“Oh, great!” said Mekhmet. “Terrifying and more dangerous than an entire squadron of Imperial cavalry. Just what we need.”
“Well, it’s no good sitting here and talking about it. They’ve got physical bodies now. Let’s do something!” said Sharley. Drawing his scimitar, he charged.
Mekhmet watched open-mouthed as Suleiman leaped forward, then, gathering his wits, he too drew his sword and galloped into the attack.
Kirimin flattened her ears in fear and anger. “Oh, bloody hell,” she snarled. “How stupid! How typically male!” And roaring out a challenge she joined in the assault.
Sparks flew as the boys struck at the wraiths with their scimitars. But encased in iron and steel as they were, the ghosts were impregnable. Kirimin beat at them with her huge, clawed paws, but only succeeded in gashing her flesh on their shells of broken metal. Quickly the friends drew back and turned for the gate. Strategic withdrawal was no disgrace, and at the present time they had no answer for the ghosts’ armour. But it was too late. Their retreat was cut off by two of the phantoms standing directly in the gateway.
“Things are definitely not looking bright,” said Mekhmet, as they retreated to the middle of the courtyard.
“No,” Sharley agreed, trying to sound far braver than he felt. “In fact I think this could very well be it. There’s nothing we can do against armoured ghosts.”
Kirimin licked her cut paw and squinted at the wraiths that were howling and screaming in the shadows. “Why don’t they just attack and get it over with?”
“I don’t know. Perhaps they’re just taunting us,” said Mekhmet. “You know, like cat and mouse, with us definitely in the role of the rodents.”
The ghostly screeching rose to a higher pitch, and the friends turned to each other and hugged. This was it. This was the end. They’d never get back to see friends and family, they’d never get back to their own world where everything was so ordinary and . . . and real. They closed their eyes and waited in silence.
But then the screeching took on a different quality; it sounded less murderous and more uncertain, as though the ghosts weren’t so sure they could kill them any more.
After a few minutes Sharley risked opening his eyes, and there before them stood the figure of a man. He was elegantly dressed, and his posture seemed to suggest he was almost bored.
“Oh, please! I mean, how clichéd. It’s a wonder you’re not wearing white sheets and going ‘wooo’!”
The ghosts raged back at him in what was obviously a language of some sort, because the man finally stopped inspecting his nails and looked up to answer. “Do you know, as surprising as it may seem, I really don’t care if it’s your job to kill mortals. You’re not killing these.”
The wraiths advanced menacingly on him, and the change in the elegant figure was startling and instantaneous. He snapped upright, bristling with fury, and his lips drew back in a ferocious hiss that revealed long white fangs. “One step nearer and I’ll rip your ectoplasmic bodies to shreds and freeze your pathetic souls!” His voice barely rose above a vicious whisper, but it echoed around the courtyard and the ghosts retreated.
Again the screeching rose and fell in the semblance of a language, and eventually the man said: “Well, exactly who has sent you on this ‘mission’?” A pause, and then: “As you wish. It’s of no importance anyway. If the devil himself had ordered their deaths I still wouldn’t let you kill them!”
This seemed to decide something for the ghosts, and they suddenly rushed the man, their iron-clad bodies clanking and clashing like an earthquake in a saucepan factory. As one they converged on the lonely figure, and he disappeared under a tangle of ironmongery. But then, with a sudden eruption of rusting metal, the seven ghosts flew through the air and landed in a clanging, banging heap on the far side of the courtyard. The man now advanced with a slow, stalking stealth like a hunting cat, his lips drawn back over glittering fangs and his eyes aflame with rage.
With a gesture both elegant and powerful, he pointed at the heap and a great howl rose up until a bright point of light hung shimmering in the air above it. For a moment it scintillated, and then fell with a brittle chink onto the stones of the courtyard.
“Your choice has been made; you attacked and I have punished. Now, who else will surrender their soul to my wrath?”
Six ragged skeins of mist rose up from the broken metal and fled screaming, their voices diminishing to a distant echo and then finally silence. The man stooped, picked up the tiny shred of light and placed it in his pocket, as though he’d found a coin. Then he turned and regarded the boys and Kirimin, who’d witnessed it all.
Sharley and Mekhmet still held their scimitars, but something told them to remain still and offer no challenge. “Who are you?” asked Sharley curtly.
“Someone who has just saved your life, young man,” came the reply, and the man walked over to stand before them with indolent ease. “A little gratitude might not go amiss.”
“Then have our thanks, and willingly given,” Sharley answered. “Please excuse us if we seem overly suspicious, but I’m sure you’ll appreciate our caution while travelling in this particular place. You, erm . . . you appear to be a vampire.”
The man smiled, revealing his glittering fangs. “Not any more, technically speaking. You see, I’m the ghost of a vampire.”
“But vampires don’t have ghosts,” said Kirimin. “Everybody knows that.”
“Well, I am the exception to that general rule,” the man answered.
“But how? And why?” asked Sharley in confusion.
“It’s quite simple really,” the man said, folding his arms and shifting his weight to one hip so that he looked exactly like some of the statues Sharley had seen in Venezzia. “At the end of my long physical . . . existence, I learned to feel compassion, and friendship – and also, most importantly, I developed the capacity to love. And as these qualities are the very things that are the building blocks of the spirit, I found that I had developed a soul.”
“Who did you love?” asked Kirimin, her romantic nature moved by the idea.
“Ah, that answer is simply given, but would take an age to explain. Suffice it to say that she made the aching burden of Vampiric existence as light as the touch of moonlight; she filled the darkness with the radiance of her beauty and she gave the formless aeons a shape and purpose.”
Kirimin sighed. “Does she have a name?”
The man frowned. “I’m afraid we both lost our names down the long ages of the epochs we spent together. But she does have a title.” He paused, consciously raising the dramatic effect, then finally said: “She is known as Her Vampiric Majesty, and she is now the sole ruler of The-Land-of-the-Ghosts.”
“Then you must be the Vampire King!” said Sharley.
His Vampiric Majesty smiled and bowed. “The very same.”
“But you were destroyed in the war against the empire,” said Sharley, trying not to let his jaw drop in amazement.
“Indeed I was.” The King conceded.
“Didn’t Bellorum destroy you?” asked Mekhmet.
“Definitely not!” snapped the King. “The weapon that ended my long rule was nothing other than treachery, wielded by that loathsome dog. I’d defeated him in fair contest, using only rapier and dagger, and never once resorting to my supernatural powers. He lay at my feet bleeding from the many wounds I’d inflicted. And then, when he raised his hand, I gave quarter, as a gentleman must, and prepared to grant him his final wish before performing the coup de grâce. It was then that the treacherous worm ordered in over a hundred musketeers.”
“But lead shot wouldn’t have killed you,” said Sharley.
“Indeed not,” the King agreed. “But each musket was loaded with wooden bullets, and my physical existence was ended there and then.”
“I see,” said Sharley as he absorbed the information. Then, remembering the needs of the moment, he went on: “But to get back to our present situation, what I don’t understand is why y
ou decided to help us against the ghosts just now.”
“Quite simple, young Lindenshield,” said the King with a small bow. “I rescued you in deference to your mother. Queen Thirrin became a friend despite many long years of enmity between the Icemark and The-Land-of-the-Ghosts. For a mortal, she was, and is, truly great, and had the greatness of spirit to offer friendship even above the demands of treaty and alliance. When you meet again, remember me to her.”
“You don’t know how we can get back to the physical world, do you?” Kirimin suddenly blurted. “I just thought that as you’re a ghost, you might know where the tunnels are.”
“Alas no, Princess Kirimin,” said His Vampiric Majesty. “The location of the gateways between the worlds never remain constant. A tunnel to the mortal realms this week may become a simple network of caves the next.”
“Oh, well, I just thought I’d ask,” she said quietly.
The Vampire King smiled sadly, then turned back to Sharley. “And now I would ask a favour of you.”
“Of me?”
“Yes, when you return to the physical realms I would deem it the greatest of favours if you would go to the Blood Palace and seek audience with Her Vampiric Majesty. Tell her . . .” he paused as sadness gathered in his features. “Tell her that I exist still, and that if she too learns compassion and love then we will meet again, once she has laid down the terrible burden of her physical continuance.”
“I will,” said Sharley simply.
“I have been watching her almost nightly, but of course she can’t see me, and even when I kiss her she merely feels a gentle draught across her lips.” The Vampire King shook his head sadly, then, seeming to recollect where he was, he bowed with an elegant flourish, and after blowing them all a kiss with his exquisitely gloved hand, he slowly faded away. “Remember,” his voice echoed on the air. “Remember.”
Kirimin sighed again. “How beautiful.”
“What is?” asked Mekhmet.
“That their love should have survived for so many centuries and still live on even after death.”
“Oh, that . . . yes, I suppose it is beautiful. Perhaps the sages are right; nothing is ever completely evil. Even the worst of us have a spark of good somewhere within us.”
“I could think of a few exceptions,” said Sharley.
A sudden flapping of wings interrupted their thoughts. “It seems that mortals enjoy a surfeit of good luck!” said Pious as he circled above them. “You were in deep trouble before that Vampire arrived. Those ghosts would’ve reduced you to gooey jam!”
“Oh, shut up,” snapped Mekhmet. “Why don’t you just flap off somewhere and leave us in peace?”
Kirimin and Sharley both agreed loudly with this, and the Imp spiralled away. “I know when I’m not wanted!” he called as he flew off.
“Some power’s obviously working against me, and this time I don’t think it’s the Witchfather,” Medea said to Orla as she swept off to her great chair to think.
The old witch said nothing, and waited in silence for her mistress to go on.
“It could, of course, be something higher; in fact, it could be something far higher. But if She’s getting involved, why doesn’t She just perform a minor miracle and transport them back home?”
“The actions of the Goddess are always a mystery,” Orla said quietly.
Medea nodded in weary agreement. “Though there’s always the possibility that we’re all being put through some sort of tedious ‘learning process’.” She slammed her hands down on the arms of her chair-that-was-almost-a-throne. “She’s so pathetic! Grandfather’s completely right to reject Her. When he finally begins his war against Her he can count on my support!”
Orla nodded, then hoping to distract her from her worries she asked: “Would the mistress perhaps like a little wine?”
“No, the mistress would not!” Medea snapped in reply. “The only vintage that would satisfy my thirst would be about eight pints tapped from the veins of Charlemagne Weak-in-the-Leg Lindenshield!”
CHAPTER 15
Cressida climbed the tightly winding corkscrew of the spiral staircase and finally emerged on the wind-blasted pinnacle of the highest lookout tower in the citadel. Being in strict battle-training, she wasn’t breathless at all despite the hard climb, and she quickly looked about her and smiled when she saw her father.
“Couldn’t we have met over a mug of mulled wine in a quiet parlour somewhere?” she asked ironically as an icy gust of wind howled through the tower’s battlements.
“This is more private,” Oskan answered. “There are things I want to discuss, and I don’t want them generally known.”
Cressida secretly wondered who’d be foolish enough to spy on the Witchfather, but said nothing. Instead she climbed onto the viewing platform and looked out over the Plain of Frostmarris towards the Great Forest, a distant haze of autumnal golds and reds.
“Fine. What do you want to talk about?” she asked in a characteristically direct manner that made Oskan smile despite the grimness of the situation.
“I need your help in the Magical Plains,” her father went on, deciding to adopt his daughter’s directness.
She swung round in amazement. “You need my help in matters supernatural? But why?”
Oskan sat down on the edge of the viewing platform and patted the cold stone next to him, as though inviting his daughter to sit on a comfortable cushion. Cressida joined him and waited patiently for an explanation.
Her father rested his elbows on his knees and gazed sightlessly ahead. “You’ve never actually been told this before, Cressida, but you have a powerful magical talent.”
“Me, magical?” she said incredulously.
“Yes; in fact, in your own way, you’re almost as powerful as Medea is.”
She wasn’t surprised to hear Oskan refer to her sister in the present tense. Somehow she’d known she wasn’t dead, and keeping her ears open over the last few weeks had confirmed it. Her mother and father were constantly having hurried and hushed conversations that stopped abruptly whenever anyone walked into the room, but the name Medea had hung in the air like a storm cloud.
“Exactly how am I as powerful as that vixen?” Cressida finally asked.
“You know she’s alive, then?”
“Of course,” she answered. “You don’t get rid of a nasty stain on the family’s fabric like Medea that easily. But you still haven’t told me; how am I as powerful as her?”
“Almost as powerful,” Oskan corrected. “But still, your Gift could withstand anything she sent against you.”
“Look, are you going to tell me or not?”
He smiled at her impatience. “You’re immune to magic.”
“Oh, so I can’t blast the bitch to death, then?”
“No, I’m afraid not. Your Gift is completely passive, you can’t actually ‘use’ it as such; it just is.”
“Well, what’s the use of that? If I’m going to be magical I’d sooner have something I can actively use, like . . . like . . . oh, I don’t know . . . the ability to incinerate enemies, or call a storm . . . something like that.”
“I know you would,” Oskan replied, feeling a huge upwelling of pride for his warrior daughter. “But the Gift you have is enormously useful, and powerful. Nobody can harm you magically; not even Cronus himself could blast you. If an Adept conjured a weapon into existence it couldn’t be used against you; they couldn’t even lay a magical trap for you, or lead you astray. Don’t you see, the ramifications are enormous!”
“Yeah, but they could still kill me with a real weapon; I could still be ambushed using conventional methods, couldn’t I?”
“Well, yes,” Oskan agreed. “But you could walk through any part of the Magical Realms and not be harmed by anything other than physical means. In fact, you could even walk through the Darkness itself and come out completely unscathed by evil magic, and that’s what I want to talk to you about . . .”
“The Darkness?”
“
Yes. I need you to lead a unit of hand-picked werewolves and housecarles to hold off the Ice Demons while I . . . confront Medea.”
“Hah, now, they could do me damage,” she said, referring to the Ice Demons, which all mortals knew about, especially as they’d peopled ghost stories and nightmares since their earliest childhoods. “They’re as physical as a lump of granite smashed on the back of your head.”
“Exactly,” Oskan agreed. “And I need your fighting expertise to keep them at bay while I attack your beloved sister.”
“Is this so that you can rescue Sharley and the others?”
“Yes. If I can injure her enough to break her hold over them, it’ll be a simple matter of transporting them back home.”
“I see,” said Cressida with quiet relish. “When do we go?”
Her father smiled and squeezed her hand. “One thing. Your mother mustn’t know about this. She has no magical Gifts and she’s got enough to worry about with Erinor. I want to go in, rescue Sharley and get out again without her knowing a thing.”
“Agreed,” said Cressida.
Over the next few minutes they discussed the logistics of their upcoming raid and finalised the details. Then, with her characteristic energy, the Crown Princess suddenly stood, kissed him on the cheek and rushed off to begin putting her plans into action.
Oskan watched her go and sighed gently; her fire and tough tenderness reminded him so much of her mother. In fact, there were many strong warriors in his family and all of them were an odd combination of disciplined violence and deeply loving gentleness; Sharley and Eodred too. How could he ever leave such a fascinating, adorable, contradictory rabble? How could he bring himself to risk losing them for ever?
“Because if you don’t you will lose them anyway, and everything else you’ve ever known and loved.”
Oskan looked up, and wasn’t particularly surprised to see that he’d been joined once again by the Goddess’s Messenger.