Steemjammer: The Deeper Truth

by John Eubank

  “Och!” he growled, slapping his forehead hard enough to hurt. “I left it down there.”

  “Leaving it behind you always are,” Alfonz commented. “Too dangerous now.”

  Will glanced downstairs and saw several Rasmussen agents on the first floor. One reloaded a crossbow, and the others seemed to be preparing to charge up the stairs.

  “We really need it,” Will said.

  Donell grunted. “All right, lad. I’ve come tah trust ye.” He grabbed a heavy cabinet and bellowed, “A FIN!”

  Spinning, he hurled the piece of furniture over the banister. Grabbing his hammer, he charged downstairs. The first two Raz spun and fled in fear. The one reloading his crossbow rushed his shot but missed because Alfonz had come down to join Donell and threw a flower vase at him. The agent ran.

  “A FIN!” Donell cried, taking out the fourth one with a mighty hammer blow.

  Out of nowhere a sword jabbed at him, and he had no chance to block it.

  “Hoy!” screamed a tiny but furious voice.

  Gus, who’d followed him down unnoticed, leaped through the air and kicked the blade out of the Raz agent’s hand. The man backed off in fright and then fled.

  “Good one!” Donell told the Gnome.

  More agents, however, gathered around the front doorway, preparing to make a charge.

  “Will?” Donell called. “Hurry!”

  Will was already running down the stairs behind him. He saw the box on a table and grabbed it.

  “Got it!” he cried.

  Escorted by Gus and Alfonz, he ran back up, while Donell took a defensive stance on the stairs.

  “Must be a hundred Raz outside,” he panted. “A wee guddle, I’d say. Nothin’ we can’t handle.”

  “Help me,” Will said, opening the metal box and staring at the cold Incendium ingots resting on the sheet of Moderacium inside.

  Cobee made a face. “With what?”

  “The Tracium is in the ball. Don’t you get it?”

  “Oh!” Giselle said. “It’s in the bronze itself?”

  “Right. We’ve got to melt it out.”

  Over to the side, Jack and Kate held the swords they’d been handed awkwardly. They stared on with horrified silence, wishing they hadn’t so rashly agreed to come with the others.

  Will held the opened box over the top hole in the steemball and began sliding an ingot of Incendium with his dagger.

  “But Will,” Cobee objected, “you can’t!”

  “Ya,” Alfonz echoed. “The haas down-burning will be!”

  “Not before we escape,” Will assured them, “through the verltgaat.”

  “If it opens!” Cobee said.

  “It will.”

  “But what if the heat destroys the Tracium?”

  “Then, at least the Raz won’t get it.”

  Will dropped the first ingot into the hole, where it glowed red-hot. With Cobee and Giselle’s help, all the ingots were soon placed inside the ball. They could feel ripples of intense heat coming from the hole.

  “They’re massing up,” Donell warned, coming back to the landing, “to rush the stairs.”

  “More furniture,” Will said. “Block it!”

  They tossed down dressers and chairs.

  “This isn’t good!” Cobee said, pointing. “The floor’s already smoldering!”

  The steemball got so hot that wisps of blue smoke rose from its base, where it touched the floorboards. Above them, ripping and tearing sounds stopped, and the sound of stomping feet got much louder.

  “Gevoor!” Tante Klazee called. Alert! “They’re in the attic!”

  “Listen,” Cobee said, trying not to panic, “we’re going to have a blazing fire here any moment. We’ve got to do something, or we’ll burn up!”

  Will kept his eyes on the steemball. “Angelica? Is anyone watching the bathroom?”

  “I am now,” Klazee called, moving to look in the door. “Nothing. No verltgaat, and your sister’s not there.”

  “Someone find Angelica, please. I need to know more about what she saw.”

  “What if she’s hiding?” Giselle said. “Try the secret knock, the one you used at Beverkenhaas to let her know she can come out.”

  Nodding, Will made a fist and knocked a pattern on the wall. Three times, once, and then three times again. Giselle tried it at other places, but there was no sign of her. Will felt his heart race.

  “Where is she?” he asked.

  At the top of the steps, Donell gripped his hammer. “Here they come!”

  ***

  In the sub-basement of Beverkenhaas, Marteenus tied a piece of rope to the lever and made it tight. There, he thought. The repeated tugging from some sort of spring in the panel would never overcome that. He was safe.

  Still flummoxed from the close call, he took a deep breath and tried to gather his wits. Seeing an open verltgaat had been terrifying. The large woman remained unconscious, limp and hanging against the ropes that held her to the pillar.

  As he got up from the panel, he almost didn’t notice a small thing that was out of place. Glancing back, he still wasn’t sure if he was imagining it or not. But yes, he realized, over behind a piece of machinery, he could see a tuft of hair. Blonde hair.

  For a second he felt like the world had vanished beneath his feet, making him fall into an abyss, but it wasn’t Henry. This was someone else’s hair. Putting his hand on the pistol in his belt, Marteenus crept forward.

  “I see you,” he said, trying not to sound scared.

  The hair didn’t move.

  “I know you’re there,” he said, “and I’m well armed.”

  Still, no movement.

  “Better come out, now,” he warned.

  Taking out the pistol, he dashed to the side and found himself aiming at a ten-year-old girl in a homespun dress. She glared at him defiantly. With hair nearly as tall as she was, he recognized her: Hendrelmus’ daughter.

  “Angelica Steemjammer,” he said, grinning ear to ear. “How delightful of you to drop in.”

  This was fabulous, he realized. Not only was he going back, he was returning in triumph with the enemy’s precious little girl. For this, the Rasmussens would pay anything.

  “Don’t make me hurt you,” he warned.

  “EAT ROCK!” she shouted.

  Something whirled blisteringly fast in her right hand. Suddenly scared, Marteenus began to shoot. But he stopped himself. He couldn’t kill his hostage, and what if he damaged the Variable Engine? He’d be stuck.

  THWAP! In a fluid motion she released her sling, and a rock hit Marteenus right in his mouth. He felt a bolt of white-hot pain and tasted blood.

  “My tooth!” he whimpered, utterly shocked. “You broke my tooth!”

  He could feel a big piece of his left front tooth on his tongue. This was terrible, and she was already whirling her sling, ready to nail him again.

  THWAP! She slung another, but he dodged. The rock thumped off his shoulder, stinging but doing no real harm. He thought he heard something breaking upstairs but put it out of his mind. His priority was this girl.

  “You little imp!” Marteenus growled, spitting out the tooth chip and rushing her.

  He lunged but missed. She was incredibly fast as she dashed away. Losing track of her in the darkness, he dodged just in time as another rock came at him, bouncing harmlessly off his thick, kinky hair.

  “This is getting tedious,” he said, chasing.

  He dove forward and grabbed her hair. She kicked him, hard. Shocked by how much it hurt, he managed to grab her around the waist and pick her up. Finding herself face-to-face with the strange little man, she could only think of one thing to do.

  “Ow!” he yelled as she bit him on the nose.

  He put her down roughly on her feet near the base of the steps and grabbed her neck.

  “If you don’t stop that,” he growled, “I’m going to actually have to hurt you!”

  She smiled. What kind of wild child, he wondered, was thi
s? He was so focused on controlling her that he hadn’t noticed a strange flapping sound. When he finally processed what it meant, it was too late.

  “AGH!” he screamed.

  The cursed penguins! The igloo, he realized, had finally melted, and they’d gotten out. Hearing the girl’s yells, they’d broken into the house. One was actually sliding down the steps on its belly, bouncing but gaining speed. It careened off the floor with a slap and sailed through the air, low and fast like an avian cruise missile, and jabbed Marteenus in the thigh with its beak.

  The pain was excruciating. Screaming, he dropped the girl and struggled to get the pistol from his pocket. Meanwhile the other penguin came down. Honking and hissing, they pecked him savagely.

  BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! He missed three times.

  “Stop!” shrieked Angelica, who grabbed his arm, causing his next shot to go harmlessly into the wall. BLAM!

  “Agh!” he screamed, wondering how birds could be so vicious.

  He flung the girl off his arm and shifted. Aiming, he pointed the gun right at the larger penguin’s head. This time, he knew, there was no chance he’d miss.

  “NO!” the little girl screamed.

  Clenching his teeth, Marteenus squeezed the trigger. CLICK! The big penguin pecked his belly, and the other tore at his coattail. CLICK! CLICK!

  “What is wrong with this useless thing!” he shrieked, desperately trying to fire the pistol that had run out of ammunition while the birds pecked him mercilessly. CLICK! CLICK! CLICK! “What have I done to deserve this?”

  “You’re a bad man!” Angelica accused fiercely. “That’s why!”

  He saw a blurred spinning thing to the side of the little girl’s head, and with a snap, she released her sling. Time seemed to slow as he watched a grainy, tan rocklike object fly right at his face.

  THWAP! It hit him square on the forehead and would have been fatal had it been a real rock. Angelica, however, had loaded her sling by accident with a groat klonk. Though quite hard, it only stunned him.

  Marteenus staggered and stood there for a moment with the strangest expression frozen on his face. Then, he passed out and collapsed to the floor.

  “Toory! Clemmie!” Angelica said. “Are you all right?”

  They seemed unhurt, so she rushed over and kicked the pistol away from the unconscious man. Facing the verltgaat machine, she felt a surge of panic in her chest. What to do? Could she really make it open a world hole?

  “AAIIIY!” a high-pitched voice screamed.

  Waverly Norman had awakened to see the purple “space monsters” staring at her. She mercifully passed out again.

  ***

  “RING THE BELLS!” Donell cried, hurling a hardwood dresser down the steps at a pair of Rasmussen agents.

  It smashed into them, sending them back, but more were crowding in behind them. Donell no longer cared. Caught up in a battle fury, he felt like his veins ran with liquid fire, like his body had turned into a sort of human boiler, which gave him surges of incredible strength.

  “A FIN!” he bellowed, hitting the next Rasmussen to come up the steps with his hammer so hard that the armored man was knocked off his feet.

  Behind him, Will hurled a stool, catching another Rasmussen in the head, dazing him. Alfonz threw a chair. For a moment no more came up the steps, but they had another pressing problem in their midst. Around the red-hot steemball the floor kept catching on fire. Cobee, Kate and Jack rushed back and forth from the bathroom, bringing water to douse the flames.

  “Och, we’ll all die if it continues like this!” Donell said. “Klazee, can we get to the roof?”

  “No good,” Cobee shouted. “Can’t you hear them?”

  Now he could. Footsteps thumped on the rafters above, and it seemed the agents up there would find a way through the ceiling soon.

  “Where’s Angelica?” Giselle asked desperately. “Did she ever come out?”

  “Hey,” said Will, who was looking down, ready to hurl a chair. “They’re leaving.”

  Not believing it, Donell turned to look. In fact, the Rasmussen agents were not only leaving, they were running. They dodged and ducked as kitchen knives flew after them, and Gus, who’d been throwing them, raced up the steps.

  “Hoyzaa!” Will cheered at the little gnome, who turned and faced him gravely. “Go, Gus!”

  “Not me,” he called, “that they run from. Keek!” Look!

  Will went down enough to look out the open front doorway and see that a large steemwagon had pulled up. A hooded man dressed in black opened the back. An ominous stomping began, which quickly grew louder. Feeling a tinge of fear, Will knew what this meant.

  “Shadovecht!” he cried.

  Chapter 15

  BESET ON ALL SIDES

  “Get me a sword!” Clyve hissed in exasperation.

  Someone handed him a blade in a scabbard, which he affixed to his belt.

  “I’m going down,” he said. “Any steemsuits?”

  “Too heavy to keep on board,” the captain replied. “The Shadovecht have arrived. Surely that means all is well.”

  “Our men are scattering. Look!”

  The captain saw Rasmussen agents scampering out of holes they’d made in the roof. They dropped their weapons and ran in terror, jumping to other rooftops. Seeing something else, he scowled with concern.

  “Sir,” he said, “that smoke’s growing by the minute. The house is on fire.”

  “All the more reason,” Clyve said, heading to the rope ladder, “to go down. I’m immune to the fear. I’ll keep them from escaping out the top, and if I have to burn to get Zander his prisoner, so be it.”

  ***

  Thick, dark smoke wafted up the stairwell. Will, who stood partway down, ducked to keep from breathing it. Looking back, he saw the cause. Though most of the steemball was still intact, a thin ribbon of molten bronze had cut through the floor and was streaming down, setting the lower floor ablaze.

  He scanned through the haze, trying to see what the Shadovecht were doing. Because of the growing fear aura, he sensed them getting closer, and then he thought of the others just up the stairs.

  “Someone grab Jack and Kate,” he cried. “Don’t let the fear make them jump out a window!”

  Sounds of scuffling and panicked shouts indicated that this was already happening.

  “Calm down!” Cobee hollered. “Do you want to get yourselves killed?”

  Good, Will thought. At least Cobee wasn’t overwhelmed, and he doubted Tante Klazee would fall prey to the fear aura. Donell and Alfonz, he realized, might break down.

  STOMP STOMP STOMP! Through the thickening haze, a dark shape approached the stairs. He backed up the steps as the lead Shadovecht came to a stop. Its face had been painted dark red to resemble dried blood. Looking up with soulless, green glowing eyes, the lids snapped open in its cheeks, revealing the extra pair of red eyes. Will knew it was staring right at him.

  Its hand came up with a nozzle, spraying a plume of gas up the steps. Dashing back, Will knew it was some sort of poison, probably meant to put them to sleep. He hadn’t counted on that and feared it was too late, that they’d pass out in moments and be captured.

  The gas, however, was flammable, and an ember set it ablaze. Instead of putting them to sleep, a gout of flame roared up the stairwell. It singed Will’s backside but caused him no harm.

  At the top of the steps, Donell forced himself to remain in place, his trembling hands turning white as they gripped his hammer’s handle. Alfonz leaned against the wall, averting his eyes in terror.

  “Great Maker,” Donell said in prayer. “Steel my heart and burn away all fear.”

  “Did it open?” Will cried. “The verltgaat?”

  “No,” Tante Klazee shouted from the bathroom.

  Turning off the gas, the first Shadovecht began slowly treading up the steps. Will tossed a chair, which only bounced off it. He remembered they had trouble on stairs, but he felt fear growing inside him. This wasn’t caused, he thought, by t
he aura from the creatures. It was the very real fear that they might all die.

  “Steady,” Will said, putting his hand on Donell’s shoulder.

  They hurled furniture at the monster, which it easily smashed to bits. Another Shadovecht could be seen behind it. Will realized they had no way to stop them.

  “Save yerself,” Donell told Will. “I’ll hold them.”

  “You need me,” Will assured him.

  “Don’t let them take ye alive, laddie.”

  Will couldn’t say anything to that. He wanted to tell Donell it would be all right, but of course that didn’t seem true. There was no handy pit to lure the monster into, and even if they could somehow kill the first one, the other two were close behind.

  “Come and get what’s comin’ to ya!” Donell tried to growl but found that his voice, normally strong as a bull’s, was cracking up.

  Flames from the dripping, molten metal intensified but didn’t harm the Shadovecht, which slowly trudged up the steps. Will felt his heart sink.

  “Out the windows!” he shouted at the others. “Scatter and run!”

  “If they capture even one of us,” Giselle yelled, “they’ll force that person to open world holes for them.”

  Even if they all got away, Will shuddered, the Raz would be able to dig the Tracium out of the burnt ruins of Tante Klazee’s house, and they’d be able to open verltgaats. Had he failed? Had his enemy actually won? Fighting off waves of despair, he looked back.

  “I’m so sorry,” he started to say, but he stopped as something caught his eye.

  Hope surged through his body like a cleansing ocean wave. From the open bathroom doorway came a flickering of multi-colored light in the smoky haze. For a moment he feared he was hallucinating, but the dazzling light grew stronger, shifting to a deep purple.

  Will pointed. “Run!”

  “No,” Donell said, hands trembling so badly he could barely hold his hammer. “Last stand. Right here.”

  “The verltgaat! RUN!”

  The monster was only four steps away. Its razor claws snapped out, and it was moments from reaching him.