by Phil Parker
‘Aren’t they? From what I heard, your friend’s wyvern was.’
Oisin had berated me for my fear of these animals, he’d said it came from spending too long with human beings. I wished he could see the beast perched on a huge stalagmite like a raptor, waiting for us to race for our lives again. I’d show him why it paid to be scared of the bloody things.
It wasn’t like the animal I’d seen in Glastonbury. This one was snake-like, nearer to the wyvern in that respect. Its wings were bigger, more powerful, making it like a bird, except for its huge jaws. Luke was right though, this thing did possess some intelligence, the eyes of the dragon in Glastonbury showed its stupidity. This one knew where we hid, it watched unblinkingly at our location and knew it only had to wait. The bastard was happy to rest, coiled around a huge stalagmite, ready to launch when we started running. Its one apparent weakness, according to my fellow dragon-hater, could be seen in the creature’s heaving chest. It needed enough air to hover and breathe fire at the same time, the more time it spent flying, the less it had to fry us. It took the animal about three minutes to recover, three minutes to sprint from our hiding place to the next hole in the wall. It didn’t give us time to catch our breath, Luke slapped my bicep.
‘Come on!’
The mouth of the next tunnel looked very far away, out of the corner of my eye I watched the dragon inhale deeply as it watched us run for our lives. The path was narrowing to no more than the width of a man, its edge offered a direct and swift descent to the cavern floor, all we needed was one miss-step or to trip over a piece of rubble.
‘It’s flexing its wings!’ Luke yelled.
His thighs powered forward with an amazing burst of energy, his feet danced over lumps of rock as though he’d practised it every day of his life. In comparison, my lungs burned, so did my ankles as I scraped them against lumps of rock.
The soft swish of leathery wings told us the dragon had taken off. Our refuge was miles away, it wasn’t getting any nearer, no matter how fast I ran. I focused on keeping up with the man in front of me who managed to find extra energy from somewhere. I inhaled heat with every breath when, what I really wanted, was cool air.
Then the dragon was there, level with us, wings flapping furiously. It hung in the air, its narrow body twisting and curling so as to maintain its position while it targeted us with its enormous green eyes. I was sure the bastard thing was grinning.
Almost without stopping, Luke reached down, picked up a rock and flung it at the creature without breaking step. The rock struck the animal’s snout, not hard enough to cause any damage but it triggered enough consternation to make the creature swoop out of range briefly before returning and filling its lungs.
I watched it open its jaws, angry that I was going to die in such a pointless way, in a place no one would find, when I was yanked onto the pathway floor, surrounded by darkness until scorching flame hit the limestone wall. Dripping water sizzled and steamed, oxygen vanished momentarily and breathing meant inhaling searing heat. I felt myself pulled further into the darkness of our refuge.
‘Thanks,’ I gasped as the blaze ceased and plunged us into darkness.
‘You’re welcome,’ came the rasping reply.
Sitting in the relative cool tunnel was a relief to be savoured. We didn’t speak until we’d regained our breath.
‘This tunnel is much longer.’
Luke was right, the vaguely yellow light was no more than a pin prick at the end of the tunnel.
‘That’s a relief. I don’t think I could repeat that last section again.’
‘You did fine. Come on, let’s go.’
I wasn’t sure when leadership had switched and I didn’t care. My legs wobbled and my breathing was laboured, inhaling hot air wasn’t pleasant, and yet none of those things affected this guy who strode off with purpose. I struggled to my feet and followed, cursing whoever chose to leave a dragon guarding the portal with every form of blight I could muster.
We stumbled through the darkness in silence. For as long as I could remember, and that was a long time, I’d been the one protecting others but this man could look after himself. I felt a huge sense of relief, not only was he a soldier and able to fight, he had a resilience that was going to prove important because we faced an incontrovertible truth; there was no way back. We were trapped in this huge cavern. Our only salvation was to travel through the portal to Tir na nÓg. Just so long as our fire-breathing friend agreed to cooperate.
Tir na nÓg.
My one-time home and now the place from which I was exiled. Hardly the return of the victorious warrior. I was skulking back as a traitor, a king killer. They would arrest me on sight. Plus, thanks to my complete lack of preparation, I was travelling without weapons too.
I looked at the outline of the tall, powerfully-build man in front of me, if we were caught he’d be treated as a spy, his life would be the penalty he’d pay for coming with me. There’d be little chance of him ever finding a way back, now the portals were gone, he’d need to spend his remaining years in hiding. Either option wasn’t a pleasant one for him, he had to have realised that already.
Unless our destiny was to feature as barbecued lumps of carbon in this enormous cavern.
‘Perhaps we should wait in this tunnel for a while, see if our friend gets bored waiting for us to come out.’
The vague outline of the other man stopped, turned.
‘No. Dragons are relentless, they don’t get bored.’
‘For a human you sound very knowledgeable.’
The reply wasn’t immediate. When it came, it was flat and devoid of emotion.
‘I’ve fought them before. We met a squadron of this type, outside Guildford. They strafed us in formation, we lost a lot of men.’
‘Squadron?’
‘Don’t know what your people call a bunch of flying dragons.’
‘They’re not my people.’
Another pause.
‘Sorry.’
We continued walking. Silence, like the heat, grew oppressive.
I was being sensitive, I wasn’t anyone’s people now. Besides this guy didn’t deserve my bad temper, he’d taken the same risks as me and for fewer reasons, and we were now travelling companions, whether we liked each other or not.
‘I’m sorry. Force of habit.’
The reply was warmer. ‘I get it. I react the same way.’
Though he didn’t say what caused those reactions.
I liked that he could forgive so readily, I felt comfortable around him even after such a short time, that’s what happened when you risked your lives together. Soldiers shared a camaraderie for that reason, you bonded quickly when you depend on another for your survival, it was something I’d always missed. Once a soldier, always a soldier.
‘I was a soldier once.’ It was an overture.
‘I wondered. What kind?’
It helped that I couldn’t see the other man’s face, it was an anonymous confession.
‘Trooping Fairies. We were an elite unit.’
‘I trained with Special Air Forces, the SAS. They were the same. Before the war of course.’
‘Of course.’
‘Do you miss it?’
How could I describe the carnage, the humiliation and torture that made me walk away? None of it would mean anything to this soldier.
‘I miss my friends.’
It got a grunt of agreement. ‘You form a special bond, don’t you? Nothing like it, anywhere else.’
The soft yellow light grew brighter as we reached the end of the tunnel and poked our heads around its edge to feel the warm embrace of air. On the cavern floor the dragon prowled on powerful legs and the limb-like protrusions on its wings, like an enormous bat. Now we were nearer I could see just how the enormous the thing was, its jaws especially, dripping saliva as though anticipating the joy of freshly cooked flesh. It didn’t move very far from the archway that housed the portal. The scaly bastard knew where we were heading.
The instant it spotted us, it croaked its satisfaction, ruffled his leathery wings spread out across the rocky floor.
Luke snorted softly and looked up at the roof of the cavern and down at the animal in front of them.
‘I assume that’s our destination?’ he pointed to the corner of the cavern where two enormous and wide stalagmite columns had somehow been bent over to merge into a limestone archway.
‘Got any ideas how we can distract our fire-breathing friend long enough to run over there and open the portal?’ I asked.
With a shrug of those broad shoulders he reached down to the gun at his hip.
‘It’s no good shooting the thing. Those scales are like armour,’ I said.
A grin. ‘I know. I’m thinking of something else.’
With a confidence that bordered upon the suicidal, Luke stepped out from the protection of the narrow tunnel, aimed his gun at the roof of the cavern and fired five shots in quick succession. The sharp retorts of gunshots merged into a creaking noise and a loud crack. It made the dragon pause, look up in confusion and twist its enormous head from side to side as it tried to make sense of what was happening.
The stalactite dropped with such speed everything was over and done with before I’d processed what had happened. The cavern echoed with a high-pitch keening sound as the dragon thrashed uselessly to free itself from the limestone spear which penetrated its out-stretched wing and pinned it to the ground. It quickly learned to keep still so as not to rip its wing any further, it lay resentfully and glowered at us as we sprinted to the floor of the cavern. Luke marched up to the stricken animal which snapped at him impotently, pointed his gun and fired into one of the dragon’s eyes, it exploded with yellow liquid and the massive head flopped to the ground.
‘Deal with that, you bastard!’
I needed to reassess my opinion of this guy, who’d turned from being a softly-spoken and sensitive man into someone raging with the joy of vengeance. He turned to me with a smile and the friendly guy was back again. I shook my head in astonishment.
‘How…?’ But words wouldn’t come.
Those broad shoulders performed another nonchalant shrug.
‘I’m a good shot. Regimental champion in ’11.’
He hurled the empty gun at the animal. I could only shake my head in surprise.
‘That was amazing.’
More shrugging and grinning. ‘Nah, luck mainly. I hoped the one I’d chosen was narrow enough to penetrate. I wasn’t certain the stalactite would land in the right place either. Couldn’t think of any alternatives.’
He jerked a casual thumb at the portal.
‘I hope you know how to operate these things.’
He sauntered over to the archway. I followed, there was a danger of me hero-worshipping this guy.
Water dripped from the ceiling to land on the moulded stalactite and trickle along its curves, the moisture reflected the yellow hue of the crystals set in the wall around the archway. It made the portal look alive with energy, as though the limestone itself thrummed with power. At the foot of each stalagmite was a metal plate with indentations that held two crystals as large and sparkly as diamonds. I knelt down to reposition them, aware my actions were being closely watched.
‘We’ve got scientists working like crazy to understand this technology.’
I glanced up into a face that didn’t hide his curiosity. Perhaps I could show I had some useful skills and knowledge too.
‘For as long as I can remember, mankind told stories of people travelling to fairyland. Locations where the membranes separating the two realms were unusually thin. Now your scientists call it superstring theory and have developed theories of other dimensions. It’s why, long ago, humans thought the Fae were magical.’
‘We might have caught up with you, in some ways but we still don’t understand each other, do we?’
‘No. We need to find an answer to that, without destroying each other in the process,’ I said.
He nodded as he looked up at the impressive archway. I repositioned the clear crystal, aligning its smooth edge to the metal plate and moved across to the other side of the arch.
‘How did your assassins get past our fire-breathing friend?’
I looked over at the corpse, stretched out across the cavern floor, clear liquid pooled around its large head.
‘I suppose they brought it food. Otherwise the thing would have starved. It might have been trained to recognise the Fae, or to attack humans.’
‘It didn’t differentiate where you were concerned.’
‘No.’ A memory surfaced that I tried to ignore but moments where Oisin laid at my side in a barn were too vivid and arrived in my dreams every night. ‘Someone told me I smelled like a human these days. Perhaps he was right.’
I went to kneel so I could align the second crystal when a thought occurred.
‘You do realise this is the only way out of this cavern, don’t you?’
He’d been looking at the crystal at my feet but now those dark brown eyes met mine. Not for the first time I saw contradiction in them, there was a caramel softness which excited me but the lines around his eyes told me there was strength, resolution. He was going to need those qualities, big time.
I realised we were staring at each other. He smiled.
‘We’re at something of a crossroads, aren’t we?’
‘Yeah. You need to realise that when we get to the other side of this portal they will be lining up to kill you. The only uncertainty is whether you’ll be their first victim, or me.’
‘We’re going to need to avoid getting noticed.’ He looked at himself, at his jeans and plaid shirt and chuckled, ‘I didn’t dress for under cover work.’
I’d reached the same conclusion and decided to spell out the implications.
‘If they catch you, they’ll treat you as a spy. That means not just execution but torture and my people treat the process of obtaining information from unwilling subjects as something of an art form. There is no Geneva Convention in the Fae realm.’
‘I told you, I’m ex-SAS, we were trained to resist…’
I knew he was going to trot that out as his defence. I needed him to be aware of the dangers, it was what you did before setting out on any mission, you established the risks and prepared yourself for when everything went to shit. Because it would. It always did.
‘You can’t prepare for what they’ll do to you. These bastards live to inflict pain, they fucking orgasm on it. You’ll tell them everything but it won’t stop them, they’ll keep you on the right side of death until they’re bored. They’ll have you begging for it.’
I saw fear in his eyes but that stoic resolution too.
‘You sound like you know all about it.’
There was no point in denying it. ‘Oh, I do. The bastard who trained me was a master. I was young when he had fun making me suffer, he used to say he was making me the man I needed to become. Well, now I’ve become that man, I’d love to meet him again and introduce myself. But, just to make the point again, you are risking more than your life going through this portal.’
He nodded upwards, at the entrance we could make out at near the cavern roof.
‘I can hardly go back, can I?’
‘I don’t know. A bit of rock climbing might be needed but…’
He shook his head and smiled again.
‘You’re stuck with me. You want to find who’s trying to kill you and we both want to find a way to stop this war from reigniting. It isn’t an option I’d have chosen, to go on a mission without any preparation and hope of rescue, but soldiers don’t always get to choose, do we?’
I had to admit I’d misjudged this man. I’d seen him as someone obsessed with control and maintaining order but he’d behaved differently today, as though putting on civvies changed him. I hadn’t considered his motives either. If we managed to survive, he had a point, we might be able to do something to avert war. We were committed to going, it seemed. I knelt and reali
gned the second crystal on its metal plate.
‘Step back. Your first time can leave you feeling a bit nauseous. Just keep breathing, some people tend to hold their breath, which doesn’t help.’
I’ve never understood the physics behind the technology, I tended to fall asleep in those lessons when I was a kid. I like to think of the air within the archway thickening, it’s simpler than describing how ionisation levels increase exponentially. If you’re close enough to the energy field you might find it harder to breathe until the moment the air snaps and energy spills from the top of the archway, where there’s a key stone or a fissure of some kind. With the two crystals in position, a few seconds for us to move out of the archway to safety, a pale green curtain of energy tumbled from the top of the archway to ground its energy into the limestone floor. It fizzed and reminded me of cider that had over-fermented, full of bubbles desperate to reach the air and pop. Its colour intrigued me. The colour of each portal was usually different, it depended on factors such as the type of activating crystal and the surrounding geology. It had been a very long time but I thought I recognised that shade of green, I hoped I was right because if I was, we were going to come out at a location I’d once known.
I turned to look at my new travelling companion, he wore an expression of awe and it made me smile. It truly was an impressive sight.
‘Ready?’
I didn’t wait for a reply but stepped through the verdant curtain of effervescence, felt my skin tingle, my hair stand on end and my stomach churn. If I hadn’t known better, I’d have assumed it was plain old fear.
Chapter 7
Moisture on limestone walls reflected the same yellow hue, two arched stalactites and stalagmites bent over to greet each other in the same way as the ones we’d just left. Luke looked around him, a little bewildered.
‘Robin, are we in the same…?’
I shook my head.
‘Similar cavern, different dimension.’
It earned me a distracted nod as he looked back at the glittering curtain the colour of sage leaves that we’d just passed through.
‘I’ve read a little about how these event horizons work, as far as our scientists understand them, at any rate. They’ve had to completely rethink the laws of physics. Looks like Hawking was on the right lines after all.’