by Juliet Boyd
“Okay. And what is the right way?”
Malice shrugged. “Never tried. Wouldn’t have a clue. On the edges? If we don’t do this, her power will return.”
“Return?”
Malice nodded toward the fight. The queen was on her knees. Still fighting back, but definitely not in control.
“If she wins this fight, we will all die.”
Ellie lifted the rune up high and slammed it down. She needed no more encouragement. A chip broke off the corner.
Malice ran over to another spot on the wall and started to pull another rune down.
Chapter 20
“Can someone please tell me what you want to do with her?” Flynn called out. She needed to know. If any of them could speak, that was. Bones could only bark, without a mind connection. Rag looked as if he was completely out of it, and a little … angular. Ellie and Malice were smashing stuff from the walls like maniacs. She wasn’t about to consult the madhouse inmates behind her. “Hey, someone. Before I crush her into oblivion. Unless that’s what you want, of course.”
At that, Malice turned, looked, ran over, and proceeded to cross her arms, a smug look on her face. “So, Mother, how does it feel to be on the other end of the wand?”
Flynn sputtered, slightly losing her concentration. Wand?
Malice glanced at her anxiously.
“Can we just get on with this?” Marchmont said. “My attention is beginning to wane. There’s only so much entertainment in telegraphing someone’s magic, then it becomes tiresome beyond the plane of the astrals.”
“Yes, all right.” Malice looked back at her mother. “You will abdicate. You will revoke your magic. You will sign over everything to me, and you will go and live in the basement until I find somewhere better to incarcerate you. No questions. No arguments.”
Her mother’s mouth crooked. “And you’ll take over?” She turned her focus to Flynn. “You think she will be better than me? Kinder than me? More life-generous than me? She’s the distillation of my hate and anger in one tiny little ball. She will turn the Underland into a hell hole. Everyone will be clamouring to get to the Overland. Is that what you want?”
“She’s lying. No one will be going to the Overland. I’ll make sure of that.”
“She’s lying. She has no way of stopping people leaving. Laws and threats don’t do it, believe me. This is where most of your monsters have come from. The fantastical ones, anyway.”
Malice sighed. “Well, then, it’s down to you. Who do you believe?”
Flynn glanced at the others. There was still no one she trusted that she could ask. Her decision.
The queen pushed at her magic, just a little, and she felt pure evil. She crushed it in one blow of telegraphed strength and the queen begged for mercy.
Chapter 21
Malice, now installed as the queen of the land of the purposefully insane, until her mother found a way to subvert the wards that had tied her to the castle’s basement, had given Bones a set of clothes that looked like something a Mediaeval member of the court might have worn on a Hollywood film set. It was better than only wearing a pair of Lycra shorts — he shuddered at the thought — but the difference was marginal. The moment he got back home, people would be staring at him and crossing the road to avoid him, or taking pictures. That was always a possibility. They were going to have to avoid that. A body-less costume was a little too high profile in the world of instant Internet. The garb wasn’t particularly convenient for trekking through a forest.
“Mmph,” Rag groaned, for the hundredth time. Naturally grumpy vampires were the worst patients.
They’d wrapped a whole load of bandages around Rag’s neck to brace it. It really was stomach-churningly floppy without it and not something you would want to look at for a long time. Bones had the task of helping Rag back to the Overland, so he got the brunt of the wordless complaints. For some reason, Rag didn’t seem to be amused about his situation, or the fact that Bones had joked his head might heal lopsided and he’d end up not being able to see straight, but as he couldn’t currently speak, ribbing was the order of the day. Knowing someone so well that you could hit their tetchy bone every time was one of the great pleasures of a very long life.
Ellie and Flynn were supporting each other on their journey. Both were injured and exhausted, but nothing serious. Flynn had done a good job, but it was worrying that she’d needed help to achieve it. If he wasn’t mistaken, her magic was getting weaker the longer her life as a vampire continued. That could be a problem.
“How much longer?” Flynn said.
Bones snorted. Next she’d be asking for sweets.
The begrudgingly helpful Malice had given them directions to what she said was the nearest portal back home. It was ‘Behind the uproot of the downside tree. That they would know when they got there.’ It wasn’t particularly helpful, but the compass drink they had all consumed was definitely pulling them all in the same direction.
They had tried to shorten the journey, but Flynn couldn’t transport them, as she’d never seen where they were going. She also couldn’t transport them home, as there was a band of magic barriers, wards, between the Underland and normal Earth. They were so obsessed with the barriers between the worlds. It was a wonder anyone managed to get in and out. But they all had, some of them via a more circuitous route than others.
“Is that it?” Ellie said, pointing to a glow in the distance.
No one answered. No one knew.
###
“The downside tree,” Ellie said. “An upside down tree.”
They walked around it, looking for anything that seemed as if it might be a door. They reached out their arms, feeling for a magical pull to another world. All except Rag. He was propped up against the upper … downmost branches of the tree, waiting.
“We need your friends,” she said to Flynn. “They might have a better idea.”
“Friends? Acquaintances, at best.”
“Don’t you bond when you perform magic with someone else?”
Flynn’s eyebrows jumped up her forehead. “I hope not. I don’t ever want to see him again.”
Bones laughed. “Neither do I. If there is a bond, can you sever it now?”
Marchmont, Hattie and Dorey had remained at the castle. They seemed to think it was their due to be looked after, and Malice, surprisingly, had agreed, although what she would think of them as long-term castle companions, especially when their families turned up on the doorstep, she hesitated to consider. And woe betide anyone who crossed her. She was just as fearsome as her mother. Maybe, more so. What she had been able to do after her mother’s wards had been removed had made Ellie fearful that they would never leave.
No matter. She had let them leave.
It was a different world. They didn’t have to worry about it. They would seal the door at the other side, if they ever found it, and make sure no one ever came to the Overland again. The Overlord had to be happy with that.
###
“I’m bored,” Rag said, which came out as, “Mmbrph.”
No one even looked at him. He pushed away from the branches of the tree and tested the stability of his head by moving it a little to each side and back and forth. Even minuscule movements were inadvisable. He tried a couple of steps keeping dead solid. The reverberation from foot through body felt … it was indescribably, painfully odd. But bearable. He slowly turned around to face the monstrosity. If he moved between the branches, he would be able to get out of the sun. He was getting really worried about his lack of tablet consumption, and blood consumption. He had no true concept of how long it had been. If he started to fizz and pop, who was going to notice?
He only had to duck once to get beneath it, but in the process of that once, he nearly knocked his head completely off. He did scream. “Blaaagh!” They did come running. They did lift him up and drag him further under and they did all get pulled up in one giant whoosh through the hollowed out centre of the trunk.
It was li
ke one of those money tubes with the suction.
His head was definitely going to come off this time. It seemed to be going faster than the rest of him.
G-force, was the first, not entirely random thing that came into his barely connected brain. I’m a bloody astronaut, was the second. I hope the landing is soft, was the third.
###
Flynn reached out, trying to work out the whys and wherefores of their situation. She could feel the magic that was transporting them. It didn’t seem to have anything to do with the tree, although growing upside down didn’t seem like something that could happen without magic. The magic wasn’t coming from below. It was coming from above. It was coming from the Overland, not the Underland, from their own world. How could that be? That would mean that someone on the other side was controlling it. Could it be true that there were lots more creatures from the Underland in their world? That didn’t bode well.
“And where—”
She landed with a thud on her backside, which made no sense at all. Bones landed beside her. Rag on top of them. Ellie a little way off.
Rag filled the air with unrecognisable cursing. She assumed it was cursing. It would’ve been if she were in his situation. His head was still on, thankfully.
“Where are we?” Bones said, rubbing at his back.
“You don’t recognise it?” Ellie said.
“Ah, yes.”
Midbury. The portal from the Underland had brought them right back to the car park by the stone circle.
Just great.
###
“You stupid, stupid creatures. You let Malice live? Down there? If I had a pound for every time someone had told me they wouldn’t get out of the Underland again, I’d be a millionaire. There isn’t only one way in, or out of the Underland. You know that already. You cannot seal that hideous land off and forget about it, or we’d already have done that. You know that just imagining an exit can create one for those who live there? Did they tell you that? But they’ll send you in rings around the place to find it. You are the worst kind of fools. You could’ve taken her while she was weak. Now, she has all the power of her people. She will suck the life out of them until there is no resistance. If she comes back again, I swear …”
They’d had no choice but to take those few steps to the Overlord’s lair. She would’ve known they were there, no doubt. Her face was crumpled rage. There ought to be something to say back to her, to plead their case, but there wasn’t.
Ellie looked at Bones. Bones looked at Flynn. Flynn looked at Rag. And Rag looked back at the Overlord, slightly askew.
Dear Reader
Thank you so much for reading this book. I hope you enjoyed it. I certainly enjoyed writing it.
I know your time is valuable, but if you have a spare moment, I’d really appreciate it if you could write an honest review on the website where you purchased it, so that other readers can get a better idea of whether it is the right book for them.
Happy reading. Hope to see you again soon.
Juliet Boyd
About the Author
I’m a British author and I live in the county of Somerset, which is in the south-west of England.
My main writing interests are fantasy, science fiction, weird fiction and horror, with a little humour thrown in for good measure.
You can find me online at:
Website
www.julietboyd.com
Instagram
www.instagram.com/julietboydauthor/
Facebook
www.facebook.com/JulietBoyd.Writer
Pinterest
uk.pinterest.com/julietboyd/
Some of my other works are listed below.
The Midgard Born Series
Beyond the Third End
In Search of Hidden Gods
The Threshold of Truth
Ruled by Choices (Summer 2017)
Glamoured
The Survival Project Duology
Rifter
Traitor
In a Realm of Memories
The Rag & Bones Vampire Series
Trapped
Concealed
Secrets
Kindred
Death
Allies
Conflict
Chaos
The Hunter Vampire Chronicles
Metally Fatigued
Flash-Fiction Collections
Random
Random Two
Random Three
A First Year of Random
Crescendo
Grandma’s Eyes
The Perfect Colour
Acknowledgements
A big thanks to Katerina Sanders for, inadvertently, giving me the idea for this story, just going to prove that you never know where inspiration might come from.
Thank you also to Unsplash on Pixabay for the cat image used on the cover, and to algotruneman for the Arms Akimbo Male silhouette and dear_theophilus for the Xolo silhouette, from openclipart.org. Thanks also go to Sinister Fonts on 1001fonts.com for the Gypsy Curse Font.
