by Paul Stewart
Lennius Grex was looking across the city to the Free Glades district now. A large phraxvessel was hovering over the ancient-looking academy tower at the centre of the lake.
‘Ah, yes, of course,’ Quove Lentis said, and smiled. ‘You’re here for … the entertainment.’
Lennius Grex nodded, then raised his spyglass. ‘Yes, yes, that’s it,’ he agreed. ‘May I?’
‘Certainly,’ said Quove Lentis, producing a spyglass of his own from his topcoat. ‘Let’s watch this together.’ He smiled again. ‘While you give me a detailed report of the blockade …’ His manner became icy once more. ‘Phrax Commander Grex.’
The phraxmarines towed the sumpwood couch over to the edge of the balcony, and Quove Lentis raised his spyglass to one eye. Standing beside the couch, Lennius Grex did the same, but his hands were shaking. From somewhere behind him, he heard the nightprowls’ low rumbling growls and snarls, and the sound of huge paws padding across the marble floor as the great cats approached.
‘The blockade is going well, High Professor,’ said Lennius Grex, focusing his spyglass on the hovering phraxvessel.
On a spar, jutting out from its upper foredeck, stood three figures: a fourthling and two cloddertrogs. They were bloodied and stooped, and their hands and feet were bound tightly together.
‘The attacks of the skymarshals have grown less frequent,’ Lennius explained, ‘now that our fleet is permanently in close hover over the Mire grasslands.’
‘So, still no closer to Undergarden and the floating city itself?’ Quove Lentis said, his voice still ominously calm.
‘It’s only a matter of time, High Professor,’ Lennius Grex insisted. ‘Nothing can get in or out of New Sanctaphrax while our fleet keeps it blockaded—’
‘And while our phraxfleet is tied up over the grasslands,’ Quove Lentis broke in, ‘others take advantage.’ He nodded to the figures on board the hovering phraxvessel. ‘Those three, for example.’
In the distance, the spar abruptly tipped forward, throwing the fourthling and the cloddertrogs headlong down through the air. They crashed into the lake, throwing up plumes of water as they sank, only to bob up to the surface a moment later. Then suddenly, behind them, gleaming shapes rose from the depths, twisting and turning as they leaped from the water and arched their scaly backs, before diving back deep down into the lake.
‘Like all true predators, the snaggletooth doesn’t wait,’ Quove Lentis said, a satisfied smile on his lips. ‘It strikes, suddenly – and with deadly effect,’ he concluded as the ripples on the surface of the lake died away and the phraxship moved off.
Lennius Grex shuddered.
‘Those three were tallow-hats, caught raiding one of our phraxmines in the Eastern Woods,’ Quove went on. ‘The longer the blockade continues, the bolder these sky pirates become. Do I make myself clear?’
Quove Lentis snapped his spyglass shut, making Lennius Grex jump and almost drop his own. Behind him, the nightprowls snarled more loudly. Lennius Grex looked round to see the two sets of pale blue eyes staring back at him.
‘Please, High Professor, we’re doing our best,’ he said, aware of the pleading tone in his voice. ‘We just need a little more time …’ He was standing at the very edge of the balcony. The nightprowls started padding towards him, their teeth bared. ‘I’m begging you, please …’
‘My nightprowls are hungry,’ said Quove Lentis evenly. ‘They want to be fed …’ He paused. ‘What do you think, Captain Adereth?’
Lennius Grex fell to his knees, the hood of his storm-cape pulled up defensively over his head and his eyes clamped shut. Trembling uncontrollably, he clasped his hands together.
‘I think the phrax commander deserves one more chance, sir,’ said a female voice.
Lennius Grex opened his eyes and looked up. A fourthling in the green uniform of the Freeglade Lancers – Quove Lentis’s personal bodyguard – was standing beside the two burly phraxmarines. She had braided hair, pulled back beneath a tall pointed forage cap, large ears, a thin mouth and eyes as pale as the nightprowls’.
‘You’re right,’ said Quove Lentis.
He grabbed the white quarm by the scruff of its neck and tossed it to the nightprowls. Seizing it between them, the two great cats stole back into the shadows, the panicked screams of their victim shattering the quiet, then abruptly ceasing.
Quove Lentis clicked his fat fingers and the phraxmarines towed him back inside the Purple Hall. The Freeglade Lancer captain watched them go, her pale eyes no more than narrow slits. Then she turned to Lennius Grex, who had climbed to his feet and was straightening his fine uniform.
‘Thank you, Captain,’ he said as he regained his composure. ‘Our glorious leader has been known to be somewhat impetuous. Thank Sky that cooler heads like ours have prevailed.’
‘So, do you intend to attack New Sanctaphrax?’ asked the captain, standing in front of the phrax commander. ‘I believe the High Professor made his opinion clear.’
‘His opinion concerned the hideous monsters with which he’s populated the Freeglade Lake,’ said Lennius Grex with all the dignity he could muster. This tall rangy captain with her pale eyes was almost as unnerving as the nightprowls. ‘He has left the conduct of the blockade to me. Now, if you’ll step aside, Captain …?’
‘Adereth,’ said the Freeglade Lancer captain. ‘Captain Felicia Adereth. And you, Phrax Commander Lennius Grex, have just used up your last chance.’
Reaching out, she gave the phrax commander a gentle shove that unbalanced him.
Flailing wildly, Lennius Grex fell from the grand balcony of the High Hall of the Palace of Phrax, built upon the site of an old loading scaffold, then the highest point in the city. Moments before he hit the ground, its name flashed into his thoughts.
The Forlorn Hope.
· CHAPTER TWELVE ·
As he walked up the grand avenue, with the wind singing through the elegant buildings on both sides, Cade felt for his father’s barkscroll of working drawings, his fingertips probing the material of his jacket. They were still there – thank Earth and Sky! – stitched into the lining, where he’d concealed them back on the Hoverworm.
It seemed so long ago that his friend Thorne had given them to him. At the time, he’d suggested that Cade should pass them on to the High Academe, Nate Quarter. But when the two of them had finally met up in the Great Library, his uncle had turned them down.
‘I’m sure they’re fascinating, Cade,’ he’d said, ‘but leave them where they are. I’m afraid phrax technology really isn’t my thing.’
Cade must have looked disappointed, because his uncle had smiled encouragingly and clapped him on the shoulder.
‘Seftis Bule is the one you should give them to,’ he’d told him. ‘New Sanctaphrax’s Chief Armourer. He and his Armoury academics will know exactly what to do with them.’
‘He’s trustworthy?’ Cade had asked.
‘I’d trust Seftis Bule with my life,’ Nate had assured him.
Now, three days after arriving in New Sanctaphrax, Cade was about to meet the armourer at last. As he climbed the broad stone stairs that led up to the Armoury’s heavy ironwood doors, with their black studs and elaborate hinges, his body tingled with the thrill of anticipation.
Unlike the reverent hush of the schools and academies Cade had already visited, the entire barrel-shaped building thrummed with the noise of industry. There was the roar of the furnaces, the clank and thud of work tools and, above this background cacophony, the sound of voices bellowing instructions and commands.
Cade raised a fist, hammered loudly on the door and waited. Then, unsure that anyone had heard him, he raised his fist a second time – only for the door to creak open. A brawny cloddertrog wearing a large tilder apron, burn marks from splashes of molten metal staining its shiny leather surface, filled the entrance. He stared down at Cade, his dark eyes narrowed with mistrust.
‘Seftis Bule?’ said Cade uncertainly.
‘What of him?’ said the c
loddertrog gruffly.
‘I’m … errm … looking for him,’ said Cade.
‘He’s busy,’ the cloddertrog grunted. ‘The Chief Armourer is always busy,’ he added, and went to close the door.
‘Nate Quarter sent me,’ said Cade quickly. ‘The High Academy Elec—’
‘I know who Nate Quarter is,’ the cloddertrog said. He looked Cade up and down before pulling the door back open and stepping to one side. ‘Follow me.’
They went along a broad corridor, both sides lined with mounds of metal objects – suits of armour, antiquated engines and water tanks, gates and metal fencing, rolls of wire netting and heaps of forks and spoons. The air grew warmer and noisier as the cloddertrog led the way to the doors at the far end – then exploded in a wall of searing heat and deafening clamour when he pushed them open.
As they entered the cavernous hall, a dense cloud of glittering smoke billowed up into the air. It startled the ratbirds that, attracted to the Armoury by the heat of the furnace pipes, roosted on the ceiling rafters. Cade looked up to see a large flock of the little creatures flex their leathery wings and take to the air. And as they flitted round and round the high vaults, their high-pitched cries adding to the general din, he was reminded of the forest canopy at dawn in some distant Deepwoods grove.
In every corner of the hall, goblins, trogs and trolls were hard at work, some at benches or cooling troughs, others shifting barrow-loads of raw materials from one part of the Armoury to another. Cade was transfixed.
‘He’s over there,’ the cloddertrog bellowed, and pointed to a blazing furnace at the far side of the Armoury, before turning and stomping back through the doorway.
Suddenly finding himself alone, Cade checked – one last time – that the barkscrolls were still in place, then crossed the oily flagstones towards the furnace. He passed a banderbear who was operating a set of bellows, carefully calibrating the flow of air into the furnace chamber. Ahead of him, standing in front of the blazing forge, was a thin, wiry mottled goblin, the red-hot flames reflected in his sweat-glazed face.
‘Are you Seftis Bule?’ said Cade.
The mottled goblin stared back at him, his expression blank. Then he cupped a hand to his ear.
‘I said, are you Seftis Bule?’ Cade shouted.
‘Who wants to know?’ came the belligerent response.
‘My name’s Cade. Cade Quarter,’ he told him. ‘My uncle Nate sent me to see you.’ He reached down, tore open the rough stitching in the lining of his jacket and pulled out the sheaf of barkscrolls. ‘He said I should give you these.’
Without taking them, Seftis grabbed Cade by the arm and steered him past the forge and into a small room with a desk, a chair and a bank of filing cabinets. He slammed the door shut. Instantly the noise abated.
‘Say all that again,’ he said.
Cade did so, relieved not to have to shout any more, then handed the chief armourer the barkscrolls. Seftis flicked through them quickly, then looked up.
‘I’m going to need some time to look at them more closely,’ he said. He frowned thoughtfully. ‘Are you at all interested in the Armoury?’
‘I think it’s incredible,’ said Cade. ‘Though a bit noisy,’ he added with a rueful smile.
‘It’s not always this loud,’ said the goblin. He wiped his sleeve over his sweating brow. ‘Or so infernally hot. We’ve been catching up on an important order. Tell you what, Cade. I’ll get Theegum to show you round and we’ll meet up again here in an hour.’
Leaving the barkscrolls on the desk, Seftis Bule took Cade back into the forge hall.
‘Theegum!’ he shouted. ‘We got a guest. Cade Quarter. Show him round.’
The banderbear – a huge female with thick fur and the stubby yellowed stumps of two hacked-off tusks – nodded. Then, without saying a word, she turned and trudged off.
Seftis patted Cade on the back. ‘An hour,’ he reminded him.
Apart from the odd yodelled grunt, Theegum remained silent as she led the visitor through the Armoury. It was left to Cade to make sense of the things he was seeing.
In the main hall, amid smoke and flames and the smelting of ore, with ratbirds screeching and bellows wheezing, there was the drama of forge work. Beyond the hall were the workshops, where the clink and clatter of the metal workers set up an ever-changing rhythm, and the smell of resin oil and cogwheel polish was heavy in the air. Then, running parallel to the workshops, they came to the arsenal chamber.
For Cade, this was the most interesting part of the tour. There were long shelves of neatly labelled phraxweapons, both arms and ammunition, as well as phraxpacks, protective armour and phraxchambers of every size. Time and again, Cade stopped in front of one of the upright display cases at the ends of the aisles, and peered in at the intricate tools and armaments – ancient and modern – that were stored behind the glass.
One claw-like object in particular caught his eye. It was some kind of metal glove or gauntlet, with small round holes on the knuckles of each finger that looked as though they might fire ammunition of some kind. Though how they worked, Cade couldn’t guess.
‘Wuh-waah,’ Theegum grunted, and swung her arm up in front of her, her clawed paw opening and closing, then darting forward. ‘Wuh-wurra-waah!’ She stabbed at the air, then repeated the gesture. ‘Waah! Waah!’
Suddenly Cade understood. ‘Flames,’ he said. ‘It’s some kind of flame-thrower.’
And Theegum nodded, a smile brightening her hairy face. She repeated the whole movement. ‘Wuh-wuh.’
As the hour drew to a close, the banderbear indicated – in grunts and gestures that Cade was just about able to interpret – that the two of them should head back to Seftis Bule’s office.
Cade realized he was grinning. The previous evening, Tug had asked him what his favourite place was in New Sanctaphrax. At the time, Cade couldn’t answer. ‘It’s all amazing,’ he’d said.
Now he had an answer: the Armoury.
For Tug himself, there was no question. It was Undergarden that he loved best; everything about it. The steam allotments that lined the banks of the Edgewater River; the enclosures and pastureland in the western district; the untamed copses and glades amid the ruins to the east. The wildlife and birdsong. The delicious fruits and vegetables, ripe for the picking …
Since that first day with Celestia, collecting herbs and plant samples, Tug had found every opportunity in the weeks that followed to leave the confines of the Knights Academy and take the basket down from the West Landing to Undergarden. There he would spend the day with the Undergardeners – scholars from the Academy of Earth Studies in their blue-grey robes with the distinctive green trim. And for their part, the scholars had welcomed this great hulking ‘nameless one’ into their midst, finding him chores to do and tasks to complete.
Tug, the Undergardeners soon realized, could turn his hand to anything and was a quick learner. He had a natural affinity with the livestock, shepherding the miniature hammelhorns around in the western enclosures and tending to the elegant blue-backed tilder in the pastures of the palace ruins.
And it was there, amid the lush gladegrass, that he was first brought up short by the sight of a moss-covered stone figure, half buried in the dark soil. Enthralled by the sight of the eerie statue, Tug had taken the time to excavate it carefully with his curved claws and, clamping it beneath one arm, had made his way through the flocks of grazing tilder to the arched entrance to the old sewers. There, he removed all the shrubs and saplings to create a small clearing, and having cleaned the statue, scraping away the soil and moss and returning the carved figure to its original state, had placed it at its centre.
It was to be the first of a growing collection.
On a warm evening some weeks later, Tug was – as usual – down in Undergarden. The low sun dappled the western pastures and was turning the drifting clouds to orange and pink. Tug had already secured the skittish tilder in their pens for the night, and was now making his way back through the en
closures and down the mossy slope towards the banks of the Edgewater River.
Under his arm, he was carrying a particularly fine statue that he’d unearthed that morning. It was a figure of an ancient, long-forgotten Undertown leagues-merchant in a short cape and a high, conical hat. Carefully chiselled and elegantly detailed, it would, Tug had decided, make an excellent addition to his collection.
‘A fellow dweller of the Nightwoods? Why, yes, yes, it is. You must be Tug …’
The soft, sibilant voice seemed to be inside Tug’s head. He started with alarm, held the statue out in front of him and stared, furrow-browed, into the impassive stone face. Then, slowly, warily, he brought it closer, until the carved mouth was pressed against his ear.
‘Tug,’ came the soft voice again.
‘Wurgh!’ Tug grunted in alarm, almost letting the statue slip from his grasp. But then he saw it. The figure of a tiny female waif.
She was standing on the river bank beside a softly rustling dropwillow. Dressed in the blue-grey robes of New Sanctaphrax, she was holding a glass ampoule in her long-fingered hands. As she stepped forward, twenty or so other ampoules chinked in the burlap forage sack that hung from her shoulder.
‘Forgive me, Tug,’ the waif academic said out loud, the thin barbels on her lower lip quivering as she spoke. ‘It was rude of me to intrude on your thoughts like that.’
‘Tug startled is all,’ said Tug, smiling lopsidedly. ‘Tug not heard a waif’s voice since Tug was a young’un.’
‘There are so few of us out in the world these days.’ The waif nodded. ‘Especially Nightwoods waifs such as myself. I’m Professor Sentafuce of the Academy of Cloud,’ she said, and held up the ampoule. ‘I’ve just been testing the quality of the water …’ She paused, her large pale eyes widening as they focused on the statue in Tug’s hands. ‘So it’s true what they say about you, young Tug. You’re quite the excavator.’
‘Tug find in tilder pastures,’ he explained. ‘In palace ruins. Tug show.’
