by Caro King
Edging closer, level with the columns of bone, Nin could see the inside of the giant’s ribcage, festooned with bats hanging from the joining ridge and the upper sides like some kind of weird lining. Below, the ground was thick with their droppings and she wrinkled her nose at the squelching underfoot. Peering at the bats, she thought something glinted, shining out at her once from the depths of the shifting, rustling, leathery mass far above her head, then disappeared. There was something silver up there, caught just where the rib dipped to join the breastbone. She wondered how it had got there, carried by the bats perhaps?
‘What’s that?’ she cocked her head, listening. It was that ringing again, cutting through the sound of distant thunder. It reminded her of the noise a tuning fork makes, a high, silver humming, calling her. From up above, deep in the sea of bat wings, came a glint of light that pierced her eyes and was gone.
‘I dunno,’ said Jonas, but he wasn’t hearing the same thing as Nin. Eyes suddenly sharp and every muscle tense, he was staring into the trees where something rustled stealthily.
‘Nin, be careful. I think someone else might be hiding in here with us.’
Ignoring him, Nin stepped forward into the dead giant’s chest space, regardless of the bat droppings. All she could hear was that silver ringing. Her skin tingled as the sound ran through her like electricity. There was only one thought in her head. She wanted the shining thing and she wanted it NOW.
‘I’m coming,’ she murmured, her eyes searching the darkness overhead for that bright gleam.
Jonas glanced after her, startled.
‘Nin? Where are you going?’ his expression turned to one of fear as he saw her put one foot on the slope of the rib and begin to climb. ‘WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING!’
And in that moment, as Jonas stared the other way, Dandy Boneman stepped out of the shadows.
10
Giant’s Rib
oneman was alone this time. Unlike Jik, his mudmen hadn’t made it through the storm. He didn’t say a word, he just took aim at Jonas and fired.
Jik sprang, leaving his waxy overcoat behind as he flew through the air. Before Jonas worked out what was happening, Jik got him in the midriff and the two of them crashed to the ground and rolled just as the blast struck, right where he had been standing.
I’ve killed us, Jonas thought, as he lay face down in the damp earth, I should have guessed Boneman would be heading for the town. The storm must have driven him in here too.
He pushed himself up, leaping back on to his feet. Jik was already standing.
Boneman snarled, his eyes glittering in the half-light. His coat was so drenched it looked nearly black and his hair hung in dripping rat-tails. In the gloom the staff shone, radiance coming off it like steam. One hasty glance at Boneman’s face was enough to tell Jonas that he was right. The body might be that of a mere Quick, but inside was the once-sorcerer, Ava Vispilio.
The only shield to hand was the great column of the giant’s rib, so Jonas edged sideways fast, keeping an eye on the staff as he went. Boneman tracked him, steadying his aim, but Jik bunched his fists and jumped into the line of fire, eyes glowing. The staff wavered as Boneman took a surprised step back.
Jonas stopped and grinned savagely. ‘Give up now,’ he said. ‘I’ve got a mudman and he’s aimed at your heart. The staff won’t stop him because he was born in fire and believe me, he’s ready to take you out.’
‘Nice try,’ sneered Boneman. ‘But Land Magic isn’t that strong, boy. The thing is only a lump of earth. One blast and it will shatter into pieces.’
Jik leaped aside and the staff followed, blue fire arching from its dragon-tip as it spun, ripping through anything that stood in its path.
Inside the skeleton, Nin was halfway up the giant’s rib. Its inner surface had a coat of rough scaling that left gaps and edges where she could wedge her fingertips and the toe end of her boots. She scrambled on, higher and higher, the bats shuffling out of her way with a leathery rustling. All she could hear was the ringing sound, like a bell calling her. All she could see was a dazzle, star-like above her, hanging from the top of the ribcage.
Blue-white and vivid in the giant’s shadowy insides, the blast cut the air close enough for Nin to feel its heat through the soles of her boots. It carved a dark furrow in the moss and the bone beneath and a stink of burning filled the air, along with the sound of splitting bone.
Nin screamed as she felt the rib lurch sideways, then jerk to a stop. Her grip went and she hung loose, her left arm flailing wildly as she clung on by her toes and the fingers of one hand. Bats took off in a swirling blur, pattering against her face and body like dark rain and blocking her vision, their high-pitched screech surrounding her. She reached out desperately, feeling their wings under her hand as they curved and dipped, spinning around her in a whirlwind of leathery wings. Then her fingers found bone and she scrabbled for a hold, ripping her nails and grazing her hand, until she was safe again, cheek pressed against the rough surface, heart thudding in her chest.
Far below, Jonas had thrown himself to the ground, just in time to feel the staff’s fire graze his back. He rolled, pressing his singed coat into the wet leaves, then looked for Jik.
The mudman was pinned against a tree, held up by the blast. It had shattered his hands and feet but he was still mostly whole. As the stream of fire ended, he slipped to the ground, glowing red-hot.
Boneman howled and fired again. Snakes of flame twisted through the air, ripping the mantle of leaves overhead to shreds. As if in reply, forked lightning split the sky and a tree burst into yellow flames as the Hounds dipped lower. Scraps of burning branch fell everywhere, forcing Jonas to scramble under the outward curve of the giant’s rib. Thunder broke loud enough to shake the woodland.
Scattered drops of rain hissed into steam on Jik’s baking surface as the mudman sprang to his broken feet and launched himself at Boneman, red-hot arms outspread. Screaming with rage, Boneman fired again and again, the blasts keeping Jik at bay, but making him even hotter.
In the shadows, illuminated by blinding flashes of staff fire and lightning and with burning wood still raining down around him, Jonas scrabbled desperately through the leaves and broken branches, searching for his pack. He had put it down while they stopped to look at the skeleton. Now, there was something inside that he needed.
‘Hang on, Nin,’ he muttered as his hands found the sodden bag hidden in a clump of half-burned ferns.
High above the fight, her breath coming in short gasps and her hands sticky with sweat, Nin struggled on up the giant’s rib, feeling her way from one tiny edge to the next. Thunder broke right over her head, a tidal wave of sound that tore at her, as if determined to shake her loose. Fire arched around her and she didn’t know if it came from above or below. A spear of light struck the already damaged rib in the centre of its curve. She heard a wrenching, grinding sound and felt the bone twist sideways, falling.
But right ahead, right THERE was the shining thing. Nin stretched out one arm to its limit, grazing the thing with the tips of her fingers. It swung a little, sending arrows of light spinning amid the whirl of dark wings, its silver call cutting through the clamour to pierce Nin’s head. She reached just a little further, hanging on with her fingernails and with all her weight balanced on one toe wedged in a gap narrower than a pencil. As the rib began to tear itself free of the breastbone that was now only feet away, she felt her foot slide and her grip come loose. For a moment she hung in the air, still desperately reaching for the shining thing. She felt its cool touch on her fingers. And then she fell.
At the sound of her scream, Jonas looked up to see Nin plunging through the air in a whirlwind of bats and lightning. He ran, taking with him the rope he had just dug from his pack. Knocked flying into a pile of wet leaves by a hit from the staff, Jik staggered again to his broken feet and tottered towards the bone arches. Boneman’s head swivelled, his turquoise eyes vivid in his white face.
Hurtling down through a wh
irling sea of leathery bodies, their dark mass split by flashes of brilliance, Nin felt as though the fall went on forever, like she would be plunging towards death for eternity.
And then, suddenly, it was over and she was lying on the ground, face down in a load of bat droppings with half her fingernails ripped out and some bruises she wouldn’t forget in a hurry, but still alive. She turned her head. In front of her, twined around her fingers, there it was. A thin rope of leather knotted through a silver wedge traced with a star design that seemed to burn in the air just above the metal. Beyond her hand, she could see the white wall of the collapsed rib where it had crashed to the ground only yards away. She tightened her grip on the amulet.
‘I’m OK,’ she murmured, hardly believing it, ‘though I’m not too happy about the bat dung.’
Right next to her, Jonas groaned. He had broken her fall, so she reckoned his bruises were going to be at least as good as hers. She didn’t have time to get used to still being alive, before fire blazed over her head, striking the ground beyond them. They were an easy target, but Boneman couldn’t kill Jonas without hurting Nin and he wanted her whole. Mostly whole anyway.
‘Move away,’ said Boneman, his eyes like chips of blue ice. ‘Move away, girl, because I want to kill him.’
Nin hung on to Jonas, both of them struggling up to stand facing Dandy Boneman. Jonas had a bleeding cut on his forehead, burns on his hands and was covered in dung. Nin didn’t look much better. She also noticed that Jonas was clutching an odd-looking rope woven of green stems bound tightly together, as if each thread had grown into the others.
There was a cracking sound of trampled twigs and Jik hurtled into view behind Boneman. He was stuck all over with leaves and lopsided, but his red eyes were glowing.
‘Oh for Galig’s sake,’ hissed Boneman, ‘is that mud rat still going!’
Swinging the staff by its lower end he whacked at the mudman, felling him to the ground and smashing his legs. Jik glared at him and began to struggle up.
Nin felt Jonas push past her. In the time it took Boneman to turn back to them Jonas had walked forward, swinging the rope of stalks like a lasso. His eyes were fixed on Boneman and blazing with something that made Nin shiver. She could have sworn that as the rope swung, the green stems began to writhe and twist as if they were alive.
Boneman paled. He knew what Jonas held in his hand. He also knew that it would take him two seconds to reposition the staff and fire.
It took Jonas one second to throw the rope.
Nin couldn’t believe what she was seeing.
The rope coiled around Boneman, binding him from head to foot, forcing him to drop the staff. Where it touched it sent out shoots that burrowed into him, pushing through clothing and skin. Boneman screamed. The shoots burst through the other side and went on growing. Wiry stalks twined around him and leaves unfolded from his ears, nose and eyes. Buds appeared at his fingertips, splitting the skin and sending the ring flying into the air where it arched in a flash of gold, hitting the ground and rolling into the shadows. He opened his mouth to scream again, but only green fronds came out. Staggering, he fell to the ground. The shoots went on bursting out of his chest and limbs, unfurling into fierce purple blooms, their petals touched with scarlet. Dandy Boneman thrashed briefly and then was still.
Jonas watched until there was nothing left but a man-sized patch of purple flowers and a lot of leaves. Above them, the dark sky boiled and the rain began falling in earnest. The flaming trees hissed and smoked. Nin looked up.
A funnel of clouds dark as night was pouring towards the gap in the woodland canopy. In front of them, with the trees reduced to jagged, smouldering trunks, the wood was open to the sky. Nin could see the cloudy shapes of jaws and hound-heads as the Storm dived towards them.
‘Run!’ she screamed.
Jik was already lurching along on his half legs, heading as fast as he could to shelter. As the baying of the Hounds grew louder and the cold rain slashed through the air like knives, Nin grabbed Jonas and pulled him towards the deeper woods. He shook her off and stepped forwards.
‘Jonas!’
The Hounds were almost on him as he leaned down and picked up Dandy’s staff. He stood again, looking up into the open jaws and lightning eyes just a heartbeat away from his own. Then, as the first Hound lunged towards him, he turned the staff and hurled it downwards, ramming it head-first into the Land so that it stuck there, quivering like an ivory sapling in the gale.
The ground shuddered as the staff earthed itself, pouring all of its stored magic into the Land and drenching the wood with power. Blue light irradiated everything. A scorching wind burned outwards, smashing through the Hounds and scattering them, forcing them to turn and race back towards the horizon. Nin screamed and ducked as the magical force seethed about her, whipping her hair and stinging her face like a desert wind. Still clutched in her hand, the amulet burned and hissed against her skin.
And then the light winked out, leaving behind it a big animal bone stuck upside down in the ground. The staff was dead, drained of its magic, its eerie glow gone as if it had never been.
When Nin straightened up the first thing she saw was Jonas, staring up at a clear sky filled only with twilight and a gentle evening breeze.
Stars lit the night-time forest, shining through the wreckage of the leafy roof. From underneath a bush, Skerridge watched the two Quick as they patched up the mudcreature with new feet and hands made from dark woodland mud and put him by the fire to bake. Then they settled down for the night in the mortal remains of the last giant, Scardoom Thunderfoot. It didn’t seem terribly polite, but dead was dead and Scardoom wasn’t in a position to complain.
Skerridge had been following the whole affair with interest and was shocked to find that he almost wanted to join in. He had crushed the urge at once. It didn’t do to get involved with the Quick.
He chuckled. This whole chasing his target across the Drift thing was turning out to be quite an entertainment!
Watching Right Madam bewitched into risking her neck for the amulet had given him some nervous moments, though. After all, she’d be no use to Mr Strood in pieces. But sorcerer magic liked to belong to the kind of person who wanted something badly and Right Madam had got the amulet’s attention all right! As it was, the kid probably thought she had found it instead of the other way around. The Quick just didn’t appreciate the nature of spells.
Skerridge yawned, stretched and settled down again, but sleep was a long time in coming and he lay awake for hours, watching the stars grow brighter and a half-moon rise slowly in the sky.
Pictures paraded through his head, old Thunderfoot in his last days as the plague devoured him, his eyes haunted by the knowledge that he would soon die and, with him, his entire species. The city of Beorht Eardgeard just before it fell to the Raw, its streets layered with dead and the great Hall of Galig towering against a sky the colour of old iron, the lights in its spires finally extinguished.
And even when he finally dropped off, Skerridge only dozed fitfully, his dreams laced with images of the Final Gathering, when the Seven Sorcerers had come together to weave a spell big enough to cheat death. Skerridge had been there, had seen it all and it was an event that was bound to live on in the nightmares of every witness. An event that had marked the last chapter in the story of Celidon and the first beginnings of the Drift.
Because soon after the Final Gathering, the Sorcerers had gone forever, Mr Strood had taken over and, for the BMs at least, everything changed.
11
Grimm
kerridge snuffled irritably. It was early morning and the mudman was standing, propped up against old Scardoom’s rib, staring at him.
Skerridge stared back.
Fabulous couldn’t make mudmen, it took a spark of Quick life to do that, but Skerridge knew all about them. And what he knew was that they were not insolent things that stared back at you. He didn’t know what Right Madam had done to it, but the thing was getting on his n
erves. It was an unknown quantity and it made him feel uncertain. Skerridge didn’t like uncertain.
Through the gaping hole left in the woodland, a tinge of gold was burning a line across the horizon, and the air buzzed with the electric feel of raw magic. The tinge grew to a flicker as flames licked the rim of the Drift. Then the sky ignited.
Skerridge turned his gaze to watch. As much as he hated the sun he had to admit (grudgingly) that its rise over the Drift was dramatic. Raging across the heavens from the east horizon to the west, the boiling flames lit Scardoom’s broken ribs to pillars of gold.
Unknown Quantity tilted its head back, now staring at the sky instead of Skerridge. It was an improvement.
Curled up among the giant’s remains, Obstacle and Right Madam stirred, awakened by the dawn. Right Madam had slept badly, Skerridge knew, her night filled with dreams of pursuit by something that never gave up, never grew tired and never forgot. But then, if any Quick was stupid enough to go messing with the Gabriel Hounds, let alone Ava Vispilio, they weren’t going to get any sympathy from Skerridge.
When the sun was finally up, Obstacle got to his feet and stretched.
‘Come on, Ninevah Redstone,’ he said, and another day began.
Jonas, helped by Jik and Nin, spent ages raking over the forest floor looking for Vispilio’s ring, but in the end he had to give up. It was lost somewhere amid the chaos of leaves, ferns and shrubs. Hopefully it would stay that way. But he did find Boneman’s pack hidden behind a clump of trees, and while they ate their breakfast of cold roast rabbit he went through it looking for anything useful. His best find was a net, woven from the same stalks as the rope that had killed Dandy Boneman.
‘Fantastic! A crowsmorte web. That’s the flower, see,’ he added, nodding at the purple patch of ex-Dandy. ‘Crowsmorte. Named after the sorcerer who made it, Morgan Crow. The web will hide us from the Hounds.’