She flew into the clearing, her wings flapping madly. The hole where Cressida and Joe had buried the Book of Fire was now dug up. A mound of earth next to the hole was being guarded by an irie carrying a small twig with a thorn stuck on the end. She landed next to him and made him jump out of his skin.
“You’re back!” he exclaimed. His name was Gormus, and Corona’s brother.
“I have news of the direst kind!” Corona declared. “I must see Bullavent this instant before it’s too late!”
She heard Bullavent call out her name. She looked up to see him descending with a gaggle of his guards. It seemed so long since she’d been with her own people that it felt a dream. He didn’t appear too pleased to see her. After all I’ve been through, she thought. What does make him happy?
“Where is the book?” Bullavent demanded the instant he landed.
There was a procedure when dealing with her father. You had to be careful not to complicate things just in case he was made to feel stupid. He had to be treated with respect, even while he was shouting at you. The most important thing was not to be frightened. Corona had never been afraid of her father, but now she did show fear. Not towards Bullavent but at the threat they were facing.
“The book which the two human children have us the most powerful spell-book of all time, the one we vowed to destroy should we ever get our hands on it,” said Corona. “It’s the Book of Fire.”
Her brother and the assembled guards gasped in awe. It was like she’d met the Goddess or bathed in pure magic. The Book of Fire was known to exist, known to be real. For it to be residing in a house not too far away was unthinkable.
“The Shadow Assemblage must have had the book all along,” said Bullavent. “Where did you hide it? Can you take me to it?”
“I didn’t get it,” Corona admitted.
Bullavent crossed his arms, bared his teeth. He was furious.
“Then why are you here?” he demanded. “Go back there and get the book!”
“The Shadow Assemblage is going to resurrect Frostma so she can freeze the world again!” Corona cried. The word “Frostma” seemed to reverberate around the clearing like an echo. It seemed even the trees and the very air itself was scared of her.
“All the more reason we have it,” said Bullavent.
Corona, embarrassed, muttered, “Well, it was a little harder than I’d expected. I decided to abort the mission early so I could tell you what they intended. We have to do something! We have to stop them!”
The irie needed to rise up! They could defeat the Shadow Assemblage, destroy the book and make sure Frostma stayed dead! They could save the world! Corona quite liked that idea. It’d be nice to be known as a hero. Her father would be proud of her.
Bullavent tapped his chin in contemplation. “While it’s true I don’t want Frostma to rise again and destroy the world I know there’s nothing I can do to stop it.”
“We can help the humans!” cried Corona. “We can help them defeat the Shadow Assemblage. We may be small but we can do what we can.”
Bullavent wasn’t a coward but he knew a hopeless situation when he saw it. To go up against such a formidable opponent was to commit suicide. He had his people to consider, his wife and children to think of. He couldn’t allow them all to die for nothing. They had to do the unthinkable.
“We will leave for the Wild Realm,” said Bullavent. “Send the code to the tribes of the world! We start the evacuation of Pangaea immediately.”
Corona pushed herself forward, but many thorn spears were thrust in her way. She had to appeal to Bullavent.
“Father, this is a world worth saving!” she said. “We can’t just abandon it!”
“To save ourselves we must,” said Bullavent. He sighed. “The reign of the human is finally coming to an end. That will be one thing I’m not sorry about.”
Bullavent flew away back to the colony, ready to begin packing. He hoped he had enough time to eat a blackberry one more time. They didn’t have them in the Wild Realm, and he’d miss them.
Corona wanted to hit Bullavent, but she couldn’t. She’d get arrested, even though she was his youngest daughter. What could she do? How could she convince them? There was only one way; the humans themselves would have to ask the irie for their assistance. If Cressida had survived the assault on her house she would have to go to Bullavent.
As Corona flew off, hoping that Cressida was still living, the call was sent out to all the corners of the world, wherever there was a colony of irie. The message was simple and frightening; “Frostma comes again. Evacuate to Wild Realm immediately. Bullavent.”
Chapter 32 - Escape
The dilemma was tearing her in half. She could either allow her friends and family to die or see the world smothered in a sea of ice instead. I shouldn’t have to make this choice! I’m only eleven! This isn’t fair!
She looked to the side, at the trees that edged Blackberry forest. If she could somehow make it in there, with the book, she would be safe. Dark magic users couldn’t get to her in there, and dodging the irie would more preferable to giving up the book. She’d wait it out until the real Snow Day had passed and there wouldn’t be a single thing the Shadow Assemblage could do; until next year, anyway. No, she thought. If they could do the spell every year they would’ve done it ages ago. This year must be some significant event, one that’s extremely rare. They have to do it this year or not at all.
“The clock is ticking,” said Elias. “I’m not really a patient man and I am getting on in years so standing about like this is really not good for my health.”
Cressida didn’t care one tiny bit about his health. This man had tried to kill her with a monster made out of books and now he was forcing her to make the most heartrending decision of her life. She hated him. She wished that, if her grandmother had known him like he claimed, she’d broken his heart.
She looked at her friends, cowering from the flames that circled them. Abe was mumbling spells but nothing seemed to be happening. Bram and Emily were doing nothing, probably smart enough to know they couldn’t do a thing. Joe was looking at her with wide, compassionate eyes, and he nodded. Was he telling her to save the world? Was he telling her to let him and the others die?
“The book is ours,” a voice hissed in her ear. She felt something pierce her body, coldness unlike anything she’d ever experienced. Her limbs shivered like she’d just been dumped into an icebox in the middle of the Ice Caps. She pulled away, almost tumbling to her feet, to find Phobos, his shadow hand reaching out to her.
“What was that you said?” she asked sweetly, mockingly.
The shadow roared, “Give me the book!”
“Try and take it,” she challenged him. She walked around until she could keep her eyes on both Elias and Phobos. They wouldn’t be able to sneak up on her or do anything without her knowing about it. She hated surprises. She doubted very much she had the power to stop them if they tried, and they could have if they wanted. So that meant Elias wasn’t the book’s next intended host, and neither was Phobos. They had to kill her when only the next owner was present.
What do I do, Rafreya? What do I do? Cressida thought. Tell me Phobos was lying when he said you were dead! Please tell me!
“I’ll go with you if you agree to the deal you offered me last night,” she said to Phobos. “Or we can strike a new deal. Save my family and my friends after the world has been iced over. We will worship you!”
She couldn’t help but snigger as she said, “Stuff that. I wouldn’t worship you if you were the last god in the last universe. What if I decided to kill myself right now? What would happen if, say, you, Phobos, were to become the book’s next keeper?”
Phobos considered this. He had often thought that this very idea would be the best one but to admit he couldn’t grasp the ancient Elvish language would be to admit he was less intelligent than a human. When most of his omnipotence had been stripped away during the battle with the gods of his home universe he had lost his abi
lity to assimilate languages. There was a particularly beautiful, lyrical language he once spoke. It was all vowels and spoken through the back of the throat. He wished he could remember it.
“We have our chosen one and nothing will deviate from the plan,” said Phobos.
“Let my friends go or I will kill myself!” she threatened, not sure how she’d kill herself but she could figure that out later.
“Run, Cressida!” Abe shouted.
The human shadow turned his dark gaze upon his now former employee. He was most disappointed. Phobos had thought this man a consummate professional, a thoroughly reprehensible sort right to the bitter end.
“I will destroy her,” he promised him, before turning back to Cressida. Abe knew what he meant, and a part of him began to wilt and die. There was nothing he could do to stop him.
Phobos watched the indecision on Cressida’s face as she gave the forest a brief glance. She would be safe in there from him, certainly; but at what cost? He would enjoy ordering someone to inflict pain and torture on the girl’s family.
“I suppose you could try and escape,” said Phobos, amused at her difficult choice. “You will not let your friends die to save the world, even if it means they die eventually anyway when Frostma returns.”
“You have to make a run for it!” shouted Joe, although his head was telling him to find some way out of this. “We’re all dead anyway.”
“Speak for yourself,” said Emily.
Joe tried to remember a spell that would help them out, began mumbling things under his breath that were pure gobbledygook. Nothing happened, not even a spell going wrong to hit him in the face. This is so stupid, he thought. I need to do something!
“The circle of fire is blocking our powers,” Grandpa Bram whispered.
Joe sighed, feeling like a complete idiot. Of course their powers were blocked; otherwise Bram would have blasted his way out ages ago. I’m so dumb, Joe thought. I don’t deserve to have the magic gene!
Cressida couldn’t look her friends in the eye. Phobos was right. She could never give her friends up for the slaughter, but she couldn’t give up the book either. There was a third option, she knew there was (excepting the suicide one; she wanted to live!) She just had to think of it. She had to outsmart a former god from another universe, but how? The only spells she knew came out of a book for five year olds. There was always the possibility she could levitate him a few inches or make a dandelion grow out of his head. What use would they be?
“Give me the book, there’s a good girl,” said Elias.
The book, she thought. The book is going to save our asses yet again.
She twisted her neck to bring her accusing, smug grin upon Phobos and threw the book at him. Like a Frisbee it spun through the air and connected with the head of the man made of shadow. He cried out as he vanished. Cressida smirked as Elias shouted and she turned to her friends, still trapped in the ring of fire. She quickly thought back to the lessons with her mother last night, particularly to the spell to help your Mummy and Daddy water the garden (the book was for five year olds, remember?). It was a spell that created moisture from the air. Satisfied she let it rip. Globules of water began to form above her terrified friends and she let them drop, extinguishing the flames. I bet Mummy and Daddy didn’t think this spell would be used to combat gods, she thought.
“Run for the forest!” she shouted. She suddenly remembered the marble statues of the others, including her mother. They couldn’t leave them behind for the Shadow Assemblage to smash to pieces. “And don’t forget the statues!”
A smug Elias made to kick her mother’s statue but Emily threw her cat at him. The portly feline landed on his face like a clawed projectile, scratching and biting and hissing and tearing. Elias threw him off, and Snaps landed on the ground with a hiss. He looked up to find Bram, Emily and Cressida firing three consecutive levitation spells at him. The old man had a single moment to gasp and was flung into the air like a flabbergasted cannonball. He landed behind the burning remains of the house.
“Now!” she shouted.
She took the Martin statue, figuring she was the least experienced. It floated in the air, bobbing behind her like a balloon. Emily was trailing her mother, Bram had Miss Weber and Abe had Seth. Joe followed them feeling like a useless lump. I wish I could just do one spell right, he thought miserably. It’s just not fair.
She felt a presence behind her, the same coldness she’d felt when the shadow man had reached his hand through her body. She took a quick look back as they sprinted for the forest to see Phobos melting across the ground towards them like some giant, man-like slug. She hurried her pace, almost feeling his cold hands clutching her and pulling her back to suck out her soul. I bet he could do that, she thought in terror. I bet he could suck out my soul!
“Give yourself and the book to me!” Phobos cried.
Joe was sick of feeling inadequate, like he was a two year old with the magic gene but unable to express himself properly with magic. He knew magic! He could help them. Even their former enemy, the one who had tried to squash them in Cressida’s house, was helping them now! So he turned around, stopped, and said the light orb spell. The orb appeared in front of him, spluttered weakly like a fish out of water, and then dived into the ground. Just as Phobos caught up with him, and Cressida cried her friend’s name, the light orb exploded. Joe was running back to the forest at that point but Phobos wasn’t so lucky. He was showered with a pulse of bright white light and dirt and, with a scream of pure impotent rage, his form broke apart into smaller shreds of shadow.
Cressida, and the others, reached the forest. They put the statues down further in and looked back to where pieces of Phobos floated around on the slight breeze. She wondered for a moment if Joe had actually managed to kill him when the pieces began to swim towards each other; Phobos was reassembling himself. He wasn’t a human or other living thing as she knew them. A small explosion couldn’t kill a simple shadow.
“That was good work, Joe,” said Emily, fawning over Joe like he’d just saved the world. “Was that the grenade spell?”
“Erm…yes,” said Joe. “It packed a pretty mean punch.”
“He’s going to be really angry when he pulls himself together,” said Cressida, stifling a giggle. “His defeat must have torn him to pieces.”
“That’s not funny,” said Emily, unable to suppress her own fit of giggles. Even Abe had to laugh, despite thinking that his beloved Grace was probably unaware her own death was coming to greet her.
They continued to watch, like spectators at a very macabre magic show, until Phobos was fully formed again. Elias had joined him, limping slightly, his clothes a little worse for wear. He gave Cressida a look of pure malice. Phobos stretched and elongated his limbs at impossible angles, getting rid of all the kinks. It was very inconvenient to be blown up, but he could deal with it, especially when he looked at the boy who did it and imagined with perverse delight the same fate for him. He was quite sure he wouldn’t be able to shrug off having his internal organs explode like mines.
“Do you really think you can survive in that forest indefinitely?” said Elias. He was wiping dirt off his face with a handkerchief. The university library had given him it for his sixtieth birthday.
Cressida smirked. “I don’t have to. When the real Snow Day passes you won’t be able to resurrect Frostma any more, will you?”
That shut them up. Even Phobos appeared ruffled. She had got them; she had outsmarted them. They couldn’t enter the forest to get the book so that was it. The game, for them, was over.
“You haven’t beaten us,” said Phobos.
“I’ll destroy the book!” she threatened. All she had to do was continue her lessons with Emily. She could do that. They were friends now. Emily wasn’t nearly as bad as she’d thought she’d be. Besides, they were both on the same side now.
Phobos walked up to the perimeter of the forest. “You are a thorn in my side, Cressida Widdershins. You are forever an en
emy of the Shadow Assemblage. Destroying the book will not keep you safe. We deal with our enemies harshly. Unless you intend to spend the rest of your mortal life living off berries and sleeping under trees in this forest you will one day have to resurface, and when you do I shall have you all tortured and killed.”
His gaze swept over them all. “All of you.”
With those threats uttered with a chilling finality Phobos vanished into the ground. Elias Tombs gave them a hearty wave and started hobbling away. Pretty soon he was down the lane and out of sight. All they could hear now was their own hearts beating, fast with terror, and the crackling flames that were consuming her once loving home.
Chapter 33 - Survival
Snaps was not a cat accustomed to surviving on his own. Dinner was to be presented to him in a small silver bowl and he would be petted and cuddled as much as he wanted. Life was good, content, with the human girl. Then she’d abandoned him, just when he needed her most. She’d thrown him around like he was a dog’s chew toy and then just left him while she ran into the woods! Where was she now?
He sniffed a tree at the edge of the forest. There was the faint dirty aroma of mouse. It was different from his tinned dinners yet somehow more intoxicating. He could almost taste the freshness, the flavors, in his mouth! Fresh mouse? The outdoors? Who needs a human?
And with his life of comfort forgotten in the flap of an irie’s wings Snaps the cat was into the forest, ready to begin his new life.
Chapter 34 – The Brutal Truth
Grace yawned. She could have sworn she’d been asleep just a second ago. She had been practicing for her role in Elverica: The Musical in her sleep using a spell her drama teacher had taught her. One minute she’d been singing the opening number to act two, there’d been a loud, sudden bang, and now she was awake. It was most likely the next-door neighbors. A community of sprites lived in the house next door. The entire house had been converted into a mini-city, home to about two hundred sprites. They could be quite rowdy sometimes.
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