Tommy was still out cold, whether unconscious or simply asleep, Ed found it impossible to tell. Either way, he was somewhere where the pain couldn’t reach him; there was that at least to be thankful for.
Stefan passed him a lit cigarette and Ed smoked it down without really noticing it. He saw Danny farther down the slope, his arms already full of pieces of dry wood and vegetation.
“I should go and help,” Ed said, but Stefan held him back.
“You watch your brother, I watch the two of you, and Elsa watches her new friend. That is the way it is to be. Understand?”
Ed understood well enough. He didn’t have to like it though, but just then Tommy let out a moan and Ed was at his side again in seconds.
There was pain in Tommy’s eyes when he looked up, but also surprise.
“Ed? Where are we?”
The little lost boy voice was gone; older Tommy had resurfaced. But it appeared he had no memory of anything since bashing his head coming down the water chute from above.
“What is this place?” he said, tried to sit up…and noticed the empty space where his leg had been. He screamed, a wail that echoed around the whole cavern. There was an answering howl, far off back the way they had come, thankfully distant. But Ed’s attention now was on his brother. He held Tommy down, put his head close to his brother’s face and began explaining, slowly and carefully, trying to ensure he understood. Tommy was in no mood to listen.
“You took my bloody leg off,” Tommy shouted. He was looking over Ed’s shoulder at where Danny was returning.
“It was either that or let you die,” Danny said, as casually as if he were passing the time of day in the street. “You’re welcome, by the way.”
Ed had turned to look at Danny, so he only caught Tommy’s movement out of the corner of his eye just as he felt the pistol leave the holster at his hip. When he turned round, Tommy had the weapon raised, pointing at Danny.
“You bastard,” Tommy said. His aim wavered alarmingly; the pistol was obviously too heavy for him in his weakened state, but the redness at his cheeks showed that it was rage that was fueling him at present.
Danny dropped the wood at his feet and stood, relaxed and easy with his hand falling naturally over the grip of his own pistol.
“Put that away, lad, before you do someone a mischief.”
“We had to do it,” Ed said. “You were poisoned.”
“We? You were in on it too?” Tommy said, swing the pistol to aim it at Ed’s chest. “My own brother?”
Tommy was shouting again, and again it was answered by a screaming howl from above. It sounded closer now, and as if for the first time Tommy took note of it.
“What in blazes is that?”
“That, my lad,” Danny said, “is the thing you should be angry at. It was yon bogle that gave you the wound that led to us doing what had to be done.”
The old soldier had his pistol in his hand now; Ed hadn’t seen him draw it, and neither had Tommy, who was now looking Ed in the eye.
“What’s he talking about? What bogle? What wound?”
Finally, Tommy’s strength gave out and he couldn’t hold the pistol any longer. It fell with a soft thud to the grass where Ed grabbed it and tossed it back towards Danny. Tommy fell backwards, utterly spent. The color had gone from his cheeks again, leaving him as pale as alabaster, and his eyelids fluttered weakly.
“Bastards,” he whispered faintly, then was out again, his breathing rapid and shallow. When Ed felt for a pulse, it was to find it racing even faster than before.
“Do me a favor, lad,” Danny said laconically. “Keep him away from the guns…or anything sharp for that matter. I don’t think he’s in the best frame of mind.”
The howling rose again in the cavern they had left behind.
“It is getting closer,” Stefan said.
“I know,” Danny replied. He nodded towards the pile of wood and vegetation. “Give me a hand with this, would you? Some of the wood looks fibrous. We’ve got rope, and something to tie it up with. We should be able to make a litter.”
He turned back to Ed.
“Watch your brother. And mind what I said about weapons.”
Ed felt like a spare wheel as he watched the other two men build the litter. They worked calmly and efficiently, as if they’d been a team for years. Elsa lay at Stefan’s side. She showed no interest in Tommy now, obviously preferring the boy that had been to the man now returned.
In some ways, Ed knew how the dog felt. There had been an innocence and charm there that Ed had missed in the intervening years. Tommy had grown into a hard-hearted, self-centered young man, and if they hadn’t been brothers, Ed might not want anything to do with him. And yet, looking at him now, helpless, maimed, possibly dying, it was impossible not to feel the tug of old filial strings.
“I promised to look after you, Tommy,” he whispered. “That’s one vow I’ll not break, no matter how angry you get.”
It only took a matter of minutes for Danny and Stefan to put a rudimentary litter together from wood, rope, leafy vegetation from the bushy scrubs, and makeshift cords fashioned from strips of fibrous bark. Danny looked at it critically.
“It’ll hold, for a while at least. It’ll probably need two of us at a time to shift it though, which means only one gun on guard. I don’t like it.”
Ed didn’t like it either. The wounds at his chest were far from healed, he was already as tired as he’d ever felt in his life, and now he was going to be asked to help haul the dead weight of his brother across rough terrain with a wild beast howling somewhere at his back.
What’s not to like?
But when Danny gave the order to move out, Ed moved.
He owed it to his brother. He owed it to himself.
He didn’t take the pistol when Danny offered to return it.
“I don’t trust Tommy,” he said sadly. “And I don’t trust myself not to give in to him.”
He undid the belt and holster and passed them to Stefan who looked like a pirate in his shepherd’s clothes with the pair of Colts strapped to his hips. He took up the extended pole at one side of the litter, Stefan took the other, and, after an initial heave to get the thing moving, were soon walking, albeit slowly, down the slope.
Danny and Elsa brought up the rear.
- 13 -
To begin with, they made good time over what proved to be even ground, almost pasture-like. The stone ceiling was high above their heads now and a stiff breeze in Danny’s face made the cavern feel somehow more open, less oppressive.
Ahead of him, young Ed and Stefan seemed to be handling the litter easily enough and with little discomfort and Tommy, thankfully, was still out for the count. Danny hoped that Ed didn’t realise just how close his brother had been to getting himself shot; Danny had considered it, and if the lad hadn’t dropped the gun when he did, he might well have acted on the impulse, brother or no brother.
He was watching Tommy for signs of consciousness when Elsa let out a yip at his side.
“What is it, girl?” he said, turning to look back up their trail, half-expecting to see the wyrm coming across the open ground towards them. But there was no sign of the beast, and when he looked down, he saw that the dog was looking, not backwards, but upwards towards their rocky ceiling.
At first, he wasn’t sure what he was looking at, thinking it was merely a group of thicker, almost barrel-like roots dangling in a cluster. Then one opened out, flower-like, stretching a pair of pale, leathery wings that must have been almost ten feet in span and he realised it was a colony of bats…or at least, bat-like creatures. Like the rabbit and horse-things, these too had six limbs, two each of arms, legs, and wings. Their heads seemed to share the horse-like aspect of the Wyrm and their necks looked misshapen, too long for their bodies. The creatures hung upside down, clinging to the rock and roots with long-toed, clawed feet.
The one that had opened its wings closed them again, wrapping the leathery cloak around itself as it snuggl
ed back into the tight group. Elsa barked again, a small yip only, as if afraid to bring attention to them.
“It’s okay, girl,” Danny said. “As long as they’re up there, they’re not down here. Live and let live, that’s my motto.”
All the same, he kept a close eye on the beasts as they passed underneath them and only breathed more easily when they’d passed the spot and the bats were some way behind them.
They were still following the same stream that had been their trail from the beginning but now it meandered slowly across an almost flat plain, the slope having leveled out. The cavern they were in appeared endless, its far end obscured in gloomy shadows. The horse-things, having been spooked on their approach, had retreated off somewhere to Danny’s left out of sight behind a copse of thicker gorse and now the group of men were the only things moving in the stillness of the cavern.
Silence fell, the only sound the scuffing of the rear of the litter across the dry vegetation underfoot. It was broken by Tommy as the litter bounced over an unseen rock, shaking the whole frame and bringing him awake with a start and a howl of pain. The howl was answered from their rear by the wail of the wyrm and this time when Danny turned, it was to see the pale beast come barreling out of the gully, heading at a run across the plain towards them.
Stefan dropped his end of the litter and made to draw the pistols but Danny stopped him with a shout.
“No, not here in the open; he’ll run over us like a train even if we get some shots into him. We don’t have the firepower. Run!”
He pointed to his left to the thick copse of gorse.
“In there if we can, and hope it slows him down.”
Stefan took up the pole again and they ran. Every step caused the litter to bounce, bringing howls of pain from Tommy and wild screams of anticipation from the approaching wyrm.
They splashed through the thankfully shallow stream and reached the copse not more than thirty yards ahead of the thundering beast.
Danny stopped at the edge of the gorse and turned, drawing both his pistol and his sword although he thought neither would prove much use; he was merely trying to gain time for the others to get under cover. He heard Tommy scream again behind him as Stefan and Ed forced the litter none too gently into the dense foliage, but Danny couldn’t afford the time to turn around. With Elsa baring her teeth at his side, he raised his weapons and waited for the beast to come for him.
He knew he might only be given time for one shot. He took aim at a huge eye blazing in fury and pulled the trigger just as there was a snap, as of a sail in a wind, and a bat creature fell on the wyrm like a falcon taking a pigeon. His shot went high and wide. The pale thing’s headlong rush came to a halt mere yards from where Danny stood but its attention was no longer on the men; two more of the bats dropped down and began to tear gouges in the beast’s flanks, using talons both on their feet and on their small, almost withered, arms. All of the howling was now coming from the wyrm as the silent bats pressed another attack. The wyrm rolled and tumbled. Danny heard a crack as the spine of one of the bats broke and when the wyrm stood upright again, there was a dead bat beneath it. But more, a dozen and more, were already swooping out of the sky.
The wyrm turned tail and fled, harried all the way back to the gully by swooping bats.
Like crows seeing off an eagle, Danny thought, and realised the comparison was probably an apt one; it seemed that this particular cavern belonged to the bats and they didn’t take kindly to a predator entering their domain.
Danny waited until the wyrm made a hasty retreat back up the gully in the distance and the bats whirled away to circle near the roof. Only when he was satisfied that another attack wasn’t imminent did he turn to the gorse.
There was no sign of the others, but Elsa seemed to know where she was going. She made her way quickly through a gap in the foliage and Danny went through after her to find the others in a natural hiding spot, a hemispherical empty area where the gorse had grown out and then died away in the center. It was dim in the enclosed space but he saw that it was tall enough that they could stand upright and wide enough to accommodate all of them lying down if need be.
Stefan stood, pistols in hand and ready for action. Ed was tending to Tommy who lay flat on his back, whimpering, his face showing too white in the gloom.
“Brandy, for pity’s sake, give him the brandy,” Ed said.
Stephan shook his head.
“It is all gone, young sir. I have no more.”
Ed turned to speak to Danny.
“What can we do? What can I do?”
There was nothing Danny could say that would be of any use. Instead, he addressed Stefan.
“It appears you’ve found us a hidey hole, for now at least. The bats should keep the big beastie away, and they don’t seem to be interested in us. We should rest before moving on. Shall we say an hour?”
“We can’t move him again,” Ed said, almost shouting. “Can’t you see the pain we are causing him?”
“There are two alternatives,” Danny said. “We either wait here with him until he dies, or we leave him here to die alone while we go on. Which would you prefer?”
Ed reacted as if he’d been slapped.
“Leave him? You can’t be serious?”
“What I’m seriously suggesting is that we rest for an hour and then move on as before with the litter. You are the one arguing against that.”
Ed ran a hand through his hair.
“I’m sorry, it’s just…”
Danny put a hand on his shoulder.
“Don’t sweat it, lad. Look to your brother. That’s all you can do.”
Danny turned away, bent, and went out into the open again. The bats still circled high overhead but they were showing little interest in the men’s position, and there was no sign of the wyrm.
When he went back under the canopy, Tommy was sitting up and having an earnest talk with his brother under his voice, almost whispering. He looked about as ill as anyone Danny had ever seen and still be alive.
“Brother stuff,” Stefan said. He passed Danny a cigarette and they both lit up. Danny was grateful for the comfort the habit brought, a small piece of normality in what had turned into a madhouse.
“It is bad, no?” Stefan said.
“It is bad, yes,” Danny replied. “But that breeze is stronger here. We could be getting close to an exit.”
The look he got in return from Stefan told him that the shepherd wasn’t sure of that conclusion.
“My belly is still telling me that we are going the wrong way,” Stefan said.
Danny shrugged.
“It’s the only way there is.”
- 14 -
“Listen to me, Eddie,” Tommy said. “You know I don’t like the old soldier but he might have a point. You’ll get out of this much easier without me.”
“Don’t you dare even consider it,” Ed replied. “We’re going home, both of us. Then we’ll see how a one-legged man gets on in an arse-kicking contest.”
Tommy tried to laugh but instead brought on a coughing fit that left him panting for breath before he could speak again.
“I can’t do much more travelling on that,” he said, nodding towards the litter. “Every step is like someone running a hot poker through what’s left of my leg. It’ll kill me.”
“You’ll die if we don’t get you out of here.”
Tommy reached for Ed’s hand, turned it over to look at the gold ring.
“At least I’ll go having seen that you were right all along.”
Tommy’s skin had taken on the same grey, wet sheen that had only been apparent on his leg earlier, with sweat running in rivulets from his hairline. His tongue was a dry, almost rock-like thing behind cracked, almost black lips. His eyes were sunk down in dark hollows, pupils dilated, giving him a maniacal stare. Where his fingers touched Ed’s, they gave off heat as if being too close to a boiling pan. There were fresh tears among the sweat when he looked back into Ed’s eyes.
“I’ve had it, Eddie, and we both know it.”
“I know no such thing…”
Tommy cut him off.
“Look at me, Eddie. Look at me and see the truth, the way you saw it when you found that map.”
For the first time since the amputation, Ed took a close look at his brother’s condition. He’d already seen the sickness in Tommy’s face. Now he looked at what was left of the leg. The stump was a charred, blackened lump of a thing, oozing pus and watery blood from crevasse-like cracks in the burnt flesh. But worse still was the flesh above the cauterized area; it was bloated and sickly green, puffed up so much that the skin was stretched tight, looking fit to burst. Fluid roiled and swam just under the surface, white and soapy. The amputation had been too little, too late; the poison they had hoped to curtail was seething through what was left of the leg, and probably through Tommy’s whole system.
“You see?” Tommy said softly.
Ed saw only too clearly, and now he too had tears in his eyes.
“I’m still not leaving you,” he said. He called for Danny. “Please, have a look at this. Can anything be done?”
It took the soldier all of five seconds, and Ed saw the look in his face and knew the answer before he spoke.
“It’s only a matter of time,” Danny said, his tone grim. “It’s in his blood, what’s left of it.”
Danny turned to the older brother.
“We haven’t seen eye to eye, lad,” he said. “But for what it’s worth, I’m sorry it’s come to this. It’s no way for a man to die.”
Danny turned away again, and Ed knew he was being given time with his brother, perhaps the last time they would have together. He had no idea what he was going to say until it all came out in a gush.
“This is all my fault. Me and that stupid map. I wish I’d never found it. I want no part of it now.”
He took off the ring and put it on Tommy’s finger.
The Lands Below Page 7
