by E. G. Foley
But its light was enchanting and cool. Ramona was rapt with it, even in her astral state. Its silver brilliance dimmed the stars, made the pale sand look like snow, and painted the slopes of all the dramatic, wind-sculpted sand dunes in countless shades of blue.
The place was silent, not a living thing in sight except for them. There were probably little lizards awake and on the hunt, but their arrival must have startled them into going motionless.
Finnderool quickly closed the portal after everyone was through.
Good, thought Ramona. If Henry’s information was still correct, the Dark Druids would know they were here soon enough. No need to draw their attention any faster by the light the portal gave off.
“Henry?” Sir Peter turned to the shapeshifter while the female centaur clapped the queasy younger wizard on the back to steady him.
Hanley Fletcher looked a little like he might throw up, a not-uncommon reaction for those unused to Grid travel. The elvish healer gave him a piece of candied ginger and a sympathetic smile.
Henry left his twin’s side and walked over to Sir Peter, pointing at a sand dune ahead. “The crater should be just beyond that ridge. I’ll go make sure the castle’s still there and signal you.”
With that, the children’s mild-mannered scholar went through the brief but painful process of shedding his human shape and becoming a wolf again.
“Good luck, brother,” Helena whispered as her twin trotted ahead. The big brownish-gray wolf went loping alone up to the top of the sandy ridge.
When he reached it, he peered down over the other side, then lifted his snout and gave a short howl.
Ramona could see the fighters exhale in relief that the Black Fortress had not jumped locations yet. Then their faces hardened and their eyes turned steely. Helena and Urso both transformed into their respective shapes, Urso shifting into a mighty grizzly bear, and ebony-haired Helena becoming an elegantly lethal black leopard.
For her part, Ramona had always winced and looked away during the twins’ transformations. It seemed painful. Their ferocity in these forms, however, was a large part of the reason why she had hired them for the children. They were excellent protectors.
Everyone else got ready, too, and started walking toward the sand dune where Henry waited. Helena loped ahead to join her brother. Ravyn shrugged the tension out of her shoulders, then drew two large knives.
Finnderool nocked an arrow in his bow, his keen eyes narrowed with anticipation. Ranjit clapped his hands softly together and conjured a fine British rifle. Janos did not yet assume his dreadful vampire form, but tied a black desert-style scarf across his face until only his eyes showed so he could participate without being identified.
The half a dozen brides and countless hatchlings he was so proud of would certainly be targeted if the Dark Druids realized that their supposed ally was, in fact, a double agent.
Aleeyah disappeared in a puff of smoke and rematerialized far ahead, joining the two animals staring down the other side of the tall sand dune. Unbound by physical form like the djinni, Ramona swept ahead of the party and caught up to the other three, quite intrigued to have a look at this “fiery crater” where Zolond had parked his castle.
Once again, though, she thrust him out of her mind immediately. Any thought of him was dangerous.
How strange, she mused as she looked ahead. A fiery crater was exactly what it was. It did not belong at all in the peaceful blue moonscape all around them.
A black hole yawned in the middle of the desert for no particular reason. It looked like a place where a meteor had struck, punching a perfectly round, small canyon into the earth. It was so deep that the layers of stone beneath the sand were exposed. And yes, the crater was on fire here and there, just as Sir Peter had said.
She couldn’t quite tell why. But, sure enough, illumined by the flames’ orange glow, the jet-black parapets and four tower tops of the Black Fortress were visible just below the crater’s rim.
This was definitely Zolond’s doing, she thought wryly. He should be right at home in that hellish pit. But once more, Ramona banished her foe from her mind, for thoughts of him risked drawing his attention.
In hushed tones, it was decided that the two teams should split up to surround the castle and approach from both sides. They parted ways and marched off across the dunes, spreading out in a wide V-shape with perhaps a mile and a half of sand to cross before they reached the edge of the crater.
Team one consisted of Finnderool with Ravyn as his Guardian, Janos and Sir Peter, Henry and Helena, the minotaur, and Red.
Team two was led by Lightrider Ranjit, guarded by the towering Ebrahim. They were joined by Urso in his bear form, along with the other wizard, both centaurs, and the healer.
Aleeyah the Djinni would go back and forth between the two groups as needed. For now, she remained with team one.
Team two set off, having the longer route, for they had been assigned to go around to the far side of the crater, while Sir Peter’s group continued straight toward it.
Hovering over top of the whole scene, Ramona had a clear view of both groups, but she opted to stay near Red and the twins.
Something about this whole situation gnawed at the back of her mind. She felt suspicious about why Zolond would have moved the castle to such a place. Why here? What are you up to? she wondered. This is bizarre even for you.
But there was no way to guess what new scheme the Council’s dark genius might have hatched, so she kept her spectral eyes and ears open.
Following along in spirit form as her friends trudged through the deep sand, she overheard a casual conversation between Janos and Ravyn.
“So…how is my son?” the female Guardian asked warily, trying to seem nonchalant.
“Eh, he looked healthy enough to me.” Janos pulled the black scarf down a little to grin at her with just a brief glint of his fangs. “He likes a girl, you know.”
“Really? Who?” she exclaimed. “What is she like? Does she like him back?”
“She’s trying. Not getting very far with him, though. They’ve taught him well not to follow his heart. Just like they did us,” Janos said. “Not that it worked very well…or I wouldn’t be a vampire right now and you would never have fallen for that ridiculous prince.”
“At least he’s a real prince,” she shot back. “But never mind your philosophizing, Janos.” Ravyn punched him in the arm, while Ramona listened, highly curious. “Tell me about the girl!”
“She’s an empath and a Keeper of Unicorns. Lady Bradford’s niece. Jake’s cousin, Isabelle Bradford.”
Now both of Ramona’s eyebrows rose. Indeed?
“Really!” Ravyn exclaimed, then she frowned. “Well, she sounds too far above his station.”
“So she is,” the vampire agreed. “Of course, if you had let that stop you when you first met the prince, your son wouldn’t exist.”
Ramona still wasn’t sure if Maddox had told the other children that his birth father was actually a royal.
“You are cruel to bring it up. Remind my son when you see him that romantic pursuits are against the Guardian code.”
“He knows. And why don’t you tell him yourself?”
She sighed, a wistful sound at odds with her menacing appearance. “My word holds very little authority with Maddox.”
“You’re his mother,” Janos said.
“Birth mother,” Ravyn said flatly. “He hates me.”
“That’s nonsense.”
“Very well, hate is a strong word,” she admitted. “But he thinks I ‘gave him away’ because I didn’t care about him, when just the opposite is true! I knew the blacksmith and his wife were good, strong, decent people who could give him a better life than I ever could. I just wish Derek didn’t recruit Maddox for the Order. At least my son could’ve had a chance at a normal life.”
“Well, he’s very good at what he does, and he enjoys it immensely.”
“Really?” she murmured with a sideways glance full
of maternal pride.
Janos nodded. “And as for the girl, I can see why he likes her. Pretty thing. Looks as fragile as a little porcelain doll, and yet she stood up to Garnock himself and helped Jake defeat him. I fear for her, actually,” Janos confessed. “Our enemies have long memories, and cannot bear to encounter innocence without destroying it. And she is…more innocent than most,” he added softly.
“Then perhaps it is for the best that Maddox is close by,” Ravyn said.
Janos nodded. “Of course, she also has Her Ladyship looking after her. And Jake. That boy’s got pluck.” He chuckled. “Rather reminds me of myself at that age.”
“Well, that can’t be a good sign,” Ravyn said drily, arching a brow at him.
Finnderool, at the head of their party, suddenly held up a fist, signaling for everyone to stop; his long, silvery blond hair flew around his shoulders as he jerked his head to the left. “What was that?” he whispered, then pointed. “There!”
Everybody scanned the sea of pale, powdery sand before them.
“Where, Finn? I don’t see anything,” Sir Peter murmured.
The Guardians stared into the blue, shadowed darkness, their heightened senses attuned, while the shapeshifters in animal form lifted their noses and sniffed the air.
“Let’s keep going,” Janos said restlessly.
“Wait! There it is again!” the elf said.
“Yes, there’s something out there,” Ravyn murmured, squinting as she followed Finnderool’s keen-eyed gaze across the shifting desert sands.
Ramona floated closer and saw what they were staring at. A trick of the wind, perhaps, gave the illusion of a sand dune rippling speedily across the desolate expanse before them.
Sir Peter frowned. “It’s just the wind doing that, I daresay. Isn’t that what they call a dust devil? Aleeyah, you were born in the desert. Do you know what it is?”
The djinni did not answer right away, but her stare into the distance was intense, her silence ominous.
The minotaur puffed out an uneasy snort through his wide nostrils and swung his club, while Red’s feathers twitched and bristled on the back of his neck as they watched.
“There it is again!” Finnderool pointed, and now they all could see something pushing up the sand as it moved beneath the surface with a winding, serpentine motion.
“Er, Aleeyah?” Janos prompted as the ripple in the sand changed direction and began speeding toward them.
This time, they all saw it.
“What is that? It’s coming straight toward us!” Ravyn said.
“It’s moving like a snake,” Finnderool clipped out.
“No snake I know of is that big,” Janos said.
“Don’t move!” Aleeyah suddenly said, holding out her arms. “Hold perfectly still—all of you!”
“Are you daft? We need to get out of the way!” Sir Peter cried.
“No! The vibrations of our footsteps will attract it!” Aleeyah insisted.
“Then you do know what it is?” Finnderool asked.
“If my fears are correct, I believe it could be a Cyclopean sandworm.” Aleeyah’s dark, kohl-lined eyes were fierce. “We have them where I come from. They are deadly, vicious, and fast. The Bane of the Bedouins, as they’re called. They hunt by sound and vibrations. They’ve been known to swallow a camel and rider whole.”
“Aha, then they’re large,” Sir Peter said, his politeness sounding a bit strained as the shape raced toward them.
“Huge,” Aleeyah shot back. “So just…stay still and don’t make any noise.” She looked toward team two. “I have to warn the others, then I’ll try to draw it away. Once it’s distracted, run for the crater. It can’t break through the layers of stone down there and will avoid the flames.”
With all of them holding stock-still, the Cyclopean sandworm failed to home in on their party. They gasped as it swept by, a portion of its segmented body humping up out of the sand. The giant sandworm had thick, pale, leathery skin, and Aleeyah was right—its horrid, segmented body was as big around as a train. It barreled through the sand nearly as fast as one, too, leaving a wake of powdery sand spraying up after it.
Then it disappeared below again, but no one dared to hope that it had gone away. It seemed to be just circling around, trying to sense their vibrations. Ramona blanched to realize it was hunting them.
“Go,” Finnderool ordered the djinni. Aleeyah nodded then vanished in a puff of smoke, reappearing a few seconds later near the other group far off to their left.
Ramona scanned the surrounding desert from her higher vantage point, trying to track the creature. She cursed Zolond once again for his cunning. He always knew how to take advantage of any situation or environment by working with what was already there.
Aleeyah must have given Ranjit’s team her warning, for they stopped in their tracks at once. Immediately, the djinni whisked away again, reappearing at the base of a far-off sand dune.
In the distance, she began stamping her bare feet, clapping her hands, and shouting to draw the beast’s attention. Unfortunately, one of the centaurs had cantered ahead of Ranjit’s group to scout out the way and mustn’t have heard the warning to hold still.
As the centaur went galloping back toward his team, the sand shifted behind him; a monstrous hump of pale, segmented body slithered into view before disappearing again a few yards behind him.
The healer shrieked to warn the centaur, but it was too late. No one could’ve stopped what happened next.
The worm reared up from beneath the sand and swallowed the centaur whole.
It plunged back under the surface as several people screamed in shock, and was gone again in the blink of an eye.
Everyone stood staring, absolutely stunned.
In the distance, Aleeyah kept shouting and pounding her feet, too far away to see what had just happened.
“Come on,” Sir Peter urged the others grimly. “We have to make it to the crater like she said.”
“Run!” said Janos.
They raced across the open sand, running for their lives, humans and animals alike.
Suddenly, another sandworm—somewhat smaller than the first—burst up out of the desert floor ahead of them, showering them with sand, its one baleful eye glowering at them, its round, jagged mouth screeching.
The minotaur was nearest, and reacted automatically. Lifting his club, he bashed it in the head. The worm’s unearthly shriek turned to a whimper, and it immediately vanished back under the sand.
“How many of these things are out here?” Finnderool exclaimed, sweeping the landscape with his penetrating gaze.
“How should I know?” Sir Peter retorted. “Keep moving, everyone! We have to reach the crater!”
In the distance, they could see the larger sandworm speeding toward Aleeyah, making no effort to conceal itself anymore as it narrowed the distance between them.
Visible now in the moonlight, its ghastly form was as wide as a carriage and shockingly long. It left a giant worm trail behind it in the sand as it raced toward the djinni.
Aleeyah waited, steely-nerved, until it was almost upon her. At the last moment, she transported herself off to yet another safe vantage point to lure it even farther away.
Meanwhile, Ramona saw the elvish healer starting to fall behind the rest of her fleeing team.
Hurry, she thought, but she could only watch in helpless horror as a ring of sand suddenly exploded around the she-elf, who then simply vanished, her short scream cut off as the beast pulled her under.
There was nothing to be done for her, so the two teams continued racing across the sand, desperate to reach the crater, still about half a mile away.
Even the shapeshifters in animal form labored to run in the deep sand. Ramona was surprised Janos didn’t take his bat form, but it seemed he was honorable enough to stay on the ground to help protect his teammates.
And they would need all the help they could get, Ramona saw, for a few minutes later, the larger worm that had
gone after Aleeyah must’ve realized it was moving away from the food. After lunging up out of the ground a few times and finding nothing to bite but empty air, the beast apparently had enough intelligence to abandon the game, slithering back into the desert to return to where it had hunted successfully before.
It seemed one centaur hadn’t quite satisfied its hunger.
This mission was not off to a good start, Ramona thought grimly as she saw the hump in the sand speeding back in their direction.
Fortunately, Sir Peter’s team had regrouped in time for the next attack. They saw it coming—it would have been difficult to miss the surge of sand plowing toward them—and this time, they were ready for it.
The creature suddenly blasted into view behind them, rearing up out of the sand, its round mouth churning with rows of razor-sharp teeth.
“Keep going! We’ll handle this!” Janos shouted, waving the rest on toward the crater.
“I’ll help you!” Ravyn shouted.
“No! Get on the Gryphon and get off the sand.”
“Don’t be daft!” She turned to the minotaur. “Guard the Lightrider!” she ordered. “I’ll be right there.”
Finnderool shot an arrow at the towering beast before the minotaur hurriedly pulled him away by the arm, then he ran with Sir Peter and the shapeshifters.
“Escape on the Gryphon,” Ravyn muttered, shaking her head at Janos in disgust.
Aleeyah reappeared in a puff of smoke. “Sorry! I guess it got bored of the game.”
Janos drew a second blade. “Guess he wants to play a little rougher.”
Then he and Ravyn began harrying the monster, taking stabs at it, hurling weapons, leaping onto it and then springing away before it could catch them. Red helped distract it, flying past its head and shrieking at it, raking it with his claws as he passed.
Roused to fury, the sandworm stretched up even higher out of the desert floor, writhing and gyrating and roaring in the most peculiar fashion.
“Aleeyah! Take it!” Janos shouted, pointing at the creature’s head.
