Snared: Voyage on the Eversteel Sea

by Adam Jay Epstein

  “This battle will be for the freedom of all Panthasos,” Odette said to Wily as she stood by his side. “And I’ve got to say, life was a lot easier when all I wanted to do was get away from this place rather than save it.” She paused for a moment and then continued: “But who ever said life should be easy?”

  Stalag, with his arms crossed, looked down at Wily and his friends. Then the mage began to speak. His words, enchanted by some deep magic, were magnified louder than thunder.

  “What a precious reunion,” Stalag said sarcastically. “Father and son, finally together.”

  “We have a common goal now,” Wily shouted up to him. “Defeating you.”

  “After what he did to you?” Stalag laughed. “If you only knew how he told me to treat you, you wouldn’t be so ready to forgive and forget.”

  “Don’t listen to him,” Kestrel said. “He’s a bitter and jealous old mage.”

  “I followed your whims,” Stalag said. “Or at least I made you think that I was.”

  Wily looked over at Kestrel, who was now avoiding eye contact with his son.

  “He said I should never show you kindness,” Stalag continued, “in order to make you weak in spirit. And to never let you eat too much because it would make you strong in body. He told me to lock you in a cage if you misbehaved or tried to escape. Even I couldn’t be so cruel.”

  “Lies,” Kestrel insisted.

  Wily wondered how much of what Stalag was saying was actually true. He suspected more than Kestrel would admit.

  “I don’t care if you believe me,” Stalag said. “I’ll kill you both just the same. I’ll kill you all.”

  “Don’t be so sure,” Wily said.

  “I may not have stone golems this time,” Stalag said, “but I have something far more potent. Machines and magic together.”

  “We’ve brought machines of our own,” Wily called back. He gave a signal, and Pryvyd and Righteous, together wearing the Master Suit, came marching toward the edge of the ship, the ubergearfolk following in line behind them.

  Stalag seemed unperturbed. “How fitting this will be, Kestrel,” he shouted. “Your old machines against your new ones. It is like a battle against yourself. I will enjoy watching from on high. Gearfolk! Stop that”—Stalag pointed to the amphibious sailing ship—“thing, whatever it is.”

  “It’s the Daring,” the Recluself called out. “That’s the name I have given it.”

  “When I take it from you, it will make a great addition to my army,” Stalag said as he rubbed his fingertips together.

  Dozens of snagglecarts came rolling down toward the amphibious ship. The first two dragon-shaped carts, with spears pointed forward and ready for battering, made contact with the front wheels of the Daring as it rolled ahead. The spears crackled with magic upon contact, but didn’t stop the Recluself’s ship. The force of the giant rolling vehicle crushed the snagglecarts, flattening them underfoot. Wily watched as the rust fairies fled the machines before they were flattened too. Four more snagglecarts struck the rolling boat immediately after, their spears getting imbedded in the wooden hull. Two of the enhanced snagglecarts were rolled over easily by the ship. The next two, however, got caught in the wheel wells, grinding the amphibious vehicle to a stop with an ear-piercing screech.

  “They didn’t break through the ship,” Wily said, concerned, “but they did manage to break it.”

  “Wily, Pryvyd,” Kestrel said. “We have only one chance at this. I know how the gearfolk were built. I know how to defeat them. Let me prove to you that I am not the man I used to be.”

  “Just tell me how it can be done,” Pryvyd said. “I will follow your suggestions.”

  “I know just where to hit them below the neck,” Kestrel said. “If you fail, we all fail.”

  Pryvyd was already shaking his head when Wily said, “Let him. I trust he will do the right thing.”

  Pryvyd relented. He slid off the armor and handed it to Kestrel. Righteous, however, was less keen to give in.

  “Take it off,” Pryvyd said.

  Righteous tried to fly away, but Pryvyd caught him and detached the plating from the hovering arm. Kestrel put the armor on and tested a swing of his sword. All the ubergearfolk followed suit.

  “Let’s hurry up!” Odette shouted.

  “Follow my lead,” Kestrel said to Lumina.

  “There’s no one who knows how to break what you build better than I,” Lumina said, as she pulled a scarf across her face. “I’ve had lots of practice.”

  Impish and Gremlin raised their paws as if to remind Lumina they were there too. Lumina looked over to her two furry sidekicks.

  “With your help, of course,” Lumina said to them. “I would have just been a rogue wearing scarves without my loyal ferret saboteurs.”

  This made the two ferrets smile broadly.

  Kestrel put the helmet of the Master Suit on his head and marched down the ramp as the army of eversteel gearfolk followed.

  Kestrel and Lumina rushed into battle with the gearfolk. Lumina darted through the opposing army, leaping onto the shoulders of one of Stalag’s magical mechanical minions. The gearfolk swung its enchanted ax at Wily’s mother, but she was able to spin out of the way of the sharpened blade. With a series of twists, she popped off the head of the mechanical man, sending the rust fairy flitting off in terror. Impish dove into a rolling machine and with her small hands broke it apart from the inside, causing its wheels to come rolling off and its arms to snap out of place. Gremlin had a more explosive tactic, twisting the inner workings of another and causing it to explode in fits of smoke and flying gears. Magical axes were of little use to the gearfolk when they were separated from their arms.

  Kestrel, meanwhile, led his army of ubergearfolk into battle with unwavering confidence. He seemed to delight in the combat, swinging his sword like the conductor of an oglodyte orchestra, every minion following commands as if their lives depended on it. Kestrel struck the old gearfolk in the armored gut, dispatching them with simple precision. Then, with a uniform kick, he knocked his former soldiers to the ground and marched over them. The rust fairies controlling Stalag’s gearfolk never even got to swing their weapons.

  “You should have stayed in your tomb,” Kestrel called up to Stalag. “You were never destined to rule the Above.”

  “You think that I was your pawn?” Stalag said. “No. You were always mine. I knew that if you were taken out of the picture, this land would be mine. Don’t think for a second that you were smarter than me.”

  “Look around you,” Kestrel snorted. “Who is wise and who is not?”

  Stalag clenched his brittle fists as he looked down upon his army being crushed underfoot.

  Kestrel and Lumina were joined on the battlefield by the goblin chefs, the Knights of the Golden Sun, and the giant slug, who all did their part to combat the gearfolk. Even the Skull of Many Riddles was trying to bite the rust fairies out of the gearfolk armor. Despite the danger and chaos, it was a beautiful sight. Wily’s friends from all through his life were joined together, working as one, as a team. They fought arm in arm even if they didn’t have arms.

  “How am I doing, Wily?” the giant slug said as she tossed a gearfolk across the battlefield.

  “I couldn’t have done it any better.”

  Roveeka and her fellow knife-tossing hobgoblets had seized control of a snagglecart and were driving it through the battlefield, catching gearfolk in its large metal mouth.

  “Over there,” commanded Roveeka, pointing to a group of metal men engaged with Spraved and the Knights of the Golden Sun.

  “You got it, Grand Slouch!” A palace hobgoblet turned the snagglecart toward the knights in danger as Roveeka hopped off the top of the steel machine and onto Moshul’s back.

  Wily glanced up to see the growing anger on Stalag’s face.

  “This isn’t over yet!” the cavern mage shouted as he raised his arms overhead and fired off bolts of energy at Kestrel’s eversteel soldiers. The electrica
l jolts just bounced off harmlessly. Enraged, Stalag tossed a scorpion from the balcony, which grew in size as it flew through the air. By the time it hit the ground, it was as large as a crab dragon.

  “We need to get to Stalag,” Wily said. “We can’t let him escape again. Once he realizes his magic won’t win the day, he’s going to take off on his giant cricket.”

  “But how do we get up to the balcony before he disappears inside the castle?” Odette asked. “Are you going to build another flying machine?”

  “There’s no time for that.”

  Wily thought back to just over a week before, when he was standing up on that balcony rather than looking at it from the ground. So much had changed since he had fallen into Moshul’s waiting arms. If only he could go back to that moment—

  “I can’t get up there,” Wily said suddenly to Odette, “but you can.”

  “Moshul,” Wily turned to the moss golem, “you were able to catch us when we fell off the balcony. Now I need you to throw Odette back up onto it. With her gymnastic skills, she should be able to stick the landing without getting hurt.”

  Both Moshul and Odette were considering.

  “If he threw me high enough, far enough, and with proper aim, then yes,” Odette said. “But otherwise…”

  Moshul began signing. I feel a whole lot better about catching people than throwing them.

  “You’ve got the best knife tosser sitting on your shoulder,” Wily said. “She can teach you how to throw. But you don’t have a lot of time for practice.”

  The giant scorpion was attempting to crush the eversteel soldiers in its pincers, but Kestrel’s army’s armor was too powerful. They fearlessly marched forward as the stinger tried to stab them. There was no need for them to dodge or have quick reflexes; they were impenetrable.

  It was practice time for Moshul. The moss golem picked up a fallen gearfolk and tossed it underhand toward the balcony. The suit of armor flew upward, looking, at first, like it was heading in the proper direction before missing the balcony and smacking against the wall. It dropped down, hitting the rocks at the edge of the moat with a sickening thud.

  “Maybe this isn’t such a good idea after all,” Odette said.

  “You can’t throw it underhand,” Roveeka said. “You won’t get enough control. Try overhand instead.”

  The mud golem nodded.

  “You’ll get it this time,” the hobgoblet encouraged him.

  He picked up the next gearfolk and this time threw overhand. The suit of armor smashed hard into a high portion of the wall before crashing below.

  “Huh,” Roveeka said. “That technique always works for me when I’m throwing knives.”

  “She’s not a knife,” Pryvyd shouted as he realized what was about to happen. “Wily, we’ve got to try something else. I’m not letting her get hurt. Send me instead.”

  Odette pushed Pryvyd out of the way, grabbing a sword from the ground. “No way. This is my turn to be the big hero. I know that. Throw me, Moshul!”

  Moshul picked Odette up and launched her into the sky. Wily wasn’t sure if it was Moshul’s aim or the way in which Odette positioned her body, but the elf soared like an arrow (or perhaps like a well-balanced knife) straight for the balcony. Wily watched as Odette caught the edge of the stone railing and vaulted herself up onto the balcony. Even from this distance, Wily could tell that Stalag was so startled to see her that he nearly stumbled off the side. She pointed her sword at the frail wizard’s chest.

  Stalag raised his hand and shouted down below. “Rust fairies, put down your weapons. I surrender!”

  The rust fairies zipped out of the suits of armor and fled into the sky. All the gearfolk fell to the ground limp and lifeless. The goblin chefs cheered as the Knights of the Golden Sun raised their arms in celebration.

  “The king shall take his seat on the throne again,” Pryvyd cried.

  “Yes, I will,” Kestrel said. Then he spun around and smashed Pryvyd over the head with the blunt end of his sword.

  20

  THE BATTLE OF KINGS

  Pryvyd dropped to his knees. Righteous zipped to his aid, but another quick blow from Kestrel’s sword knocked the hovering arm into the metal cage of an open snagglecart.

  Kestrel turned to face Wily. As he did, all the other metal soldiers did the same.

  “So all this was so you could take the throne again?” Wily asked. He was seething. All his worst fears about his father had been justified.

  “Don’t think about it like that,” Kestrel said. “We both wanted the same thing: for Stalag to be removed from the palace.”

  “Not like this,” Wily said.

  “I asked you once to join me,” his father said. “I will offer it again. We could rule Panthasos together, in a fair and just way. There is nothing wrong with order.”

  “Order at the expense of freedom is enslavement,” Wily said. “The Infernal King will never take the throne again. I would never be a part of that.”

  “Unfortunately for you,” Kestrel said, “I am in control of this army. And, in time, I will build hundreds more gearfolk. They say one man is not an army, but in this case, I am.”

  “You will not get away with this,” Lumina said to her former husband. “We will not let you take back the land.”

  “I learned a lot from my failure with the last batch of gearfolk,” Kestrel said. “Watching you disarm them and break them to pieces has taught me a tremendous amount. And these new mechanical men have none of the same weak points. I saw to that. With the help of our brilliant son.”

  Impish and Gremlin bounded to the nearest magnetic mechanical man. Kestrel swatted his hand, batting the ferrets away as if swiping at a pair of flies. “Your ferrets should crawl back into a hole and nibble nuts instead. They won’t have much luck trying to blow up the unbreakable armor from the Eversteel Forge.”

  “Together we can bring them down,” Valor shouted as she leaped into battle with Roveeka and a troop of goblin chefs. Kestrel merely laughed. He started swinging his blades, creating a wall of swinging swords so tight that even the thinnest elf couldn’t squeeze through.

  “It’s no use,” Wily said. “I built every one of those with him. Claws and butcher knives will do nothing. But I know something that will.”

  Wily reached into his boot and from it pulled a single screwdriver.

  “Surrender,” Wily said to Kestrel, brandishing the tiny tool.

  “How adorable! A hero to the very last,” Kestrel scoffed. “But unless that screwdriver has been enchanted by magic given to you by the all-powerful Glothmurk herself, I’m not worried.”

  But Wily wasn’t listening. Instead, he lunged at his father. Kestrel swung his sword, and Wily ducked in the nick of time, the blade just missing the top of his head. Wily pulled off a roll that he thought Odette would be proud of and ended up kneeling before Kestrel, who stabbed down again with his sword, slicing the trapsmith belt right off Wily’s waist.

  Wily desperately scanned the suit of eversteel armor, waiting for the right moment to strike his target. Just below the breastplate on the right torso was a thumb-size screw. It looked no different than the five other screws lining the chest portion of the armor. But Wily knew it was. His arm shot out, and the end of the screwdriver stuck straight into the small indentation. With a twist of his wrist, he spun the screw fast and hard. In a flash, it popped out of the suit of armor and fell to the ground.

  Kestrel looked down and let out a laugh. “Only a thousand more to go.”

  “Nope,” Wily said. “All I needed was one.”

  And he was right: all of a sudden, dozens of identical screws popped out of the eversteel soldiers.

  “I have no idea what you’re planning, but this ends here,” Kestrel said, and lifted his sword into the air.

  As he did so, his armor split apart. It was as if every piece of metal had been locked together by a single screw. Kestrel was left standing in his pants and tunic, with only his gauntlets left on his hands. Near
by, the eversteel soldiers were collapsing. Each was falling into a pile of unbreakable scraps.

  “What have you done?” Kestrel screamed in anger.

  “That sixth screw I added to the design was built in as a precaution. Just in case something like this happened. Actually, because I was expecting something like this to happen.”

  “What happened to giving second chances?” Roveeka said. “I thought everyone deserved one.”

  “They do,” Wily said. “But Kestrel has had far more than two.”

  “You deceptive little creep,” Kestrel said as he took steps backward. “You tricked me. Maybe you are more like me than I thought.”

  “Being prepared isn’t being deceptive,” Wily said. “And I am nothing like you.”

  Kestrel dropped his sword, turned, and began sprinting for the palace drawbridge.

  “Cut him off before he gets away,” Lumina shouted to Valor.

  Valor, riding on the back of her mount, Stalkeer, sped forward and bounded between the former Infernal King and the lowered drawbridge. But it suddenly became quite clear that wasn’t where Kestrel was heading. The former resident of the royal palace sprinted up to a large boulder in the ground. He jammed his finger into an indentation in the stone and tapped quickly on it in a very specific pattern that Wily couldn’t see. A secret door in the boulder slid open.

  “Where did that come from?” Lumina said. “I didn’t know that was there.”

  Kestrel had lived in the palace since he was a little kid. It was no surprise he knew of more secret exits and entrances than Wily and his mom. As Kestrel disappeared into the darkness beyond the door, he hit a button on the inside wall to close the door once more. Wily knew that if he didn’t get there fast and soon, the secret door would slam shut and he would have a very tough time opening it again. He scooped up Kestrel’s fallen sword and took off.

  He had to reach it before it closed. His feet flew fast, but judging by his speed and the distance, he wasn’t going to make it. He needed to go faster. Still, his legs weren’t as quick as Valor’s. It appeared he was out of luck. Just then, something flew over his shoulder. It was Pops, Roveeka’s knife. It stuck into the doorjamb, blocking the door from fully closing. The mechanics of the door struggled to push the blade. The extra second was enough time for Wily to slip through. As soon as he was inside, the secret door smashed closed, knocking Pops to the ground outside.