They walked slowly forward and soon heard trickling water up ahead. Boomer bounded down the path, lulled by the refreshing sound.
Zale thought back to the few clues he had heard about the Grimstone’s hiding place.
“Within the land where none may land, the Grimstone lies between what has been and what will be.” He remembered Tomescrubber’s notes. “The land where none may land now makes sense. But what has been…?” Boomer moved back and forth on the path ahead, exploring and sniffing about. “The past?”
Boomer suddenly leapt into the air with a high-pitched shriek. A great plume of purple fire erupted from the ground ahead of them, just off the path. A freezing gust of air blasted through them, a sensation now all too familiar to Zale.
Zale felt like his very blood was going cold, and not just because of the darkfire. “Is it even remotely possible that we’re somehow witnessing a glimpse of the Shadow Age?”
“Sha-sha dee rakaka. Mu-mu dar….”
“Much-much dark,” said Zale, somehow catching Boomer’s meaning.
Just ahead they saw the stream, which flowed with drab, grayish water. Boomer trotted toward it and leaned forward, about to take a drink.
“Boomer, no!” Zale shouted. He picked up a stick from the ground, half-wondering if it would crumble into ash or some toxic dust in his hand. Fortunately it held together, and he tossed it into the flowing water.
White steam surrounded the stick. Moments later it became frozen, encased in a layer of ice. Zale and Boomer watched it in stunned silence as it floated away.
“Assume absolutely nothing is safe,” Zale said. “Just stay to the path.”
Peals of thunder rumbled in the air. Jagged forks of lightning stabbed through the layers of clouds above them. Darkfire bursts continued at random, but never on the path. If they did not stray from the path, Zale reasoned, they would be safe.
Eventually the path passed through a copse of lifeless trees and came to an end at the entrance to an old stone building, like an ancient temple. Three steps led into its gaping mouth, which was as a black vacuum of lightless air. Zale looked around for any hint of flamethyst that could be struck for fire, but he knew it would be a lost cause. In this land, any agent of natural light was banished.
He slowly walked up the three steps, Boomer by his side. As he passed the threshold, a large torch burst into life with the bright purple flame of darkfire. Warily, Zale took hold the torch, feeling an enormous sense of discomfort that he now must rely on the deathly fire for his source of light. He continued into the rectangular corridor.
“The Treasure of Mac is not very far….”
The words slithered through the air and straight into his ears. Zale froze.
His torch went out. Such a thick blackness surrounded him that he felt near suffocating.
“The Treasure of Mac is not very far….”
Zale’s breathing was loud in the stillness. Boomer’s rapid breaths were even louder.
“Once you know where to look,” Zale spoke into the darkness, “then you’ll know where you are.”
Another torch mounted upon the wall ignited. Zale grabbed it and kept going.
“O wondrous Mac, if faith do ye lack…” the voice said.
“Then ne’er shall ye claim the great Treasure of Mac,” Zale said.
A circle of darkfire flames within small buckets came to life, one by one, until they completely encircled a stone pedestal with a small, cylindrical object on top. It hovered just above the stone, encased within a translucent-purple orb.
“The Grimstone,” Zale whispered. “To be honest, it’s smaller than I expected.”
Words were engraved in the floor before the pedestal. Zale read them aloud:
“I now reveal—to this rhyme there is more;
Ye’ve passed through the dark days of centuries four.
Behold the pedestal of ancestral fame;
A power such that none can contain.
Before thy quest can finally end;
With the treasure let us see what thou dost intend.”
He approached cautiously, glancing around the room. Images on the wall to his left showed a man standing before this very pedestal, placing his hand over the top of the orb.
“I take it this is a pictograph—an instruction,” Zale said. “According to the last part of that rhyme, it wants to see my intentions. Hmm. It’d be nice to know what happens if it doesn’t approve.”
The next picture showed the man with closed eyes and rays shooting from his head.
“Apparently light’s going to beam out of ol’ Pop-Pop’s head. Should be quite the show.”
Boomer pointed at the rays in the last picture. With a cackle he said, “Heh-heh boo-boo-boom! Kakaka!”
“Well, that’s comforting—thanks.”
Zale rolled back his shoulders. He took a deep breath. He held his hand, which trembled, above the orb.
“Okay…let’s get this done.”
He rested his hand fully upon the orb.
His body seized for a moment as the energy took hold of him, and his eyes closed. He saw visions of handing the Grim-stone to Vidimir, Fulgar watching from afar with folded arms. His crew received the single greatest payout in the history of the entire guild, shattering the mastery bar with fanfare and joyous celebration.
Zale opened his eyes. A flamethyst torch ignited on the wall to his right, where he saw more words:
“To reach this place, thou hast walked in the past….
Before ye can leave, must ye see what comes last.”
A wall in the darkness beyond the pedestal slowly raised, the stone grinding loudly with its movement.
Zale swallowed through a dry throat. “It seems we must first see what’s beyond here.”
Boomer chittered softly by his side, and together they walked into the darkness.
Jensen stood firm and close with the rest of Murdoch’s crew beside the river as the feathery horde charged toward them with their dark, curved blades held high.
Grimkin squawks and screeches blended with the steely clangs of weaponry, forming the chaotic chorus of battle. A few of the deckhands had pulled away the gangway to make boarding the Queenie less convenient, should any of the enemies get near enough.
Seadread’s actual crew of humans had not deigned to risk their own skins in battle. That’s what these hired grimkin goons were for. Ruthless as Seadread’s reputation might have been, in this way he was a true coward.
Armed with one of the Gukhanian swords, Jensen swung with all his might into the blade of one grimkin. The birdlike cretin was quick and agile, but Jensen found that his swings were stronger. He backed his opponent down toward the edge of the riverbank. It stumbled, and Jensen slashed its torso, with a final kick into the water.
Meanwhile, Yancy and Rosh, who were aboard the ship, had rigged together some sort of a catapult device.
“Look out below!” Fump called.
Small barrels launched from the ship—extra barrels of pitch that Yancy was notorious for loading prior to any voyage. “It’s for sticky situations,” he was known to say.
Most of the barrels shattered upon the ground, confounding several grimkins who stumbled into the gummy tar. Other barrels crashed directly upon enemy heads with sundered timbers and splashes of black goop.
“Fire!” Rosh shouted.
Flaming arrows soared from the ship, aimed wherever the pitch had fallen, dappling the battlefield with fiery patches and enflaming grimkins, who flailed and squawked in panic. Fump and Chim cackled with glee.
Shortly after, Hookknee fired a six-foot whaling harpoon from the ship’s ballista, impaling the heads of two grimkins and the arm of a third, pinning them to the ground.
Wigglebelly chuckled from behind one of the ship’s crossbows. “Huhuhuhuhu! I got one, man!”
Evette had both hands upon a club and yelled out with every swing, bludgeoning skulls and cracking limbs. Her four oarsmen held their own with Gukhanian swords.
Fulgar was nimble and deadly with his novidian dagger, striking down three foes within seconds. The fallen cutlasses of those grimkins flew through the air, directed by Fulgar, and slew three more.
The crew of Murdoch seemed to have the upper hand in this battle, with minimal injuries and most of the grimkins subdued.
As Jensen took down another opponent with a fist and a pommel to its beaked jaw, he realized that a small wave of grimkins had stayed back. He glimpsed a particularly hard-eyed grimkin dressed in dark red, tall and burly, holding a sword in the air and speaking orders to its comrades. They lined up, moving their arms in a most peculiar pattern, as though drawing rectangles in the air.
When the violet light hit his eyes, he knew what was coming. “Darkfire!” he shouted.
“Everyone stay behind me!” Fulgar ordered, bounding forward.
Fulgar’s dagger was surrounded in ghostly, pulsating light, brighter than before. He stooped low, pointing his dagger at the ground to his left. Standing, he swept it through the air above his head, like the path of a rising and setting sun. He lowered himself again, completing the dagger’s path at the ground to his right.
Purple fireballs shot out from the line of grimkins, soaring in their direction.
An odd ripple emitted from where Fulgar stood, like the momentary shudder of a filmy wall between the crew and the grimkins. Then Fulgar pointed his novidian toward the incoming fireballs, as many as he could catch. One by one, a barely visible field of energy surrounded the darkfire bursts, suspending them in midair. With intense effort, Fulgar turned them in different directions, away from the crew, and some right back into the grimkins.
Fulgar dropped to his knees, breathing heavily. The return-fire had taken down only a few of the remaining grimkins. The twenty or so that remained charged ahead at the order of their commander.
Jensen readied himself for more combat, eyeing one of the grimkins coming his way.
That grimkin suddenly became invisible.
Fulgar stood back up, shouting, “Look out, crew of Murdoch! These foes are channeling powers of the Void using byrne!”
Zaps of electric energy shot out from Fulgar’s dagger, striking several of the grimkins despite their invisibility. With each successful strike came a puff of black and purple dust. Jensen stared at Fulgar, stupefied by what was happening, his mouth hanging agape.
Fulgar glanced back at him. “I strike for their byrne,” he said.
Jensen’s crewmates flailed about and swung weapons against unseen foes. His heart racing, Jensen shuffled backwards, step by step, wondering if something he couldn’t perceive was about to pounce. In short intervals he swung his sword all around him, desperately hoping to thwart any surprise attack.
“Cal and Fritz just disappeared!” screamed Evette.
She kicked at the air before her and was rewarded by the sharp squawk of a winded grimkin. It lost its invisibility and raised its downy hands in defense, but it was too late to stop Evette’s club from rapping it across the beak. Despite this, her coxswain’s mates did not reappear.
In fact, to Jensen’s horror, he saw more of their crew disappearing all around. Miles…Kelvin…deckhands Abel and Jonas…more and more just gone in an instant. The rest of Evette’s oarsmen vanished, soon followed by Evette herself.
All over the battlefield small clouds of dirt rose into the air, kicked up by crewmates being dragged away.
“What in hell’s blazes is happening here?” shouted Kasper.
Moments later he, too, vanished, his strangled shouts and curses diminishing with unseen distance.
It was all happening so fast. All Jensen could do was swing aimlessly, hoping to strike a foe before it struck him.
Fulgar tackled one grimkin to the ground, its visibility faltering. He ripped away a black stone from around its neck and electrocuted the grimkin with his dagger. His smooth head glistened with sweat. He frantically looked around at the ever-worsening scene.
Yancy, Rosh, and mates Ian and Rowan clung to ropes and swung from the ship’s deck into the fray below. It wasn’t long before Ian and Rowan also disappeared.
Rosh spun neatly around and clobbered a grimkin behind its head with the blunt end of his sword. As he raised it for another strike, he was hit from behind. Rosh yelled in pain, dropped the sword, and disappeared a second later.
Yancy fought with a stylistic fervor rarely seen in merchants or sailors. He swung wide with a spear and turned to pin it into the chest of a grimkin like a javelin in a throwing tournament. Tiny dirks seemed to materialize in his hands, pulled from concealed areas all around his clothing.
Jensen squinted at the slightest distortion careening toward Fump. He charged forward into its path. He slammed into the form, eliciting an angered squawk of surprise. The impact was a shock to his senses. He saw the grass mash down where the creature landed and tumbled over the riverbank.
“Look at you, surviving and being brave!” said Yancy. Then he also disappeared into a shouting distortion of air.
Jensen stumbled back and swung his sword wildly. He heard splashes from the river behind him and realized that the grimkin he’d just charged was coming back for vengeance. “Stay back, devil!” he yelled.
Suddenly a crossbow bolt struck it, and the wet anomaly gave an undignified death-screech. The bolt stayed in midair, its front half crimsoned with blood. Then it swayed and fell, with a now-visible grimkin, back into the water.
Jensen looked up at the ship. Starlina stood behind one of the crossbows.
“Wonderful shot, milady!” Jensen called.
“Oh, I got it!” she cheered. She loaded another bolt.
With most of the crew now gone, the remaining grimkins abandoned their invisibility and focused their strength on capturing everyone else. Most of them were preoccupied with a group of deckhands who had stayed close together throughout the fight.
Fulgar sprinted up to Jensen and waved madly up at the ship. “Starlina, you must get to safety!”
“You clearly need some help!” she called back.
This was enough to redirect the grimkins’ attention. Their commander shouted out in their chittering language. A half-dozen of the cretins raised the gangway into position and rushed toward the deck.
“No!” Jensen cried out, dashing after them.
Fulgar followed, moving much slower than before.
In his frenzy, Jensen flung the first grimkin he reached into the river with only his hands. With the next one he locked blades, striking up, down, side to side. The grimkin struggled despite having the higher position upon the gangway. Jensen won a slash to its arm and gave it a hard push, so that it pounded into the hull before splashing into the water.
Fulgar zapped the next one, but it was a much weaker jolt than what Jensen had witnessed earlier. It was still enough for Fulgar to finish the job with a stab to the chest. The glow of his novidian anelace, however, had faded.
Starlina’s scream pierced the air. One of the grimkins now on the deck had managed to grab her before she could escape below deck.
BONG!
A giant soup pot flew from the steps of the quarterdeck and into the head of the grimkin holding Starlina. It loosened its grip and crumpled down the stairs to the lower deck. Wigglebelly approached, wiping his hands together. “Take that, man! Grimy, grisly, feather-noggins!”
Another grimkin was right there to grab Starlina before she could get away. One of them kicked Wigglebelly in the gut. He bent over and was knocked to the deck.
The remaining three grimkins tackled Jensen and Fulgar and held them firmly to the deck. Before they knew it, Jensen, Fulgar, Jaxon, and Starlina—the last standing of Murdoch’s crew—were firmly bound in rope and fishing net. As the rope was tightened, Fulgar dropped his dagger to the deck.
“Let us go!” screamed Starlina.
“Release us!” Jensen shouted.
“This will not end well for you, my feathered friends,” said Fulgar.
Wigglebelly only wheezed a
nd whimpered.
The grimkin commander circled them, its dark eyes narrowed and its beaked mouth stretched in grim amusement. As he passed by Fulgar, he snatched the anelace from the deck and gazed over it curiously.
The commander retrieved a parchment from within its dark-red tunic. He unfolded it, laid it against the mast, and pinned it with the anelace. His wicked eyes seemed to laugh at their plight.
He twittered further orders to his subordinates before the last of Murdoch’s crew, including Starlina, were dragged away from the deck of the Queenie.
CHAPTER 11
ONE STEP AWAY
8/9/3203
One step into darkness, and then another, until suddenly Zale stood upon a cobblestone surface under the light of day. He recognized this place: it was the market square of Warvonia, completely empty and utterly quiet.
Boomer’s presence helped him realize that this was not just some hallucination, nor was it a vision of the past.
“What is the meaning of this?” he asked quietly.
The ground rumbled, the onset of a tremor. Boomer chattered in alarm. Zale stumbled from the shock, and then took off down one of the connecting streets.
There were establishments he recognized, others he did not. Some he expected to find, only to see that it was something else entirely. Where he expected a cobbler he found a black-smith. Where he expected an eatery he found a grimy-looking candle shop. The Wench’s Tavern sign was where he expected, but the front entrance was boarded shut.
The entire street rippled underneath, the old stones welling like a tidal wave, knocking Zale to his back, a black sky in his sight overhead.
When he stood, he was elsewhere. Grassy knolls surrounded him, and as the hills contoured toward sea level, a dilapidated town spanned the view below. The land was ruptured, as though meteors had been raining down in droves. The air was extremely quiet—the sound of desertion.
Something erupted from the ground. Boomer screamed and Zale yelped. It appeared as a black mist, rising up and fading into the sky. Moments later, wails pierced the air. Whitish, wispy apparitions flew above them and throughout the streets of the town below. A black mist burst from the ground where he stood. It flew through his face and gave him a strong sensation of oncoming death.
Heroes of Time Legends: Murdoch's Choice Page 16
