The Beasts of Upton Puddle

by Simon West-Bulford

  The

  Beasts of

  UPTON

  PUDDLE

  Published 2013 by Medallion Press, Inc.

  The MEDALLION PRESS LOGO

  is a registered trademark of Medallion Press, Inc.

  Copyright © 2013 by Simon West-Bulford

  Cover illustration by Chase Stone | © Chase Stone, 2013

  Edited by Emily Steele

  Illustrations by James Tampa

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission of the publisher, except where permitted by law.

  Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictionally. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Typeset in Adobe Garamond Pro

  ISBN# 978-160542520-7

  ISBN# 978-160542594-8

  DEDICATION

  For my wife, Ruth,

  who still smiles when I draw monsters

  and write about them!

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  With special thanks to my wife, Ruth, and also to Kirstie, Charlotte, Carrie-Ann and Andy, Jenny, Gill, Jennie, Bev, Michelle, Mo, and a whole host of other friends too numerous to mention. Your encouragement and enthusiasm when I first wrote this book have always stayed with me.

  Also a massive thanks to everyone at Write Club, especially Jason Heim, Caleb Ross, Paul Eckert, Anthony David Jaques, Richard Thomas, Mlaz Corbier, and Nik Korpon. Your encouragement, advice, and critiquing were amazing.

  Thanks also to everyone at Chronicles, where the world of Pyronesia first blossomed.

  And also a huge thanks to Medallion, especially Emily Steele, who put the sparkle into my words and is fantastic to work with.

  Thank you!

  PROLOGUE

  1962—Location Unknown

  One more minute and Ronnie would be free from the stifling heat of the cavern. Five more minutes after that and she would be back on the boat, sailing home.

  Safe. Alive.

  But that was not going to happen now. There was a terrible moment when Ronnie thought she might actually pretend that she heard nothing—that she was the only one left alive and could run away to safety.

  But the cry was unmistakable.

  “Ronnie! Help!” It was weaker the second time, with subtle tones of defeat.

  Shielding her eyes from the sun, she stole a final glimpse of the island she loved so dearly. Framed perfectly by the cavern mouth, the bay stood, gentle waves lapping on its virgin-white beach. And sweeping back in a huge rocky crescent, the swelling green hills that nurtured the untroubled wildlife tempted her to abandon any remaining hope. In a place of such unspoiled beauty, the horror of the past two hours could almost be considered a lie. But the truth forced her back into the cavern with terrible cruelty.

  A coiling jet of fire seared the air above. A warning shot.

  “I’m coming, Heinrich,” she called.

  It was on the tip of her tongue to ask if he was hurt, but the answer was obvious. She saw exactly what happened, and it was a miracle he was still alive at all.

  A roar like the sound of a freight train rushing through a tunnel shook the cave walls, but she carried on. No turning back. She’d rescue Heinrich or die trying. Probably the latter.

  The mouth of the larger cavern loomed ahead—a hub area connecting a series of vast underground tunnels and caves, richly embedded with diamond deposits and lush natural architecture. Earlier that day it was a place of popping champagne corks and snapping group photographs. Now all she expected to find when she got back inside were smouldering bones and the stench of death.

  Testing not only her balance but her nerves too, she grabbed at the rock face to steady herself, ready to bite back the pain radiating from her torn ankle before running inside. Her skin blistered when she touched the hard surface, and at once she pulled away, feeling a rush of cold adrenaline as her foot took all her weight. She conceded a small yelp, but the ache was bearable, and without pausing for thought, Ronnie half ran, half hobbled toward the hub area.

  Great rhythmic thuds crashed somewhere ahead and above her, each one followed by a fiery snort of breath. It was coming.

  “Ronnie!” It was more a scream than a cry for help that time.

  “Almost there! Don’t move! If you can see it, don’t provoke it!”

  “Quickly!”

  Ronnie tripped as she entered the area. Cursing at the sudden pain, she glanced back at the cause and saw the jutting handle of a barrow they had brought in earlier. It was full to the brim with diamonds, each one sparkling with fiery brilliance, illuminated by the tiny flames lapping the roof.

  The roar came again.

  Flinching, Ronnie glanced around the cavern, desperate to find Heinrich. All she could see were the charred remains of their equipment blasted across the ground. Oscilloscopes and clinometers smashed; notebooks, specimen bags, and tools scattered. And, of course, the bodies.

  Then she saw him. A hulk of a man now reduced to a battered wreck, Heinrich lay sprawled in the blackened dirt next to some storage cases, a red sheen covering one side of his face, one leg twisted underneath him. Something was huddled between his shuddering arms beneath his burnt trench coat.

  “Heinrich!” She scrambled across ash and broken glass to reach him, suppressing a shriek when he revealed what hid beneath his coat. A small boy, streaked with dirt, lay there shivering. He stared directly ahead—the look of shell shock Ronnie had seen so many times as a girl in the war—but then she saw. Two bodies, burned almost beyond recognition, lay against another barrow filled with diamonds.

  “There were supposed to be no children on this expedition.” Heinrich sobbed. “He hid himself away to be with . . . to be with . . .”

  Ronnie could not look at the bodies for another moment. She fought back a surge of despair as she closed her stinging eyes.

  “Get him out of here, Ronnie. Before—”

  The dull thud of something heavy impacting the ground interrupted them, and Ronnie, knowing precisely what she would see, turned to look.

  A fluttering of ash churned around a huge reptilian head, larger than a truck, dark red like congealed blood. Two great eyes, each a river-green vortex of light, shone through the settling cloud.

  Ronnie drew in a faltering breath and stifled it, as though some primal inst
inct told her any movement might be the last she made.

  As if it sensed her fear, the beast slowly lifted the top half of its jaw to reveal a pink thorny tongue and an explosion of twisted grey fangs. A blast of earthy breath ruffled Ronnie’s hair as another roar blasted out.

  Behind Ronnie, Heinrich moaned, but she dared not turn.

  The jaws clamped shut, and the head, still pressed to the ground, began a fluid zigzag motion toward them. A thick scaly neck trailed behind it, leading into one of the connecting caverns ten feet above. It was then that Ronnie realized just how huge this creature was.

  Two sizeable forearms dragged a huge body out from the hole, and with a sound not unlike the snapping of a hundred wet branches, an intimidating set of leathery wings unfolded. With its head still flat to the ground, back arched, and wings fully extended, the enormous lizard was a terrifying sight.

  “Such a sudden end for so magnificent a venture,” Heinrich said quietly.

  From somewhere, Ronnie managed to find the strength to steady her shaking as she said what might be her final words. “Ah, Heinrich, but how many people can say they have lived to see a real dragon?”

  “Don’t you mean dragons, Ronnie?”

  Ronnie was about to ask what he meant when two more reptilian heads, much smaller than the first, appeared from behind the enormous wings, hissing in defiance.

  “Hatchlings,” she gasped. “No wonder it attacked so ferociously.”

  “A breeding colony?”

  “Exactly.”

  “Could we have stumbled upon a more dangerous place?”

  “We have only one chance to survive this,” she said, staring at the boy cowering within Heinrich’s coat.

  “No!”

  “Bring the boy. Now.”

  ONE

  Joe Copper yawned a fourth time, switched off his mobile phone, and listened for birdsong, bemused. Most Sunday mornings, he would finish his paper round by five thirty, drag his old trolley into the woods, slump against his favorite tree stump, and fall asleep listening to the unhurried noises of nature. Most of the other twelve-year-old boys he knew couldn’t care less about wildlife. But to Joe, Ringwood Forest, aglow with the blush of first light and alive with the dawn chorus, was the most wonderful place on earth.

  This Sunday was different. The lull of sleep beckoned him as it always did, but not a single chirp or whistle could be heard. A brooding silence smothered the forest, as if everything living had paused to stare at something in astonishment.

  And that wasn’t the only mystery Joe had encountered since he started his day. At exactly three minutes past five every Sunday, Joe delivered the Telegraph to the Gordon residence. Today he did just that. Peering cautiously through the black bars of the gate, as always, he pushed the newspaper into the letterbox and braced for the inevitable maniacal barking from their oversized rottweiler. As far back as he could remember, it was the only animal that had ever disliked him. On several occasions, the ferocious dog almost took a chunk out of him as it rammed its spittle-covered jaws through the gate, but oddly enough, there was no sign of the animal today.

  Joe fought his sagging eyelids, sucked in another yawn, and smiled despite the strange atmosphere. The aroma of baking bread from Mrs. Parkin’s home bakery near the edge of the woods reminded him that Upton Puddle would always hold fond memories—especially on a Sunday. Collecting rejected loaves from her backyard was one of the many things that made his paper round such a pleasurable routine. He stared through the trees, straining for a glimpse of the puffy clouds rising from her chimney, but these days it was hard to see. A huge tower block loomed on the far side of the woods, swallowing the sunrise and spoiling Joe’s view. It soared far above the tips of the ancient oak trees, glowering at the forest with its deep red brickwork and long shadow. Joe hated it.

  Less than a year ago, Redwar Industries—a research company with a monstrous appetite—had turned its hungry eye on the unassuming village of Upton Puddle and built its head office right in the heart of the community. Each passing month the industrial park chewed its way through the woodland, replacing trees with scaffolding and ponds with concrete and parking lots. Maybe it was Redwar Industrial Park that had frightened off all the animals.

  Joe kept his smile, trying to ignore the presence of the Redwar building. He rubbed the heel of a hand into one eye and relaxed into a final yawn before the early morning snooze took him.

  Perhaps it was the uncanny silence or the lingering thoughts of Redwar’s building that caused Joe’s dreams to be so strange. Whatever the reason, Joe was startled by how real it all seemed. But even more startling was the fact that he actually knew he was dreaming—it was a rare treat. Having never left the shores of England, Joe didn’t recognize the tropical surroundings of his dream world, but he instinctively knew he was walking on the beach of an island far from home. Scorching sand burned the soles of his bare feet, and a hot gale tugged at his ragged clothes as he pressed forward. Squinting through fierce sunlight, Joe took in the impressive landscape. Gaping caverns lined the edges of a crescent-shaped cliff edge to his left. Ruling the horizon above the caves, a structure stood that Joe knew from the world outside his dreams.

  A vast tower, wider and taller than any he had seen before, weaved a twisted path into the sky, its tip obscured by clouds. Enormous extensions reached at crooked angles from the walls, and it was then that Joe realized the whole thing looked exactly like a gigantic, leafless tree. It was even made of wood, as if the designers had decided to cut down all the trees on the island to construct one monstrous imitation in the center. Even knowing he was in the middle of a dream, Joe was curious and quickened his pace, determined to find out who or what lived inside before he woke up.

  Joe stopped, aghast, when the details became clearer. At the end of each branch, objects that looked like bunched grapes from a distance revealed themselves to be clumps of bulbous eyes, all staring intently at Joe. Then came a series of terrible sounds. A roar of fire belched from the caverns, forcing Joe to stagger backwards, shielding himself from the heat. A thundering vibration of galloping feet and terrified yelps drove Joe into a panicking sprint away from the cliffs and toward the sea. He could not see the source of the sounds, but it was enough to know they were heading his way. It was time to wake up.

  Joe lurched from the tree stump, half dazed and still raw with alarm and bewilderment. It took a second to realize that some of the sounds still echoing in his thoughts were not just creations of his imagination but were actually happening in the woods surrounding him. The silence had been shattered by the yelps and growls of one wild animal being attacked by another.

  Joe rubbed his eyes and scrambled to his feet, glancing between the trunks of large oaks, looking for signs of the struggle. Perhaps Mr. Gordon’s rottweiler had escaped and was running, crazed, through the woods. Perhaps he would be next!

  The commotion paused and Joe crouched, holding his breath, staying as still as he possibly could. Bulky steps came from behind, too heavy to belong to a dog, even one as large as the Gordons’. Joe turned his head slowly, hoping his movement would not draw attention to whatever was lurking. Something dark and hairy moved behind a tree less than thirty feet away.

  It was hard to see properly in the half light, but Joe was convinced it was taller than a man. It slouched like an ape and, with massive hairy feet, prodded at something motionless on the ground that looked like a badger. It shuffled as if in confusion, scratching its side with long spindly fingers, then stretched its mouth wide to reveal a set of decayed fangs. The roar that followed was cut short when Joe jumped in shock. The ape thing snapped its mouth shut with a loud clack and ducked as it stared in Joe’s direction.

  With a mop of straw-colored hair and a bright blue T-shirt to match his eyes, Joe knew he would not be well camouflaged, and sure enough, the creature saw him.

  Great emerald eyes glared at Joe as the creature’s lips curled into a snarl.

  Joe swallowed hard. His throat felt
as dry as the sand he had been dreaming about only moments ago, and cold shock froze him as he stared at the thing crouching between the trees. The staring continued for several long seconds, and as each moment passed, Joe chided himself for not looking away. He’d read enough books to know that maintaining eye contact was a sign of aggression for most animals, but Joe couldn’t help himself.

  Astoundingly, the creature seemed to lose interest. It turned away, loped off a few steps into the forest, and shuffled down into a mound of earth, disappearing from view.

  Joe waited a full minute before making another move. Watching his surroundings, he crept toward the creature’s victim, dragging his trolley with him, and found that his suspicions were right—it was a badger. The poor animal was on its side, breathing slowly and making no attempt to escape from Joe as he approached. Taking great care not to make sudden moves, Joe edged closer, holding a thick stick near the badger’s mouth in case it decided to bite. If the animal was badly injured, it probably wouldn’t attack, but Joe knew not to take any chances.

  After a few awkward maneuvers, Joe had safely wrapped the injured badger in his jacket and placed it in his trolley. It was time to wake up Mr. Wheeler, the vet.

  Three raps on Argoyle Redwar’s office door announced the arrival of another doomed employee. The director frowned at the wooden panels, then at his secretary, who stared back at him through disturbingly thick glasses.

  “Who’s that?” he growled.

  The small woman, semiconsumed by a leather chair, continued to gawk. Her eyes widened only slightly as she tilted her head and mumbled something about not seeing through walls.

  “Come in,” Redwar boomed.

  The door opened, and a well-groomed man wearing a cautious but friendly smile stepped inside, clasping a folder against his chest.

  “I do apolo—”

  “Door!” Redwar thumbed his way through a planner, hardly interested in the visitor.

  The man hesitated, then closed the door and smiled nervously at the secretary, who squinted back. An embarrassing silence followed as the employee glanced around the huge windowless office, the mahogany paneling, the meager lighting, and the long line of animal heads gazing down with lifeless eyes. There were only three chairs: one at the far end of the room, another for the secretary, and behind a monstrous desk, the thronelike chair for Argoyle Redwar.