by Glenn Dakin
Dr Pyre loomed behind them. ‘Kindness,’ he muttered. ‘Ah yes, of course.’
Theo grinned back at Dr Pyre. Now he, too, was full of the happiness that Chloe felt.
‘You were wrong, sir!’ he said, grinning up at the faceless man. ‘There might have been monsters down here once, but now I can sense . . . friends!’
Theo span around with a gleeful abandon he had never felt before. Now it was all clear to him. Coming to this crypt had been his destiny. His whole life had been leading up to this moment. Now he would be truly happy.
His eyes scanned the forest of stalagmites all around for signs of life. Suddenly he expected to see happy smoglodytes, kind garghouls, playful phantoms in the shadows.
‘They’re hiding,’ he laughed. ‘Shall we go and find them? Shall we make friends?’
‘Ooh, yes,’ Chloe cried back, breaking into a skipping run. For a moment it struck Theo as odd – he had never seen Chloe skip before. But the misgiving soon vanished. It was going to be wonderful to meet his new friends. He could sense them waiting for him just ahead.
They tripped eagerly down the stairway, towards the welcoming darkness below.
‘No!’
Dr Pyre’s roar seemed to shake the cavern. With a swift gesture he blocked the path ahead with a wall of flame. Dr Pyre grabbed each of them with a biting, claw-like hand on the shoulder.
‘Stay,’ he growled.
Theo blinked in the sudden glare. ‘Why did you do that?’ he cried. Dr Pyre peered silently beyond the crackling wall of flame.
‘There is no happiness here,’ the man whispered at last. ‘Step slowly forwards.’
Dr Pyre waved a hand and the wall of flames disappeared. He held up his other hand like a glowing torch. Just ahead, where Theo and Chloe had been about to run, was a concealed pit. With a gesture, Dr Pyre illuminated its depths. Deadly pointed stalagmites could be glimpsed far below.
All the happy feeling drained out of Theo. He sank to his knees. Chloe gave a short cry and slumped next to him.
‘Ah, my canaries,’ growled Dr Pyre finally. ‘You have served your purpose well.’
In his faint, red glow, Theo and Chloe clutched each other. Theo peered anxiously into Chloe’s eyes to check that his friend had come back to her usual self. She gave him a slight nod.
‘The attack comes differently every time,’ Dr Pyre said. ‘From the evil powers that lurk down here. Sometimes through illusion, sometimes through fear, the dark forces seek to catch mortals unaware. This time, through the realm of hopes and desires they have come, invading your hearts and stealing away your minds!’ He surveyed Theo and Chloe with his deep, liquid eyes.
‘If I had not brought two weaker minds with me, as an early warning, then I may well have been deceived. I could have stepped into the trap.’
With his fiery hand he revealed a way around the pit. He pushed past Theo and Chloe, leaving them to struggle after him.
‘The attack has failed,’ Dr Pyre said. ‘We may proceed. From now on, I shall lead the way.’
Theo stumbled on. He felt a great emptiness inside. But his mind was his own again. Chloe patted him on the arm and gave him an abashed smile.
‘Forces of darkness,’ she said. ‘They get you every time.’
Theo smiled, then felt the crelp tug at his ankles with those familiar thorny tendrils.
* * *
Dr Pyre led them into the heart of the Crypt, down a ringing iron stairway bolted into the rock. Far below, tiny lights were winking through a ghostly mist.
As they descended further, Theo could make out the shape of an enormous gateway rising from the cavern floor below. It was like a great prison wall stretching across the centre of the cave, barbed with spikes and glittering with warning lights.
‘This is it, my dear Fool,’ Dr Pyre said. ‘The secret at the heart of the crypt.’
Dr Pyre peered through the mists and cast one or two flares down into the gloom, but they revealed nothing.
‘This is where the crack in the world is hidden, known to a select few as the Chasm. This is where it all comes from – the nightmares, the shadows, the things we do not understand. Like the crelp,’ he added significantly. ‘In ancient times, the alchemists built this great gateway to hold back the horrors. Some have the gift of opening it.’
‘But now it is closed,’ the crelp hissed. ‘Something is wrong – our kind come – coming through no more!’
‘Indeed,’ Dr Pyre said. ‘Something has barred the way, and that must be rectified. We will descend. My canaries will remain here.’
Theo and Chloe were left on the last iron platform before the descent to the great gate. One thorny, immense old crelp was left to guard them. It sat a long way up the steps above them, silent, almost as if sleeping.
Dr Pyre disappeared down the stairs, into the mists, followed by the other crelp. Chloe nudged Theo.
‘Time we were going,’ she whispered.
Theo wondered if he could defeat that hideous, sprawling crelp. He began to summon his power.
‘Well?’ Chloe urged.
‘Yes,’ came a clear, soft voice.
In a blur of motion a black shape dropped from the ceiling, and drove a broken stalactite clear through the centre of the crelp guard. The creature stiffened, thrashed its tendrils wildly, then became still. Theo looked on, wide-eyed.
Tristus had came to their rescue.
As Theo gazed in delight and relief, the garghoul fell to one knee, then collapsed face down on the floor.
Chapter Twenty
Spies
‘Tristus!’
The garghoul began to rise up from the floor of the platform. Theo could see that the creature’s stony skin was scored and scratched with terrible marks. One of his claws was broken and one of his wings was horribly ripped, flapping at an awkward angle. A chip had splintered away from one of his horns.
The garghoul’s eyes burnt a pale blue. ‘You must flee,’ Tristus said. ‘I tried to keep you away from this peril, but it seems destiny is stronger than the will of an asraghoul.’
‘What happened?’
‘I followed the crelp – I found your friend and tried to keep her from harm.’ He nodded politely towards Chloe, who gave a slight bow in return.
‘I tracked their evil to here – the gateway. They were pouring out of this place. There was a battle – I managed to kill all of the ones in this crypt, then close the doorway with an ancient asraghoul word of command.’
At that moment, wild screeching sounds echoed up from the mists below. It seemed the crelp had discovered their fallen comrades.
‘I . . . I was too injured, too weak to leave this place,’ Tristus said, slowly clambering up on to two feet. ‘I was forced to enter my stone dream to recover my strength. But now that you have arrived down here, it seems my work is not done.’
‘You have to get away with us,’ Theo said. ‘You’re too hurt to – to take on Dr Pyre.’
At the mention of this name, Tristus looked grim.
‘There are things here that you do not understand, Theo,’ he said. ‘Now leave quickly.’
With a grimace, the garghoul rose into the air awkwardly, with one broken wing.
‘Tristus!’ Theo cried. ‘Don’t –’
‘I’m telling you to go. Now!’ Tristus snapped. Then he swooped away below.
‘Tristus!’
Theo ran to the edge of the platform and looked down towards the gateway. The mists had cleared a little. Everywhere, crelp were flitting in rage and distress, thrashing their tentacles around.
‘Slaughter! Slaughter!’ they whined among the bodies of their kind.
Dr Pyre was approaching the gateway. Despite his evident injuries, Tristus made an elegant landing, coming to earth between the faceless man and the gate.
Theo strained his eyes and ears to witness the encounter.
‘Come on,’ Chloe said. But neither of them moved, transfixed by the scene far below. Tristus folded his arms and addre
ssed Dr Pyre in his clear, beautiful voice.
‘I know the Aftertime is a disaster,’ Tristus said calmly. ‘But is this really all there is left . . . madness?’
Dr Pyre roared. ‘You!’
‘Kill it, kill it!’ screeched the crelp.
‘No!’ Dr Pyre said, unleashing a ring of fire to keep the maddened crelp at bay. Theo watched, spellbound. He knew that garghouls did not choose to speak to many humans. Tristus and Dr Pyre must have been enemies from way back. Perhaps garghouls communicated with those they fought in battle, as well as with their close allies.
A terrible silence followed, as the two extraordinary beings faced each other. Finally the garghoul broke the silence.
‘You’re dying,’ Tristus said. ‘I can help you.’
For a moment, neither one moved or spoke. Then, with one swift motion, Dr Pyre reached out and planted his glowing hand between the garghoul’s curved horns.
Fwoom!
Tristus reeled backwards, smoke pluming from his head, lost in a shower of flaming stars. One word from Dr Pyre rang out across the cavern.
‘Traitor!’
The crelp slithered and bubbled around the fallen garghoul in a wild frenzy. Tristus began to struggle to his feet.
‘Secure him!’ Dr Pyre cried.
Theo tried to see what was going on, but the vapours now obscured his view. For now, Dr Pyre and his slaves had no thought for their previous captives. Chloe tugged at Theo’s arm.
‘Come on! Tristus has given us our chance!’
Theo gave Chloe an imploring look. ‘I – I can’t!’ he blurted out. ‘I can’t just leave him!’
‘He told us to go!’ Chloe grabbed Theo’s arm and managed to push him back towards the steps.
‘Listen,’ she cried. ‘A garghoul can’t be killed! We can! Come on – we have to take this chance – it’s what your friend wants!’
Theo began to back away, but his eyes were fixed on the mists below, where the struggle still went on.
Why traitor?
‘There’s nothing you can do!’ Chloe shouted. ‘We have to get away – and warn the world. But we’ll be back – I promise!’
She raced up the stairway. With tears in his eyes, Theo followed her.
The proud garghoul lay stretched out before the gateway, eyes closed, his stony body smoking. The tentacles of the crelp wove around him in an almost solid mass, until he had no hope of struggling free.
‘Take him to the Furnace, to be caged,’ Dr Pyre said. He turned around to watch, as the crelp lifted their burden.
‘Wait!’
Dr Pyre swept the chamber with a swift gaze. ‘Where is my Fool?’
The faceless man looked at the still garghoul as the crelp carried him towards the stairway.
‘This was no coincidence,’ he growled. ‘The garghoul appears and the Fool disappears . . .’
He began to race up the stairs, roaring at the crelp as he passed. ‘Of course,’ he cried. ‘Spies! Sniff them out, you dogs!’
* * *
The doorway at the top of the steps was unguarded. Theo and Chloe stopped running, their lungs almost exploding with the effort of escaping out of the Crypt.
‘We need to hide somewhere, anywhere, just to get him off our trail,’ Chloe said, looking around desperately.
Theo looked up. There was the long curved conduit he had seen before. This stone pipeline, as large as a London Underground tunnel, was poised far above their heads, supported on a huge pillar of stone.
‘See that pipe up there?’ Theo said. ‘I’ve seen pipes like that – but from the other side – from the top.’
Now he had spotted what he was looking for. In the cave wall opposite the pillar were steps, cut into the limestone, disappearing upwards.
‘Once we’re up above that pipe, I think I can get us to safety!’ Theo said.
Chloe grinned, her face red, her hair in disarray. Reluctantly she threw off her coat and abandoned it in the ash.
‘Good work, Theo,’ she said. ‘The Candle Man will find a way in the dark.’
Theo felt a frisson, a chill of excitement as he heard these words. With every tired muscle in his legs protesting, he led the way upwards.
Now Theo knew exactly where he was going. A lifetime of being stuck in his lonely room with nothing but obscure books and old charts for company had given him some useful skills.
His memory of the network map and the images burnt into his mind from his perilous arrival down there just a few hours before, combined to help him picture his way out with almost shining clarity.
Up from the limestone staircase behind them came echoes of frenetic slithering.
‘Let’s go!’ Chloe said. ‘Don’t look back.’
Theo struggled upwards. He felt blisters rubbing his heels. His lungs were bursting too. He had done so little running in his whole life, his body hardly knew what exercise was. Through dark, slippery caverns they raced, Theo retracing his journey with the crelp. Suddenly a roar reached their ears.
‘I can see them!’
Dr Pyre’s voice boomed through the darkness just as he and Chloe stumbled into the cavern he had so desperately sought. The glimmering of the luminous fungus and moulds was faint, and Theo splashed crazily among pools and stalagmites as they staggered to their destination.
‘Stop them, you fools!’ Dr Pyre was not far away now, getting closer every moment.
‘There it is,’ Theo cried.
The capsule station appeared out of the gloom, its elegant silvered dome like a fallen spacecraft on a barren planet. The door was open. Theo led the way inside.
‘It’s really only designed for one,’ Theo said.
‘But we’re both pretty light,’ Chloe said, finishing his thought. ‘Thank goodness for all that millet and greens you eat.’
Chloe stepped into the tube and Theo jumped in after her.
‘No!’ came a terrible roar from Dr Pyre. A bolt of power ripped into the silver dome as the capsule rocketed upwards.
Chapter Twenty-one
On the Surface
The capsule hit the surface and Theo and Chloe tumbled out of its door, surrounded by billowing smoke.
We made it, Theo thought. Then, through the haze he saw dark figures lined around the walls of the ice house, many of them holding guns.
‘You’re under arrest!’ one figure shouted. ‘You have entered a forbidden area without authorisation.’
Theo’s head was swimming. He saw Chloe put up her hands, moments before he passed out.
‘What’s he doing in there?’
Theo awoke and found himself unable to move. Chloe’s voice had called him back from a deep, sweet sleep that had been far more welcome than the world he had awakened to.
He was lying in some kind of glass-walled cylinder. The purring of a ventilation system breathed air all around him. Both his head and chest were attached to wires. Through the glass he could make out a nurse in a blue dress and Chloe, all in black, standing over him.
‘What are you doing to him?’
The nurse spoke calmly as Chloe peered around at the apparatus holding Theo.
‘Lord Gold has told us to monitor the patient as carefully as we can.’
‘Theo is all right,’ Chloe replied stubbornly. ‘I was with him. He’s just exhausted. But putting him in here could traumatise him.’ She gestured angrily at all the devices surrounding Theo. ‘It’s just like the tube that his evil guardian used to keep him in!’
‘I’ll go and speak to my superior,’ said the nurse coolly, and she rose to depart.
‘What – what happened?’ With alarm, Theo recalled being surrounded by figures with guns.
‘It was the police. When you vanished from Empire Hall, they searched the grounds and uncovered the ice house. They had the place staked out after that.’
‘Where am I?’ Theo asked.
‘Safe,’ said Chloe. ‘In the headquarters of Project Orpheus, the new police department. You were transferred here a f
ew hours ago.’
‘Orpheus!’ Theo exclaimed. ‘I – I know about that! It’s a police force – set up by an ancient Greek hero – or something . . .’ His voice trailed away. Theo gave Chloe a weak smile. He had only just noticed her impressive new black uniform, with the small silver badge.
Chloe grinned. ‘You’re a little confused,’ she said. ‘But that’s close enough. I’m Orpheus now, too – all signed up and given full security clearance. At last the police are taking the network seriously. This is their medical facility.’ Chloe leant on the big cylinder that was holding Theo. ‘I didn’t know they had a Mercy Tube here.’ She smiled feebly.
‘What are they doing, really?’
‘You passed out,’ she explained. ‘I told them you couldn’t be examined by conventional medicine, so I suppose they’re doing their best.’
‘Exactly,’ said a friendly voice.
Theo turned his head to see a tall man appear behind Chloe. Theo had an impression of twinkling blue eyes and a kind smile.
‘Police Commissioner Vincent Gold,’ the man said. ‘Your new boss on Project Orpheus.’ He turned to one of the nurses.
‘Get him out of that contraption – right now,’ he said.
He loomed over the pale, exhausted Theo. In contrast to the teenager, the Commissioner was a picture of health, with his bronzed skin, light curls of golden hair, and perfectly cut pale blue suit.
‘Theo needs rest now, not a mad scientists’ tea party.’ He gestured at all the machines surrounding the teenager.
Theo sat up. ‘Is there any water?’ he croaked.
‘That’s the spirit,’ Commissioner Gold said. ‘And bring him some millet and greens,’ he added as a nurse hurried away.
‘Millet . . .?’ Theo was surprised.
‘I’ve done my research – I know all about you,’ the man smiled. ‘Don’t worry, Theobald, Project Orpheus looks after its people – and you, and Chloe here are now all mine.’
Theo thought this must be some kind of joke, so he smiled politely.
‘He means we’re both Orpheus agents now,’ Chloe explained. ‘He decided to offer you a special role with the police – on any terms that you like.’