When Finn had touched the charm against the nape of the Bone Creature, things had gone weird.
Weirder, anyway.
As Sulawan had told him it would, the charm activated once he touched it against the place where the creature’s neck met its head. Sulawan hadn’t told him he’d hear the torment of the organisms holding it up, though, or that there would be the brief but skin-crawling sound of them being sent back to whatever half-death they’d come from.
Finn knew there and then he wasn’t going to get out of this in one piece. Not a normal-sized piece anyway. After all, the whole structure of bones was beginning to fall apart in a hail of daggers, and he was inside it.
He was strangely accepting of this.
Maybe it was living so long with the prophecy that had prepared him for the moment when he would reach a point of no return, where he would sacrifice himself to save others, when he would die a death greater than any other. That’s what it promised.
Maybe it was the fact he had exploded before.
Maybe it was that he knew his luck had to run out one day. Or that he had run away from his home town and had to reach the end of the line sooner or later.
Maybe he was just distracted by being inside a giant creature formed from the bones of the long-dead.
Whatever it was, he was more ready for the end than he thought he would be.
He had accepted his fate, found a strange calm in the moment of the implosion.
This was the end.
He was wrong.
A solid, fleshy, somewhat green hand grabbed him, hauled him backwards through a gateway, and into the Infested Side.
Following the usual – and now incredibly familiar – scrambling of his entire being, Finn found himself in the arms of a very annoyed-looking Sulawan.
“Do you know how long it took us to find you this time, kid?” Sulawan said, his one eye filling Finn’s field of vision. “Your signal has faded so much that little old Beag had a very hard time doing whatever it is he does with that weird looking-through-the-worlds trick.”
Beag was crouching behind one of Sulawan’s mighty calves, sheepish, any excitement drained from his wide eyes.
Finn smiled at him. Sulawan seemed only then to realise he was cradling Finn like a baby, and quickly put him down on the ashes of the Infested Side.
Finn was still holding Gantrua, so tightly a couple of his fingernails were bruising.
“I can’t begin to tell you how glad I am to see you two,” said Finn, taking a deep breath to fight the familiar but lessened nausea.
They were standing in a particularly gloomy spot, on the side of a hill – which Finn supposed explained how they’d been able to grab him from so high up in his world – the grey ground and sky coloured as if by one bleak palette. The gateway had closed. Finn hadn’t even noticed it, so wrapped up had he been in Sulawan’s huge arms.
“I stopped the Bone Creature,” he announced.
“You did?” asked Sulawan, intrigued.
Beag peeked out from behind his leg.
“I think so anyway,” said Finn. “That’s what I was doing when you grabbed me.”
He noticed for the first time that Sulawan had a Gatemaker in his left hand.
“Great, you have crystals,” said Finn. “You can get me home again. Maybe drop me off somewhere far away from here, so I can figure out what to do next.”
He felt a bit giddy. From the battle inside the Bone Creature perhaps. Or his escape. Or just tiredness. And hunger. He suddenly realised how hungry he was. “There was a burger stall a bit that way – that would be a good stop.”
Finn noticed that Sulawan’s right hand was holding something else.
“Is that a knife?” Finn asked.
Sulawan didn’t need to nod in reply. A mild grunt worked fine.
Finn’s giddiness began to dissipate a little.
“Are we in danger?” Finn asked, looking around. “Did the Bone Creature show up here too?”
Sulawan shook his head, bent over Finn with that eye boring into the top of his head.
“You did well getting rid of the Gashadokuro. That’s impressive for a thin strip of flesh like yourself.”
“Thanks,” said Finn.
“In fact, it’s saved me a job that I wasn’t looking forward to,” said Sulawan. He spat the rock from his mouth, and it ricocheted off the hard ground like a bullet.
Beag flinched.
“But, and here’s where I have to be straight with you, kid,” continued Sulawan, “I have another job to do too. So listen up, because here’s what’s going to happen now.”
It should have been a triumphant moment for Finn; instead it felt increasingly threatening.
“Where are Cornelius and Hiss?” he asked.
“What’s going to happen,” said Sulawan, “is that you’re going to give me Gantrua and then I’ll use this Gatemaker to send you back home and we’ll say nothing more about it.”
“Why do you need Gantrua now? The Bone Creature has gone. You don’t need the charm. You don’t need this guy at all.” Finn held up the desiccated Gantrua. “Why would you even want him?”
Sulawan glared at Finn, his single eye so close that Finn could see the little red capillaries in it, like tributaries spread across a white landscape. “I could say it’s for honour and glory and as a victory for our kind in the eternal battle against the ruinous humans, and so on, et cetera,” he said. “But the truth is more simple. Beag?”
“Gantrua paid us more to release him than the others paid us to just grab him and stop the Gashadokuro,” said Beag, almost apologetic.
“There you have it,” said Sulawan, matter of fact. “We’re mercenaries and we work for whoever needs us. Cornelius and Hiss paid us to help them. But Gantrua had already paid us to help him in case he didn’t make it back. So, everyone wins. Well, we win. Now, hand him over.”
“That wouldn’t be right,” said Finn.
“Listen, kid, you’ve done a good job getting rid of the Gashadokuro,” said Sulawan. “You’ve saved us. Maybe that’s your prophecy fulfilled – didn’t that occur to you?”
It made some sense to Finn. He hoped it was true and he could finally be rid of that prophecy.
“So maybe you can go on and live whatever life you have left, safe in the knowledge that you saved a couple of worlds,” said Sulawan. “That’s not something to sniff at.”
Sulawan wiped his nose with the back of his hand. “Look, kid, it’s nothing personal, you understand. Not against you. Not against old Doggy Snake Bottom. Not against those unfortunate souls who think you’re important. No. I’m just a mercenary. It’s just a job. If you, or they, or anybody could pay me more then I’d do whatever you wanted. But you haven’t, so that’s the way all this works. But me and Beag only get paid if you hand Gantrua to me, and I get to finish my job. If you don’t …”
He held his Gatemaker up with one hand and the knife with the other. “Well, I’m your only way out of here,” said Sulawan. “It’s up to you which one you choose.”
Sulawan raised his hands in a “What are you going to do?” gesture, looked around as if to emphasise that it was just the three of them here, although Beag was still keeping as out of sight behind his leg as possible. It was as if he was ashamed.
Finn knew instantly he had no option left. But he still had so many questions. One in particular. “What are you going to do with Gantrua if I give him to you?”
“Stick around and we’ll show you,” growled Sulawan.
Finn’s options were limited to the choice of handing the Gantrua-ball over, or having it torn from his hand. And maybe having his hand torn from his arm while he was at it. He remembered, though, that it was only the desiccated remains of Gantrua. There was no Reanimation fluid to go with it. Besides, a long time ago, he had seen a serpent reanimated here and it hadn’t worked nearly as smoothly as it did back home, but had left a horrible, mutated mess.
All of this convinced Finn to do the thing least l
ikely to result in losing a limb. Reluctantly, he handed over Gantrua.
Sulawan greeted this with a measure of respect. “Good decision, kid,” he said, examining the ball. “So, that’s what happens when you shrink one of ours.”
“Maybe you’ll get to find out in person some day,” said Finn, surprised – and a little perturbed – by his own boldness.
Smiling a little, Sulawan put the knife away in his belt. Pulling a fresh rock from a pocket, he examined the ends of it and, settling on the one he wanted in his mouth, gripped it between his teeth.
The one-eyed Fomorian held Gantrua in his left hand while he ran the Gatemaker through the fingers of his right.
“Beag,” he said, and the Sprite emerged around a leg twice as wide as his arm-span.
For the first time, Finn realised he had something with him. It was a wide shell, rounded and closed, a spine sticking out of either end.
He placed it down on the stubbly ground, prised it open carefully. There was a smooth muddy-green substance inside.
“Gantrua has a Troll who does the science-y stuff for him,” said Sulawan, crouching and placing the desiccated Gantrua into the substance. “Mixing dust. Tickling the air. All that stuff. He brought your half-dead human into this world.”
“Mr Glad?” asked Finn.
“Is that what you called him? Well, Gantrua had him working on something before he left. This …” he rolled the desiccated Fomorian in the mouth of the shell, coating it in the sticky stuff, “… goo.”
Once the ball was fully covered, Sulawan stood and rubbed his hands on his leg to clean them. “Anyway, the Troll warned me not to lick my fingers or my head could end up the size of a mountain.” He leaned in. “I said, ‘Would anyone notice?’”
He placed the ball on the ground. It hopped, like a jumping bean. It rolled. Shook. Shuddered.
“We should probably stand back,” said Beag, scampering away.
Gantrua unfolded.
He grew, widened, stretched in stages. Legs into hips into chest, out of which unfurled arms and, finally, like a flower reaching into the daylight, his head and face.
All was not right.
It was Gantrua, but pieced back together like broken pottery. He was disfigured, a tooth pushed through his cheek, his hands more like claws, the muscles in his chest a patchwork of lumps and thick sinew pushing through the leather, and metal plates that looked boiled, half melted.
There was the sound of the shell crushed beneath his feet.
Finn’s jaw had dropped so wide it began to ache.
“This is bad,” said Sulawan, taking Finn by the shoulders, his grip making Finn feel like he was being squeezed like a tube of toothpaste.
“I meant it when I said it’s nothing personal on you, kid,” said Sulawan. “I meant it when I said you could go back. You’re a brave human. And not a bad one. You’ve just stopped something big and ugly and very dangerous, and you almost died doing it. You’ve saved us all. Maybe you’re done now. Maybe you’ve fulfilled the whole prophecy deal. So, here’s my advice: quit while you’re ahead.”
Gantrua was opening his eyes. One was half in its socket, like it had been pushed back in place hurriedly.
“In a moment Gantrua is going to be conscious again, and not very happy,” said Sulawan, as he held a Gatemaker up in the air. “You don’t want to be here for that.”
With a spark and the now-familiar screech of the benighted scaldgrub within, a gateway ruptured the air.
“One last thing,” said Sulawan. “Now he’s back, it’s going to get messy here. Make sure your side stops opening gateways or it will get very messy for your world too. And make sure you don’t come back here. You won’t always have someone to save you at the last moment. Understand?”
Finn nodded.
“Good,” said Sulawan.
Gantrua let out a roar of awakening that rumbled through the ground, kicked up a wave of dust.
Sulawan shoved Finn through the gateway home.
Finn was back in Smoofyland.
He used his last dregs of energy to drag himself into a seated position, back pressed against a sparkly purple umbrella lined with prancing unicorns.
All these times he had switched between worlds, found himself dragged between different realities, but he would never, ever get used to it.
In contrast with the sight of Gantrua in the blasted landscape of the Infested Side, peace had settled on Smoofyland after the fight with the Bone Creature. The calm felt so total it was almost perfect. A carpet of bones littered the ground, but there was no noise, no movement.
Finn didn’t envy the park’s cleaners. All those bones to pick up. They’d be finding them for weeks. Kids would be picking them out of their burgers, seeing them bob up out of the boating lake or sticking out of the shelves of Smoofy’s Sparklemarket.
Sitting there in the cool of the early night, Finn felt he could almost trick himself into believing he was just relaxing here after a busy day at the theme park. He felt like getting an ice cream – until he moved a little and he realised that, no, he actually felt so tired and sore that he might just stay in this spot for the rest of his life. Maybe after that he’d get an ice cream.
There was a noise nearby. Footsteps. He groaned, wondering who this was, coming to bother him. What this was. An assistant? A rogue Legend?
“Not now,” he begged. “Please just give me a break.”
“Finn …”
He looked around quickly, ignoring the pain and exhaustion shooting through his shoulders. He laughed a little.
“Emmie.”
She stood at the corner, beside a vending machine full of sweets. He still felt really hungry.
“You should have seen it,” he said to her, trying to push himself back up to his feet. “You’d have loved it. Loved it.”
He moaned as he stood, like he sometimes heard his dad groan in that exaggerated way dads did when they had to pick something off the ground.
“Bones. Legends. Things breaking. Me needing rescuing.” He smiled at this, was slightly disconcerted that she didn’t smile back. “Although Gantrua is back. Over there.” He pointed at thin air.
“Finn, I’m so glad you’re safe but you’d better come with me now,” Emmie said, serious.
Stooping, he tried to read her emotions. “I thought you didn’t want to be near me after everything. You said you didn’t trust me.”
“I just had to be sure, that’s all.”
“And are you sure yet?” he asked and shuffled a little towards her.
Emmie took one step back.
“No,” he said. “You’re not.”
“You’ve done things you shouldn’t have, made some crazy decisions,” she said. “It was very difficult. I needed to figure it out myself.”
“I did make some crazy decisions all right,” he acknowledged. “But they were for the right reasons. I hope you know that.”
“I’ve figured a lot of stuff out,” she said. “Come on.”
She moved to the corner, with Finn following gingerly.
Remembering something, he stopped walking.
“You know they call you Red Warrior?” he said, smiling.
“Who?” she asked without breaking stride, walking through the surreal, blinking lights and half-standing amusement park.
“The Legends,” said Finn, following her again. “They worship you – some of them anyway – but they …” He started to laugh, and it hurt his ribs. He couldn’t stop, though. “They argue about whether you’re smelly or not.”
She looked insulted and confused in equal measure.
“Don’t worry, I told them you’re not,” he said. “At least, I think I did. It’s just that we left a lot of stuff behind when we last went to the Infested Side, and they think those objects are important. Schoolbooks and things like that. It’s kind of crazy.” He winced.
“I know,” she said. “Some of it anyway. Things have been showing up all around the world. Those things we left behind
. I’ve been told all about it but right now we need to go. Come with me and I’ll explain everything.”
“I don’t blame you for getting away from me,” Finn said, shuffling after her. “I really don’t.”
Emmie dropped her head. “It was important,” she said, then looked him in the eye. “It was never about leaving you. It was about saving Darkmouth. You. All of us.”
“Well, it’s all gone for me now,” said Finn. “I’ve little hope left. Darkmouth is yours if you want it.”
“Finn—” Emmie started, but before she could finish that thought they were interrupted.
“You,” said Lucien, standing among scattered teddies and squashed plastic unicorns.
His last strands of hair were sticking up, his head was scraped, his glasses cracked. He looked caught between anger and shock.
Elektra and Tiberius stood, one under each of his arms.
She was subdued, with one surviving ponytail, and looked like she wanted to go home.
He was giddy and looked like he didn’t.
From behind them, other assistants, covered in the concrete dust and dirt, were slowly making their way towards them. Axel was among them. The scientists Scarlett and Greyson too. They looked shell-shocked, unsure, as if lost and needing orders and certainty.
Finn sighed. “Here we go.”
“They could have died,” Lucien snarled. “Your big bony friend could have killed them. Could have killed all of us.”
Finn’s exhaustion dragged so hard on him that he should have had no energy to stand up to Lucien. But he managed it anyway.
“You messed with the gateways,” he told him. “In Darkmouth. Here. Maybe in Blighted Villages all around the world, for all we know. You brought the Bone Creature in here. You did this, not me.”
Lucien looked around at the assistants. It was clear they just wanted orders, someone to tell them what to do. Lucien lifted his chin. He was going to be the one to do it.
“Interesting theory,” said Lucien.
“I have the proof,” said Finn. The camera was crushed, but he remembered he had the computer tucked away safely up a chimney in an abandoned Slotterton building.
Hero Rising Page 18