by Robin Jarvis
Dimlon blinked and trembled under the ferocity of his outburst then took several steps back and fiddled with the buckles of his satchel.
“Are you certain you will take him with you?” Neltemi asked Mulligan. “The boy is moon-kissed; his company can only be an affliction.”
The Irish mouse sighed. “I feel responsible for him,” he said. “Whilst onboard ship I thought an agent of the serpent was drawing too close, but there were a pair of brave-hearted and generous lads to whom I would’ve entrusted the fragment if the situation proved too hopeless for me. Those two were the friends of this poor idiot, but they were lost in the wreck. No, the fool will go with me, perhaps I can instil some sense into him.”
“Such beneficence!” rang a sudden, spiteful hiss that crackled with hatred and cut through the air like a razor.
Mulligan’s face fell and he wrenched his eyes over to where Dimlon had stood.
“How selflessly noble of you,” the vile, vicious voice continued, “to take that poor jabbering cretin under your protective wing. I would have spiked or gutted him long ago and dissected his oozing brains to find the cause of his crass imbecility.”
Neltemi clutched Mulligan’s arm and her eyes shone with fear as she looked upon the evil vision which now stood before her.
“What... what trick is this?” Mulligan stammered. “What fiendish devilry is at work here?”
Immersed in the diabolic glare of the leaping fires, the wide-eyed innocence now dismissed and with a deriding, scornful sneer twisting his features, the mouse he had known as Dimlon sniggered hideously.
At last he had abandoned the nauseating masquerade of the simple, likeable Dimmy and was revealed as his true, pitiless self—the cloaked figure who had watched the bungling rats try to waylay the Irish mouse upon the quayside, and the one who had murdered Able Ruddaway.
From his satchel he had taken two curved, glittering blades, fixed them onto his claws and was now waving them menacingly in front of their faces—slicing the glinting knives to and fro and revelling in the horror that shone in their eyes.
“Gullible and credulous have you been, Mulligan!” crowed the fiend that had pursued him over land and sea. “You should have obeyed the counsel of your dotard masters and trusted no one. See to what hazard your blind faith has brought you!”
“He’s one of the Scales!” Neltemi cried. “A disciple of the serpent!”
Stupefied, Mulligan opened his mouth then clapped it shut many times before managing to utter a sound.
“N... no...” he stammered. “This cannot be, it isn’t possible. Dimmy—Dimmy, what is this?”
A gurgling laugh answered him. The glinting blades continued to weave a taunting dance as the leer distorted his features beyond recognition and the mouse’s eyes began to burn with a golden light all their own and the dark pupils shrivelled into narrow slits.
“Dimmy?” rapped the harsh, needling voice. “How swiftly you accepted that odious simpleton! His contemptible, chattering character was but an invention—a device to inveigle myself into the loathsome company of that guileless fieldmouse and his tedious associate and so finally into your own. And oh—how easy it proved. You were so eager to gain their confederacy that you failed to question the identity of this absurd, donkey-witted oaf who dangled at their tails.”
Screwing up his horrendous face, he assumed for a moment Dimmy’s incredulous voice and taunted Mulligan all the more.
“Feebleheadedincompetentpegleghah! Are you not ashamed to have ever believed in such a ludicrous façade? There is no Dimlon! No brutish Aunty Lily—only I and my consummate, lying tongue.”
“And who might you be?” murmured Mulligan faintly, although he knew only too well.
“Dahrem Ruhar,” hissed the other, “loyal servant of the Black Sovereign, dedicated unto Him when from my recanting mother’s womb I was gladly freed. And you—dear, terrified weed-picker, you were quite wrong, for I am no ordinary disciple.”
At that he flicked his tail and brought it snaking around before him. Then, as Mulligan and Neltemi stared, the tip of its writhing, worm-like skin suddenly quivered and a dark pink line appeared, dividing it in two until the halves curled backwards and the malformed shreds shook apart, twitching into a repulsive fork of flesh.
“An adept!” cried Neltemi. “He’s an adept of the Scale!”
With his mutilated tail switching to and fro, Dahrem bared his teeth and they saw that they had grown into hideous yellow fangs.
“Now you are mine, Mulligan!” he roared. “Long have I dogged your crippled shamblings, for the secret of your gutterbred family I suspected. Over the globe you have flitted, wallowing in the bottle and carousing in dockyard dives. Yet I knew that one day you would lead me straight to that which we all are seeking—and then it happened.
“Into the land of the drab of the firmament you were received, in Greenwich and there my guesses were confirmed. I knew then that from that place you bore a valued prize and even the pretended ignorance of Dimmy could not fail to have recognised the truth. So, that is what became of the ninth fragment. Many years have our scholars studied the ancient records gathered from the pathetic temples of our enemies and pondered over its fate.”
Cackling, he stalked closer and Mulligan’s fingers tightened over his bag, but the servant of Suruth Scarophion had him trapped and there was no escape.
“The location of the others we have long known,” he hissed, “for who can hide the creeping desert and the wild wastes that spring from such hidden treasures? Yet where the final piece was bestowed, none of our arts could reveal. But now I have it. Dahrem Ruhar shall take it back to its rightful place and he shall rise high in the Dark One’s favour when He is reborn.”
“You’ll not lay your scurvy claws on the cursed evil my family have fetched and ferried over the seas for countless generations!” Mulligan told him, his old tenacity returning. “I’ll not end our terrible legacy by passing it straight to one of your hellish and profane crew!”
When he heard this, Dahrem threw back his head and let out a hooting shriek of mocking laughter.
“And who will prevent me, Master of the Rumswillingguts? Not you certainly, and as you so stupidly pointed out, there is no one left alive here to come to your aid. We are completely alone, we three, and you are far from any chance of rescue. My brethren have done well, they have taken the seventh fragment which this ramshackle shed of a shrine has been hiding—and do not think that we are ignorant of where the eighth is secreted. That has ever been known and soon, before the stars that herald His return begin to flame in the sky, that too will be assailed. But now your time is over and my own star is about to rise. Surrender the fragment unto me.”
He opened his blade-bound claws but Mulligan drew back.
“It’s through me you’ll have to pass before you’ll see so much as a wink of it!” he growled.
“Oh believe me, I shall be delighted to oblige,” the grotesque creature replied with a malignant chuckle. “Do not think that because you saved my life on board the Calliope that I will spare yours. No, your life will I most eagerly take to win my prize.
“Do you desire to see the other powers granted unto an adept of Sarpedon—My Majestic Lord? Should I slough this raiment for your harrowing and most awful benefit? I think not, your blood would freeze if I were to reveal my unhallowed grandeur. No, it would be better for you to yield up the fragment without my having to wrest it from your paws and, just to make it more amusing, I know just the way to compel you.”
With a flash of gold, the claw reached out, seized Neltemi by the paw, then wrenched the maiden from her feet and dragged her close to him. Before Mulligan could do anything she was held fast in the treacherous mouse’s grasp, his wiry arm crooked beneath her chin—glittering blades resting threateningly upon the fur.
“Make no attempt to save her,” he spat maliciously, “for you cannot. The talons of Scarophion are steeped in the vessels which house His black blood. One tiny snick of the fles
h and she is doomed to a torment greater than your pickled mind can grasp. Now, open that precious bag of yours and give the fragment to me.”
“No, Mulligan!” Neltemi gasped, throttled by the crushing strength of Dahrem’s sinew. “I am nothing. Run now—you must try.”
The adept of the Dark Despoiler squeezed her throat a fraction tighter and her rasping voice became a shrivelled squeal.
“You ask the peg-leg to run!” he snorted. “And how far do you think his hobbling could get him before I pounced to rend and rip? Keep silent little flower puller, or my talons may grow weary of your squeaking and snip into that lovely neck to carve out your windpipe and let it flap from the gash to whistle in the breeze.”
“Don’t!” Mulligan cried, dragging the bag from his shoulders and opening it hastily. “Take what you want! Just do her no harm—I beg you. She’s scarce more than a child.”
The jagged fangs ground together in Dahrem’s jaws and a feverish light gleamed in his horrible, reptilian eyes as he watched Mulligan take from the pack a peculiar object covered and bound by many strips of dingy grey cloth.
“Remove the wrappings!” he urged. “I must see it before I release her.”
“No!” Neltemi shrieked, battling to drag the powerful arms from under her chin.
But Mulligan ignored her protests and bent over the parcel, his fingers tugging at the bindings.
A horrible grin like a row of pointed gravestones appeared on Dahrem’s face and, while the maiden continued to writhe in his grasp he stared at the unravelling bundle in Mulligan’s paws.
“Don’t!” Neltemi wept. “Please!”
The Irish mouse glanced up at her for a moment. “I must,” he said. “I know what torture would be yours if I did not submit. I will not have that evil upon my conscience. Let the thing go, let him and his infernal mob take it. The time of our guardianship and custody is over.”
Tearing another ribbon of cloth away from the object in his paws. Mulligan’s face was suddenly illuminated from beneath by a rich gleam of burning gold and a deep, emerald green.
“The ninth fragment!” Dahrem yelled. “Give it to me!”
But imprisoned in his deadly embrace, Neltemi stared down at the terrible thing which Mulligan held and even now he was lifting it up to give to him. Desperately the maiden sobbed and snapped her eyes closed, then with a shudder, she called “Take this chance I give to you Mulligan—flee if you can!”
Gripping the two curved blades in her paws, she yanked them down towards her and they plunged deep into her throat.
“NOOO!” Mulligan bellowed, leaping to his feet.
Snarling, Dahrem hurled Neltemi from him and his twin knives flew across her back in rage as she collapsed onto the lawn.
Wailing, the maiden felt the venom race through her veins and already it began to eat into her flesh as from the great, ugly wounds the blackened blood frothed and spouted.
Aghast at the sacrifice she had made. Mulligan gaped down at her thrashing form as it convulsed and buckled in agony, then he stared across at Dahrem.
The ghastly mouse was tensing himself, preparing to spring. The muscles rippled under his pale grey fur and upon his claws the lethal blades scratched at the air.
But Mulligan was too quick for him. Inflamed by the screams issuing from Neltemi’s foaming mouth, the peg-leg loosed a deafening yell and with all his strength, lunged forward, striking Dahrem full in the face with his pack.
Howling, Dahrem tumbled backwards and Mulligan’s lumbering weight came trampling over him, punching the breath from his lungs until he wheezed and gasped for air.
“Scum!” the Irish mouse bawled, raising his fist and striking the winded creature’s jaw with a resounding smash of knuckle and bone.
Dahrem yammered in pain as one of the fangs splintered in his mouth. Then another almighty crack smote the side of his head and when the third impassioned blow pounded into his face his yellow, snake-like eyes fluttered shut and he knew no more.
“Right!” Mulligan raged, reaching for the abominable creature’s knife clad claws. “This is one nap you’ll not wake up from, Dimmy lad! You foul savage wretch. I’m goin’ to take off them poisoned blades and shove them into your lying, treasonous mouth. It’s eating them filthy razors you’ll be doing and while you’re at it I’ll cut out that deceitful tongue of yours! Let’s see how long your blood takes to turn black and burn you from within! That’ll open them viperish gogglers again I’ll be bound, just long enough to see me laugh in your face and watch the skin melt off your bones.”
Overwhelmed by hatred. Mulligan fumbled with the fastenings that held the golden weapons in place. Nearby the cries of Neltemi were failing and tears filled his eyes for he knew there was nothing he could do to save her. Once the venom entered the blood, the die was cast and the abhorrent fate sealed.
Carefully, he removed one of the curved knives and set about untying the second. But in his anguish and trembling from the hideous screams that clamoured in his ears. Mulligan’s fingers slipped.
To his despair, the one-legged mouse’s paw jerked along the base of the blade and his thumb accidentally pressed against the razoring edge.
Yowling, he stared at the drop of blood that blobbed up from the broken skin and, in that awful instant, knew that he was finished.
Of all the perils Mulligan had prepared himself to face over the mounting years, never had he suspected that in the end his death would be due to such a clumsy, senseless blunder.
He who had fought in so many ferocious battles, who had been captured and taken to the dens of the Scale in Singapore and shown there the terrifying instruments of torture as the chisel-featured high priest and his blubbery, powdered consort looked on in callous disregard. There, even as they manacled him to the rack, he had torn himself free—leaving his leg still fettered in the irons as somehow he managed to fight his way out, though the pain threatened to overwhelm him.
Many times had Mulligan the mariner thwarted the designs of the dreaded enemy but now, here at the last, his own carelessness had doomed him and from the black venomous blood of Sarpedon there was no remedy or salvation.
Suddenly the dying cries of Neltemi fell silent and the Irish mouse stared over to her steaming body.
“So the last of the twelve maidens passes,” he breathed, “and soon I shall follow her.”
Desolately, he staggered to his feet, not wishing now to kill the unconscious figure that sprawled under him. Only one thing mattered at that precise moment, only one thought loomed large and great inside his stricken mind. The fragment—everything else dwindled into insignificance, only that mattered. It must be taken away, cast into the sea, if that was the only choice left to him.
“Green grant me time,” he mumbled, taking a final, shivering look at Neltemi’s blistering remains. “My wound is small, perhaps the venom will take longer to work its evil. The ninth piece must not be left out here for any to find. Here at the end of my life’s labour I must do what I can.”
Wretchedly, he stooped to snatch up the object he had taken from his bag and removed from the many layers of wrapped cloth. Then, with long lumbering strides. Mulligan raced over the lawns and disappeared into the dim shade of the pine woods.
In the brooding silence that followed, a groaning murmur disturbed the peace and Dahrem opened a dimming eye as gradually he slipped back into wakefulness.
A brief pang of terror washed over him when he found that one of the blades had been removed from his claw and he waited for the first searing agonies to commence. Yet no poison had invaded his lifeblood and when he realised that, the merciless mouse marvelled.
“The fool!” he whispered. “What lunacy of his rum-drowned wits made him spare me?”
Then, from some distant reach of the obscuring trees there came a fearful shriek as Mulligan felt the venom begin its grisly work and Dahrem sprang up.
Hooting with ghastly mirth, he set off in pursuit—fixing the knife back onto his claw.
9 -
The Passing of the Burden
All was dark beneath the waves. Far above the storm was raging, but in the turgid deeps no force of wind or rain could penetrate the tranquil peace.
Through the cavernous, rippling gloom a solitary figure fell, turning slowly through the shrouding shade, like an autumn leaf lazily spinning from the tree.
Down went Woodget—his little body limp and silent. No thought stirred in his blackened mind, he knew only peace and an end to his sorrows as deeper he drowned.
Yet in that hollow chasm, two points of soft grey light glimmered, faint in the distance. Swiftly they advanced and around them a face formed in the dim darkness.
Concern and sadness scored the ashen brow, and the tangled tresses of her sable hair flowed like ink about her forlorn face.
Through the tideless waters Zenna came; seventh daughter of the king under the sea, whose understanding surpassed the groping thoughts of earth-born races. Princess of the remote cold regions beyond the province of her vain and frivolous sisters, her territories were the ice-locked north and the biting cold of the southern wildernesses.
In those desolate wastes only the hardiest and oldest of living things dwelt, biding out the passing ages in winding caves at the roots of the world. Unto those very foundations of rock and earth, right to the source of all that now moved through the ocean or walked upon the land above, had Zenna ventured and from those nameless spirits and cloistered intellects she learned much.
Since that evening when Woodget had defended her from her scorning sisters, she had followed the Calliope, hoping for another glimpse of the small land creature. Then, when the storm commenced and it was plain that the ship was in danger, she had fled to her father’s halls and pleaded with him to bring calm and still the wrath of the waters. But the squall had not been of his making and there was naught he could do. Over that part of his realm where the tempest boiled across the sea, a power greater than his held sway.