Whizzing upwards through the sunshine felt very exciting to Nathan. He definitely thought it more pleasant than the ladder, which was always complaining and usually far too slow. He could see the Sky Island coming closer and closer, with the roots of trees hanging down below the base. He could also see the first sparks of the great volcano which covered almost half of the land. Yet before they could fly any closer, Messina was suddenly distracted. Above and to one side where the sunlight was so brilliant it was almost blinding, there was a huge white cloud, and from it came the little faint squeak of crying kittens.
“Wait,” called Messina, and she hovered on the breeze, looking towards the strange cloud. “Nathan, did you hear calls from the cloud?”
“I heard cats,” said Nathan, rather puzzled. “But not Hermes and not Sam. Why would the cats call, but not the ones who can talk?”
“Quickly,” Messina grabbed Nathan’s arm again and flew towards the cloud. At once a thick white haze enclosed them and they could not see a thing. Nathan swung his arms around, trying to clear the mist, but Messina pointed, shouting, “Give us sight,” and the mist began to lift.
It turned to a spiral fog, twisting around almost like a donned with a clear space in the middle where now Messina stood. But Nathan, as the cloud lifted and twirled. Had been caught in the foggy ripples, and now he could not escape and felt as if it held his feet like ropes of crawling white ivy, and filled his mouth with great lumps of damp cold fluff, so he could not speak or make any loud noise at all.
Messina could not be trapped that easily, and she remained on the circular outside of the cloud, looking around, puzzled, and searching for everyone else, especially Nathan. She knew this was no part of the island Sparkan, and from below it simply appeared as a cloud. Yet once caught in it, this was more like a wet misty island too, and she could walk on the cloudy ground. With an impatient hop, she landed in the centre opening, once again raising both hands.
There she found herself staring into a dark opening into a tunnel. The cloud whistled past the great cavernous hole, where small fat slugs were crawling. But Messina did not dislike any living creature until she knew where it came from, and she stood there for a moment, looking at the pale slugs. “Who are you?” she demanded, pointing at the largest. “|Can you speak?”
The slug curled into a ball with its little squashed head poking up. “We are slaves to the devil Yaark. We must serve him at all times.”
Messina was interested. “Indeed,” she said, “when Yaark takes over Wagster, there is often a slug on his forehead. What were you before Yaark tricked you?”
Several slugs grouped together, sitting around the edge of the tunnel entrance. “We were always slugs,” said one. “But we were free and lived in the marshes on Lashtang and we had friends amongst the snails and the beetles and the happy little flies.”
“Now we are forced to live here in the dark,” said another, twitching his antennae. “I hate the dark. We don’t like it here and we have no friends.”
“Now tell me,” said Messina, “has anyone come past you lately? Two boys, a goose and several cats?”
“We aren’t allowed to speak to strangers,” said another slug with a miserable twitch. “Yaark will squash us.”
“Not at all,” insisted Messina. “I am the real empress of all Lashtang, and when I win back my throne, I will give you your nice slimy holes back in the marshes. Or, if you wish, I could make you into different animals. Butterflies perhaps. Or fish.”
“No, no, we love being slugs,” said another with a little shiver. “We were exceedingly happy before Yaark came along.”
“Very well,” Messina said, smiling, both arms upraised again. “Now I command you to answer my questions, and I will protect you from punishment. But you must tell me the truth. Where is Yaark?” The tunnel appeared to be long, wide and pitch black. There was nothing to see within, and nothing to hear. But Messina produced a small flickering light from her fingertip, just like the small flame from a match.
Illuminated in the flickering flame, one slug said, “Yaark is inside the tunnel. He comes here often. He can look up to where he came from, and he likes the dark. He can send out power to Clebbster on Sparkan, and others on Lashtang. This is his secret home. “
“And who has Yaark trapped in there?” Messina asked.
“Ah,” said the slug, “I don’t know any names. But there’s four little cats and two boys. One is a little boy with yellow curls. The other is a much older boy with hair like tawny stripes. Last, there’s a goose and a very large one too. It was angry and dangerous at first, but then Yaark has them all imprisoned. None of them will ever escape. Yaark doesn’t permit escapes.”
Chapter Five
Messina nodded, took a deep breath, summoned all her magic to come to her, and slowly walked into the tunnel. Behind her the brilliant blue sky disappeared, and all the nasty damp cloud disappeared too. She could see the island of Sparkan floating way above, with its roots hanging down and the sparks of the volcano rising faintly, far away. But now all that had gone and suddenly she was enclosed in black nothingness.
She was suspicious and wondered if this was just another trap, for here she was at the exact place where they said Yaark lived, in the unexpected tunnel in the middle of a magic donned cloud. But without hesitation, she continued walking into the darkness.
The smell of magic was different to the Hazlet acid smell and different to her own spicy magical perfumes. This was a most unpleasant stink like excrement and rotten rubbish. Messina screwed up her nose. Then, very softly, she called, “Nathan, Sam, and Hermes, I am here. You will be safe and free very soon. No one can imprison me. And Yaark if you are there, beware, because I am coming to get you and you will not survive against me.”
There was no answer, but a hot wind blew back from deep in the tunnel. It was most unpleasant and carried a stench of disease and death. It sucked and boiled, and even Messina found it repulsive and had to push herself to walk onwards. Feeling as though each step was a struggle and knowing that she was being forced backwards, Messina used her own stronger magic and continued to march into the tunnel. She had re-magicked the little march flame at her fingertip, and this little glowing light brought glittering shadows and showed the marks of the rocks along the walls and ceiling. Many other slugs crawled there, but no other life appeared. In one place there was a steady drip drip drip of water, which smelled sour and dirty. It landed in its own puddle of yellow slime.
Then Messina realised that the passageway had widened, and she guessed it was getting closer to the cave at the end. So, stretching out both arms, she blew out the little flame and instead a huge white light sprang from the palms of her hands, and every tiny detail was immediately visible, taking Yaark by surprise. At once Messina noticed that a very tiny blue star which had been hanging in the centre of the rocky roof, swinging a little as though asleep, just floating in the darkness. But now the magic white light lit all the corners, the star whizzed and swirled as if confused while three other stars came from the shadows and clustered together. One was pink, another deep green and the last was quite black. They clung their minute spangles together, and then quite suddenly disappeared.
As the little bright stars blinked out, so the gloomy dark swirl of shadow on the ground disappeared as well, and Messina, holding her own silver light higher, saw everything she had been unable to see before.
On the ground sat Nathan, his arms and legs and face all tied up in clumps of white fluff like moving cloud, and beside him sat Sam, also imprisoned in exactly the same way. Hermes lay on his side, his wings trapped in the same murky mist, and Mouse and her three kittens were curled, frightened, beside Sam, just as though they were sitting in a pot of oozing sludge.
Briskly Messina walked to Nathan, smiled and said, “One moment and you’ll be free my dear,” and began to study what had imprisoned him. Three times she raised her hands and spoke different words, but the cloud did not disperse. “Free my son,” she said the
first time, then, “Break these bindings,” but even the last time when she called, “Clouds of the Succubus, be gone,” nothing moved.
She sat down beside the cats and stared into their eyes, then lifted Hermes’ head and stared at him. She decided their eyes were blank and they were half asleep. So the third time she began to sing,
“Wake from the clouds of forgetfulness,
And return at my command.
Fly out from the mists of forever less,
And act as I demand.
Evil magic and Yaark be gone,
Leave the Empole of Lashtang free,
The good magic of the empress’s song,
Is the true source of freedom’s key.”
She sang in a deep slow voice, both beautiful and sinister. But nothing changed in any manner, and even the fluffy white mist did not move.
Waiting, and watching, Messina stretched out one hand, stroked Nathan’s cheek, but could see that his eyes did not move, and he had no knowledge of her being there. “Dear me,” she muttered to herself, refusing to accept that Yaark’s magic was so much stronger than her own. But she did wonder if she should call on Granny or Sherdam to help.
Then, turning back to the tunnel she hurried into the darkness once more until she saw one of the fat little slugs. She peeled it off the rocky wall and carried it into the room at the end where Nathan still sat beside Sam, Hermes and the cats. The slug was squirming between her fingers, slightly smelly and very slimy. “Now then,” she said, “tell me everything you know about Yaark and his magic. What has he done to these boys?”
She placed the slug on the ground at her side and finally it answered in a teeny little squeak. “Don’t be mean to me,” it said. “I never wanted to be here. I want to be down amongst the flowers on Lashtang, eating geraniums and cabbages, or up on Sparkan playing with the Wooshabouts. I hate the dark.”
“Then answer my questions,” Messina said. “You must have seen these captives brought in, and you must have seen what the blue star did to them. I wish to know in detail. And what are the other three stars?”
“They are the incubi of the Sparkan underground roots,” whispered the slug. “Many of us come from those deep places too. We were happy slugs living on the roots and eating the grasses. But the incubi flew down among us a hundred years ago and spoiled everything. I don’t know where they came from before that. Somewhere up up up in the sky.”
“Interesting,” admitted Messina. “And what have they done to these prisoners?”
“They are in a special trance,” said the slug with a little shiver. “An incubus takes away the mind and climbs in themselves. But this time, they have just taken away the mind, and they didn’t have time to swim in themselves. They’ll come back and do that soon.”
“Ah, I understand,” scowled Messina. “How disgusting. As Yaark did with Gilden, now he wants to get inside the heads of my beautiful son and his friends.”
The slug was trying to get away. “The black star is the worst,” it squeaked. “He will eat me up. I’ve told you all I know, so let me go.”
“Very well,” Messina said as the slug slid off to the nearest wall, and she turned to Nathan and the others. “Now then,” she spoke aloud to herself, “If the trance has stopped them all being themselves, I should turn each one into something else entirely, and then the trance will not work anymore and when I turn them back, they will be their real selves.”
She considered this for some time, first searching the cave with her great silver lights to make sure that Yaark and the other stars were not present, and then thinking about the best way to handle this situation. She wondered if it had always been Yaark doing terrible things in the past, or whether perhaps it had been all four incubi together. And we still have no idea what Clebbster does.
“But that doesn’t really matter,” she murmured. “I will sort that out at another time. First I must get Nathan back, and his friends too.” And standing tall, wiping the slug slime off on the ground, she raised both arms, and pointed all her fingers at Nathan. Then, very very quietly she muttered five soft words. “Bubo scandiacus Stand and Fly.”
There was a pause.
Nathan had been thinking of nothing at all. Not only could he not remember what had happened to him, he couldn’t even remember who he was. His mind was asleep, and all there was inside was a vague feeling of worry, as if something wasn’t quite right, but he didn’t know what.
Then gradually, after the words which he had not heard, for he could neither see nor hear a thing, something inside Nathan began to wake up. He felt he was growing but he was growing in a way that made little sense.
His neck started to stretch. He could feel the sprouting of more bones in his neck, but all around these tiny bones was the sprouting of feathers. They itched as they poked through his skin, fluttering outwards, all prickles and fluff. Then he felt his shoulders and arms shrink, and that felt very strange indeed. They squashed up and fizzled away and when he tried to stretch out his arms, all that happened was another flutter of feathers. His eyes felt very large. He gazed only forwards but now he could see to both sides without bothering to turn his head. Then, as an experiment, he actually tried to turn his head and discovered that he could turn it right around in a complete circle, which startled him, and he half expected his head to fall off. He opened his mouth, and all the white fluff that had filled his throat floated away, but when he tried to speak he could only clack, just as though he had a beak instead of lips. So he sat where he was, hoping that something would make sense if he waited long enough.
Then Nathan looked down at his feet and gave a startled hop. There were two feet with funny black toes and very long sharp claws. That just didn’t feel right at all. So he puffed up his chest feathers and looked down at himself again. Although he did not understand, he did think he looked rather grand. His feathers were white, and some had small brown flecks, but most of him was white and he was quite proud of looking so glossy and handsome. Then he stretched and discovered that this brought his wings out. He stretched again, peering first to the right and then to the left, admiring his gorgeous flight feathers. The tips of his wings were thick, and each separate feather was soft and clean. Automatically he began to preen those wing feathers, making sure they lay straight and ready to fly.
Finally he realised someone was watching him. Looking around and up, he saw a woman, very tall and serene, who was smiling down at him. She had striped hair nothing like his wonderful white feathers, and yet he had the strangest feeling that she looked a little like him. He started to speak to her and ask her who she was, but as he opened his beak, he just said, “Toowit, too-woo,” which greatly puzzled him, as although he had said it himself, he had no idea what it meant.
The woman was smiling, and she said, “Hello Nathan. Are you hungry?”
He understood exactly what she said, but it seemed a stupid question. He wouldn’t have minded a little mouse for breakfast but clearly she didn’t have any of those, so how could she feed him? He began to say no, he wasn’t really hungry, but it just came out again as “Toowit, too-woo.” Nathan felt rather embarrassed by this limited vocabulary, but there seemed little he could do about it, so he began to preen his feathers again.
Looking around past the tall lady, he suddenly saw another bird. This was a magpie, which also looked rather confused, and it was hopping up and down and squawking and ruffling its wings. Those feathers glowed with a gorgeous black and deep blue iridescence, but the bird seemed unhappy. It stared at its little claws and then sat down heavily with a tiny burp.
Four other little birds had collapsed in a heap, all together. One was a slightly bossy starling, which was trying to keep the three smaller birds together. They were sparrows, but they mewed with sad little cat noises, which completely puzzled Nathan and the magpie.
Lastly amidst all this confusion, stood an ostrich, tall and elegant, stretching its legs and looking down at them in amazement. It bent its head backwards, stared at its own
fluffy tail, wiggled its fluffy feathers, shook its head, peered downwards in dislike at its large clawed feet, and stared back at Messina. She remained still and silent, her arms crossed, regarding them all. She kept a watch for the stars, but she was more concerned for the birds which she had created one by one. So then, slowly and carefully, both arms stretched out towards the birds, she began to chant in a deep voice. “You no longer belong to Yaark and his company. I have made you and so you belong to me.”
Then suddenly she snapped her fingers and pointed first at Nathan and then at the others. Gradually, still confused, all the birds turned back into who they really were. Their wings squashed to their sides, their legs became thicker and their feet changed entirely. For a moment Nathan looked like a tall boy with an owl’s head, but then, with a twist and a ruffle, he became entirely himself. “Toowit, what’s going on?” he demanded, looking at Sam, who was half boy and half magpie. “I think I went to sleep. But I dreamed about owls.” He stared again. “Who’s that?”
“What a silly question,” said Sam, his last feathers disappearing. “You know perfectly well who I am.” Sam hurried to cuddle the cats, who were all once again themselves, but he was a little puzzled by the tiny fluffy feathers left stuck to their fur.
Hermes shook himself and said, “My illustrious lady, I have had a most strange experience. However, what happens to me is of no importance. May I ask where we are? And what you wish me to do next?”
There was little now to see. The rocky cave was empty except for themselves, and it was chilly. Messina still spread the light from her hands, but there was nothing to look at except each other. “We must move,” she said, “but it may not be easy. This is a passage within a cloud where it seems Yaark has made his home after Nathan wrecked his previous hiding place in the old castle. But he managed to trap all of you, and had I not come here, you could never have escaped, and no one would ever have found you. I have broken his spell, but I cannot believe we can just walk out. There will surely be a trap at the end. We must all be wary.”
Dominoes Page 5
