by Ruth Eastham
And the crowd goes wild! Tomassen’s saved it! Unbelievable!
The spooling commentary evaporated as Jack became aware of a hissing sound nearby. He looked up to see fire sweeping greedily over the roof. “Come on!” he shouted to Skuli and Emma. His throat felt like it had razor blades crammed in it. With a cry of effort, he pulled himself straight, rotating his ankle to get his foot in a solid loop of rope. Then he leaned into the gap, his arms outstretched.
Emma took a run-up. She lunged towards him and there was a wrenching impact. He clung on to her, his arms almost torn out of their sockets. Her nails dug into his skin. There was a splitting sound as a crack widened along the pole.
“Get down!” Jack said, jaw still vibrating, and quickly she was shinning down the pole, sliding down the last stretch to the ground. Jack let out a sharp breath. “You now, Skuli!”
Skuli blinked towards him, sweat streaming down his sooty face as he broke into a sprint. Jack saw the tiles disintegrate beneath his feet as his friend ran forward, the roof collapsing, crumbling as he jumped, his Viking helmet whizzing away. He slammed into the pole so hard that Jack was knocked right off it.
Pain wrenched through Jack’s leg as the rope looped round his foot swung violently outwards. He heard barking from somewhere below; saw the flag alight, the ravens in flames. As he hurtled back towards the flagpole, Skuli slid past him on his way down, mouth wide.
Jack grabbed the pole and spiralled round it, following. His knees buckled as he landed at the base. He rolled over the grass and lay there as his friends crouched over him, Sno giving him slobbery licks.
“Thanks, Skuli,” Jack croaked, patting his dog with a stiff hand. “I always wanted to try the fireman’s pole.”
Skuli gave a wry smile, then used the arrowhead to slice the rope from Jack’s foot. Emma helped him to sit. “God, look at the sun.” She glanced at her watch and cried out in horror. “There’s hardly an hour until midnight! We’ve got to get to Tor.”
Jack broke into a limping run. They skirted the engulfed church, shielding their faces from the heat, aiming for the lane on the other side of the hill.
But then Jack grabbed Skuli and Emma’s arms and they skidded to a stop. “Wait!” He rubbed his still-stinging eyes. “I saw something.”
He grabbed hold of Sno and they rushed for cover, crouching behind a gravestone with outstretched angel wings. Scraggly bushes covered the ground nearby, and Jack slid forward on his stomach, straining to see through the thorny branches. The back of his neck was moist with sweat.
Hooded figures moved in front of the blaze. He counted five, six, but more appeared every second. “Kids!” he whispered. They’d obviously seen the fire.
Just now the kids were doing something weird. They had all stopped and turned in the direction of the sun. It was like they sensed something; the moment getting closer. Their faces glinted, reflecting the sunlight, and Jack realized that they were wearing masks: expressionless gold-coloured masks that covered just their eyes and noses.
A chant thumped the air, getting louder and faster as more voices joined in.
“Odin’s vengeance. Hunt. Kill. Our god must have his sacrifice.
Odin’s vengeance. Hunt. Kill. Our god must have his sacrifice.”
Jack heard a voice rise above the others. It sounded like Lukas, but with the hoods and masks there was no way to be sure. The kids seemed to merge, locking into a procession that snaked and seethed as they chanted.
Skuli edged out from behind the gravestone but Jack shot out a hand to stop him. “No!” he hissed. “Wait till I say!”
The ground beneath them shuddered with another tremor, and Jack heard screams of delight and the wild clanging of the bell in the burning tower. The plague of earth, building up to something big.
The procession wound down the lane and Jack saw their chance. He tugged the hood of his tunic over his head and gestured to Skuli and Emma to do the same.
“Now!” The three of them moved fast, away from the graveyard and downhill, through the close-packed, spindly trees. Branches whipped Jack’s skin as he dodged the branches, keeping Skuli and Emma close. They skirted round thorny hollows and stumbled on patches of bare ground. How much further? wondered Jack, half running, half tumbling over the rough ground. He struggled to get a sense of the direction as they moved faster and faster…
And then, without warning, they were somehow on the gravel of the lane.
Right in the thick of the procession.
Jack’s legs scrambled on the loose surface. He stopped dead. The kids were all around them. It was too late to draw back; too late to hide.
“Be part of it!” hissed Emma. She waved her arms, copying their swaying dance.
The kids surged round them as Jack and Skuli joined in, Sno weaving round their legs. The four of them continued down the lane, deliberately slowly so the kids swept past and tramped on ahead.
Jack felt a tug at his tunic. Then another. “Skuli,” he hissed.
“What?”
But it wasn’t Skuli. When he turned he saw a small girl, staring up at him, biting the ends of her hair under her mask. Jack saw Skuli’s look of panic, Emma shaking her head. “You’re Jack,” the small girl said. “They want to get you.”
“I’m not Jack. I’m Jon. Have a sweet.” Jack fumbled in his pocket, desperate to distract her.
“You are Jack,” she said. “I’m not stupid. That’s your dog.”
“Here. Look.” Thank god for chocolates, even if they were melted into a clump. “Want one?” He stifled the urge to clamp a hand over that silly little mouth. Shut her up.
The small girl chewed the mangled mess, licking her blue lips, but kept on staring.
“Oh, look,” Jack said, pointing behind her. “Your mummy and daddy have woken up.”
“Where?” she said suspiciously, whirling round and lifting herself up on tiptoes. “Where?”
“Just over there,” said Jack. “Can’t you see them?”
They edged away, the little girl still peering up the lane.
We’re almost clear. Jack kept close to Emma and Skuli as they headed for the cover of the trees. Just a few more steps…
“Jaaaaaack!” the savage shout went up.
The girl was loud for such a small one, he’d give her that, and the fact she was pointing straight at him didn’t help. The procession stopped. One by one, in a ripple of movement, the masked faces turned to look.
“Run,” said Jack out of the side of his mouth. His legs started to pound the ground before his brain could properly kick in.
There were shouts and the kids started running too, and then a cry went up, even louder then before. Only this time it came from Jack himself. “Run!”
22
MASKS
What is twisted cannot be straightened.
Ecclesiastes 1:15
Jack ran, and the mob followed. Get away! he shouted inside his head. Get to Tor.
Then there was no room for any other thinking, just trying to see the way ahead; trying to get enough breath; just the mass of masked kids streaming behind like they were one single thing.
It wasn’t until they reached the square that the next tremor hit.
But instead of fading away, this tremor was followed by another, stronger one that forced them to the ground. Debris rained down from buildings. Roof tiles crashed on to the road. Cracks appeared in the tarmac and up the sides of buildings. There was the groan of shifting timber. Jack saw walls buckle and slump, straining to stay upright; collapsing in on themselves.
As he struggled to his feet he made out Gran and Gramps’s house. Thank god that was still standing. Then he heard the short laughing screams of the mob and there was nothing to do but run on.
“The footbridge!” Jack shouted as they neared the river. A wild, desperate plan spun through his mind. It
was the only way to the museum. If they could get across to the other side without being caught…
The narrow suspension bridge trembled as they started across it, Skuli first, then Emma, then Jack, leaping the gaps and the jagged slats of broken wood. They were almost on the other side when Skuli stopped with a cry and Jack slammed into Emma as they bunched up behind.
There was a masked boy at the end of the bridge. He must have somehow raced ahead. Tall, wide shoulders. Lukas? He stood there, blocking the walkway, and Jack saw now that he was holding a knife: a long-bladed knife with a jagged edge, the kind that hunters used.
Jack spun round to see the mob stopped at the other end of the bridge. Sno was hunched, teeth bared and growling, and the kids watched from behind their expressionless gold masks.
A whisper went up. “Hang them from the bridge! Yes! From the bridge!” The words hissed through the crowd, and Jack saw three kids near the front, each holding something stretched between their fists.
Three lengths of rope. Three nooses.
The bridge juddered as one of the kids stepped on to it.
Before Jack could react, there was a yell, and he turned to see Skuli shoot forward, ramming headlong into the boy with the knife, knocking him backwards off the bridge. The blade spun on to the ground, but the boy was up again in an instant. He gave a violent punch to Skuli’s head, and Skuli fell hard against the twisted steel of a suspension cable driven into the ground.
As the boy reached for the weapon, Jack saw Emma spring off the footbridge and kick it back on to the walkway. He smacked her in the face. She rolled across the ground, and he darted past her to retrieve it.
Jack felt the suspension bridge sway as the mob poured on from the other side. He flung a fist at the first masked face and the kid fell back, but the next loomed up instantly, and more were coming all the time, packing on to the walkway, trapping Jack between them and the boy with the knife.
Sno snarled and barked, biting at fingers. Jack saw his jaw clamp round a wrist. But there were so many kids, kicking and trampling, blue mouths shouting. Too many of them.
I’m not going to make it. I’ll never get off this bridge.
He saw Emma crawling to her feet, one eye half shut and bloody. Skuli was gripping the cable, dragging himself up.
The desperate idea flashed again into Jack’s mind as he hit out and was punched back. The one slim chance they had. Emma and Skuli were off the bridge … Skuli had the arrowhead…
Sno leapt up, teeth snapping savagely. As the mob swayed back from his bites, it gave Jack the space he needed. He gathered his strength to shout:
“Skuli! Cut the cables!”
Emma’s mouth dropped and Skuli shook his head violently, but Jack’s voice rose, commanding. “Do it! You can launch the boat without me!”
“The bridge is going down!” he yelled at the mob as they surged over Sno. Fingers grabbed his throat; rough hands tried to slip a rope round his neck. Through a sea of thumping arms, he saw Skuli, face creased with indecision, arrowhead raised over the cable. The boy was charging back along the walkway with his knife, eyes fixed on the gold. Jack braced himself. What choice did Skuli have. Cut the cable!
The walkway lurched. The punches stopped as kids staggered back. Jack clung to the steel wire running by his feet as each shake came stronger than the last; wave after powerful wave.
The bridge tilted like a boat capsizing. Jack saw the churning river below him as the walkway swung up at a sheer angle. Skuli was on his knees, the cable still uncut, the boy still on the bridge…
Rocks broke off the gorge and crashed towards the water. The kids streamed back off the bridge and scattered, falling over themselves in their haste. The surface shot up again and the boy slid towards Jack, giving him a vicious kick as he passed, then anchoring himself on the handrail.
Jack saw Sno crouched in the middle of the walkway, eyes wide, ears flat back. He crawled towards his dog, reaching forward between the jolts, grabbing a fistful of Sno’s trembling fur and pulling him close.
The boy was clawing his way back towards them. Skuli and Emma were at the end of the bridge, lying on their stomachs over the gorge edge, reaching out. “Jack! Come on!”
Clutching Sno, Jack edged painfully towards them on all fours, slowly closing the gap. The walkway went into another spasm. His knee broke through a slat and he pressed his chest against the disintegrating surface, holding Sno tight. He tried to drag himself forward, but now one foot wouldn’t move at all, and as he twisted to free it, he saw the boy with the knife had hold of his boot.
The suspension bridge rose up, almost vertically, then crashed down with a sickening wrench, setting off a rippling effect, like the movement of a snake. From the far side came a grating squeal of steel, and Jack saw the suspension cables wrench up from the ground, lurching free of their supports.
He gritted his teeth and held on to Sno. This is it, he told himself. The bridge is going down.
More planks fell, shaken out like rotten teeth. The grip on Jack’s foot went slack. He kicked back hard and heaved himself forward over the rickety boards. But he felt himself slipping as the bridge buckled. It’s breaking loose on the other side! Sno gave a yelping whimper, paws flailing. Jack fought to stop them both from falling.
“Reach for us!” he heard Skuli shout from above. “More! Just a bit more!”
Jack hoisted Sno up and pushed him forward.
“Now you, Jack!” screamed Emma. “Reach!”
Jack stretched until his bones seemed to snap. Their fingertips touched. The bridge was collapsing under him, his body sliding towards trembling ground. Hands held his wrists and wrenched him up…
But just below was the boy, his mask broken off and spiralling down into the gorge. Jack shot out a hand and grabbed hold of his wrist, as the last slab of bridge came away.
“Give me your other hand!” Jack held tight to the boy’s fingers, gasping at the burning pain in his shoulder socket. “Your other hand…” he hissed between his teeth. “Please, Lukas.”
Lukas dangled over the deep gorge, his wrist slowly slipping from Jack’s fingers. Why won’t he listen? thought Jack desperately. Why won’t he try and save himself?
Lukas looked up, blinking with some kind of surprise, realization; and Jack saw that the blue colour was gone from his mouth. Their eyes locked. “Then we’d both fall,” Lukas said, with a small, sad shake of his head.
It was the last thing Jack saw before it came, that one last quake that flung him and Sno, Skuli and Emma backwards across the cracking ground. That last awful plague of earth that sent the edge of the ravine crashing and crumbling and tumbling away.
23
LAUNCH
Wonder seized him, to know what manner of men they were.
Beowulf
Jack lay on his stomach, staring down at the river. But there was no sign of Lukas. No sign of the other fallen kids.
He crawled to his feet. His hands were bleeding, but he couldn’t feel anything, just his teeth clamped shut; bile rising in his throat. Sno pushed against him, trembling.
Jack heard Skuli and Emma’s shallow breathing as they helped him up. Beyond the ravine, masked children were getting to their feet as well and stood watching them.
His mind switched to Mum, Gran, Gramps, Emma’s parents… He stared at the shattered bridge, hanging straight down into the gorge. There was no way back now.
And Tor’s boat! Jack’s breathing sped up. What might the big quake have done to that?
“I nearly cut that cable.” Skuli’s eyes were round with shock. “If that earthquake hadn’t come…” He blinked at the arrowhead lying by their feet.
Jack limped over and gave him a light punch on the arm. “I’d rather you kill me than them.” Jack cast a wary eye at the still-motionless kids on the other side of the gorge. He held the arrowhead a moment, then
placed it in his chest pocket. “Forget it. Come on!”
The three of them stumbled into a run, Sno lolloping ahead down the slanting track towards the water.
“And the plague of fire?” called Emma tensely.
In his mind, Jack saw the blank panel on the standing stone. What would the last plague be? He had no idea. But it was coming, and soon. His sore knees jarred as they descended the slope. The golden sun seemed to be expanding as it dropped, getting more intense each moment.
Twenty minutes.
They got to the water’s edge and followed the boardwalk towards the museum, the sea lapping up on to the slippy wooden planks. Despite the strong sea air, Jack could smell burning, and when he glanced back he saw the church on the hill, still glowing bright against the sky.
And then there was the mountain. Something strange was happening with Brennbjerg. The metallic banks of cloud were thicker now, and swarmed and circled round its peak. Strange sparks of light flared from its rocky ridges. He swallowed and forced his eyes away from it; made himself concentrate on the job in hand.
Ahead of them was the museum. As they got closer, Jack saw that its steel walls had buckled and wide cracks were running up the concrete pillars.
They eased through the mangled door, framed with jagged glass. “Is it safe?” hissed Emma.
Safe from the roof falling in, did she mean? thought Jack as he stepped over a headless mannequin. Or from Vekell on the prowl? As long as that nutter thought he had the real arrowhead, he’d leave them alone, right? With a bit of luck he’d be pinned under a massive slab of collapsed building somewhere.
But Jack couldn’t help glancing behind him all the same.
They picked their way through the wrecked corridors strewn with rotten-smelling seaweed and broken ceiling tiles, keeping together, moving as fast as they dared.
Tor? The dragon ship? Jack dreaded what he’d find.