at him sadly. She knelt at his side and took his hand. ‘My dear Hawk,’ she said. ‘How far I have come to find you.’

  Hawkmoth blinked. ‘Eve, wh-what are you doing here? How did you get here?’

  ‘Hush, it matters not. But you must listen. The enchantment around our home has withered and failed. All is perished. I come… to say goodbye.’

  ‘No, Eve, this cannot be.’

  ‘Hawk, dear, it is. Thank you for finding me all those years ago. Thank you for saving me. Thank you for showing me what it is to be loved.’ She reached out and touched his face.

  His eyes shot open. He sat up and looked about. He spied Gargaron at the helm, and Locke and Melai near the prow gazing northways from their position. All were too keenly watching something ahead of the ship to have noticed Hawkmoth’s waking.

  He looked about, but saw no Eve. Yet she had been here, presently. He were certain.

  6

  Hawkmoth pulled himself to his feet, still expecting to spy his witch wife somewhere on the carrack. ‘Gargaron, is Eve amongst us?’

  Gargaron started slightly at the voice. He looked around at the sorcerer, a corpse risen from death it seemed. ‘Glad to see you have come around at last.’

  ‘Is… is Eve here?’

  Gargaron looked confused. ‘Eve? No. Why would she be here?’

  Hawkmoth swallowed and drew in a long breath and rubbed his face in his palms. ‘Ignore me. It were but a dream.’ He slumped back to the deck once more, leaning there up against the bulwark. That or nightmare, he thought gravely.

  Melai and Locke turned at the sound of voices. Seeing Hawkmoth awake they started over.

  ‘Tell me, did we avoid the scar?’ Hawkmoth croaked as if the event had only just transpired.

  ‘Which scar do you mean exactly?’ Gargaron asked.

  ‘The scar…’ Hawkmoth frowned. ’Where you toppled ov…’

  Gargaron eyed him closely. ‘Toppled overboard? That scar be five days gone, good sorcerer. We have had to avoid many since. Not to mention Leviathan beasts. And storms.’

  ‘Leviathans?’

  ‘Aye, my little Zebra did much to defend our first attack,’ Locke said. ‘Alas, she has left us.’

  Hawkmoth felt most confounded. ‘Zebra?’

  ‘Aye. She were a hero,’ Gargaron said.

  ‘Oh, I am sorry Locke.’

  ‘Be not. For I prefer to believe she has not perished but enjoying herself at the bottom of this sea, stirring up its beasties.’

  ‘Aye, those are fine thoughts.’ Hawkmoth drew in a long breath and rubbed his neck. ‘How long have I been gone?’

  ‘Five days,’ Gargaron said.

  ‘Five days?’ It were not possible.

  ‘Aye,’ Gargaron confirmed. ‘You have slept through much on this voyage.’

  ‘How have you navigated these seas?’

  ‘Compass by day, stars by night,’ Melai told him. ‘A whale horn to scare off the sea monsters. Oh, and your little imps to alert us to sea scars. I stole the idea from your thoughts.’

  Hawkmoth shook his head, thoughtfully. ‘I recall none of this, it would seem. Though, sounds as if you have all been quite resourceful.’ He eyed Gargaron for a while. ‘How many troughs and Leviathans have you encountered?’

  ‘Many,’ Melai told him.

  ‘Boom shakes?’

  Gargaron shrugged. ‘None, surprisingly.’

  ‘Most strange,’ Hawkmoth said. ‘And I see you stand before me, giant, lest you be some apparition thrown out by some jaded part of my mind.’

  Gargaron considered the sorcerer’s words. ‘I suspect your temporal sorcery be the cause of my salvation. If so, then I give you my thanks.’

  Hawkmoth stared long at the giant. He reached his hand to the small of his back and felt layers of stone covering him from his hip to his shoulder. ‘I have little recollection,’ he said softly. ‘But whatever I did, I am glad it were not in vain.’ He took in a prolonged breath, filling his chest, feeling the pain at the rear of his ribs where there were no give anymore in the flesh about his spine. ‘So where are we? Have we made no headway?’

  Gargaron pointed. ‘See for yourself. Perhaps you might tell us if that be the land we seek?’

  Hawkmoth stood, this time with Melai’s aid. Unsteady on his feet, he surveyed the way forward. He felt a tad giddy. But he spied a large landmass on the horizon to the north. Running his eyes along its distant shore, eyeing its towering inland trees, he knew here from his text books that this were at last their destination. Vol Mothaak.

  THROUGH THE GATES

  1

  THERE were no moorings. That much became apparent. No jetties, nor pier, just wild, uninhabited coastline for as far as they could see.

  ‘Do we seek one then?’ Locke put to them all. ‘A jetty.’

  ‘Or do we sail until we catch first sight of this tower?’ Gargaron suggested.

  Hawkmoth knew not why, but he felt somehow that this strange land had no piers nor jetties. He somehow knew that this were as wild a place as any he’d ever visited. And somehow more ancient than anywhere on the Vale; he had never felt about anything such a sense of age as he did as they sailed toward this unchartered coast; older too than the cave paintings
he had seen in Dorubudur. Though something about it were odd, unnatural. There seemed a peculiar precision to the dimensions of the coastline. As if it held a perfect, unbroken, and unwavering curve. Were he floating high above in one of his zeppelins, he wondered, would Vol Mothaak look a perfect circle? He could not shake the idea that the land before them had been carved by intelligent hands.

  ‘We head straight for shore,’ Hawkmoth told them, ‘I feel there be no place on this land to moor a ship. And I feel this tower we seek be located at island’s central point and not visible from the coast. Thus we should simply head for land and forge a pathway inland.’

  2

  The shoreline were raised up from the Grass Sea so that when Hawkmoth and his crew eventually met land they did so with the starboard side of their carrack shunting up against the grassy bank and there Gargaron set about grabbing hold of strange trees overhanging the whispering waves to hold the carrack in place. Locke and Hawkmoth scrambled ashore with mooring ropes, securing them to hefty tree trunks. Once done Gargaron left the helm and jumped ashore, offering to carry Melai with him. She insisted on flying though, and it felt lovely to stretch her wings again and not be dragged so heavily downward as had been the peculiar influence of the grass ocean. But Gargaron stuck as close as he could to her lest the Grass Sea happened to drag her back one last time into its ungodly waves.

  Still, she flew freely, unhindered, it seemed. And before they turned their back on the carrack entirely Hawkmoth surveyed it. Looking one last time for Eve.

  ‘What be it?’ Gargaron asked him.

  Hawkmoth shook his head. ‘Nothing, giant. It be nothing.’

  3

  The land before them sloped downwards. It felt to Hawkmoth that he and his companions stood on the high rim of some amphitheatre. At its base there ran a looming iron fence that followed the island’s curvature eastways and westways. There were what looked to be gates interspersed at regular intervals along it. Beyond this fence, they could see rugged, shallow bushland and stunted trees. And far off on the horizon lay the island’s distant interior, shimmering in a heat haze.

  ‘If there be none who live here, and none who have ever stepped here,’ asked Melai, ‘then why are there gates?’

  ‘And,’ Locke said, ‘who built that fence?’

  Hawkmoth had no answer. Only speculation. ‘Perhaps some ancient, long died out race.’ He gazed far northways, to where the bushland vanished into the haze, wondering if he should have been able to see the tower from where they stood. And as it were not visible, he wondered how long it would take he and his friends to reach it.

  4

  Through sand and stunted sea shrubs Hawkmoth lead his troupe downhill, Gohor and Melus above them both pushing their way up into morning’s sky. They were halfway down the decline when suddenly a peculiar phenomenon arose. One that halted them all in their path.

  Firstly, the buzz and hiss of hidden bugs surprised them. Such a sound in recent times had become almost alien. It were a welcome noise in many ways, a comforting familiar noise. Yet to hear it here brought a sense of unease. Though the peculiarity that struck them all were not the sounds of bugs, but something else: the closer they drew to Vol Mothaak, the bushland beyond the fence appeared to grow in size. And with every step forward, the larger and taller it became.

  ‘What be this?’ Locke said sounding humoured. ‘Some illusion to trick us?’

  No-one answered. They all simply stared wide eyed at the scrub that were now a virtual woodland. Even the fence seemed higher somehow, taller. But now that Hawkmoth and his troupe had halted, so too had the growth of the woodland.

  Gargaron stood alongside Hawkmoth. ‘What magic be at work here, sorcerer?’

  ‘It be nothing I understand,’ Hawkmoth told him. ‘Perhaps as Locke suggested, it be an illusion. Perhaps one sent to test the minds and mettle of would be trespassers. Stay here a moment and tell me what you see.’ With that Hawkmoth retraced his steps through the coarse sand and made his way back up the slope behind them.

  5

  Melai and Locke and Gargaron watched him keenly.

  ‘How are the trees?’ Hawkmoth called down to them. ‘Do they remain so tall?’

  ‘Aye,’ Gargaron called back. ‘There be no change.’

  ‘Where as from here,’ Hawkmoth relayed, ‘they have reverted to naught but arid bushland.’

  ‘So, it be an illusion as I said,’ Locke commented.

  Hawkmoth returned to them. ‘Perhaps. Perhaps not.’ And with a smile he marched down to the base of the rim, the others following, the woodland growing taller and taller with every step closer they took.

  By the time they reached the fence, the woods beyond had taken on colossal proportions. Trees that had looked like meagre saplings from afar had grown now into mighty oaks that stood as thick and wide as a giant’s cottage. Shrubs that earlier appeared no taller than Gargaron’s ankle now dwarfed him. Insects that before they could not see but only hear, stood now larger than hoardogs, clinging to bark and branch.

  And the top of the fence loomed above them at an enormous height.

  6

  ‘Have we somehow shrunk?’ Melai wondered aloud, eyeing the top of the fence line before gazing back to the top of the incline from where they’d come.

  ‘Anything be possible,’ Hawkmoth said, smiling at her, as if the discovery of new enchantments were still a treat to behold. ‘Still, no time to stand and marvel. Our mission calls us ever onward.’

  He turned and headed toward the nearest gate. The others trailed him, watching as he tested the iron handle. It did not budge and the gate refused to open. Unperturbed he hauled his staff from where it were slung across his back and presented Rashel’s face to the key hole. ‘Laye doon un submiss,’ he murmured.

  Rashel’s tongue, rarely seen, slithered from her gaping mouth and wormed its way into the key hole. It licked about inside like an anteater cleaning out a nest of mud-ants. But it were to no avail. Her tongue soon retracted, she closed her mouth and the gate remained locked.

  ‘Right then,’ Hawkmoth said. ‘Time for a heftier dose of diplomacy then.’ He stood back and again aimed his staff at the lock. He opened his mouth to speak his spells… but hesitated. He looked around at the others. ‘Ah, best if you all back up a wee way.’

  They did as were told, climbing back up the slope a bit of a distance. Locke even found himself a tuft of grass on which to get comfortable, settling in as if for a spot of live theatre.

  Hawkmoth proceeded. And he spoke: ‘Bring uss diss eea funss doon!’

  A rocketing blue flame squealed from Lancsh, blasting the vicinity of the gate that held the lock.

  There came a counter strike in the form of a jagged bolt of blue flame that struck Hawkmoth in the chest and threw him out into the air, over the heads of his friends, depositing him high on the slope of the rim.

  7

  Melai flew to his aid, Gargaron and Locke scurrying up slope behind her. They expected the worst but before they reached him he grunted and sat up. He looked about as if he’d merely been slapped across the face. His staff were still in his grasp.

  ‘Be you well?’ Melai asked breathlessly.

  He looked at her, slightly dazed, then put his hand inside his robes, feeling his chest for wounds. He withdrew his hand and proceeded to tap his breast bone. ‘It would seem that stone for skin has its benefits after all.’

  8

  Once Hawkmoth’d had himself a swig of some revitalising brew, he sat gathering his thoughts.

  ‘Perhaps you weren’t, ah, diplomatic enough,’ Locke suggested with a wry smile.

  ‘What be your next move, pray tell?’ asked Gargaron.

  Hawkmoth sighed. ‘Why, we trail the fence line until we find a gate that permits us entry.’

  ‘What if there be none?’ Gargaron put to him.

  ‘Well, we climb the ruddy thing.’

  Gargaron surveyed the fence from their position high on the slope. Once again, the woodland bey
ond appeared to have shrunk. ‘Seems easy enough from here. But down there the fence be a league in height.’

  ‘Plus it be lined in spikes,’ Locke reminded them.

  ‘Aye. But we’ll need find some way in,’ Hawkmoth said. ‘Or our coming here will have been a complete waste of time.’

  ‘Right, then we walk the fence line,’ Melai answered impatiently.

  ‘In which direction?’ Gargaron put to her.

  ‘Split up,’ were Locke’s suggestion. ‘Two of us go one way, two the other.’

  Hawkmoth shook his head. ‘Not a sound idea. I fear this place would like to have us divided. No, we stay as four.’

  9

  They set off eastways. In the direction of the nearest gate. But it were locked and so were the next. So they kept marching, trailing the fence line and testing gates as they came to them. The call of bugs persisted. Gargaron spied them through the fence as he traipsed forward. Enormous things. Crickets, thrips, horned beetles. Clamped to tree trunks beyond the fence. Or clambering about the forest floor, squealing or hissing or chirping.

  Melai watched them too. She also watched the trees. With something of awe and wonder. So much so that with each passing stroke of the clock she felt the woodland drawing her, as though it were Mother Thoonsk.

  Hawkmoth concentrated of course on the fence. What he (and then the others) began to notice about it were that in some sections, portions of its vertical iron bars had sprouted small iron leaves, and branches. And occasionally, blooming from twisting iron stems at the tops of the gates were what looked to be huge embryonic sacks; a thin metallic membrane concealed some sort of wriggling being on the inside.

  ‘What by Thronir be those things?’ Gargaron asked puzzled, gazing up at the phenomenon far above their heads.

  The group had stopped to observe one such sack, craning their necks, while Melai flew to their height to observe them, although she were mindful to keep her distance.

  ‘I have no idea,’ Hawkmoth admitted. ‘Be some curious enchantment I do not understand.’

  ‘Perhaps they give birth to sentries,’ Melai suggested. ‘Mother Thoonsk would give birth to such things of wood and stone if she believed herself at risk of being raided or trespassed upon.’

  But living iron? Gargaron thought. He had seen no such thing in all his days.

  10

  They moved on. And on. Trudging through sand and shrub and leaf matter, mile after mile, with dwindling hope that they might ever chance upon such a thing as an unlocked gate. Melai who had long grown exhausted of flying, perched herself upon Gargaron’s broad shoulder; there she sat with her legs crossed against his shoulder blade, watching this strange circular land recede behind them.

  But it were Melai, quite by chance, who spotted the eventual breach in the fence line.

  At the time there were an ongoing discussion about the merits of splitting up. ‘Perhaps two of us ought to have done as Locke suggested and striven west,’ Gargaron were saying. ‘We may have found our way in by now.’

  ‘And you may also not have,’ Hawkmoth had replied, ‘and we would be a split and weakened party.’

  ‘Well, might we all turnabout and head the other way?’ Locke said, almost smirking, knowing what the answer would be, knowing he were simply fueling the debate.

  ‘A foolish notion,’ Hawkmoth scoffed. ‘We have come half a day already. Our heading is almost northways at this current hour. It would be more worth our while at this point to continue on our way than to back track.’

  ‘And what if an unlocked gate lay just west of our starting point all those long hours gone?’ Gargaron argued.

  ‘And what if it didn’t?’

  ‘But it might have.’

  ‘Right, if that be so, then, if this island be circular as I suspect, we shall eventually come by it.’

  ‘And how long must we traipse before that happens?’

  It were here Melai saw it. None of the others made any sign at all that they had glimpsed it, all too engaged and distracted by their discussion it seemed.

  Melai spread her wings and left Gargaron’s shoulder, fluttering to ground and landing by it. ‘Do you three not see this?’

  They stopped and turned, curious looks upon their faces as they took in the rent in the fence as Melai presented it. By now their inane argument had ceased.

  ‘Oh my,’ Hawkmoth said as he stepped before it.

  It were clear that it were not so much a rent or breach as a parting in the bars where iron branches had sprouted forth, the bars leaning here and there as would the trunks of growing trees. What remained were a large gap in the fence. One that might submit even Gargaron, Melai thought, at a squeeze.

  ‘Oh, well spotted,’ Gargaron said.

  Hawkmoth announced he would pass through first. ‘We cannot risk a bolt of energy on your lives,’ he told them.

  ‘What about yourself?’ Melai asked.

  To this he smiled. ‘Why, should I be assailed again, well, at least now I know I carry natural armour.’ So through the gap in the fence he climbed. And reached the other side without incident.

  While Locke went next Melai on impulse flew over the top, (which she had been dying tod o for horus) but which seemed to irk Hawkmoth and Gargaron both. She could see that much by the looks on their faces. ‘What?’ she said looking at them as she swooped down on the opposite side.

  ‘I shall not lecture you,’ Hawkmoth told her, ‘except to say be mindful here.’

  She took the advice with a nod. She had not considered the idea that the fence may have struck out at her as it had the sorcerer.

  11

  They stood now in the sand and grass that lay between the fence and the woodland fringe, marveling at Vol Mothaak’s beauty and grandeur.

  ‘Never have I felt like a flea on the back of a spine-hog,’ Gargaron declared, ‘never as undersized and slight as I do at this present moment.’ For the trees themselves, now that Gargaron and his friends stood this side of the fence, had taken on even greater proportions.

  Melai simply felt an urge to fly. To be off in amongst this mighty woodland realm and pretend she were home in Mother Thoonsk. Though she stayed close by her companions. Something about the place filled her with a sense of unease. Perhaps it were the enormous insects, who she felt were somehow watching her. (Watching her out of hunger? Or spying on her for a higher power, she did not know.) But there were danger here she felt, disguised by beauty.

  Locke though, smiled like a child. ‘What endless wonders does our world still have waiting for us beyond this?’

  It were impossible to know, but Hawkmoth were eager to be on with their journey, for every moment gone were a moment closer to another possible boom shake. Besides there were other menaces to consider. ‘We must keep our senses about us here,’ he warned his friends. ‘The Ghartst paintings, as far as I could decipher, showed depictions of Star Angels, strange beings that inhabit Vol Mothaak, who supposedly cling upside-down to trees by tentacle legs, who bear the torso of a woman and an elongated head with no face. They are the guardians of these woods I fear and all trees come under their protection. Though our simple presence here may be enough to agitate them. So, be mindful.’

  VOL MOTHAAK

  1

  THE troupe struck out westways and for a time none spoke. Their eyes and attention were on the enticing world about them. For the woods were enchantingly beautiful; trees themselves whose girth were so unbelievably wide and so dizzyingly tall were almost godlike. As if this were a garden, a sanctuary, where the gods of the cosmos came to rest at the end of their days. An indescribable light cascaded down amidst the canopy so high above them. A golden light that turned almost green as it refracted through a million leaves. High up in the leafy boughs there were almost a misty quality to the air. As if clouds of pollen drifted. And constantly there came the fall of leaves dropping like feathers to ground.

  Every now and then away in the woods, if there were a corridor through the trees to spot them, the
re stood or huddled the forms, or the appearance, of giants. Not Gargaron’s kind; Gargaron were a dwarf in this strange place, a nymph, a minnow. These giants were colossal beasts, and towered far above him. And they stood concealed in shadow. None but large apish eyes watching them in silence.

  ‘Do you see them?’ Gargaron asked the others hushly.

  ‘Aye,’ Locke promised, intrigued by what he saw.

  ‘What be they?’

  ‘Dark Ones,’ Melai said, yet were not certain.

  ‘Press on,’ Hawkmoth urged, determined to ignore them and the myriad other distractions this land threw at them, and they hurried onwards as quickly as they were able. ‘They may be statue, they may be sentient being, they may be the guardians of these woods, but press on, I implore.’

  They pressed on. Into regions where many trees had somehow assumed the appearance of great standing cosmic angels. Hands and arms, sprouting with branches and leaves, displayed as if in prayer or offering. There were the feeling here of strolling through a gargantuan cathedral, somewhere immense but sacred.

  ‘Could this be what we spied?’ Melai asked. ‘Those towering shadows back there watching us. Something like these?’

  ‘I would like to think as much,’ Hawkmoth answered. ‘But somehow I feel these be different. Trees, fashioned or grown to honour deities perhaps.’

  2

  The further they went the more quiet the woodlands became. The chirping thrips stopped chirping. The squealing cicadas stopped squealing. The only sounds seemed to be the shifting and rustling of the troupe’s weaponry and equipment, the muted sounds of their footfalls on the soft, leaf riddled ground, the sounds of their breathing. There were no echo in this woodland; when Locke whistled to test it, it fell from his mouth a flat, muted sound.

  There were also no breeze, yet the air felt cool, and a fragrance wafted about as sweet as any floral odour. The curious insects here that crawled lazily upon tree and branch went about with a stillness and quietness that seemed somehow unreal. And perhaps they were not real. In a living sense, at least. For as the travelers past them by within close proximity the insects did not appear organic, but somehow things formed from a sort of copperish metal unknown to them.

  3

  They ate as they travelled, picking at what small provisions they had not stowed aboard ship, never stopping for lunch as they had done at other times during their travels. Gargaron’s stores were growing low. They had spied nothing within this strange place to hunt, no deer, no rabbit, no fox, and no eel nor fish in the few brooks or streams they crossed. Hawkmoth had called this place enchanted but Gargaron preferred to think of it as cursed. If it had ever supported such animals (and somehow it felt as though it never had) they had gone. Fled, or perished at the hand of the Ruin. Gargaron had enough rations to last him another two, maybe three days. He hoped that by then, the Death Bell they had come to visit had been put to sleep, and the state of the world put to rights.

  4

  It felt as though they had been marching for many hours when Hawkmoth had an urge to check their bearings. He removed his chronochine, studied it for a few moments and were pleased to establish they were still more or less on a westways heading. When he checked time of day however, he were puzzled.

  ‘What be the cause of your consternation, sorcerer?’ Locke asked him.

  He inhaled slowly as he considered his reply. ‘Either my chronochine be dying a sickly death, or unnatural forces are playing mischief with its internal workings. It claims that twice, time around us has stopped. And on three separate occasions, it tells me, time has begun running backwards.’

  Melai looked about. ‘Backwards?’ she asked.

  ‘Aye.’

  ‘How can that be?’

  Hawkmoth laughed quietly. ‘I have no answer.’

  Locke smiled. ‘Well then, naught can be done about it. We push on and ride out whatever this place throws at us.’ He sounded like someone eager to take it on, like someone keen to leap from the top of a waterfall, hoping to dodge submerged stones when he landed.

  They pressed on after each had satiated thirst from their gourds and rest their feet a short while, gazing about their surroundings, listening to naught but bone dead silence.

  Though once more Cahssi entered Gargaron’s mind. And once more he heard her as if she stood before him. You be the earthchild. Soon the days will begin to run backwards. From you, a new world will come. But you have work here first.

  5

  For much of that day the suns swung slowly across sky—if they were not visible to Gargaron and companions on the ground, their glare were evident beyond the canopy. Yet for long stretches it seemed the suns did not move at all. And when Gargaron looked up at them late in the day, well, one moment they were directly overhead and after he had blinked they were suddenly and inexplicably hovering in the eastwun hemisphere. ‘Do you lot notice the position of Gohor and Melus?’

  They had. And they had all stopped to study the phenomenon.

  ‘Has time once more reversed?’ Gargaron asked Hawkmoth who were again studying his chronochine.

  ‘Aye. Almost a full day this time.’

  ‘Be it a symptom of these woods, this land?’ Gargaron asked. ‘Or a symptom of the gravitational forces forecast by the Ghartst cave paintings?’

  ‘I might suggest we shall not know the answers until we are rid ourselves of this place,’ Hawkmoth replied.

  ‘Whatever the case may be,’ Melai said, ‘I don’t much like it.’

  Locke made no comment. He appeared untroubled, merely fascinated.

  6

  They moved on. Hawkmoth leading the way. Lock and Melai following. Gargaron at rear.

  Later, Melai and Locke were in conversation about home and family; Hawkmoth and Gargaron were lost to their own thoughts. For a little while the troupe proceeded as such until Gargaron drew alongside Hawkmoth and said, ‘You mind if I have a word, sorcerer?’

  ‘What be on your mind, giant?’

  Gargaron took a while to answer. He were at once trying to recall Cahssi’s strange words. He were nervous to repeat them. ‘There is something I have not spoken about since our leaving Dark Wood.’

  ‘Oh, and what might that be?’

  ‘Cahssi spoke in my thoughts,’ he told the sorcerer. ‘Just before she were swallowed by Slüv the Vanisher. She said that when days began winding backwards, a new world would come. That I might have something to do with it.’

  ‘Is that so?’ Hawkmoth said with a distant look.

  ‘Aye. She claimed I were the earthchild.’

  Here Hawkmoth almost stumbled, but he regained his footing and looked keenly into the giant’s eyes. ‘Earthchild?’

  ‘Aye. Were she speaking nonsense or have you heard such a phrase?’

  For a while Hawkmoth did not speak. Instead he walked on through the woodland, using his staff as a rambling stick, tugging at his beard with his free hand.

  ‘Have you heard this phrase?’ Gargaron questioned him. ‘Tell me.’

  ‘I would not concern myself with it.’

  ‘Why, what does it mean?’

  ‘It means nothing.’

  ‘No. I tell you something strange is afoot,’ Gargaron insisted. ‘Unless I have merely imagined it, I have had my wife come to me in my dreams and she has told me I have work yet to do. That may not seem so strange in and of itself but Grimah, when he left me, expressed the same words. And so too Cahssi.’

  Hawkmoth were silent. Contemplative and silent.

  ‘What be an earthchild, pray tell?’

  Hawkmoth sighed. ‘The earthchild theory be naught but a witch’s tale told on harvest eve,’ he said. ‘A child from a distant star system comes to Cloudfyre to bless the crops and suns and the rains. It is said that those who pray to the earthchild will receive great yields and fertile lands. Thus it feels as if the world has been born anew.’

  Hawkmoth would not look the giant in the eyes as he spoke this lie. For the fact that Cahssi had mentione
d this phrase were enough to concern him. For he now feared he had misinterpreted entirely the paintings on the cave wall.

  THE EMPTY TOWER

  1

  LATE in the day Hawkmoth’s troupe emerged from the woodland into a substantial clearing where there sat a wide pond of silver water and upon a circular island in its middle were an enormous stone foot.

  All stopped to stare. For the foot in turn were attached to a stone leg that climbed high above Mothaak’s distant canopy. They stood craning their necks to take in the structure’s full height.

  ‘Be this it?’ Gargaron asked hushly. ‘Our Empty Tower?’

  ‘Aye,’ Hawkmoth said. ‘I feel it be so.’

  ‘As do I,’ Melai said, her voice low.

  2

  It had been with growing trepidation that they came to this point. The simple fact that they had been advancing upon the very thing that were responsible for dishing out so much death and sorrow across the Vale were lost on none of them. So the feeling that they were heading toward a sleeping juggernaut buzzed their nerves and heightened their senses and stirred their feelings for vengeance.

  ‘What sort of tower be this?’ Gargaron said with suspicion.

  ‘I could not begin to say,’ came Hawkmoth’s grave reply.

  The top of the leg culminated somewhere near the upper thigh. And clasped around its knee were what looked to be a gigantic stone hand; its wrist and arm were suspended out into sky where it ended in jagged crumbling mortar somewhere before the elbow. The fingers of the hand were splayed apart and between them there were vents, or windows, into the tower itself—what lay within were but a mystery. Yet it were what hung at the top of the tower that arrested their attention and stirred both their curiosity and fears.

  A monstrous garish face glared down at them with crazed goggling eyes. Both eyes were askew, one looking this way, the other that way. It hung there near the top of the construction, the upper thigh of the tower stuffed through its mouth and sticking out the back of its head. Subsequently its mouth were stretched wide with lips drawn back, and its rows of fangs could be seen biting into the stonework.

  ‘What be that ghastly thing?’ Melai asked without taking her sight from it. ‘It watches us, I am certain!’

  ‘None but an idiot face,’ Hawkmoth reassured her, reaching for something in his sidepack. ‘Mindless, mute, stupid. Naught but stone and mortar and paint designed as such to scare folk from this place I would guess.’

  But Melai would swear its eyes followed her, that they moved like the eyes of a shadow cat slyly watching the progress of a tasty swamp rat. ‘Where sits this infernal bell then?’

  As Hawkmoth dragged a collection of crystalline stakes from his pack he said, ‘I am guessing of course, but perhaps beyond those vents up there.’

  They studied the spaces between the fingers as Hawkmoth went about placing each stake around them, effectively cordoning off a wide grassed area of the clearing.

  ‘And who or what tolls it?’ Gargaron asked.

  ‘Perhaps that we may soon discover,’ Hawkmoth replied, going about and adjusting his stakes.

  The others watched him now.

  ‘What have you there?’ Locke asked.

  ‘It be a Storm Haven, kindly provided by my old friend Skitecrow. Something developed by my Order for use in alpine expeditions. Effective against rock falls, blizzards and avalanches. Thus it should provide us shelter should this tower toll its bell.’

  ‘How does it work?’ Gargaron asked.

  ‘The onset of any shockwave ought to activate these crystals,’ Hawkmoth explained. ‘An umbrella of Deeplight will form, a powerful barrier sourced from the seas off the coast of Erohsvtta. We simply shelter beneath. And wait out the shockwaves unharmed.’ He stood there brushing down his hands, surveying his handiwork. ‘Right then. Let us inspect this tower, shall we. Oh, and keep back from the pond. There is a stench to it I do not much trust.’

  3

  The liquid in the pond were the colour of liquid silver and it lay as still as a mirror. Trees, leaves, sky, could be seen perfectly reflected upon its surface. The smell made its way into Gargaron’s lungs. He coughed it out. ‘What be that acrid stink?’ he said, his eyes watering.

  Hawkmoth had no certain answer. ‘Mercuruan. As would be my guess. It smells as such.’

  ‘Mercuruan?’ Locke said. ‘Never heard of it. Poisonous, I take it?’

  ‘Oh aye. Take a sip of Mercuruan and it shall burn holes in your throat and mouth before it even reaches your belly,’ Hawkmoth assured them. ‘Wade through it and it shall strip the flesh from your bones as easily as a butcher’s cleaver slices through meat. Thus we must exercise caution while we are here. To bring this tower down, to destroy its capacity, may require methodical planning. Though keep your eyes peeled and ears open. If anyone suspects or sees the smallest sign that the bell be about to chime, then yell out so that we might all retreat in time to this safe zone. Our mission here may take one sweep of the clock, or it may take several days. We shall set up camp within this protected area, if need be. Though we shall not leave this woodland until we have taken out the infernal bell.’

  ‘How do you propose we tackle it?’ Locke asked studying the tower. ‘Call out. Knock. See if anyone’s home?’

  Hawkmoth considered Locke’s jest, gazing up at the enormous hand grasping the tower’s midsection. ‘Aye. Why not?’

  ‘I were jesting, of course, sorcerer,’ Locke said.

  ‘I realise,’ Hawkmoth told him. ‘Though finding out who or what lies within be a good starting point.’

  ‘How might we do that?’ Gargaron asked. ‘If we cannot cross the pond?’

  The sorcerer looked thoughtful. ‘I am not certain we need to cross the pond, giant.’ He turned to Melai. ‘Dear woods nymph, how are your wings?’

  ‘In fine fettle.’

  ‘Good. Do you think then you might fly to the hand up there and report what you see beyond those windows?’

  Melai gazed up the tower’s leg, trying her best to ignore the goggling face. ‘I could, aye.’

  ‘Be mindful though, keep your distance. I suspect this Empty Tower be enchanted.’

  ‘Enchanted?’

  On the Ghartst cave paintings Hawkmoth had seen symbols of people reaching out and touching the tower, symbols of people lying dead about its base. To touch the tower might put one to sleep, he had surmised. He conveyed this to Melai.

  ‘To sleep? Or death?’ she asked.

  ‘Perhaps either. So stray nowhere near it.’

  ‘Yet close enough so that I might spy what lies within?’ she said.

  ‘Such be my idea. Though if you think it be too dangerous then let it be known and we shall find another way.’

  ‘What other way would there be?’ Melai asked. ‘None of you have wings.’

  ‘There are trees we could scale,’ he told her. ‘A spyglass from a tree may just as easily yield us what we wish to know.’

  ‘And it may not,’ Melai suggested.

  ‘We shall not know until we try it.’

  ‘None of this sounds encouraging,’ Gargaron said.

  ‘It does not,’ Melai agreed. ‘Though, if this tower houses a death bell that killed my dear sisters, then its demise be the reason I am here.’

  ‘Well said,’ Locke told her.

  For a few moments they all stood there gazing up at the windows.

  4

  ‘Right then,’ Hawkmoth said. ‘Shall we get started?’

  ‘Aye, let’s,’ said Locke eagerly. ‘We haven’t come this far just to admire the view.’

  Gargaron eyed Melai. He did not wish to express it but he felt some anxiety about what she were about to do. ‘You feel up to this?’ he asked her.

  ‘Yes. I be fine.’

  He nodded. ‘Right then, be safe.’

  ‘And have your weapons at the ready,’ Hawkmoth warned. ‘Everybody. Our very presence here is bound to arouse some sort of suspicion. And once we begin our picking abou
t the tower we might just bring the grubs out of the woodwork, so to speak.’

  ‘Let them come,’ Locke said.

  Removing his sword, Gargaron looked around, searching the woodland that surrounded them. ‘Right then,’ he said. ‘Good luck to all.’ And he extended his hand to emphasise his words with the offer of a brief handshake to his companions. Hawkmoth took the giant’s hand before Locke reached out and placed his hand on theirs. Melai, fluttering amidst them, not to be left out, did likewise.

  ‘Friends till the end,’ Gargaron said with a smile. The others replied, ‘Friends to the end’ and Locke followed up with, ‘Now let us bring this blasted tower down and be home in time for tea.’

  At that, and he could not help himself, Gargaron found himself laughing. ‘I am sorry,’ he said. ‘But no, you are right, Locke. Let us do this. And if we may, let us be home in time for tea.’ On impulse then, Gargaron reached wide and dragged them all to his chest and gripped them in a mighty bear hug. ‘When we are done here, you are all invited back to Hovel, where I shall personally cook and serve you up roast suckling hog, the best you will all ever sample. Oh, and for you Melai, Hibiscus flowers, Golden Spore, Juniper sprouts, redmelon, and the best Spotted Blues from Summer Woods.’

  ‘Sounds wonderful,’ Melai told him, ‘I will hold you to that.’

  None of them could know it… but it were the last moment they would share together.

  5

  Melai lifted away toward the windows, determined to keep her eyes off the goggling face. She suspected Hawkmoth had some plan once she’d scoped out the tower’s interior. A magical explosive perhaps, thrown in through the vents. Something to take out the bell.

  As she fluttered upwards she looked down occasionally. But half way to her intended destination she became aware of an illusion…

  Her companions on the ground had grown small. It were as if she were elevated two hundred feet. Gargaron, Hawkmoth, Locke, down there gripping their weapons, looked like Mynych, the famed tiny people from myth, standing there beside a vast lake rather than a pond. The warped perspective threw her nerves. And she had to simply hover there for a moment, eyes shut, to gather herself and calm her breathing.

  What pushed her on eventually were thoughts of her dear sisters: Corlai with her long auburn hair; and Frelai the cheeky one, always laughing, always playing; Veylai the elder one who knew so much about Thoonsk and her secrets; and Yelai, the smallest and youngest and most innocent of them all and the least most ready to die. The image of them in her mind pushed her from her state of panic. ‘I will avenge you all,’ she hissed through gritted teeth and flew toward the vents.

  6

  Here the tower itself now seemed to evolve, to grow. By the time Melai had reached the stone fist it had taken on absolutely enormous proportions. Melai felt as if she were but a mere birdling flapping about the walls of some giant’s fort. And when she dared look she realised with fright that the face looming above her had eclipsed both suns. It felt to her like it were the ceiling of some vast cavern, the ceiling of the world. And those eyes, she knew, followed her every move.

  To Gargaron, Hawkmoth, and Locke, it were Melai who had grown miraculously smaller until she looked no bigger than a puny fly against a cliff face. They had all but lost her from sight. Hawkmoth had to employ his spyglass simply to keep her monitored.

  And it were while Hawkmoth, and Gargaron too, had their sights fixed on their wood nymph, Locke noticed movement in the woodland surrounding the clearing. He turned and searched the tree trunks and what he sighted caused him to back up, his blowpipe held close to his mouth.

  ‘Why, looks as if we have attracted some attention,’ he told his companions.

  Gargaron, and now Hawkmoth, saw strange feminine beings hanging upside-down from tree trunks. Beings with grey tentacled legs, each with her torso arched backwards, belly and breasts poking outwards and upwards into the air, their peculiarly long arms dangling out behind them, their heads hanging upside-down as if dead, yet their faceless visages somehow watched them.

  ‘Star angels,’ Hawkmoth said softly.

  And here these nightmare creatures began to mewl.

  7

  Melai, oblivious to the goings on below, rose finally to the level of the vents. She focused her attention on the tower’s innards. But found she could see nothing for it were dark within. She would need to fly closer for a clearer view. Which meant being in nearer proximity to the tower. Hawkmoth’s warnings of the potential dangers of touching the construction rang out in her mind. And up this close she thought she saw hairs growing from the stone work, as if this tower were not a construction at all, but something living.

  It be sprouts of some kind, she convinced herself. Weed or vine, nothing more.

  She steeled herself to flutter forward but found herself thinking again of the leering face far above. She could not be certain, for she did not wish to look, but she felt as if the face had begun to grin at her.

  Dare to take a look within, it seemed to say. I dare it, child, oh I dare it.

  Another voice, one more familiar, entered her mind. And so real and tangible did it seem that she swung about in flight, believing that someone or something were hovering beside her. Ignore the great Face of Nothing, it said.

  There were naught hovering by her, nothing immediately above her, nor below.

  Be calm, Melai, the voice said, be calm now, dear. It be me, Hawkmoth.

  She gazed down. Way down there, apparently a hundred leagues below her, stood Hawkmoth and the others.

  Ignore the Face of Nothing, the voice spoke again like a breath upon her ears. It is of the Id, an idiot visage, a pest, a clown, reflecting and reacting to your fears. Nothing more. It cannot harm you.

  But would you dare to look, my dear?

  Confusion twisted her thoughts.

  Would you dare to look within, my sweet?

  Melai! Ignore what you hear, or what you think you hear. Concentrate on my voice.

  Still… dare to look within, my child of the swamps. I dare it, I dare it, I do.

  Melai withdrew her bow and nocked an arrow. ‘Hawkmoth,’ she said. ‘Answer me this and answer me true, so that I may know at least one of these voices I hear is yours. When we first met, I asked you a question about the winds of Ostamare. Tell me now the answer you gave me then.’

  Oh my dear, I shall tell you just as soon as you peer within and report on what you see.

  ‘Hawkmoth?’ she asked pleadingly, terrified, gazing down at him. ‘Hawkmoth? Do you speak to me?’

  No! But I do.

  She looked up and squealed.

  The face, without her knowing, had slid down the shaft of the tower leg and hovered there mere yards above her head, its enormous idiot eyes flicking back and forth, alternatively watching her and focusing on events at ground level, its enormous teeth still embedded in the stonework.

  Suddenly she noticed the hand clasping the tower were no longer part of a detached wrist—an arm had grown out into the sky, buried away in the clouds. The fingers were beginning to move, flexing, as if altering their grip. In its efforts the hand slid down the tower about twenty feet, leaving the windows free. And Melai saw it then, in the hollow of the tower through its tall arched windows once concealed by those fingers. A tongue dangling out of that face. A vast, horrible wet beast, barbed with hooks and hanging from them were thousands of bodies. And at her level, she could see the dead forms of her sisters, hanging there, eyes open, staring at her.

  She squealed.

  And on that moment, for the first time in days, the Death Bell tolled.

  8

  Melai took the full brunt. The mere sound wave alone shredded her wings and tore them from her body, and away she were flung into Vol Mothaak, tumbling head over foot. Had it not been for her crushing collision against one of the great oaks, she might have flown on for a thousand leagues, lost and sunk down in the depths of the Grass Sea never to be found.

  Below, the Storm Haven talism
ans were blown to bits and Hawkmoth, Gargaron and Locke all succumbed to the shockwave, thrown off into the woods like mere dolls of straw caught on a cyclonic gale.

  The faceless Angels of the woods, clinging upside-down to tree trunks, remained utterly unaffected. As if, for them, the shockwave did not exist. And from their perch, they watched the intruders upon their realm sail wildly and mercilessly through the woodland.

  RISE OF HOR

  1

  LONG after the shockwave had swept away, Gargaron lay in the leaf litter moaning, unsure what had hit him. He opened his eyes and gazed up into the trees. His vision were blurred. He blinked and lifted his hand to rub his eyes but his arm felt as heavy as stone.

  After a while, and with great effort, he sat up, aching from toe to chin. Blood dripped down his face. He blinked, hoping to clear his vision. But his left eye were gummed up with some sort of warm sticky substance. He tried wiping it away but pain came back at him. Gently he fingered his eye socket. His eye were naught but mush, and the bone were shattered, crumpled, caved-in.

  He looked around. Uncertain where he were. Gargantuan woodland trees rose up about him, so tall he could not see where they ended. He took his gourd from his belt only to find it bashed in somehow and without its lid. It held but two or three sips of water. Which he tipped into his mouth.

  He took some deep breaths then staggered to his feet. Weak, he stumbled. One of his legs shot up with excruciating pain. He grimaced. Using trees around him for support he managed to stay upright. He strained his good eye, hoping to focus his vision. It did not matter, the world around him remained a haze.

  2

  Absently clasping his empty gourd, he vacated the tree against which he were leaning. He held his arms out in front of him. He stumbled into another trunk. And held himself to it as if to let go would mean falling down and never getting up again. He steadied himself, took long breaths, tried focusing his good eye. Blood ran down his face.

  He slid down the tree to his rump and sat there panting. He smudged the blood from his face. There were a hundred other bleeding wounds across his body. They itched and stung. He reached for his pack, not even sure if it were still clung to him. He sighed with relief when he felt it there, strapped across his back. Unhitching it took tremendous effort. The strap were caught on his shoulder. He hung his head, panting, spit swinging from his lips in bloody tendrils. Eventually he wrestled the pack into his lap. He did not notice that Drenvel’s Bane were missing. He were concerned only with fetching out his medicinal satchel. From inside he took a small black-glass jar. He screwed the stopper with his thumb and finger back and forth until it came free. Dropping the cork he upended a handful of miniscule primate like critters into his palm. None of them were any bigger than the Ladybird Beetles that his dear Veleyal liked to collect on spring mornings.

  He picked one up in his fingers and placed it as near as he could estimate to the gushing wound on his forehead. He had to do it by touch. Though his fingertips felt numb. Still, he knew once the scent of blood brought the critter from its stasis, the critter would need no help seeking the wound.

  He felt it move, felt it waking. Felt it clambering across his brow like an ant. Then felt it at his wound—a sensation like a mad bee sting and then a satisfying tingling sensation and a gradual numbing of pain.

  He placed others across his body. Through blurred sight he watched them awaken. They scurried about him in search of ruptured flesh. When they sniffed out a bloodied wound they opened their ravenous mouths and sunk their fangs in.

  Gargaron let the Zombeez cavort over his body, their rampant appetites driving them to his wounds, where they drank and ate. The giant’s physiology were no friend to them however. Their saliva stimulated Gargaron’s immune system and flaps of his skin folded over each of the undead creatures, absorbing them into his flesh thus arresting blood flow and sealing each wound.

  He sat back, moved to take another draught of water. None remained. He dropped the empty gourd and closed his eyes, grimacing, hoping, praying that he had not lost too much blood. Above him the two suns beat down through Vol Mothaak’s canopy, hot and oppressive.

  3

  Sometime later, once the Zombeez had done their business, Gargaron tried standing again. Using the nearest tree for support, he climbed to his feet but when he stepped forward his legs crumpled beneath him and he collapsed into the leaf matter. He lay there panting. Sweat ran into his good eye. He smudged it away with his wrist. He climbed to his feet again, gripping the smooth bark of the trees about him. He stepped forward, one foot at a time.

  He stumbled aimlessly, looking about, trying to gain his bearings. ‘Melai,’ he tried calling though his voice were reduced to mere croaks. ‘Hawkmoth. Locke. Where be you?’

  He were never certain which way he were heading. He thought of the tower. Where did it stand? If he could only glimpse it through the woods he might gather his bearings. Unless of course his friends had succeeded in pulling it to ground. His memory, his mind, everything were an utter mess. He were certain of nothing.

  There were little sound, little breeze; his footfalls were muffled. The suns remained directly overhead, beaming down hot and harsh, the glaring sunlight pained his eye. He ached. His bones hurt.

  Exhausted, he fell against yet another tree trunk, panting, spit running from his mouth. ‘Thronir, help me find a way from this nightmare,’ he whispered desperately, his bloodied lips pushed against the rough bark. It were then he heard a faint swishing noise. And a glooping liquid sound, something splashing, splatting.

  He grimaced as he turned himself about, slumping spine-first against the trunk. With his one good eye he peered out into the blurred realm before him.

  He saw… movement. Thirty yards away he judged. He could not tell however what he were looking at. But the swishing sounds, the splashing noises, seemed to come from that direction.

  ‘Hawkmoth?’ he croaked. ‘Melai? Locke? Be that you?’

  If it were, none answered him.

  He pushed away from the tree, again hands held out in front of him. The conspicuous movement ahead did not cease. He pushed closer. His vision could still not make out what it were. ‘Melai,’ he croaked. ‘Hawkmoth. Somebody answer me.’

  He saw those strange beings clung to tree trunks. The faceless ones, Star Angels as Hawkmoth had called them. And he gasped when he recognised the sorcerer sprawled across a twisted bed of roots. The angels had him surrounded. And though the scene were fuzzy, Gargaron realised what were happening: the angles were jabbing him with spears. Retracting… jabbing… retracting… jabbing… again and again and again, like knives into a hoardog.

  4

  Gargaron, alarmed, reached for his sword but it were not on him and could not recall when he last had it. He looked about, thinking it may have only recently fallen from him. But if it lay in his vicinity, such were his eyesight, that he could not distinguish it from stick nor branch.

  Without thinking, he shoved his way before these Star Angels, attempting to ward off their attacks with naught but his arms. He found himself amidst a flurry of spikes that pierced his clothing and his leather arm-guards, that punctured his skin and muscle. As they retracted from his flesh, pulsing jets of blood spurted into the air.

  He staggered backwards into the ancient gnarled bark of a tree, his boots splashing through thick pools of sorcerer blood. He watched the Star Angels with his compromised vision. They clung to the tree trunks around Hawkmoth, dangling upside-down, jabbing their long spikes at him still.

  They possessed no arms with which to wield weapons. And only tentacles for legs. But he saw upon their featureless faces a large obscene orifice that spat out a tusk as long and straight as his very own great sword. They stabbed Hawkmoth repeatedly and as they retracted, drawing fresh spurts of blood, these spike drew back somehow into heads no larger than Gargaron’s.

  5

  Gargaron crouched and grabbed the sorcerer. Amidst a flurry of spear strikes he hefted Hawkmoth into hi
s grasp and hauled him backwards.

  Sweat drained into his eye. He wiped it off but it smudged with blood and made his eyesight worse. He reached again for his sword. It were not on him. He considered Drenvel’s Bane. He reached for it. But could not feel it in his pack. He searched the ground around him hoping maybe it had slipped out when he’d grabbed hold of Hawkmoth. There were lots of blurred objects. But nothing his fingers touched were the hammer hilt.

  He grabbed the sorcerer by the wrists, gathering his strength to haul him into his arms and run off with him. But he realised the onslaught had abated.

  He looked up.

  The angels clung to their trees. Motionless.

  Gargaron waited for the attack to kick off again. But it did not come. Why would they stop? he wondered. Unless… unless Hawkmoth were finished.

  ‘Hawkmoth?’ Gargaron croaked. ‘Hawkmoth, do you hear me?’ He could make out no detail other than large blurred patches of red upon his friend’s body that were probably blood and flesh. When his hands found them, these areas they were pulpy and wet and warm.

  ‘Hawkmoth?’ Gargaron groaned. ‘Hawkmoth! Hear me now.’

  The sorcerer were unmoving. He were sprawled and his limbs loose and unresponsive. Gargaron lowered his ear to Hawkmoth’s chest, listening.

  It were faint, but there were a heartbeat.

  ‘Hawkmoth,’ he said close to the sorcerer’s face. ‘Stay with me. Do not leave. I be here at your side. You are not alone.’ He glanced up at the Angels. They were gone he realised. He looked about. The woodland were a blur but he saw no movement.

  He turned back to Hawkmoth, wondering if some tincture in the sorcerer’s sidepack might work to bring the sorcerer round. Yet he knew nothing of Hawkmoth’s peculiar potions. Even after spending so much time in his company. He did not want to administer something that might kill the sorcerer outright. Not if there were some small chance that he might recover.

  Gargaron considered his own remedies: his Zombeez, his skin grafts, and the various potions and ointments engineered by his village druids. Nearly all were giant specific. Meant only for his kind. And yet, there were Lyfen Essence.

  Will it work on Hawkmoth though? he wondered. It had failed to save the elven woman who had ridden Grimah to him.

  6

  He took it from his pack, identifying it by feeling for its horizontal bottle. He fished it into his grasp, and held it before his face, unstoppering it, sniffing it. Like some blind-struck soul, he felt around for Hawkmoth’s face, then his mouth. He brought the bottle to Hawkmoth’s lips and dripped in what he thought would be two or three drops.

  He sat there then, wondering what to do next. A thought came to him. He lifted the vial to his face and let fall a drop into both eyes. There proved no change in his left eye; it remained spongy, broken, pulverised, unseeing. Yet, more swift than he would’ve thought possible, his good eye began to clear; the blur of the woodland realm all about him coalesced into vibrant clarity.

  He gazed down at the sorcerer and gasped when he noted the extent of Hawkmoth’s injuries. The sorcerer were a bloodied mess of broken limbs and punctured flesh. The side of his head had been torn open, one ear entirely gone. His jaw were broken. Or horribly dislocated for it hung at a horrific angle. His eyes were shut but puddled in drying blood. His arms were twisted and bent. There were a huge rent up the side of his body where even the stone skin had cracked open like a foul egg.

  Dear sorcerer, Gargaron thought, if you come back from this, it shall be a miracle.

  Gargaron felt useless. The sorcerer had brought Gargaron himself back from death. All Gargaron could manage were some drops of liquid that may or may not work.

  He sat back with a hefty sigh, dispirited, looking about, wondering what to do. And though it tortured him, he could not take his eyes from Hawkmoth for many long moments. In the end he forced himself to avert his gaze. To gaze off into the woodland and work out what to do next.

  It were here he noticed something. Through the trees, a small clearing… Some crumpled mass lay on the leafy forest floor. He saw large crab legs poking from it.

  7

  Gargaron hefted himself to his feet. And set off, grunting as he stumbled forward.

  He reached the clearing and dropped to his knees beside a massacred body. Gargaron put his hand over his mouth, despaired, terrified. It were Locke. His body ripped open. Crab guts were dragged out behind him, tangled in the trees. The shell of his remaining legs were shattered. His head were bent at a terrible angle, the bones in his neck stuck through his skin, crab blood were everywhere. There were no heart to listen for. Locke’s chest were burst open and organs were spilt out across the grass.

  Gargaron slumped back, barely able to breathe. His eye watering with tears. ‘What am I to do?’ he whimpered.

  It were obvious now, it had all gone wrong. Their plans to save their country were terminated. He pushed himself back against a tree trunk, up against its lumpy roots. He sat there weeping. His belly ached. He realised he were bleeding again. Several puncture wounds dotted his body. The roots beneath him dug into his bones. He pushed himself from them. One shifted. He pulled it free and tossed it aside. As it flung away he realised it were no root. But Drenvel’s Bane.

  He eyed it from where he sat. He cared for it no longer. What use has it ever been? he thought. What use be it now?

  He were still processing the demise of both Hawkmoth and Locke when he heard a familiar sound. The sound of swishing spikes, the sound of splashing blood.

  He looked tiredly toward Hawkmoth who lay where he’d left him. But the sorcerer were free of those fiendish Star Angels.

  Gargaron stood as quick as his aching body would allow. He clutched his aching stomach; bleeding out it were. He turned slowly, searching through the woodland near and far with his good eye. He had rotated almost fully when he saw it. Through the trees, a cluster of Angels, stabbing something out of his view.

  He did not want to imagine what it were. But he feared the worst. Melai.

  And if it were, he would tear down those Angels. Though this time he needn’t be their pin cushion. He stumbled forward, and fetched Drenvel’s Bane into his grasp.

  8

  Fighting exhaustion, he staggered through the woodland. Bumping into tree and branch, gripping each for support. He drew closer and closer to the Angels. Their assault on whatever they were attacking continued. And when Gargaron finally stumbled into a small shaded glade he saw her being speared, punctured, perforated.

  Dear little wood’s nymph Melai.

  His heart sank. ‘No,’ he yelled. ‘Leave her be!’ They might as well have been digging their vicious spines into his daughter, his wife, every soul he had ever loved.

  He gripped the hilt of Hor’s legendary hammer. And as rage surged through him he felt a mighty fire ignite in his chest. Suddenly he felt his fatigue abandon him. He felt no more pain. He did not bleed. He felt all the strength and power of a thousand giants.

  Once more, the mighty hammer head appeared at the end of the hilt.

  9

  If Melai had been conscious she would have witnessed a being of enormous stature rise to his feet before her, a being clad in dark steel armour, clad in a dark steel helmet, gripping a hammer that held a bluish iridescence.

  Here now, before her unconscious form, the figure turned and let the Star Angels have his wrath. Trees were obliterated, smashed and bashed, wood splinters flew off in a thousand directions, shaken leaves rained down, catching the sun as they spun and fell. The Star Angels were pulverised, each swing treating them as if they were naught but hollowed clay dolls, golden blood splashing across the woodland. Though they did not break apart themselves, nor shatter. They were rendered across the woodland as long shards of metal, stuck out from the very trees they clung to, like streaks of silver smeared across a canvas. And none of them ever moved again.

  But Hor were not yet done. For he had spied Dark Ones standing amidst the shadows, surrounding the clearing, watc
hing.

  Laughing a deep sonorous laugh, he stomped toward them. They put their own hammers up in defence. But while he battered them all they made no move to counter his attacks. They simply parried his hammer blows. Still, he dispatched them all the same. Twenty of them; all matching him in height and bulk. And though they did not feel to be a physical part of this world, pockets of blackness embedded in the wall of reality with glowing white eyes, he bludgeoned them down with his magical hammer. Until they were pockets of blackness spilled across grass and fallen oak, like fallen shadows left with naught but their searing pale eyes.

  Hor marched back and forth, wanting more, arbitrarily swinging his hammer down a tree here, another there. Once he were done, once the leaf matter had settled, once the bodies of Angels were discarded hither and thither, once there were no further sign of Dark Ones, he saw her… Melai.

  And suddenly his fury were replaced with sadness.

  10

  By the time Gargaron knelt at Melai’s side his hammer were again but a hilt and his pain had returned and exhaustion threatened to overwhelm him, to pull him down into sweet oblivion.

  But he would not allow it.

  He would see to Melai first before his life gave way. He would either help sustain her life. Or ease her passing. Neither had he been able to do for Veleyal or Yarniya. If the gods willed his death, then so be it, but not before he tended to Melai.

  She lay crammed against the root of a tree. As if she had been thrown and kicked and stuffed there. She were bleeding profusely. She were a mess. And unmoving.

  Tears filled Gargaron’s eyes as he stared down at her small, broken body. He saw she were without her wings. He saw her limbs were snapped. He saw that her ribs had cracked and her chest cavity caved inwards. He saw spike holes punctured through her. Her pale green blood were splashed everywhere.

  And yet unbelievably, there were a pulse in her neck.

  He crouched and lay his head on her chest. It were faint, but it were there. Her precious heartbeat. ‘Melai,’ he said. ‘Melai. Do you hear me? It be Gargaron. I am here at your side. Can you hear me?’

  There were no response. Quickly he took the bottle of Lyfen Essence from his pack and administered a drop into her mouth.

  The result were surprising. Right before his eyes her wounds began to heal. He had not seen the Essence work so well even on giants. Still… it did not restore her fully. He heard her breath return, a light, short breath. But that were all.

  ‘Melai?’ he asked. ‘Do you hear me?’

  No response.

  ‘Melai, it be Gargaron. Hear me. Please.’ He watched as her eyelids moved and slowly parted. Though her eyes did not see him; they appeared to gaze off into the woodland. If she were actually seeing anything he could not tell.

  He moved his face into her line of sight, gently smoothing her hair from her brow. ‘Melai,’ he said gently, ‘it be me. Gargaron.’

  He watched her blink, and then he believed her eyes focused on him. She watched him for a long while. He held her hand. She tried to speak. There were no sound. Not at first. But then a murmur. ‘Gar… garon.’

  It were so faint it were like a listless breath of breeze on a summer’s afternoon.

  ‘Gargaron,’ she murmured weakly.

  He smiled, but tears were in his eyes. ‘Melai. I be here with you.’

  ‘It got us.’

  ‘Lie still. Don’t talk. Let me aid you.’

  ‘It got us,’ she said again softly.

  ‘Melai, save your strength.’

  ‘I looked into its eyes,’ she whispered. ‘I saw its thoughts and mind. It cannot be stopped. I know it now as I did not before.’

  ‘What are you saying?’ Gargaron laughed awkwardly, smudging sweat and blood from her forehead. ‘Stop talking. Keep your strength.’

  ‘I… I’m dying. It’s too late.’

  ‘Melai, no, I shan’t let you.’

  Slowly, painfully, she reached up with her arm and touched his cheek. ‘Oh, if we’d only met years before. We would have been great friends. You are a kind soul. I am truly sorry for the loss of your daughter and wife.’

  ‘Thankyou,’ he said, a lump in his throat. ‘But you shall be fine. You shall be fine.’

  ‘My wings are dashed. I am dashed. I must go now. Remember your promise. Take me back to Willowgarde, release me to my sweet sisters.’

  ‘Melai,’ he said as her eyes watched him and her life slipped from her body. She fell limp and her arm fell from his face. A slight smile remained on her lips.

  ‘Melai, no,’ Gargaron sobbed. ‘Melai, please, no. Stay awake, hear me now, stay awake. Please.’

  Her head lolled back and her eyes gazed out into the treetops of this hell forest of Vol Mothaak. And Gargaron saw it then, away through the woodland, the top of the tower, the idiot face gazing down at him with its idiot, mocking smile.

  11

  Gargaron roared and stood, taking up Drenvel’s Bane once more. ‘NO!’ he yelled.

  Once more a blinding fury swept over him. And once more his pain fell away, and the strength of a hundred Skinkks filled him. He strode through the woods toward the tower. Growing ever taller as he went. Ever bigger. Hor’s horned helmet and armour of black steel plate forming about him. All the anger that had seethed within him since the tolling of the first bell drove him, all the fury that had built up since the fall of his village, since the discovery of his wife and daughter dead.

  He began running, running, faster and faster, bashing aside Star Angels who now descended upon him, springing and wriggling from tree to tree, attempting to crowd him, hundreds jabbing at him with their spikes. But he flailed his hammer and smashed them asunder and he charged toward the toxic silver pool at tower’s base and when he reached its bank he took a breath and roared as he leapt out over the poisonous Mercuruan pond…

  He crashed heavily into the small island on which the tower stood. He landed on his knees and rolled and all in the same movement he were up and on his feet, wheeling back Drenvel’s Bane, bringing it crashing into the stonework.

  A boom shook the foundations, dirt and dust splintered from the ancient mortar, bits of brick peppered the pond. Ignoring the tower’s leering demonic face that dropped down at him with tremendous speed, its enormous mouth aghast and laughing, Gargaron wound his arms back and brought his hammer into the tower again and again and again, punching stone’s out across the toxic pool, splashes of silver liquid crashing against the banks.

  Bring me down if you can! a voice screeched in his mind.

  ‘Oh, I intend to!’ Gargaron roared back gleefully.