Blood and Fire (Book 3)

by Marcus Alexander

  Rising to her feet, she took off. E’Jaaz ghosted after her.

  Even knowing that it was coming, Charlie was shocked by the abruptness of their action. She had assumed there would be more talking, more of a chance to mentally prepare herself for this last push. Scrambling, she hastened to catch up with the other two Keepers.

  Nibbler, also slightly unimpressed that there was no last-minute speech or a chance to wish everyone good luck, followed too. However, caught up in the excitement of the moment and totally oblivious to the dangers ahead, he was soon swishing his tail and lolling his tongue at the thought of one last spectacular battle.

  33

  Mosaics

  Marsila tore back the ivy that covered the skylight vent in the roof, ripped the ancient and near-crumbling grille from off its mounts and, with a quick look over her shoulder to make sure everyone was still behind her, jumped through the opening. There was a faint flash of gold as she summoned her Will, then nothing.

  ‘Ancient Keepers, grant us luck,’ said E’Jaaz. ‘Lots of luck.’

  Then he too grabbed hold of the opening and disappeared into the chamber below.

  Heart pounding in her chest, Charlie jumped feet first into the angled vent. Her heels scraped against the stonework and she picked up speed as she slid further forward. The light from below grew stronger, then the skylight’s shaft came to an end, dropping her into free fall.

  Charlie caught a quick glimpse of a round room, a mosaicked floor, lots of statues and an unhealthy number of Stomen rising from their neatly ordered beds with looks of anger on their faces and weapons in their fists. Seeing the floor rapidly rising towards her, Charlie grasped her Will and landed in an explosion of yellow flames.

  Immediately a large and very spiky mace whipped through the air towards her. Charlie’s mouth formed an ‘O’ of surprise, her eyes grew wide … then instinct took over. Whipping her head beneath the mace and ignoring the swoosh of its passing, she tripped her assailant, somersaulted over a Stoman still attempting to rise from his bed, then started sprinting towards the other Keepers. On the wall behind them was a carving of a Winged One; its wings were spread wide and in its outstretched palm was a stylized version of a burning comet. Countersunk into this comet was the socket.

  ‘Ooooof!’

  All the air exploded out of Charlie’s lungs as a fist landed in her gut. Distracted by the keyhole, she had failed to watch where she was going. Pain lanced through her and she struggled to stay upright.

  ‘Brat!’ snarled the Stonesinger. Purple lines of power crackled around his shoulders and arms. Punching her again and again, he knocked her to the floor and, raising a huge foot, slammed it down towards Charlie’s head. There was a snarling whirlwind of claws and flames as Nibbler bore the Stonesinger to the ground. Lightning flashed, then the young dragon jumped upright, leaving what was left of his foe whimpering on the floor. He grabbed Charlie with one paw and dragged her towards the far wall, spitting flames and lightning whenever any of the Stomen got too close.

  Gasping for breath and almost overcome with pain, Charlie tried to stop her feet drumming uselessly against the floor. She did her best to stand upright but her diaphragm was still clenched, making it hard for her lungs to work. As Nibbler continued to drag her along she heard more shouts, a clatter as something heavy was dropped, then a burst of golden light. Two pairs of strong hands took hold of her and hauled her upright.

  Winged One

  ‘I know you’re winded, Charlie,’ shouted Marsila, ‘but give us your Will. We have to Triad up!’

  Charlie tried to stand on her own two feet but only succeeded in coughing up a small puddle of vomit.

  ‘Come on, Charlie!’ cried Marsila.

  Slumping forward, Charlie held out her Will, then emptied the rest of her stomach’s contents across the floor. As the others formed a Triad she felt a current of their shared strength wash through her. She forced her breathing into a more natural pattern and raised her head as E’Jaaz and Marsila wrapped the four of them inside a bubble of gold.

  Angry lines of Stomen began to crowd around the Keepers, screaming and yelling as they tried to force their way past the golden shield. Axes and barbed spears crashed impotently. Each time they struck the bubble of Will it would flare, make that odd bouncy-ball noise and deflect their weapons.

  BRRRR-BBOING!

  BBBOOOOOING!

  At any other time the Keepers, safe in their shield, might have smirked but the venom displayed on the faces of their enemies, the overwhelming number of them, the seriousness of the situation and the acidic stink of Charlie’s vomit all sobered them.

  Their earlier confidence evaporated.

  ‘Charlie, can you –’ began E’Jaaz.

  ‘I’m good,’ gasped Charlie, cutting him short. ‘I’m good,’ she repeated even as her stomach clenched. ‘Just give me a second.’

  ‘We don’t have a second!’ yelled Marsila as she watched a Stoman raise a trumpet to his lips. Grabbing a knife from its sheath, she flung it through the shield, knocking the trumpet from his fingers. ‘Get on with it!’

  Furious with herself for being caught off guard, and only too aware that every second counted, Charlie spun round to better examine the carving’s socket.

  ‘It’s too high and we need to get nearer!’ she said.

  As the four of them shuffled closer to the wall Charlie spotted an upturned stool lying just outside the circumference of their shield. She lunged for it, but an axe, intended for her outstretched hand, splintered it into pieces.

  ‘Oh, for crying out loud!’ groaned Charlie. She cast her eyes around for something else to stand upon. But there was nothing else.

  ‘Come on,’ insisted Marsila. ‘Hurry it up!’

  Vexed, Charlie punched her hand through the shield, grabbed a helmetless soldier with her glowing hands, then snatched him forward to meet a crushing blow from her head. The Stoman’s eyes rolled up and he collapsed in a heap. Charlie dragged him closer to the wall, then stepped on his back. Standing on her tiptoes she reached up to the keyhole but found that it was still out of reach.

  Almost growling in frustration, Charlie repeated the process. She avoided the swish of a downthrust sword, grabbed its owner’s cloak and yanked him in. Kicking him in the knee, then following that up with a series of elbows and punches, she flipped him over her hip to land on top of his comrade. She adjusted his senseless limbs, then clambered on top and reached out.

  ‘Yes!’ she exclaimed.

  Tearing the pendant off from round her neck, she slapped it into the socket and funnelled her Will into the keyhole.

  The pendant began to glow.

  Stix and Stones rode the night skies. Wheeling and swooping, they patrolled the dim landscape below, keeping a watchful eye on the torchlit temples that gleamed in the darkness.

  A trumpet sounded.

  Stix cocked his head to one side to better detect its origin over the buzz of his Stowyrm’s wings. He waved to his brother who, having heard it too, merely shrugged his indifference.

  ‘Let us wait, brother!’ yelled Stones, his voice loud enough to be heard over the rushing wind. ‘The glimmer of Will shall be our signal. Patience!’

  Stix grunted and tugged on the reins, causing his Stowyrm to bank to the side. This wasn’t the first trumpet they had heard in the last hour and he doubted it would be the last. The soldiers, rattled and jumping at every little noise, were worse, in Stix’s opinion, than a huddle of choirboys. And, even now, with no credible reports of the Keepers making an appearance, they still heard a trumpet or bugle call at almost every turn of the clock. He was tempted to fly down there and yank the trumpet from the sentry’s lips and stick it in an unspeakable place.

  Growling to himself and trying not to fidget with the hilts of his swords, he rose to ride beside his brother. Side by side, with a crescent moon shining overhead, the two flew their stone leviathans through faint wisps of cloud.

  A soft glow appeared beneath them. At first ne
ither noticed, but as the strident alarm of trumpets continued to howl and the glow grew to an other-worldly brightness, they wheeled their mounts in a barrel roll that left them facing the strange event below. The large southern temple that their troops were using as a temporary garrison was shining like a lighthouse beacon.

  ‘Ha!’ roared Stones. ‘They show themselves! Brother, our time has come. Let’s gut that little rabbit and her friends and hang their heads from our saddles!’

  ‘Yes!’ shouted Stix with feeling. Whipping a sword from his back, he held it overhead. ‘For mother!’

  ‘For mother!’ echoed Stones.

  They kicked their heels into their beasts’ flanks and dived through the sky, hurling their screams of hate and vengeance before them.

  34

  The Gateway

  ‘Comeoncomeoncomeoncomeon,’ muttered Charlie in an impatient chant. Still standing atop the two unconscious Stomen, she jigged from side to side, urging the Gateway to hurry up and open.

  It felt like the process was working but it was taking an unpleasantly long time.

  The bright outline of the Gateway had appeared, the carvings on the walls were writhing and a strong wind had arisen, sucking clothes and bed sheets into a vortex and whipping them around the chamber in tight circles. That weird sound, so oddly reminiscent of a rising elevator, had also grown to near-epic proportions. Louder and louder it screamed, greater than they had experienced at any of the other temples, but still the Gateway had yet to open.

  Outside their shield, only the cadre of Stonesingers remained. The Rhinospiders and soldiers had been forced out of the chamber by the power of the wind. The Stonesingers stood in a semicircle, facing the Keepers with hate-filled eyes. Their cloaks fluttered around them, flames of purple and green flared from their fists and, to counter the fierce wind, they had commanded the mosaic floor to rise up and wrap round their feet, securing them with anchors of stone. The chant of their Stonesong must have been loud but amidst all the bedlam and chaos it was almost impossible to hear it inside the shield. They could, however, see that the grim Stonesingers were gesturing for a behemoth to rise. With a lurch, the ground split apart and a terrible arm arose. The Stonesingers made hooking motions with their hands and the floor ripped further apart to reveal the monstrous shoulders and featureless head of their stone puppet.

  ‘Why isn’t this working?’ shouted Charlie, loud enough to be heard over the rising scream of the Gateway.

  ‘It is working!’ yelled E’Jaaz. ‘The Gateway is forming. Just keep at it!’

  BRRAABOINGGG!

  The bubble of Will skittered as the behemoth, not even clear of its pit yet, rolled around to slap them with a huge hand. With gritted teeth, Marsila and E’Jaaz fought to keep their shield in place.

  ‘Hatchling!’ yelled Marsila. ‘A little help!’

  A fork of lightning cracked into the behemoth’s knee, causing it to stumble. Patches of Stonesong reached their ears as slowly, ponderously, the behemoth raised itself upright.

  ‘The Stonesingers!’ urged E’Jaaz. ‘Not the behemoth!’

  The shield shook as the behemoth delivered another blow. Cracks appeared in the fabric of their Will.

  ‘Come on, Hatchling!’

  Opening his jaws, Nibbler let loose. The Stonesingers wavered before his onslaught and, uncontrolled, the behemoth momentarily collapsed, its head and shoulder ripping a long furrow in the wall. But, far from finished, three of the Stonesingers pulled great slabs of rock from the ground and used these as barriers to block Nibbler’s lightning, giving the others the freedom to return unhindered to their puppeteering. Groaning and creaking, the behemoth pulled itself upright again and resumed its bludgeoning attack on the Keepers’ shield.

  Dazed as she was, and fighting to maintain her balance upon her makeshift footstool, Charlie did her utmost to concentrate on the pendant and the socket. Sending out additional tendrils of Will to investigate the keyhole, she noticed that something felt slightly off. Much like a key in a real lock, it was as though it hadn’t quite caught properly, as though not all of the lock’s tumblers had engaged. In Charlie’s mind it felt like the pendant needed a little more energy to overcome this obstacle.

  ‘I need more Will!’ she shouted.

  ‘What?’ roared E’Jaaz. He cupped hand to ear to better hear over the pandemonium.

  ‘I need more –’ Charlie staggered and nearly fell as the behemoth struck another glancing blow. ‘I need more Will!’

  ‘If we feed you more, the shield will weaken!’ shouted E’Jaaz.

  ‘I don’t think the Gateway will open without it!’ Charlie made stabbing gestures at the pendant to give her words additional emphasis.

  They were drenched in shadow as the behemoth loomed overhead.

  Groaning with effort, E’Jaaz leaned close to Marsila. ‘What do you think?’

  ‘I think we’re stuck between a behemoth and a hard place!’ retorted Marsila. ‘But the odds have always been stacked against us. Give her the Will and let’s see this done!’

  E’Jaaz nodded. Allowing the amount that he fed to the shield to slacken, he transferred the excess to Charlie. The bubble of gold around them thinned and, as the behemoth struck, more cracks, larger than before, zig-zagged across its surface. Marsila and E’Jaaz stared in concern. With no other options left to them they began to lash whips of Will at the behemoth in the hope of slowing it down. Cracks of lightning and cascades of flame flew over their heads as Nibbler joined his efforts to theirs. The Stonesingers, aware that the end of this game was rapidly approaching, redoubled their efforts too. More rocks and craggy spears were flung at the Keepers’ weakening shield, their voices – still barely heard over the tempest – grew slightly louder and the tempo of their Stonesong increased. The behemoth juddered faster, its bludgeoning blows fell with increasing frequency and the Stonesingers’ purple and green flames of power rose higher and higher to twist and turn alarmingly in the wind’s whistling vortex.

  At the very epicentre of all this frenzied attention was Charlie. Lurching from side to side, she fought to retain her precarious perch on top of the two fallen Stomen. Nonetheless, she could feel herself growing more powerful as more Will was passed to her from the others. Her lips pulled back in a gesture that was more snarl than smile and, seizing the moment, she twisted the way her Will funnelled into the pendant. The change was instantaneous. The elevator noise deepened and mellowed until it sounded reminiscent of old trees groaning in the wind or ancient doorways creaking on their hinges. The outline of the Gateway throbbed with additional light and the wall contained within the Gateway’s outline was depressed inwards.

  ‘It’s happening!’ shrieked Charlie. Eyes wide in disbelief, she stared at the glowing Gateway. ‘It’s really happening!’

  She reached towards the pendant with trembling fingers.

  KRRR-KRACK!

  The wall on the opposite side of the chamber burst apart. Huge slabs of rock smashed to the floor and one of the large circular doors toppled inwards to crash with a resounding boom. Snaking its way in with a gnashing of teeth and a flutter of wings was one of the great Stowyrms. Upon its back was Stones. Malevolent yellow eyes flashed murderously as he pulled his bow from his back and, in one smooth motion, strung an arrow and released it to spit across the room.

  The shield shattered.

  Charlie felt the hot whizz of something crack past her neck and an unbearable stab of pain in her hand. Her eyes sprang wide open and a half-formed scream of horror gurgled in her mouth. Stones’s brutal arrow was quivering in the soft glowing fabric of the Gateway and where her little finger used to be was a gap and a disturbing splatter of blood.

  Her blood.

  She swallowed the remnants of her first scream. Drew a deep breath and prepared to unleash another scream. A scream worthy of the terror and pain that she felt. But a stern voice of authority reached her ears first.

  ‘Focus, Charlie. Stay focused!’ Marsila, eyes still facing forward on the
enemies that threatened them, reached behind her to wrap her fingers reassuringly around Charlie’s upper arm. ‘No matter the burden, no matter the cost, we are Keepers! Open that Gateway!’

  The monstrous crunch of the behemoth’s footsteps shook them as, unhindered by the non-existent shield, it strode closer to loom over them.

  There was a crackle of lightning as Nibbler continued to fight, a chant of Stonesong half heard over the shriek of the wind and the rumble of disturbed brickwork as Stones and the Stowyrm wriggled further through the wreckage of the wall.

  But Charlie barely registered any of this. All she could focus on was the pain cramping up her arm and the shred of pink that used to be a part of her lying on the floor.

  ‘Charlie!’ shouted Marsila. ‘Stop thinking like a child, act like a Keeper and for Realm’s Sake open that Gateway!’

  Marsila’s words cut through Charlie’s confusion and pain, shearing past the horror of losing a chunk of flesh to reach the knot of determination that lay hidden but ever present inside her chest. The ball of determination pulsed and throbbed and, fuelled by Marsila’s words, flared into life. Adrenalin pumped through Charlie’s heart. Matched by a rush of resolve, it shivered up her spine to sear its way into her brain.

  Shunting her pain and shock aside, Charlie stood on her toes and slapped her mangled hand against the pendant. Blood mixed with her Will, changing it from its normal yellow to a golden red. Gritting her teeth and forcing all the remnants of her Will into the keyhole, she commanded it to open.

  The pendant lurched beneath her hand and, with a final glimmer, the socket sank inwards. Bit by bit, the carving, the pendant and the wall surrounding it seemed to be sucked away to dwindle and vanish in an impossible twist of perspective. And where the wall had once been now stood a doorway, edged with a golden nimbus of light, and through this Gateway, so similar and yet so different from a normal Portal, was a breathtaking, fantastical view.