by SJB Gilmour
The combined silver and gold within The One ceased their struggle for release. Their knowledge and power was vast and ancient and inside that combined force, Sarah and Melanie knew that these two metals were completely impartial. An idea came to them.
The One smiled at Him. ‘Within us is gold and silver, Archer God! If you won’t teach us, then teach them! Only combined can they use your secret!’
Apollo nodded and reached deep into the whirling vortex that was the combined gold and silver within The One.
Sarah and Melanie lost their hold over the metals within them as the gold and silver took over control of The One for one last moment. Then there, in front of a few hundred who would tell the story to their children and grandchildren, who would continue to tell the tale for hundreds of generations to come, The One cast out the three bodiless souls from within her and filled them equally with the combined power within her.
As the power flowed from The One, the silver and gold within her began to separate, and Sarah and Mel began to become more independent. Finally, her job done, The One separated. Sarah took with her all the gold and Melanie, all the silver. Sarah fell to the ground, barely conscious. Her golden coat was wet and ragged and her breaths came in short, agonising pants. Mel crumpled to her knees, shaking and sweating, but at least she was able to keep from passing out. Then she stood and faced the three new gods who had once been her mother, father and baby brother.
‘You better go to Jilde,’ she told Them bluntly. ‘The rest of the gods will kill Apollo if You don’t. I guess You’ll need to create Your own heaven and hell and whatever.’
Susan smiled at her. ‘Never fear, Mel. We’ll take good care of your Jilde.’
David looked around at the devastation and saw not only the physical bodies of every dead goblin, but their souls, drifting aimlessly in misery near where they fell. He reached out and commanded them to follow Him back to Jilde. Then He vanished. Susan, who was now cradling Her reborn son, nodded at The One and She also vanished.
The crowd that witnessed this amazing occurrence began to cheer, but Jerrit waved one angry claw at them to shut up. They did nothing of the kind.
Apollo looked at the former ruler of Jilde with a wry smile. ‘Allow me, goblin,’ He told him.
Jerrit nodded in awe as Apollo turned and waved one tanned hand at the crowd. ‘Be still, my children!’ He commanded.
The crowd hushed respectively.
Then Mel turned to face Him. ‘We’re not done yet,’ she told Him wearily.
Apollo seemed confused.
Mel pointed at Sarah. ‘We’ve got to find Cromwell. He’s gone to Valhalla with Loki. He’ll be treated like a hero. That’s not fair. He should pay for his part in all this!’
Apollo nodded. ‘I concur, my child.’ He pointed at an empty patch of sand. A shimmering portal appeared and within it, the semblances of the grinning form of Loki, clutching the cringing soul of Oliver Cromwell.
Mel was angrier than she had ever been in her life. She nudged Sarah with her foot.
Feeling her friend’s touch, Sarah shook herself awake and scrambled to her paws. She glared at Loki and Oliver Cromwell’s spirit.
‘You bastards!’ she growled.
Loki simply laughed while Cromwell wailed.
‘Forgive me!’ Cromwell’s spirit cried. ‘Please! What was I supposed to do?’ Now he appealed to Apollo. ‘Could any man be expected to betray his god?’
‘You chose to worship Loki!’ A new voice boomed. ‘The fault is yours!’
Next to Apollo appeared the great bearded form of Hades. ‘As for you, Norse Trickster, Tartarus is too good for you!’ Hades boomed at Loki. ‘How dare you abuse the faithful to create such grief?’
Loki sneered at Hades. ‘What are you going to do about it?’
‘He’s not going to do anything,’ Sarah told Loki with cold fury. She resumed her human form and held her hand out for Mel to hold. ‘We will!’
Loki gaped in horror as Sarah and Mel once more joined hands and melded together to become The One. Unlike their previous incarnation, this time there was no conflict within her driving them apart. The gold and silver seemed to have reached some form of understanding that both metals would not be combined for long, and when separated would again be completely alone with their respective masters. Fuelled by their combined anger and grief as well as the raw power they both possessed, The One reached through the portal to Valhalla and took hold of Loki by the shoulder.
Loki cried out in pain and agony as The One hauled Him out of Valhalla and onto Earth.
‘You wanted Herpethia to come here!’ The One yelled. ‘We sent her back. Since you like her so much, you can join her!’ She waved at the portal Apollo had opened to Valhalla and blasted it shut. Then she forged a new portal back to the hell she had rescued Mel’s mother, father and brother from, and hurled Loki, screaming in protest and dismay, into it. After she closed the portal, leaving Loki to suffer, she turned to Cromwell’s soul.
‘Please!’ he begged. ‘I had no choice!’
The One sneered at him with pure contempt. ‘Tough cheddar, Cromwell.’ She turned to Hades. ‘He’s all Yours, Lord Hades. Do whatever You want with him.’
Hades replied, ‘With pleasure!’ and took hold of Oliver Cromwell’s soul. The ancient Greek god glared at Cromwell with a mixture of pity and anger. ‘Eight thousand years you served Loki in a pointless exercise that cost thousands of lives,’ He accused. ‘Then eight hundred thousand more, you shall suffer more hopelessness!’
Not understanding what Hades meant, Oliver Cromwell looked at Him in terror. Hades’ smile vanished as He hauled Cromwell’s soul down through His Underworld to the darkness of Tartarus. There, at the base of a mountain, He found the eternally suffering Sisyphus, as he had done countless thousands of times before, beginning to push his rock up the mountain, where it would inevitably fall back down.
‘Rest Sisyphus,’ Hades told the condemned soul. ‘Your new task is to watch this miscreant continue your labour!’
Sisyphus gaped at Hades and then sank to his knees before his god. ‘Thank-You, My Lord!’ he cried as Hades hurled Cromwell at the rock.
‘Labour onwards, White Pirate!’ Hades ordered him. ‘Onwards and ever!’
Without even knowing how or why, Cromwell suddenly felt himself compelled to do as he was told. He began slowly and painfully pushing the enormous rock up the side of the mountain. Even though he knew that the moment he got it to the top, it would fall back down again, Cromwell had to obey and would be doing so for the next eight hundred thousand years.
Back on the island, The One bent and panted. The effort she had just expended would have killed a lesser being. She turned to Apollo who was holding Angelina in a firm embrace. Too tired to bother with pleasantries now, she waved at them.
‘Well, go on,’ she told the grinning pair. ‘Go be married or whatever.’
Apollo smiled at her and then He and Angelina also vanished.
James looked at her with an admiring expression. ‘Nice work,’ he complimented her.
The One grinned at him weakly.
‘There’s one thing left,’ James told her.
‘Oh?’
James pointed at the huge pile of rubble that was all that was left of The Nonagon. ‘Nathan’s under there somewhere. We better get him out before this whole place sinks into Davy Jones’ locker.’
The One nodded and cast her attention to the ruins. It did not take her long to find the bookwyrm, who was desperately stuffing tomes into the satchel. She quickly muttered an incantation to bring him and his satchel of enchanted literature to the beach. Then she collapsed, her energy gone completely. She shimmered for a moment and then there was just Sarah and Melanie, both lying unconscious on the ground.
From behind them came a ragged yelp. A small shimmering portal appeared and Benjamin emerged looking very battered indeed. His fur was singed and his head and paws were scraped and bloody. Despite his wounds, which were healing thems
elves with every step, he was grinning broadly. Behind him, staggered a very dazed and battered-looking man dressed in a filthy loin-cloth.
‘Did I miss anything?’ Benjamin asked.
‘Just your average saving of the universe and birth of three new gods,’ James told him with a nonchalant shrug. His attention turned to the bedraggled man behind Benjamin. ‘Who’s that?’
‘Don’t you recognise me, Master Isaacs?’ the man asked. He staggered forward and held his hand to James, who shook it carefully. ‘I’m Bruce.’
James grinned at him. ‘Well, Bruce, welcome back to the real world!’
Any further conversation was lost as the crowd erupted in great cheers at what they had just witnessed. The cheers and applause came to a sudden halt moments later as the island was rocked with another great earthquake. Starting from the centre where the tower had been, it began sinking into the ocean as if it were sand in an enormous hourglass.
‘I dunno about you old boy,’ Jerrit observed to James quite calmly, ‘but wouldn’t you say it’s time to get the hell out of here?’
James grinned. ‘You know what? I think you’re right!’
Benjamin McConnell arrived at Wolfenvald, carrying Sarah to the trees where her parents had been buried. Leaving Fergus and several other werewolves to guard Sarah, he, Kate O’Brien and Pack Jasper began the sad task of returning as many of the werewolf corpses they could find. Of course many more had sunk into the ocean along with the rest of the island, but at least their souls all came to rest in the same place — Wolfenvald. The souls of all those werewolves who had already joined their ancestors there, welcomed them all with gentle calmness and warmth.
Sarah woke, feeling battered, bruised, and hungry. She looked around at the long rows of burial mounds the forest floor had made as it accepted each werewolf corpse into the ground. Each mound covered a werewolf she knew. Some she had come to know quite well. Sheila Freeman sat sorrowfully by the mound that entombed her mate Mannix. Others, she had known only in passing, but now that they were all part of the collective consciousness that was Wolfenvald, she knew them all completely.
One mound had not yet been made. Despite her hunger, Sarah went to the Labyrinth of Minos. There, she assumed her human form and was shown to the morgue where the body of Felix in his wolf form was housed by a few tired and battered minotaurs. Felix was the closest to anything like a boyfriend Sarah had ever had. A single tear ran down her cheek and she gently brushed back his coat with her hand for a moment. Refusing any of the help offered by the silent minotaurs standing nearby, she picked up Felix’s body as best as she could. In his human form, Felix was quite skinny and would have been easier for her to carry. As a prone, lifeless but way heavier wolf, he was much harder to bear. Still, she managed to hoist his still corpse over her shoulder in a fireman’s carry, and forged a quick (and slightly less stable than usual for her) portal to Wolfenvald.
Once she returned to Wolfenvald, she lay Felix down on the ground beside the mounds where her parents were buried. Then, as if her human self now disgusted her, she flowed back into her Golden Mane form with great relief. She knew then that she would stay a wolf more and more. Humans, their gods and their predilection for evil had caused all this grief. Wolves would not do something so horrid. Being human reminded her of everything evil in the universe and she didn’t like that at all.
As it had for the bodies of dead werewolves countless times in the past, the living loam of the forest floor absorbed Felix’s body with quiet dignity. So many wolves had died for her, Sarah thought bitterly and a great rage welled up inside her. She sat back on her haunches and howled, letting all her pain and grief flow out into that howl.
Sarah howled her dirge alone for several minutes and then her voice was not alone in the forest. Every living werewolf on Wolfenvald stopped what he or she was doing and joined in the solemn wolf song. Then, as every living werewolf voice was joined with that of the Golden Mane, the dead werewolves too added their voices to the chorus of mourning.
When Sarah had howled herself hoarse, she knew that there was no more she could do. She had honoured those who had fought and died in her name as best she could. She vowed to herself then and there that from that day on, she had a debt to pay Wolfenvald and if she was going to represent her world, she’d do so by being the fairest and most just that she could be. Of course, Sarah Coppernick had always been a very honest person who truly believed in always doing the right thing, so this wouldn’t be such a hard thing for her to continue to do. Instead, it was the responsibility that she felt the strongest. Always before, she’d acted in this way simply because she knew in her soul that was how things should be done. Now she had another reason. She’d made a commitment and wasn’t going to let her ancestors down.
Benjamin looked at her with his great steel-grey eyes and knew exactly what the Golden Mane had decided. He nuzzled her gently.
‘You did it!’ came a yip from nearby. From behind a tree, the ancient and quite dotty Golden Mane Rufus appeared. He crowed at her, proudly wagging his tail. He seemed absolutely delighted. Sarah knew she should be proud and happy too, but then and there, she knew the awful truth that there is no joy in winning any war when the cost was even one life.
‘Yes,’ she said simply. ‘We did it. Conundrum Gate is gone.’
Rufus stopped wagging his tail and became deadly serious. ‘Then my work is done.’ He sniffed once at Sarah gratefully. ‘Thanks for giving me the chance to run again. I’ve enjoyed it, but this body you gave me should never really have been mine.’
Sarah and Benjamin watched in silence as Rufus’ living body shimmered and began to fade. In the space of a few heartbeats, he was every bit as ghostly as Henryk and Jozefa, Sarah’s parents who arrived at his side. Moments later, they were joined by Felix.
All four ghosts capered around Sarah and Benjamin and yipped happily at them, often nudging and licking them until Sarah and Benjamin began to smile.
Kate O’Brien watched Rufus’ ghost caper about for a long moment, her fierce eyes strangely haunted. ‘You lucky bastard,’ she muttered. Benjamin nudged her flank gently and her cold eyes softened.
‘You’ll get used to it,’ he told her. ‘Besides,’ he added with a playful smile, ‘forever’s only a long time if you don’t do anything in it.’
Now that Sarah finally knew for certain that all was well, she could at last begin to feel happy. She sat on her haunches again and gave another long howl, only this time it was a howl of triumph. Once more, the voice of every werewolf, living and dead joined her in the howl of victory.
‘Well done, Sarah Kopernik,’ the voices of Wolfenvald told her when all was silent once more. ‘Hail Golden Mane! Hail the new Queen of Wolfenvald!’
Sarah gave a happy yip and nudged Uncle Benjamin’s flank. Then Aunt Roberta and Uncle Robert were there and the five werewolves of Pack Sarah — one Golden Mane, two Silver Shrouds, (Kate O’Brien was now never very far from Benjamin McConnell) and two Brown Coats bounded away into the forest. All were hungry and needed to run and hunt, and that is just what they did.
Chapter Twenty-five
The next day, though still tired and sore, Melanie woke with her belly rumbling as though she’d not eaten in a week. She needed to shield her eyes from the increasing brightness in her room. Being able to see through one’s own eyelids did have its advantages, but getting to sleep was not one of them. Her room, several floors up in the Imperial Palace of Jilde had been reinforced with brass and lead on the walls, ceiling and window shutters. However, she could still see quite clearly, especially during the daytime. Without even opening her eyes, Mel knew that it was about noon on Jilde and the harsh daylight would be around for at least another fourteen hours or so.
Her stomach was grumbling very loudly and she ached all over. Still feeling sore, tired and strangely emotionally numb from the battle, she emerged from her soft bed and walked naked and barefoot to her enormous bathroom. Once she had showered, she dressed in the neares
t things she could find which annoyingly, were a fine green dress and matching shoes that would befit a princess. They were not to her taste at all. She looked at herself in the mirror and swore. There was no way she was going to get about in that kind of outfit. She looked around the room and was not pleased to find her normal jeans, cargo pants, boots and shirts were all missing.
She stripped off the dress and kicked away the shoes, already beginning to develop quite a temper. ‘Attiros!’ she commanded and she was suddenly much more comfortably clad in black jeans, black combat boots and a black tank top.
Outside her room, she could clearly see several goblins eagerly waiting for her to emerge. They’d obviously heard her moving about and though they were not game enough to enter her room yet, they weren’t far from doing so. Mel decided not to give them the chance. This was her room, damn it. It was bad enough that she hardly had any privacy and these stupid goblins were about to come charging into her room. Didn’t they know what the hell she’d just been through? Didn’t they know who she was?
She wrenched one of the doors open and glared at the goblin waiting staff. Her sudden appearance startled them quite badly but that was nothing compared to their shocked faces when she told them, in no uncertain terms and with quite a few profanities, to go away and leave her alone. Two began to protest but Mel, now well into a very bad mood, though careful enough not to let herself heat up all over, created a gleaming silver sword in her right hand and began waving it in their stunned faces. She issued one last ultimatum and the goblins fled. Mel reabsorbed her sword and stalked about her room, cursing to herself for not instructing them to bring her some food.
Fortunately, food was never very far away. Her rooms came equipped with a small kitchen and two very well-stocked refrigerators. Mel went to one fridge and made herself a cheese sandwich. She was halfway through that and a large glass of chocolate milk when she saw the unmistakable form of Jerrit marching along the corridor to her room. Beside General Jerrit strode Field Marshal Jax, Melanie’s second in command.