In the Shadow of Mountains: The Lost Girls

Chapter Forty-Three

  Her Other Self

  Soo-Kai spoke with Mai-Ra when they reached the West Tower and she hurried inside. They all quickly followed. Prince Harold turned to L’Barr.

  “If the beast comes, delay her until we are successful.”

  L’Barr smacked his chest and nodded. “If she eats me, I swear I will stick in her throat and choke her!”

  Prince Harold smiled. “If we live, remind me to ask my father to Knight you!”

  Sir Morgan grabbed Prince Harold. “He will not fight alone. This day I stood against you, and would have killed your brother, the Crown Prince. But now I seek repentance and ask only that my name be honoured for the sake of my wife and children.”

  Prince Harold stared at him. “I promised a pardon to all those who fought against us. It seems pointless now, as nearly all have fallen to this beast, but if my brother agrees, this will also be granted to you.” Prince Harold then turned to his brother.

  Prince Carl nodded. “Most of your words were true, L’Ajarn, and my anger was due to my guilt at knowing this. Your name will be honoured so long as I live. I swear it.”

  Sir Morgan seemed content. “Then go and kill the beast while we block her path.”

  Prince Carl and Sir Morgan shook hands.

  Kai-Tai was growing impatient. “Hurry! The Outsider will not wait once she knows her other self is threatened!”

  Sir Morgan, L’Barr and his men waited by the entrance to the West Tower with four of the Destroyers while everyone else went inside. As they hurried along, Anne wondered why this felt so easy.

  Anne knew nothing about Destroyers, even little about the monster that was threatening them. All she knew was her own fear and confusion. But these people seemed to know what to do. It all seemed so simple. But if it was so simple, why hadn’t the monster blocked their path?

  They ran down the steps and found another door that was open. It was the door L’Roth had once tried to pass when Sir Henry had blocked his way. They ran through without hindrance. Inside was a large circular room, with stone steps going up to another floor above. Here the other Destroyers waited for them, Mai-Ra holding the torch that hung from the wall. It was the fifth one from the door. But the room wasn’t empty. And everyone stared in amazement at what lay around them.

  Becky also stared. All around were recognisable pieces of cars and engines. Bits of wiring littered the floor, along with car head-lights and even a car battery. And in one corner, sitting on a four-wheeled cart, was the strangest looking device she had ever seen.

  It was mounted on a tripod that was fixed to the cart. Part of it looked like a large Wurlitzer jukebox, but it was made from steel with lots of wires and tubes coming out of one side. The tubes and wires went to a hotchpotch of wiring and bits of radio circuitry that was all connected to three more car batteries fixed down on the cart. Even the wheels on the cart were car wheels. The other end of the device was an obvious giveaway as to its purpose. It was a long, black tube with fins for cooling. The whole thing was most obviously some kind of gun.

  Rolf and the two Princes stared at it uncomprehendingly, but it was Soo-Kai who explained.

  “It is the weapon they intended to use against you,” she said. “Now it is yours.”

  “Can we use it against her?” Prince Harold asked.

  Soo-Kai shook her head. “She cannot be killed unless her whole body is consumed. And even this weapon is not great enough for that.”

  “Then it is of no interest to us,” Prince Harold replied, and turning to Mai-Ra he nodded.

  Mai-Ra turned the holder that supported the torch. Immediately there was the sound of grating and part of the floor tipped downward, causing Jane and Bernice to jump out of the way. They could all hear the sound of ropes and pulleys rattling as somewhere a counter-weight rose. The doorway in the floor tipped lower and lower, revealing the thickness of the floor slabs upon which they all stood, but then, just as it cleared the edge of the stone slabs and revealed a thin wedge of light beneath, there was a loud crunch and it stopped.

  Hai-Fam and El-Vin jumped down and stared through the narrow gap. Hai-Fam poked her sword through the gap and moved it about while El-Vin looked up and spoke to Soo-Kai in the Destroyer language.

  “What did she say?” Prince Carl asked.

  “She says that the Outsider is indeed within, but that something is underneath the door and has blocked it. The door is jammed.”

  Gil-Yan backed out of the ruin that was the South Tower, and without her bulk to support it, it slowly collapsed and fell inward. She had failed to find her victim among the debris, but now something else drew her attention. She stared along the wall towards the West Tower, seeing the humans and the Destroyers gathered around the doorway. Gil-Yan’s eyes narrowed, glowing a deeper red.

  So they searched for her, did they? Well, they would find what they searched for, but they would not reach her.

  Baring her teeth and growling, she lowered her head and trotted towards the West Tower.

  L’Barr turned to Sir Morgan. “Here she comes!”

  Sir Morgan waved to the others. “Back! Move away from the door! If we are to delay her, we must do it inside! Out here we will be cut to ribbons and trampled into the dust!”

  They all moved down the steps and watched through the open doorway as Gil-Yan bounded closer and closer, until at last she was close enough to hurl herself at the entrance.

  There was a tremendous crash as Gil-Yan smashed her way through the doorway. The wooden door and frame were pulverized and stones fell from the walls as she forced her head into the opening, snapping at those within. And as before in the passageway under the courtyard, she narrowed her body, stretching out her neck.

  L’Barr, Sir Morgan and the four men and Destroyers with them all found themselves fighting with a serpent that oozed slowly into the passage and down the steps towards them. They sliced and chopped at her face while Gil-Yan snapped and spat at them, trying to reach them.

  Then Gil-Yan lashed out with her tongue, tripping one of the men. As he fell, she seized him by the legs, dragging him back and devouring him even as he screamed.

  “Keep out of her reach!” Sir Morgan cried, striking with all his might at her bloody snout, and cutting a deep wound.

  Gil-Yan’s flesh turned to silver and the gaping wound closed and then turned back to flesh.

  “I see you Sir-Mor-Gan!” Gil-Yan hissed at him, her voice still loud in the confines of the corridor. “Like all humans, your loyalty is fickle! I had hoped to draw the life from Le-Roth, but now I will feast on you!”

  Sir Morgan was unafraid. “We may die, but you will soon follow!” he cried. “To save yourself you must pass us first! And every moment we delay you brings your death closer!”

  “You think so? You think I am not wise to my weak spot? Then know this, Navak! While I paused in the stairway eating those I had caught, I slept while my other self woke. She placed the drone under the door to the lower chamber. Now your way to her is blocked, and your only path to escape is through my jaws to my stomach!”

  With a mighty heave, Gil-Yan surged forward, and before he could step back, she had caught another man in her teeth and shredded him. He wasn’t the last.

  A moment later, and one of the Destroyers was seized and carried aloft, her body smashed from side to side as Gil-Yan shook her like a dog shaking a rat. Lai-Po was the unfortunate victim. Gil-Yan threw back her great head and gulped her down, whole.

  SNAP!

  Sir Morgan, L’Barr, the Destroyers and the remaining two men with them now fought for their lives as Gil-Yan oozed further and further towards the doorway to the chamber behind them. And as they fought, they were bathed in Gil-Yan’s rancid breath, and slipped in her spittle and the blood and gristle of those who had fallen.

  Jane stood by the door. Outside she could hear the men fighting and the sound of Gil-Yan’s jaws snapping. She peeped around the door and screamed in horror.

/>   “She’s nearly here!” she cried out.

  Soo-Kai barked orders to El-Vin, Zen-Wa, Hai-Fam and Mai-Ra, and the four of them ran out to help L’Barr and the rest.

  Down on the floor, Prince Carl and Prince Harold were trying to lever the door open with the discarded steering column of a car. Two swords lay broken nearby. Panic was beginning to set in.

  Rolf was at his wits end. “It’s no use! We have to get out of here!”

  “There’s no way out!” Prince Harold shouted at him. “Come down and help or we are all doomed!”

  Rolf did as he asked, and the three of them strained on the steering column.

  Anne stood with her arms around Vanessa and Becky. “I knew it was too easy,” she muttered in rising panic. “She was prepared for us, she was smarter than us. She let us come down here because she knew we couldn’t escape–”

  “Shut up!” Rolf shouted, then the steering column snapped and they all fell over.

  Soo-Kai drew her sword in despair. “Go with good heart, my husband,” she called to Rolf, and then she ran through the door to join L’Barr and the others.

  Rolf scrambled after her. “No! Soo-Kai! Wait!” It was too late; she had already disappeared through the door.

  Then Becky shouted, “The gun! Why not use the gun?”

  “But the gun can’t stop her!” Prince Harold shouted back.

  “Not her! The floor! Shoot at the floor!”

  Prince Carl stood up. “Yes! The girl is right! It’s our only chance!”

  Rolf turned to him. “But how do we operate it?”

  Kai-Tai answered him. She lay on the floor in the arms of Bernice. “I know. Move it into position,” she said. “And I will fire it for you.”

  In the castle courtyard, nothing remained alive. Horses, men, friend or foe, Gil-Yan had killed or consumed them all. Now only her rear end was visible, crouched down on her haunches, her head and neck hidden inside the West Tower, her tail waving lazily behind her.

  By the ruin of the South Tower, Craig and the rest of the children had all gathered to search for Jai-Soo. The two French boys also helped search among the fallen stones. They were called Emile and Jean. With them was Nan-Po. She led the search.

  Nan-Po had emerged from the darkness of the forest looking bruised and battered. She had lost her bow and her nose bled. She had paused to stare at the crying children huddled under the gatehouse and then snarled in disgust. When she had ran on towards the South Tower, the children had simply followed her. Sophia had gone first, then Karen and Jemma. The two French boys had followed. Craig would have preferred to stay back, but Amy had tugged at him, and he gave in. So together with Rowena and Paula, they had followed after the rest.

  The South Tower was now an open ruin. Only the outer part of the tower, where it joined the main walls, remained standing. The inner part had all collapsed, bringing down the floors within. Nan-Po could scent Jai-Soo somewhere under the fallen stones, and maybe it was because Jai-Soo could scent that it was now an Insider who searched for her that she was found so quickly. Emile lifted a stone and up she popped, shaking her head free of the dust.

  Nan-Po rushed forward and pulled Jai-Soo out without waiting for her to catch her breath. She spoke rapidly to her in the Destroyer language. Jai-Soo replied, pointing to the West Tower.

  Nan-Po snarled and drew her sword. Without a further word she ran towards Gil-Yan.

  Jai-Soo finished dusting herself off and turned to see Emile holding out her sword to her. He had retrieved it from the pile of stones behind her and now held the handle in one hand and the blade in the other. Jai-Soo looked at him closely as she slowly took her sword from his unmarked hands. He smiled at her, and then Amy appeared next to him.

  “Thanks for doing what you did,” Amy said to Jai-Soo. “If you hadn’t distracted that monster, it would have eaten those two French boys and Paula, too.”

  Jai-Soo looked at her with a most puzzled expression. “It seemed right for the moment,” she replied, not very confidently. Then she began to wave all the children away. “Go back to the entrance of the castle,” she told them. “You are only toose; this is no place for you!”

  “Toose?” Amy repeated.

  “Young, immature, not adult,” Jai-Soo explained. “Enough delay! Go now! Flee to the forest!”

  Without waiting any longer, Jai-Soo ran after Nan-Po.

  Craig called after her. “What are you going to do?”

  “Annoy her!” Jai-Soo called back.

  Despite Jai-Soo’s request, the children had hardly moved. Now they stared as Nan-Po reached Gil-Yan’s lazily moving tail and leapt up at it, striking at it with her sword, and chopping the end off.

  If the intention was to do Gil-Yan any serious harm, Nan-Po had failed. If it was to get her attention, she had most definitely been successful.

  Gil-Yan’s shortened tail whipped back and forth while the chopped off end writhed about on the ground in a frenzy before it finally turned black and lay still. Nan-Po had to duck as the shortened tail shot passed her, just missing her head. It was on its way back when Jai-Soo also leapt up and sliced at it with her sword, cutting off another, much fatter piece.

  The children all cheered as they watched the two Destroyers darting back and forth, striking at Gil-Yan’s tail and at her exposed hindquarters. The fact that it probably had no effect on Gil-Yan didn’t seem to matter, what did matter was that they were fighting back. With a surge, the children all ran forward.

  But then Gil-Yan’s tail began to change shape. The mutilated end became more bulbous, and the tail itself grew fatter and longer. But that wasn’t the only change. It seemed like the whole of Gil-Yan’s rear end was changing shape. Her body grew slimmer, longer, and claws appeared on the other side of her feet. But it was the change in her tail that caught the attention. The bulbous end became bigger and rounder, then it grew a snout. Almost in an instant, angry red eyes snapped open and huge jaws sprang apart, revealing long curved teeth.

  In the corridor of the West Tower, Gil-Yan was getting ever closer. Even with eight Destroyers to help them, there was no stopping her. Soo-Kai fought alongside Sir Morgan, L’Barr and the others. But it was all to no avail. If they stood their ground it would have only meant their deaths. Their blows did no harm, they continually got in each other’s way, and they hardly delayed Gil-Yan. She snapped and snarled, oozing constantly closer to the door, forcing them back and back, until finally, they spilled through in a mad panic, knocking over Jane in the process.

  Gil-Yan pounced. Lashing out with her tongue, she caught hold of Jane and dragged her towards the door. Jane screamed wildly, trying to hang on to the floor slabs, the door frame, anything that she could reach, while Bernice and Vanessa ran to help her.

  Almost as Jane disappeared out the door, L’Barr grabbed her hand and pulled back. In a second he was pulled off his feet and followed her. Vanessa and Bernice held on to L’Barr, but they were all dragged towards Gil-Yan’s gaping mouth.

  Sir Morgan ran forward, raised his sword, and sliced through Gil-Yan’s tongue. In a flash, Gil-Yan turned and snapped him up, her great teeth killing him in an instant.

  L’Barr quickly dragged Jane back into the chamber, prodding at Gil-Yan’s severed tongue with his sword until it let go of her, and together with the girls and the Destroyers, they all tried to close the door and hold it against Gil-Yan. As they strained against the door, Gil-Yan’s severed tongue still writhed about on the floor between them. They kicked at it until it turned black and lay still, the girls sobbing and splashed in blood, and L’Barr and his men white with terror. They all put their weight against the door, but Gil-Yan kept crashing into it again and again, and it rocked back and forth, splintering and creaking.

  Behind them, Rolf and the two Princes had moved the cart with the artifact into position. Now they held it steady, tipped over at an angle, the gun pointing at the floor. Becky and Anne held up Kai-Tai as she stood on the sloping cart, work
ing on the gun. All of them were almost hysterical, only Kai-Tai remained calm.

  “Shoot!” Prince Harold shouted to Kai-Tai.

  Becky waved him to be quiet. “Shush!” she shouted. “She has to make the circuit! This wiring is all crap!”

  “There is no art in this!” Prince Harold shouted back at her. “Shoot, damn it!”

  Outside, Gil-Yan pressed her jaws harder against the door, her teeth punching through the wood, causing it to creak and splinter even more. El-Vin and one of L’Barr’s men fell back, both impaled by Gil-Yan’s protruding teeth. But the teeth didn’t stay teeth. Each grew a bulbous end that soon split apart to reveal needle teeth within, and eyes, like red lights blinked open and narrowed.

  “You cannot escape!” Gil-Yan called to them as the door rocked on the groaning and rapidly loosening hinges. As she spoke from without, the heads that had formed on the end of her teeth echoed her words. “Soon you will all dwell inside me! Cleansed and absorbed into my flesh!”

  The small heads began to grow larger, and the teeth upon which they sat grew longer and fatter, oozing further through the door like sinuous snakes. They began to snap and bite at those who held the door, drawing blood from all they could reach. One fastened onto L’Barr and didn’t let go until Hai-Fam severed it with a single blow from her sword. Then one of the hinges on the door gave way.

  Kai-Tai held the last two wires. The ends were stripped bare, and the pain in her back forgotten for a brief moment. “Now, Outsider,” she muttered. “Feel my wrath!” She touched the wires together and the gun fired.

  The whole chamber was briefly lit up by a white flash like lightning, and there was a heavy, low pitched thud followed by a sudden roar as the floor fell in beneath them. All of them, gun, cart, Princes and children, all tumbled into the hole and disappeared in a cloud of dust.

  In the courtyard, Nan-Po and Jai-Soo suddenly found themselves being pursued by a long and sinuous snake that grew longer and longer every second. Gil-Yan’s whole body had changed shape; it now looked like she had got stuck coming out of the West Tower rather than trying to get into it. Her feet clawed and strained forward, stretching her body, which narrowed and grew even longer. And at the end of her long neck, Gil-Yan’s new head twisted back and forth, snapping at them with her new jaws and teeth.

  “Insiders! Gnats! Fleas!” she snarled at them. “When I seize you I will suck the skin from your bones! I will shred you and grind you! You are an abomination! An insult to the Tun-Sho-Lok!”

  Jai-Soo had to scramble and leap out of the way as Gil-Yan now lunged at her, her huge, silvery teeth smashing down onto the ground where she had just been standing.

  The game of annoying Gil-Yan was now well and truly over.

  Nan-Po and Jai-Soo both ran while Gil-Yan spat the soil from her mouth. With a heave, Gil-Yan oozed and stretched after them.

  All the children stopped and stared as Nan-Po and Jai-Soo ran towards them, then without a word, they turned and also ran. They all rushed back towards the gatehouse, running as fast as they could, while behind them, Gil-Yan snarled and hissed, her huge jaws gaping wide as she oozed after them, her long neck stretching out longer, and longer.

  Paula was more tired than the rest; she was still exhausted from her climb up the steps and her run from before. She quickly fell behind, the other children all moving ahead of her. Then Nan-Po ran passed her without a glance. Paula looked around, desperate now; terrified that she would be caught. Next came Jai-Soo, but instead of running passed, Jai-Soo grabbed Paula by the collar of her blouse, almost pulling her off her feet.

  They ran on together. But with Paula slowing her down, Jai-Soo also began to fall behind. She kept dragging and pulling Paula along, never once letting her go, but it was no use.

  Paula felt the hot, moist breath on her back and on her legs. She looked round in terror and saw the huge jaws bearing down on them. They were right on top of them, wide open, the huge teeth glinting in the moonlight.

  In a last desperate moment, Jai-Soo turned and flung Paula behind her, striking at Gil-Yan with her sword, but in that instant, the great jaws had closed around them both, driving deep into the ground.

  Anne opened her eyes and shook her head. Everything was deathly quiet. She could actually hear the dust falling from the hole in the floor above. She looked around, and what she saw was even more bizarre than what had filled the room above.

  She was lying among the stones and fallen debris in what appeared to be another very large chamber. All around her lay the cannibalised wrecks of cars and even her own school minibus. But that wasn’t all. There was also a machine that looked very much like a small motor, or generator. Wires connected it to another, octagonal shaped device that sat on top of it. It was an open chassis the size of a football, and inside it a light flashed on and off.

  Almost underneath the point where the hidden door had been was another vehicle. Anne sat almost right next to it. It was long and smooth, with a tail-plane and the exhausts of two engines at one end, and a long thin spike at the other. It almost resembled a rocket, but in the middle portion was a doorway and windows. It sat on three sets of small wheels and there was a big hole in its side.

  The silence in the chamber was torn apart by a tremendous roar. It was filled with anger, hatred, and despair. It shook the walls and the floor.

  Gil-Yan burst through the door above them, knocking aside all who still tried to hold it against her. Soo-Kai and most of the Destroyers were all sent flying across the chamber, while Mai-Ra, Hai-Fam, L’Barr and one of his men, all fell down the hole in the floor, bouncing and slithering over the metal of the rocket-like vehicle. And Vanessa, Jane and Bernice all ended up flattened under the door.

  Gil-Yan oozed into the dust filled chamber like an enormous snake and went straight through the hole to the chamber below.

  “You will not harm my other self!” she snarled, baring her teeth. “For I will take her within, and afterwards you can all chase her with my pleasure!”

  In her path lay Rolf and the two Princes, woken at last from their stupor by the roar of Gil-Yan. They scrambled to their feet and ran in three different directions. Their movement proved to be a distraction, for Gil-Yan lunged at them, tearing great chunks from the floor where they had lain. Then twisting her long sinuous neck, and turning back and forth, she snapped at them all as they ran among the wrecked cars, her teeth shredding the metal as easily as it would their flesh.

  Kai-Tai lay among the tangled wiring and broken bits that had once been the cart, Becky with her. She fought her pain and stood up. Then, staggering forward, she shouted, “Find her other self! Quickly! For if she consumes herself, her only weak point will be beyond our reach!”

  Gil-Yan snarled, turned and lunged straight at her.

  Bernice had been the first to get out from under the broken door. She saw Gil-Yan rushing towards Kai-Tai, her mouth wide open. Kai-Tai just seemed to stand there.

  Move! Move or the Outsider will consume us!

  No. It is over at last. All these years, all the death and killing, I am tired of it, sick of it. Only now in the bond do I see it; my whole life a waste. There is no purpose in the Purpose, only death and suffering. Now the moment has come and I go willingly.

  Move!

  No. I don’t want this life anymore.

  “Kai-Tai!” Bernice cried, and without thought, she jumped down the hole in the floor. Vanessa tried to stop her, but it was too late. Bernice slid down the side of the rocket vehicle and knocked Kai-Tai aside just as Gil-Yan snapped. But where Kai-Tai once stood, Bernice now stood. It was all over in an instant.

  With Vanessa still screaming as Jane hung on to her, Gil-Yan turned her attentions back to Kai-Tai. She now lay on the ground almost right beneath Gil-Yan’s jaws. Then a voice shouted in triumph above all the noise.

  “I find you!”

  Gil-Yan spun round, snarling and spitting, Kai-Tai completely forgotten.

  Prince Harold stoo
d by an alcove. He held the curtain wide, revealing someone sitting on a narrow bed inside. She was very slim, and her skin was pale. She had light brown hair that almost reached to her waist. She would have been beautiful if it had not been for the completely vacant expression on her face and in her eyes. And it was only when you looked closer that you realised that her head was misshapen. Part of her skull on the left side was either caved in, or completely missing. She sat on the bed patiently, calmly, and uncaring.

  Prince Harold looked triumphant as he held the curtain wide with one hand, and clutched his broken sword in his other hand.

  “I find you!” he repeated. “Now you will be slain, demon dragon of the night!”

  With a roar, Gil-Yan lunged forward, knocking aside the wrecked cars in her path. She was so fast that she had almost reached him before he could react. With Gil-Yan’s hot breath on his neck, Prince Harold rushed into the alcove, raised his sword, and struck.

  Paula and Jai-Soo disappeared under Gil-Yan’s gaping jaws. They crashed down on them, knocking Jai-Soo off her feet and digging into the ground. Paula screamed, wrapping her arms around Jai-Soo, who in turn hugged Paula in their final moments.

  Nothing happened.

  There was sudden silence as Paula whimpered, her eyes tight shut, and her face pressed into Jai-Soo’s chest.

  A few seconds passed, and then Jai-Soo stroked Paula’s head. “Hush, toose. It is over. The Outsider is dead.”

  Paula didn’t move, so Jai-Soo tried again. “Look, toose, there is nothing to fear. You still live, do you not? Look. See for yourself.”

  Slowly, Paula relaxed her grip and turned her head. What she saw terrified her. They were both sitting right inside Gil-Yan’s mouth, her teeth half embedded in the ground all around them. Paula tried to turn away again, but Jai-Soo held her chin and made her look.

  “There is nothing to fear,” she repeated. “The Outsider is dead. They have killed her other self, and now she has turned once more to the metal of our swords, to the black metal that marks our death.”

  As Paula stared at the inside of Gil-Yan’s mouth, she saw that it was indeed all dark and black. And as she looked, Jai-Soo kicked out with her foot at one of the great, black teeth. It made a dull, metallic thud.

  At last, Paula relaxed. “It’s dead,” she whispered.

  Then a face appeared between the teeth. It was Craig. He was down on his knees.

  “Are you two okay?” he asked.

  Jai-Soo said, “Yes, but you will have to dig us out. We are imprisoned.”

  Craig disappeared from view and they heard him shout, “They’re alive!”