Dogchild

by Kevin Brooks

  BOOM!

  The sudden earthshaking blast came from the Quarterhouse – a massive explosion that lit up the sky with a blinding white flash – and when I looked over at the building I saw a gaping hole in the wall where the door had been and a massive crack in the stonework above that had almost split the building in 2. Great lumps of stone and twisted metal were scattered down the steps, and plumes of thick black smoke were beginning to billow out from all around the building – the shutters, the roof, the hole in the wall---

  A Fighter suddenly appeared through the smoke, running out of the building with a rifle in his hands – bent over, choking, holding a cloth to his mouth---the Dau Fighters opened fire, cutting him to pieces, and he fell to the ground without firing a shot.

  I heard more shots then, but these were much closer and quieter.

  Phht-phht---phht.

  A wail of pain came from somewhere below---

  Phht.

  The wailing stopped.

  I looked down over the parapet and saw 3 dead bodies lying amid the rubble of the wall. 2 of them were Dau Fighters, and the other one had to be Hensch. He was lying on his back inbetween the other 2, his face staring up at me, and although he didnt look exactly like Skender, the resemblance was too close to be a coincidence.

  Hensch was dead.

  I dont know how much of what Ide told Glorian was true – I was only guessing about most of it – and I dont suppose Ile ever know for sure what Pilgrim was really planning to do, but it doesnt matter now, and it didnt matter then. Whatever the 3 of them were aiming to do, the only thing I wanted to know about it was how it affected me and Chola Se. And the only reasons Ide been talking to Glorian about it were firstly to see if I could get anything out of him – which I hadnt – secondly to see if I could rile him into a mistake – which also hadnt worked – and thirdly because I was playing for time.

  I didnt know if I was right about why they hadnt killed me yet, but they obviously needed me alive for some reason, and as long as I was alive they needed to keep Chola Se alive too, because without her they had no control over me. But they werent going to need us forever.

  The dogs were getting close now though, and I was with them. I was with my mother, running through the night with her, seeing what she could see, feeling what she could feel – the burning town up ahead, the smell of charred flesh in the air---the closeness of the pack all around us---the big gray male, the 3 adult females, the 2 juveniles, the 2 young sisters---

  I was with them all.

  And all around us, everywhere we could see, hundreds of other dogs were running in resolute silence – large packs, small packs, families, lone dogs---

  The Deathland dogs were coming, drawn together by the scent of human blood, just as they had been all those years ago when theyd attacked the wagon in the Black Mountains, only this time there werent just 30 or 40 of them---

  This time theyd risen as one.

  I could hear Pilgrim moving now – stepping away from the gunport, leaning the sniper rifle against the wall – and as I turned away from the parapet and looked down over the walkway into the lower section of the turret, I saw him standing there staring up at me – composed, cold-eyed, confident.

  He drew one of his Colts and calmly aimed it at my head.

  Youre right about one thing, Jeet, he said. I do like killing people.

  It looked as if my time had come.

  JEET!

  It was Chola Se, calling out to me from the East Tower. As I spun round and looked over, I saw Kite hurrying across the walkway towards her, her pistol raised, yelling at Chola Se to keep quiet, and I saw Chola Se standing against the parapet wall, her hands still tied behind her back, her body twisted round in a strangely awkward position. Her head was facing me – her eyes burning into mine – but her legs were side-on to the wall, one in front of the other, her feet about 18 inches apart.

  She glanced at Kite, saw that she was closing fast, then quickly turned back to me and called out again at the top of her voice.

  WELE STILL DIE TOGETHER, JEET! FIGHT FOR US---NOW!

  And then, with a graceful bound, she launched herself up and over the parapet wall and was gone.

  I knew she couldnt survive the fall. It was a sheer 90-foot drop to a solid mass of glassrock---no one could live through that. I knew it, and for a fraction of a second after shede jumped the pain screamed through me like a dagger plunging into my heart---but then, in an instant, she came back to me, and I saw her again just before she jumped – the life in her eyes, the telling sound of her voice – FIGHT FOR US---NOW! – and I knew---

  I knew what shede done.

  And I knew what she wanted me to do.

  I waited a moment.

  Ide moved across to the eastside walkway when Ide seen Chola Se leaping from the tower, and as I stood there now – still pressed up closely to the parapet wall, watching Kite as she leaned out over the battlements and gazed down at the ground, searching for Chola Se – I knew Glorian would be coming for me. Without Chola Se they no longer had a hold over me, and Glorian had to put that right---and hede want to do it right now, while I was still in shock, still stunned by the sight of Chola Se jumping to her death---still frozen to the spot, blinded by grief, unable to see him coming---

  I could hear him crossing the walkway now – rapidly, silently---

  I still waited.

  I could sense him right behind me – his presence, his breath, his sweat---

  I heard Pilgrim shout, DONT KILL HIM!

  And I moved, dropping to my left just as Glorian lunged at me from behind. He sailed past me, stumbling wildly, and his momentum sent him crashing heavily into the parapet wall, and as the ancient battlements cracked and gave way under his massive weight, and he lurched down over the crumbling wall, I spun round, threw my arms round his legs, and heaved him over the edge.

  I didnt wait to see if Pilgrim had changed his mind about killing me now, I just leaped back across to the southside walkway, threw myself flat on the ground, and rolled til I hit the wall. As long as I kept down and away from the edge of the walkway, Pilgrim couldnt see me from below. And if he couldnt see me, he couldnt shoot me. But I was only safe for a moment. Pilgrim knew I was unarmed, so all he had to do was cross over to the steps and climb up here---

  I heard him moving – his boots clacking quietly across the turret floor---

  I jumped up and ran for my knapsack – keeping low, running on all 4s---streaking along the stone ledge, leaping across the corner – and as I landed on the westside walkway, just a few yards away from the knapsack, I saw Pilgrim coming up the steps at the opposite end of the ledge. He was moving slowly, cautiously, edging his head up over the ledge to see where I was. He saw me, then I saw his eyes flick down at the Beretta on the knapsack, and just for a moment he hesitated. I dived headlong for the pistol, grabbing it in my outstretched hand as I hit the ground, and as I rolled quickly to my left and opened fire – working the trigger as fast as I could – I saw Pilgrim ducking down out of sight. I stopped firing, and in the sudden silence I heard his bootsteps hurrying down the steps, and I knew then that he still wanted to keep me alive. He didnt have to run from me. He had an MP40 submachine gun and 2 Colts – he could have fought back. And whatever he was, he wasnt a coward. He wasnt running from me, he was retreating, saving himself so he could take me alive---saving my life as a gift to the Dau.

  His footsteps had stopped now, but I could still hear some kind of movement – a faint shuffling, a grunt of breath, a single muffled step---

  I crawled across to the rim of the walkway and very cautiously peered down into the lower section, and the first thing I saw was the top of Pilgrims head disappearing down into the hole in the floor. I jumped to my knees and fired off a couple of quick shots, but I knew I was wasting my time – I could already hear his bootsteps clomping rapidly down the spiral steps. They slowed after a while, then faded completely, and for a moment I wondered if hede stopped on the steps somewhere and was
waiting for me to come after him, or if he was still going down but simply wasnt hurrying anymore. And if he wasnt hurrying---

  Dont think about it, my heart said.

  It was my mothers voice, loud and clear and true. She was very close now.

  Just do what you have to do, she said.

  I went back to my knapsack, picked up the coil of cable and my knife, then shouldered the bag and crossed over to the northside ledge. As I sheathed the knife and put the pistol in my belt, I began to feel something – a rising---a sense, a power, a force---

  It was everywhere – in the air, the sky, the stars---in my flesh, in my mind, my memories, my blood---in the tower itself, in the walls, the stone---

  It was everything.

  The rising.

  The dogs were here.

  I looked down over the parapet and saw them – a ragged army of silent beasts waiting outside the wall, their vast gathering stretched out across an area of glassrock the length of the wall – and half as deep – with more dogs arriving all the time, streaming in out of the Deathlands to swell the ranks of the hundreds---

  My mother was there. I could see her sitting with her pack, calm and serene---and I could see myself through her eyes.

  I was with her---

  I was with them all.

  We were one.

  The rising.

  I didnt understand it, but I knew it.

  Just as I knew that Chola Se was down there somewhere, waiting for me to join her.

  I got to work.

  First I tested each of the battlements to see if they were strong enough to take my weight. One of them was visibly cracked and loose, and another was slightly unsteady, but the rest felt sturdy enough. Next I unwound the loop of twined cable, checking it wasnt tangled, and tied one end to the strongest battlement, winding it round twice and knotting it tightly. And finally I took hold of the rest of the cable, leaned out over the parapet, and launched it into the air. As I watched the coil of cable tumbling down, unraveling as it went, the image of Chola Se came to me again – the moment before shede jumped – and although I knew now that shede somehow managed to fix her cable to the bracket in the wall before shede jumped, I still couldnt imagine how terrifying it must have been for her to have to just leap over the wall into the unknown – not knowing if the bracket would hold, or how the cable would unwind, or how she could possibly control the fall and somehow stop herself from either hurtling straight down to the ground or slamming into the wall or falling halfway before the cable suddenly caught hold and snapped her spine or her neck---

  No.

  Shede made it, she was safe.

  She had to be.

  I looked down. The cable hung in a straight line all the way down to the ground. I reached into the knapsack and took out the hand grenade that Cruke had given us. Ide never actually used one before – theyre too rare to practice with – but Ide been taught how to use them in Fighter training. Cruke had told us that this one had an 8-second fuse, which meant that once Ide thrown it, Ide have 8 seconds before it exploded.

  I didnt know if that gave me enough time or not, but I had no choice. Whatever it took, I had to kill Pilgrim.

  Whatever it took.

  I pulled the pin from the grenade – making sure I still held down the safety lever – then I moved to the edge of the walkway, focused on the hole in the floor for a few seconds, and lobbed the grenade towards it. I waited a moment, just long enough to watch it arc through the air and drop into the hole, then I turned and crossed quickly to the parapet.

  1 second---

  I heard the dull clank of metal on stone as the grenade hit the steps, and as I climbed over the parapet and grabbed hold of the cable, I briefly heard it clattering downwards, picking up pace as it went.

  2 seconds---

  And then I was off, not listening to anything, just scrambling down the cable – hand over hand, slipping and sliding, the cable ripping the skin off my palms as I let myself drop as fast as I could without falling---

  3 seconds---

  4 seconds---

  I was about a third of the way down when a heartsense came to me from my mothers eyes – a vision without sight or time – and as we looked up at the tower together we saw a bloodied dogchild in a giants coat scrabbling down the wall like a broken insect, and at the top of the tower, leaning out over the parapet and looking down, we saw a dead-eyed human in a black Cowboy hat.

  The vision left me.

  5 seconds---

  I grasped the cable, twisting it round my bloodied hands to halt my fall, and as I hung there – spinning and swaying – I looked up and saw Pilgrim scrambling hastily over the parapet.

  6 seconds---

  I had no understanding then.

  I realize now that Pilgrim must have been waiting on the steps somewhere near the top of the tower when I threw the grenade. He would have heard it coming – bouncing and clattering down the steps towards him – and then, as it sailed past him, and it suddenly dawned on him what it was, his instincts had kicked in, telling him to run, and hede run back up into the turret – not knowing how he was going to escape, but knowing that if he stayed where he was, or ran down the steps, hede be killed when the grenade exploded – and when hede reached the turret and seen that I wasnt there, he must have spotted the cable tied to the battlement---

  And now he was clambering down over the parapet and grabbing hold of the cable, and any second now he was going to start climbing down---

  The cable was never going to hold.

  He was at least twice my size, probably more.

  And even if the cable could take the extra weight, the battlement never would.

  I looked down.

  I was still at least 60 feet from the ground. If I let go and jumped now, the fall would kill me.

  7 seconds---

  I loosened my grasp and let myself slide, and as I hurtled down – keeping hold of the cable with just enough grip to stop myself freefalling – I closed my eyes and saw in my heart the dead-eyed human plunging down the cable above me, plummeting even faster than me, dropping down on me like a great black bird swooping in for the kill---

  8 seconds.

  I dont know where the grenade was when it exploded.

  My memory of the moment is unclear.

  I vaguely remember hearing the blast – a low muffled boom from inside the tower – but I cant recall if it came from above or below me. There was an unearthly sense of silence for a moment – a strange hanging hush – and then something slammed into me, a massive jarring impact from above, and the silence erupted in a great rumbling roar of crashing stone---and all I remember after that is falling, tumbling down through the darkness in a thunderous torrent of rock and dust and howling black air---thoughtless, blind, breathless, gone---engulfed in an avalanche of pounding stone---

  Then a sudden shattering crash.

  A crack of bone---

  Then nothing.

  Pilgrim was standing over me with his gun in his hand when I opened my eyes---the dead-eyed human. Standing over me like a living corpse – a thing of dust and earth and tattered rags, a thing of the underground, a thing of the grave. His skull was caved in – shattered bone, torn flesh hanging down, raw red, blackened blood thick with dirt---

  He could barely stand – his body swaying like a drunk man – and it was taking him every last ounce of his strength to keep the Colt in his hand leveled at my head – his arm tensed, quivering---his broken teeth gritted---a film of sweat oozing from his pores, glistening pink with blood---

  There was nothing but death in his eyes.

  Mine and his.

  He was dying, he knew it. But he was going to kill me first.

  I saw all this the moment I opened my eyes. I saw him looming over me, the burning black sky above his head, and I saw his finger tightening on the trigger, and in the next moment my eyes closed and my heartsense opened and I was with my mother – streaking across the rubblestrewn glassrock towards the dead-eyed
human, and as we looked together through her killing eyes, I saw myself lying there at his feet---sprawled on my back in the dust, limp and motionless, ready to die---and I saw the humans finger tightening on the trigger---and then his eyes flickered, and he turned and saw us hurtling towards him, and then we were flying, leaping up through the air at him, launching our massive jaws at his throat---

  My eyes opened.

  I saw Pilgrim swivel round and raise his gun just as my mother leaped at him. I saw him sighting the pistol at her head as she flew through the air towards him, and in that moment I knew she wasnt going to make it. I saw his finger pull the trigger---

  Then something flashed, spinning through the air, and a pearlhandled switchblade thudded into his back.

  He froze for an instant, his eyes widened---

  And then a savage blur of crushing jaws engulfed his head and he crashed to the ground with my mother tearing at his throat.

  I heard Kite screaming as Pilgrim died – howling from the depths of her heart – but by the time Ide managed to get to my feet, there was no longer any sign of her in the East Tower. Not that I cared. The only thing I cared about was finding Chola Se, and as I turned to my left – where the switchblade had come from – and I saw her hobbling through the rubble towards me, I felt the same strange tingling sensation in my belly that Ide experienced when I first met her. Shede clearly been hurt when shede jumped from the tower – she was limping badly, her left arm looked broken, and the side of her face was grazed raw – but she was alive.

  Shede made it.

  She barely glanced at Pilgrims body as she came over and stood beside me – he was nothing now, nonexistent – and as my mother trotted over to stand with us, licking Pilgrims blood from her lips, Chola Se didnt look at her either. She didnt have to – theyd killed Pilgrim together – she was in my mothers heart.