The Dark Portal (The Gryphon Chronicles, Book 3)

by E. G. Foley

  He’d better come up with something good.

  Because if Aunt Ramona found out about this, the old bird would have a fit, and as usual, he would somehow end up getting blamed.

  With a harrumph under his breath, Jake stalked back into the dining hall, upset that now he’d also have to put the Oubliette spell on these kids.

  Perfect. After all that they had been through, now he’d have to do the mind-wipe spell on them.

  That was the usual protocol that Aunt Ramona had taught him when regular folk saw something that they shouldn’t. It would make them forget.

  But when Jake went in and bent down amid the circle of younger children sitting around on the floor, he looked at their pinched, drawn, pale, hungry faces, and realized he didn’t have the heart to take it away from them—that little taste of wonder that Dani O’Dell had just shared with them.

  Instead, he hid his frustration, put on a fake, enthusiastic smile and gathered them around closer, then made a game of swearing them all to secrecy.

  Fortunately, he was still an accomplished liar.

  He told them the Illuminium was one of Archie’s scientific projects, a boring old chemical compound of aluminum and phosphorus or something. But he warned that this invention was still waiting on its official government patent, so they mustn’t tell anyone, or some other scientist might try to steal Archie’s idea.

  Once they understood this, the children eagerly agreed, much to Jake’s relief. They seemed thrilled to share in the duty of keeping Archie’s secret.

  Finally satisfied they’d keep their little mouths shut, Jake nodded and left them.

  “At last. What took you so long?” Garnock huffed when Mischief and Mayhem finally returned. They did not look too much the worse for wear. “Did you get it?”

  Mischief jumped up onto Mayhem’s head and perched there, proudly holding out the ring of power on his dusty gray palm.

  “Ah, ha, ha, good boy!” Garnock swirled closer with a gloating laugh, but Mayhem let out a low, indignant yowl, as if to say, What about me? “Yes, yes, of course, I meant both of you.”

  Mayhem snuffled at this blatant show of favoritism.

  Garnock tried to lift the ring off the little gargoyle’s cupped gray palm, but alas, as a spirit, he could not pick it up.

  He uttered a low-toned spell to levitate it; Mischief’s eyes widened as the ring floated up and spun slowly in midair while Garnock admired it.

  “I will wear this again,” he vowed. “As soon as I have my body back. And believe you me, I will use it well.” When his concentration broke, the ring plopped out of the air back into the imp’s hand. “Keep it safe for me until it’s time.”

  Mischief bobbed his head and clutched it.

  “I’m going back to the school. I’m starting to feel peckish. I need to feed again. You two stay out of sight. You’ve done well for today, but I’m afraid you’re going to have to go back down there—no whining!” he scolded Mischief when he complained.

  “Tomorrow, I want you to go back to my workshop and then slip through the Portal and start bringing more of your brethren through to our side, in case I need them.

  “Have them hide in the mine until I’m ready to mobilize my army,” he said in a sinister tone. Then he frowned. “Mischief, be careful with that thing! How many times have I told you a ring of power isn’t a toy? Stop fooling around!”

  His warning came a bit too late, for Mischief had just given the ring some sort of order: In turn, it sent him shooting backwards twenty yards across the grove.

  He landed with a yelp.

  Mayhem laughed heartily.

  Garnock sighed and shook his ghostly skull of a head at their antics, then made his way back to the Harris Mine School.

  It was time to feed again on more of the students’ life-force.

  Once he had preyed on a total of one hundred souls, the spell to bring him fully back to life would almost be complete. And then…his first order of business?

  Revenge on whatever remained of the Lightriders.

  Naturally.

  PART III

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Waterfall Village

  Jake couldn’t believe he had such an impressive piece of Nature on his property.

  White Lace Falls plunged a hundred feet over the cliff’s edge, breaking into five whitewater plumes that pounded the boulders.

  Where the last glow of sunset filtered through the spray, the light shattered into a rainbow that hovered in the mist between the thundering cascades.

  It was breathtaking, tucked away within the sprawling wooded acreage of Plas-y-Fforest. Because the river with the waterfall cut through his lands, Jake’s ancestors had been able to let the dwarves live here in privacy for an age.

  Well, there’s the waterfall, Jake thought, but peering eagerly out the carriage window, he did not see signs yet of any dwarf village.

  “Are we here?” Archie asked when Nimbus brought the coach to a halt beside a grassy clearing on the banks of the river’s lower run.

  “We must be,” Isabelle said.

  This was confirmed when the house-brownie coachman came and got the door for them. Everyone climbed out dressed in their best finery for the occasion of the dwarves’ celebration.

  The girls shone like jewels in satin gowns with puffy skirts that nearly reached the ground. Thankfully, the dwarves’ reception was not quite formal enough for the boys to wear tuxedoes. Instead, they had donned the nicest trousers, waistcoats, and jackets they had brought.

  Still, without Henry to tie his complicated red cravat, Jake had had to resort to having Miss Helena do it. Once the knot of his neckcloth was properly sorted out and smoothed down, he thought he looked pretty dashed smart, if he said so himself.

  Too bad Petunia Harris couldn’t see him, he had thought, mugging in the mirror before they had left the cottage. Ha! Well, she’d get her chance soon.

  Derek marched ahead of them to the edge of the river, having somehow found the strength to stop staring at Miss Helena. The half-French governess admittedly looked fetching in her dark purple bustle-gown and elbow gloves, with her black hair all pinned up and a dark ribbon elegantly fitted around her neck.

  Truthfully, out here in Nature, though, it seemed like a better place for them to be wearing the hiking boots Derek had insisted on when they had had their tour of the goldmine, Jake thought.

  He wasn’t quite sure what was going on when Derek nodded, standing at the river’s edge, and gestured to Nimbus.

  Nimbus took his tin traffic horn out of its holder on top of the carriage and blew it.

  Jake surmised that this was some sort of signal.

  Derek beckoned to them. “Everyone, follow me. Mind your step.” He proceeded to walk out onto the stepping stones that led into the middle of the river.

  Jake and Archie exchanged a startled glance.

  “Come along, it’s quite safe,” Derek said.

  The boys rushed forward, though, even to Jake, it seemed dicey to undertake this little obstacle course when they were all dressed up.

  The girls looked appalled at the prospect of getting their fancy gowns splashed—or worse, falling into the muddy river.

  Which Jake thought might be kind of amusing. Especially since he and Dani O’Dell still weren’t speaking.

  Fortunately, however, Miss Helena was right behind them, moving with her particular cat-like grace, just in case either of the young ladies should wobble.

  As it turned out, the stepping stones were very easy to walk on—close enough together for even a dwarf’s short strides.

  The constant rumble of the falls grew louder as the group picked their way out toward the middle of the river.

  All around them, the water pooled and swirled in eddies here and there. Old fallen logs trapped it in spots, creating tranquil little shallows, where fish drifted.

  “So, why are we doing this?” Jake called to Derek when he could no longer contain his curiosity.

  The Guardi
an merely smiled over his shoulder, stopping when he reached the center of the river, but it was Archie who first grasped the answer.

  “Look! The waterfall’s slowing,” he said.

  Jake blinked. “It looks like the water’s shutting off.”

  “No, the flows are merely being redirected. See? Sluice gates on the upper river temporarily channel the water into the four side flows. That’ll leave the middle one dry in a moment. Then we can go in,” Archie said brightly.

  “The dwarf village is underneath the waterfall?” Dani exclaimed.

  “Behind it,” Derek said with a grin. “Surprise.”

  Sure enough, as they watched, the middle cascade trickled off, while the four remaining falls—two on each side—poured down all the stronger as the water was redirected.

  “The dwarves are really excellent engineers,” Archie murmured.

  Derek nodded in agreement, but Jake just stared in astonishment as the waterfall parted like theatre curtains, revealing the grand arched doorway to the dwarves’ secret realm.

  “How do we get up there?” Isabelle asked, cupping her hands around her hair in an effort to protect her golden curls from the mist and spray around the falls.

  It was a good question.

  The arched entrance to Waterfall Village was set about thirty feet up on the sheer rock face of the cliff, obviously for purposes of defense.

  Jake didn’t see any way to scale it. No steps, no bridge, no ladder, nothing.

  “Surely they’re not going to make us climb?” Isabelle asked in dismay.

  The Guardian was apparently enjoying keeping them all in suspense. “Let’s hope not, hmm?” he teased.

  Suddenly, a metallic cranking sound filled the air, and a mechanical platform rolled out from underneath the archway, right out of the cliff face.

  When it reached its full length—about the size of a mattress—another layer of metal dropped out neatly from under it and likewise trundled forward. Again and again, this repeated with a series of loud metallic thuds. Clank, clank, clank, the long, broad platforms came clattering down and toward them, creating a dark metal staircase with a red carpet down the middle.

  By this means, guests could simply walk up to the entrance of Waterfall Village.

  “Voila,” Derek said.

  “How do you like that!” Archie laughed as the bottom step locked into place with a bang right at their feet.

  “After you.” Derek gestured politely to the boys to go ahead of him. They did.

  Then he waited for the young ladies, who all looked exceedingly relieved. Miss Helena’s eyes twinkled as she placed her gloved fingers on Derek’s offered hand, lifted the hem of her long skirts, and stepped gracefully onto the bottom stair.

  When they had all moved safely off the stepping stones onto the strange mechanical stairway, they walked up in a group. Each metal stair retracted behind them, though not as quickly as they had rolled out.

  Jake looked over the edge at the frothing river as they went closer to the falls. The breeze from the rumbling cascades blew his forelock around. “Brilliant.”

  When they reached the top and stepped through the archway, the stairs disappeared behind them, and somewhere on the upper river, the sluice gates must have been cranked open again, for the main waterfall resumed flowing, arcing over them, and tumbling ceaselessly behind their backs. It was marvelous. Jake stared in wonder at the back of the waterfall.

  They were behind it now, invisible to the outer world.

  Even more unusual was the sight before them: hundreds of dwarves waiting to greet them. Emrys trudged out with a broad grin, opening his arms wide in a gesture of welcome. Old Ufudd came hurrying along a step behind him.

  Miss Helena turned quickly to the four of them. “Children, get into position as we discussed. We are going to meet the dignitaries on the receiving line.”

  Jake turned to the nearest girl, who happened to be Dani, and offered her his arm to escort her in, as the governess had instructed would be expected of them.

  He lifted an eyebrow, however, when the carrot-head turned up her freckled nose and walked away, going over to take Archie’s arm, instead.

  “Fine,” Jake muttered with a scowl. Thankfully, Isabelle did not shun him.

  At the head of the row, Miss Helena took Derek’s arm; the Guardian stood ramrod straight.

  The dwarves were waiting for them. It was time to parade down the receiving line, nodding cordially to the dwarf bigwigs and shaking their little strong hands here and there as they went.

  Isabelle was much better at all this than he was, smiling and waving to the crowd like a blasted royal princess. Behind them, Dani and Archie were both waving madly everywhere—pair of cheerful little widgeons, Jake thought. It was all he could do not to scowl after Dani’s snub, but that would look haughty and rude. So he put a smile on his face.

  Honestly, though, it was bad enough still having Red peeved at him without Dani also joining the ranks of those against him.

  Just then, the Gryphon bounded over to join their party, landing a few feet away from Jake.

  Jake looked over hopefully. The noble beast folded his magnificent scarlet wings against his tawny lion-back and walked along proudly beside them in their formal parade.

  Jake noticed that the dwarves had honored Red with a gold medal of some kind.

  It hung from a blue ribbon around the Gryphon’s neck.

  They sure love their mighty Crafanc, he thought in amusement, and the feeling was obviously mutual.

  Red seemed very happy here in Waterfall Village. That realization actually came as a relief, for it dawned on Jake that maybe he had misunderstood.

  Maybe Red was not so much avoiding him as choosing to spend as much time as possible with his dwarf friends before it was time to go back to England.

  I hope so, Jake thought. He could certainly see why Red liked it here.

  Waterfall Village was snug and dry and extremely cozy. It was underground, true, and a little dim for Jake’s tastes, lit only by streetlamps and hanging lanterns everywhere, but it seemed to suit the mining folk who dwelled there, and it was they who made it warm.

  The dwarves thronged the village center, crowding around to see their guests, waving and yelling friendly hellos.

  Jake marveled at everything, craning his neck to look around in all directions.

  The village center sat under a tall, domed ceiling of hollowed-out rock, just like the Atrium back at the goldmine. Under this soaring space, it had all the amenities of an ordinary village, except everything seemed child-sized.

  A quaint fountain splashed in the middle of the village square; market stalls sold food around the edges. A clock-tower overlooked the scene, and little railroad tracks ran past for the crazy mining carts that pulled in each morning to take the men to work.

  Above all this, which sat on the ground level, the upper walls of the surrounding dome were honeycombed with the dwarves’ countless shops and their homes—charming cubbyholes with rounded doors and little flowerboxes on some of the windows. (Shade plants, Jake presumed.)

  Everywhere, little ladders and stairways carved into the rock wound their way up the walls; the open space above was crisscrossed with catwalks and wooden footbridges, just like at the mine.

  Straight ahead, the back wall of the dome apparently served as the dwarves’ shopping arcade. Jake read the quaint wooden signs for each shop in fascination: Apothecary, Barber, Baker, Butcher, Cobbler – Shoes and Boots, Tinker – Mining Tools and Axes Sharpened Here! Chandler – Candles and Lanterns, Rag & Bone Man, and up at the top, a Smokehouse with a chimney to the surface.

  He raised his eyebrows at the sign for the Bat Catcher. Prompt and Affordable Pest Removal.

  Then Jake grinned as he realized that while most villages aboveground had rat catchers, people who lived in underground caves were more likely to need a bat catcher.

  Well, that makes sense, he thought.

  Then they arrived by the fountain, where
chairs had been set up for them and a raised platform awaited the official welcome speeches.

  As soon as the large visitors sat down, the little mayor climbed up onto the platform and spoke with the long-winded pomp of a politician twice his size.

  The speech was rather boring, but Jake was just glad he wasn’t the one who had to give it.

  After the speech came the songs, of course. First, choirs sang rapturous, mesmerizing tunes that fairly put Jake and the others in a trance.

  Then came the bagpipers and drummers in their kilts.

  Their rousing battle music reverberated so loudly under the dome that they drowned out the constant rumble of the waterfall in the background.

  Thunderous applause resounded when their concert was done. With the show over, refreshments were served and it was finally time to socialize. They were charmed to meet Master Emrys’s wife and two kids—a boy and girl, ages six and four—and their family dog, a miniature Dachshund.

  “His breed doesn’t mind being underground, do you, boy?” Emrys said fondly.

  The funny little wiener dog wagged his tail with a big canine smile, and Jake hid his amusement to see how the gruff mine boss melted over his dog, possibly more than he did over his children.

  “Oh, you want to meet everybody, eh?” Emrys picked up the Dachshund, then they all crowded around to pet the dog while the junior Emryses went tearing off to get some of the honey cakes and sweet biscuits that were presently being served on scaled-down plates and dwarf-sized cups.

  His wife couldn’t stay long, either. She hurried off to get in line for the Ladies’ Axe-Throwing Contest.

  “She can use an axe?” Archie exclaimed.

  “Of course she can, she’s a good dwarf woman! Quite deadly, actually.”

  “Blimey,” said Jake.

  “Ah, our people have always had to be ready to fight,” Emrys told them. “Why, look at us! Larger folk always start trouble with us, thinking we might be an easy target—especially since everybody knows we’ve always had a way with gold and precious stones. We’ve had to teach bigger folk a lesson many times over.”