The Book of Beasts

by John Barrowman

  It was coming for them next.

  SEVENTY-FIVE

  ‘Anyone know anything useful about griffins?’ screamed Sandie, her back as far against the rock as humanly possible as the beast approached at breakneck speed.

  ‘I’m thinking…’ Em stammered.

  ‘Think faster!’

  Vaughn pulled his sketchpad from his jacket pocket, but the blast of wind from the griffin’s wings blew it from his hand and sent it spinning several metres along the ledge. Zach dropped the rope from his waist and broke away from the wall, running along the narrow rocky path to retrieve it.

  ‘No!’ yelled Em. Zach, the griffin will get you! Stay back against the wall!

  Vaughn launched himself at Zach, bringing him to the ground as the griffin swept overhead, its sharp-edged wing slicing the front of Sandie’s jacket and its heavy lion’s tail thrashing across Vaughn’s back.

  ‘We can’t stay on this ledge for much longer,’ said Sandie as Vaughn and Zach struggled to their feet. Zach was clutching the sketchbook. ‘How are we supposed to fight a griffin?’

  ‘Griffins are guardians of treasure,’ blurted Em, suddenly remembering. She felt in her pockets for a pencil. ‘If I draw some, we might distract its attention.’

  ‘Do it,’ said Vaughn. ‘Fast.’

  Em pulled the sketchpad from Zach’s hands and scribbled, fingers flying.

  In a burst of yellow light, a treasure chest overflowing with gold and silver doubloons appeared on the ledge.

  At once, the griffin swooped down from a great height, its eyes blazing, and landed on the ledge, a few paces from Em and Zach, snapping its hooked beak. Then it pounced.

  Sandie screamed, reaching for Zach and Em.

  ‘Wait,’ Vaughn said, pulling her back. ‘Look!’

  The griffin had climbed on top of the treasure chest and was wrapping its wings protectively over the doubloons, knocking a cache of them over the ledge into the chaos below.

  Zach and Em pressed their backs against the rock face and sidled behind the griffin to join the others. The beast watched them, its tail sweeping back and forth along the ledge, gathering loose coins beneath its rump.

  ‘Where now?’ said Sandie.

  Em gazed down into the abyss. The arches around the periphery of the amphitheatre-like pit looked familiar.

  ‘I painted one of those in the left-hand panel of my triptych,’ she said, pointing at the arches. ‘If my painting is right, Matt – maybe Jeannie too – will come through one of those tunnels. They’ll run right into that hell. We have to be there for them.’

  ‘But how do we get down there?’ said Sandie helplessly. ‘We must be at least a hundred metres up! And how do we survive when we reach the ground?’

  ‘One thing at a time,’ said Vaughn. He gazed over the rim of the ledge, assessing the rock face. ‘The gorge walls are rough; there are plenty of foot- and hand-holds. If we start now, we can be at the bottom in half an hour.’

  Zach raised his hand. ‘I don’t think we have that kind of time,’ he signed. ‘Something monstrous is coming. And I feel like it’s bringing Matt and Jeannie with it.’

  Em sensed something much worse than fear from Zach. She felt terror.

  ‘Are they OK?’ she signed back at once. ‘How do you know they’re with this thing?’

  Zach pressed a shaky hand to his chest. I feel it here.

  Sandie was staring over the edge. ‘I think the beasts agree with Zach,’ she said.

  The pit was emptying in a violent stampede. Beasts galloped, grunted and gored their way into the various tunnels, leaving a tide of blood in their wake that flowed into the crevices and crannies in the ground. Em watched a yale – an odd bovine-like beast that could have been an ancestor to a Highland cow – skewer a wild boar with one of its arm-like horns and toss it into the air in a desperate bid for freedom. The air swarmed with cockatrices, manticores and firebirds; gargoyles and rocs fought with orcs and owlmen, trolls with valkyries… Everything was desperate to leave.

  To put as much space between themselves and whatever was coming.

  SEVENTY-SIX

  ‘We need a fast way down,’ said Vaughn as the tornado in the air and stampede on the ground reached a crescendo. ‘Think!’

  ‘A giant airbag?’ said Sandie. ‘The kind of thing you see stunt men jump on to from tall buildings?’

  ‘Too unpredictable,’ said Vaughn. ‘What if one of us lands badly and breaks a leg, or worse? What if one of these flying beasts swoops past in mid-jump and picks us off as lunch?’

  Em stared up at the spires and towers, the nooks and crannies of the gruesome gorge. They couldn’t stay up here.

  Em suddenly remembered a construction site at one of the old mansions in Kensington Gardens.

  ‘A slide!’ she said. ‘Like those long tubes they use on demolition sites to get rid of rubbish and debris.’

  A million sets of eyes stared down at the four of them, the beasts of the air watching them as if they were field mice. Em grabbed Vaughn’s sketchpad and animated a tubular slide, fusing it on to a thick root jutting out of the rock face. The tube extended like a telescope, one section expanding from another in whirling cracks of light, until the last tube hit the distant ground with a hollow clang.

  ‘Sandie, you go first down the chute,’ said Vaughn, sketching at the same time as Em. ‘As soon as you reach the bottom, clear out of the way and get inside that for safety.’

  He pointed to a cage on wheels that he’d animated round the airy cushion at the bottom of Em’s slide.

  Sandie wriggled into the tube first. She disappeared almost at once. Em followed.

  The ride was breathtakingly fast. Em rocketed in a wide spiral down to the bottom of the gorge, slewing from side to side, the tube walls a blur. She emerged with a gasp in the cage Vaughn had created, bouncing next to her mother on the cushion. Zach and then Vaughn exploded from the tube behind her, almost cartwheeling into the cage bars.

  Way above them, a dragon shot out of a crevice, spewing fire at the very spot where they had been standing moments earlier. The edge of the tube caught fire.

  ‘What the—’

  Vaughn gave an exclamation as the paper in his hand burst into flames. They could only watch as the tube, their protective cage and the drawing flared away to nothing, leaving them alone and defenceless on the rocky, bloodied ground.

  The ground trembled. An overwhelming stench of rotting flesh and sewage gusted down the nearest tunnel, causing all four of them to gag and cover their noses.

  Through the gloom, a hulking shape was moving slowly towards them.

  We have got to move from here fast, Zach. Something really bad is coming. I can feel it.

  And then Em heard a familiar shout, deep in her mind.

  OH… MY… GOD… EM! Am I hallucinating, or is that your obnoxious voice I can hear?

  SEVENTY-SEVEN

  ‘MATT!’ Em screamed, out loud. ‘Mum, Zach, Vaughn – I can hear Matt!’

  Sandie’s face flooded with colour as her eyes darted in every direction, landing on the entrance to the foul-smelling tunnel.

  Matt was still yelling in Em’s head, making it impossible to hear herself think. But it was the best distraction ever. Despite their circumstances, she found herself laughing and crying at the same time, tears spilling down her cheeks. She threw herself into Zach’s arms and danced a jig with him.

  We came to find you, Matt. We opened this place to come and find you! Are you OK?

  ‘Is Mattie hurt?’ Sandie begged. ‘Tell me, Em, is he OK?’

  At the thought of Matt wounded as she had painted him in her triptych, Em found that he was gone from her mind. She grasped blindly, trying to find him again.

  Matt! Can you hear me?

  Nothing.

  Zach saw and felt Em’s panic rising. What’s wrong? Have you lost him?

  Em nodded in anguish.

  The Grendel lurched out of the tunnel in front of her.

  At first Em t
hought its body was made of soft, wet clay. Then she saw it more clearly. Layers and layers of mud were peppered with hundreds of pulsing holes, like empty eyes blinking in the darkness. The creature oozed through the tunnel into the great pit in front of them, red eyes flaming, the stench of decay hanging over it like a shroud. Em stumbled back in disgust and horror.

  Matt! Can you hear me?

  Had they found Matt, just to lose him again?

  Sandie yelped as she crunched across a nest of bones that was sinking into the ground. Vaughn reached over and lifted her off.

  ‘Pick a tunnel,’ said Vaughn as the Grendel advanced, inhaling the air around it, creating a death draft that sucked the bones on the ground towards it with a hideous clattering sound. ‘We have to get out of here.’

  But every tunnel Em could see was full of countless monsters, stopping and turning and shifting forward in an ugly kind of unison. Their fear and stench was overwhelming. Suffocating.

  Em felt her mother’s hand grip her own. ‘We need weapons.’

  ‘A tank?’ signed Zach. ‘We could use it to charge our way into one of those tunnels.’

  The watching, waiting creatures of Hollow Earth moved more quickly than Em would have dreamed possible. In moments they were utterly surrounded: the Grendel before them, the nightmarish beasts behind.

  Trapped.

  Em wondered wildly if the beasts had tricked them, cleared the pit to lure them from the ledge to their doom. It was as if they were thinking as one.

  Where was her brother? Why couldn’t she hear him any more?

  Matt! Matt!

  An enormous serpent creature with the crested head and spindly legs of a cockerel bounded towards Sandie. Vaughn was drawing, but not fast enough. The beast whipped its thick snake’s tail and knocked the pad from his hand.

  ‘It’s a basilisk, Mum,’ screamed Em in blind panic. ‘Don’t let it breathe on you! Its breath is poisonous! Vaughn, draw us weapons – anything! Hurry!’

  Vaughn scrambled for his pad. In seconds they were armed with glittering, sparking swords. As the basilisk went for Sandie, she dropped to her knees, ducked beneath its toxic beak and slid her sword into its feathered breast.

  The serpent gave an unearthly scream. Sandie only just rolled out of the way before the monster collapsed to the ground. The Grendel was across the pit in a blur, sucking out the basilisk’s heart and stripping its feathers and flesh. It lifted its enormous ape-like head and bayed, bringing more creatures out of the tunnels, darkening the air above and the ground below with their writhing, fluttering, flexing bodies.

  Em was filled with awe at the sight of her mother, dripping sword in hand, like the warriors Em loved to draw. The sight filled her with resolve. If her mother could be brave, she could too. The fear of this place wouldn’t defeat her.

  Em ran to her mum’s side, ready for whatever horror was coming.

  And then Matt and Jeannie stumbled out of the shadows.

  SEVENTY-EIGHT

  Matt and Jeannie were holding each other upright. Jeannie was still dressed in her orange safety vest, although it was tattered and torn from one shoulder and Matt’s clothes were in shreds. Both were hobbling. Matt was wounded, just as Em had painted him. But thankfully, the bone quill was clutched in his hand and no longer deep in his flesh.

  Despite her mum’s warnings, Em sprinted across the bone-filled gorge and wrapped herself in her brother’s arms.

  You took your time.

  Matt’s face blazed with relief and delight. I’m happy to see you too Em, but maybe we can do this whole reunion thing when we get out of the hellhole?

  Sandie ran over to Matt, ignoring the host of slithering serpents and flying beasts around them, and pulled him into a fierce mother’s hug. Then she turned and tearfully embraced Jeannie.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said.

  ‘Ach, lass,’ said Jeannie. ‘It was nothing.’

  ‘I hate to break up the reunion,’ said Vaughn, ‘but we have a problem.’

  Zach and Em were cut off from the others, staring down a drake: a two-legged, horned dragon with a crocodile’s tail. The beast was spitting green fireballs at them which exploded into toxic slime at their feet.

  Zach touched Em, pulling her gaze from Matt. When I give the signal, Em.

  He thrust his sword at the beast’s head, jabbing its wide nose. The drake roared with rage. A ball of green flame landed at Zach’s feet; another seared the shoulder of his jacket, but he kept jabbing.

  Now!

  Em pictured her mother killing the basilisk. She jumped into the air, flashing her sword, driving the shining blade through the monster’s thick scales and into its back. As it turned its horned head in agony to spit fire at her, Zach thrust his sword deep into its leathery neck, earning a spray of green, smelly blood that gushed all over him. He choked, covering his nose.

  Whoa… this stuff stinks like pee.

  Em animated a lavender-scented towel. Hardly pausing to thrust it into Zach’s gunky hands, she threw herself into Matt’s arms again.

  ‘Ow!’ Matt mumbled, squeezing her weakly. ‘Injured man here, OK?’

  Em jumped back as she remembered his wound. To her horror, her brother wobbled and fell to the ground.

  ‘He’ll be all right, lass,’ said Jeannie, looking at Sandie and embracing Em and Zach together as Sandie and Vaughn gently lifted Matt back on to his feet. ‘But we need to get him out of here. He’s lost a fair amount of blood.’

  Vaughn was on guard at the entrance to the tunnel, staring out into the pit where things were not looking good for them.

  Sandie studied the snarling, snapping beasts surrounding them. ‘Guys, we really need to leave.’

  Vaughn looked at Jeannie and squeezed her arm. ‘Any ideas?’ he said.

  Jeannie smiled.

  SEVENTY-NINE

  Setting her hands flat on the wall while the others watched, Jeannie closed her eyes to summon their salvation.

  At first, only the area of rock directly under her palms pulsed, outlining her hands with a pale green light. But then the pulsing rhythm spread out across the wall, shooting light in every direction, illuminating the colossal cavern with veins of brilliance that throbbed to the steady cadence of a heartbeat.

  ‘We need more than twinkling lights,’ Vaughn said. ‘Are you sure this will work?’

  ‘You never did really listen to my stories, did you, son?’ Jeannie sighed. ‘He’ll come. Have a wee bit of faith.’

  ‘We need to get Matt on a stretcher,’ said Em, holding her semi-conscious brother’s hand. ‘Mum, can you draw one?’

  Sandie animated a simple length of canvas with two poles through loops on each side. Once Matt was settled, they waited, huddled together for warmth and comfort, keeping their eyes half on the prowling beasts and half on Jeannie’s light show as it made the great, gloomy cavern shine as brightly as a fairground ride.

  A golden glow shimmered in the air above them, right in the centre of the cavernous space. Silent now, the beasts began to part like the Red Sea. Not one creature bayed, howled, lunged or growled. Even the Grendel fell silent.

  Albion walked among them, dressed from head to toe in a fur cloak and white gown, the familiar silver helix spinning on his breastplate. His crown of antlers was gold and shone as bright as a hundred torches.

  Gripping his carved wooden sceptre, he stopped in front of Jeannie and bowed. He turned to Em and did the same. Em bobbed an awkward curtsey in return.

  ‘Thank you,’ Albion said, in a voice that sounded as if it hadn’t been used in centuries. ‘For listening to your imagination. For seeing beyond the real to the eternal.’

  Then with his heavy fur cloak brushing the ground, Albion held his sceptre aloft. The golden light from his antler crown expanded, filling the space with even more brightness. And a beam shone from the peryton set in the top of the sceptre to a dark cave mouth far up on the gorge walls, further even than the ledge where they had first entered Hollow Earth.

&nbs
p; ‘There’s our way home,’ said Em.

  And she pointed to where the white peryton was waiting for them at the mouth of the cave.

  EIGHTY

  The Bay

  Present Day

  When Simon spotted a rolled blue tarp dropping from nowhere into the choppy bay, he knew they had found Henrietta de Court.

  With Renard using all his abilities to cloak their presence, they had successfully sneaked up on the sleek cruiser. It had been almost impossible to see. If it hadn’t been for the splash, they would never have found it.

  Henrietta stood on the deck, her hair tied back in a scarf and her binoculars trained on Era Mina. While Renard held the small Abbey boat steady, well out of Henrietta’s sightline, Simon climbed stealthily over the side, slipping the syringe from its leather wrap. Henrietta didn’t look round.

  Tanan was piloting the craft from the top deck, wind in his dark hair and aviators on his nose. Simon climbed up the side of the boat and dropped lightly behind him.

  Tanan’s reactions weren’t fast enough. Simon plunged the tranquillizer deep into his thigh, catching him as he slumped to the ground.

  Simon set the cruiser to autopilot, after tying Tanan’s hands firmly behind his back. He wouldn’t wake up for a while, but there was no point in taking chances.

  Then he climbed back down to the deck.

  Henrietta was still watching the small island, crooning softly to herself as she adjusted the binoculars. At the sharp prick of Simon’s needle, she fell into his arms. In a matter of moments, she was trussed up like a turkey and left on the deck to wake up in her own good time.

  ‘I have them both,’ Simon said, returning to the cabin. ‘Renard?’

  Renard was gazing at the tapestry which he had unfurled inside the cabin.

  ‘Look at this, Simon,’ he said.

  The great tapestry showed Malcolm as a knight with wings on his shoulder plates and a swirling helix on his breastplate, leading an army of skeletal black knights. Even as they watched, the threads brightened, burned and restitched themselves into a fresh design, a different pattern: a new story.