by SJB Gilmour
Mel shut her eyes and bowed her head slightly. The goblin gulped and placed the crown on Mel’s head. It was too big, and being gold, it was certainly the wrong element. Mel felt her body turn the crown to gold dust that fell away like sand. Then, as bright as a welder’s arc, a new silver crown appeared on her head.
The crowd roared again and this time Jimbeaux joined in, hooting and roaring with delight. In the middle of what was about to become a free-for-all celebration, Jonex scrambled forward yet again, still clutching the crystal ball.
‘Your Majesty!’ he screeched through broken teeth and mashed lips. He hurled the ball at her. ‘You must see this!’
Mel caught the ball just as several guardslins grabbed the bureaucrat with more force than was really necessary. Mel looked into the ball and could hardly believe what she saw. There, weeping with rage and dismay, was Cassandra, begging her to help her. In the time it took for the dropped crystal ball to leave her grasp and hit the ground, she had drawn her weapons and run through a portal to Crete.
Chapter Twenty-one
Sarah glared at Angelina. ‘What are you doing here, Captain?’
Angelina shrugged. ‘Penethelia told me to stay at Lentekhi, but mother called so I came here. Susan’s my sister, Sarah. I had to come!’
Sarah waved that aside. She remembered O’Brien informing her of her new rank. ‘Well,’ she muttered to herself, ‘if I’m gonna be a General then I might as well start behaving like one.’ She glared at Angelina. ‘Alright, but once we’ve worked out what happened, I want you back at base. If Penethelia’s at Gembrook, she can stay there and liaise with the others.’
‘Where have you been?’ Cassandra shrieked at Sarah as Mel strode through her own portal.
‘I got here as soon as I could,’ the Golden Mane growled.
‘Same,’ Mel added curtly.
Sarah sniffed around, ignoring the startled minotaurs and shrieking Cassandra. She whined miserably as she sniffed Felix’s cold body. Even though only moments before she had met his ghost on Wolfenvald, she was still shocked to see his corpse. Sarah sat back and howled a short dirge to the fallen werewolf who had been her only male friend even close to her age. Her rage-fuelled determination took charge once more.
She turned and growled at Cassandra. ‘Pull yourself together, Captain.’ Cassandra wasn’t listening, and Sarah had no time for that. She pointed her nose at Cassandra and commanded ‘Attiros!’
A small spark of lighting stuck the hysterical seer on her bottom, and she was instantly garbed in a modified Amazon captain’s uniform. Though obviously not an Amazon, it was clear Cassandra now had a definite place within the ranks of The Armies of Nine.
Cassandra gasped and glared at Sarah. She rubbed her posterior, furious.
‘Snap to it Captain!’ Sarah barked at her. She turned to Tor. ‘Herdmaster, assemble your troops to be ready for orders. You and Cassandra are coming to Gembrook with us.’
Tor snapped to attention and saluted sharply. ‘Aye, Ma’am,’ he responded and waved to his lieutenants, Davey and Merry.
Sarah went to the spot where Cromwell had disappeared. His scent was all over the traces of where the portal had been. ‘Cromwell did this,’ she growled. ‘His signature is all over it.’ She pawed at the ground. ‘The portal went to Conundrum,’ she announced. Before she could tell Angelina to wait, the furious Amazon warrior dubbed The Angel of Death and bride-to-be of Apollo, created a portal and was about to run through it.
‘Captain stay where you are!’ Sarah snapped.
‘Sarah I can’t!’ Angelina protested. ‘Marzdane—’
‘Didn’t do this at all and I gave you an order! You’re going to Lentekhi to muster the troops or so help me I’ll stick a bloody mountain on you!’ Sarah barked so loudly that sand and rubble fell from the ceiling. ‘Cromwell used an illusion! You should know better than to just trust your eyes! Can’t you smell it?’ She sniffed disdainfully. ‘Call yourself a necromancer!’
The barb stung Angelina to the quick. She came to attention with a flaming face. ‘Ma’am!’
‘Think about it, Angelina!’ Sarah went on in a more reasonable tone. ‘Why would he abduct them instead of just killing them? He needs them for something. Some kind of sacrifice to give him enough power to operate Conundrum Gate without The Star of Planes.’
Angelina went white. ‘There’s only one kind of spell he can use!’ she exclaimed. ‘It’s the necromantic rite of human sacrifice…’ She sighed and relaxed a little. ‘It’ll take him days to complete it.’
Sarah wagged her tail. ‘Then we’ve got enough time to get them back without doing anything stupid.’
Melanie had run to where the portal had been. She examined it and traced around the edges. ‘Sarah’s right,’ she muttered darkly. ‘This portal was made by Cromwell!’
‘I know what I saw!’ Cassandra insisted, still rubbing her bottom where Sarah had zapped her.
Even though Mel had never met her before and knew that she should probably treat her grandmother with more respect, she marched up to the furious woman and yelled at her.
‘Cassandra!’ Mel waved at Sarah. ‘Cromwell made that portal! Sarah and I trained with that bastard. We know his work! It wasn’t Marzdane who took them!’ Garbed in her silver armour, with wings and fangs, Mel was quite an imposing figure. Her loud yell and threatening appearance was enough to finally bring Cassandra around to her senses.
‘Well whoever it was,’ Cassandra grated, ‘he took Susan, David and the baby.’ Her eyes glazed over as another premonition hit her. She sank to her knees, shaking. ‘The Time of War has come!’ she croaked. Then she keeled over onto the floor in a crumpled heap.
Mel rolled her eyes. ‘No kidding,’ she drawled. She nudged Cassandra in the ribs with her booted foot. ‘Get up old woman. We don’t have time for hysterics now!’
Sarah agreed. ‘Cassandra, you, Tor, Mel and I are all going back to Gembrook,’ she told her.
‘General, I want Cromwell!’ Angelina interrupted. Her temper was flaring up again. Sparks were flickering up and down her body and her eyes were flared dangerously.
Sarah glared at her with eyes glowing like two angry suns. ‘You can have him but only if you follow your orders, Captain, or should I say Lieutenant?’ Sarah growled very quietly but a crash of thunder rocked The Labyrinth with every syllable. ‘Get back to Lentekhi.’
Angelina swallowed and then nodded. ‘Alright,’ she muttered.
‘What was that?’ Sarah thundered.
Angelina saluted. ‘Aye Ma’am!’
Master of enchanted botany, James Isaacs stared at the places in Benjamin McConnell’s hall where the enchanted elevators had been. Three days ago, the two shiny machines from the Ottispuschenshuffen Brothers, had just disappeared. Of course, this kind of thing was hardly unusual, so long as the elevator had been called by someone. This time, there had been no sign at all that anyone else needed to use the temperamental and very expensive machines. Even more disconcerting, he had no idea where the machines had gone.
He sat alone at the huge table in the hall. A cup of coffee, untouched and un-noticed, had gone cold at his elbow.
‘They’ve just scarpered,’ he muttered to himself. ‘But where? Why?’
‘We’re better off without them, if you ask me,’ piped his butler, Felicia the faerie.
James frowned. ‘We’re about to march into a war, toots. We’re going to need some form of transport. I don’t know about you but I don’t have the power to carry more than a dozen or so through a portal.’ He thumped the table with his callused fist, ignoring the cold coffee that spilled from his mug. ‘Where are they?’
Felicia fluttered down quickly to wipe the table and retrieve the mug before the stewing sorcerer could make any more mess.
Nathan the purple bookwyrm wriggled up to the table. ‘I might have some news about that, good Master,’ he told him. He nodded at the table and the latest copy of Spellcaster Monthly appeared, alongside a much less reputab
le-looking copy of The Rebel Rouser. The headline on Spellcaster Monthly stated:
Elevators Vanish!
Thousands of Ottispuschenshuffen elevators have disappeared in the last month. The cantankerous machines have left their owners in the lurch in a mass desertion. Their manufacturers, Ottispuschenshuffen, Ottispuschenshuffen and Ottispuschenshuffen, who had been making enchanted ladders and elevators since before any of them could remember, closed their shop in Neroland earlier this year.
Neroland has been deserted. A circular from a rival publication warned all the inhabitants of that mysterious place that something terrible was coming. Unlike all other such dire predictions, this one was actually taken seriously. Spellcaster Monthly examined the report and could find no reason or prophecy that could affect Neroland. All visitors to Neroland are urged to remain calm and confident that the place in the middle of nowhere will always be just where it isn’t.
While the Rebel Rouser had three headlines.
Missing an elevator?
Blame Mautallius! Rebel goblins raided the Ottispuschenshuffen Brothers’ shop in Neroland, apparently at the orders of Mautallius and his cronies Marzdane Hardingleflass and Oliver Cromwell Senior! The three wise old master smiths fled their shop only moments before it was ransacked by Mautallius’ rebels. The brothers are now in hiding, fearing for their lives. Their products, as difficult and grumpy as they are, are nonetheless loyal machines and have been deserting their posts in support of their makers.
Travel Alert For Neroland!
Any and all inhabitants to and inhabitants of Neroland are advised to flee. We’re not sure where Neroland came from, but we are certain that very soon, it’s going to return. That’s probably going to be a very dangerous thing to be in the middle of, so get out of there while you still can!
Conundrum Found!
Conundrum has finally been located. The Nonagon is situated on an island in the middle of the Bermuda Triangle (co-ordinates 28°30’.84” North, 69°06’39.27” West), but whatever you do, don’t go there. Mautallius has surrounded it with a maze full of demons and soldier crabs the size of elephants. All non-Guild sorcerers are advised to steer well clear of this island.
James began to laugh. He was still worried about not having transport, but at least now he knew the grumpy machines weren’t going to be helping his enemy. While he was still chuckling to himself, four shimmering portals appeared in the hall. Out of one, strode on short, stumpy little legs, His Majesty, King Roger Heraldstone the Nineteenth. Beside him marched Generals Mason, Quarry and Kilnmacher.
From a second portal came Field Marshall Jax and General Jerrit of the Imperial Guardslins and a strange old goblin, Jeff, The Smith of Ages. Then the portal grew to enormous proportions and through it came the huge diamondback dragon Siouxanne and the much smaller Jimbeaux. The dragons were followed by three bickering old smiths, the Ottispuschenshuffen brothers.
The third portal allowed several werewolves to bound into the hall. Mannix Freeman, First of Pack Mannix was followed by other Firsts, Grey Coat Jasper Jones and Brown Coat Fergus McArthur. Behind them came Red Coat Hershel Silverberg and White Coat Abby and Benjamin McConnell. Last of all, came the deadly Silver Shroud Kate O’Brienl. They all sniffed about for a few moments and then made their way to the table.
The fourth portal produced two heavily armed Amazons — Her Majesty Queen Penethelia and her partner and second in command, General Sally Troy. Also with them was a witch Benjamin recognised immediately — Master Healer Amelia from the hospital in Bodabayo in Russia, where David and Susan had recuperated after being attacked by trolls the year before. Amelia had defied The Guild by allowing Benjamin, Angelina and the others entry to the hospital where Sarah had healed her best friends’ parents.
Benjamin and O’Brien sat next to James and then the three of them stood politely to allow the rest of the group to seat themselves around the table. The werewolves remained in wolf form and climbed up and perched themselves on their chairs. Siouxanne and Jimbeaux seated themselves well away from the table and rested their great jewelled heads on their fore-claws. Siouxanne’s head was so large that her enormous eyes were level with the heads and shoulders of all those seated at the table.
‘About time you all showed up,’ James muttered sourly. ‘I was beginning to think I’d have to fight this war on my own.’
Penethelia ignored him and glared around the table. ‘Alright,’ she said gruffly. ‘Who wants to report first?’
King Roger cleared his throat. He waved at his generals who, perched on several cushions so they could reach the table, all nodded. ‘The Halfling Hunters are ready,’ he told them. ‘But we’ve got no way of getting our troops to Conundrum now our elevators have disappeared.’
The others murmured the same sentiments.
Jerrit smiled at them all. ‘Oh yes you do,’ he told them calmly. He nodded at the three old smiths, who were bickering among themselves. ‘That’s why these three are here.’
‘Wot?’ Laurence demanded, suddenly aware that all eyes were on him and his brothers. Maurice seemed confused. ‘Why are we here again?’ he asked his other brother Jerome.
Jerome responded by smacking his forgetful brother over the back of the head. ‘The elevators, you stupid git,’ he muttered. Now that the three old smiths were no longer in business, they had dropped their Germanic accents and now sounded like a trio of troublesome lads from Yorkshire.
‘Oh yeah,’ Maurice replied, grinning. ‘You lot have probably noticed your elevators have gone missin’,’ he told them.
‘Not just ours,’ James said, pointing at the two newspapers on the table.
Laurence nodded. ‘That’s wot we’ve been up to,’ he added.
‘Yeah,’ also added Jerome. ‘We issued a general recall and got all them Jilde Academy boys to make a few adjustments to the whole lot of ‘em.’
He produced a crystal ball and gazed into it where the image of an apprentice smith appeared. ‘Let ‘er rip!’ he barked at the apprentice and then put the ball back in his robe.
There was an almighty shudder in the hall as a very large and obviously heavily modified elevator appeared. It was roughly three times the size of the previous Millennium model, and unfortunately, three times as grumpy. It was swearing and cursing to itself.
‘You lot need to get your troops to Conundrum, right?’ Laurence asked the table. ‘Well that’s wot we’ve been doin’ for ya. The maze you will be headin’ into has walls five metres high and it’s got corridors four metres wide.
‘And them corridors is full of soldier crabs as big as buses,’ Maurice added.
‘Your new elevators are all five metres high and about three metres long,’ Jerome told them proudly. ‘And they each weigh about sixteen tonnes. That’d be plenty to squash a bleedin’ crab or two, wouldn’t you say?’
‘And they can carry a lot more troops,’ added Maurice. ‘We got ten thousand of ‘em at the ready. Each one can carry about twenty goblins at a time.’
James sighed and sat back with obvious relief. ‘Phew,’ he breathed.
‘And,’ Jax added calmly, ‘our Majesty has a new additional force to add.’
All eyes looked at him curiously.
‘She marched in to Exlam and—’
‘Axlam?’ King Roger asked.
‘Exlam,’ Jax corrected him. ‘Our most sacred crypt where we inter only our most fearsome warriors. She resurrected a large number of them them as mummies and did something to their armour. It’s some kind of silver alloy and it’s alive. Cut them, smash them, tear them to pieces… They just re-assemble themselves and go back to fighting.’
There was a moment’s silence then James ventured, ‘And who’s in charge of them?’
Jax shrugged. ‘Her Imperial Majesty, Queen Melanie Hazelwood, Nightsmith and ruler of The Nightcorps is their leader.’
James gaped at him. ‘You gave the kid the bloody crown?’
Jerrit laughed. ‘I wish my own coup had been so bloodless,�
� the former Emperor replied affably. ‘If I’d tried to make a stand against her, I’d have been torn to pieces. It was the most amazing landslide victory in Jildere history.’ He nodded towards Jimbeaux. ‘This fellow taught her how to grow wings and fly, and fly she did. Straight up to the heavens where she deposited an orb of living silver. It’s orbiting the planet now, growing and growing as it absorbs more and more silver from the surface. The Moon Cult has even set up shrines in her honour where the faithful are depositing silver offerings. How could we not bow to the one who gave us back our moon?’
James gaped at him for a moment, then his eyes grew sly for a split second before he assumed a more fitting expression. He briefly scribbled a quick not on a piece of parchment.
‘Never mind that,’ General Kilnmacher growled. I’m more interested in these un-dead soldiers she commands.’
‘They would be The Forever Dead,’ Nathan suggested meekly. The purple bookwyrm nodded at Queen Penethelia. ‘Just as the legion Mistress Coppernick—’
‘General Kopernik—’ Sally Troy tried to correct him but was herself interrupted.
‘Her Majesty, Queen Kopernik, First of Wolfenvald,’ Jasper corrected her.
James blinked and sat back, awed. ‘Bugger me,’ he breathed. ‘They’re both queens now. They’ll be impossible!’
Penethelia waved that aside and nodded at Nathan. ‘You’re right, bookwyrm. The troops she brought back seem to be un-killable.’
Nathan bobbed his head in enthusiasm. ‘The Gilded Warrioresses! Tell me, Your Majesty, are they truly golden?’
‘Their armour is. So are their blades.’
Sally nodded. ‘And all their eyes are the same gold colour Kopernik’s are, and their skin has a kind of golden gleam to it as if they’ve been rubbed down with saffron oil.’
‘That’s not all,’ Benjamin told her. ‘We met them on Wolfenvald.’