by G R Jordan
“Furballs?” asked Austerley.
“Blood sprites. The fog things.”
“Oh. Well, I could…”
After a period of kicking the furballs back into the barn, Havers had retreated to open up on the creatures from a distance. The shots rang out into the dark, each one precise and taking a casualty. Austerley jumped at the sound.
“Shuggoth! Mother Hydra. On the walls, Churchy, on the walls! Close it, close it.”
Oh hell. Kirkgordon tried to grab Austerley but he turned wild again, thrashing around. Calandra looked across from where she had run to help Nefol. The girl was lying on the ground but still pointing at Kirkgordon.
“Churchy, she’s been bitten. There’s a large chunk out of her thigh. We need to go!”
“And I feel our exit cannot be too soon, Mr Kirkgordon.” There was just a tremor in Havers’ voice.
How? thought Kirkgordon. How do I get off this roof, if not by jumping? It’s too far; we’d break our legs at best. Nefol was still pointing at Kirkgordon and he knelt down beside her. “Sorry. You shouldn’t be here. I’ve wronged your father.”
“Kirkgordon…” Her breath was rasping. “Shut… up… The arrow… green… red… feathers.”
“What’s she saying?” asked Calandra, who was now standing between Nefol and the hole, fighting back the occasional furball who had beaten Havers’ guns.
Kirkgordon didn’t wait. He dived into his quiver and located the arrow Nefol had mentioned. Drawing his bow, he took aim into the hole in the roof.
“No…” said Nefol weakly.
Kirkgordon aimed. Just as he was about to release, he felt a tap on his leg. Looking down, he saw Nefol pointing off into the distance. And then she closed her eyes.
“Now, Mr Kirkgordon! They are coming through!”
Kirkgordon fired the arrow into the distance. As the projectile was loosed from his bow, a rope began to form along its flight path, holding an impossible curve. Once the arrow had hit the ground the rope remained and Kirkgordon grabbed it. He pulled it tight and was surprised that when he let go, it remained in its supported form.
“Time to go, Mr Kirkgordon. Been a while since the old death slide.” Havers grabbed at the rope but his hands fell right through it. “Ah, slight problem, old bean. I think that it’s only solid when the shooter touches it.”
Kirkgordon saw the furballs pouring through the hole and Calandra grabbed Nefol off the floor. The building was now burning intensely and part of the roof over the original exit had collapsed completely.
“We go. Grab a leg or get burnt!” Kirkgordon threw his quiver strap over the rope and began to run. Glancing round, he saw Calandra racing behind him with Nefol on her shoulder. Havers had Austerley by the scruff of the neck. Kirkgordon jumped and let his arms take the strain as he dangled from the rope. Within a second, two arms had wrapped themselves round his legs and, like an amateur acrobatic team, they began the slide to freedom.
The Cliff
Kirkgordon grimaced in pain. He had wrapped the leather strap of the quiver around his wrists as he jumped. His left hand had let go in agony at the weight of Havers and Austerley jumping onto his left side and all that remained was the strap cutting into his wrist. Glancing to his right, he saw Calandra with one arm wrapped around his leg and her other arm pulling Nefol close to her chest, anchored under the child’s armpits. Calandra’s ponytail was gone and her hair was blowing out loosely behind her. Now that’s a sight to die to, thought Kirkgordon.
A crash behind him made him turn his head. The barn was now fully ablaze and collapsing. Strange howls were coming from within and the roof had sunk inward, leaving the bizarre arrow-rope hanging in space. Looking ahead of him once again, he saw the blur of darkness. Somewhere the ground was rushing up hard to meet him, but the light of the fire had blinded his eyes too much and the distance to the ground below was a mystery.
Calandra dropped first. She stumbled as her burden caused her to lose footing and she crashed to the ground. She tried to wrap herself around Nefol but ended up burying her own head, face first, into the dusty soil with Nefol lying beneath her.
Havers dropped Austerley and the professor crashed spectacularly into the dust, ending up in a heap. Then Havers alighted, touching down lightly onto his feet. With his load dispersed, Kirkgordon lifted his legs out of the way in time to feel the smack of his arse hitting the ground. For a moment he continued to hold onto the rope above. Then, looking up to free his hands, he saw it was gone.
“Everyone okay?” was Kirkgordon’s optimistic cry.
“Nefol’s not good, Churchy,” said Calandra. “She’s lost blood and is pretty banged up. And she’s been bitten by those things. Look!”
Kirkgordon ran over and saw the glow from Nefol’s leg where she had been bitten several times.
“We need to take her back home,” said Calandra.
“There’s no time, Miss Calandra. Farthington is our objective. Unless we can find something to help her on our way then she’s an unfortunate casualty.”
“Casualty! I’ll break you apart if you abandon her, Havers.”
Kirkgordon looked round at Austerley but the occult genius was silent and obviously out cold. Damn it, that stupid arse might actually know something about these bites. “Havers, have you ever seen bites like these?”
Havers shook his head.
“You, Calandra?” Another negative. “Well then, Havers is right.”
Calandra threw a shocked look at Kirkgordon. “I’ll take her back alone if I have to.” Little icicles were forming at her tear ducts. “She damn well saved your life, Churchy.”
“I know, Cally. But listen. Who knows what that wound will do? I don’t. None of us do. I doubt all Havers’ resources back home could manage it. And with Indy gone to sleep then we need another expert. The frog-men came from somewhere, Cally. That’s a somewhere which just might have help. It’s a long shot but it’s all I’ve got. So we need to continue, but at a pace.”
“And what about Mr Austerley? How do you expect us to move his rather considerable hide onward? I barely hung onto him during our descent,” said Havers.
“I’ll take him, Havers. You take Nefol. And Cally, you go out front, keep the way clear.”
“I’m not letting him take her, Churchy. He’s likely to dump her somewhere as a casualty. I’ll guard her.”
“No, Cally, you won’t. You’re faster than us, you’ve got wings to get up in the air and look ahead, and you’re the best fighter. I need you up front. Don’t worry, I’ll gut Havers if he does anything to harm that child.”
Calandra nodded and gave a thin smile. Then she turned around and raced off into the dark.
“Gut me, Mr Kirkgordon? How very crude,” sneered Havers.
“Trust me, it won’t be a clean cut. Now let’s go.” Kirkgordon grabbed Austerley by the shoulders and sat him upright. Then he heaved Austerley by his stomach onto the opposite shoulder from his bow. Crap, he is heavy.
It wasn’t so much a jog as a fast walk, but with Austerley’s weight bearing down on him, Kirkgordon reckoned his progress was impressive. Calandra routed to and fro making sure the way was clear and that their direction led back to the path the frog-men had been on. Occasionally Kirkgordon would see her rise up on her wings, scanning into the distance. He found his eyes wandering along her back and then down her legs from her trim rear. He put this down to a momentary lapse, but he knew in his heart that Cally was growing into the place Alana had always occupied.
Havers was keeping good pace but it surprised Kirkgordon that the Major wasn’t trying to pull ahead and drive them on. The wounds Farthington had given him must still be affecting him.
“Where the hell am I?” Austerley’s voice. So he’s waking up, thought Kirkgordon.
“On the run with me again, Indy. And when we get back, you are going on a diet,” said Kirkgordon. He believed that humour in adversity was always uplifting, although that maxim was certainly being put to the test.
<
br /> “What happened to her?” Austerley nodded in Nefol’s direction.
“She saved our arses, Indy. But she got some bites from those furballs.”
Austerley made the strange sound he had made when he had seen the fog. “That’s their name, actually. Is it glowing?”
“Yes.”
“Poor kid. She’s infected. The creatures replicate by planting eggs from their mouths into victims. They bury in and you need some” – another strange sound came out – “to remove them.”
“So where do you get this stuff? What does it look like?”
“I don’t know. The book was a general travel guide in the language of another dimension. I didn’t really understand everything. We’ll need to find someone. A healer. Head for where the frog-men came from.”
“Already ahead of you, my overweight friend.”
“Makes a change,” said Austerley and closed his eyes. Kirkgordon was stunned to hear snoring some five minutes later.
The night turned into a damp and cold day before Calandra returned from one of her scouting missions with news.
“There’s something up ahead. This whole plain ends at an enormous cliff face as wide as I can see. At the bottom of the cliff there’s dense forest, and within that forest there’s a city rising up. It’s truly massive and it appears to have links coming away from it.”
“Is there any way down the cliff?” asked Kirkgordon.
“Yes, there’s a fairly wide path, enough for carts. It’ll be very open but it seems to be the only way down.”
“Well, that’s a risk we’re going to have to take. Nefol hasn’t said a word. Havers tightened up the wound with part of his outfit and the bleeding’s stopped, but she’s still unconscious,” said Kirkgordon.
Austerley made one of his unintelligible sounds. “That’s what it’s called. The City in the Shadow.”
“Shadow of what?” asked Kirkgordon.
“I don’t know, but it was definitely in the shadow rather than in shadow.”
“And you are sure of that? It’s not like you’re always one hundred percent accurate.”
“You try and read” – another unintelligible noise – “and it’s my thirty-seventh language by the way. I doubt you can even read French.”
“Enough!” said Calandra. “She needs help. Can we get a move on? In fact, why don’t I run on ahead with her. I’ll get there quicker.”
“And do what, Miss Calandra?” interrupted Havers. “You can’t speak the language, you can’t read anything. How would you find help? I fear you require the services of Mr Austerley.”
“No, Cally, we stick together,” said Kirkgordon. “But let’s step up the pace, Havers.”
“I wasn’t aware I was the one holding us back, dear fellow.”
No, thought Kirkgordon, it’s been me carrying Austerley. But in fairness I do have the heaviest weight. “Okay, Cally, lead the way.”
Another hour brought them to the cliff edge. As Kirkgordon looked around the vast plain behind him, he saw no one. Turning to look at the forest below, through the trees he saw roads busy with traffic. And dominating it all was the city.
At the centre were enormous spires reaching up towards the sky, reminding Kirkgordon of a sci-fi movie. The architecture was crisp and clean and every piece of stone was jet black. Outside of these central pieces the city seemed positively medieval, with all buildings being wooden in construction. They spread out from the central core, gradually diminishing in height until there was an outer circle of ramshackle huts and collapsed houses. There appeared to be major routes running through the city, and even from the cliff edge the noise and bustle could be heard.
The path down from the plain cut back and forward into the cliff face and had clearly been designed rather than created by the impact of time. Descending the very steep slopes, Kirkgordon found his knees screaming at him as he fought to keep Austerley on his shoulder, which was numb from the constant carrying and jolting. With no feeling in the shoulder with which to balance Austerley, Kirkgordon found himself hanging on harder.
Halfway down the slope, the path twisted out from the cliff face to give a glorious view of the rock itself. Kirkgordon was astonished to see a building cut into the cliff face.
“Damn, that must have been a lot of work. You could nearly fit an army into that,” said Austerley.
“And you don’t know how far back it goes, either,” added Calandra.
“I think you’ll find the word is ‘cyclopean’, Mr Kirkgordon,” said Havers. “Some of the room sizes would appear to be on a scale with some great works found in Antarctica. But I don’t see any symbols or markings on the outside indicating who the construction belongs to.”
“And frankly, guys, I don’t care. Nefol needs help, so let’s move,” insisted Calandra.
It was another three hours before they reached the bottom of the slope and found a road leading into the dense forest. The air was dank and most of the trees were rotting. There was little green foliage but the light was kept out by the sheer number of branches emerging from each tree, like an ad hoc wicker canopy. The path weaved round thicker patches of trees, clearly constructed by a determined mind, for the density of trees was becoming claustrophobic.
As they turned round a tight bend, the party was confronted by a small party of roughly clad soldiers. Each was wearing leather garments and a metallic hat, accompanied by a small weapon at the soldier’s side. Maces, hammers, clubs. Looks like a local militia of some sort, thought Kirkgordon.
On seeing Kirkgordon’s party, one of the soldiers starting yelling instructions at them. When it was clear there was no hint of comprehension, he shouted other words in a different language. And then a third language.
“Austerley, are you getting any of these?” asked Kirkgordon.
“All of them. They are pretty common languages, just not on earth.”
“But it’s not the Nether Land language. The one you read.”
“That’s old, Churchy, very old. I doubt many people would speak or even read it today. Maybe those of a religious bent.”
“Well,” said Kirkgordon, setting Austerley on his feet, “go and sort our passage out.”
While the rest of the group held back and huddled around Nefol, Austerley hobbled up to the militia and began to converse at a rapid rate. There were shouts and laughs from the soldiers while Austerley held a sorry form, hunched over and slightly off kilter, leaning on his smaller foot. Eventually he trudged back to the group.
“They want money to let us pass. They say they are the city militia and have the right to take road taxes. So if we want past, we have to pay.”
“Did you tell them we have no money?” asked Calandra. “And that we have a girl in need?”
“He didn’t mention the money, which was quite wise, Mr Austerley, but he did tell them of Nefol’s plight,” said Havers. Kirkgordon looked quizzically at the agent. “It’s a common enough language, Mr Kirkgordon.”
“I guess we’ll have to find something to barter with,” suggested Austerley.
“Like hell,” swore Calandra, her wings erupting from her back and her staff clutched in both hands. “I don’t have time for this.”
The City in the Shadow
“Cally, no!” implored Kirkgordon.
“It is not advisable, Mr Kirkgordon,” said Havers, “to shout out your colleague’s name just as she is about to attack the local authorities.”
Calandra strode forward directly to the man who had been talking with Austerley. The man stood up to his full height and called out to his men, who took up defensive postures around their captain. Calandra began to spin her staff, but at a noticeably slower speed than when she was in full flow. Then Havers gave a simple shout.
“Guns!”
Kirkgordon saw the soldiers draw guns from their clothing and heard gunfire from beside his head. Three of the soldiers catapulted backwards into the air. The two closest to their captain were dropped by a whirl of Calandra’s staff be
fore she grabbed the captain by the throat and held him high. The rest of the guard froze on seeing their captain compromised, and for a split second there was a silence, before—
“Shuggoth! The walls, it’s on the walls, Churchy. Mother Hydra! In the dark. Close it, clo—”
There was a dull thud as Austerley fell limp to the ground.
“For the last time, would you stop using the damn guns? You know it freaks the poor sod out. Was there really any need, Havers?”
“Indeed there was, my good fellow. The opposition were drawing their own guns and I believe Miss Calandra’s life, if not indeed all our lives, was in peril.”
“I’ve seen her take out multiple Nightgaunts, Havers, so don’t give me the ‘she wasn’t capable of handling it’ speech.”
“Well, Mr Kirkgordon, I’m glad you have such faith…”
“Guys, shut it!” yelled Calandra. “And Havers, tell this man I’m holding that if his men don’t drop all their weapons and let us through, I am going to break his scrawny neck. We need to get moving.”
Havers spoke briefly in the foreign language for some thirty seconds. After a harsh command from their leader, the militia dropped their weapons and stepped aside from the path.
“Good,” said Calandra, dropping the captain. “Now somebody grab Austerley and we can get going.”
“Look, forgive me for asking,” said Kirkgordon, “but is anyone else here bothered we just blew away three soldiers, in full view of their cohorts, all belonging to the city we’re about to go into?”
“Hardly, Mr Kirkgordon, all we did was give them a little bloody nose.”
“Bloody nose, Havers? You damn well killed three of them.”
“Now that would have been most foolish, my dear fellow. They were just hit with thumpers. Knocked them down like skittles. Bit of a bruise but nothing permanent. Really, Mr Kirkgordon, you do sometimes mistake me for an amateur.”
