Henry had never used a Halek knife before, but Pyrgus had told him all about them. They were specially made, in limited editions, by Haleklind wizards who guaranteed them to kill anything, anything at all. You stabbed with the knife and if the blade didn’t shatter, the energies flowed into whatever it was you’d stabbed, killing it instantly. You couldn’t graze with a Halek knife, couldn’t wound. You could only kill. Anything.
You could kill a dragon!
Henry swooped on the Halek knife as the monster thundered towards him. There was only one problem with these knives: if the blade shattered, the energies poured back into the person using it, killing him. Pyrgus talked about that all the time. But Henry didn’t care. The knife could kill the dragon. He could kill the dragon and save Blue.
Instead of running or dodging, Henry stood his ground.
The dragon was almost on top of him.
Ninety-Four
‘Henry!’ Blue screamed. He was standing like an idiot with that stupid Halek knife glinting in his hand. The dragon was almost on top of him and he was just standing there, waiting.
Blue realised abruptly what was happening. Henry thought the Halek knife could kill the dragon. Pyrgus was always going on about Halek knives and how amazing they were – he had a real thing about them. For certain he’d talked to Henry about them at some time and now Henry had one in his hand. He couldn’t know the knife was worthless against this creature. He hadn’t been there when she’d tried to use it herself.
A horrible suspicion occurred to her. The dragon’s scales were as hard as flint. She’d been lucky when she’d tried to use the knife on it before, while it was an unar-moured serpent: the blade hadn’t shattered then. But that sort of luck never held and if the knife shattered now, Henry was dead for sure. Her mind laid out a picture of the dragon feeding from his body.
‘Henry!’ Blue screamed again. She jerked against her chains with manic violence and the fittings suddenly gave way.
Blue found herself off balance, teetering on the edge of the platform, staring down at the lava river below. The chains ran through the loops of her manacles with a high metallic sound; then she was free, still fighting for her balance, still staring down into the lava. Her arms flailed in a desperate attempt to save herself; then she knew it was too late, knew she must fall.
Blue bent her knees and pushed off with all her strength from the very edge of the platform. Her leap carried her across the lava river, if only just, and she landed in a squatting position on the far side. Her whole body jarred and she thought she might have twisted her ankle, but there was no time to worry about that now. Ahead of her, the dragon was almost on top of Henry, who was standing, feet firmly planted, facing the beast like a warrior king.
‘Henry!’ Blue shouted a third time and sprinted towards him.
Ninety-Five
From behind, Henry thought he heard someone call his name, but there was no time to look round, no time for anything except the monster thundering towards him. He raised the Halek knife.
The real trick would be to get out of the way when the dragon fell. The weight of the beast could crush him like a gnat if it came down on top of him. From everything Pyrgus said about Halek knives, death would be instantaneous, but the dragon’s momentum would carry it forward. So Henry couldn’t be in front of it when death occurred. He needed to step aside, needed to stab and kill and let the dying body thunder past. Then he needed to jump back so the reptile corpse didn’t roll on top of him.
A movement at the corner of his eye distracted him momentarily. He risked a glance and discovered that, incredibly, the charno was plodding resignedly across the cavern floor. It was the strangest beast he’d ever known. What did it think it was doing. But no time for that now. The dragon, still charging, had lowered its head and Henry suddenly realised the massive flaw in his plan. If the monster breathed fire now, he would be a charred potato chip in seconds. No weapon, not even the mighty Halek knife, could save him.
But the dragon didn’t breathe fire. Instead the massive jaws opened to engulf him. Henry stared directly into the creature’s mouth, ringed with huge serrated teeth, a tiny flame flickering perpetually at the back of its throat. He waited until he could smell the stench of methane breath, until the floor beneath his feet was shaking from the onrush of the charging beast, then stepped gracefully to one side and raised the Halek knife.
‘Henry!’ Blue was at his side, gripping his wrist, jerking his arm, knocking him off balance so that his knife thrust missed the dragon completely and he fell – they both fell – in a heap as the creature rushed past.
‘What are you doing?’ Henry demanded as he fought to extricate himself from her grasp.
‘Halek won’t work,’ Blue gasped as they were climbing to their feet.
‘Hammer’s the only thing will work,’ the charno said and dropped the huge war hammer at their feet.
‘I can’t lift the bloody hammer!’ Henry screamed at it.
There was a roar that shook his bones, a horrid scrambling of talons on stone. He swung round to find the dragon had turned, ready for another charge.
‘The Halek knife’s no good against it!’ Blue shouted in his ear.
They were together now. At least they would die together. Along with the charno, probably. From somewhere to his left he caught a flash of blue. Lorquin was trying to join in the action. Lorquin would die too. All of them, all dead.
The dragon pawed the floor like a bull.
‘Why don’t you use the hammer?’ Henry yelled at the charno. The charno had carried the weapon here and seemed able to wave it around like a feather.
‘Don’t be stupid,’ said the charno.
This was such a mess! Such a God-awful, lethal, Henry style of mess, like his whole miserable life. Mother and father in the process of divorce… no idea where he was going or what he should be doing… the girl he loved about to die because he couldn’t save her…
‘I can’t even lift the hammer,’ Henry said to Blue plaintively.
‘I know,’ Blue said, ‘I couldn’t lift it either.’
The dragon charged.
Blue said, ‘Maybe we could lift it together.’
Lorquin ran at the dragon from the side, wielding exactly the same sort of crude flint blade as the one Henry had already broken.
Blue and Henry swooped on the war hammer lying on the floor. Their hands reached out together, gripped the shaft together. They lifted the war hammer easily, swung it above their heads. Lorquin jumped astride the dragon’s tail and stabbed down with his blade, which shattered against the armoured scales exactly as Henry’s had done. The dragon didn’t even seem to notice. It was only yards away now. Its head darted forward, neck stretched. Its mouth gaped like a fiery cavern. Blue and Henry swung the hammer.
The weapon connected with the dragon’s snout and exploded in a shower of sparks. There was the most curious ripping sound Henry had ever heard. The platform and the lava stream both vanished. Light poured through an archway into the cavern. The dragon transformed for an instant into a gigantic serpent that seemed miraculously to fill the world, then disappeared. Lorquin, who’d been riding on the tail, fell to the ground, but bounded up at once, grinning broadly.
‘You did it, En Ri!’ he called excitedly. ‘You slew the dragon!’
‘I think we sent it home,’ said Blue.
Ninety-Six
Henry couldn’t keep his hands off her. He hugged her, kissed her cheek, kissed her nose, hugged her again. He slipped off his jacket and wrapped it round her to cover up the torn blouse. Then his emotions overcame him and he hugged her a third time. Blue didn’t seem to mind. ‘Nice to see you too,’ she murmured with a little smile.
Henry did an odd thing. With his arm around her waist, he led her over to the small blue boy and made a formal introduction: ‘Lorquin, this is Prin- this is Queen Blue of the Faerie Realm. Blue, this is Lorquin.’ He hesitated for a heartbeat before adding, ‘My Companion.’
The b
oy looked pleased, and bowed. Sensing something important was going on here, Blue bowed back.
Henry glanced towards the platform and the pillar. ‘How did it happen? The dragon and everything?’
‘Long story,’ Blue said, ‘I was looking for you.’
‘I was looking for you!’ Henry grinned happily. He felt like an idiot, but a happy idiot. It was a long time since he’d felt so happy. He hugged her again.
Blue said, ‘You’ll squish me, Henry.’ But she was smiling and it didn’t seem like an invitation to stop, so Henry kissed her. She closed her eyes and kissed him back.
‘We faced a dragon!’ he murmured when they stopped.
Blue’s smile broadened.
‘We all need to go home,’ the charno said. It gave a long, slow blink of its huge brown eyes and added, ‘If you two have finished smooching.’
‘Can you find our way out?’ Henry asked Lorquin.
‘He may not have to,’ Blue said, glancing towards the archway. ‘That looks like sunlight.’
‘Oh, yes,’ said Henry, wondering vaguely why he hadn’t thought of that. He felt high, as if his feet were floating inches off the ground. He slid his arm from around her waist and ran across the cavern to find out the source of the light. He stepped through the archway and stopped. He backed away a pace and stopped. His jaw dropped.
‘Good God!’ Henry whispered.
Blue joined him within seconds, then Lorquin. All three stood in the archway staring into the light.
After a long moment, Blue said hoarsely, ‘What is it, Henry?’
‘It’s an angel,’ Henry said.
Ninety-Seven
Henry felt like an iron filing in the presence of a magnet. He was frightened, but he took a small step forward. The others must have felt the same, for they moved blankly alongside him. The creature in the cage was like nothing he’d ever seen before. It had the shape of a man, but far taller – nearly eight feet – so that it stooped to fit into the cage. It was muscled like a human torso, but there any resemblance ended.
The angel shone. Every square inch of its skin fluoresced the way things did under ultraviolet light. But beyond that, it glowed like some gigantic lamp, emitting a dense white light that hurt the eyes if you looked at it too long. But even that was not the strangest thing. The strangest thing was its wings.
Henry had seen angel wings before, lots of them. His books were full of them when he studied History of Art and he’d even seen them carved in marble that time his mother dragged the family on a cultural tour of Britain’s cathedrals. But those wings were nothing like these. The artists and sculptors had all visualised great white feathered birdy things, as if angels had the shoulder muscles to fly like an eagle. The wings Henry was looking at now were nothing like that. They weren’t feathered and they weren’t even white. In fact, in a peculiar way, they didn’t seem to be there at all.
Henry blinked. The angel’s wings stretched out behind him in shimmering fans of radiant energy that sparkled violet and writhed like the aurora borealis. They were probably the most beautiful things he had ever seen in his life. He’d never been a particularly religious boy, but there was something about those wings that made him want to fall down on his knees and worship.
Blue took another step forward with Lorquin at her side and Henry’s urge to worship suddenly evaporated. ‘Careful!’ he hissed in the sort of whisper you always felt you had to use inside a church. Then, when they took no notice, he said sharply and more loudly, ‘Don’t get too close!’ His stomach had knotted. For some reason he was convinced the angel was every bit as dangerous as the dragon.
Blue ignored him as usual. She had a curiously vacant smile on her face and her eyes were wide. Lorquin looked even more peculiar. His face was ecstatic, but his eyes were utterly blank. Together they took another step forward so that now they were no more than a few feet from the cage.
The angel moved its position and the sweep of energy from those weird wings flowed outward to envelop Blue and Lorquin.
‘Blue!’ Henry shouted in sudden alarm.
Blue changed. Henry watched it happen. In an eye blink she was a mature woman, her hair streaked with grey, the first clear signs of furrows on her brow. Then just as suddenly she was old – not old the way Pyrgus was old when Henry saw him on Mr Fogarty’s lawn, but really old, like Mr Fogarty himself or Madame Cardui. She still stood upright and there was the familiar hint of arrogance in the tilt of her head, but otherwise she was hardly recognisable.
‘Blue!’ Henry screamed again.
The change in Lorquin was, if anything, even more spectacular. He looked across at Henry and gave his bright, familiar smile. But it was a smile on the face of a man now, handsome, tall and broad and proud. It was the smile of a hero who had fought hard and seen much.
Then the wings swept back and folded and suddenly Blue was Blue again and Lorquin was a boy.
Henry heard his own voice shout, ‘Don’t go near the cage!’
Blue said quietly, ‘We must release him – he’s in pain.’
Of course the angel was in pain. He’d been confined in this cage – in this reality – unable to stand upright for weeks. But worse was the magic Brimstone had used to confine him: it burned the angel’s body like hot irons. Henry knew all this, but he didn’t know how he knew.
The angel turned its head and looked deep into his eyes.
‘We must release him,’ Blue said again.
The angel was talking to Henry, but talking without words. It was the strangest sensation, intimate and warm, like being with somebody and discovering you were in love. No wonder these creatures had been worshipped. Knowledge flowed from the angel’s mind into Henry’s own. No wonder they had been called Messengers.
Blue made to move forward again, but this time Henry was too quick for her. He darted forward and grabbed her arm, if you go any closer, it will kill you,’ he said soberly.
Blue looked at him blankly, then looked at the angel. ‘He wouldn’t harm me,’ she said, a little dreamily.
‘He doesn’t want to,’ Henry told her. ‘But he shouldn’t be in this reality. He distorts it, changes the flow of time. It’s worse when he moves those wings – they send currents out across the whole Realm – but if you get too close, it doesn’t matter whether he’s moving or not. Just being near him will kill you.’
The dreamy look vanished from Blue’s face. ‘How are we going to free him?’ she asked.
‘We’re not going to free him,’ Henry said. ‘I am.’
Blue caught on at once, ‘It won’t affect you because you’re from the Analogue World? This isn’t your reality, so you can get close to him without it killing you?’
Henry took a deep breath, ‘I think so.’ He hoped to heaven Blue would leave it at that, not ask any more questions.
‘Are you sure?’ Blue asked.
Henry let go of her arm. ‘Only one way to find out,’ he said. And walked towards the cage.
Ninety-Eight
Chief Wizard Healer Danaus frowned. He was looking down on the frozen body of the Forest Princess Nymphalis, locked in stasis beside the body of her husband, Prince Pyrgus. Both showed the age ravages of temporal fever, Pyrgus more than Nymph so far – since stasis ceased to hold the fever, he had turned into an old, old man – but Nymph certainly. From a young woman she had transformed into a mature woman, a middle-aged woman really, and he had been vaguely considering increasing the intensity of the stasis field. Not that he believed it would do any good – you were either in stasis or you weren’t – but he disliked the feeling of helplessness that came when there was absolutely nothing one could do. Thus he stood staring at Nymphalis and… and she looked a little younger.
Which was impossible, of course. The temporal fever was a one-way trip. Even when stasis still stabilised it, nothing reversed the effect. So possibly he was imagining it. Wishful thinking sometimes had an influence on observation, even trained observation. All the same, he couldn’t rid himself of the fe
eling she seemed younger. Her skin tone looked better. He could have sworn there were fewer, if only just a little fewer, wrinkles.
On impulse, Danaus stepped across to the stasis cabinet that held Pyrgus. The shock was so great that he actually gasped aloud. Pyrgus too looked younger, a lot younger. There was no possibility of a mistake. The effects of the fever were reversing.
For once Danaus forgot his dignity and ran down to the wards. But even before he reached them, the commotion told him something dramatic was happening. As he burst into the corridor nurses were scampering in all directions, healers were hurrying to and fro, but most astonishing, most amazing, most bewildering of all was the fact that patients were on their feet as well, patients who just that morning on his rounds had been lying in deep comas.
Danaus grabbed the arm of a blue-coated healer as he hurried past. ‘What’s going on?’ he demanded.
‘Spontaneous remissions,’ the healer told him shortly.
It was the sort of stupid thing they’d all been trained to say when they had no idea what was actually happening, ‘I can see that,’ Danaus snapped. ‘What’s caused them?’
The healer shook his head. ‘Don’t know, sir.’ Then, annoyingly, he smiled. ‘But it’s great news, is it not, sir?’
Great news but bewildering. By the time Danaus had made a few cursory examinations to convince himself the effect was genuine, reports were pouring in from outside of "spontaneous remissions" throughout the capital city. He had not the slightest doubt that similar news from the surrounding country would be arriving soon.
With so many patients suddenly recovering, the administration burden was heavy and it was late afternoon before he suddenly remembered Nymph and Pyrgus were still in stasis. And hot on the heels of that realisation came another: Madame Cardui was in stasis too. He’d had her placed there as a matter of course for a woman her age even though all the evidence was it would no longer hold back her disease. What else could he do? Stasis might have staved off her inevitable death for a few more hours. Or she might be dead already.
Faerie Lord fw-4 Page 30
