He stopped talking and slowly turned his eyes to the wall of the cell next to them.
“They’ve come for him,” said Patch. “They’ve come for the Hamelyn Piper. All these years they’ve waited, and finally they’ve come. Somehow they heard he’d been moved, and they must have known exactly where he was moved to!”
What will they do next? signed Wren.
Patch laid out his blanket and started to put his belongings on top, preparing to turn it into a parcel again. “I’m not waiting to find out,” he said. “We’re lucky that attack didn’t kill us. If they do it again we’re dead!”
Wren jumped onto the Fox and Owls board as he reached for it, his hand trembling. What are you doing? she signed.
“We’re leaving.”
How?
Patch pointed at the newly created hole in the wall. “That way.” He nudged her off the game board and packed it up.
Wren looked at the hole. She stared at Patch. We’re climbing down? she signed. You’re not serious!
Patch nodded, trying to sound confident rather than terrified. “They’ll assume I died in the attack, Wren! This is my chance of freedom.”
You’re crazy, she signed, and he thought she was probably right.
“I can lip-play a bit of courage into both of us,” he said. “And there’s a climbing Song I know that’ll help.” He wrapped the blanket-parcel to leave plenty of string spare, and tied it around his waist.
But at that moment, the warning bells rang out again.
Outside, a lone figure was flying towards the Castle from the assembled dragons. Patch wondered how much damage the previous flaming assault had done to the huge Battle Horns. Not enough to put them out of use, it seemed – as the solitary dragon approached, the low pulsing hum of the Horns began, building a defensive Song. They’d been caught by surprise once before, and this time they were taking no chances.
The dragon representative carried a white flag in one front claw, and something else in the other.
A scroll! signed Wren.
“Their demands, I assume,” said Patch. He climbed up into the hole again to keep sight of the dragon. This time, Wren scampered up with him. She seemed confident enough, he saw, climbing on the shattered wall, even in the blustering wind. A rat, he knew, could fall from such an enormous height and walk away after landing. For him, the result would be very different. Messier, for a start.
Patch watched the dragon as it came closer to the Castle. It wore a battle harness – a hardened leather chest plate on the front, and packs and straps on the sides which held equipment and supplies. The animal certainly looked fearsome enough. Patch could see what he thought were battle scars, discoloured areas on the creature’s underbelly and flank. There had clearly been some trauma affecting its muzzle. And wings.
And tail, come to that.
It was male, Patch could tell, lacking as it did the giveaway spines on its back. It – or rather, he – came within a hundred feet of the battlements and stayed there, wings beating steadily as he tucked the white flag into the top of the battle harness.
The dragon unrolled the scroll he carried and began to read in an impressively booming voice. “By the authority of the Triumvirate of the Great Circle of the Red Sand, I demand that you hand over the prisoner known as the Hamelyn Piper. Failure to do so will be met with the displeasure of the dragons here gathered. You have thirty minutes to respond.” He rolled up the scroll and turned to fly back to the other dragons.
“We have to go right now,” said Patch. “If we’re here when they attack again, we’ll be killed.”
Wren jumped onto his shoulder and gave him a thumbs up; Patch found the water jug on the floor, on its side but still with some water in it. He rinsed the dust from his mouth and licked his lips, ready to whistle up some courage.
But before he could begin, a deep rhythmic melody filled the cell. It was coming from the Battle Horns.
“That’s an attacking Song they’re building,” said Patch, looking out to where the dragon with the scroll was still flying away from the Castle, barely a fifth of the distance back to the rest of the dragons. “Don’t tell me they’re going to—” The melody suddenly picked up pace, the underlying low hum from the Battle Horns pulsing now, rapid and deep. “They are!” he said, shocked. “They’re sending their answer already! They’re going to bring that dragon down!”
The dragon messenger looked over his shoulder and started to flap his wings harder. Too late, though – the sound from the Battle Horns grew so loud and so strong that it made the air shimmer and twist, and the space in front of the Castle took on a multicoloured sheen. The colours shot out towards the lone dragon like a rainbow turned into a torrent of flame, making a sound that was half-thunder, half-scream. The dragon was engulfed by the blast, and he tumbled hundreds of feet down through the air, vanishing into the dense pines in the forest far below. The crunch of impact made Patch wince.
Cheering began from the Castle walls, but in the dungeons a shocked silence fell. One prisoner shouted out: “We’re dead! The fools have killed us all!”
The Battle Horns maintained their deep pulsing rhythm. Out of range in the distant trees, dragons were taking off and circling, gathering their numbers. “There are just too many of them,” said Patch. “The Battle Horns won’t be able to stop them all. They’ll get through and the Horns will be abandoned. We’ll be defenceless.”
And then he heard a voice that had been silent all this time.
“Aye?” said the Hamelyn Piper, his voice almost mournful.
Patch looked out of the gaping hole and saw the rock-wielding dragons closing in. Behind them he saw other groups of rock-wielders, who were rising sharply at high speed, releasing their rocks well out of range of the Battle Horns. The air shimmered as the Horns did their work, but the rocks were flying up, arcing, coming down again, this time within the Castle walls.
There were crashes and screams, and the Song of the Battle Horns was silenced.
The dragons had already taken out the most important defence.
Cannons thundered from the battlements high above, but it was the rock-wielders heading right for the dungeon walls that Patch was watching now, almost hypnotized by the sight.
Wren’s piercing squeal snapped him out of it. She scampered to the outer wall in the corner farthest from the Hamelyn Piper’s cell, and he dived towards her as the rocks hit their target.
Impact after impact came. The cell shook violently. Stones shattered and flew. He tried to shield Wren with his body as he covered his ears with his hands. He yelled in terror, certain that he was moments away from a painful death.
The attack stopped.
Patch stood, shaking. On the floor under him Wren was holding her paws around her head. She peeked out and looked around.
There was no dust this time. It had cleared quickly in the strong breeze, because there was almost no wall now. The only remaining part was the small piece beside them that had miraculously remained intact. Patch looked up at the ceiling and saw a worryingly deep crack in it. He looked across to the Hamelyn Piper’s cell. Much of the wall between the two cells had collapsed, and the external wall in that other cell was entirely gone. The Hamelyn Piper was on the floor, half-covered in rubble. A single word came from him, frail and almost lost to the wind. “Aye…”
Patch found himself staring at the most dreaded of Pipers, yet somehow he felt no fear of the masked man and started to walk towards him. He was aware of movement out in the distance. He turned and saw dragons holding their position in the air higher up, making sure of no further defensive assaults from the Castle, while a line of dragons formed some kind of honour guard, maintaining their height. Past the end of that line a group was coming closer, at the centre of which were three who wore incredibly ornate battle harnesses, flanked by black-armoured dragons.
The Triumvirate and their guards, Patch guessed. The rulers of the Dragon Territories, here in person to claim their quarry. They would reach the
ir target soon, but Patch still walked towards the edge of the Hamelyn Piper’s cell, drawn there by an irresistible need to see.
The attack had wounded the man badly. A large slab of stone had crushed his legs. The Iron Mask was visibly damaged at the front. Patch watched with horror and fascination as the Hamelyn Piper’s hands came up and tore at the Mask, until the front opened outwards and it clattered to the cell floor.
Patch stared at the thin face, the Hamelyn Piper’s eyes now locked with his own.
“Aye…” said the man, with a cough of pain that brought up blood. But the Mask’s protective charms, the charms that had forced him to repeat the same word over and over, had no more hold over him now. “Aye…am…” he said.
Patch marvelled at how he felt no terror, even though he was in the company of the most evil Piper ever to have lived. And he realized what the man had actually said.
What he had always been trying to say.
It wasn’t “Aye”. It wasn’t the single word of defiance that the story claimed. Instead, it was only the first word in a sentence that he had never been able to finish.
Until now.
“I…am…” said the man, relief in his voice. He swallowed and took a breath, still looking directly at Patch. “I am not the Piper of Hamelyn.”
The sound of wings announced the arrival of the black-armoured dragons. Patch stepped away quickly, knowing he was at their mercy, but they ignored him. Instead, they lifted the slab the man was trapped under and yanked their quarry from the rubble.
There was no fear written on the man’s face, Patch thought, only a sense of release.
A short way from the Castle the Triumvirate waited. They gave their guards a nod. The dragon carrying the prisoner let out a deafening screech and flew high into the air, higher than the Castle battlements. The other dragon guards, together with the Triumvirate themselves, formed a circle. When ready, the prisoner was released, falling towards the circle in silence.
The circle of dragons aimed upwards and breathed their fire, creating a blast of flame that caught the man right in the centre and tracked the path of his fall.
All that emerged from underneath the circle were the blackened chains that had held him. Of the man, there was nothing left but ash, drifting in the wind.
Patch looked back to where the Iron Mask had fallen. He climbed over what was left of the dividing wall, then took the Mask and returned to his own cell.
Wren was angry with him, squeaking loudly to get him to come back. Fragments of stone fell on his head as he ran to Wren, and the moment he reached her a loud cracking came from the stone around them. Wren climbed up to his shoulder, scowling.
You scared me! she signed. Promise me you won’t do anything that stupid again!
But before he could make any promise at all, the floor shuddered under them and shifted outwards in a sudden jerk. Patch found himself dropping down, a scream leaving his lips as he fell.
Patch came to an abrupt halt, sprawled on his knees on the small section of cell floor that had broken away. It had landed on a wide rocky ledge jutting out from the sheer cliff the dungeons had been built into; beside them, in the jagged rock of the cliff face, was a crevice about ten feet high and two across.
He shared a look of bewilderment with Wren. She suddenly squealed with terror and pointed up: above them another huge chunk of wall was falling. Patch grabbed Wren and scrambled off the ruined floor, into the crevice. He winced as the falling chunk crashed into the space he’d just stepped out of, then stood with his eyes shut, not daring to look as debris rained down behind him.
There were other screams. He opened his eyes and turned, staring as masonry and prisoners alike tumbled down past them. The piece of floor they had been on had already vanished, and the ledge that had stopped their fall had been sliced away from the cliff face.
They’d fallen fifty feet or so. Above them at least eight cells were open to the elements now – eight cells whose walls had gone, several having lost most of their floor. Shouts for help echoed around the devastation.
He put Wren on his shoulder and was suddenly aware of something in his other hand – he was still clutching the Iron Mask. He tied it to the parcel at his waist.
Very slowly, Patch bent his knees, keeping his back pressed hard against the rock. He worked his way as far into the crevice as he could, and found he could actually sit. Wren was staring ahead blankly, just as stunned as he was.
“I’ll, um, wait until I stop shaking before I climb anywhere,” he said.
It took a while.
As they waited, the shouts and calls echoing around the Castle above them grew less and less urgent. Apart from the occasional piece of stonework tumbling past them, the structure of the dungeons held together.
Soon they could hear gruff voices hollering to each other, describing the damage and assessing what could be done to shore up the Castle until repairs could be attempted.
Patch wasn’t shaking any more, but with all the activity that was going on he decided to wait until nightfall before risking the climb. As things stood, the Pipers would assume he’d died – certainly, he didn’t imagine they’d be hurrying to hunt through the rubble for bodies. If people saw him climbing, that would all change.
In the distance, the dragon army was preparing to leave, apparently unhurried. There certainly didn’t appear to be any sign of reprisal from the Castle – the dragons had come here to kill the Hamelyn Piper, and now that it was done the fight seemed to be over.
Far below, the forest at the base of the cliff showed the scars where the largest chunks of masonry had crashed to the ground. There was another scar that Patch could see – a smaller area further out, where the broken tops of trees were visible. He pointed it out to Wren. “Is that where the dragons’ messenger fell, do you think?”
Wren looked for a moment then signed her reply: Could he have survived?
Patch thought back to the dragon dropping out of the sky, and the crunch of the impact. “I doubt it.” The dragons had presumably collected their colleague’s body during the attack. Patch felt a wave of empathy for the messenger, accompanied by a strong feeling of shame at how the Pipers had attacked him from the rear while he carried a white flag.
The dragon army rose and began the long journey back to their homelands. The darkness of dragons receded, until at last it looked like a flock of birds in the distance, just as it had when Wren had first seen it approach.
Once the dragons had gone, the sound of hammer on stone and the bawdy conversation of workmen drifted down to them.
Patch set Wren down beside him in the crevice, and a moment later she lurched to one side and grabbed a juicy beetle that had blundered too close. She tucked in, ripping the insect’s head off with her first bite. As she crunched into the abdomen she noticed Patch’s grim expression. She polished off the rest in two mouthfuls. They’re actually pretty good, she signed. A bit like caramel.
“I’ll take your word for it,” said Patch.
As night fell the work on the Castle ceased. Patch and Wren risked a quick glance up and saw the roped-timber reinforcements that had been put in place, all rather impressive considering how speedily it had been assembled.
In the sky the moon shone through wispy cloud.
“I think it’s safe to go,” he said. He checked the parcel at his waist and took a moment to better secure the Hamelyn Piper’s Mask. He lifted Wren back onto his shoulder. “If I fall, jump away from me. You’ll survive the landing as long as I don’t come down on top of you.” Wren just gave him a hard stare. “Okay, okay. I won’t fall. Right. Time to whistle up some courage. Quite a bit of it, I think.”
Patch built the Song of Courage as best he could without a Pipe. As a very young boy, he’d stumbled onto some rhythms and melodies that made him feel a little braver; anyone who had ever felt emboldened by joining in a normal song of hope or patriotism could understand the kind of feelings he’d been able to create when he was young. The power of music
was clear even to those who knew little of the Piping Arts. But as he’d learned the ways of the Pipe at Tiviscan, his eyes and ears had been opened to the real power that music could conjure.
He felt strength flowing through his blood.
Confidence. Certainty. Courage.
I can do this, he thought.
He stepped to the edge of the crevice they had taken refuge in, and looked down.
I can’t do this, he thought.
He stepped back from the edge. It was a long way down. Long, and craggy, and sharp.
Are you okay? signed Wren.
Patch took a breath and nodded. “I’ve a little courage now,” he said. “Next, I need help with the climbing part.” He began the Song of the Climb, slowly building it up, the rhythm steady. In his mind, he could already feel the satisfaction of his hands moving over rock, finding purchase, knowing how much weight a handhold could support.
As he whistled, he put out of his mind the knowledge of where many Songs came from, where many had originated and been refined.
War.
Pipers had accompanied armies for centuries, and had also ventured on smaller missions: infiltration, sabotage. The Song of the Climb, for example, would have helped a group of fighters tackle terrain that an enemy thought impossible.
And while not all Songs had such origins, most of those that affected people came from the battlefields of history.
He whistled, eyes closed, until he felt a kinship with the rock itself. It would show him where to place his feet. It would guide his fingertips to where they would cling. He was ready to start the descent. He kneeled and lowered his legs over the base of the crevice.
The moonlight was unnecessary; instinct alone was leading him down the face of the cliff. Only the rock seemed real. Everything else faded away, coming back into focus from time to time and prompting him to change what he whistled. Whenever terror crept into his bones, he whistled for courage; when his sure reach for handholds faltered, he went back to the Song of the Climb.
A Darkness of Dragons Page 9