Venom and Song

by Wayne Thomas Batson

  He didn’t answer, but Tommy did. “It’s Bear! It’s Bear! Look!”

  “Wha—really? I don’t see him,” said Jett.

  “He just ran behind those trees—no, wait!”

  Then, though not as clearly as Tommy, they all saw Bear. He was running circles around a patch of black trees. But Tommy saw something the rest could not. “The trees have eyes!” he yelled. “They’re Cragons!”

  Bear howled again and ran south across the battlefield. The lords watched as the Cragons suddenly fell over in a heap.

  “Did Bear do that?” asked Jett.

  “I don’t think . . . I don’t really know,” said Tommy.

  “I never cared too much for that grand big wolf,” said Jimmy. “But if he can take down Cragons five at a time—”

  “The Gnomes are helping with the Warspiders,” said Johnny. “And Bear comes back to do a number on some Cragons . . . it’s almost too good to be true.”

  Autumn shook her head. “Guardmaster Grimwarden, sir, have you ever seen anything like it?”

  “Ellos answer prayers?” he clarified. “Yes, I have seen him answer prayers . . . many times, and often in the strangest ways . . . ways both unlooked for and impossible to predict. But, no, I have never seen anything like this before. The Elves and Gnomes have not fought side by side in thousands of years . . . since the First Days, when Allyra was young, and the First Lords claimed their birthright.”

  “Passed much time has,” said a high voice behind them. “Generations of time, in my reckoning, misused by both races, it has.” And slowly Migmar melted into existence beside Grimwarden. He bowed to the Guardmaster and dropped a quick knee in the direction of the lords. “If not for wayward rascals”—he thumbed toward the lords— “separation, much longer, I presume.”

  Migmar turned to Tommy. “Survived you the Terradym Fortress. Very good. When all is done, you tell Migmar all your stories.” The Gnome sovereign took out a sprig of dragonroot, chomped off a bite, and passed gas like a bass saxophone.

  A look ricocheted between the lords. “Uh, Grimwarden,” said Tommy. “Meet Migmar, Barrister King of the Gnomes.”

  Migmar nodded to Grimwarden. “Pleased am I to meet you at last.”

  Grimwarden crossed his wrists and bowed. “Sovereign of Gnomes, you and your people are a blessing beyond estimation.”

  Tommy looked closely, saw tears in the Guardmaster’s eyes. Wow, he thought. He’s getting emotional.

  Kat’s thought popped into his mind. “I don’t think that’s why his eyes are watering.”

  “Be a bigger blessing yet, Guardmaster,” said Migmar. “My army, two-thousand strong, you command,” he said. “You see only some advantages, we have. Devices, we have. Observe perhaps the Keeper and the Cragons?”

  “Keeper?” echoed Tommy. “You mean Bear? The big wolf? Migmar, you brought him here?”

  “Taught him new tricks, we Gnomes have, ha!” Migmar chomped another bite of Dragon root. “Made him friendly, you did.”

  “Migmar,” said Tommy. “What else can your soldiers do?”

  “Scale walls and diminish defenses, if you wish. Harder there, Gwar have keen sight. See us plainly, they can’t, but see our movements, they do. The Drefids, chief trouble for us. Their black eyes see everything, even shadow world.”

  “We will need your aid behind the walls,” said Grimwarden. “But not yet. We wait for more aid . . . a map from our kinsmen venturing far from here. From this map we will know the fortress’s weakest points. From it we will learn how to enter with least resistance. We seek to free the slaves in the bowels of Vesper Crag . . . and empty its throne of the Spider King once and for all.”

  “Little we know of Spider King. If foolish, you say, to infiltrate fortress without more guidance, we wait. Then what for Migmar and his Gnomes?”

  “Your army has rescued our forces fighting at the wall,” said Grimwarden. “You have slowed the mass of Warspiders and kept them from assailing our siege force from behind. If I may command that which is yours by right, then I ask that you continue to protect our flank from the Warspiders, Cragons, . . . and whatever else may come.”

  “As you ask.” Migmar bowed, and as he did so there came a sound like the quack of a duck.

  Jimmy started to laugh, turned away, and quickly walked in the other direction. Kat held her breath.

  “Before Migmar returns to front lines with my people, something I must know,” said Migmar, and even as he spoke, his boots and legs blurred, melding with the grassy hill and stone beneath. “Master Grimwarden, by your side, fight, we will. Your enemy, our enemy. But mark time, we cannot, with lives of our soldiers . . . nor, reckoning, can you. Laid siege, you have, upon the Spider King, have you not? Conquer, you intend to. Do not your kindred return with map? What then?”

  “By Ellos’s hand, we will conquer,” said Grimwarden. “With or without the map. When the time comes, I will release the doom of the Spider King, his curse. I will unleash the Seven Lords of Berinfell, the finders of the Keystone and bearers of the Rainsong, to do what they may.”

  Migmar looked quizzically at the six lords gathered there, seemingly weighing them with his eyes. Tommy wondered what he was thinking. Did Migmar see the awkward teen warriors who were so easily drugged and captured by the Gnomes? Or did he see the true Lords of Berinfell who passed all the trials and tests of the Terradym fortress? Tommy almost asked Kat to relay the Gnome’s thoughts. But then, Tommy thought, I might not want to know.

  Migmar bowed. “As you say, Master Grimwarden.” By now, he was just a face and a head sitting atop a wavering mirage of a body. Seconds later, Migmar had vanished altogether. “Go now Migmar,” came his disembodied voice, “and spiders cut to pieces! Oh! But hate, I do, smell when abdomens burst!”

  “It can’t be much worse—,” Johnny started to say, but in a flash Autumn covered his mouth with her hand.

  “Migmar?” Tommy called. “Migmar?” But the Gnome was gone.

  “Those little people are certainly a force to be reckoned with,” said Jett. “Lights out.”

  “Actually,” the Guardmaster replied wryly. “Actually, I was thinking of those who face just Migmar. Bah, it is good to breathe clean air again.”

  Kat, Jett, Johnny, and Autumn laughed . . . but not Tommy. He shared Migmar’s concerns: Do not your kindred return with map? What then?

  Jimmy hadn’t laughed, either. How long had it been since Kiri Lee fell behind enemy lines? Is she okay? Of all the futures he wished he could see, it was hers. But he could not; his powers were not maturing as fast as the other lords’. So Jimmy decided to try something else. Dear Ellos . . .

  35

  Ashfall

  A HARSH red light shone forth from the highest tower of Vesper Crag, and a dark figure stood out upon its balcony. All the lords and Grimwarden could see was that the figure raised his arms high, parting the blazing red light, creating shadowy phantoms in its otherwise unbroken streams.

  But Tommy could see farther. Once more his vision crossed the vast battlefield, passed over the hissing mad Warspiders and the Gnomes who harassed them. Above the heads of the Elven flet soldiers and their catapults and siege engines. Up and over the main walls of Vesper Crag and the Gwar defending it. Climbing the high passes and twisting trails up the jagged mountain to the high tower itself. And there, Tommy beheld him.

  Tall and broad, muscular but less pure bulk than the average Gwar, the Spider King lowered his arms and smiled. The canine teeth of his lower jaw were stark white and protruded in a hideous grin. But it was the Spider King’s eyes that chilled the marrow in Tommy’s bones.

  Tommy had come face-to-face with many Gwar. He’d looked into their eyes and held his ground. But these eyes, these terrible eyes, were different. The shape was half-moon, but they had an odd slant, a kind of unnerving clever tilt. The vertical sickle-shaped pupils looked like smears of blood on his black irises . . . reminding Tommy of the hourglass of the black widow. And somehow, though perfectly impossi
ble from that great distance, Tommy felt like the Spider King was looking directly at him.

  Tommy shivered. Then he ducked.

  An explosion rocked Vesper Crag. For a moment, all fighting stopped. A mile north of the battlefield, a bloody red crack in the ground vomited fiery destruction into the sky. Blast after blast shook the ground. Bright yellow and orange flames shot upward and, in slow motion, arced toward the battlefield. The first flaming chunks of debris knocked the Elves, Gwar, Drefids, and Warpiders out of their trances. One blazing piece slammed into the forward wall of Vesper Crag, exploding into dozens of smaller hunks. The wall sustained no damage, but Elves below could not move fast enough. Crushed, crippled, or burned, hundreds fell.

  “Did you see that?” Jett exclaimed.

  “What are those walls made of?” asked Johnny.

  “Oh no,” said Autumn. “Travin . . . no.”

  “Grimwarden! Sir!” yelled Jimmy urgently. He yanked at his commander’s elbow. “Sir, we’ve got to do something. The Gnomes, the ashfall, Travin, and his men . . . I’ve seen it . . . they have to—”

  “Have to what?” Grimwarden said sadly. “Leave the field of battle? We cannot. Travin will not. He will position his troops as best he can to keep them safe, but he must maintain pressure on the enemy. All our plans depend on it, and maybe Kiri Lee’s life depends on it.”

  More thunderous explosions. A great cloud, shot through with bursts of fire, rose up from the now-gaping fiery mouth of the volcano. As the cloud ascended, it was absorbed into the stormy mantle that already hung there.

  “But, Grimwarden, sir!” Jimmy persisted. “We’ve at least got to warn the Gnomes!”

  “Warn them of what?” he asked. “They know about the volcano by now.”

  “Listen to him,” Goldarrow whispered to her commander, but not loud enough that anyone else might hear.

  “No, not that,” said Jimmy. “I mean, it is that, but . . . well, just listen.”

  Jimmy explained what he’d seen in his vision. The other lords gasped. Grimwarden looked up at the volcanic cloud spreading above them. Jagged roots of lightning crawled across the sky.

  “We’ve got to do something!” Kat cried out. “They’ll be slaughtered.”

  “I’ll go,” said Autumn. “I’m the only one who can. I’ll warn them. I’ll get in and out in a minute.”

  “How will you warn them?” asked Goldarrow. “You cannot see them.”

  That silenced all discussion for a moment, but then Grimwarden said, “Our own soldiers knew what they were getting into. But the Gnomes came blindly to take up our cause. My heart is torn, Autumn. If you should not return—”

  “I will,” she argued. “I’m not the reckless little kid who got skewered in Scotland. I have twice the speed now. I have my axes. And I have Ellos!”

  That was when Grimwarden did something no one expected. He leaned over and kissed Autumn on the top of her head. “Go,” he said, “with my blessing.”

  “No!” Johnny protested. “Let me go with her! I—”

  “You could never keep up,” Grimwarden replied.

  “But I can use my fire to—”

  “Yes, you will use your fire, but not for this. To do so now would announce ‘Here we are!’ to the Spider King and every enemy on the battlefield.”

  They fell silent. Autumn drew her axes. She was a momentary blur, and she was gone.

  Johnny felt as if his heart had torn free of his chest and gone with her.

  As fast as the landscape went by Autumn, she saw it all, every detail. It was not like watching a movie but like watching a slideshow. First just rocky terrain. Then carnage: wrecked catapults and siege towers, broken bodies, fallen warriors. Finally she flashed up behind the teeming Warspiders, still locked in a struggle against thousands of foes they could not see.

  Goldarrow’s words came back to her. How will you warn them? You cannot see them. She had no plan, but she acted. Her eyes darting, scrutinizing the slides of vision, and analyzing every possible threat. She sprinted around the Warspiders, between them, even over them. Her movements were not smooth, not graceful, but they were fast. And while she ran she yelled out her warning to the Gnomes.

  Finding a clear patch of ground, Autumn stopped to breathe. Seconds later, the Warspiders found her. From all directions they came, but the moment they were upon their prey, their prey was gone. Not knowing if the Gnomes had heard her above the din of battle, Autumn continued yelling her warning.

  Barely a minute gone, she’d made a lightning-quick circuit of the undulating mass of spiders. Halfway through her second revolution, she tripped. Even as she tumbled beneath a huge Warspider, she could not imagine what she’d tripped over. She hadn’t seen anything.

  A Gnome.

  The Warspider backed up. Its massive fangs hung in the air above her. But Autumn yelled out, “Gnome, are you okay?!”

  “No thanks to you!” came a disgruntled voice from nowhere. “You Elfkind? Ah, a second, please.”

  Autumn didn’t have a second. The spider was upon her, the fangs crashing down.

  And then there were no fangs. The Warspider shrieked, its fangs sheered off to bleeding stumps, and reared back to crush Autumn. But Autumn was not helpless. She sped out from beneath the spider. As it collapsed to the ground, Autumn’s axes moved with swift and terrible speed. When she finished, there wasn’t much left.

  “On your bad side, surely I will not get, Elf,” said the Gnome.

  Breathing heavily, Autumn stood over the dead creature, now a bloody pulp. She wiped her face. That’s when she felt it: a light sensation on her nose. Then on her cheek. She saw the flakes, falling like snow. “Gnome!” she yelled. “Tell your people my warning!”

  “What warning, Elf?”

  Autumn told him.

  “Oh, dear,” he replied, just as another Warspider advanced on their position.

  “I’ve got to run!” cried Autumn. “Warn your people!”

  “I will!” promised the Gnome.

  A second silence fell over the battlefield. This one not spurred on by the shocking explosion, but rather by an eerie muffling of all sound. The ash had begun to fall. Tommy held out his hand and watched the gray flakes collect on his palm.

  “Come on, Autumn,” muttered Johnny. “Get out of there.”

  “She’ll make it,” said Kat, patting him on the shoulder.

  “But what about Kiri Lee?” asked Jimmy.

  “The volcano likely has bought her time,” said Goldarrow.

  “If she lives,” said Jett. He still felt they should have gone in after her the moment she went down behind the wall. Forget the map. Forget the walls. Kiri Lee was one of their own.

  “You lords are made of tougher stuff than that,” said Grimwarden. “You may all meet your fate this day, but I very much doubt it will be from a fall. If anyone could survive plummeting from a height, it’s Kiri Lee.”

  “Yeah,” said Tommy, trying to sound cheerful. “I bet she floated down like a leaf.”

  “What was that?” asked Kat.

  “Volcano’s still rumbling,” muttered Jett.

  “No, I heard a kind of whistle,” she said. “A warbly kind of whistle.”

  Jett shrugged.

  The volcano continued to growl, though now its sound was dampened by the falling ash. Molten rock bubbled and gurgled, spilling over its edges and rolling across the ground in fiery globs. But more than the lava now, massive towering pillars of smoke and ash boiled into the sky. Whatever air current prevailed above, it seemed to be carrying all the ash over the battlefield. For now, it came down harder.

  The Elves watched from their promontory. But Tommy was the only one who could see what the ash was doing. Of course, Jimmy had seen it, too, just minutes before it happened. Falling like a heavy snowstorm, the ash coated the battlefield in a blanket of gray. Tommy watched the Warspiders, wondering if the Gnomes had gotten the warning.

  Clearly, some had not.

  The ash began to adhere to
the Gnomes revealing them, especially the ones out in the open or leaping from spider to spider. Before the Gnomes could drive the beasts mad, their hacking and stabbing coming from unseen hands. But now the battlefield was filled with little gray shadow-beings. Warspiders began to snap the Gnomes out of the air. Using their forelegs as spears, they skewered the miniature people as they fled. It soon became chaos. No longer invisible, the Gnomes raced in and out of spider legs beneath the creatures, seeking some path to safety. But, as far as Tommy could tell, very few were finding their way out of the death trap.

  “The Gnomes are getting killed out there!” Tommy exclaimed. “Autumn must not have warned them in time!”

  “I did so!” declared Autumn, appearing suddenly between Tommy and Grimwarden.

  “AUTUMN!” Johnny picked her up and hugged her.

  “Thanks, Johnny, but put me down.”

  Reluctantly, Johnny put her down. “Sorry. I’m just glad, that’s all.”

  “Autumn, I can see the Gnomes,” said Tommy. “Because of the ash. The Warspiders can see them now, too. The Gnomes are getting torn to shreds.”

  “Nooo,” said Autumn. “I warned them. I really did. I even got a chance to talk to one of them. I . . . warned them.”

  Tommy stared at his feet. Death, death, and more death—that’s all he’d seen since the battle began. And he had been able to do nothing to help. He was fed up with standing still. “Grimwarden, we’ve got to go help.”

  “We have helped,” he replied, staring into the strange ashen twilight. “Against my better judgment, we sent Autumn to warn them.”

  “But it didn’t help,” said Tommy, earning him a swift stinging glance from Autumn. “Migmar’s whole army could die. If we all go out there, we could save them.”

  “You would indeed save the Gnomes,” said Grimwarden, eyes fixed ahead. “And you would strike a blow against the Spider King by annihilating an immense portion of his Warspiders. But . . . you would cost us all the war.”

  “You’ve said things like that before,” said Jett. “I don’t see how smashing those spiders to smithereens causes us to lose anything.”