“Aye,” said Blane, “for it is the sun’s fire cast upon the moon’s surface. “‘Tis redirected into the Moon Pendant. That will charge it fully, and the Guardian will be able to close the Portal.”
Fergus raised an eyebrow. “How is it that these feckin’ faeries are here already?” he asked, rubbing his bristly chin.
“Years ago the Portal was opened, and a few Fae made it through,” stated Blane, “They nested here in these lands. The ley lines keep them at bay. You must understand the Portal is in a limbo state, allowing only certain Fae like the Ankou through it. Once the Portal is fully open, more will come through, some not as nice as the Nuckelavee and the Baobhan Sith.”
“Will-o’-the-wisp,” cheered Izzy, playing around with Edgar’s faeland app. “Foolish firelights seen by travelers at night trying to lead them astray.”
“I could’ve told you that, lass,” Blane glowered at Izzy.
“True,” smirked Izzy, holding up her iPhone, shaking it back and forth, “but you didn’t! Edgar’s app did.”
Blane cocked an eyebrow at Izzy. “Fergus, best you stand guard.”
“Aye,” Fergus replied, slipping his hands into his leather bomber, leaning his shoulder against the frigid stone wall.
Blane yanked open the thick oak door, a cloud of dust exploding in our faces as we opened the crypt. Cautiously, we entered the isolated tower, enshrouded in darkness and silent as a frosty tomb. Our ears perked, reacting to any sound that creaked or popped in the darkness. Our eyes shifting rapidly to any shadow moving in the gloom.
Blane lit one of the torches cradled in an iron sconce on the wall. Our eyes adjusted slowly to the flame’s flickering light.
“Where’s the Bloody Baron?” whispered Izzy into my ear.
“I don’t know,” I said, tilting my head back, gazing up the hollowed inside of the stone tower. A planked staircase curved along the tower’s inner walls, spiraling up to a wooden ceiling. Dangling down from the center was a rope pulley, one cable that pulled up and one that went down. On the stone floor next to our feet was a counterweight attached to one rope.
“What is that?” I asked pointing at the large wheel suspended above our heads.
“That’s how they raised the stones to make the tower,” stated Blane, lighting two more torches.
I stepped forward, my feet wobbling on a metal grate underneath my boots. “Blane, why are my feet wobbling?” I asked.
“You’re just noticing that now?” snorted Izzy, flicking on a flashlight and beaming its bright shaft of light around the tower.
Blane lowered the burning flame, illuminating the ground below our feet in a warm glow, revealing a latticed steel grate with a bolted metal lock fastened to its side. We knelt to see an empty chamber, a damp prison cell, its icy walls lined with shackles and chains, its floor dripping with rusty rain water, bleeding into the cell through a small spout.
“‘Tis a dungeon, an oubliette,” murmured Blane, throwing his arm out to protect me, gently grazing my breast as we rose to our feet.
My heart fluttered inside, as I bit my lower lip.
Izzy focused her iPhone on an odd statue of a gruesome man at the base of the stairs. “Let’s see who you are,” she said, rushing over to the stone figure.
“I guess we go up,” I said, stepping in front of the hideous stone statue at the base of the wooden staircase. His body was pure granite, a sinister smile painted across his face, exposing his sharp incisor teeth, a thick sloping hat drooped on his oval head, a crooked nose, and a sharp iron pike with a hacksaw edge clutched in his rangy hand. “Is this the Bloody Baron,” I asked Blane, certain that he looked just like the Bloody Baron in the portrait.
“I can’t get this dang thing to work!” mumbled Izzy, slamming the iPhone repeatedly against the palm of her hand.
“Come, lass,” said Blane, his hand outstretched, grasping onto my hand, leading me up the spiraling stairs, “we have to go to top, Guardian.”
I twisted my body around to see if Izzy was coming, causing my shoulder to graze the tip of the iron pike. “Ow! That hurt,” I squealed, rubbing my shoulder where the rigid pike pricked me, smearing blood on my fingertips. “Are you coming, Izzy?”
Izzy looked up quickly at me, her hands still fiddling with her iPhone. “Yeah.”
We climbed up the rickety staircase warily, our feet teetering on each narrow plank of wood, slowly creeping up its thousand steps.
“Here we go,” said Izzy in an elated voice. “Red Cap!”
“Shhh,” I said, stopping mid-step on the steps, “did you hear that?”
A low growl echoed throughout the tower. Izzy flashed her beam of light toward the statue of the Bloody Baron. The pike’s tip began to ooze with blood, gradually stripping away the hard stone, its red liquid slithered down the pike and onto its talon hand, revealing its pink flesh.
“Red cap: Butchers wayward travelers, soaking its cap into the victim’s blood to keep it alive. Despite its iron-clad boots, Red Caps are fast as lightning. Weaknesses,” Izzy paused, “unknown.”
A deep scratchy voice crawled into our ears from below, “Mmm…so sweet.”
“Run!”
My heart thundered inside my chest as I raced up the tight staircase, the tips of my boots barely touching the steps, bouncing up into the air before the other one landed, leaping from sole to sole. Blane and Izzy ran behind me at a quickened pace.
“Blane,” cried Izzy, one of the steps split in two, collapsing beneath her feet, her torso wedged between two steps, her legs hanging loosely below the staircase, “get me out!”
I made an about-face, catching Blane’s intense eyes. “Go on, lass,” he said, “make it to the top!”
I sprinted as fast as I could, hurdling up the steep steps, hoping that the Bloody Baron hadn’t slaughter Izzy yet.
♦♦♦
Izzy
Crap! I said to myself, figures that I’d turn into the cheese in the rat’s trap. Nah, scratch that, I’m the piece of meat in the lion’s den at the Bronx Zoo!
“Blane!” I screamed, it seemed for the hundredth time, “get me out of here!” I had just jumped onto one of the warped wooden planks when it gave out, splintering into a million pieces, my boots punching through the step along with my body. I was stuck.
I could hear the scraping of metal, flogging the staircase. It could only mean one thing: The Bloody Baron had fully transformed from stone into living flesh. What’s with these dang faeries flipping from stone to flesh, anyway?
“Blane!” I hollered again, wiggling my body around, pushing my body weight up with my hands, still lodged between two wooden planks. Two burly hands hooked under my armpits, hauling me out, laying me down onto the solid wood steps.
Blane didn’t miss a beat. He spun around and began ascending the stairs three by three, racing ahead of me, chasing after her royal highness.
I rose onto my feet, wobbly, trying to climb up the steps as fast as I could, but it was too late.
“Sweet blood,” the Bloody Baron growled behind me.
I slowly pivoted my body around to face the Bloody Baron. He stood hunched over on the steps, snarling, blood trickling from his cap, seething, aching to catch his prey. Out of the corner of my eyes, I spied the thick rope from the pulley.
The Bloody Barron narrowed his red eyes on me. “Sweet blood,” he snarled, flapping his lips in an animalistic voice, his pike lunging toward my chest.
I leapt over the banister in one quick swoop, my leather jacket rippling through the damp air, hooking my hands onto the braided rope and wrapping my whole body around it.
The Bloody Baron paused for a moment, sniffing the musty air with his hairy nostrils, and proceeded to clamber up the staircase, pounding his iron-clad boots into the warped steps.
I knew he was going after Anabel.
I jerked my knee up, nearly losing the firm grip on the rope, my fingers fumbling at my boot, and then sliding out the bone knife I got (wink, wink) from Vyx.
> I took in a sharp deep breath. I couldn’t believe I was going to do this for her royal highness, of all people! I gritted my teeth. The cold blade stung as I sliced it across the palm of my hand.
“You want blood, Baron?” I called aloud, scooping up a small amount onto the steel blade. I swung over to the edge of the banister and smeared a glob of my blood onto the splintering railing, and swung back to the center of the tower. “We are sisters, after all! I should taste just as good or even better!” Who was I kidding? I knew I tasted better than her royal highness.
The Bloody Baron zipped down the stairs, harnessing a desire to quench his thirst, his bony finger skimmed through my luscious red fluid, his fingertip drenched in my juice as he slid it into his grimy mouth, lighting up his eyes, painting a twisted grin across his sullen face. “So sweet,” he murmured, “sweeter than sweet…”
“I have been known to be the sweeter one,” I joked nonchalantly.
He turned to me, standing on the edge of the banister, hissing, stabbing his weapon at me, wanting to tap me like a kegger and get drunk off my own special brand of Jamba juice. I dodged out of its way, swinging from side to side, throwing my weight back and forth.
“Blane!” I screamed again for the thousandth time. I looked up as I swayed on the rope like a trapeze artist from Cirque du Soleil. Finally, he poked his head out of the ledge above. “A little help, if you don’t mind?”
Blane leapt from the ledge, straddling the pulley’s counter weight rope.
I peered into the Bloody Baron’s bloodied eyes and winked. “Don’t tell mom,” I said ironically, cocking my head to the side, curling my lips into a smirk, “I’m the sweeter one.” The rope sprung upward, hoisting me toward the top of the tower. “She might not believe youuuuu,” I howled with my voice trailing off.
Blane’s muscled mass whooshed past me as he repelled down to the ground floor of the tower, and I skyrocketed towards the ceiling. My body was suspended in mid-air, coiled around a thick rope with a bad stench of mildew in the air, unaware of what Blane was doing – or the Bloody Baron for that matter.
I heard a thundering sound below, along with the resonance of rattling metal. That all got drowned out when I heard the Bloody Baron, battering the steps with his heavy boots, speeding up the stairs, getting ready to do, who knows what to me.
The line was taut, vibrating beneath my hands. Blane was down below switching the counterweight. I promptly repelled down to the ground, silky raven hair blowing above my head, flying past the Bloody Baron perched on a railing, a surprised look on his heinous face, and waving to him briefly as I descended.
“Nice seeing you again,” I said to Blane flying past me.
Blane nodded back, his thick arms curled around on the other pulley rope, his barbaric torso soaring up into the sky, his chestnut hair waving wildly in the wind.
I craned my neck up, squinting hard, trying to see if I could really see what was under his kilt.
No such luck.
I pummeled down toward the ground floor, my feet landing in the center of the chilly dungeon. Arching my back, I hollered up the hollow of the stone tower, “Yo! Baron! Come and get your sweets!”
I barely even blinked when the Bloody Baron popped his head out from above the open grate, foaming at the mouth and growling. He jumped down inside the dingy dungeon, his iron-clad boots making a sickening thud as they landed in front of me, his back humped over, a dapple of blood trickling down his brow, his eyes narrowed in on me as he sneered.
“Now, Blane!” I yelled up into the dim abyss of the tower.
The Bloody Baron smirked, crouching low to the ground, shifting his weight from bent knee to bent knee, sticking the iron pike into my face.
I gulped.
“I said now, Blane!” tugging at my rope, foolishly.
His fingernails drummed along the iron pike, sharp and talon-like, tapping one nail at a time; over and over again, he continued on, repeating the same beat, drumming against it as if it was some sort of tribal ceremony he was preparing for, before he chopped me up into little chicken McNuggets.
“Blane?” I whimpered, “I’m really, really sorry about the Braveheart jokes.”
The Bloody Baron inched closer, his hot breath heating my face, he shoved his crooked nose out, and with a few quick snorts, he blissfully inhaled the air around me. “Sweeter than sweet.”
“Blane! BLANE!?!?!”
Blane’s voice called from above, “I can’t, lass! It’s stuck!”
Great, that’s the last thing I needed to hear with this creepy faery getting ready to make instant Izzy minced meat pies out of me. I let out a deprecating laugh and then winced waiting to be chopped up and served in his Red Cap made Shepherd’s pie.
The Bloody Baron’s lips curled into a demonic grin, his lips quivering against his razor-sharp teeth, wheezing as he snickered.
He knew I was doomed.
Chapter 11
♦♦♦
Anabel
Finally, I arrived on the upper landing of the circular stone tower. “What do I do?” I asked Blane, scanning the empty space, noticing only a wooden ladder and a mere slit of a window.
“I doona know, lass” he answered, leaning over the railing, standing guard, his eyes casting down into the dark tunnel below, the wheel of the pulley suspended above his head. “The Guardians always did it alone.”
I rolled my eyes. Seriously, I thought, he was here to help me. I traipsed across the floor to the window shaped like a thin cross, wanting some fresh air and curious to see how high up I was.
“Blane!” Izzy shrieked from the darkness below.
Blane vaulted over the banister and ran back down the stairs, leaving me all alone.
I gazed out the window, studying the beautiful landscape of Scotland. Even under the darkened skies I could see the lush green hillsides, covered in a blanket of deep purple heather, rolling into one another. I sighed enjoying a faint breeze softly brushing my cheek, a spark of electricity pricked at my chest. My eyes cast down to the Moon Pendant, flickering on and off with a brilliant blue light on its outer set of stones.
The wind!
It made sense to me; I needed to charge the Moon Pendant with the element of air. Hence, it needed the power of the wind. The only open area in this tower was the rooftop. Quickly, I darted over to the ladder and shimmied up it, cracking open a heavy trap door, throwing it open with a deafening bang. I crawled onto the stone roof, searching for a wind source.
Instead, I found myself encircled by a thousand white flickering orbs, buoyantly bobbing in the still air.
“Will-o’-the-wisp,” I whispered to myself, lifting my finger out to touch one, its iridescent bubble bouncing softly in the air, and then drifting aimlessly as if they were bobbing on the ocean.
There was no breeze, no wind at all on the roof, just the mystical lit orbs wobbling serenely above my head. A single feather swayed in its own breeze, arcing upward, gliding within its own breath of life about ten feet above the stone floor, and two feet away from the tower itself, hovering over the endless drop, down to the solid ground below. There was no way I could reach it. Not unless, I paused, eyeing the metal barren flagpole shooting up from the stone floor. If I could just climb up it to reach the feather, I knew something would happen.
I hugged the flagpole, straddling it with my arms and legs, slowly scaling it, hoisting my body upward inch by inch. At last I was level with the white feather, flittering in the moonlight. I extended my arm out, feeling the spring breeze kissing my skin, my fingers flailing outward, the Moon Pendant flickering on and off, gaining more and more strength the further I reached out.
“Guardian!” bellowed Blane from below me, “you mustn’t move,” his broad body positioned below me, opening his burly arms out, waiting to catch me if I fell. “Lass, just slide back down and I’ll catch you!”
“I’m fine, Blane,” I answered. My left hand curled around the pole, my body arching back as far as it could go, stretch
ing toward the soft fluttering feather. Boldly, I leapt into the warm stream of air.
“Anabel!”
♦♦♦
Izzy
Yup! I was doomed for sure! The Bloody Baron pricked the edge of his iron pike into my neck, tapping into his sweet supply of sugary nectar, and my wild berry blood trickled down the nape of my neck. I watched his lanky finger dip into it, soaking up all its goodness, his finger rolling around in his filthy mouth, eyes rolled back into his head in ecstasy, sucking it dry.
“Good, huh?” I said with a note of hysteria.
I could’ve shivered inside, got sick by hurling up my dinner, projectile vomiting into his asinine face, not that it would have made him look any better, but I didn’t. I needed time, precious time, and I was going to get it!
I released the pulley’s rope, my eyes fixed on the Bloody Baron, fiddling with the laces on my glove, untying them, raising up my scar to this demon’s face. “Look here,” I said frankly; offering him my wound, “you have direct access to the bloodline!” I wiped off my bloody neck with my glove, shoving it up into his wooly nose.
His crimson eyes studied me, shifting sideways, his head lowered down, cunningly, sniffing my bloody glove. His eyes dazzled in delight, I could tell he was hooked on my drug.
“Ahh, ‘tis good,” I said, nodding my head up and down. I crumpled the glove up hastily into a ball, flinging it across the cell like a chew toy, trying to play fetch with my new pet.
The Bloody Baron didn’t hesitate and sped across the dark cell.
Looking up, I flung myself into the air, reaching for the edge of the steel gate, barely grazing it with my fingertips.
The Bloody Baron was hunched over, licking my glove in pure delight; his body whirled around, fixing his blood red eyes on me.
I hopped up once again into the air, still missing the edge of the dungeon’s main floor.
His face twisted into a malicious demon, seething, raging with a boiling heat, and racing toward me.
I vaulted into the air like the acrobat that I am (not!), clasping my hands onto the steel gate, bending my knees upward, focusing all my energy into my feet. I plunged the heels of my boots into the Bloody Baron’s chest, hurling him back against the stone wall, crashing his curved back against it, his leathery body sliding down and landing on his arse.
Guardian of the Moon Pendant Page 11