by Joshua Khan
There were people from all over. Gehennish for sure, with their sallow skin and gaunt features, but also folk from Lu Feng and even green-tinted natives of the Coral Isles. The cloud ship had traveled far and wide, kidnapping along the way.
How many were trapped here? Hundreds for sure, and he’d only explored a fraction of the cloud. Maybe thousands. A few were swollen, their bodies hosts for baby jewel spiders, but most looked merely, but deeply, asleep.
Some were completely cocooned in webbing. What if one of those was Gabriel? How he would find the Solar boy among this crowd?
Then Thorn found something stranger still.
Trolls.
And he’d thought Dott was big.
Dozens dangled from the webs, their limbs bound by the thickest silk. Not one was under ten feet in height; most were double that. They had wide, broad bodies and long arms, especially compared to the legs, which were thick and short. Their skin was as gnarly as old bark and their hair the texture of wet rope. Some had moss growing in the folds of their chins or within the wrinkles of their eyes. Others had horns and tusks.
The men wore bone jewelry; the women, when he could tell the difference, decorated themselves with necklaces of stones and shells and carved figurines. Both had tattoos, and Thorn had heard that each clan had unique designs. Lily would know all about them, but to Thorn, a troll was a troll.
The webs pulsed with multicolored lights. These colors rippled along the glassy threads, and the strings hummed, releasing a deep, continuous sound that resonated within Thorn’s chest.
The webs pulse with their dreams.
Some webs were wider than the Great Hall at Castle Gloom and covered with sleepers; others would have accommodated a bed bearing a couple of victims. The size of each web corresponded with the size of the spinners. Thorn could see how the individual webs were all linked, like a patchwork quilt, steadily growing larger and attracting more jewel spiders.
There’s a pattern to them. It tells when the victims were captured.
The natives of Lu Feng had been caught first. That made sense; that’s where the cloud ship had come from. The Lu Fengese filled the biggest, most complex webs. The ones that had been woven first.
Thorn grinned. He’d seen enough cobwebs in his life to know how they worked, and now he knew how to find—
Bootsteps beat the floor, interrupting his thoughts. Thorn ducked behind a column as a trio of soldiers marched past. He peeked.
Their armor was horizontal strips, laced in place. The helmets they carried were plumed with different colored feathers. One was more elaborate than the others; maybe he was a captain? Instead of belts, their swords were tucked into blue silk sashes wrapped around their waists. Each wore his hair in a topknot, again decorated with feathers.
Renegades from House Typhoon? Were they the crew of the cloud ship?
Thorn waited until they were long gone before he came out of hiding. He scanned the chamber, searching for the smaller, and thus most recent, webs. The ones containing Gehennish sleepers.
He found one maybe a dozen feet wide, with three or four jewel spiders working on it. A handful of victims, all dressed in local black, dangled from the strands.
“Boy…”
Thorn stopped in his tracks.
“Boy…” Someone was calling from the web.
One of the trapped men moved. He pulled his head free of the webbing. “Boy…”
“Tyburn?”
He was alive! Lily had been right!
The executioner snarled as he struggled, and the activity drew the attention of one of the jewel spiders. It scuttled over the threads.
Thorn put an arrow through it.
He re-slung his bow and pulled out his dagger. “Just give me a minute.”
“I’m…not going anywhere.”
Hope surged through Thorn. With Tyburn back, the odds had suddenly changed in their favor.
Thorn sawed through the threads as quickly as he could. They weren’t thick but surprisingly tough. The vibrations were alerting the other spiders. “How come you’re not asleep like the rest?”
“You have any idea how many times someone’s tried to poison me?” Tyburn leaned forward, stretching the bindings. “You build up a resistance, or you don’t last long as an executioner.”
Thorn began hacking. “Come on…”
Tyburn’s arm broke free. He ripped at the bindings on his other arm while Thorn set to work cutting free his legs. Eventually the threads parted, and he helped Tyburn away from the web. The old man was sluggish and didn’t have the strength to hold himself up.
“You took your time getting here,” muttered Tyburn.
“How was I supposed to know the spiders were coming from a cloud ship?”
“I’d have thought it was obvious.” Tyburn rubbed his legs to get the blood flowing. “How else do you think Dott ended up in Gehenna? Don’t you remember where she was found?”
“Spindlewood. All beaten up and unconscious.”
Tyburn nodded. “I wondered how a lone troll child could be so far from the Troll-Teeth Mountains. Then I noticed the broken branches. She’d fallen out of the sky. Simple, and obvious.”
“Oh, yes. Very simple and obvious,” said Thorn. “I’m being sarcastic.”
“Didn’t know you knew how.”
“Lily’s been teaching me.”
“Using your spare time fruitfully, then?” replied Tyburn. He shook his head and moved on. “They’ve been kidnapping trolls. That’s why all the clans are on the march. The trolls think we’re behind the disappearances of their kin.”
“And half of Gehenna thinks trolls are stealing our villagers.” Thorn groaned as he saw the pieces falling into place. “What a mess. There’s war coming, Tyburn. All because we don’t trust trolls.”
Tyburn released himself from Thorn’s support, filled his chest, and let out a long, steady breath. “I followed the weather, the drift of the clouds, and that led me to Pitch Farm. I was too late and ended up getting caught myself. Left you a clue, though. Only thing I could think of. Threw it off me as I was being hauled on board, drugged by those spiders.”
Thorn slapped his forehead. “Your sword! It was stuck in the roof. It was there at the very beginning, and I didn’t recognize it.”
Tyburn grunted. He limped back to the web. “Help me with this one.”
It was a young boy. Thorn cleared some webbing from his face. “Alfie Pitch.”
Together they dragged the sleeping boy out of the cobwebs and laid him down. Tyburn patted the boy’s cheek. “I don’t know where they took his brother, but at least we can get Alfie out.”
The boy blinked. He was bewildered, his eyes glazed. “I…I was dreaming.”
Thorn smiled. “About what?”
“We had the biggest farm with the fattest pigs ever.”
Thorn helped the boy up. Alfie looked around. “Where’s Sam? Where’s my mom? And Dad?”
Thorn frowned. Now was not the time to tell him that his parents were dead. “Do you trust me, Alfie?”
“I suppose.”
“Then do as I say for now, and we’ll sort it all out. I promise.”
“Stick with me, child.” Tyburn held Alfie’s hand. “You take the lead, Thorn.”
They headed toward a staircase. Thorn reckoned that if he went this route he’d end up near Hades. They’d find somewhere to hide and he’d take Alfie down first, then come back for Tyburn. Easy. And then he could search for Gabriel.
Probably…
But it all looked the same. He couldn’t figure out where he’d left Hades.
“Give me the dagger, boy,” muttered Tyburn. “I’ll be needing it.”
“Why are you stopping? We just need to get a bit farther….”
Thorn looked up as he heard the whisper of swords being drawn.
The three soldiers stood at the top of the stairs, waiting.
“You’re in no condition to fight, Tyburn,” said Thorn.
“Just give
me the blade.”
Thorn handed it to him and stepped back down. He nocked an arrow. Their armor looked good, but there were gaps he could aim at.
Except he’d never shot at a man before. He wasn’t sure he could.
Tyburn’s legs wobbled as he took a step.
The soldiers grinned. Three of them versus an old, sleepy man with a mere dagger.
Tyburn flicked the dagger into the throat of the first man and snatched the sword from him as he tumbled past.
Thorn put an arrow through the hand of the second. The soldier cried out, and now Tyburn had two swords.
The third ran down the stairs and jabbed, scoring a red wound across Tyburn’s ribs. Tyburn brought both blades across.
The soldier’s head sprang off his shoulders.
Tyburn groaned as he put his hand against his bleeding side. “Move. Keep going down.”
Cries rose across the cloud ship. Bolts whizzed through the air, their steel tips rattling against the walls. Soldiers ran toward them, packs of them coming from all directions. Jewel spiders of all sizes swung down from their webs.
Thorn tried supporting Tyburn, but their progress was painfully slow. After a dozen steps, Tyburn let go.
“Get back to Gloom. Warn them of what’s coming,” he said.
Thorn didn’t want to leave him. “We need you!”
Thorn despaired. They couldn’t win without Tyburn. But it wasn’t just that. Thorn felt…Tyburn had brought him to Gehenna. He’d given him this life.
The executioner glanced sideways at him. “You’re not getting all sentimental on me, are you?”
Thorn blushed. “No, of course not. It’s just…Lily will blame me if you get yourself killed.”
“I’m not in my tomb yet,” said Tyburn.
If they were out of time, Thorn needed to know something. “Who’s behind this, Tyburn? There’s a sorcerer, isn’t there?”
Tyburn smiled, clearly impressed. “You work that out yourself?”
“Only way to make the cloud ship fly, ain’t it?”
“There’s hope for you yet, Thorn. Yes, there’s a sorcerer behind this, one trained by House Typhoon but returned here, for revenge.”
“Revenge? For what?”
Tyburn grimaced. “Does it matter? Whatever else happened in the past, he is our enemy now.”
“How do we stop him?”
“You’ll find a way, boy. Now get going.” Tyburn pushed him off. He tightened his grip on the sword and stood up, facing a gang of soldiers.
“Stick with me, Alfie!” Thorn ran, bow and arrow in hand. He needed to get back to Hades.
But which way?
The cloud ship’s form changed with the currents. He wasn’t sure where he’d come from and had no idea where he was headed.
A sudden blast of wind blew him and Alfie off their feet. Alfie grabbed a column, but Thorn slid across the smooth floor. His arrows skittered over the edge. Thorn dropped his bow to grab hold of the floor before he was tossed over into empty sky. He halted mere inches from the lip.
The wind howled around him, but he managed to get to his feet.
The air crackled with lightning. The clouds darkened with rage, and the hairs on his neck rose. Sparks bounced across the walls. Lightning flashed overhead, and Alfie screamed in terror.
High above him stood a man looking down from one of the platforms. His robes of midnight silk flapped in the wind, and he held out a claw-curled hand.
He threw himself off the ledge, in Thorn’s direction. It was a hundred-foot drop.
Shadows enveloped him and carried him down on smoky black wings.
The sorcerer landed gently, facing Thorn. The wind dwindled to a faint breeze, and the thunder quieted. The man was wearing a hood, but it couldn’t hide the hideously burned face or the feverish eyes.
“Weaver…” Thorn said.
The man who had robbed Lily of the Skeleton Key and broken into the Shadow Library. Thorn might have laughed. This fearsome sorcerer had pretended to be a mere conjuror.
Jewel spiders scuttled over him, and his robes glistened with their silvery spider silk. Thorn glimpsed dancing skeletons among the embroidery. Weaver limped closer, dragging his left foot behind the other. “We don’t appreciate stowaways on the Baofengyu.”
Was that the name of the ship? “Who are you? What do you want?” Thorn asked.
Weaver’s body jerked, and a feeble hiss came shaking out of his lips. He lowered his hood. “I want…justice.”
Thorn grimaced. Lily had told him about the injuries, but up close…
His skin was blackened and wrinkled. The lips were gone, and the ears were wax lumps clinging to either side of his head, which was bald except for a few dull black patches. The body was as broken as a body could be. The power lay in the eyes, storm-gray with suppressed rage. A red tongue rolled over the edges of his mouth, constantly wetting them so he could speak. “Your attempt to save the executioner has failed. It would have saddened me to lose so important a…guest.”
So Weaver knows who Tyburn is, and wants him alive for a reason.
“And who are you, boy?”
“Thorn. Of Herne’s Forest.”
“You are far from home, young Thorn.”
“You are, too.” Thorn pointed eastward. “Yours is a long way off in that direction.”
“And there you are so very wrong. Though you’ll never know why.”
The jewel spiders crept forward. They were less than ten feet away. Thorn gripped Alfie as they backed away.
Weaver smiled. “You’re running out of floor, young Thorn.”
Thorn glanced over the edge. All he saw was a lot of sky. He tightened his hold on Alfie and asked him once again, “Do you trust me?”
Alfie looked petrified, but he forced a nod.
Weaver scowled. “You’re trapped. Surrender.”
“And what?” snapped Thorn. “Become spider food? Forget it.”
“You won’t survive the fall.”
Thorn grinned. “I dunno. The snow’s pretty deep.”
He hurled himself and Alfie over the edge of the cloud ship and into free sky, a thousand feet above the earth.
“Hades!” yelled Thorn. “Hades!”
Where is that bat?
“Hades! I need you RIGHT NOW!”
Thorn tumbled. Over and over he turned—the world was up, down, all around—with Alfie locked in his arms. The small boy had his eyes squeezed shut.
“Hades!”
The rushing air stole his cries from his lips and threw them into the clouds.
That stupid bat. What was the point of him having those big ears if he didn’t use them?
“HADEEES!”
The clouds parted, revealing the ground, far below. The patches of snow in the clearings between closely packed trees. The bare rock. He even glimpsed a cluster of cottages, and the square white fields surrounding them.
Would he feel anything when he hit?
His fear of death only came second. What he was really afraid of was that Lily wouldn’t know. She wouldn’t know that Weaver was behind this attack. That the jewel spiders could come and go on their cloud ship. That this war with the trolls had been a setup from the beginning.
She wouldn’t know, and that would be that.
He couldn’t let it end like this! “Hades!”
He bet the greedy bat was off hunting some poor sheep. Swooping over an unfortunate farmer’s fields with no thought of anything except filling his belly.
If Thorn ever got his hands on that monster, he’d tweak his ears until they fell off.
Stupid bat!
Thorn faced the ground. It was zooming toward him. He gritted his teeth. The wind roared and stung his eyes. He was crying and wasn’t sure if it was because of the cold wind or…the end?
Should have made me a whistle. Hades would have heard that.
Why hadn’t he?
Because Hades weren’t no pet.
He’d never again run his hands th
rough the monster’s spiky black fur. Never feel the heart beating against his when he lay down on the bat’s back. Nor the roll of Hades’s shoulders or the thrum of the wind through his sail-sized wings.
Thorn gazed at the ground. He could make out the individual trees now. He hugged Alfie, preparing…
A shriek shook the snow off the trees.
Hades!
The bat tucked in his wings and dove.
Thorn cried, “Come on, boy!”
Hades gritted his own teeth, and his eyes blazed. He hunched his shoulders to tighten his body. No falcon had ever swooped so fast.
But would he be fast enough?
Thorn didn’t look down. He stared at Hades, willing him to become a lightning bolt.
“Come on…”
Thorn held Alfie with one arm, and reached out with the other.
“Will you hurry up? I thought you were fast!”
Hades twisted. His claws spread and plucked Thorn and Alfie out of the air. He threw out his wings and jerked them downward.
The snow blurred beneath them. Thorn grabbed on to Hades’s legs.
Hades cried and stretched every muscle in his body to rise.
But it wasn’t enough.
Flying too fast to change direction, Hades plowed into a snowdrift. Thorn flipped head over heels, dropping Alfie as he went, before collapsing, face-first, into a heap.
Snow stuffed his eyes, nose, and ears. It was up his sleeves and down his neck. Every part of him was one huge ache. But he was alive.
Thorn rolled onto his back and lay there, staring up at the clouds. He wiggled his toes and fingers, checking, bit by bit, that he was all there, unbroken.
He sighed with huge relief.
“The things I do for you, Lily…”
Over the last few days, he’d been bitten by a rabid dog, poisoned, and attacked by one of the head squires. He’d nearly been murdered by an executioner. He’d had to beat off a horde of jewel spiders, and just now, dive off a cloud. Oh, and he’d almost been crushed to death by a collapsing gatehouse.
He deserved a raise.
Thorn pushed himself to his feet. He wobbled but only a bit.
“Next time, don’t wait so long,” he chastised the bat. He stumbled over to Alfie and dragged the boy out of a drift. “Are you all right?”