“That’s very clever, isn’t it?” said Icrick, again stumped by the Poppum’s talents, which then brought him to say, “I’m so sorry for questioning your intent before, Pew. You know I think the world of you. Do you forgive me?”
Pew never took much notice of the Grogoch’s rant to begin with, so there was nothing to forgive. This pleased Icrick. And just as he was about to go off into another of his soppy blatherings, something pricked the top of his ear.
“Ow! What in heavens!” he yelped, when Stell got jab on his shoulder, and then Wren, on her backside.
Soon those darts were hitting them from all angles. It was only when they glanced up could they see, in full congregation, a mass of those ice-pixies, all brandishing tiny little ice-spears which they boundlessly replenished using foul sorcery. They weren’t smiling anymore. Their faces were more evil and ireful.
Spear upon spear they cast. Had those projectiles been any bigger than toothpicks, they might have delivered a dreadful puncture; yet they were but thin and brittle, shattering virtually upon contact. This still didn’t change the fact that they were under attack.
Taking no chances, they ducked and lurched away. Icrick, however, took a direct spear to his nose-wart, and with startling fury he snatched a frying pan from William’s satchel and batted that little pixie so hard that it made a big blue splat on the bottom of it.
“Have that, you little blue-faced git you! That’s for my fly,” he lividly shouted, and before they knew it, he was out playing pixie-tennis with all of them.
“Hay-hay!” he laughed boldly, like a sea-going swashbuckler, clubbing faeries this way and that like there was no tomorrow. “Take that! And that! And have a little piece of that too while you’re at it.”
This cheered Khrum up some, such that he wanted to get involved in the action himself, even if it did just mean spurring Icrick on. He was still a trifle blue, you see, but was slowly coming around.
So with a renewing lease on life, he cried from William’s shoulder, “Good man, Icrick! That’ll show ‘em. Knock their blocks off, ya hairy legend ya!”
He’d finally unearthed some mettle within himself, and they were all egging him on for it.
“That’s it, Icrick!” they hailed. “Give ‘em a piece of your mind.”
Icrick’s frying pan clattered through their masses with brutal force. Suddenly its base, after wearing thin from punishment, fell out of the bottom, leaving the daring Grogoch with an even fiercer looking tool. A tool which he, in fact, kept with him long after this day, for he saw it as a token of good luck; and was the deliverer of a fine sting, too.
It had the look of a sickle to it, in an abstract sort of way, and was about as sharp as one to boot, if not gruesomely saw-toothed. Thrilled with his new blade—his very own trademark weapon—Icrick fought harder and with more style, dyeing the brown earth blue with their blood.
But then, there droned a barely audible hum which hastily loudened. Wreaking a chilling panic down upon them, a thunderhead inked black by its numbers drove down over them from above. More pixies. A thousand times more. They had, I suppose, akin to a wasp, smelled their dead, and so came rushing in for vengeance.
Gathering up into a swirling mist, they then dove in for attack. Icrick’s allies attacked back. A roaring skirmish kicked off and, within the snap of a finger, everyone was hacking, slashing, and even punching whomever or whatever dared get in their face.
Brawl as they might, they were still ridiculously outmanned. They had no choice but to retreat back inside the tomb, when a most curious thing transpired.
Wren’s heel had only just inched over the tomb’s threshold, when every last pixie halted. They hovered in mid-air, regarding it with breathless anxiety, undecided of whether to pursue or wait. Something in that place, a presence, maybe, scared the living wits out of them.
They waited a short while longer, before finally giving up. Our friends were free to carry on again, but this sudden retreat on the pixie’s part didn’t grant much hope for their road forthcoming.
* * *
Down there they found themselves at the mouth of a wet and fusty corridor, known as a cryptoporticus. Even in their heights of dread, the collected the courage to slink down it, all the while their eyes played tricks on them. Or so they believed. Their very shadows, from what they could tell, were behaving very differently than normal; than themselves. A trick of the candlelight? Possible. Though they really didn’t believe so. For those grim silhouettes followed their steps in a crippled state; dragging their heels, humped, hobbling, nothing at all like their counterparts. Furthermore, they could’ve sworn they heard them conversing, time and again, in dark, hissing tongues; whispering, scheming. And whenever they tried to catch them out, the shadows would quickly return to normal with blinking haste. Nevertheless, they weren’t convinced. These shadows, they knew, were in some manner bewitched, and whilst they might not have witnessed it, straight out, they were very aware that something was up when their backs were turned, so they stayed on the ready.
An hour or so later, they stopped seeing those things, and had finally reached the end of the corridor. One big double-door awaited them, with a pentagram etched onto it. An upended pentagram. An insignia which, in various cultures, is said to symbolize the underworld’s fetid ruler. It looked not to have been opened in many a year. A film of grime draped across it. A soft mould had burgeoned into layers, welding the large wooden bolt to the main panel. Above this doorway, chiselled into a worn stone frame, was the head of a guillotined goat. Again, a mockery of everything they stood for. Their stomachs tightened in abhorrence.
The Pooka’s sheer malevolence was in a class all of its own, and this was no faerie-tale anymore. In William’s stories, the unlawful were cruel and bloodthirsty, naturally, and yet none of them could compete with the wickedness of Briggun. Drevol was, beyond dispute, the most evil, sick, and frightening foe he had ever come to know.
They weren’t the only living things who loitered there, either. For, what they first believed to be Pew, turned out to be more of an unsettling squeal. A sickly noise, but incessant. When they searched by their feet they saw, scampering along the edges of the walls, some gangling rats, whose balding flesh was peeling with red lesions. Their piercing eyes lit up like pinpricks of sharp chartreuse through the gloom. Even those fetid vermin of filth, who were known for thriving upon death and disease, could not be spared the sin that overshadowed that place. Their appearance said it all. But they kept pretty much to themselves, so it wasn’t too bad.
Stell split that mildewed seal with a soft crunch, then snapped the large bolt back. With a sustained, chilling squeak, the door halved and opened in harmony to an elusive snarl, not too far off. It forced them to their blades, but had already dissipated. A moment they waited, to make sure, but it was gone. Stifled by chilling nothingness. And probably never to be heard from again.
They were at the threshold of a cold vault now, and what they saw within was not very nice. For one of them, in particular.
Strewn around this low, groin vault were mounds and masses of blessed artefacts. The whole scene bore likeness to a profane quarantine. Varieties of crucifixes, large and little, had been tossed about recklessly. Sacred paintings, hanging crookedly, had been shredded and marred. Pendants and rosary beads were mounded waist-high in every nook, alongside stacks of Bibles and sacred parchments. And chalices, dented from ill-treatment, were laying in a scattered mess upon the floor. Then they noticed the statues.
Several sculptures, some daubed in darkness, were propped up against the walls with not much care. Owing to their broken bases, it was clear that they’d been pried from their original standing places, then brought here to this terrible tomb. But ‘twas their faces which froze our heroes where they stood. Their eyes, more so; those enflamed eyes, with pupils no bigger than peppercorns for the dread which was behind them. No one, irrespective of whatever dreadfulness they were made brave, throughout whatever hardships or whatever nightmares,
could envisage mockeries so ghastly. Even young William, sceptic that he was, did not know what to say. It was almost as if, after witnessing the outright contempt that was shown for their God and His precious ornaments, these effigies of good saints, druids, and priestesses had been mortified into paralysis by the very sight. The shocked stares had somehow stayed on their faces, and would never come undone. And with so many of them around, it was difficult to ignore the distinct and eerie sensation of being watched.
William wasn’t completely offended by this, but he did find it quite unnecessary, and he could therefore understand why one would feel slighted by it. Whereas Wren was finding it the most trying. Her breathing was fast, and after grabbing William’s hand for comfort, she started squeezing unknowingly. It was only when he asked if she was all right did she loosen her grip, but she looked as wound up as ever.
Centring the vault, to their left, was a sarcophagus encircled by more of those floating candles. Pew’s light was of little use anymore, so his candles re-joined their kith beside the sarcophagus. Pew decided to follow, unruffled by his whereabouts. The others went after him. They didn’t want him running off by himself, should he happen by trouble. He didn’t know any better, really, being a simple thing at heart.
A small slope of even more holy trinkets poured from the open side of that coffin. By that stage, they were racking their brains, trying to understand the meaning behind all of this, when Stell spoke out, with his awareness far, far away.
“He intends to bury all that is good,” he realised. “That’s the explanation behind all of this. I see no bodies. No bones. Just our blessed objects dumped in a crypt. A crypt that is guarded behind symbols of evil, no less. I have heard talk of this place once. But I never thought I would actually see it first-hand. The great wide world that Lythiann is, and I end up stumbling upon this unholy lair.”
Intrigued but horrified, the others listened on.
“The Pooka’s perpetual servants, the ones who remain loyal beyond the power of the eclipse—Ahueé, Demons, Gremlins, Wraiths…lackeys—donate to this professed shrine anytime they pass through on their way to his lair. As a token of his cause, as it were. The cause of divesting this land of all good. Be it plundering hallowed ruins, or even fabricating holy relics of their own for the sole reason of defacing them again, they have always made it customary to leave a little something behind for him. And over the years, it has built up to this.”
“Just sacred objects,” Wren asked, and although she behaved a mite less flustered than before, her emptiness was actually beset with animosity, “or would any token do? I mean, is it absolutely necessary for them to do this? To gloat? To add insult to injury? The whole of Lythiann has already fled in fear. Hiding, if not already dead. What could Briggun possibly have to gain by doing this, too?!”
“You already know the answer to that, Wren,” Icrick replied, who had a very sad way about him. “No doubt they bring him other things as well. Staple and wine, perhaps, when they can get it. But this? This…well…this is just to prove to their lord that they can be just as dark as he needs them to be.”
Wren was so nauseated, that she averted her eyes and wept.
First those bodies on the trees, and now this. None of them were expecting her to snap the way she did, and when it happened, they weren’t really sure how to handle it. She was like a different person, in a seething rage, shouting, crying, and gripping her hair as if to tear it from its roots. That’s when Icrick approached her.
He was about to advise her, when, with the trails of her tears augmenting behind that feverish fury in her cheeks, she pushed him away and screamed, “No! Not this. He can’t. He has no right!”
Startled by her upsurge, they recoiled even more. Whatever could they do or say to calm her, considering how beyond pity she looked to be? She hurtled around the tomb, gathering armfuls of beads and crucifixes in an effort to liberate them from this cruel place.
“What are you just standing there for?” she snapped and sobbed. “Help me!”
They watched her, hesitantly, pitifully. They didn’t know if they should take part, or try to ease her pain. Hoping his participation would wheedle her into seeing this for the irrational conduct it was, Icrick got to work on the plunder in the coffin. As for the others, they knew that they couldn’t carry all of these ill-gotten gains to safety. I mean, what were they going to do? Stuff their pockets and sacks, slow themselves down, and end up failing their mission? That idea certainly had a sense of romance to it, but it would only bring about more harm than help.
Alas, they stood where they were, in sympathy, in the hope that she’d just get it out of her system and then stop of her own accord. She did no such thing.
Enough was enough. Stell decided it was his turn to approach. She’d taken a break to catch her breath, and was weeping into a small dune of prayer books and cleric’s linens.
“There-there. It will be all right, my sweet Rose,” he whispered, caressing her hair. “Everything will be fine. It may be so—that what we see in this tomb is very disturbing—but there is nothing we can really do about it now. Fulfilling our quest is what we need to do. And that alone will prove more to our God than rescuing an entire sea of His treasures. It is our duty to bring down the one who did all of this in the first place, not to clean up after the things he’s already done; when it’s too late. That can be done after we do our part. For now, alas, we need to let it go. You understand? We need to forget this place.”
Wren already knew this. She knew that she couldn’t save every little artefact in that tomb. She was just so outraged by everything that she reacted without thought.
“I suppose you’re right. I don’t know what came over me,” she sniffled.
“You were just angry is all, my flower. You needed to let it out. Not to worry,” the Elf smiled, in his own kindly way.
Meanwhile, Icrick’s bristly legs were sticking up out of the sarcophagus, kicking madly. He was trapped. This was enough to make Wren smile, but that’s about all. She apologized for her behaviour, nonetheless, then to Icrick later on, who held no grudge whatsoever. Lord knows, he’d thrown a few tantrums of his own in his time.
In any event, Icrick struggled away and was doddering on the verge of hysteria again, so William grabbed his feet and, in pressing down on them like two grimy levers, hoisted him free.
“Holy Jehovah!” the Grogoch panted, with a bunch of necklaces dangling from his schnozzle. “Thought I was never going to get free of that thing. Not pretty, I say. Not pretty at all; being stuck in a coffin with your backside hanging out, when it’s not your time. Most embarrassing! Aha, William. Just the lad.”
“What…?” William replied, shadily.
The Grogoch took a quick look around.
Everyone else preoccupied with Wren, so he handed the boy a small piece of parchment, and whispered, “You’ll never guess what I found. Here! Have a look. Go on!”
William, taking the parchment, unfolded one corner… then another.
He was just about to unfold the last, when a vicious scream emptied the quietude. Cramming the parchment into his sporran without thinking, William liberated Thérn, and in one deft motion, it flurried into a dead halt, aiming itself at a nearby pillar, as a pointer would do when tracking.
Behind the shade of this pillar (which was situated in a corner that they had not yet noticed) was a void in the floor. It wasn’t terribly wide, and yet it dropped so far into emptiness that one would pass away from old age long before hitting its end. An unsettling scratching could be heard down there; at times loudening, before going quiet again. It put a shiver through their bones, and they hoped that they wouldn’t come across whatever was responsible. On the far side of this crevice was a small, square drawbridge, half-opened, with its golden gate designed with convoluted details of vast quantities. Very pretty, but its location suggested it was a far cry from friendly.
“Well I’ll be a monkey’s uncle!” exclaimed Icrick, surprised to see such splend
our on the outskirts of Briggun’s haunt.
“He-he! Ya bloody-well could be ya know, the cut o’ ya!” Khrum tittered, salvaging a little of his humour.
He couldn’t refuse such an obvious ribbing. The Grogoch might, normally, have challenged his remark, but Khrum needed some perking, so he gave him that one.
With this being the only way to go, they unwound a heavy crank (which Wren found at the rear of the pillar) and withdrew from that dreaded tomb, to find themselves in a hall much more foreboding.
- Chapter Fifteen -
Courage from Blood
They crossed the drawbridge. And after passing through a pitch-black tunnel into light, they soon realised that they were deeper underground, mere feet beneath the roof of a great, domed cavern, which was again riddled with chain meshes, iron sheets, murky shafts, and crumbling stones. A portion of that fiery stream was dissecting, too, from one corner of this cavern, right up to the far end. It then disappeared into another slight channel in the opposite wall.
They secretly surveyed their whereabouts from an outcropping, behind a large boulder. A steep stair twisted its way down to the very bottom from there. This could not be used. Not by them, at any rate. For they’d entered what became known as ‘The Goblin’s Keep.’ A Goblin-infested place where, from here on in, they’d need to sneak as often as possible. Doorways and stairs were of no use there. Not with those ferocious animals watching all corners.
While they were high enough to survey without being seen, they remained low enough so as to be heard had they uttered loudly. Ahead of them, running from one side of the dome’s edge to the next, were some stone girders, which met with a sort of exposed fissure on the opposing side. This crack had the potential to guide them out of that horrible place and away from those Goblins below. Hundreds of the blighters. The sandstorms had obviously come early that year.
The Other of One: Book Two Page 46