In the dark, Cal started to say something, but Robin instantly clapped his hand over his mouth.
With her cat-like elf vision, Tara could see him gesturing at them to keep quiet. They moved away from the door and entered one of abandoned rooms.
“This should be okay,” whispered Robin. “Nobody should be able to hear us here.”
“It’s the Ravager, isn’t it?” gasped Tara. “He managed to possess the two wizards and force Fafnir to come back here so he could seize the Castle. And he seems to be able to contaminate other people very easily.”
“I think it’s even worse than that,” murmured Cal. “Did you notice that Fafnir was wearing different clothes? She wasn’t coming back from the Gray Fortress. I think the Ravager has already taken Hymlia!”
Robin and Tara stared at each other, deeply dismayed.
“After elves, dwarves are the fiercest warriors on this planet,” said Robin. “If the Ravager has overcome the dwarves, then humans won’t be able to hold out very long.”
“We’ve got to leave,” said Cal. “The Voice was very specific. It said the only way to defeat the Ravager is to attack the source of his power, the Island of Black Roses, with the help of the White Soul.”
“But what if we can’t find it?” asked Tara.
For the first time, she felt discouraged. In a strange way, she could face the fact of someone trying to kidnap or kill her. But, if they went after her friends, it sapped her strength and made her feel unable to fight.
In the darkness, Cal shrugged, saying, “I’m sure I’ll be as handsome as ever with purple skin, but it’s going to clash terribly with my blond hair!”
Tara couldn’t help chuckling. Cal had his own way of dispelling anxiety.
“So, what do we do?” she asked.
“First, we get out of here,” said Cal. “The Transfer Portal will almost certainly be guarded. So we’ll take the passage the Castle showed me, the one we used to come in the last time. Once we’re outside, we’ll decide what to do next. All right?”
“Okay. Let’s go.”
It was quiet in the tunnels, and Tara realized with a shiver that the dwarf’s voice could no longer be heard. Fafnir had fallen silent.
The secret passages that the killer had used connected with the Living Castle’s tunnels, so they soon reached the dungeons below. They quickly realized that the guards there had also been infected. With glassy eyes and purple skin, they were walking around like zombies.
Cal went first, in a foul mood because his new body greatly impaired his natural agility and secrecy. Then Robin waved Tara ahead.
She ran forward and had almost reached the exit when a dark mass crashed down on her, half knocking her out. Her reaction was lightning fast. In a single motion, she let herself fall, rolled on her shoulder, and drew her sword. She only stopped her blade when it was a hair’s breadth of the throat of a vampyr!
It was a good thing her reflexes were equally fast, because she’d almost slit Master Dragosh’s throat.
“Good grief!” she hissed. “You can’t go around jumping on people like that! I nearly killed you!”
The bat tried to answer, but produced only a squeaking gibber. Then Dragosh remembered that he couldn’t speak in that form, and he shape-shifted.
Tara, Robin, and Cal examined him very carefully. Red eyes, white fangs, black hair, and nice pale skin—not the slightest trace of purple. All right, everything was fine. For the time being, anyway.
“Miss Duncan?” breathed the incredulous vampyr. “What are you doing here, disguised as an elf?”
“It’s a long story,” she whispered quickly, “and this isn’t exactly the place to tell it. How did you recognize me?”
“By your smell. I was about to neutralize you when I recognized your smell. Elf blood isn’t harmful to us, but human blood is, terribly. If I had bitten you, I would have been contaminated!”
Tara frowned. Contaminated? She stared at the vampyr, who was shaking with anxiety. Her brain was working at top speed. But in that case . . .
Cal’s voice interrupted her thoughts. “Hey, this is no time to slow down! Let’s get out of here before we’re spotted.”
The Living Castle opened the secret passage to the street behind the building, and they soon found themselves outside. On the streets of Travia, nobody seemed aware of what was happening in the castle. People were going about their business without realizing the terrible danger threatening them from within.
Once the group was far away from the castle, the vampyr explained that he’d seen the cloud of black smoke making its way into the prison. The prisoners had their own tubs, hot and cold, and he happened to be soaking in the hot one. As soon as he saw the smoke, he let himself sink to the bottom and held his breath for half an hour. Underwater and in the darkness, he was invisible. The black smoke eventually withdrew, and Dragosh was able to get out. He shape-shifted into a rat to explore the castle. To his horror, he saw that nearly everyone had been possessed and they were all obeying Fafnir. He then shifted into bat shape to fly out a window, only to find all the doors and windows locked. He had just returned to the dungeons to think the situation over when Tara and her friends had burst in. He thought he’d been spotted, so he attacked her.
Tara quickly told him everything she knew about the Ravager, who she believed was invading the castle.
The vampyr was naturally pale, but as he listened, he went dead white, with a hint of green on his cheekbones.
“We have to combine our forces,” he said anxiously. “I’m going to immediately leave for Urla, our capital, and gather other vampyrs to help you find the White Soul. The Mud Eaters fear us, so it shouldn’t be hard to get information from them. The problem is the Transfer Portal. We don’t yet have a vampyr embassy in Travia, like in Tingapore. The only available portal is the castle’s.”
“Not exactly,” said Cal. “We can use the gnomes’ portal. Their king owes me a ton of favors.”
Dragosh looked intrigued but didn’t pursue the matter. “In that case, let’s go quickly. There isn’t a moment to lose!”
They cautiously moved through the streets. People were dressed in hide, hair, and feathers of every possible color, but purple was generally absent, except for an occasional decorative touch. They reached the Transfer Portal and were soon at the gnome embassy. But once there, they encountered a slight problem.
When they requested a meeting with Ambassador Tul Tultul, the guards mounted on their giant praying mantises refused to let them in. The guards told that that since they didn’t have an appointment, they couldn’t just show up this way. It simply wasn’t done.
Cal grabbed one of the mantises by its mandible, ignored its squeaks of protest, and forced the giant insect’s head down. Then, displaying his rippling muscles, Cal stared the little blue gnome nervously gripping the reins right in the eye.
“You’ve got a choice,” he growled. “You can either call the ambassador immediately to tell him that Thief Caliban Dal Salan, who saved your king’s butt, is waiting, or I’ll beat you and your beastie to a pulp. Is that clear?”
The gnome gulped and nodded. Wheeling his mount, he raced off to inform His Excellency of their presence.
When the latter finally appeared, he was wearing an elegant bathrobe and seemed annoyed. His mood grew even worse when he didn’t recognize Cal.
“Well, well, well,” he said sarcastically, studying the two elves, the vampyr, and the gorgeous human. “The last time I saw Sir Caliban Dal Salan, he stood about five foot three. Have you had a sudden growth spurt?”
“Very funny,” grumbled Cal. “It’s a disguise. There’s been a huge problem at the castle and you and your gnomes better get the heck out of here before it spreads. The Ravager of Souls has overcome everybody there. We need to borrow your Transfer Portal so we can go to the Gray Fortress and then to the Island of Black Roses. We have to stop the Ravager before he takes over the entire planet.”
Ambassador Tultul looked at him, then
sighed. “The mental health clinic is just two streets farther on. My guards will show you the way.”
He gestured to his guards to encircle the little group. The green mantis that Cal had grabbed squeaked with satisfaction and clicked its mandibles.
Cal glared at Tultul and stood his ground. He opened his mouth, but Robin spoke first.
“Look at his neck,” he said, pointing to his friend. “Our little adventure in the service of your King Glul Buglul left Cal with a souvenir. Something you will find easy to identify. Because he’s probably the only person still alive to carry this mark.”
The gnome raised an eyebrow in surprise, but obeyed. And when he saw the small, golden scar on Cal’s neck, he turned bluer.
“By my ancestors!” he muttered. “The mark of a golden t’sil!”
He straightened and waved them into the embassy, to the mantis’s great disappointment.
“Explain exactly what happened,” Tultul ordered, once they were all comfortably seated in the conference room.
Tara jumped right in, with Cal and Robin adding details from time to time. By the time they finished their story, the gnome had turned a very dark blue.
“This is a disaster! I’m going to immediately order the evacuation of the embassy. To escape the Ravager, our people will take refuge underground.”
“Send messages to all the countries,” said the vampyr. “We have to prepare our world for what it’s facing.”
“Yes, yes,” said the ambassador, jumping from his chair in a great hurry. “I’ll take you to the portal immediately. I’ll leave two volunteers here to greet you if case you need it again later. Good luck! May the spirit of Demiderus protect you!”
In seconds, the Transfer Portal was activated and Dragosh was on his way to his native Krasalvia. Before the others departed, they turned their skin color purple, to be on the safe side. Tara restored Gallant to his pegasus shape. Then, along with Cal, Blondin, and Robin, they transferred to the Gray Fortress.
Located in Gandis, the land of giants, the Fortress had been Magister’s old headquarters. The terrible Bloodgrave clan used it to imprison OtherWorld’s apprentice spellbinders, whom they’d kidnapped and infected with demonic magic. After the stinging defeat of the Blood-graves at the hands of Tara and her allies, Master Chem had suggested that the giants turn the Fortress into a treatment center for giants who were infected by magic despite their natural immunity, and for infected dwarves, who despised magic but whose members occasionally exhibited it. Spellbinders from all the other nations were there to help the patients as well. So Tara and her group expected to be welcomed by one of the representatives of those communities.
But when they rematerialized, no one greeted them—neither giant, dwarf, nor spellbinder. They looked around curiously. Built of gray spellblock stone, the Gray Fortress hadn’t changed much. It was still huge, cold, and massive.
Tara, Gallant, Robin, Cal, and Blondin walked from the Transfer Room to the landing at the top of the stairs. There, they found themselves nose to nose with a giant. Under his blue and gray breeches and gray jerkin, he was purple from head to foot.
CHAPTER 16
THE WHITE SOUL
“What are you doing here?” thundered the giant in a voice so low it seemed to be coming from some deep cave.
Cal’s pulse was racing about two hundred miles an hour, but he managed to keep his tone flat and cold.
“Our master ordered us to go to the Fortress,” he said. Then—because lying is always dangerous when you don’t know the situation—he added, “We don’t know why. We’re waiting for his instructions.”
“I see,” said the giant, shifting the gigantic axe resting on his shoulder. “I’ll go check. Wait here.”
He strode off heavily, his steps shaking the Fortress.
“We better get out of sight,” whispered Tara. Despite having her powerful new elf body, she’d practically choked when she saw the huge axe.
“The main gate is guarded,” said Robin, leaning over the banister. “There are two giants and two dwarves downstairs.”
“Crap! I didn’t imagine we’d get trapped right away,” grumbled Cal. “What about the tunnel that Fafnir dug when we escaped? You think it’s been filled in?”
“Can’t hurt to check. It’s probably the only way for us to get out of the Fortress without being chopped to pieces.”
They discreetly made their way down to the cellar. To their great relief, the storeroom shelves hiding the mouth of Fafnir’s tunnel were still in place, though the bottles on them were gone.
“All right, let’s just pray that the other end hasn’t been blocked,” said Tara.
Luckily for them, this wasn’t the case. The high wizard in charge of the Fortress apparently hadn’t had time to deal with the tunnel, and it was intact.
They emerged at the same spot as during their first flight through the forest, but the situation now was very different. This time they could use their magic fully; no Bloodgrave was hunting them. And Tara was no longer constrained by the fear of killing her grandmother because of the blood oath.
“We can’t take as much time getting to the island as before,” she announced. “Three days is too long. Who knows what the Ravager will do while we’re walking. I’m going to shape-shift.”
“Shape-shift?” asked Cal, who didn’t understand. “Into what?”
“Into a dragon, to fly us to the Island of Black Roses.”
“Oh, no you don’t! No way! The last time we climbed onto your back, you almost killed us. I’ll do my own shape-shifting.”
“Come on, Cal, be reasonable!” said Tara with annoyance. “After the effort you’ve put out these last few days, you don’t have enough power to maintain the same shape for long. What if you shifted into a hawk, but reverted to your human form when you were half a mile high? Can you imagine what you’d look like when you hit the ground? Splat! Flat as a pancake!”
But Cal was stubborn. “Look, I’m not climbing on your back—period. You can just use the same process you did to create this stupid show-off body of mine. Give me some of your power and I’ll change myself into a bird.”
This time, it was Robin’s turn to get annoyed. “No way! Tara’s going to need all her power to fight the Ravager. Each time she gives you some of it, she needs time to compensate for what she’s lost. And what if you’re not able to shift back? I don’t think you’ve got a choice, Cal. You’re not gonna get your way this time.”
Tara spoke up before Cal could change his mind: “Let’s find some place out in the open. I’ll need a lot of space.”
They moved from the Gray Fortress toward the plain, where they would have plenty of room. To show Cal that he had nothing to worry about, Tara quickly shape-shifted. Helped by the living stone, it was pretty easy. Within moments the young she-elf was replaced by a magnificent, blue-eyed, golden dragon with the living stone set in its forehead like some fantastic jewel.
Cal was facing her, so he didn’t realize that Tara had neglected to grow herself a tail.
A tail is essential, because it counterbalances the front of a dragon’s body—a fact brought home when Tara decided to test her forelegs. She made a slight move and suddenly felt herself tipping forward. Instinctively, she realized she was missing something. Seeing her enormous bulk toppling toward him, Cal began to back away. She created her caudal appendage in the nick of time, restoring her balance before she crushed him. The tail appeared with a loud pop!
“What was that popping sound?” asked Cal suspiciously.
“What was what?” she asked, in her deep dragon voice.
“That sound, that pop?”
“I didn’t hear anything. Did you, Robin?”
“Not a thing,” he said, limp with laughter. “All right, I’ll climb aboard first. Have Blondin follow me. That way, we can wedge him between us.”
“You overlooked one minor detail,” noted Cal sarcastically. “My familiar isn’t a fox anymore; he’s a big lion.”
“Just shrink him! It’s easy. You say, ‘By Miniaturus, make the lion shrink to a smaller size, quick as a wink.’”
Having run out of objections, Cal finally obeyed and shrank his lion to the size of a large dog. When Robin suggested making him even smaller, Tara said:
“That’ll do, Cal. My back is broad enough to carry him. And I’m going to create a passenger basket for the three of you. It will make the ride safer.”
Tara remembered seeing a picture of a howdah, a riding box on an elephant on Earth. With an ease that somewhat reassured Cal, she made one appear on her back. It was a strong wicker basket held down with wide cinch straps in front of and behind her wings.
Gallant mentally informed Tara that he planned to fly too and took off immediately. He knew that she was much more powerful than he was, and therefore faster.
Tara waited patiently for Cal, Robin, and Blondin to be securely seated before starting her takeoff. She had observed Gallant’s technique and copied it exactly.
To get underway, she began running, which tossed her passengers about.
“Whaaa . . . t . . . aaa . . . ar . . . e yyy . . . ou . . . ddd . . . ooing?” screamed Cal.
“I’m running so I can take off,” she yelled.
“Yyy ou’re . . . a . . . ddd . . . dragon. You . . . dd . . . don’t nn . . . eed tto . . . run! Jjj . . . j . . . just . . . flap . . . yyy . . . your . . . wi . . . wings!”
“Oh? Just my wings?” Tara stopped in her tracks, nearly pitching her passengers overboard. Then she flapped her wings, raising a huge cloud of dust.
“Let me down!” screamed Cal, trying to fight free of Robin, who was holding him. “Let me down! She’s going to kill us all!”
Cal had one leg outside the howdah when Tara finally managed to get airborne. The takeoff was so abrupt that he fell out backward and wound up dangling from the basket by his hands.
“Pull me up,” he cried, terrified. “Pull me up!”
Because of the wind roar, Tara didn’t understand him. She thought he was telling her to pull up, so she did, climbing straight up into the sky.
Tara Duncan and the Forbidden Book Page 29