When the pair reached the open hatch Sturgeon himself appeared in the doorway. His complexion reddened and his face twisted into a horrible scowl. "You fools, stop them!" he shouted at the guards. They had their hands full with the cutlery, and that gave the companions ample time to duck down into the escape route.
Ned shut the hatch and hurried everyone down the stairs. Fluffy eagerly awaited them and they all climbed onto the beast's back. They heard footsteps hurry down the steps above them and Fluffy flew down the steps just as Sturgeon made his appearance around the corner. A cruel, cold smile appeared on his lips and he shouted to them. "Are you leaving so soon? Before all the fun begins?"
Ned had Fred stop Fluffy two dozen yards down the cavern, and the old man twisted around to face their adversary. "Sorry to be such rude guests, but we have a battle outside that won't wait for us," he called back.
Sturgeon held up a hand and showed off the ring about which Percy had spoken. "Do you recognize this power, pathetic castor?" he mocked Ned.
Ned straightened and scowled. "I do, and I know that power is too great for you to handle, Sturgeon."
Sturgeon fisted his hand and darkness swirled out of his clenched fingers. "Then let me prove you wrong."
A great wind blew around Sturgeon, and from his hand spilled out the undead from the Valley of the King. The skeletal warriors rode on their rotting steeds and raced down the stairs after the companions. Sturgeon mounted one of the steeds and led his army down the steps. Fred's eyes widened and he spurred Fluffy down the cavern. The wind whipped and bit at their faces, and behind them the undead army closed the gap. Fluffy whimpered and Fred understood. His load was too great.
"What's wrong?" Ned yelled above the wind.
"We're too heavy. Fluffy can't go any faster!" Fred shouted back.
Ned looked to Ruth who sat between them, and Tramadore was against his back. "Perhaps it's time you spread your wings," he told her.
Ruth blinked, and her eyes widened when she realized what he meant. She smiled and rubbed her hand against the jeweled necklace. In a moment of dazzling light she transformed into her true form and opened her wings. The gust from the undead army pushed her upward, but she caught hold of Tramadore's shoulders and lifted him with her into the air. The old gentleman cried out in alarm and clung onto her clawed hands. "Hold on, my lord!" she yelled at him.
The companions sped through the underground cavern, two in the air and two on Fluffy. They dodged in and out of the myriad of holes, spikes, and stalagmites with the army ever at their backs. In a small nook at the front of the caverns beside the stairs, and well-covered from the wind, sat Deadly Sins. He watched Sturgeon and his undead army give chase, and beneath his handkerchief he grinned. "My good lord, it seems your cunning is your undoing." He glanced up at the ceiling that stretched all the way to the golden gate. Explosives had been set by Sturgeon's men to protect the passage, and the fuse hung in front of Sins. He stuck a match against a stalactite and lit the fuse. The flame ran quickly along the coiled rope and into the first of the gunpowder-filled balls. "Run faster, little cantankus," he prayed.
The first bomb shook the entire cavern, and Fred looked over his shoulder in time to see the chain of explosives detonate. Ned glanced back and his face paled. "Oh dear."
Fred thought that was an understatement, but they had bigger problems to worry about. The exit was a dot at the end of the tunnel while stalactites rained down on the rear guard of the undead army and crushed their bodies into dust. The earthquakes from the blast hastened the collapsing spears of rock, and rubble fell all around them. Fluffy dodged the boulders and jumped over the holes created by the earthquake. Ruth ducked and swooped around the collapsing ceiling, and Lord Tramadore was a rag doll to her twisting and turning. The wind carried them faster than the cantankus could run and they outdistanced their companions by only three dozen yards.
Sturgeon glanced over his shoulder and saw the chaos of his own making. He spurred on his undead steed and his army followed, but not without losses. Even their supernatural speed couldn't outrun the falling boulders and debris. The explosions matched their speed, passed them, and overtook even the cantankus ahead of them. He narrowed his eyes, clenched his teeth and focused his power into the horse on which he rode. The consequence was that the skeletons at his back lost their speed and their undead lives. They were caught in the collapsing ceiling and their shrills of pain echoed above the noise of the pounding rocks.
The extra power gave his steed more push, and Sturgeon closed the distance between the cantankus and himself. Ned turned and saw the lord inch closer foot by foot. He swung his staff and shot out a blast of fire. Sturgeon raised his ring and with a swipe of his hand brushed aside the flames. A sneer slipped onto his face. "You will have to try better than that, old man," Sturgeon crowed.
Ned tried again and again to hit Sturgeon with the balls of fire, but the effort didn't even slow him down. With the cavern falling all around them and an earthquake beneath their feet, Sturgeon came up beside them and morphed the ring's dark energy into a sword. He swung the blade down on the riders of the cantankus, and Ned held up his staff and blocked the blow with the length of the wood. Ned pushed Sturgeon back, and the lord thrust and parried with Ned while Fred dodged both their weapons. He watched the path ahead of them and his eyes widened when he saw a large boulder the size of a house fall down from the ceiling. Ruth and Tramadore were nearly at the end and easily passed the rock, but it crashed to the ground in front of the rest of them.
The boulder covered the path on their side and there was a narrow opening on Sturgeon's side. The only opening Fluffy had lay near the ceiling, and the shattered boulder didn't provide much of a trail up to the hole. Through his heavy panting, Fluffy's eyes rolled up to the boy and shined. Fred blinked as an idea traveled from Fluffy's mind into his own. The boy leaned down close to the beast's head. "You really think that's going to work?" he called back to him. Fluffy nodded, and Fred smirked. "All right, let's do it." He looked back to Ned. "Hold on!"
Ned pushed Sturgeon's sword away from them just as Fluffy turned away into the steep wall to their right. The old castor grabbed onto Fred's waist while the boy leaned over the saddle horn and pressed himself against the beast. Fluffy's speed gave the cantankus enough momentum to slam his large claws into the wall deep enough to cling there for a second before the rock slid out from beneath his paws. The cantankus could literally sprint across the wall, and that's exactly what he did with his two passengers clinging onto him. Fluffy made straight for the hole at the top and burst through with no room to spare.
Sturgeon shot through his own hole and looked up to see the cantankus completely upside down and running in a swirling pattern along the ceiling. Fluffy came down the wall and they ended up on the left side of Sturgeon, where Ned and he resumed their attacks. Unfortunately, the large boulder wasn't the last and the opening at the end became obscured with the falling debris. The earthquakes opened up pits in the floor and nothing remained of Sturgeon's army save for his horse and him. Behind them lay shaking rubble, and the collapse of the entire ceiling was catching up to them.
Fluffy growled and the horse neighed at one another, and while the two riders fought the beasts started their own battle. Their shoulders collided against one another trying to dismount the riders or trip the other. A false move would mean certain death while the falling rubble nipped at their heels. Fred saw Ruth and Tramadore fly to safety, and he glimpsed the glowing keyhole of the vanished door. The boy had a terrible idea, and he pulled out his stick. It transformed into the staff, and when their steeds bashed against one another again with both hands he shoved the staff between the horse's two front legs. The steed tripped but didn't fall, but that still gave them a few yards ahead of their enemy.
Fred glanced over his shoulder at Ned, but found the old castor had his hands full keeping Sturgeon from catching up with fireballs. The young man would have to accomplish his plan on his own, so he tightly gripped his st
aff and urged Fluffy onward. Behind them Sturgeon cried out in frustration and kicked his horse to catch up while he swiped the fireballs away. The steed whinnied and sped along, closing the gap again. Yards turned into feet and Sturgeon reached out his sword to slash at them, but he was too late. Fluffy reached the lock a few seconds before the horse and passed it.
Fred focused his staff on the key as he'd done on the cake platter, but this time the magic obeyed him. The key dove out of the lock just as Sturgeon reached out to grab Ned. The golden gate came down on Sturgeon and his outstretched arm was severed at the hand. He screamed out in agony and the horse beneath him disappeared. The lord fell to the ground and clutched the stump against him, but he didn't suffer for very long. The ceiling above him collapsed and a huge chunk of rock fell down on him, ending his life.
Fluffy galloped out of the cavern entrance and Fred turned him around to glimpse the final crashing of the secret pathway. The bottom of the golden gate disappeared beneath a thick layer of rubble, and behind it lay nothing but broken rocks and collapsed walls. Ruth and Tramadore rushed over to them, and the lord clasped Ned's hands after he dismounted.
"You have all done me a service I could never repay," Tramadore thanked them.
Ned grimly shook his head. "There's no time for thanks yet, old friend. Your city is still-"
At that moment the night sky lit up with a column of light that came from the front of the city.
CHAPTER 25
At the gates of Tramadore the battle raged as described by Sturgeon's minion. Pat and her forces were vastly outnumbered by the wraiths and couldn't keep the shadows from attacking the city walls and busting down the gate. Without weapons blessed by Ned the defenders in the city were no match for the shadows. The wraiths spread through the lower levels of the city and attacked soldier and civilian alike. They discriminated against no one. Spalding saw their trouble and rode through the wisps of wraiths to help his traitorous men. He burst through the broken gates and hacked at the shadows who mauled and killed the guards.
"Captain!" cried out one of the traitors.
Spalding scowled at the guard. "Shut up and fight, traitor. These wraiths will show less mercy than even I."
He helped one of the guards to their feet, and their swords touched. Part of the magic passed from one weapon to the other, enchanting them both with the power to destroy the fiends. Spalding grimly smiled and gestured at the guards with useless weapons. "Help them by passing on the magic!" he shouted at the man he'd helped.
The guard nodded and stumbled forward to his companions. Spalding glanced back through the splintered gate onto the darkened plains. Night had fallen, but the column of light from the stone lit up the area like a sun with the soft glow of the moon. Hawkins, Pat and Canto aimed their efforts on the stone itself for the wraith army would never be depleted so long as the column of light kept spewing them out. They hacked and slashed through the countless wraiths, and reached the stone with no others but the three of them to help each other. They had even lost their steeds in the skirmish. Pat struck her blessed sword against the glowing stone and her blade clanged the side. There wasn't even a scratch on the surface to show her effort.
"Move aside!" Canto cried out. Pat jumped back, and with a great yell Canto raised his ax above his head and brought it down on the stone. The ax bounced off the side of the stone and Canto's whole body shook with the reverberations. He fell back on his butt and glared at the stone. "But for a wealth of castor magic!" he cried out.
While they tried their hands at the stone, Hawkins protected them. The wraiths noticed their efforts and many focused their attentions on the three companions. They screeched and dove for the group, and Hawkins swung his sword too fast to be seen. Wraiths fell in ribbons before him, but there were too many. One swiped at his left arm, and its claws cut through his shoulder armor and into his flesh. Another swooped down and struck him behind the knee which felled him to the ground. The wraiths saw his weakness and barreled down on him. Hawkins held up his sword to block their blows, but they never came.
Dozens of burly shadows swooped down from the sky and swept through the wraiths. The fiends scattered and one of the lead shadows slammed down on the ground in front of Hawkins. The captain raised his head and his eyes widened as Sampson stood before him. The gargoyle leader knelt in front of him and looked over his wounds. "You won't be useful in a fight with those wounds," Sampson told him.
Hawkins scowled. "I won't leave here until the battle's done or I am."
Sampson grimly nodded, and overhead they heard the screeching of the wraiths. The fiends recouped from the surprise attack and flung themselves onto the gargoyles. Sampson and the others clawed and whipped their tails at the wraiths, but their limbs passed through the shadow bodies. One of the creatures flung itself onto Sampson's shoulders, and more followed in a pileup of gnashing teeth and claws. They brought Sampson to the ground, and he roared as they bit and dug their claws into him.
A bright sword swung through the wraiths, and they scattered. Sampson looked up to find Hawkins over him with his enchanted sword in hand. There was a pained smile on the captain's face. "If you want to play with these things you're going to need more than your claws," Hawkins scolded him. The captain opened his hand and offered the sword to the gargoyle.
Sampson raised a brow and reached out for the sword. His claws nicked the blade and the magic passed from the steel weapon to that made of nails. Sampson held up his glowing claws and turned his hand over. "This must be Edwin's doing..." he murmured.
The pair didn't have time for talk as the wraiths battled the gargoyles. Sampson stood and ran on all four legs at his comrades with Hawkins at his side forsaking the pain in his leg. They tore and slashed into the wraiths, and passed on the magic to the other gargoyles. The clan took on the task of protecting the two humans and dwarf, but they still had the problem of destroying the stone. Pat and Canto had attempted more cuts, but nothing created even a scratch on the surface.
Hawkins rejoined them at the foot of the stone and glanced up at the shining light that towered above them. Their weapons had failed them, and the wraiths continued to spill forth from the column. Hawkins stiffened when his mind brought up a memory. He grasped his chest, and the two around him feared his heart was giving out.
"Captain, what is it?" Pat called out to him.
Hawkins tore the hairpin from his breast and held it in his open hand. The small, insignificant object radiated its own light and pushed back the cold glow of the stone. The wraiths saw the new light and redoubled their efforts against the gargoyles to try to grab at the three companions. The wraiths who flew from the column noticed them and swooped down on top of the group. Those in the city, too, felt the reverberations of the hairpin and flew out of Tramadore to protect the stone. Spalding led his men, traitor and loyalist alike, out of the gates and into the battle on the plains.
The three companions around the stone ducked and swung at the fiends, and were driven back from the base of the stone. The dwarf swung his ax and took out a half dozen of the fiends. "What's got their britches in a tangle?" Canto yelled.
Pat cut two more wraiths into ribbons and glanced at Hawkins' hand. "They don't like what Hawkins is holding!" she called back.
"I need to stab the stone with this!" Hawkins cried out to his companions.
"Then pray for a miracle!" Canto replied.
A pair of heavy hands fell on Hawkins' shoulders, and he looked up into Sampson's face. "Step aside, man of Galaron. We'll set you a path," Sampson told him. He pulled Hawkins aside and a dozen gargoyles dove in front of them and into the fray of a hundred wraiths. Beasts and fiends tore and clawed at one another, but slowly they opened up a hole to the stone. Hawkins limped forward, but Sampson swung the man onto his back. "Victory won't wait!" Sampson yelled at him.
Hawkins clutched onto the gargoyle's back and Sampson shot into the open path running on all four legs. They dodged, and dove over and under fighting gargoyles and wraiths, a
nd the stone came ever nearer. Two dozen yards; a dozen; ten feet. A wall of wraiths rose up from the base of the stone and blocked their path. Sampson roared and jumped high into the air. He used the wraiths' semi-solid forms to propel himself into the air, and his wings opened wide. The wind carried them over the wall and Sampson landed atop the stone a hairbreadth's away from the column of dark light.
Hawkins clutched the hairpin in his hand and slid off the gargoyles back. He raised the trinket over his head and the wraiths screamed when he brought it down. The hairpin broke through the thick shell of the stone and stuck fast. Cracks arose from the hole and spread along the surface like a flooding river ripping open new paths for itself. The earth shook beneath the armies and the wraiths screeched in pain. The fiends rose into the sky and from their eyes shot forth short beams of blinding lights. They clutched at their faces and drifted toward the stone.
Lightning made of dark energy shot up through the column of light, and smaller offshoots filled the air around the pair atop the stone. Sampson tucked Hawkins under his arm and glided down to where their friends waited from them two dozen yards away. They landed and turned back in time to see the column above the stone implode on itself in a flash of brilliant light. A dark vacuum was created in place of the column, and the wraiths were pulled into the darkness.
When the last fiend disappeared into the vacuum the darkness collapsed straight down into the stone. The cracks split open and the stone exploded out into a million small pebbles that fell from the sky. The light of the stone vanished and the plains sunk into the blackness of night. There was silence for a time. No one could believe they had won against the wraith army.
The Unwilling Apprentice (Book 2) Page 18
