A long shadow fell on the twins as the Minotaur blotted out the streetlight. Manus grabbed Conn out of the way just in time to stop him from being comprehensively squashed.
Finn led Emmie through the maze of alleys into the heart of Darkmouth. “We have to shake it,” he shouted at her.
They kept checking over their shoulders, standing up on the pedals to peer above walls, trying to keep track of the Legend.
They spotted the Minotaur pounding through a parallel alley at the same time as it saw them. Finn and Emmie turned sharply onto a side street. The Legend tore through a yard and crashed over a wall, a line full of clothes wrapped around one thigh.
Finn braked and skidded, navigating the maze of alleyways as Emmie struggled to keep up. They needed to escape; he just didn’t know where to. He yearned again for his father to appear with a plan, his mother to return and calmly—
His mother. That was it.
The Minotaur appeared again, blocking their way, and Finn spun the bike around. “I’ve an idea,” he shouted as he hared past Emmie. “My mam’s place.”
She turned sharply after him. The Minotaur followed, stopping only to tear a water hydrant from the ground and toss it toward them. It smashed off a curb and bounced on, narrowly missing the front wheel of Emmie’s bike. She wobbled, but managed to stay upright.
They arrived at full pelt on Broken Road, jumping off the bikes at Finn’s mam’s dental office.
“What now?” asked Emmie.
They got their answer when a mailbox skimmed Finn’s ear and punched a hole straight through the front door. The office’s alarm responded by hammering out a deafening duet of siren and bell.
Scrambling through the door and into the dark hallway, Finn searched for his mother’s room, eventually finding it just as there was a crunch of a giant fist on glass at the front of the building.
Emmie screamed into her radio. “Dad. The dentist’s. Now.”
In the dark of the room, a fraught Finn patted the walls until he found the hook on which his mam hung her keys. He dropped to his knees to find the keyhole. There was another smash outside. He told himself to be calm. To take deep breaths. To focus. But he couldn’t manage that. His hands shook. And trembled. The gloves of his fighting suit made gripping the key awkward. Blind luck slid the key into the door. It turned with a welcome click.
Grabbing what he hoped were two bottles of anesthetic, Finn handed one to Emmie.
“What do we do with this?” she asked.
A minor quake shook the room, equipment falling from carts as the Minotaur pounded at the front of the building.
“Knock it out, hopefully,” said Finn. “But I don’t think there are syringes big enough,” he added, abandoning his search through drawers and cabinets.
More blows shook the building. Finn ran back through the office, his eyes growing used to the dark. Through the window he could see the silhouette of the creature out on the street, pounding at the building. The front window had caved in.
Every instinct was telling Finn to run far, far away. But he wasn’t going to do that.
He was going to do the opposite, in fact.
He was going to run toward the Minotaur.
Finn took a deep breath, then went for it, vaulting onto a chair, out of the window, and stumbling onto the pavement.
Seeing Finn, the Minotaur bellowed with such ferocity it set off a row of car alarms. Finn faced the giant. Inhaled. Exhaled. As soon as the Legend dug a clawed foot into the concrete and lunged, Finn ran straight toward it, feeling as if the world was moving in slow motion.
At the last moment, he slid between the Minotaur’s legs, twisted, and popped up behind it.
As the Legend lurched toward him, Finn took one stride onto the hood of a car, a second onto its roof, and then leaped high toward the Minotaur. As he flew through the air, he threw the bottle of anesthetic at its gaping mouth.
He missed.
60
The bottle of anesthetic bounced off the giant’s fat, blistered lips and shattered on the ground. Finn crumpled onto the asphalt, pain shooting through his leg, and clawed at the hard ground, trying to escape.
The Legend towered over him, the tufted blotches of its skin like the surface of a hostile planet, its hot breath ruffling hair already rigid with fear. Finn could see his face reflected in the dark pools of the Minotaur’s pupils: a vision of how brittle he was.
He wanted his father so desperately, longed for him to come to the rescue again, to calmly blast this creature into Desiccation and walk away with a quip.
It wasn’t going to happen this time.
The Minotaur reared up, fists tight, its roar in chorus with the thunder booming above. Finn braced himself. Closed his eyes. Tensed for impact.
It didn’t come.
He opened his eyes to see the giant grabbing at the back of its neck, searching around its shoulders. Gripping onto the Minotaur and scurrying around its head and shoulders as he evaded the giant’s claws was Broonie.
“Female child!” he shouted to Emmie. “Give me the vessel.”
Emmie steadied herself and threw her bottle to the Hogboon. Juggling, he managed to catch it, rip off its cap, and drop the bottle straight down the Minotaur’s gullet.
The Legend gripped its throat. It gave its head a shake, then took another step toward Finn.
“I hope that’s not just water,” Broonie said to Emmie.
“So do I,” she responded.
The giant stopped, shook its head again, took another step. Its knees buckled a little, but it regained its balance and loomed over Finn, who was on all fours, trying to pick himself up even as pain shot through his knee. A deep gurgle ran along the vast tracts of the Minotaur’s innards as it collapsed across Finn, its face wedged against the wall.
Steve’s van screeched into view at the top of the street and accelerated toward them as Emmie ran to Finn and pulled him out from underneath the fallen Minotaur.
The van skidded to a halt and Steve jumped out. Seeing the Hogboon, he raised his weapon.
“Don’t, Dad,” said Emmie, stepping in the way. “Finn’s alive because of him.”
She laughed a little in disbelief and relief. Her dad pulled her close and hugged her, smearing her fighting suit in damp blood.
Finn stood now, the shock seeping through his body, a shiver spreading through his chest. He felt cold, alone.
“I didn’t have to do that, you know,” said Broonie.
“How did you survive the Desiccator wave?” asked Finn, a rattle running through his teeth.
“The Desiccator what?” said Broonie.
“There was a . . . a sort of bomb, that shrank all the Legends. Well, almost all of them anyway. I set it off,” said Finn.
“I don’t know,” said Broonie. “I ran. You told me to run, so I did. I managed to get almost all the way out of town.”
“You must have been outside its reach,” said Emmie. “But why did you come back?”
“I was on a hill overlooking the town when I saw the Minotaur. And I saw who he was chasing. I’ve met Minotaurs. You don’t want to be chased by one. Besides, I owed the boy a debt. A Hogboon always pay its debts. Most of the time. But, if Gantrua ever knew what I did, he’d skewer me on those teeth he collects.”
“I thought I was dead . . . ,” said Finn, shivering.
“Are you going to thank me for saving you? Don’t forget that since I came here I have been beaten, shot, frozen, electrocuted . . .”
“Electrocuted?” asked Emmie.
“Don’t ask.”
“Thank you,” said Finn. He looked at Emmie. “Both of you.”
“You’re welcome,” said Broonie, then pointed at the Desiccator. “Anyway, if I were you, I’d perform your little magic trick on that Minotaur and worry about the details later. Whatever it’s just gobbled is unlikely to be potent enough to keep it quiet for long.”
Emmie’s father raised his Desiccator, but, before pulling the trigger, changed h
is mind and handed it to Emmie instead. “It’s time you had a go,” he said.
She took it willingly, but hesitated to shoot. “It seems sort of cruel to do this when it’s just lying—”
The giant snorted angrily into life.
Emmie pulled the trigger.
61
It was Emmie who first noticed the dust eddying in the breeze, a dull sheen reflecting in the glare of the streetlights. It settled in a fine layer on the cars, their alarms still screaming. It fell gently on the broken bricks at the front of the dentist’s office. With her foot, Emmie rolled the desiccated Minotaur and it carved a small path on the lightly dusted sidewalk.
Broonie held his finger out to catch some of the dust, licked it, and spat it out. “Tastes of home,” he said.
Finn stood, shoulders slumped, hands hanging by his side, feeling utterly lost. The sky had closed up again. The gateways were gone and his parents were lost somewhere in that terrible beyond.
“Come with us, son,” said Emmie’s father.
But Finn stayed where he was, resisting Steve’s gentle pull on his shoulder. He took his phone from beneath his fighting suit, dialed his mother’s number, and hoped forlornly for a connection.
A stranger’s recorded voice told him: “This number cannot be reached at present . . .”
Emmie stepped forward. “Finn . . .” For once, the words that usually flooded from her had dried up. She simply reached out, squeezed his wrist, and kept hold.
Broonie hopped around anxiously. “Are we going to stand here much longer? I am very far from home, you know. Maybe someone could acknowledge that.”
Steve took the Desiccator from Emmie and waved it halfheartedly at Broonie, who cowered immediately.
“I have warmed to the young humans,” Broonie murmured, “but you deserve to be fed to the death larvae.”
Emmie’s father picked up the desiccated Legend and walked back toward the van. Emmie tugged a little at Finn’s wrist, encouraging him to follow, and he trudged slowly over to the vehicle, stopping briefly to nod at Broonie.
The Hogboon looked around and, having weighed his options, followed them. Emmie put out her hand to open the van door. Finn paused. “They’re gone. Mam and Dad are stuck there on the Infested Side and there’s nothing I can do about it.”
Beside him, Broonie crouched by the door. “You’re not the only one who’s lost everything, you know. Without a crystal, there’s no way home for me. I’ve a bag of beetles that need feeding.” He jumped into the van.
“What did you say?” asked Finn.
“I said I’ve got beetles to feed. They’ll start eating each other and then I’m done for.”
“Not that. The other thing. About the crystal.”
“Well, unless you happen to have one lying around, I’m stuck here.”
Finn leaped into the back of the vehicle, slammed the door shut, and ordered Steve to take him home as quickly as possible. The van screeched away, Broonie protesting in the most vigorous terms as he was flung around in the back.
62
Broonie reached as high as he could. The crystal Finn had found in the aftermath of the Minotaur’s first attack was no longer in his underpants drawer: it was in Broonie’s outstretched hand and the Hogboon was standing in the middle of the library. The little Legend moved the crystal around, trying to find a snag in the air.
“Are you sure you know how to do this?” asked Finn as politely as he could.
“Don’t insult me,” snapped Broonie. “Of course I do. But it’s not simply a matter of holding it up and letting it go. It requires patience, finesse; and if you could pass me that chair it would be a great help too.”
Finn obliged and Broonie stood on the office chair, almost losing his balance as it swiveled round in a full circle. “Really,” he barked. “This place . . .” He resumed his hunt for the snag in the air.
“Having you all stare at me while I try isn’t very helpful either,” he complained. Finn, Emmie, and her father kept staring.
The Hogboon cursed under his breath, then quieted as he appeared to find what he was looking for. He slowly unwrapped his fingers from the crystal and dropped down off the chair. The crystal stayed where it was, impossibly but firmly attached to the air.
“You should stand back,” he said, shuffling away from the crystal. “It can sometimes frazzle your ear hair. I knew a fella once who lost an entire—”
The gateway exploded into the room, sending them all reeling. Broonie landed on his bottom. Finn fell onto Emmie, who caught him and held him up for a moment until he righted himself. He tried not to look too embarrassed, but failed completely.
They grouped at the flowing light of the narrow gateway and examined the shower of sparks dancing at its edges.
“You’re sure my mam and dad will be there?” asked Finn.
“Every part of the Infested Side is linked to a specific place in the Promised World,” answered Broonie. “If they went through here, they’ll still be there. If you see what I mean.”
He wasn’t sure they did see what he meant, so he continued. “Imagine one world is on top of the other. Open a gateway in this room and it will always lead to the same place on the Infested Side. Open a gateway on the other side of town and you could end up on Gantrua’s lap, for all I know.”
“So we wait?” asked Finn.
“We wait,” confirmed Broonie.
They waited. No one came through.
“You had better not be lying,” said Steve through gritted teeth.
“Right, my time here is over,” said Broonie, indignant. “This was supposed to be the Promised World. Not worth losing a finger over, if you ask me.”
He stepped toward the gateway.
“Wait,” said Finn.
“I’ve opened the door,” said Broonie. “It’s not my fault if no one walks through it. I’m not waiting for it to close.”
“I want to come with you,” said Finn.
“Over there?” said Broonie. “I don’t think you do.”
“You’re not going,” said Steve.
“My parents are in there. I’m going to get them back.”
“That gateway will close soon,” said Steve.
“Then I need to do this now.” Finn stepped up to the gateway, its aura raising goose bumps that pushed against the inside of his fighting suit. Then he stopped, suddenly aware of what he was about to do. His father hadn’t hesitated to jump in there, he told himself. Neither should he. It was time to become the Legend Hunter he was expected to be.
He just didn’t want to do it on his own. “I could . . . actually . . . use some help,” he said.
Emmie skipped forward. “Then count me in too,” she said.
Her father placed a hand on her shoulder and stopped her dead. “He doesn’t mean you, Emmie.”
“I can’t let Finn do it alone, Dad.”
“He won’t. I’ll go with him. You stay here and if you don’t I’ll put your fighting suit through the shredder. This is not a game, either of you. And Finn, before we go in there, here are the rules: If we don’t see your parents, we leave. If I say we leave, we leave. If I leave, we both leave. And, if I get killed, I will never let you forget it.”
Steve lifted his Desiccator and approached the gateway. For the second time, Finn put his hand into the light and let it pool around his wrist, like he was checking out the temperature of the sea before diving in.
“What about the prophecy?” asked Emmie.
Finn pulled his hand from the gateway, which remained vivid and strong for now.
His death on the Infested Side. Finn had forgotten, those lines becoming buried under the shock of losing his parents and the need to get them back. But he felt again the full weight of the prophecy as he stared at the gateway. It was golden and beckoning, but he knew it was a torrent ready to sweep him away.
“See you soon, Emmie,” he said.
“Right, enough talking. Time is running out,” pleaded Broonie, a lilt of panic
in his voice. He barged between Finn and Steve into the gateway and was at once devoured by the light.
“A bit of spying, they told me,” muttered Steve. “Nothing dangerous, they said.” He dipped and stepped boldly into the light.
Finn raised his chin, held his breath, and followed.
63
For a moment, Finn was nothing but light.
64
Then Finn experienced a sensation like the jolt between waking and sleeping, like the last embers of a dream. It was his consciousness being scrambled for a nano-moment and put back together in almost exactly the right way.
It was exhilarating.
Then he reached the Infested Side and spent his first seconds there being violently ill, bent double with the shock of the foul air. Steve was standing beside him, peering into the grim light, his helmet still on and his visor down, offering protection from the wretched atmosphere.
As Finn recovered, he wondered what Steve was looking at. Then he saw the two bodies lying in the scrub.
65
Finn and Steve ran to the bodies, crumpled in a hollow among spiked reeds.
“Fomorians,” said Steve. He examined the two large prostrate figures, each with a crescent scar branded into its forehead. “Even uglier than we’ve been taught. And still alive, it seems. They’d be pretty hard to kill with your bare hands, so I’d say your father’s done well to do this much damage. Presuming it was him, of course.”
Finn stood and looked around. Behind them, Broonie was standing by the light of the gateway, which seemed far more piercing here, its radiance contrasting with the almost complete lack of charm anywhere else in this world.
“It’s wonderful, isn’t it?” squealed Broonie with sincere delight. “Oh, I didn’t think I’d miss it so much, but it tastes as sweet as slugwine.” He did a little jig of happiness.
Finn gagged, then composed himself enough to shout, “Dad!”
“No one out there,” said Steve. “Not that I can see.”
“Mam!”
“You shouldn’t hang around,” warned Broonie. “There are bandits on these roads and, whatever price a Hogboon skull would fetch as an ornament, you don’t want to find out what a human’s would be worth.” He took a couple of seconds to assess the boy, until he dismissed the dark idea forming in his head. “No, I shouldn’t. It wouldn’t be right. Honor above wealth. Always. Even if wealth and honor would be nice. . . .”
Darkmouth Page 20
