by Toby Forward
Sam and Winny kept their distance.
Sam leaned on his staff, his eyes closed, his hands tight on the smooth bark. Winny rubbed her wrists. The roots had gripped her tightly.
“What are they doing? Are they attacking?”
Sam barely moved his head, just enough to signal no. Winny’s voice was distant for him, faint.
Starback banked to the left and returned. Sam waited until the dragon had settled on the stubble and folded his wings before he opened his eyes again. When he did, Winny saw that blood seeped out from the side of his left eye.
“Do you see what the dragon sees?” she asked.
Sam stepped back, finding his feet again and letting the staff tilt without his weight. He brushed his sleeve against the blood.
“I am the dragon,” he said. “Don’t ask any more.”
Winny waited.
“They’re just standing there. All around the house. Not too close. They haven’t crossed the line of the yard and the garden.”
“Is my father safe?”
“I couldn’t see him.”
“If the house isn’t burned down and they’re all outside, something’s keeping them away.”
“Yes,” Sam agreed. “Do you know what it is?”
Winny pointed to the locket.
“What about that?” she asked.
Sam opened it. They bent their heads together and stared at the looking glass. As they did, a noise went up from the Kravvins. First, a single voice, harsh, carrying.
“Kill. Fire. Kill. Fire.”
The shout was taken up by the next and the next, until it ran round the circle, rising and falling, a wave of hate. They scratched the ground with their sharp legs in time to the chant. The raucous mixture of chant and scrape set Sam’s teeth on edge.
“I can’t see him,” said Winny, looking into the glass.
Sam snapped the locket shut.
“It’s a good thing,” he said. “If they’d got him they wouldn’t be out there, would they? They’d be running through the house. Like at the village.”
“What do they want?”
Sam gave her the sort of look Flaxfield used to give him.
“You know,” he said. “Better than me. Don’t you?”
Winny nodded.
“So don’t ask me. I’m not stupid.”
“Sorry.”
“How did you do it?” he asked. “How did you get the chain from halfway into the Finished World?”
“You’ll have to ask my father that,” she said. “When we’ve got rid of the kravvins.”
Sam glared at her.
“If I knew why they were attacking him I might be able to work out how to fight them,” he said.
Each glared at the other. Neither seemed ready to back down. Sam wondered how long it would have lasted, how great her stubbornness was, and if it matched his own. Before it was put to the test the sound of crunching twigs announced the arrival of someone from the forest.
Sam swung round, ready to face more kravvins. Winny drew a short dagger from her tunic. Even at a moment of possible danger Sam couldn’t help noticing the simple beauty of the knife, its balance and form, the way it fit perfectly into her hand, the intricately etched decoration on the blade. He noticed, too, the easy and familiar way Winny held it, ready for use. The glint of late sun from the blade.
“I don’t think you need that against a roffle,” he said.
Winny almost smiled.
Megatorine waved at them. Winny slipped the blade out of sight.
“This isn’t finding you a tailor,” said Megatorine. “Who’s this?” He nodded to Winny.
“Why are roffles so deceitful?” she asked.
“Why does a rabbit paint a windmill?” asked the roffle.
“Do you know him?” asked Sam.
“Ask him,” said Winny.
Megatorine found a pair of spectacles in his pocket and put them on. He looked at Winny with an expression of concentration. Sam saw her face reflected in the glass.
“Does a wardrobe recognize a mixing bowl?” he asked.
“I’ve got an idea,” said Sam. He grabbed the roffle’s shoulder. “Is there a roffle hole over there? Near the house?”
Megatorine took his spectacles off, polished them on his sleeve and popped them back into his pocket.
“Is Solder in there with him?” asked the roffle.
“Who’s Solder?”
The roffle looked at Winny.
“Is he?”
“No. Solder left without telling us where he was going.”
Megatorine wagged his finger at her.
“Ah,” he said. “Gone, is he? But no one leaves without you knowing where they’re going, do they?”
Winny didn’t answer.
“So Smith’s alone there? No Solder?”
“He’s alone.”
“In that case,” he straightened the straps of his barrel-pack and turned around, heading back to the forest, “I don’t know if there’s a roffle hole we could get to. Smith can look after himself.”
They watched him till he was out of sight. The trees gathered him in.
“He could have got us in,” said Sam. “Through the Deep World.”
“Or he could have gone himself, and told my father we’re here.”
“Smith,” said Sam. “Is that your father?”
“Yes.”
“Is it his name, or what he does?”
“Yes.” She kicked the earth. “Roffles. You can’t trust them. Even the best.”
The chanting and stamping rippled over them.
“It looks like they can’t get to him,” said Sam. “They’re keeping their distance.”
“For now. What will happen when night falls? It’s close now.”
“Why should that change anything?” asked Sam.
“Darkness always does. You know that.”
She moved away from Sam. He felt the distance as sharply as he would have felt a slap.
“We can’t get to him through the Deep World,” she said. “But there’s always the other way.”
Sam pretended not to understand.
“The dragon could fly over them.”
“What good would that do?” asked Sam.
“You tell me.”
“All right,” said Sam. “But I’m going to lie down. Watch the kravvins. Make sure they don’t come this way.”
He laid his staff on the stubble, lay alongside it, as though they were aligned together to some arcane agreement. He spread his cloak over himself. Winny could still see him, but only because she knew he was there. If she had walked across the field she would not have noticed him. Perhaps even had she stepped on him she would have felt only a slight rise in the level, never have thought it was a person. He was not invisible, it was just that he couldn’t be seen.
Starback flexed his legs and jumped into flight.
Dragon and boy. Boy and dragon. It was still new to Sam.
The dragon circled the ring of kravvins, diminishing the distance each time, gathering them in as with a loop of twine.
The kravvins’ eyes were fixed on the house, the scribble of smoke. They scraped sharp legs, chanted rough demands.
“Kill. Fire. Kill. Fire. Kill.”
The dragon felt the vibrations like tremors of fever. They unbalanced him, rocked his flight, blurred his eyes, gripped his throat.
He stopped circling, tilted and dived. He crossed above the line of kravvins. It was like breaking through a wall of slime. He felt himself covered in a soft layer of hate.
As he broke the circle the chanting and scraping stopped. Instantly. All heads looked up. Smooth faces glowed in red light. As a single creature, they all hissed. Starback reeled, righted and found a way to land as far as possible from the ring of kravvins.
The door opened.
“Come on. In. Quickly.”
Starback slipped through and heard the door slam after him.
Smith wore the leather apron he used at the forge
. His sleeves were rolled up. He grasped a short, heavy hammer in his left hand.
“Can you talk?” he asked.
Starback turned his head away.
“That could mean anything,” said Smith.
Starback moved to the window and looked out. The kravvins seemed to have moved nearer, the circle tighter. They had stopped hissing, and scratched their legs now, with an ominous delicacy, the sound more like a low scream.
“Can you hear?” asked Smith. “Do you understand what I say?”
Starback looked over his shoulder, raised his head and spat a jet of fire.
“I’m going to tell you,” said Smith. “Understand?”
A smaller jet of fire.
“I’ll take that as a yes.”
Smith stood next to Starback and they looked out of the window together, fixing their eyes beyond their own reflections and on to the kravvins.
“I don’t know what they’re doing,” said Smith. “And I don’t know what they want. I don’t know if they know what they’re doing.”
Opposite the front door, thirty paces away, a small clump of kravvins formed in the circle. The scraping grew louder. It was a struggle. They were fighting. The winners of the struggle pushed a kravvin into the circle. The creature staggered forward, screeched, tried to turn back, was pushed again, harder. It advanced two, three paces, screeched again and exploded. Before the pieces of the dead kravvin had hit the ground the whole circle snapped tight, up to the place where it had died.
“Kill. Fire. Kill. Fire. Kill.”
“Well,” said Smith. “There’s an answer for you. They want fire. And they’re getting closer.”
On the stubble, Sam stirred beneath his cloak. He moaned. A dribble of smoke fell from his nose.
“Look at them,” said Smith. “They’re made of fire. You can see it. Red as embers, smooth as flame.”
Starback leaned in towards the smith. He smelled the sweet leather of his apron, the scent of smoke in his hair. He responded to the solid bulk of the man.
Another knot. Another kravvin sent staggering in. Another scream. Another explosion. Another two paces advanced. Another surge of chanting.
“They’re like ants,” said Smith. “Look at them. They sacrifice their own to get what they want. It’s only a matter of time before they get to us.”
He moved back and raised the hammer.
“You fly off,” he said. “While you can. Thanks for coming, whatever you are, but escape now. Before it’s too late.”
He opened the door and stood aside for Starback to pass. The dragon stepped through. He flicked his tail against Smith’s legs, gently.
“Thanks,” said Smith. “If you can bring help, I’ll be grateful. But don’t stay here to be killed with me.”
Starback leaped forward. Instead of rising into the air he ran full pelt towards the kravvins, fire flooding from his open jaws.
“No!” shouted Smith.
Sam writhed and groaned. Winny crouched beside him.
“Are you all right?” she asked.
She put her hand to his forehead. It was too hot to touch. She jerked away.
“Sam.”
He rolled to one side, smoke pooling round his mouth and nose.
“No!” shouted Smith. “Don’t.”
Starback charged the line of kravvins.
The chanting billowed and quickened.
“Kill. Fire. Kill. Fire. Kill.”
Sharp legs stabbed at him, broke off, stabbed, snapped.
The line broke. He roared fire. Kravvins swelled up and spattered, exploding with wet, stinking slime and shattered shells.
He was trying to clear a way for Smith to escape, a breach in the wall of beasts. As many as died were replaced by others, as the water closes over a stone.
There was no breach, no escape.
Starback sprang up, swirled round, flicking his tail to scythe through the nearest kravvins. He darted back, joined Smith and waited for the circle to reform.
Two by two, three by three, four abreast, the kravvins followed him.
“You’ve broken the barrier,” said Smith. “They’re coming in. This way!”
He ran to the wide door of the storeroom. Starback swooped over his head and darted ahead of him. Smith slammed the door shut and bolted it.
Starback heard their legs jabbing the door, heard them scurrying up the walls, over the roof. They were all around now.
“Come on.”
Smith led them through the maze of stacked scrap metal. Starback was dizzy with the effort of attack and retreat, sickened by the drumming of the kravvins’ feet on the walls and roof. When the first kravvin broke through and fell from the ceiling he roared in fury and fear and leaped high above the stacks, engulfing it in fire. The kravvin popped and fell, and others followed. The walls and roof were breached. The kravvins were everywhere. Starback saw Smith run through another door. He swooped down to follow and Smith slammed the door shut before he could get through. A kravvin was trapped in the slammed door, legs caught, screaming with pain. Starback spread wide wings and landed, feet first, on the trapped creature, tearing at it with his claws, disgusted by the pus that oozed from the split shell. He reeled back, flipped, and flew along the stacks and straight through another door, where he found himself in a small room that went on for ever, facing an endless image of himself repeated and reflected in a thousand mirrors. ||
Tim found himself dropping to his knees
and loping along the corridors at night when everyone else was asleep. He liked to sniff in corners and push his face into angles where walls met the earth. The sweet stink of other dogs attracted him. He took off his shirt and lay on his back, writhing against pebbles to scratch himself. He let his tongue loll out to catch the moist cool air of the dark garden.
In the mornings he was exhausted. Scents of the night made him retch. There were bloody lines on his back. His skin stuck to the sheets and when he eased himself away the cuts opened up and bled more.
Smedge came to him, smiling.
“How are you feeling? You look tired.”
He put his hand on Tim’s arm. Tim flinched and pulled away. Smedge frowned.
“Don’t hit me,” said Tim.
Smedge smiled.
“Have I ever hit you?”
“No.”
“Then why do you say that?”
Tim cringed, turning half-sideways, keeping his eyes on Smedge in case of an attack.
“I don’t know. I just said it.”
Smedge raised his hand.
“Come here,” he said.
Tim approached, in small steps, head bowed.
Smedge put his hand on Tim’s shoulder.
“Good boy,” he said. “There’s a good boy.”
Tim was amazed to find that he was grateful for the touch, relieved. Smedge tousled Tim’s hair and Tim felt an overwhelming need to scratch behind his ear.
“There’s a good boy,” said Smedge. “Now run off and wash yourself.” He pulled a face indicating disgust. “You’ve been rolling in something.”
Tim felt sad when Smedge took his hand away, abandoned. He jogged to the bathroom and washed all over, standing up in front of the jug and basin.
Clean, and in fresh clothes, Tim felt a surge of anger and shame. Smedge and the others had gone to classes. The dormitory was empty. Tim was missing a lot of lessons these days, being so tired in the morning. He dragged his bedclothes into something like tidy and lay down and slept.
He was thirsty when he woke, and hungry. His head ached and his back tingled from wounds closing over.
He rolled over and groaned.
“Feeling bad?” asked Smedge.
Tim moved to see him sitting on the bed.
“How long have you been there?”
“I can make you feel better,” said Smedge.
“Why are you watching me?”
Smedge’s hand was so fast that Tim didn’t see the smack coming. It stung his face and jerked his head
to the side, hurting his neck. He curled up, hands protecting his head, and made a quick spell to send Smedge a neck pain to match his own.
Smedge laughed.
“Is that the best you can do?” he said.
He batted the spell away and Tim’s pain doubled. He yelped.
Smedge grabbed Tim’s wrist, pulled his arm away from his head and spattered a series of slaps on to him, palm open, heavy and hard. They thudded into Tim’s head, sending it bouncing off the pillow and back into Smedge’s hand, blow after blow.
Smedge stopped, let Tim relax and gave him a final, reeling slap that drove Tim’s face against the mattress.
“Magic’s a good weapon,” said Smedge, in a very calm voice, as though he was a teacher, instructing a class. “But you should never use it against someone with stronger magic. It will only hurt you all the more. And sometimes,” he continued, “it’s just so much nicer to use your hands.”
He raised his arm again. Tim cowered.
“With your hands,” said Smedge, “you can feel the slap landing.”
Tim waited for the next attack.
“Come on,” said Smedge. “Get up. There’s work to do.”
Tim uncurled and slid to the floor. He stood and faced Smedge, keeping out of arm’s length.
“I don’t want to be a dog any more,” he said. “I don’t want to be your dog.”
“That’s a pity,” said Smedge. “Because that’s just what you are. Now, come with me.”
“I’m going to lessons. Stay away from me.”
Smedge moved closer and raised his arm. Tim was taller than Smedge, stronger; he braced himself for the fight.
Smedge paused, smiled, lowered his arm.
“Down, boy,” he said.
Tim felt the spell overwhelm him. He struggled. It took tight hold. He gathered all his magic and resisted. Sweat shone on his forehead. His chest hurt.
Smedge was relaxed and amused.
“It’s so funny,” he said. “Like watching a baby trying to lift a farm cart.”
Tim stumbled and fell. His claws rattled on the dormitory floorboards. His tail swished against the bed. Smedge clicked his fingers.
“Come on, boy.”
Tim trotted after him and was pleased when Smedge stroked his ears. He wagged his tail and licked the back of Smedge’s hand.
At the great gate of the college Smedge pushed a jerkin into Tim’s face. It smelled of Tamrin.