by Robin Jarvis
At his side the shrews were faring less successfully, and many died in the first horrific moments of the battle. But as soon as any breach was made in the Haran barricade which blocked the street, another of the small animals jumped in to replace the dead and their little swords proved just as deadly as the weapons of the enemy.
Several rows behind the main conflict, Thomas and Woodget prepared themselves for the onslaught as the ranks began to thin and the ferocious army of the Scale drew ever closer.
At their side, Dahrem eyed the brutal proceedings with intense interest—it was immensely satisfying to see the dark forces drench the marble stairs with blood and when they had charged through the entrance he had had to bite his tongue to prevent himself cheering. Yet now he was faced with a difficult problem and he sought for ways to solve it.
It was he who had discovered Mulligan’s fragment and he certainly wasn’t going to let anyone else steal the credit for that. But how could he flee to the mountain without being challenged?
“Dimmy’s mortalafearedfraidycat!” he whined piteously. “’He ain’t no soldier. He can’t stay here, he wants to go and hide in darkcubbyholeunderstairsorindraughtylofty. Let him go, let him through.”
“Keep the fool silent!” Chattan’s sister demanded, pushing forward to be at her brother’s side. “Behind our lines there are infants and babes in arms with more courage than he.”
Thomas glowered at the pale grey mouse. “Pipe down!” he shouted. “Where d’you think you could go anyway? There’s no escape from these horrors. Just do the best you can when your time comes.”
At that moment the evil host sent up a great clamouring as Karim sprang his ambush and, at the head of the mongooses and voles under his command, plunged deep into the right flank of the vile, scrambling horde.
The creatures dedicated to Scarophion shrieked in confusion as this unlooked-for hazard drove clean across the narrow street and those caught between the two Haran forces squealed in dread. Ahead of them Chattan and his sister were dealing out death to any who dared lunge at them and even those hateful little squeakers at their side were doing nasty damage with their sharp daggers. Now a new front had opened behind them, cutting them off from the rest of their kind and Karim’s tassled spear had already impaled four burly rats whilst his sword had hewn the arms off another and chopped the legs from under a sixth.
But their snarling panic at their perilous predicament only fuelled the fires of their madness and they threw themselves upon their enemies with more savagery than before.
Dodging the mongoose captain’s sweeping sword strokes, a large, slavering, black rat burst through the defending shrews, his claws raking their tender flesh as his snapping jaws bit out their throats. In a crimson-spattering instant he was behind the front line and, standing in his ravaging path, gazing up into his hate-filled eyes, was Woodget’s small and frightened form.
With a thrash of his forked tail and a curdling screech of delight, the brute dived straight for the fieldmouse’s head, his claws outstretched—ready to rend it from his body.
Woodget squealed and woefully held up his knife, but before he knew what was happening, Thomas dragged him aside and grimly took his place.
Yelling hideously, the black rat cannoned into him and Master Stubbs collapsed beneath the crushing weight of the vile-smelling beast, yet even as the venom-soaked claws came reaching for his neck, he thrust up with his dagger and pushed the blade clean through the fiend’s windpipe.
A horrific, bubbling gurgle issued from the beast’s choking maw but to Thomas’s dismay his stroke had not been fatal. Rearing off him, the rat grasped the knife’s hilt, wrenched it from his throat and a fount of hot blood went flowing over his matted fur.
Groggy, but inflamed with cruel purpose, the creature raised Thomas’s own knife and, lying sprawled and winded upon the flooding street, the mouse knew the end had come.
“You leave him be! You scaly heathen scurvy scum!” Woodget’s high voice shouted, his fright blossoming to courageous fury and finding Mulligan’s favourite curses the only words suitable in such a dreadful plight.
Baring his teeth and gripping his own knife vehemently, he pounced upon the rat’s upraised arm, jabbing him in the side and biting the scabby skin until he could taste the unclean blood in his mouth.
Enraged, the wounded creature flung its arm wide and the fieldmouse went spinning through the rain-lashed air, landing bruised but otherwise unharmed, way up the street and a dozen anxious paws helped him to stand.
But it was too late. The rat was now towering over Thomas and there was nothing his friend could do to save him.
Then, to Woodget’s astonishment, Dimlon jumped to Thomas’s aid, flourishing a silver-hilted sword retrieved from one of the fallen shrews.
“Keep back!” the pale grey mouse blurted.
At first the rat chuckled darkly, and then a strange, shocked expression struck his ugly face as he leered at Dahrem and he blinked in bewilderment. Then his lips trembled and he opened his jaws to speak.
But whatever he had been about to utter was swiftly curtailed, for the treacherous mouse squeaked in mock horror and swiped the sword across the rat’s neck. A moment later, a lifeless body slumped to the ground as the severed head went tumbling down the street to bounce back into the throng of his comrades.
“The villain were goin’ to get us!” Dahrem sobbed, throwing the sword down as though it, and what he had done, appalled him.
Thomas scrambled to his feet and muttered his thanks, as Woodget came running up to fling his arms about them both.
“You was so brave, Dimmy!” he cried admiringly. “Weren’t he Tom?”
But Thomas recalled the last expression that had formed upon the rat’s face as he peered at their companion. It was not that of a callous, taunting killer, but fear had registered there and, unless Thomas was mistaken, a look of recognition.
Around them however, the uproar continued to blare and, unable to dwell on the ghastly experience, Thomas picked up the sword Dimlon had cast aside and dashed across the rat’s headless body to stop up the breach. But the number of hellish disciples trapped between Chattan and Karim was dwindling and overhead the squirrels’ arrows found many foul targets.
Yet their fortune could not last much longer. Behind Karim the remaining host of the Dark Despoiler were too great a number to hold back and around the stout lieutenant many of the mongooses in his company had been killed and the complement of voles had diminished to under twenty.
Yet despite the odds, Chattan and Karim met across a mass of corpses and with renewed vigour they meted out death to all who came.
Beside her brother, Sobhan fought as well as any warrior but when her sword crashed against a heavy axe wielded by a yellow-throated weasel the steel blade splintered in a flurry of sparks—yet she drove the remaining shard into his breast and he toppled backwards bowling over those who yammered behind him.
Desperately, Sobhan searched for another weapon but Chattan pushed her back.
“We cannot win this!” he cried. “They are too many.”
“I will die at your side!” she shouted defiantly, wrenching a scimitar from a dead rat’s claw.
Her brother glared round at her. “You would do better to spend the last moments of your life elsewhere!” he yelled. “See to the city’s children. Take them from this peril if you can—you might yet escape this foulness.”
The maiden stared at him but even in the heat of that awful moment saw the wisdom of his counsel. Blinking away her tears, she sought for words but there were none to express this parting and so with a brisk movement, she touched his arm in farewell then disappeared behind the lines and hurried back up the sloping street.
Plunging his spear deep into a powerfully-built mole’s gullet, Karim heard his captain’s instructions and prayed that his own infants would be spared the violence of this night. To allow them time to escape was the only thought that consumed him but even if they did, what manner of world wo
uld they find? When the nine stars next appeared in the sky to herald Gorscarrigern’s approach, his loathsome servants would possess every fragment of his diabolic shell and into the living plane would his soul be reborn.
Bellowing like a trumpeting elephant as he battled on, Karim shouted to his captain.
“This night all our hopes shall fail!” he boomed. “But you could still cheat the designs of the Coiled One.”
“I?” Chattan answered, splitting the skull of a ravening rat. “What riddles do you speak, Karim? Against this filth we cannot prevail.”
“Maybe,” the lieutenant barked back. “Yet what of the evil treasure they have come to claim? Are we to let them steal it so easily?”
“The fragments!” Chattan cried. In the height of the battle he had given no thought to the remaining pieces. “They must be taken from this place!” he roared. “Yet who can I send to bear them away?”
Karim staggered backwards as a cudgel rammed into his breastplate but he rallied at once and the club dropped to the ground still clutched in a dismembered fist.
“None!” he bawled in answer to his captain’s demand. “So send yourself and take the three mice with you if all still live. Their fates are bound up with the fragments, that much is plain to me.”
“I shall not desert and flee the battle!”
Just then, agonizing screams issued from the attacking host as through the gaping entrance lumbered the largest crocodile and up the narrow street it came trudging, heedless of the creatures in its determined, destroying path—squashing everything beneath its pounding, splayed feet.
With its immense, tooth-filled jaws it callously scooped up seven shrieking cult members and devoured them with a toss of its head.
Standing a safe distance away—upon the base of a statue, the High Priest rubbed his claws together triumphantly. The lesser servants were dispensable, they had served their purpose. Now the inhabitants of Hara would see that their paltry struggles were in vain and with the unholy power that was in him he spurred the huge, grotesque reptile on.
Chattan drew a paw over his brow as the grinning apparition advanced. Then, at the crocodile’s side, he saw the heads of fifty serpents rear above the screeching mob, their lidless eyes fixed upon the animals of the city and, as one, the cobras stretched wide their eye-patterned hoods.
“We are lost,” Chattan muttered.
Karim whirled around and shook him by the shoulders. “Then keep our memory alive!” he begged. “Gladly will I give my life if I can hope you have denied them what they wish.”
The captain looked at him. Already the ground was shaking beneath the approach of the great crocodile and the cobras were spitting their venom at the squirrels who quailed upon the balconies before dropping like ripe fruit into their tangling midst.
“In the Green hereafter, your place shall be set high, Karim Bihari,” Chattan said quickly.
The lieutenant held his gaze then nodded briskly. “Go now,” he instructed. “I will hold them for as long as I am able.”
Swiftly, Chattan leaped from the front line and shoved through the squealing shrews behind, calling for Thomas, Woodget and Dimlon.
Skulking a short distance away from the battle, Dahrem heard the urgent summons above the rumbling thunder and splashed forward to bring the other two from the fray.
Thomas was proving to be most proficient with the sword, and with every parrying thrust or slicing blow, his skill and confidence soared.
Hovering behind him, feeling completely inadequate and miserably insignificant, Woodget hopped from side to side, brandishing his knife in readiness. But no further incursions into the defences had as yet been made and his courage was rapidly subsiding as he beheld the terrible abhorrence which came marching towards them.
“Quick!” Dahrem cried to him, pulling on the fieldmouse’s arm. “Mongoosiecaptain calls for us. Listen! Tell Tommy!”
Woodget whisked about and saw Chattan beckoning to them feverishly.
“Tom! Tom!” Woodget squeaked. “This way! This way!”
Locked in combat with the enemy, Master Stubbs did not hear his friend. His arm was tiring and, with anguish, he wondered how long he could continue. He too had glimpsed the advancing nightmare but was too afraid to look upon it fully. Better to swipe and hew the rats and weasels before him until he perished by their swiping claws than contemplate such a horrendous apparition.
“Tom!” Woodget cried again.
Thomas glanced over his shoulder.
“The captain needs us!” the fieldmouse called.
Master Stubbs gave a final, scything sweep with his sword then sprang back and his place was immediately filled by two valiant musk shrews.
“Hurry!” Woodget urged, following Chattan’s retreating figure through the petrified crowd.
At his side Dahrem pranced excitedly, babbling in Dimmy’s plaintive tones about how glad he was to be leaving this awful place.
Hurriedly they caught up with the mongoose captain and, sombrely, Chattan told them where they were headed.
“We go to the mountain,” he said. “Though the city of Hara might flounder, the forces of the Scale must never take the fragments. Here at the end we shall deny them the sweetness of their unhallowed victory.”
With his satchel slung about his shoulder, Dahrem said nothing but the hour of his greatness was fast approaching and when Suruth Scarophion was reborn into the world, it would be due to him.
From the grisly scene of the battle, through the pouring, lashing rain, the mice and Chattan Giri raced, vanishing into the storm-drenched darkness—ascending the terraced paths that wound about the slopes of the mountain.
Below them, within the beleaguered street, the repellent form of the crocodile finally reached the Haran forces and with a croaking hiss, it swung its massive head from side to side, shattering the bones of those not quick enough to get out of its way. Then, the enormous mouth gaped open and into its crunching jaws it shovelled a dozen, shrieking defenders.
Only one stood his ground, undaunted by the oncoming terror and when the shadow engulfed him, Karim Bihari called upon the Green for aid. Then as the reeking, dripping maw yawned closer, he leaped over the gore-gouted teeth and, standing upon the scarlet-stained, fleshy tongue, rammed his spear straight into the monstrous reptile’s throat.
Braying in torment, the horror thrashed wildly, its mighty tail crashing into the ornate buildings—smashing through the stone sculptures and demolishing the houses.
Around its flailing torso, nearly a hundred followers of the Serpent were utterly crushed and in the ruin of the toppling masonry, countless more perished.
Scrabbling at its own jaws, the crocodile flipped over, exposing the pale flesh of its belly and, seizing their chance, the surviving archers strung the last arrows to their bows and took aim.
In the volley of feathered shafts that followed, the monster screamed once more, then his struggles ended. But from his lolling jaws the broken body of Karim Bihari tumbled—his pulverised armour twisted and rent about his mangled corpse.
From his vantage point upon the base of a six-armed statue, the High Priest looked on the horrific scene with no emotion save amusement and summoned through the entrance further abominations of scaly hide, who went waddling up the death-strewn street, clambering over the carcass of their vanquished brother.
At last the age-old city of the Green was defeated and the time had come to claim the eighth fragment for the glory of his master. So, leaving the main body of his infernal host to finish slaughtering the inhabitants, he took a legion of rats and poisonous snakes and, with his dark cloak whirling about him, set off towards the mountain.
Up the thousand steps Chattan and the mice had hastened, not pausing for breath nor to glance down at the turmoil which ravaged the city streets below. The steep mountain way had become exceedingly treacherous, for the rain cascaded down the stone stair, forming a rushing waterfall, causing their feet to slither and slip and many times Thomas and the oth
ers lost their footing.
Now, with the fierce gale plucking and dragging at their fur, those dangers were behind them, for they had reached the summit where the rocky ledge led to the great carving’s open mouth.
But within the sooty cavern all was dark, for the sacred fire had been extinguished by the gusting rains of the unnatural storm. The mouth of the Green Mouse’s likeness was flooded with water and the ash floated in a thick, charred scum upon its turgid surface.
Through this, Chattan waded and the mice followed him to the rear of the cave where the passage divided into two tunnels, one leading up to the Holy One’s chamber and the other plunging into darkness.
“The downward road must we take,” the mongoose told them. “It leads deep into the mountain’s roots, through the catacombs—then out beyond the inner boundary. There we must trust to providence and avoid capture, for what we shall carry from here this night is beyond price.”
“The fragments,” Thomas muttered. “If you stay here on watch, me and Woodj’ll go and fetch them.”
Chattan drew his sword once more and shook his head. “No, Master Thomas,” he told him. “You have proven your skill with a blade and must remain with me—lest the Scale are swift in pursuit. We must buy time for the fragments at the price of our own lives if need be.”
“S’all right Tom,” the fieldmouse said. “I can manage on me own.”
The mongoose narrowed his dark eyes. “One fragment is burden enough,” he warned. “Dimlon can go with you. Give the other evil to him and be as quick as you can. There is no time to waste.”
“Oh no,” Dahrem nodded deliriously. “Dimmy not dawdle—he help Woody gladly.”
And so the fieldmouse scurried up the spiralling path that led to the windowless chamber above, and at his side, with his black heart rejoicing in the knowledge that the two precious fragments would soon be his, went the adept of Sarpedon.
When they had gone, the mongoose ran back into the flooded fire chamber and peered out of the stone mouth—to look down upon the troubled city.
