by Laurence Yep
As they stood in the blackness, waiting yet again, Leech felt the mist wrap itself around his ankles like cold, damp snakes.
“Oh, great,” Koko complained. “Now there’s fog.”
“The explosion must have heated up the air,” Kles reasoned. “When that air came in contact with the ice it created the vapor, and it’s drifting through the corridors now. That could help Uncle Resak’s clan even more.”
Leech almost jumped when he heard the noise from overhead, as if a herd of cattle were stampeding toward him from overhead. The icy roof began to glow with a weird purple light and there was a flash as bright as lightning and a roar like thunder. Was it a storm within the palace?
Bayang studied the ceiling. “We must be on a lower level.”
“I thought we were moving downward for a while,” Leech said.
Suddenly humans shouted and guns roared overhead. Through the ice above he saw their silhouettes as their weapons flashed. The humans seemed to be gathering in a defensive circle, but at its center was a strange tubelike shape that writhed. It seemed to be about twelve feet in length, with all sorts of bumps and rough patches along its side, like a giant worm with acne.
“What’s that?” Scirye gasped.
“A Tizheruk, Lady,” Roxanna said.
“It’s sort of knobby, isn’t it?” Scirye asked.
“The bumps are caused by parasites, or skin that grows over barnacles that latch on,” Roxanna said. “Whales are the same way. The young ones are sleeker, so this must be one of the older ones.”
The monster was big enough to crush a human with one blow of its body.
I hope the defenders have destroyed the others, Leech decided.
Shadowy beasts skated and danced on the edge of the humans’ circle like angry clouds whipped about by a hurricane. They howled and growled defiantly. Every now and then a bullet found one of them and they went down, but the others didn’t retreat. They kept on wheeling around the intruders.
With a shock Leech realized that the clan warriors were herding the surviving invaders together before they sprang the final ambush.
The faint light filtering down from above let him see the others now. With their comrades fighting and dying so near them, it was hard for the company to keep silent. They shifted restlessly from paw to paw. Next to him, a wolf spun in a circle as if impatiently chasing her tail.
A bear in the company, eager to join the struggle, began to rumble in sympathy until a sharp word from Taqqiq cut him off.
The veteran barked a series of low commands and in the overhead twilight he saw dozens of bears slipping from the company to gather a few paces away. There they reared up a little bit away. Scrambling up their backs were foxes who stood upon the bears’ shoulders and heads so their forepaws could scrabble at the ice. Their limbs were a blur as their claws raked the ceiling, and the shavings swirled around them like snowflakes.
Leech heard a click and turned. In the dim light from overhead, he saw Scirye hand her axe over to Roxanna. Upach had taken out the curved dagger that was so deadly in her hand.
Scirye was wiping the sweat from her hands onto her coat before she pulled the gauntlet over one hand. Kles was perched on her shoulder, arching his back and fluttering his wings, stretching before the exertion of battle. And the boy couldn’t see what protection the leather would provide against bullets. She smiled nervously at him as she took out the stiletto.
Leech put away the axes. He realized he had even less practice with them than with the armband weapon. Taking off the armband, he changed it into the weapon ring again. Yes, this feels a lot better than the axes, the boy thought.
Koko had taken out an axe and was eyeing the blade.
Bayang lowered her head and whispered to the badger. “Do you really know what to do with that?”
Koko shrugged. “What’s to know? You swing it at something.”
“Wouldn’t it be more effective if you changed into a creature more deadly?” the dragon asked, and then added, “If you can?”
“I didn’t miss every lesson,” Koko said defensively, and changed into a miniature dragon. Unfortunately, he retained the same silhouette he had as a badger, so that unlike Bayang’s body, with its sleek lines, Koko’s was wide of hip, with stubby legs and short forelegs.
“That,” Bayang sniffed, “is insulting.”
“Picky, picky, picky,” Koko said. In another instant, he became his lumpy version of a wolf. “Satisfied?”
Several wolves nearby swung around, pulling back their lips in a snarl.
“Change back,” Leech warned, “before they take you apart.”
“Everybody’s a critic,” Koko grumbled, and returned to being a badger.
Bayang scratched her snout. “I think we’ll work on your transformation skills later.”
“You could have saved me a lot of trouble,” Koko complained. His belly rumbled. “All that shape-shifting makes a guy hungry too.”
The blizzard of ice shavings stopped abruptly and a fox yipped something to Taqqiq. Taqqiq gave another low command and the foxes leapt down. The foxes dropped to all fours but stood up again, this time with small hammers in their paws. They swung the tools awkwardly as they began to rain blows at the weakened ice.
It was as if a giant crystal plate had broken overhead. Ice fell in splinters as sharp as Scirye’s stiletto and some chunks as big as refrigerators. Fog billowed downward. And within the mist fell screaming freebooters. But then a huge serpentlike horror crashed on top of them and they fell silent.
Leech figured it must be a Tizheruk in the flesh. The monster was about ten feet long and four feet wide and it seemed to be mostly head attached to a large fluked tail. Its head was blunt like a moray eel’s, with a long jaw filled with daggerlike teeth. Even though its black eyes were as large as Leech’s fist, they seemed too small for a creature that size.
Near the base of the skull were gill slits, and just behind them long, bony fins protruded. They were strong enough to support the Tizheruk’s head, giving it rudimentary legs. Its body broadened into a forked tail as large as a sail. And from head to tail its skin was as knobby as the older one they had seen. So it must have had the same problem with parasites.
The Tizheruk thrashed about, wrapping itself in streamers of mist and throwing frozen rubble around like pieces of cardboard.
At a command from Taqqiq, a blade of bright flame stabbed through the dimness, licking against the Tizheruk’s hide. With a roar, the monster drew back.
Leech saw a bear with a blowtorch driving the creature into a ring of wolves and foxes. At another order from Taqqiq, the squad sprang upon the monster from all directions, savaging it. The Tizheruk’s head was so big it could only swing it and its end clumsily. As a result, it was always too late when it tried to bite one of its speedy attackers or club one with its tail. In a narrow tunnel, where you could only assault from the front, the Tizheruk would have a formidable advantage, but in a large room—like this one—its sides were vulnerable.
When the monster had fallen below, it had already been weakened by dozens of bleeding bite wounds, and now the clan warriors were tearing large chunks from its hide. After only a few moments, the monster was already moving slower.
Another squad of animals was taking away the freebooters’ weapons and gathering them in a cluster. The humans stood, dazed and frightened, as if waiting to wake up from their nightmare.
Not all the bears and foxes had survived the collapse of the ceiling, but the remaining bears gathered side by side in a line just beneath the rim of the hole. Squatting, this time they lifted sturdy wolves up to their shoulders. The wolves in turn stretched upward, trying to grasp the edge and form living ladders, but their paws flailed in vain just a few inches short.
Above them, a few of the intruders were recovering from the shock. Shots began to ring down. A wolf howled and toppled backward off a bear.
“Stand back and don’t go up until I do,” Bayang instructed Leech and the others. T
hen she said to Taqqiq, “Wait. Let me help.”
The dragon’s outline blurred and the air around her began to sparkle as she drew in the elements she needed. When Bayang’s shape sharpened again, she had swelled to twice her former size, knocking over the nearest animals who had not gotten out of the way like the children.
The sight of a giant dragon shooting upward through the opening threw off the freebooters, but only for a second. The next, shots were pinging off Bayang’s scales.
Ignoring the bullets as if they were mosquitoes, Bayang stretched forward to form a sturdy highway for the clan warriors.
“Poor guys.” Koko shook his head. “The first wave is going to get gunned down.”
Leech had caught a glimpse of the floor above. It seemed to be a large chamber with a high domed ceiling.
“Not if I can help it,” he said. He’d had enough of being on foot and slipping and sliding. If he tried that up above, he’d wind up on his rump in the middle of a battle. So he pulled the disks from his armband and spat on them. “Change,” he said. As soon as his fingers had traced the magical sign, the wheels were whizzing in front of him.
“Bayang said to wait here,” Scirye protested.
“I’m tired of doing nothing while the clan dies,” Leech said, and stepped onto the whirling circles. His heart leapt as it always did when he sprang into the air.
“You’re right,” Roxanna said. Tucking the axe into her belt, she skated over to a fallen freebooter and removed a bandolier full of bullets before she headed toward the discarded rifles.
Scirye pointed overhead. “Kles, help Leech and Bayang.”
“But Lady—,” the griffin tried to protest.
“You can protect me best by distracting the freebooters up above,” she said. “Now go!”
Kles bowed his head. “As you wish,” the griffin said, and sprang into the air. With rapid beats of his wings, he caught up with Leech as he flew upward. They darted over Taqqiq, who was already climbing onto Bayang.
Leech took stock as soon as he popped out of the hole. Purple fire imps glowed in a handful of lanterns that the invaders had brought and which had now been set on the floor. By their light, he could see that he was in a vast circular chamber into which a dozen corridors led. The room was easily several hundred feet in diameter and eight stories high from the floor to the center of the dome. An ankle-deep layer of fog billowed around above the floor.
There were about fifty freebooters in a ring around the hole, some in fur coats, others in white parkas. Their uniform trousers were patched—as if the ex-soldiers had replaced their army-issued gear with whatever they could steal.
Most of them looked as stunned as their comrades who had been captured below. The raiders had formed a circle to make a last stand—only to have Taqqiq and the others erupt from below into the very middle of their formation. Sandwiched now between two sets of enraged defenders, most of the intruders had lost heart.
Five of them, though, were raising rifles toward Leech and Kles. A man with a pistol—most likely their officer—was hollering at the rest of his survivors to shoot.
Leech’s first reaction was to cringe and duck, but suddenly he heard the voice: Fool, you can’t outfly a bullet, but you might be able to outfly the eyes aiming at you.
Guessing that the only way he was going to survive was to let the voice take over, he gave in. Immediately, he found himself raising the ring over his head as he swooped down.
The griffin, wings half-folded against his body, raced past. “Tarkär, Tarkär!” Shrieking his war cry, Kles struck the officer’s head with four sets of paws. It was as if a whirlwind of claws and a beak had engulfed the officer. Screaming, the man fell to his knees, his revolver thudding onto the ice and skidding away.
Then it was Leech’s turn. He swept his arm in an arc that knocked the first rifle aside and by luck his backstroke struck the head of the second rifleman. Leech crossed his legs like a skater and twisted as he spun.
His forward swing with the ring missed the first rifleman’s head, but Leech’s momentum carried him into the freebooter so that he stumbled backward.
As Leech went on pirouetting through the riflemen, he glimpsed the remaining three turning around to shoot him. That was their last mistake.
Taqqiq struck one of those three, bowling him over. Bayang had stretched a foreleg and knocked over the remaining pair.
Now, the voice said, knock out the dragon while she isn’t looking.
Leech had been waiting for something like this. “No,” he said to himself. He spun sideways as he and the voice fought for control, the cavern whirling around crazily. And then he was himself again—though he was not sure how.
As he straightened up, the rest of the company were surging up Bayang’s back and sweeping over their enemies like a fanged tidal wave.
Having taken care of his opponent, Taqqiq bounded toward the nearest freebooter and sprang into the air.
Horrified at the sight of the open jaws, the freebooter flung his rifle away and thrust his hands into the air. “Jeg give efter!” he cried.
In an amazing display of control, Taqqiq’s jaws snapped shut and the wolf thumped against the freebooter instead, knocking him over. As the man cowered beneath the wolf, Taqqiq’s legs trembled as he fought to contain his rage.
All around them, guns and knives were clattering on the floor as the remaining freebooters shouted the same thing in Danish—Leech assumed they were surrendering because they were also putting their hands over their heads.
“Leech, Kles,” Bayang called. “Watch over Scirye and Roxanna.”
The griffin’s eyes were glittering with a mad battle fury, but Leech called to him, “Kles, Scirye needs you.”
The griffin’s head jerked up straight as he fought to control himself. “Yes, thank you,” he said in a ragged voice.
Leech circled back with Kles next to him. He was glad to see a squad of bears and wolves that had formed a wall in front of his friends as they climbed up from the lower level. Upach led the way, followed by Roxanna with her borrowed rifle with the bandolier hanging from one shoulder. Scirye came next and finally Koko, both moving with shuffling steps on the ice.
“Is the fighting over?” the badger asked Leech nervously.
“All but the cheering,” the boy said, hovering overhead.
“Aw, shucks,” Koko said, trying to sound disappointed but not doing a very good job of acting.
Sinking her claws into the rim of the hole, Bayang flapped her good wing and managed to haul herself upward to join her friends.
By that time, the prisoners were on their knees, with their hands clasped on top of their heads. Uncle Resak, bleeding from several wounds, was leaning on his staff as he spoke Danish to one of them.
When Uncle Resak growled something at him, the freebooter started to rise angrily but sank back down on his knees when he saw Taqqiq slinking toward him, ready to leap.
With the help of his staff, the bear-man turned his back on the invader. “This worm,” Uncle Resak said contemptuously, “claims that he is a patriot who is fighting to protect Danish territory and wants his company to be treated as prisoners of war. I told him that the war was over, so that even if he was a soldier once, he’s nothing more than a bandit now.”
Roxanna looked ready to spit at the Dane. “This scum gives no quarter. They shoot anyone they capture. You ought to do to them what you do to the hunters in the Wastes.”
“The time for that kind of thing is over. I’m afraid more that these fellows know about the location of my home now.” Uncle Resak nodded to Roxanna. “I’m going to ask Prince Tarkhun to act as our liaison to the other humans.”
“I’m sure he’ll be only too happy to help,” Roxanna promised.
“As the first friendly act, we’ll turn these humans over to him for trial.” Uncle Resak gestured toward his prisoners.
Roxanna glared at the freebooters. “This scum is lucky that you’re more civilized than they are.” Her ang
ry eyes made it plain what she would have done to them.
Despite everything, Uncle Resak had to chuckle. “I suppose you could say we’re more humane than humans.” He waved his good paw. “I release you from your promise to me. Soon it won’t matter who you tell.”
Bayang looked around, worried. “But where’s Roland?”
“Slinking away if he knows what’s good for him,” Koko snorted.
“Uncle, his freebooters would have invaded only if you had something he wanted,” Bayang said urgently.
Uncle Resak hesitated and at that moment a scarred dragon rumbled out of a distant tunnel. Iron bands armored his chest.
“Aren’t we ever going to get rid of you pests?” Badik called.
Behind him lumbered the biggest Tizheruk that Leech had seen. The head was easily fifteen feet long. Just beyond its gill was a bulge about six feet long. That, Leech decided, must be some parasite.
The Tizheruk was moving too slow and was too far away to worry about now. But Badik soared into the air. “You haven’t won yet, beast,” he cried.
And then he swooped down, straight at Uncle Resak.
38
Bayang
Howling in rage and fear, the clan warriors raced to protect Uncle Resak, but the plunging Badik was already a green blur. Bayang knew they would never reach their leader in time.
Roxanna, standing as coolly as if she were at a target range, fired methodically, working the rifle’s bolt each time to eject the old cartridge and put in a new one from the magazine, re-aiming, and pulling the trigger again.
Three shots missed and the fourth pinged off Badik’s armored hide harmlessly.
Bayang knew it was up to her, dragon to dragon, as it should be. Crouching, she unfurled her wings, feeling the pain already in the injured one. She would need to time her spring just right to intercept Badik….