by Taylor Leigh
Whatever creature he had encountered, it was clearly intelligent. The thing punched him in the chest, irritated now, and with force. Reginald swallowed his panic. The thing didn’t want him to move. It wasn’t attacking him. It was just impatient. And what was he thinking, really? How could he turn and run with Arkron and Marus still out there? Despite the inquisitive creature. He tentatively reached out a hand and touched the thing which was prodding at him. He jerked his hand back in shock. It was so cold. Cold and the feeling he got from it! Horror and rage and death all mixed together. It was as if he’d touched death itself. He felt sick. He retched. Mentally begging the thing to leave him be.
And then, just as suddenly as it hit him, it was gone, completely gone, lost to the void. Perhaps distracted by some more interesting thing to investigate. The straining in Reginald’s chest relaxed immediately. Whatever invisible line that had been pulling at him had been cut. Reginald silently let out a hiss of breath and clenched his chest.
‘I found her!’ Marus’s voice suddenly broke through the void.
Reginald fought to stay put. Relief washed through him. ‘B—brilliant. Is she all right?’
Marus grunted heavily. ‘Kind of hard to tell. Keep talking so I can find you.’
Reginald swallowed, nodding. ‘Right. Just be careful. I think there’s something else out here with us.’
Marus stumbled forward. ‘So you sensed that too. Damn, I’d hoped it was my imagination.’
Reginald shook his head before realising Marus couldn’t see him. ‘Not unless I’m imagining the same thing. God, I want out of this blackness! What the hell was that?’ He hated how high strung his voice came off.
‘I don’t know. Just forget about it,’ Marus growled, suddenly next to him.
‘Was it…was it a Daemon?’
Marus huffed his breath, irritated. Reginald supposed it was more out of fear than actual impatience, however. ‘No. It wasn’t. I haven’t…Just stop talking about it.’
Reginald felt his throat closing off, but managed to grunt an agreement in the blackness. He suddenly felt very small.
Arkron groaned dramatically.
‘You all right?’ Marus and Reginald both asked together.
Arkron sighed. ‘My, here I am in the darkness in your arms, Marus. What a very intriguing situation.’
‘Well, you’re clearly fine,’ Marus grunted.
Arkron’s smile was almost visible in the darkness. ‘Just waiting for you to come rescue me.’
Marus huffed his breath.
The ground beneath their feet rocked again. The howling from the lower layers was growing nearer. Around them, the vibrating of the Realms as they continued to flash in the blackness, throbbed the air with increasing blasts. A shift was coming in the air. Something dark and powerful was growing, hooking its claws into the very fabric of Scrabia. Reginald could feel it now, ripping at him, desperately trying to push the veil aside and writhe through. He wondered if he should bring up the dark creature he’d encountered in the blackness with Arkron, but Marus’s warning kept him silent.
‘Arkron?’ He swallowed the thick blackness. ‘Do you still have that glowing orb thing?’
‘Oh!’ Arkron dug round in her bag for a moment. ‘Here it is!’
The orb floated into existence, but its light was a crushing disappointment. The cloudy darkness was so thick it was as if she’d dropped it into a pool of soot. He could barely even see his companions’ faces in the drifting black. The realisation that their chances of saving Scrabia were dwindling rapidly hit him like a knife in the heart. They were lost in the black and there was no way he could reach the palace. Not in time to stop the Realms from connecting. Not enough time to save his family. They would die and the Daemons would win. He was, however briefly, grateful for the darkness, for he felt tears welling up.
Please, please, I need some help. Anything. Just please…Reginald wasn’t sure who he was directing the thoughts to, but his desperation pushed him to it. The whooping of the Denizens was growing closer. They seemed to have some sixth sense to manoeuvre in the dark. He remembered back to what felt like years ago, when Victoria told him about the Denizens slaughtering the gladiators at the Bone Vault. He gripped his sword tighter, feeling ill.
His eyes, straining and burning, searched the blackness in futility. Nothing at all. It hurt to look. And then, suddenly, he caught something in the murky darkness, the only thing there was in the void. For a second, he thought it couldn’t be true. It was a trick of his eyes, something he had conjured out of desperation. But no, as he watched, it grew stronger, more alive.
A light.
And unlike Arkron’s orb, this was not simply masked by the blackness. This light cut through it, repelled it. And it glowed brighter as he stared at it.
‘D’you see that?’
‘What?’ Arkron barked.
‘That light!’
Marus snorted. ‘Not bloody likely! There’s nothing there. It’s just all blackness.’
Reginald was suddenly filled with a mental thought. That light wanted him to follow it. He was sure of it. That light wanted to lead him to the palace. Reginald didn’t know how he knew, but he figured it was worth a shot anyhow.
‘Grab my hand!’
‘Well, if you insist, I wouldn’t say now is really the place but—Hey!’
Reginald staggered towards the light on deadened legs, not caring about Arkron and Marus’s protests as he pulled them along. His heart beat with new hope. Despite the hot, howling darkness, there was a light. And that light was the only beacon of hope he had at the moment.
* * * * *
Victoria leant forward, Elberon’s black mane whipping round her face. She had been riding at a good pace, following the river, constantly heading towards the towering hill that marked the beginning of the Blaiden’s land.
The Blaiden’s attempt to burn down the keep had been far from successful and Victoria had no trouble finding supplies. She had managed to acquire a saddle and the matches and oil after a short search. They had done a fair job of tearing up the place, but most of the damage was simply to furniture and other unnecessary features. At least the freezing rain had been good for one thing.
She’d also managed to find a heavy fur coat and more suitable clothing in Molly’s old room, which Victoria was extremely grateful for. When the Blaiden had attacked earlier, she had had no time to dress for the freezing weather outside and the temperature was continuing to drop, making the thin outfit she’d previously been wearing an invitation for hypothermia.
Riding away from the battle and her friends still didn’t feel right, but what she was doing just might help turn things round in the long run—or so she hoped. If the Blaiden no longer had the spores, and if the spores were removed from the water supply, wouldn’t that benefit everyone? It was all she could tell herself to keep moving forward.
The spot that Victoria had climbed on her first journey was much too steep for Elberon to take and she had to spend a good twenty minutes finding a slope that was gentle enough for the horse to get up, even so, it was a treacherous undertaking.
The riding was difficult at first; Victoria had to lean forward against the horse’s neck to keep from sliding backwards and tumbling down the slope. Twice she thought the horse might lose his own footing and fall back, to crush her beneath his weight. As nerve-wracking as it was, her fears were unnecessary. Elberon was as surefooted as his master.
The forest of the mountain was eerily quiet. The snow had dropped a blanket of silence, only disturbed by Elberon’s heavy panting. Once a lone crow drifted overhead, shouting her approach, but beyond that, stillness. The trees hung low, burdened with ice. Their branches looked silver in the growing light. Victoria had to admit it was a beautiful sight.
Slowly the ground began to even out and abruptly she arrived at the flat top of the peak. It was littered with boulders, which, Victoria realised by the rusty colour of the stone, had fallen from Scrabia. She smiled; it was a litt
le piece of home.
‘Look, Elberon,’ she said, guiding the horse between the giant pieces of rock. ‘They fell here, just like me.’ She sighed. ‘And they get to stay…’
The horse snorted, shaking his body out. He was right; enough time wasting. The sooner she got her job done, the sooner she could go back. She kicked Elberon into a fast trot and started the gentle decline down the other side of the slope.
The forest was different on the opposite side of the mountain, the pine trees grew spaced out and scraggly, some completely smashed to pieces. The air was thick, heavy, despite the snow. She couldn’t shake the feeling someone—no—something was watching her. Beady yellow eyes glowed in the back of her mind. She was on the Guardian’s territory now, and its hunger had ravaged the land. With a gut-turning realisation, Victoria knew it would eventually come for her as well.
The sloping ground below held the pine barrens. Beyond that? Who knew.
A soft snap of a branch caused Victoria to pull Elberon up short. She turned round slowly in the saddle, eyes flickering through the spaced out trees. The woods were quiet. Not even the birds were singing.
Her heart’s beating had to be a dead giveaway. Was it the beast?
The soft mixture of pine needles and snow muffled all noise, but Victoria, as she listened, slowly became aware of a sound. A shuffling, stumbling, wheezing noise.
She glanced back up the hill behind her. She could no longer see the crest; the boundary of the safety of the forest was now beyond her reach.
The shuffling sound grew steadily closer. Victoria felt chills run up her body as an odd, whistling noise blew through the trees. She cast about on Elberon’s back, trying to make out the direction of the noise.
Then she saw it.
Something was standing four metres away, watching her. It was a Blaiden man, and, like the man she’d seen on her last visit, he was obviously drugged beyond any sense of the world. The man shuffled forward a couple of cautious steps, bringing himself better into her view. Dangling from round the man’s shoulders was a foetid wolf pelt which was rotting and frozen, and to Victoria’s horror, seemed to be sewn onto his skin in some places. The animal’s skull was draped over the man’s head, but Victoria could make out two glazed, yellow eyes peeping at her without acknowledgement. His breath puffed from beneath the pelt’s snout in angry clouds. Blood and mucus was streaming from his nose and eyes. He was not in a good state.
The Blaiden let out a choking grunt and black liquid burst through his lips. His brain must have finally clicked into realisation at what he was seeing, for he burst into a lurching run in her direction, gnarly fingers clawing at the air.
She dug her heels into Elberon’s sides and the horse bolted forward, knocking the man to the ground. His strange howls were left behind her as she flew down the slope.
She desperately wanted to turn round.
There was something wrong on this side of the mountain. The quiet, uncomfortable stillness that haunted the pine barrens wasn’t natural. It was as if everything had gone into hiding. Perhaps the cold was responsible. Even the very air felt charged with something wrong. Sickness. The word hit her and she even then began to feel herself ill. Every living thing here was as drugged on the spores as the Blaiden man she’d just run into.
She pulled Elberon to a walk and took a deep breath to steady herself. She was panicking over nothing. This was sacred Blaiden ground and they were a strange bunch from what she’d seen. She couldn’t start at every odd surprise. The thought didn’t comfort her. She felt more exposed now. How many more of those men were wandering around? She’d already seen two. And how much of the spores did they have to ingest before they turned into that? She didn’t like the prospect of being caught by them.
She clenched her teeth. It was going to end tonight. If Victoria needed any more convincing, the man she’d just met was it. Pity was overtaking her revulsion and Victoria could not stand the thought of anyone else falling so deeply into addiction that they became that. She was going to put a stop to it. Victoria was certain of that now.
* * * * *
Tollin and Flynn raced through the forest, following some invisible trail that only Flynn seemed to see. Tollin felt a thrill pulse through him, one he hadn’t felt for a while, not since his landing on Scottorr. It was the thrill of running, being on a mission, having a purpose and somewhere to go. He’d always known he was born for it and it was the only time he ever truly felt alive. And as much as he hated battle, the lure of it was too strong for him to ignore now. It was finally a time for motion.
They moved fast, desperately trying to reach the Druid war party before the Blaiden reached the village. As they ran, his mind worked overtime. Tollin had so far assumed the Blaiden were most likely saving their true attack for when they united with the Druids. They were attacking in two waves: the first pack, and then the group from the keep united with the Druids. Flotsen was probably next on the hit list, which would be quite an undertaking. Then again, with most of the seedier population addicted to the spores, they would more than likely automatically side with the Blaiden. That had to be their master plan. Get every village drugged up and relying on them for spores and then take over. They could continue working down the coast till all of the villages were taken out. He shook his head. How could it possibly work? Yes.
It was all speculation, but Tollin didn’t have much to go on at the moment. And his other problems were a bit more pressing. If the Druids and Blaiden had already joined forces—or were already fighting—convincing the Druids to swap sides would be difficult. Flynn had his work cut out for him.
Unfortunately, Tollin was rather sure Flynn wasn’t confident in his ability to persuade the Druids to temporarily side with the Tartans and turn on the Blaiden. After all of the hatred and fighting, getting them to suddenly switch sides would be a miracle, but in Tollin’s time he’d seen quite a few inexplicable things, and he wasn’t about to lose hope. Flynn was grasping at straws, unsure of his ability to command, doubting that his clan would follow him. Tollin believed in Flynn—somebody needed to. Flynn just needed to believe in himself. A little confidence could go a long way in impressing Flynn’s peers. And Tollin had seen rulers more pathetic than Flynn turn round into great leaders—with his help, of course.
‘Flynn?’ he called while running.
Flynn cast a look over his shoulder, slowing up. His eyes were finally starting to return to their normal shade. ‘What?’
‘Even if you are young, your clan is still looking towards you for guidance. They have not been so tainted by the spores as you have; their judgement is still clear, so you need to be absolutely positive about your convictions. Do you believe the Blaiden are your friends?’
Flynn stopped. ‘No. They have done nothing to show friendship, only power over us.’
Tollin nodded. ‘Flynn, the Blaiden are not evil, they are…simply confused right now. Just as drugged and hopeless as you were, except their exposure has been much more prolonged. They can’t even remember themselves or what they used to be. If anything, you should feel pity for them. If they can be stopped, they might also be saved, but the only way to do that is to get them to surrender. They will not be talked out of what they are doing. They’re too far gone.
‘Your people, on the other hand, still understand compassion and logic. I know there is hatred between you and the Tartans, but you have to put that behind you or else you will never be free of the hold the Blaiden have over you. Your people have to understand this!’
Flynn started to move again, ducking under low hanging maple branches. ‘If they will listen to me then they’ll understand.’
‘Well,’ Tollin said, more to himself than Flynn, who was already several paces away from him. ‘That is certainly better than nothing.’
They ran for several more kilometres till the loud cawing of a crow brought Flynn up short. Tollin and Flynn hugged the edge of a large cedar tree. Up above in a large beech the crow sat. It peered down at them and
then took to the sky, flapping the opposite direction of them, still cawing.
Flynn took a deep breath. ‘That is one of our scouts.’
Tollin glanced at him. ‘The bird?’
Flynn nodded. ‘We’ve trained them to announce the presence of others. They naturally do it anyway, so it wasn’t too far of a stretch.’
Tollin raised his brows, impressed. ‘Ingenious.’
‘The bird is trained to fly to our camp. My clan must be nearby.’
‘Good news!’ Tollin smiled. ‘That means they’re not attacking the village, then.’
Flynn looked sideways at him. ‘At least not all of them.’
They moved quieter through the forest now, not wanting to alert any more animal scouts the Druids might have posted. Tollin spotted the clan at the same moment Flynn pulled him down into the bracken. They both observed the group of Druids, about thirty or forty in all, milling about. They did not seem to have any clear purpose. They were waiting. Tollin hoped Flynn was the reason. Then he noticed the towering figure of a Blaiden man push his way through the group. He was clearly angry and impatient. Whatever the Druids were doing, by the way the Blaiden man was acting, they obviously wouldn’t be doing it for much longer.
‘We have waited long enough!’ the man shouted. ‘He is not coming!’
One Druid man stepped forward. ‘He would not just leave us.’
‘He must have fled! I always knew he was a coward.’
The Druid shook his head. ‘No. I won’t believe that. If he is not here then something must have happened to him!’
The Blaiden snorted. ‘Good riddance.’
The other Druids started to stir. ‘Yes, something must have happened,’ they began to mutter. ‘The crow scout signalled that something was amiss. We must go look for him! He should be here!’
The Blaiden grabbed the man who had initially spoken up by the throat and with a roar shoved him to the ground. He bared his teeth. ‘Forget about Flynn! He is gone and he’s not coming back! You are a part of our pack now. You don’t need him! Now, follow me. We must meet up with the rest of the pack to help with the sacking of the village.’