by E. G. Foley
Well, he thought with a gulp, there’s the body. Garnock the Sorcerer in the flesh. Actually, no flesh, just the bones. But first things first.
He needed that wand back now.
Red fussed outside the chamber, peering in as best he could. “Caw!”
“All right, all right, I’m hurrying. But I think we can conclude that this is definitely where the gargoyles came from. That hole I climbed through has got to be where they got out. Oh, crikey!” He stopped cold at the sight of a miner’s boot sitting by itself in the middle of the floor right in front of him.
It had a moldering, ripped-off part of a dead foot still in it.
He winced and stepped around it, scanning the whole place for the devilish little monkey thing that had run off with his wand.
“Those four miners must have broken through the rock into this chamber by accident. One of them tried to tell me they had found a room… I had no idea what he meant. Poor beggars, probably never knew what hit them. The rest of Garnock is in here,” he informed the Gryphon as he searched the chamber for the imp. “What’s left of him, anyway.”
Jake noted the desk with the skeleton’s hollow eyes staring over an ancient grimoire. The shelves built into the walls were laden with magical accoutrements, while the stone floor was carved with an intricate spread of strange symbols.
“This place looks like it must have been his workshop centuries ago. But it seems the Lightriders made it his tomb. Must have sealed him in down here somehow. Whatever spell they used, it must’ve been broken when the miners blew that hole in the wall.” Even as he spoke those words, Jake remembered a worrisome detail about mining procedures from their goldmine tour with Emrys.
Whenever the miners (dwarves or men) used explosives to break open a vein of gold or coal in the earth, they quickly had to put a support beam into the hole they had created. Otherwise, it could cave in under the weight of the rock layers above it.
But there had been no timber beam jammed into the opening of Garnock’s tomb. The coalminers mustn’t have had the chance to complete that step of the job before they had been attacked and eaten by the gargoyles, Jake mused. Better be careful. Without the proper supports in place, this whole chamber was probably unstable.
Then there were the huge quartz crystals all around him, complicating matters.
Before the séance, wandering around Madam Sylvia’s shop, he had read something about how quartz crystals could amplify psychic energy. No doubt that was the very reason Garnock had chosen this place for his lair.
Jake realized that if he used his powers in here, with all these massive quartz crystals pumping up magical energies, there was no telling how strong his telekinesis might come out. He did not want to bring the whole cave down around his ears.
Best to recover the wand and get out of here, he thought, scanning the darkness for that wicked little imp.
“Here, little evil monkey-squirrel-demon,” he called softly, searching the chamber for the annoying creature. “Come out, come out, wherever you are. You know, you shouldn’t take things that don’t belong to you. Believe me, I would know. Now, give it back and maybe I won’t hurt you.”
He heard a mocking cackle from above, looked up, and saw the little maniac scampering up the angle of one of the tall quartz beams. The imp was hugging Jake’s wand tightly in both of his wee gray monkey-paws.
“Come back here!” Jake sheathed Risker and brought up his hand to freeze the little menace by telekinesis.
But the pint-sized gargoyle must have been observing him long enough back in the tunnels to see more or less how the wand worked.
It let out a wild screech and waved the wand at him; Jake dove for cover with a startled yelp.
“Don’t you point that thing at me!” He lifted his head up from behind the ancient desk, only to duck down again with a cry of alarm as the gargoyle shot another bolt of magic at him.
The creature laughed in delight as the jagged stream of blue light from the wand hit the wizard’s astrolabe and sent it shooting off the desk.
“Right. That’s quite enough, you little runt,” he muttered. Setting the torch down, he left it burning where it lay on the stone floor in order to have both hands free.
Then he listened carefully, lost patience, and peeked over the skeleton’s desk. Now!
He shot to his feet and ran out from behind the desk, tearing after the little imp before the wand-thief could take another shot at him.
His goal was to float the gargoyle into midair by telekinesis and refuse to let him down until he dropped the wand.
But the imp moved too fast. The thing was scampering all over the tomb, laughing as Jake tried to catch him and mimicking human speech as if he was saying the words to various magic spells.
Miniature explosions of poorly aimed magical power were going off all over the tomb as a result.
“Stop that! You’re going to kill us both! Oh, when I get hold of you, I’m going to wring your neck,” Jake vowed under his breath.
If he could just get close enough to work with some finesse, he could use his telekinesis to yank the wand out of the imp’s hand and pull it through the air, drawing it back to himself.
Several times he had to dive out of the way to avoid getting hit by crazy gargoyle magic, but he finally saw his chance.
Using the utmost balance, Jake ran through the gloom right up onto one of the wide crystal beams near the shelves filled with some of Garnock’s magical equipment.
But just when he nearly had the imp in reach, something growled behind him.
Jake froze.
A sickening premonition dropped like a stone in the pit of his stomach. A tingle of pure fear traveled up his spine. Terrified that he already knew what he would find, he looked back slowly over his shoulder.
Sure enough, three large gargoyles with fangs, horns, and gleaming eyes surrounded him below. Cutting off his exit, they were already licking their chops over the anticipated meal.
Jake blanched, but managed not to scream. For now, only his elevation, standing on the quartz crystal beam, put him slightly out of their reach. Unfortunately, he had seen how high these beasts could jump during their battle back at the cavern.
Pressing his back against the stone wall behind him, he forgot all about the imp and the wand, caught up in morbid fascination with his more immediate problem: this ugly trio, who clearly wanted to eat him.
They inched closer, giving him a fine view of their astonishing ugliness, not to mention their deadly claws.
The first had stunted black batwings; the second had a spiked tail that it thrashed back and forth; the third sported a row of pointy little knobs down its spine.
But they all had weirdly glowing eyes and squat, sinewy bodies, muscle-packed, like guard dogs made of stone. Aye, they were pets fit for a devil, Jake thought.
When the little imp snickered at him from above, Jake glanced up and suddenly wondered if this had been a trap all along.
Were the gargoyles clever enough to have planned this?
The way the little one preened, looking so proud of himself, Jake thought he must be the brains, while these massive dog-lion types were the brawn.
With a bead of sweat running down his face, Jake shook his head, but had to give them credit. By stealing his wand, they had not only left him defenseless, but separated him from his protector Red, luring him in here alone, apparently so they could kill him.
Not good.
He pulled his dagger out of its sheath. Meanwhile, Red was roaring in wild, useless fury outside the chamber.
Jake ignored him. The Gryphon simply couldn’t fit through the hole to help him. He was on his own in this.
When the gargoyles snarled again, Jake brandished his knife to ward them off, even as he began inching higher up the smooth quartz beam.
Not that he was optimistic in the least about escaping them. Earlier tonight, he had seen how the fiends could practically run across the ceiling.
“Get back!” he yell
ed when the knobby one reared up suddenly onto its hind legs and slashed at him.
Jake struck back with Risker and warded off the beast, but the tip of the gargoyle’s talon nicked his cheek.
The creature retreated to its prior position between its companions, still snarling at him; Jake lifted his hand to his cheek where the beast’s razor-like claw had slashed him.
He glanced at his fingers and found them smeared with crimson, then he looked at the gargoyles again, taken aback.
Out of all his previous adventures, this was the first time any foe had actually drawn blood.
Likewise, the gargoyle who had cut him licked the drop of Jake’s blood off his claw, then hissed at the taste of it. “Lightrider!” it rasped in a barely intelligible voice.
Its two companions reacted with wild hatred.
They all started hissing, bristling, slashing at the air with their claws as the glow in their eyes intensified.
If I don’t get my hands on a wand, I’m dead.
Jake suddenly realized that the shelves at his back were covered with the tools of the sorcerer’s trade.
Not taking his eyes off the gargoyles, he reached for the nearest wand resting upright in a golden goblet on the shelf, where it had lain untouched for ages.
Garnock’s wand, he thought with a shudder. But he was past caring.
From the corner of his eyes, he measured the distance to the cup, knowing full well that the second the beasts saw him reach for the wand, they would attack. They seemed to have figured out that a wand meant bad things for them.
He licked his dry lips, readying himself to make his move. He would have only about one second to cast the Petrificus spell, and it had to count for every gargoyle in the chamber. Who could say how many might still be lurking in the shadows? He would have to freeze them all at once, and then shatter them in rapid succession. Thirty seconds, or they’d come back to life.
Then have him for supper.
All right. Might as well try it. He didn’t have much choice. Still, even as he braced himself to do it, he could hear Aunt Ramona’s direst warnings ringing in his ears. “Never use the weapons of the enemy, Jacob. It is the most dangerous risk you can take. It always ends up bringing terrible consequences.”
Oh, yes, he believed her, every word.
But he did not intend to end up as some half-gnawed foot in this godforsaken coalmine. Caves alone were bad enough, but he simply refused to get eaten.
Concentrate. Heart pounding, he suddenly shot out his hand and grabbed the ancient wand.
The gargoyles leaped, all flying at him at once; in a heartbeat, Jake circled the wand over his head and screamed, “Petrificus!”
His voice echoed in the hollow chamber as he flung out the spell in all directions, and the quartz crystals amplified its magic.
The big gargoyles turned to stone just inches away from him and plummeted to the floor. The little imp, too, became a statue and tumbled off the quartz beam where he’d been sitting, smashing into bits when he hit the chamber floor.
The big ones merely chipped in places, and Jake, in a frenzy of survival, summoned up his telekinesis to finish the job. One after another, he lifted them off the ground using his powers and hurled the heavy stone statues into the distant wall of the chamber.
Boom!
Boom!
Boom!
They all smashed. He did not give them anywhere close to thirty seconds to come back to life.
But Aunt Ramona was proved right once again. He had used the tools of the enemy and at once, bad consequences followed. For the impact of the massive stone statues slamming against the cavern walls rattled the unstable layers of hollowed-out rock.
Jake heard a terrible crack from the direction of the ceiling, followed by a mighty rumble. The last thing he heard was Red’s muffled roar from outside the chamber as the cavern collapsed all around him.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Trapped
When the rumbling stopped, the air was choked with dust and Jake lay coughing on the ground, knocked off his feet by the reverberations. He slowly sat up, waving the dust away from his nose and mouth, and squinting to see anything in the darkness.
Oh, no. The cave wall where he had climbed through the opening had collapsed. Now it was a giant pile of rubble. He was cut off from Red and the outer world.
Trapped in Garnock’s tomb.
Well, maybe he should’ve expected something like this after using the evil sorcerer’s wand. He threw it down in revulsion. Worse, he noticed that the rush of air from the collapse had left his distant torch barely flickering.
If that flame went out, he’d be swallowed up in pitch-black darkness and never find a way out of here. Too bad he had used up most of his Illuminium leaving the trail behind them.
Since he had no intention of sharing Garnock’s tomb with the sorcerer’s skeleton and the dead gargoyles for the rest of eternity, Jake climbed unsteadily to his feet, and, still coughing, made his way over to the torch.
Garnock’s bones and his spell-book and all the other things on his desk were still intact, though now coated in a layer of dust.
Jake bent down and picked up his torch, then blew on it gently, making the slow-burning tar that coated it glow a little stronger. “Come on, perk up. Don’t you dare go out on me.” The light it gave was still feeble.
He realized the air was so thick with crushed rock and dust particles that the flame couldn’t get enough oxygen to burn very brightly. Aw, crud. The last he checked, people needed oxygen, too. In short, he had no time to waste.
He held up the light once more and made sure the gargoyles were no longer a threat.
Indeed, the ugly beasts were beyond dead. They had been pulverized. Unfortunately, the yew wand from Plas-y-Fforest was lost, buried under the pile of rock where half the chamber had caved in.
Compared to the prospect of eventually running out of air, though, losing the wand seemed the least of his worries. Trying to shrug off a frisson of dread, he joked to himself about what a remarkably bad day he was having. First Petunia Harris practically trying to kiss him. Abduction by pixies. Hungry gargoyles, and then seeing poor Derek and Helena swept away.
Now this. If he lived to see the morning, he would count himself most fortunate.
Beyond his own fears, however, there was a Gryphon outside the caved-in chamber who sounded beside himself with panic, poor thing.
He could hear Red roaring, apparently running back and forth along the other side of the rockfall, calling for him, and stopping every now and then to dig through the rocks as best he could, obviously desperate to rescue his young master.
Jake leaned closer to his side of the mound of tumbled rocks and boulders and yelled, “Red, I’m all right! Can you hear me, boy? Over here! I’m alive and the gargoyles are dead!”
“Caw?” The Gryphon’s muffled query now came directly from the opposite side of the rock-pile.
“I’m not hurt. Try not to worry, big fellow. I’m fine. I just need to find another way out of here.”
“Caw!” Red eagerly replied. Then Jake heard the dear beast starting again to try to scratch away the stones, as if he’d dig him out with his bare paws.
“Red, stop! I don’t know if that’s the best idea, boy. The whole thing is unstable. If we’re not careful, we’ll shift the weight wrong and the rest of the chamber will come down and crush me. We don’t want to start another rockfall. Just hang on and let me take a look around. There’s got to be other way out of here.”
Red gave an unhappy yowl in answer, as if to say, “If there were, Garnock would have used it.”
Jake suddenly remembered he had Risker. “If all else fails, I still have my magic dagger. Remember how Odin said the blade can cut through solid rock? I’ll saw my way out of here if I have to, don’t you worry. I hate caves. I am not going to die down here.”
Well, as long as I don’t run out of air.
“Becaw,” Red answered uncertainly, and Jake could almost
picture him nodding his feathered head and gathering himself after that scare.
“Right, so give me a few minutes to take a look around. Maybe I’ll find something useful.” Knife in one hand, torch in the other, Jake returned warily to the skeleton’s desk.
Though finding an exit was paramount, this chamber certainly seemed like it must have been Garnock’s secret wizarding headquarters in life.
Jake figured if he had to be trapped in here, he might as well seize the chance to try to learn more about the sorcerer. Maybe he could even dig up a clue about how to defeat him.
He bent down and blew the thick layer of dust off the page of the skeleton-sorcerer’s grimoire, which had been left open all these centuries.
“Blimey,” Jake murmured as he held the torch up and saw what Garnock had been working on just before he died. The ancient grimoire was open to a page titled ‘The Spell of a Hundred Souls.’
Unfortunately, the instructions, the ingredients list for whatever potion was involved, and the details of the spell were written in Latin, so Jake had no idea what it said. It would have to wait for Archie to translate, but it might well yield the secret of what devilry the black fog fellow was up to right before he ran out of air.
Jake ripped ‘The Spell of a Hundred Souls’ page out of the spell-book. Folding it up, he put it into his pocket, then scanned the dark lair one last time before he tackled the task of trying to find an exit. Anything else important?
Just then, a ghostly glimmer caught his eye, a bluish-white spirit orb in the black shadows.
Jake’s eyebrows show up. Crikey! There’s a ghost down here?
He took a few steps toward the faintly glowing ball of spectral energy. “Hullo? Excuse me?”
Maybe it couldn’t hear him. It just kept floating on its way. It never held still, continually skimming back and forth along the chamber walls, up and down, to and fro in all directions, as though it were searching for something.
Probably a way out, Jake thought with a chill down his spine. He wondered if the ghost had been trapped down here the whole time with Garnock.
“Er, pardon me, spirit, could I speak to you, please?”