More gunfire followed.
“It sounds as if Carnehan’s boys have arrived just in time,” Moon grinned.
Brigadier Daniel Carnehan led from the front.
Munro had been able to show them exactly how they could use the Legion’s own tunnels against them. The sappers had set explosive charges – blasting through the defences that the Legion’s work teams had built – and now Carnehan’s Coldstream Guards could take the fight to the enemy.
His troops were dressed in civilian clothes; Carnehan knew that Sweet wouldn’t hesitate to execute Her Majesty if he saw just one soldier inside the Wall. This was against every army regulation but desperate times called for such desperate measures. The brigadier was well aware that this operation would either earn him the Victoria Cross or a court martial…if he made it out alive, of course.
Three Feathered Men swooped down in formation to intercept them, talons raised and ready for the kill. The soldiers opened fire, peppering the creatures’ wings with bullet holes, but this merely slowed them down.
Carnehan was unfazed. “Special gun crew!”
Two soldiers ran to the front, cradling a heavy weapon, like some sort of portable cannon. The first man kneeled, tube on his shoulder, hands on the trigger. The second man loaded a brass shell from his backpack into the breech, tapped the gunner’s arm and stepped clear. With a roar of gunpowder a weighted steel net shot out, entangling the leading Feathered Man so that it plummeted to the ground. One down…goodness knew how many more to go.
“Reload!” ordered the brigadier.
The Battle of London had truly begun.
Mr. Sweet was in the sanctuary – the centre of the Under and the black heart of everything the Legion stood for. An underground temple of evil.
The focal point of the chamber was a vast golden throne, with a back which towered ten feet into the air. It was there that the leaders of the Legion across the centuries had sat and allowed themselves to be adored. In front of the throne was the pit. A hole of impossible depth and impenetrable blackness. And at the bottom of that hole – kept there by the gate which had been locked centuries ago with the Gehenna Key – were the creatures. Awake and restless and tired of their prison.
Sweet almost fell into the arms of the throne, grateful that it was there to catch him. The Crown of Corruption was so very heavy that sometimes Sweet imagined his forehead must be bleeding just from the pressure of it. Then there were the Others, the spectres who stalked him day and night. Inside his head, whispering and laughing.
As ever, the vast hall of the sanctuary was illuminated by a thousand candles, revealing the huge carved columns that reached up to the vaulted ceiling and outlining the black lip of the pit. With every second however, the darkness was breeding. Water was dripping from between the stones of the roof and extinguishing the candles beneath. The hissing reminded Sweet of some enormous serpent, feeding in the shadows.
The vast doors of the sanctuary opened and a brigade of Legionnaires trooped in. There was a smaller figure in the midst of them. A red-headed boy.
This was the guest who Sweet had been waiting for.
This was the boy who had left him in the flames.
The boy who had stirred up London against him.
The boy who led the Watchers and threatened to destroy him.
“Ben Kingdom!” he roared.
Mickelwhite, Bedlam and the brigade slammed their fists to their chests in the Legion salute.
Claw Carter bent down and whispered in Ben’s ear. “I said I could get us to Sweet, my boy,” he said with a wink. “I’ll create a diversion and you get that crown.” And with that, Carter shoved Ben viciously, sending him reeling.
Ben released a deep sigh of relief even as he staggered. You had me going there.
“I’ve brought you Ben Kingdom,” said Carter, raising his voice.
“I brought him,” said Mickelwhite petulantly.
“Hold your tongue, boy,” said Carter. “Let the grown-ups talk.”
Carter kicked Ben in the back, propelling him forwards again.
Blimey, that hurt, thought Ben, as the professor’s boot made contact, but he could see what Carter was trying to do. Ben had to get close enough to Sweet to place the Hand of Heaven on the crown. Carter’s method was on the rough side, but it had been effective so far.
“Well?” said Carter. “Do you want to kill him or not?”
Ben allowed the next shove to knock him to his knees and he fell to the ground. He began to crawl towards Sweet. Just a little closer…
This was the moment. This was his destiny. It was now that he would defeat the Legion. Or die trying.
A rumbling sound sent tremors through the sanctuary. Ben could feel the vibrations rising up through his hands and knees as the floodwater continued to eat away at the foundations of the Under. But as well as the gurgling water and the ominous groans from the stonework, Ben could hear other noises… Disturbing noises he had never heard before, not even in nightmares, although that was where they belonged. Discordant clicks, eerie rattles. Noises of bones and teeth and claws.
First things first, Ben told himself firmly.
His right hand had been pulsing ever since he entered the Under. This close to Sweet and the crown, Ben could hardly control the trembling in his fingers. Part of him dreaded what would come next. What would happen when the Hand of Heaven made contact with the most evil object in—
Ben wasn’t able to complete that thought because a kick in the ribs from Mickelwhite knocked the wind out of him and sent him sprawling. No acting required.
He lay flat out. The hammering of blood inside his head and strange unnamable sounds that scratched at the edge of his imagination threatened to keep him there, but he could not, would not, stop now. Get in close. Grab the crown. Use the Hand to destroy it. That was all that mattered.
“You tried to kill me,” Sweet accused Carter.
“Snap,” Carter replied. “But surely bringing you this gutter-rat makes us friends again.” He punctuated his sentence with another sharp kick for Ben. The professor wasn’t using his full force, Ben knew, but it still felt bloomin’ realistic on the receiving end.
Ben used the opportunity to throw himself closer to Sweet.
Nearly there…
Still giving the impression that he was crippled with pain, Ben clambered up onto his hands and knees, gasping. He was right in front of Sweet now, but the throne was elevated and, even seated, Sweet was a tall man. Ben would need to move faster than he had ever done before… Carter and Sweet were still talking but their words disappeared as Ben focused everything on this leap. There wouldn’t be a second chance…
Calling on every ounce of his energy, Ben thrust himself upwards, reaching out with both hands…
Sweet’s face turned towards Ben as he lunged for the crown. Ben saw the unadulterated hatred in Sweet’s eyes as the big man twisted his body away from Ben’s trajectory.
Ben’s fingers came within inches of the crown but they clasped empty air. He fell against the throne and before he had time to recover, Sweet’s muscular arms were wrapped around him from behind. Ben was trapped in a bear hug that squeezed the air from his lungs. His arms were pinned to his sides and, as Sweet continued to increase the pressure, Ben felt a fluttering of panic inside his chest. Any moment now his ribs would break. Ben had no doubt that Sweet would keep crushing until there was no life left in his body.
“Ben Kingdom,” Sweet whispered. “I’ve dreamed of this moment.”
Ben tried to break Sweet’s hold, but every time he managed to twist in the big man’s grasp, Sweet only tightened his deadlock. Ben changed tack. He used his legs to kick at Sweet’s shins, even throwing his head backwards in an effort to catch Sweet a glancing blow.
Sweet laughed. “Please struggle,” he said. “It makes it much more fun for me.”
Lack of oxygen was making Ben’s head swim. He knew that he would be unconscious soon. This wasn’t how it was meant to turn out…
Just as Ben thought he was going to black out, Sweet changed his grip and flung Ben roughly to the ground. Ben sucked in a huge mouthful of air but he had no time to gather his wits before Sweet pulled him up by the hair and began to drag him towards the pit. They reached the edge and Sweet forced Ben to his knees before it, his fat fist still clenched in Ben’s hair.
“Look!” snarled Sweet. “When your Watchers are no more, all the world will be as dark as this.”
Ben didn’t want to look – hardly dared to – but he couldn’t help it. Although he scrunched his eyes shut, Ben found them opening…looking down into the pit. It seemed to call out to Ben, as if wishing him to fall.
Suddenly, Ben felt Sweet’s grip loosen. His stomach churned and Ben braced himself for the inevitable plunge. This was it…
But the death push never came.
Instead the meaty hand which had been clutching Ben by the scalp lost grip completely. With relief, Ben scrambled out of reach. Sweet was staggering in small circles. His murderous fingers fumbled at the back of his neck, until they finally plucked a tiny missile from his skin.
“Deathstalker scorpion venom,” said Carter cheerily, taking a blowpipe from his mouth. “An old favourite. Sweet made it too easy for me, though. Leaning over you with his fat neck exposed like that, he might as well paint a target on it.”
Mickelwhite nudged his fellow Legionnaires, drawing his own sword. “Don’t just stand there, you imbeciles,” he snarled.
But Carter was prepared, and moved to intercept. “Now’s your chance, Ben!”
Sweet fell to his knees as the poison spread through his system. Sweet’s eyes blazed death at Ben, but the big man’s body would no longer obey him. The great and mighty King Oliver the Merciless was helpless.
Ben took a step forwards… He reached out with both hands…and seized the Crown of Corruption from Sweet’s head.
Instantly Ben felt the shock of holding such a foul and evil object. Just touching the thing made Ben’s skin crawl. Made from the thirty Coins of Judas. Steeped in misery and blood, imbued with the selfish longings of generations. It radiated wickedness.
Ben had carried one Coin for a while and its influence had almost destroyed him. He had hurt people, and enjoyed it. The Coin had made him feel angry and spiteful and viciously alive.
The crown had to be destroyed.
Across the room Ben could see Carter hacking through the Legionnaires with his claw, sending them running in terror for the door. Standing beside the pit, trembling with raw emotion, Ben let go of the crown with his left hand so that he was holding it in his right hand alone. The Hand of Heaven.
And then the power hit.
Ben had no idea where the light came from, but it was so intense that he had to shield his own eyes while it blazed. This was the light of the sun, the fierce light of metal in the furnace, light so bright that it hurt. In the grip of the Hand of Heaven, the Coins began to bubble and liquefy. And scream. Ben hadn’t been expecting that.
Even as they melted the Coins resisted their fate, the silver twisting and turning as if it might escape. Worse, as he squinted through his fingers, Ben saw faces appear then disappear on each of the Coins. Men. Women. Young. Old. Their tormented expressions showed their desperate longing on the particular Coin that had entrapped them.
Ben saw one Coin morph into a face which terrified him: his own.
He realized then that these were the faces of the Coin carriers. All the people down the ages who had betrayed the good inside themselves for the empty promises of the Judas silver.
Ben’s face dissolved and became Ruby Johnson’s. Then her face faded to be replaced by Mr. Sweet’s. Then, with a final hissing spit, all of the Coins melted away into nothing.
Ben lowered his hand and the last remnants of the Crown of Corruption dripped from his fingers into the depths of the pit.
Sweet gave an animal howl of separation and loss. He lurched to his feet and made a desperate grab for the molten droplets of silver.
Ben could only watch as the man who had terrorized London plunged into the all-consuming darkness of the pit, his cloak flapping behind him like broken wings.
Ben closed his eyes, exhausted and overwhelmed. He saw Mother Shepherd in his imagination. And Josiah. And his own dear mother. And for the first time he knew that they would have been proud of him.
Totally spent, Ben slumped down on his backside in time to see Mickelwhite and the last of his Legionnaires cowardly scurrying out of the sanctuary. Equally exhausted from his exertions, Carter walked around the pit and came to sit beside Ben.
“We did it,” said Ben, retrieving his fallen billycock, a smile filling his face.
“You did it,” said Carter. “This is your victory, Benjamin Kingdom.”
Ben could have stayed there and basked in the moment, but he couldn’t forget his friends on the surface and the battles that they were fighting. Wearily, he rose to his feet, extending his hand to haul Carter upright too.
The huge sanctuary doors creaked open and a chill ran through Ben’s soul. A hulking presence entered the chamber…
“Grey Wing,” said Carter.
The Feathered Man extended his battle-scarred wings above him until they filled the doorway. And beneath the shadow of those wings was a girl.
“Ruby!” Ben gasped.
“Ben!” she called to him. “Ben!”
That was when all Hell broke loose.
Hans awoke and found himself in a war zone. His ears were instantly assailed by shouts and screams from the streets below. He could hear all the sounds of battle: fear, anger, gunfire and, piercing through it all, the shrieking of the Feathered Men.
As weak as a kitten, Hans struggled to sit.
“I say, steady on, old chap,” said Valentine. “You’ve had a bit of a rough time.”
Hans had no clear memory of where he was or how he had got there. He screwed his eyes shut and saw Mr. Sweet’s face leering over him. He cried out in pain as he felt the long fingers of Sweet’s domination raking through his mind.
And then Sweet’s control was abruptly snapped.
Three images rose to the surface, filtering through the confusion in his brain as if they had been held on the seabed by heavy weights and had suddenly broken free.
Ben.
Key.
Danger!
Hans grasped Valentine by the lapels. “Where is Ben?” he shouted. “Tell me!”
“He’s gone with Carter to pay a final house call on Mr. Sweet.”
“The key? What happened to the key I brought?”
“Lucy and Mr. Moon have got it.”
Hans was on his feet and running for the edge of the roof before Valentine could say a word to stop him.
“It’s a trap!” Hans shouted. “We must stop them – they are walking into the jaws of doom!”
“So far, so good,” said Lucy.
If you ignored the filthy water that they were wading through. And the rats that periodically mistook their legs for food. And the occasional body that they found, floating face down in the Under.
Moon rolled his blind eyes.
“Well,” Lucy conceded, “you know what I mean.”
What was definitely good was the map that Hans had provided for them. And the key. Lucy felt its reassuring weight in her pocket. It was the little things that made prison breaks so much easier.
But they had to get to Her Majesty first.
The floodwater had grown steadily deeper and the Under was groaning beneath the strain. The Under had remained secret and secure below the city streets for hundreds of years, but water had a power and a perseverance which nothing in nature could defy. Waves ground rocks into sand. Rain reduced mountains to foothills. And floods swept away everything in their path.
Even as they progressed down the tunnel, water was searching for a way to bring that tunnel down on their heads. Seeping through the soil. Squeezing between cracks, weakening mortar, loosening bricks.
Wi
th a shuddering rasp, a chunk of masonry came free from the ceiling a few feet in front them. It fell with a crash, sending a tidal wave through the floodwater.
Lucy let out a long breath. “That was too close for my liking.”
Clutching the damp map in one hand and her lantern in the other, Lucy struggled on beside Moon, fighting against the water with every step. Their twisting, turning journey had shown them that the tunnels undulated. In one passage they might be up to their ankles and in the next up to their waists. But from what she could make out, the final passageway headed down into the deeper water again.
Lucy grabbed a plank of wood that was floating down the corridor and planted her lamp squarely on the top. “We might need this,” she said.
Soon the water was at shoulder height and they pushed the plank ahead of them like a raft, their legs kicking out behind.
“Do you think that Her Majesty…?” Lucy couldn’t bring herself to finish the question, her teeth rattling with the cold. Time was running out. It surely wouldn’t be long before the water level reached the roof. But they were almost there.
“London breeds tough old girls,” said Moon. His voice drifted off slightly and Lucy wondered whether he was thinking of Queen Victoria or Mother Shepherd.
A few more steps and, according to the map, they were in the right place. Half-submerged cell doors lined the corridor. Could an old woman really have survived down here?
They hadn’t encountered any Legionnaires in the abandoned and waterlogged labyrinth and the moment for caution had passed. “Your Majesty!” Lucy shouted. “Your Majesty, we’re here to rescue you!”
“Lucy Lambert!” a voice replied. A deep, powerful voice that struck a chord in Lucy’s heart. It couldn’t be…
Lucy and Moon swam for all they were worth. Lucy knew that she was crying but didn’t really care. Was the Weeping Man alive?
“Josiah!” Lucy shouted, her voice cracking with emotion. “We thought you were…we didn’t know… Where are you?”
“Here,” said Josiah, and Lucy’s torch found a familiar hand emerging from between the bars of a prison cell door.
The City of Fear Page 17
