“You better run while you ssstill can…” the Sea Zombie slurred.
Cyrus stared at Edward, unmoving, so helpless on the ground. Then he looked to Fibian, maimed and bleeding in a heap. Was he even alive? Both had risked their lives for his. He looked to the Sea Zombie. She was injured and weak but growing stronger with each passing moment.
Cyrus turned and made for the door. With a shaking hand, he grasped the handle and held the door ajar. The stairway led up and away and was clear of any danger. Cyrus craved escape. An image of Niels spiked his thoughts. He shook his head and paused. His breath gusted through his throat. Was he really going to do this? He slammed the door shut. Then he chambered the bolt and locked the room tight.
“I’ve run for the last time,” Cyrus said, “It’s your turn to be afraid.”
Chapter 37
BATHED IN FIRE
LETTING HIS ANGER DRIVE HIM, Cyrus rounded on the Sea Zombie. He marched over to her and kicked her to the ground.
“How dare you!” the witch wailed, her poisoned hand shaking uncontrollably.
Cyrus weaved around a table and rack and drew a short-sword from the wall. Again, he looked to Edward and Fibian. Both lay stone still. He walked back to the cowering witch, wringing the handle of the sword. She looked cold and waxy, dripping with sweat. He kicked her in the stomach.
“That’s for my island.”
The witch wheezed and fell to her side. He kicked her in the ribs.
“That’s for Edward.”
Cyrus heard bones crack. Rorroh curled up in a fetal position. He kicked her in the head.
“That’s for Fibian.”
Rorroh’s head snapped back, her costume nose flying across the room. She slumped to the floor, blood dripping from her mouth. Cyrus stood over her like a hunter over game. He lifted her head, exposing her neck.
“And this,” he said, bringing the blade to her throat, “this is for Niels.”
The Sea Zombie clutched his arm with her remaining hand. She squeezed so tight, his wrist snapped. Cyrus cried out, dropping the sword.
“And that is just the beginning,” the witch growled.
She threw an elbow and struck Cyrus in the head. His face exploded in crimson pain. He fell to the ground and grasped his broken nose. Rorroh rose to her full height. With her wooden nose missing, her rotten, boney septum whistled and seeped. Her torn robes draped from one knobbly shoulder. She ripped off her sodden rags and threw them aside. Her sagging chest panted with yearning. Her drooping belly billowed and heaved. Her wiry legs rippled and flexed.
Cyrus struggled to his feet, favoring his broken wrist. Rorroh sprang forward, naked and crazed. She kicked him in the gut. Cyrus flew back over a table, planting on his broken wrist. Lightning pain flashed through his arm. He gasped for air. Rorroh threw the table aside as if it was made of straw. She kicked Cyrus in the mouth. His jaw shattered and his vision flashed white. As he came to, face down in the dust, he tongued his bloody mouth. Two of his teeth were broken. Rorroh stomped down on his ankle, snapping the bone. Cyrus tried to shriek but had still not recovered his breath.
Rorroh grasped him by the roots of his hair and jerked his head up.
“First, I’m going to gut your froskman friend,” she said, brown spittle flying from her lips, “then I’m going to dissect the blodbad spider. And you’re going to watch it all.”
Rorroh released her grip, bouncing Cyrus’ skull off the floor.
“And when you beg to see no more, I’m going to chew out your eyes and leave you for the klappen.”
She walked over to a wooden slab table and began to set out various knives and stained instruments.
Cyrus writhed in agony. He wished for sleep. He wished for darkness. He wanted the pain to stop any way possible.
“You know,” Rorroh said, looking over her humped shoulder, “I can understand the froskman’s betrayal. I was never sure how much hate to put into their souls. Too much and they become arrogant and unruly. A fine trait for a dragon, but not for a deadly spy and assassin. But how you were able to corrupt the blodbad’s way is truly a mystery.”
Cyrus slowly regained his breath. He tried to stand, but his wrist and ankle screamed. With great effort, he looked around. Fibian lay across from him, the short-sword near his side. What was Cyrus going to do? He could not fight.
“Master,” Fibian whispered.
Struggling, Cyrus looked up. Fibian stared at him through blackened slits. How was he talking with a lacerated throat? The froskman coughed up a trickle of blood, then opened his remaining hand. The vial of dragon’s blood rolled out.
Cyrus remembered Drache’s words. All dragon’s blood will give you is a slow, agonizing death. Rorroh turned in their direction. Cyrus swept the vial up off the floor.
“Believe…” Fibian whispered.
Cyrus coughed and twisted in pain.
Rorroh drew a long, slender spike from the table. Then she stalked over, picked the froskman up by the wrist and skewered his remaining hand to a wooden pillar. Fibian did not shriek. He just dangled like a cut of meat, his head lolling.
“Have you ever seen swine gutted and cleaned before?” Rorroh asked, wielding a long, skinny blade.
It was now or never, Cyrus thought. The pain was too much; he was going to faint. He uncorked the vial. The air seemed to snap and the blood within began to glow and boil.
Fibian raised his head.
“He is starting to believe.”
Rorroh looked at Fibian, confused, then turned to Cyrus.
“Dragon’s blood? No!”
Cyrus made a small prayer; then, cringing, threw back the elixir. The blood tasted of sugar and kerosene. It seared his mouth. The burning coursed down his throat and into his legs. Cyrus began to seizure and sweat. What was happening? His broken ankle made a cracking noise like a split rock. The agony caused him to convulse, and his back snapped. His wrist, nose, and jaw too twisted and cracked. Cyrus felt as if he had swallowed molten steel. His skin grew red. He started to tear at his clothes. He let out a throat-ripping scream. Then he emptied his stomach with a violent convulsion. Cyrus was dying. All went black…
Chapter 38
THE SEA ZOMBIE
DARKNESS. The world was silent. Was this death? Cyrus strained to move. He felt detached from his body. He opened his heavy eyes. He was blind. Then color began to creep in at the edges. He started to hear dripping water. He felt around with his hand. He was lying on cold, solid ground. He looked up. His vision cleared. Rorroh was eyeing him, frozen as a corpse. Behind her, Fibian still hung by his hand. The froskman had the distinct look of hope on his battered face.
Cyrus rose to his feet. His ankle felt strong. He held his wrist and rolled his fist. The bone had mended as if never broken.
“I survived,” Cyrus said, his jaw whole and his words clear.
“No,” Rorroh cried.
She charged Cyrus like a rabid boar. Cyrus wondered why she moved so slowly. She stabbed at his face with her long, narrow blade. Cyrus easily guided the blow away with his right hand, gripping her shoulder with his left. With his left leg, he swept her feet. She crashed head-first into the wall.
Rorroh scrambled and gained her footing, a large gash over her right eye. She looked at Cyrus, shocked and confused. Or was it fear? She drew a long-sword from the mantel on the wall.
“I’ll split you in two!”
She came at Cyrus swinging the blade with expert timing. Cyrus read her movements as if reading her mind. He picked up his short-sword and stepped back. He ducked the first blow, parried the second and jumped the third. Cyrus was amazed at how easily he could predict her patterns. The sword felt like a feather in his hand. And when he blocked Rorroh’s strikes, they seemed to have no power.
The witch grew frustrated and attempted a brute, overhead swing. Cyrus kicked her in the chest mid-blow and again sent her sprawling to the floor.
“You think you can beat me?” the witch growled, wiping blood from her torn mouth, �
��You think you can kill me?”
She sprang back to her feet, wielding her long-sword as if she was a whirling tornado. She slashed at Cyrus’ neck.
“Now,” Fibian wheezed.
Cyrus parried the blow, directing its energy downward. Rorroh’s sword bit deep into a wooden table. She wrenched at the handle as if it were a stubborn root. Using his momentum, Cyrus shifted his weight to his rear foot. His blade whistled through space. He hacked into the witch’s wrist, severing her remaining hand.
“NOOOOO!”
Rorroh fell from her sword, black blood jetting from her stump. Cyrus carried his motion into a spinning, backhanded slash. He cleaved through Rorroh’s sinewy neck. Her head spun into the air; then struck the ground, heavy and wet. Blood sprayed the room. The witch’s headless corpse kicked and thrashed at tables and chairs as if fighting off a swarm of wasps. Then it careened into a wall and crumpled into a grey, writhing pile.
Cyrus dropped his sword and stepped back. What had he done? He looked at his hands, his chest. Blood covered. What had come over him? He stared down at the empty vial that had once contained Drache’s blood. He had saved his friends’ lives. He had believed. Fibian was right. The legend was true.
Chapter 39
TINDERBOX
“CYRUS,” FIBIAN WHISPERED.
Cyrus was snapped from his stupor. He shook his head and collected his wits. Then he ran over and lifted Fibian down from the pillar. Fibian was pale and wasted. He clutched his cut throat with his pierced hand. The bleeding seemed to have stopped. Once again, Cyrus asked himself, how was he still alive?
“Your hand,” Cyrus said.
Fibian held his right arm tight to his body, the stump protected beneath his left. He looked to Cyrus, his expression mournful. He shook his head no. The hand was gone.
Cyrus stood stunned, unable to find words. Without Fibian’s sacrifice, they would have been murdered, but the price had been so dear.
Fibian nodded to the ground. Edward. How could Cyrus have forgotten? He helped Fibian over to the spider and collected him off the floor. Edward looked so small, so vulnerable in his palm. Cyrus petted his snow-white fur and felt for life.
“He is very strong,” Fibian whispered, “He may live.”
Cyrus looked around the room.
“We can’t stay here.”
He made for the secret door in the back.
“No,” Fibian said, “There is a boat.”
“Where?”
The froskman motioned in the opposite direction.
“When the klappen first delivered me to Rorroh, I saw it as she carried me here.”
The three moved towards the stairway. What klappen ambush awaited them? Cyrus wondered. He collected his knife off the ground and unlocked the bolt.
He kicked the door open. Dust and soot swirled in the candlelight. The three ascended the stairs and arrived on the top step, in the center of the chamber. Cyrus looked about, ready to strike. Torchlight illuminated several statue-still klappen. They stared at the intruders blank-faced. Then they looked beyond, down the stairway, at their mistress laying in pieces on the floor. The klappen hissed. The hiss turned into a whimper. They fell to their hands and knees, pressing their foreheads to the flagstone. Then they crawled away from Cyrus as if he were pure sunlight. Cyrus felt his chest swell.
With his arm around Fibian’s midsection, Cyrus carried the froskman and Edward to the double doors. Again, he drove his boot against the timbers. The doors crashed open. The two klappen he had locked out were standing beyond the threshold. They stared at Cyrus, wide-eyed. Then they saw their kin within groveling in the dust. The creatures looked at each other, then to the floor. They let out shrill warning cries and fled off in the direction of the upper chambers.
“This way,” Fibian said, gesturing left.
Cyrus carried the two further down the hall and arrived at another twisting stairway. Deeper and deeper the trespassers plunged. Torchlights flickered weakly on the walls. Many had burnt out leaving most of the broken steps hidden in shadow. Fibian shone his eyes bright. Cyrus pried one of the torches off the wall. Every fifty steps or so they met a landing. There, a passageway would delve into darkness, leading to some deep, dark corner of the castle.
Cyrus heard a klappen, maybe two, scrabbling and clicking around a stairway bend. They must have heard the newcomers. They emitted small squeals and fled further down the stairs.
The air grew salty and chill. Cyrus sensed what he thought was a large body of water. The stairway concluded at a final landing, which led to a narrow tunnel. Cyrus and Fibian ducked as they navigated the passage. The tunnel emptied out into a cold, cavernous chamber. Cyrus’ torch and Fibian’s eyes fought in vain to beat back the surrounding murk. Lapping waves and drizzling runoffs echoed about the cave. Fibian motioned to a large, rusted lever on a nearby stone wall. Cyrus reached out, and with great effort, pulled down the salt grimed handle.
A great KU-CHUNK thundered about the room.
What sounded like large chains rattling and gears grinding rumbled to life. Then a long sliver of daylight began to grow out of the darkness. Understanding struck Cyrus like a rock. He knew where they were. They were on the other side of the hulking steel door. The one they had sailed past when they had discovered the cove, the castle and Rorroh’s ship.
The steel barrier raised high overhead, long ribbons of water streaming off its rusted, barnacled exterior. Daylight washed in, illuminating the cave. Cyrus and Fibian were standing on a stone landing. The retreating tide lapped at the landing and clapped against the walls. Several feet away, two klappen cowered on the landing’s edge. They had been hiding in the darkness. Now exposed, they leaped high onto the stone walls and fled into the ceiling’s stalactites. As the door retreated further into the air, daylight advanced unhindered, exposing the depth of the huge cavern.
Cyrus gasped. At the center of the cave floated a large sailing ship. It was old, salt-stained and rusted, but it was also beautiful. It was about sixty feet long with dual masts webbed in a network of sails, ropes, and pulleys. Its hull was wide and deep, and a young mermaid had been carved into its bow.
“There is a skiff,” Fibian whispered, nodding to the edge of the landing.
Cyrus moved towards the water. An eroded steel ladder mounted to the landing’s side led several feet down to the sea. Tied to the ladder was a seven-foot-long skiff. The water looked cold, dark and very, very deep.
“I can manage,” Fibian said, “You first, Master Cyrus.
With Edward in his shirt pocket, Cyrus began to climb down. Mussels and barnacles encrusted the rungs. Awkwardly, Fibian followed. Cyrus boarded the craft on wobbly legs. He reached up to help Fibian. The climb proved too much. The froskman slipped near the bottom. Cyrus tried to catch him, but both fell to the floor.
The rest of the crossing passed without incident. Cyrus tied a rope around Fibian’s waist and helped him climb the sailing ship’s mesh ladder. Then Cyrus laid Fibian down to rest on a folded sail next to the foremast. The vessel was suspended in the middle of the cave by three horizontal lines. Cyrus guessed the moorings kept the ship from drifting on the tide. He cut the stern line first. Another clicking of gears roared to life. Like a bowstring, the two bow lines began to propel the vessel out to sea slowly. Cyrus immediately understood. This is how they launched their crafts without wind or oar. He ran to the bow and waited until the ship had nearly reached the door. He cut the starboard line first, followed by the port. The vessel continued its course driven by momentum and the retreating tide.
“Rorroh’s ship,” Fibian whispered, “It must be sunk.”
“Why?” Cyrus asked, “She’s dead.”
Fibian shook his head.
“You cannot kill that which does not live.”
Cyrus grew cold and sweaty. He looked back, towards the tunnel they had just escaped. Then he inspected the deck for something to sink a ship. He found coils of rope, un-scrubbed deck boards, the ship’s tiller, but no weapon
s. He ventured within the small cabin at the stern of the vessel. The space was dusty and cornered with cobwebs. He searched a table nook, shelves, and several cabinets. On a grimy windowsill, he found an oil lamp and tinderbox. Careful not to ignite the room, Cyrus used flint and steel to light the tinder. Then he lit a match on the tinder and ignited the lamp. He walked back to Fibian.
“This might work.”
The vessel passed through the towering threshold, the mast barely clearing the door. The black ship still rested within the harbor, awaiting its master. Cyrus manned the tiller and steered the drifting craft closer to Rorroh’s. He grasped the lantern and climbed up on the gunwale, holding the ship’s rigging for support. Both vessels were similar in height. Cyrus waited until he passed near the very cabin in which Rorroh had drugged him. He remembered all the salves and elixirs kept in her small galley. Some of them must be flammable, he hoped.
He cast the lamp through the cabin window, shattering the glass. The escaping vessel drifted past, further out to sea. Cyrus stared back at the black ship. Nothing. They continued on through the narrow waterway, flanked by towering cliffs. Would they have to go back? They sailed beyond the cliffs, out into open water. Rorroh’s boat still floated unharmed. Cyrus had been too rash, too reckless. He had to sink that ship. He peered back one last time.
“Fibian, do you see that?”
He looked to the froskman. Fibian had passed out on the sail. Cyrus looked back, squinting. A thread of grey seemed to issue from the black ship. Was that smoke? He needed a closer look.
Cyrus saw the explosion before he heard it. The side of the ship’s hull blew out as if struck by cannon fire. Then a great KA-BOOM echoed over the sea. Fire spewed out of the port side hole. The ship was burning.
Chapter 40
THE END?
Cyrus LongBones Box Set Page 17
