Return of the Ancients

by Greig Beck

  ‘Eilif, how do you take them? Do you . . .?’

  It was no use – she was unconscious. Lifting her head, Arn squeezed the leaves over her open mouth. Their flesh gave up more of the thick green liquid.

  Arn watched intently as the liquid first fell onto her tongue, and then slid down her throat. He waited, but nothing happened.

  His injured hand had begun to sting like crazy now that the sap from the leaves had coated it. He turned it over, and as he watched, the pocket-knife wound fizzed and foamed, the skin around turning pink and closing together like a zipper.

  Wow, I gotta take some of this back home to show Grandfather, he thought. Beside him, Eilif coughed.

  ‘Have you got any water?’ she croaked.

  Arn smiled, and felt like hugging her. Instead, he settled for putting his hand on her shoulder. He shook his head. ‘No, but I’ve got a fish.’

  ‘Yecch – Slinker food.’ She sat up, rubbing her forehead and blinking. Arn noticed her eyes shone luminously in the dark.

  ‘Where are we?’ she frowned, her nostrils twitching as she inhaled the smells of the cave. She grabbed his arm and her eyes widened. ‘Thor’s hammer; we’re in a jormungandr hole!’

  ‘A wha . . .?’ Arn looked around. The moon must have risen, as a silvery glow washed in along the cave floor, and now he could see clearly what he had previously taken to be dry sticks underfoot as he had entered.

  Bones.

  He glanced about warily and leaned in close to Eilif. ‘What’s a jormungandr?’ He already guessed it wasn’t going to be something pleasant. He pulled the Wolfen to her feet.

  She kept her eyes on the back of the cave. ‘It’s the closest thing to a daemon on Earth, and something you don’t want to meet without a company of strong warriors, or at least a sword of Wolfen steel . . . Arnoddr?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Back up slowly.’

  Arn noticed Eilif’s ears were flicking back and forth to the multiple passages that branched away into the impenetrable darkness at the rear of the cavern. He shook his head – perhaps the blood-star leaves were making her hear things. Then there came a heavy sliding sound, and something else like giant knitting needles clicking, clacking together.

  He looked back towards the mouth of the cave – he had dragged Eilif quite a way inside; at the time, he wondered whether it was going to be enough to hide them. Now he wished he had stayed near the entrance.

  The heavy scuttling and clicking was getting nearer, and the stench of ammonia was becoming overpowering.

  ‘I can smell it,’ he whispered.

  Eilif sniffed. ‘All I can smell is that stinking fish – get rid of it.’

  Arn reached into his pocket; pulling out the slimy fish, he threw it to the other side of the cave. It bounced once, but before it could come to rest, the tip of an enormous spiked leg speared it to the ground.

  Arn’s breath caught in his throat and he felt the hair on the back of his neck stiffen. The same feeling of dread had an even more pronounced effect on his companion, whose fur stood on end from the top of her head.

  Arn was frozen in place as the enormous creature rose up over them. Glistening a deep red like oily blood, its segmented body resembled massive bulbs joined together, each sporting a pair of legs that ended in sharp, bristly points.

  The largest segment was a bulging, tear-shaped head, gaping open to display fiercely curved mandibles that clacked open and closed like some sort of machine for grinding wood . . . or bone.

  Arn watched in horror as the creature raised the fish to its mandibles and ground it into paste.

  He couldn’t see any eyes on the glistening head, only a pair of wrist-thick antennae waving in the air, perhaps tasting or sensing the surroundings. Arn was in no doubt that the thing was aware they were there.

  He whispered to Eilif, ‘It’s blind – does it track by sound or movement?’

  ‘Sound, smell, movement – it doesn’t need eyes in the dark depths of Hellheim.’ Eilif started to back up, then spoke without taking her eyes off the creature. ‘Run.’

  No sooner had she uttered the word then the thing swiftly positioned itself by the cave entrance; its huge teardrop head hung over them, mandibles dripping, almost daring them to try and pass underneath it.

  Eilif’s shoulders slumped and she turned to Arn. ‘Both may not make it, but one might have a chance.’ She put her hands together and twisted free a silver ring that was on her right middle finger. She held it up to kiss it, and Arn saw that on its surface was the raised face of a wolf, with red eyes. She grabbed his hand and pressed the ring into it.

  ‘I cannot run far now, even if I escaped the cave. Already the effects of the fenninlang leaves are wearing off. But you must make it back to Valkeryn and warn the brother Wolfen.’ She squeezed his hand. ‘This is the seal of the house of Grimvaldr – it will open any doors to you, even royal ones.’

  She turned wearily, searching the ground for a moment, then crouched to pick up a long, broken bone, and moved to place herself between Arn and the creature. He saw the weight of her fatigue pressing down on her, and felt a rush of anger. The thought of allowing her to sacrifice herself was so horrible, it made him grit his teeth.

  She spoke quickly over her shoulder. ‘Tell them I died with honour.’

  She staggered under the weight of her injuries. But despite his own fatigue, Arn felt the same sensation of flowing power through his limbs that he had felt on the hillside. He raised his hands to his face, fingers flexing, and studied them in the moonlight.

  The thought echoed in his mind: the moonlight.

  He spoke softy to Eilif’s back. ‘You can tell them yourself.’

  Reaching down to pick up a stone the size of his fist, Arn launched it at the creature. It struck one of the segmented sections behind its head, chipping off a large piece of its red-hued carapace.

  Eilif’s mouth dropped open. ‘Odin’s beard! That was a mighty throw, son of Man-kind. Only the heaviest blows can pierce the jormungandr’s armour.’ Eilif picked up a stone, and threw it as well, but it simply bounced away without any damage to the thing at all.

  The jormungandr hissed. The greenish liquid that dripped from its mandibles foamed and sizzled on the dirt floor of the cave.

  ‘Beware of its venom,’ Eilif warned him. ‘Its bite is poisonous.’

  ‘Thanks. I wasn’t worried until now.’

  The massive creature’s mandibles clicked together, and more of the caustic venom dripped to the ground. Eilif motioned towards it. ‘While the cave mouth is open, we have a chance. But when it closes . . .’ She let the words hang.

  Arn frowned. ‘Closes?’ He turned to Eilif, who pointed again to the creature that was still hanging above the cave mouth.

  ‘Watch.’

  As they watched, white foam sprayed forth from the creature’s head, sticking to the top of the cave mouth and hanging down in thick webbed strands. These stiffened and darkened on contact with the air. The jormungandr seemed to rest, but only for a few seconds. It swelled slightly, as if drawing a breath, and then spewed out still more web, sealing the cave mouth entirely.

  No sooner was this done, than the jormungandr hissed and pounced at them. Arn pushed Eilif to one side, and dived to the other. He kept rolling and moving quickly, but the injured Wolfen was slower. The effects of the drug were obviously starting to wear off.

  The thing dragged more of its segments up from the bowels of the cave, and where the first dozen or so had been the size of a small table, the ones now appearing were as large as a line of small cars linked together. Arn wondered briefly about the size of this thing that still coiled away into the cave’s depths, and he had a mental image of a giant hermit crab, using the entire mountain as its shell.

  The jormungandr had sensed that Eilif was its easiest prey and focused its attack on her. The massive body was already looming over her, its tusk-like mandibles drawn wide. Arn only had seconds more before she would be engulfed by the horrible monst
er from the Wolfen’s own version of hell.

  His instincts took over. Snatching up a heavy thigh bone lying near his feet, he ran hard at the beast and leapt upon it, bringing his makeshift club down on the back of its shell with a sickening crunch.

  Cracks and fissures crazed away from the wound in its back, which immediately started to ooze black blood. The jormungandr swung away from Eilif and coiled around on itself, whipping back and forth and throwing Arn to the ground. Hissing with rage, it raised the front part of its broad body high into the air.

  Arn set his feet, preparing to leap the opposite way to whichever angle the creature came at him. Instead, its enormous body began to vibrate. He heard Eilif’s cry of warning a few seconds too late to understand what she was trying to tell him.

  A globule of green slime flew from the mouth of the beast and struck Arn in the face. His eyes burned; tears streamed down his cheeks, and his vision dimmed to a shadowy blur. The head of the creature swam before him, now seeming to fill his entire world.

  This is gonna hurt, he thought, and closed his eyes.

  Arn was struck hard from the side, and cried out in fear – until he realised it wasn’t the clacking mandibles that had engulfed him, but his friend leaping and pulling him out of the way. Wrapping him in her arms, she dragged him behind some rocks.

  He murmured, ‘I can’t see.’

  She whispered urgently into his ear, ‘The poison of the jormungandr is paralysing, and blinding when sprayed into the eyes.’ She hugged him close. ‘It was a pleasure knowing you, Arnoddr – if only for a while.’

  The huge head of the jormungandr now loomed above both of them, but as Arn buried his face in the warm fur of the strange creature that held him, he felt her stiffen and turn her head.

  Eilif let out a long and eerie call. Then she paused, listening. The jormungandr was now so close, Arn could feel the air moving as its huge body hovered over them.

  She lifted her head and howled again, letting the notes echo and stretch inside the cave, and beyond. This time, there was an answer. And not one voice, but many. Arn could hear the sound of approaching hooves, then a huge crash as the webbing over the mouth of the cave was hacked to pieces.

  The jormungandr swung away from them, and even with his weakened eyes, Arn could see the Wolfen who first stepped through the mouth of the cave was twice the size of Eilif. Dressed in his armour, the warrior looked like an enormous medieval statue that had come to life. In his hand he held a sword as long as Arn himself.

  ‘Mighty Strom!’ Arn could hear the elation in Eilif’s voice.

  The Wolfen warrior let out a roar of anger, charging at the jormungandr with his enormous sword raised. He leapt in the air, sailing towards the gaping mandibles, and burying his blade to the hilt in the thrashing, tear-shaped head.

  Roars and cries of battle filled the dark cavern, and for Arn, in his semi-lucid and half-blind state, the rest unfolded in a frenzy of blurred movement and frightening, chaotic noise. The poison of the jormungandr must have been seeping into his brain, for he thought he could feel the mandibles of the beast closing around him, and lashed out with his arm. He felt the impact of his hand on steel, and heard a corresponding yelp of pain.

  ‘No, Arn,’ said Eilif, holding him tightly. ‘It’s my brother Wolfen. We are saved.’

  The pain from the poison was now so great, Arn could only guess that he was dying. He could see her – Becky Matthews, her long hair flowing as she turned to smile at him. But then her face began to change – her nose grew long, fur grew on her features, and her eyes became a silver ice blue.

  The images exploded into darkness, and Arn slumped against Eilif’s chest.

  *****

  Strom spread wide his arms and roared – it was both a victory cry and a warning to the monster as it slithered away. He watched it disappear, then spun to yell commands to the other warriors who had fanned out in the cave, or stood at the entrance to keep watch on the surrounding countryside.

  He knelt beside Eilif and placed one large gauntleted hand on her shoulder. ‘Is there any trouble you cannot find, little one?’

  She placed her hand over his. ‘How can there ever be trouble while you exist, my big friend?’ She smiled, then winced in pain.

  ‘Easy there.’ Strom called over his shoulder to one of his warriors, who ran to his side carrying a satchel, from which he extracted several bottles and pouches. He set about treating Eilif’s wounds.

  She pushed his hands away. ‘No, treat the Man-kind first.’

  ‘He can wait. Goran . . .’ Strom motioned to his warrior to continue working on Eilif.

  ‘No!’

  Strom growled with annoyance and looked at Arn. His nostrils flared as he took in his scent. ‘It is as the king said, a Man-kind . . . and not very nice to look at, all hairless like that. I suppose we can cover him up.’

  Eilif felt her anger rising. ‘He has a noble spirit, and he saved my life.’ She looked down at the unconscious Arn, and brushed his long dark hair from his face. ‘And I think he’s beautiful.’

  Strom grunted and nodded to the warrior, still poised with the medicinal salves in his hands.

  Goran pulled back each of Arn’s eyelids. He shook his head and spoke softly. ‘Not the same as a Canite eye – the medicine might restore his eyesight, or he might lose what little vision he has left.’

  Eilif spoke without hesitation. ‘Do it anyway. Without any treatment, he’ll end up as blind as a ground-worm.’

  She held Arn’s head tightly as Goran again lifted his eyelids, and poured a thick, milky liquid into each eye. He let the lids close, and then rubbed the eyes for a second or two. Then he bandaged Arn’s head.

  ‘There is nothing more we can do. It is in Odin’s hands now.’

  Strom motioned for Arn to be taken outside while Goran tended Eilif’s wounds.

  ‘What of the others? What of brother Isingarr?’

  Eilif gave no response other than a small shake of her head.

  Strom grunted. ‘It is as we expected. We must leave now; there are Slinkers everywhere. We’ve never seen them in such numbers, and working so closely together – almost like a pack.’

  Eilif grabbed his arm. ‘Yes, Slinkers – and others like nothing I have ever seen before. You must get me back to Valkeryn; I have important news for the king.’ She got to her feet. ‘Truly we face an enemy like no other.’

  Chapter 11

  Behold, Valkeryn

  Arn held onto the strange saddle and bounced in time with the jerking gallop of the horse. His back hurt, his thighs were chafed, and his butt cheeks felt like a thousand mules had kicked him. He’d never ridden a horse before, and after this he’d make sure he never did again.

  He wanted to reach up and touch his bandaged eyes. They itched terribly, but the pain in the centre of his head had subsided, and he hoped that was a good sign. Blindness was not something he relished, especially in a land where monsters really existed.

  The horse swerved suddenly, and he gripped the saddle tighter. Someone else held the reins of his horse – leading him, he expected, back to their homeland. A branch whipped over his head – they were travelling quickly, and he assumed the danger was still close by.

  Strange birdcalls, and the hum of insects gave the impression of mid morning. He could feel its warmth on his skin, and was aware of the strange scents of flowering plants, the many Wolfen around him, the horses, and the slight smell of fish that still permeated his jeans pocket.

  They slowed a little, and he felt another horse bump up against his. A small hand grabbed hold of his arm, and Eilif asked him gently, ‘How do you travel, Arnoddr-Sigarr? Are you well?’

  ‘Like I said, just call me Arn. I’m well – but uncomfortable. I don’t usually ride horses. Well, I don’t at all actually. Are we far from your home?’

  ‘We’ll arrive by high sun. I wish you could behold Valkeryn. The turrets and towers touch the sky, and its mighty granite walls are so polished that they shine golden
in the afternoon sunlight. Never have they been breached in all its history. You will like it there.’

  ‘What happens then? I mean, what happens to me?’ An image of being locked in a cage as some sort of Wolfen carnival freak leapt into Arn’s mind.

  ‘You are my friend. You will always be safe, Arnoddr . . . Arn. You may even get to meet the king. He’s nice, but a bit stern. I know he’ll like you.’ There was silence for a moment as if she was thinking. ‘Well, I think he will, anyway.’

  Chapter 12

  At Last a Worthy Foe

  Grimvaldr sat at his long table, with a circle of his most trusted warriors gathered close around him. Spread before him were the recovered remnants of the massacre of his warriors – smashed armour, torn chain mail, a punctured shield. It came as no surprise to him that Ragnar, brave and impetuous by nature, was first to break the silence.

  ‘We must hunt them down, sire. The Wolfen pack must have been ambushed and overwhelmed. Give me one hundred warriors and I guarantee I’ll bring you back the heads of these Panterran assassins.’

  Grimvaldr looked at the faces of the Wolfen surrounding him – all tall, strong, and scarred many times over – the greatest warriors in his kingdom. They had never known defeat in battle, and now hungered for revenge. Blind revenge, he thought.

  ‘Brave Ragnar, I know you would fight to the very gates of Hellheim for your Wolfen brothers, but sometimes it is better to know your enemy first. You will have your justice – we all will. But we need to know who it is that has declared war on us.’

  The king rose slowly to his feet. ‘I want six of our best scouts and hunters to track our enemy back into the dark forests. A group large enough to bring down so many of our best fighters must be either large or extremely formidable. And no matter how stealthy, they must have left a trail that can be followed.’

  ‘My lord, there is talk that they are wraiths, and . . .’