We stepped outside and I had my first glimpse of the opposite side of the island from the cell block. This side of the island held a steep slope that led through piles of gray, shattered boulders to the edge of the lake. White waves crashed over the rocks and left pools of dark water between the large stones. The area was desolate of vegetation. Neither trees nor shrubs, nor even weeds, grew in the cracks between the boulders. There was a rough path over the rocky ground, made muddy by the weather. There was a mess of dark clouds overhead, and a cool wind blew off the lake waters and swept over the barren ground. Sprinkles of rain splattered the path and slipped down the tops of the boulders to their bases like tears.
I looked back at the Old Den. It towered a hundred feet above us and ended in a sharp, peaked roof of black shingles. Square towers with flat roofs marked the two corners of the building I could see. The sheer wall before us stretched for a thousand feet and seemed to block out the world. The first ten feet of the structure was carved from the dark, jagged rocks of the island. The upper parts were made of a mix of thick, primitive blackened bricks mingled with smaller native rocks. Arched windows looked out on the desolate grounds. Some had glass, others were empty like those in the hallway of our bedroom.
Greenwood stepped onto the path and threw his cloak over his shoulders, but I hesitated. "Isn't there a greener, less murderous-looking path to take?" I pleaded.
He half-turned to me and shook his head. "No. The Diggers wished for this part of the island to remain untouched, and it has been so for centuries."
"Yeah, about that. Who, or what, exactly are these diggers? A bunch of mole people?" I guessed.
"No, rats," he corrected me.
My eyes widened and I stepped back into the Den. "Did. . .did you say rats?"
"Yes."
I cringed. "Um, I think I'll try that escape option now."
He raised an eyebrow. "You dislike rats, don't you?"
"It's a mutual hatred."
"You have nothing to fear from the Diggers. They are generally hospitable, and won't harm us," he assured me.
"What are rats doing under an island of werewolves, anyway?" I asked him.
"They built the Old Den from the island's stone, and as payment were allowed to build their homes beneath the island so they would be protected by us from any threats above. Thus werewolves have nothing to fear from them," he explained.
I sighed and stepped into the weather. The wind whipped my dress and I wrapped my arms around myself. "You guys have an ingenious plan to keep us kidnapped girls here by giving us worthless clothes, don't you?" I commented as I walked up to him.
He turned away and proceeded down the rocky, uneven path. "The cave isn't far," he told me.
"Neither is a bad cold. . ." I muttered as I followed him.
Chapter 4
We traveled along the path that slowly descended towards the battered edges of the lake water. The trail meandered through the boulders and oftentimes I found us between two boulders. We passed through them like they were sentinels silently guarding this mythic cave entrance to the land of the rat-people.
My mind was much like the weather, moody. I rubbed my arms to keep them warm and, vexed at Greenwood's challenge that I hadn't been trying to escape, I looked for some path to follow that would lead me to freedom. We slipped through a pair of towering boulders and something out of the corner of my eye caught my attention. I paused and looked through a crack between two boulders. A small path, one not visibly connected to the one on which we traveled, proceeded away from the boulders and down the hillside to the waters. I glimpsed an old dock with a metallic-looking boat tied to one of its rotten posts.
"What's wrong?" Greenwood called to me.
I jumped and spun around to face him. "N-nothing, just thought I saw-um, I saw a rat person, that's all."
"They don't venture this far out of their cave," he explained.
I shrugged and caught up to him. "Must have been my imagination. How far is it to this cave, anyway? I'm freezing my assets off."
He stared at me for a moment and I noticed his lips were tightly pursed together. I held my breath. Sweat formed on my brow. My hands at my sides shook, so I balled them into fists. I lowered my head and breathed out when he turned away.
I jumped when I felt something soft drape across my shoulders. Greenwood had given me his cloak. I grasped the edges of the collar with my hands and looked up into his face. He again faced away from me, but I noticed his eyes held a gentleness that I'd never noticed.
"Thank you," I whispered.
He ignored me and nodded at the next corner down the trail some twenty yards from where we stood. "The entrance to the cave is over there."
My secret was safe, and after such kind attention I felt somewhat guilty about not telling him what I saw, but I was determined to prove his theory wrong. I would escape, and this bonding be damned.
Greenwood led me down the path and around the bend. Our inhospitable surroundings offered some compensation in the form of a cave opening to our left. The opening, with its sharp rocks that hung down and protruded from the ground, was like a gaping mouth. It faced the lake, but was shielded from easy view by the boulders.
The inside lay in shadows that my eyes couldn't penetrate. Greenwood stepped over the lower teeth and snatched two things from the wall. One was a lighter he used to light the other item, a large, fresh torch. The oil on the top burned brightly and illuminated the rough walls.
The entrance to the cave was a small, round room. The floor was made of the same hard rock as the rest of the hillside. A tunnel in the rear led deeper and at a downward slope into the hillside. The tunnel was tall enough he wouldn't need to stoop, but the close walls made for a narrow fit. The torchlight cast long, flickering shadows down the tunnel. The slightest breeze over the torch made the shadows jump and dance.
I lifted my legs one at a time and slipped past the jagged teeth as Greenwood moved to the tunnel entrance. I reluctantly followed him. Greenwood's tread was too light to hear, but my footsteps echoed off the walls. The amplified sound sent shivers through my damp body. I pulled the cloak closer to myself and enjoyed the warmth of his body that still lingered in the cloth.
Our travels sent us fifty yards down the tunnel before the path widened enough so I could walk beside him. "So how far is this home of theirs?" I asked him.
"We are nearly-"
"Stick up your hands, werewolves!" a voice shouted.
I yelped and jumped into Greenwood. He grabbed my shoulders and turned me to a particular corner of the darkness. The torchlight had neglected to reveal another tunnel that intersected our own. I gasped when I noticed a pair of red, beady eyes watching us.
"What does this mean?" Greenwood shouted in return.
A shadow emerged from the darkness. It was a humanoid male creature with a few defining features. The man stood just below five feet and wore nothing. His nudity was covered by a thick bunch of fur that grew over all his body but his feet, hands, and the front part of his face. Long, pointed, hairless ears grew out from the top of his head, and behind him trailed a hairless pink tail. Their feet were bare and their toes were long and ended in sharp claws.
He sneered at us and showed off two rows of sharp, pointy teeth. In one hand he held a mace made with a thick tree branch and the rough rocks of the hillside. I glimpsed a dozen more pairs of red eyes behind him.
"It means you're coming with us."
The rear rat men scurried past their leader to us and grabbed our arms. Greenwood's torch clattered to the ground as he let himself be taken. The men pulled his arms behind his back and bound him.
I thrashed and pulled myself out of reach of their clingy, clawed hands. "Hands off, boys!" I growled as I stepped back.
"Do as they wish," Greenwood commanded me.
I whipped my head to him and glared at his calm demeanor. "We didn't do anything wrong!" I argued.
"They don't see it that way," he returned.
I pursed
my lips, but stopped my retreat. The rat men wrenched my arms behind my back and wrapped a strong cord around them. They pushed us forward and down the tunnel with the leader at the head of our little party. One of the rat men happened to grab our torch and he held it up near us so we could see the way ahead. The tunnel twisted and turned, and the decline led us further and further downward. The air grew thick with dampness and the smell of dirt. We passed other tunnels and small passages where I glimpsed doorways that led into blackened rooms. The deeper we traveled the more red eyes I saw in those doorways.
We were marched deep into the bowels of the hillside. Our travels ended when the tunnel opened into a large, circular cavern. Torches lined the curved walls and more entrances to other tunnels lay on either side of us. In the center of the room were rows of crude benches carved from the rocky floor. Three dozen Diggers sat on the benches, some old, some young, and most in-between. Upon our entrance they turned to us and their wide, staring red eyes reflected their curiosity.
At the front opposite the tunnels was a short platform, and on the platform was a tall seat that curved up into the shape of a 'U.' On the seat sat a giant male Digger. The male was a head taller than the others, but his fur was gray. He wore a cloak over his furry shoulders and clean pants covered his lower half, but he wore no shirt. In his hands was a staff carved from rock with a shined crystal on the top.
Greenwood and I were pushed down an aisle between the stone benches. We reached the platform and our captors shoved us to our knees before the large Digger. The rat stood and surveyed us with his cold, bright eyes.
"Intruders, Sire," the lead rat guard explained.
The rat ruler frowned, and I noticed sharp teeth slip out from beneath his upper and lower lips. His voice was scratchy with age, but firm with energy. "So you seek to intrude on our domain once more?" he growled.
Greenwood raised his head and lifted an eyebrow. "We haven't intruded before, ," he argued.
The ruler slammed the tip of his staff against the ground and sneered at us. "Don't lie, son of Greenwood. We know who you are by your smell. You've come here to harm more of our people, but you were careless this time. My men heard the footsteps of this young werewolf." He jerked his staff towards me.
"We've only come to ask you about the earthquake, King Murinae. We know nothing about this trespass you speak of," Greenwood insisted. The crowds around us murmured, and the tone I heard wasn't friendly towards us.
King Murinae smashed his staff against the floor until the room quieted. He leaned down so his face was only a foot from Greenwood's. His red eyes studied Greenwood's face and he raised a bushy eyebrow. "I see no lies in your eyes, son of Greenwood. We may well be able to help one another in an exchange of information."
Greenwood bowed his head. "However we can for our old allies."
The king scoffed. "I wonder if that's true." He straightened and looked to the leader of his guards. The rat pulled something from his belt and tossed it on the ground in front of us. "What is this meaning of this, son of Greenwood?" the ruler questioned Greenwood.
I inspected the item and found it to be a piece of tattered cloth. The front showed half a full moon with four stars encircling it. The other half was gone, torn away by some force, but enough remained that I recognized the emblem on the rear wall of the Council room.
"This is the emblem of the Council," Greenwood admitted.
"It was found in the hand of one of our dead guards two weeks ago," the king informed us.
Greenwood raised his head and frowned. "Murdered?"
"He didn't stab his own back. . ." the lead guard muttered.
The king nodded. "Muridae is right. It wasn't an accident nor did he die by his own hand. He was killed by his own dagger. In the fight to save his life the guard tore this flimsy piece of cloth from the clothes of his foe. What have you to say to that, son of Greenwood?"
"Was there no trail or scent to follow?" Greenwood asked him.
King Murinae closed his eyes and shook his head. "Nothing."
"Why haven't you told the Council of this murder?" Greenwood noted.
The king scoffed. "And let our enemy know we've learned their identity? No, our foe is someone on the Council, the cloth proves that much. Who is anyone's guess."
"How can we help?" Greenwood questioned him.
"Warn them. Tell them not to intrude into our tunnels and that our guards have been tripled. If anyone again trespasses they will forfeit their life to us. A life for a life, so to speak," the king explained.
"I would rather the culprit be caught," Greenwood argued.
"As would my people and I, but that doesn't seem possible until we catch them ourselves," the king pointed out. He leaned forward and his red eyes flashed with anger. His voice grew low and deep. "In the meantime, you will pass that message on to your rulers."
Greenwood pursed his lips, but nodded. "You have my word, but we won't leave until our question is answered.
The king frowned. "That earthquake, yes? We only know that it didn't come from beneath the island. My men felt the tremors come from below our fourteenth floor but above the fifteen. They investigated the tunnel, but the area was collapsed. From the earthquake or something else, they couldn't tell. They are digging the tunnel out now, but the rocks are heavy and the work will take a few days to clear the thick rubble."
Greenwood bowed his head. "I see. Thank you for your-"
He didn't get to finish before the earth began to move beneath us. The rat guards and king tottered on their wide feet. The torches swayed and flickered in tune with the tremors and created a terrifying dance of shattering danger. Cries and screams came from the crowd behind us. Some jumped to their feet only to lose their balance and fall to the hard floor. Others crawled onto the floor and gripped the stone seats.
Cracks rose from the floor and climbed the curved walls. They created tree designs with their smaller offspring and destabilized the walls of the entire room. Rocks fell from the cracked branches and rained down on us.
Muridae grasped the king's shoulders, but the ruler shrugged him off and nodded to the crowd. "Save them first!" he ordered him. The guard frowned, but nodded.
Muridae and his men rushed past us and to the crowds. They assisted the people into the tunnels while the king watched on from his throne.
Without my hands to balance me I teetered and fell onto my side. Greenwood grit his teeth and strained his arms. His bindings tore from his wrists and he scrambled over to me. His hands bore long, sharp claws, and with a few swipes he sliced through my thick bindings. He helped me to my feet and I glared at him.
"You could have freed yourself from the start, couldn't you?" I accused him.
"Yes, but that wasn't the best time," he pointed out.
The rumblings sharply increased and the floor shook so hard I lost my balance. I fell against Greenwood's chest. His hands gripped my shoulders to keep me still. He pulled me towards the nearest wall and pinned me between the rock and his hard chest so that his body covered mine completely.
I heard a horrible cracking sound from behind him and glanced around Greenwood. A large crack climbed the walls and reached the tallest point in the ceiling. Its tree opened a hole in the roof and several large stones the size of me fell towards the ground. King Murinae stood beneath the largest of the stones.
Erik saw the trouble at the same time I did. He pushed me against the wall and rushed to the king. Five yards away he dove forward and tackled the ruler around the waist. The pair tumbled into the wall at the far back of the platform. The rocks fell between us and obscured my view of them.
"Erik!"
Chapter 5
Barely had the name left my mouth than Muridae flew past me. He scrambled over the rocks and bent down out of sight. A moment later he reappeared, as did the heads of Erik and the king. Muridae and Erik hauled the king over the rocks and into the aisle.
I hurried over to them and slid onto my knees beside Erik. He had some minor cuts on hi
s arms, and a bad gash on his temple that bled down his face. The king was shaken, but fine.
"What the hell were you thinking?" I scolded him.
"I don't believe thinking was involved," he quipped.
As we spoke the tremors petered out to nothing. Muridae helped his king to his feet and Erik stood on his own. King Murinae leaned towards Erik and grasped his hand.
"It seems I owe you a favor, son of Greenwood," the king mused.
Erik bowed his head. "I'd like to think you would have done the same for me."
The king chuckled. "Then you think more highly of me than I deserve." The ruler turned to his guard and shooed him away. "I'm fine. It's the tunnels you should inspect, not my person."
Muridae frowned. "But Father-"
"But nothing. Go and do your duty, my captain. Your people will expect as much when you're king," King Murinae insisted. His captain bowed his head and hurried into one of the tunnels. The king turned to us and shook his head. "He has too much heart for his old king."
"Did you need any assistance, King Murinae?" Greenwood offered.
King Murinae shook his head. "No, and I wouldn't trust who the Council would bring down here. Go back to your people and attend to your damage, and don't forget to give them my message."
I frowned glanced from Greenwood to the king and back. "What kind of a thank-you was that? He just saved-"
"We will deliver your message," Greenwood agreed. He grabbed my arm and dragged me towards the tunnel through which we'd come.
Once in the confines of the tunnel, I wrenched myself free. "What the hell was that? You like kowtowing to people?"
I could just make out Greenwood's frown. "This is his domain. Never forget who holds the greatest power."
I looked him up and down. "Believe me, I have some practice in that."
He strode forward and I followed after him. A few random torches lit our way and we passed many Diggers who stood outside their holes. Some scuttled away from us, others glared as we passed. Greenwood didn't veer off course, and in a few minutes we arrived at the cave opening. Beyond the mouth the splattering of rain was now a downpour that slicked the ground.
Greenwood paused in the cave. I walked ahead of him and glanced out the teeth. "Can this day get any better. . ." I muttered.