The Warden and the Wolf King

by Andrew Peterson

  A Grey Fang leaned against the wall, chewing on a haunch of raw meat, and Janner felt certain that someone would point him out to the guard. But the line edged Janner past the Fang, and it chewed on, slurping and grunting with pleasure. No one said a word, which was good, but Janner was inching ever closer to the dais, which was bad.

  He slipped his hand under his cloak and rested it on the hilt of his sword. At first his mind raced, trying to work out a way to escape, but when he could think of no solution, his mind grew tired and he slogged along in a thoughtless trance.Something was going to happen, he knew that. He would reach the dais, and the Stone Keeper would realize he didn’t want to be Fanged—but then what? And where was Kalmar? He’d lost sight of him.

  Janner hung his head and shuffled forward, flash after flash, bat after bat, name after ugly name. He even hummed along with the song without realizing it. And then a thought fluttered through his mind like a moth: maybe itwould be better to sing the song and be done with it. No more running. No more looking for a home that didn’t exist. No more wondering if Gnag was waiting around every corner to gobble him up.

  Shuffle forward. Flash. Cheers. Excited chatter. Shuffle forward. Flash. On it went, and the song sank into Janner’s mind, deeper and deeper, until the people around him no longer seemed quite so foolish, or quite so evil. Who could blame them, after all? They had merely chosen the winning side. In a sense, they were choosing life over death. And what could be more sane than preserving one’s own life? Even Podo said that it was better to fight on. Perhaps the melding was a kind of fighting for life, even if it meant a hollow life. It was better than nothing, wasn’t it?

  And then Janner found himself facing the dais and the iron box. It was almost his turn. Just a few paces away stood the Stone Keeper. The skinny, bearded man in front of him shifted his weight from side to side and rubbed his hands together with excitement. The woman and the boy behind him whispered to each other, wondering aloud which animal they might meld with. There were only two more people in front of Janner, and then he would be face to face with the hooded woman. He should have been afraid, but her soothing voice made him sleepy.

  Then he saw Kalmar again.

  Janner’s eyes snapped open. The Stone Keeper’s voice was no longer sweet but sinister, and it seemed suddenly laughable that Janner would ever give himself over. Kalmar stood a little behind the box and to the left, in the shadow of one of the larger Fangs—where it was impossible to see his eyes.

  Janner was sorely tempted to shout his brother’s name, to try and break the spell of his Fangness so they could fight their way out. But what if it didn’t work? What if it only got them both caught? If Janner stayed quiet, maybe Kalmar would snap out of it and slip away undetected.

  While Janner’s mind raced, the bearded man in front of him clapped like a child and sprang up the steps. The Stone Keeper asked him where he was from.

  “Yorsha Doon,” he said in a thick accent. “A village in the southern hold of Hasini.”

  The Green Fang wrote it down in the ledger.

  “Very good,” the Stone Keeper said. “We Doonlanders make some of thebest Fangs.”

  “Oh, yes,” the man said. “The best.”

  She swung open the iron door and the man stepped into the darkness. “You know the song,” she said. “Give your heart to it, and join the victor’s army.”

  She pulled the door shut and the man sang along with her. She pulled a lever on the side of the box, the light shot out of from every crack, and she opened the door again. Steam and smoke poured out, then the man—the Bat Fang—hobbled forth on unsteady legs, grinning madly.

  “Your name is Grimgar!” the Stone Keeper announced, and the crowd cheered as the Green Fang scribbled away in the book.

  In a small way, Janner had come to know the skinny, bearded man as they had shuffled along, and in moments he had morphed into this monster. Janner knew enough of despair to pity him, but was horrified by the way the man welcomed his own destruction.

  His mind was too full of these thoughts to do anything but stand at the foot of the dais like a dumb sheep and wonder what would happen when the Stone Keeper turned her attention on him.

  64

  The Ancient Stone

  “Go on,” said the boy behind Janner, jabbing him in the shoulder.

  But Janner’s feet refused to move. His neck prickled with the feeling of hundreds of staring eyes, knowing that in moments he would be thrust into action. He pulled his gaze from the Stone Keeper, who led the newly melded Bat Fang down the steps, and looked desperately for Kalmar, but he was nowhere to be seen.

  Janner had to fight her, of course. The woman who had midwifed so many into their doom, who held such sway over Fang and human alike, who must have been Gnag’s right arm of power all these years and for all these years had ordered the kidnapping, torture, and death of so many free souls—the same woman who had destroyed Uncle Artham’s mind and tormented their father—had to be stopped. And who else would do it? Who else had ever stood here in the Deeps of Throg, sword at hand, to defy her? If he died trying, Janner thought, it would be a good death. His Annieran blood sang in his veins.

  Janner slipped his hand beneath his cloak and gripped the hilt of Rudric’s sword. He tried not to look into the shadow of the Stone Keeper’s cowl, afraid of the eyes that watched him, afraid that they would siphon away what little courage he had.

  She pushed open the door to the iron box and asked, “What is your name, boy?” Her voice was just louder than a whisper. “Your name?” she repeated.

  “My name is Janner Wingfeather.”

  Janner whipped out his sword and faced the woman, his skin cold and clammy, his head dizzy with the danger. He did his best to ignore the looks of shock on every face in the room, but there was one face he couldn’t ignore.

  The Stone Keeper reared back and shrieked, and under the cowl her pale features glowed like something undead and angry. Janner knew he wouldn’t escape, wouldn’t last long against so many, especially without Kalmar’s help—but maybe it was enough to stop the Stone Keeper.

  Though his instinct screamed at him to flee, he lunged forward and jabbed his blade at the woman who had killed so many.

  With an unnatural speed, she dodged the blade, planted one of her bony white hands on Janner’s chest, and shoved him backwards and into the iron box.

  Janner crashed into the wall and crumpled to the floor as the door slammed shut and latched. Outside, the Stone Keeper cackled with glee and the Fangs howled.

  “Well,that didn’t go how I thought it would,” Janner muttered.

  A bat flapped weakly about on the floor beside him—as weak and helpless as he was. Janner stood up, knees still trembling with the rush of danger, and banged his fist against the wall. He wanted to call for Kalmar, but it was possible that the Fangs didn’t know he was out there. It would do no good to give him away, not if he was Janner’s only hope of escape.

  “Let me out!” he shouted, feeling the foolishness of his words, as if the Stone Keeper would just shrug and open the door. But he didn’t know what else to do.

  Then he noticed a small compartment in the wall. Faint light emanated from the cracks, which was how he could see the shriveled bat at his feet. The chamber walls were grimy, smeared with filth and hair, but the light was as beautiful as a sunrise.

  He peeked through the metal shutters at its source. It was a splinter of stone, no larger than a pebble. It glowed steady as the sun, a constant and lovely light that was bright enough to make Janner squint, but not so bright that it hurt to stare. He thought at first that the music had ignited the light, but now he saw that the stone couldn’t help but glow, and the Stone Keeper opened the shutter just long enough for the melding.

  Using the point of his sword, Janner pried open the shutter until he could fit his hand through. Janner swallowed, hoping the stone wasn’t as hot as it looked, then reached in and removed it. It was cool and surprisingly heavy, tingling in Janner’s palm
. He wished he could stare at it for hours.

  The bat squeaked. Then the door squeaked.

  Janner looked up. The Stone Keeper stood beside a Grey Fang in the open doorway. “Seize him,” the woman said.

  The Fang snarled.

  Then the Stone Keeper flung back her cowl, and Janner saw a face that would haunt him for the rest of his life.

  65

  Under the Keeper’s Cowl

  The Stone Keeper’s face was old, but not the sort of old that Podo was, or Oskar, or even Bonifer Squoon, who was the oldest person Janner had ever met. The Stone Keeper was old in a stretched, unnatural manner, as if her skin had loosened and loosened with time, but she had sewn it up at the back of her head like a mask. Her hair was stringy and black, but from the look of the black smudges on her flaking scalp, it was clear that she had darkened the strands with some kind of dye. Her cheekbones were high and prominent, which made her eyes as deep as empty graves. Her head wobbled, perched on a broomstick neck.

  When she saw Janner with the ancient stone, she screamed and hissed, baring her teeth. She had two long, black fangs: stout, round, and glistening in her mouth, and they protracted and retracted hungrily. She was no ordinary old woman, Janner realized, but a melded thing.

  She stood beside the Fang with her arms flung wide—several arms, Janner now saw, because her robe had opened enough that movement was visible within its folds. As her scream died away, many fingers probed their way out of the robe and pulled it open revealing black, spidery limbs, all of which ended in hands that reached out for Janner.

  Janner raised his sword and closed his fingers on the stone, which plunged the inside of the box into darkness. The Stone Keeper shouted something at the Fang and it stepped inside. Janner screamed as he raised his sword to strike.

  The Fang moved swiftly. It grabbed his wrist and pinned him against the wall, and its voice pushed through the panic in Janner’s mind: “It’s me! Janner, it’s me!”

  “Kal?” Janner said between breaths, peering at the wolfish face. Thank the Maker, his brother’s eyes were blue.

  Kalmar grabbed Janner’s wrist and dragged him out of the box and into the openness of the chamber. “Show them,” Kalmar whispered out of the side of his mouth.

  “Show them what?”

  “The ancient stone!” Kalmar shouted, releasing Janner’s arm and raising his own sword.

  Janner opened his hand, and the stone’s buttery glow filled the chamber. The crowd stared, dumbstruck, and the Grey and Green Fangs stationed throughout the room shielded their eyes, their weapons raised in alarm.

  Kalmar swung his sword at the Stone Keeper. She skittered sideways to avoid it, and Janner realized she was directly in front of the open box.

  He leaped forward and shoved the Stone Keeper. He felt her many arms wriggling and scraping him as he pushed, but she was spindly and light beneath her robes and she tumbled backward into the darkness of the melding box. Kalmar slammed the door and latched it shut.

  All this had taken only seconds, but Janner felt years older as he and Kalmar turned to face the multitude in the chamber. The collective shock of the humans and Fangs alike faded, and the cavern erupted with howls and hisses and shouts of anger.

  “I think maybe it’s time to get out of here,” Kalmar said.

  Janner glanced at the door behind the bat cages. “I think you’re right.” Janner opened his fist and the light burst forth once more. The Fangs recoiled as if they had been stung.

  The boys leapt from the dais and raced for the exit. They made it through the stunned crowd and slammed the door behind them. Janner slipped the stone into his pocket and held the door while Kalmar slid the lock into place.

  “It won’t hold them for long,” Kalmar said. “Let’s go.”

  They raced down the torch-lit corridor with the sound of chaos fading behind them. When they reached the end of the corridor it split into three passageways. The one on the right led to a stair and they bounded up, two steps at a time.

  “I thought I lost you,” Janner said as they climbed.

  “I thought I lost me, too,” Kalmar said, “until you said your name. It brought me back. I attacked you, didn’t I?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “I forgive you,” Janner said. “And I forgive you for the next time, too, and the time after that.”

  They stopped to rest at the top of the stair. “But what if I really hurt you?” Kalmar’s ears flattened and he stared at his hands. “Or worse?”

  “You’re my brother. I forgive you.”

  Kalmar’s eyes met Janner’s, then he looked quickly away.

  Janner put a hand on Kal’s shoulder. “Listen. You can’t get rid of me. I’m the Throne Warden. Besides, I can’t fight Gnag alone. We’re in this together.”

  Kalmar nodded. “What do we do?”

  “We climb these steps. We keep our swords ready. And we remember who we are. What’s your name? Say it.”

  “My name is Kalmar Wingfeather.”

  “Wolf King of Anniera,” Janner added. “And I’m proud to be your brother. You were amazing back there.”

  The brothers shared an awkward silence, then shook it off and bounded up the steps, closer and closer to the courts of Gnag the Nameless.

  66

  Vooming the Shaft

  The brothers climbed as quickly as they could, but Janner’s legs were burning, and he was breathing so hard he was afraid he might vomit. They heard sounds of pursuit behind them, a racket of howls and shouts that grew in volume with every step.

  Kalmar, who wasn’t winded in the least, stopped suddenly. “I smell something.” His ears pricked forward, then he bounded up the steps before Janner could catch enough breath to say a word. Kalmar crept back toward him with one finger over his mouth, beckoning for Janner to follow. Just around the next turn they came to another big room, bigger even than the melding chamber. Torches burned along the walls, and the cavern spread so far to the left and right that the torches shrank into tiny specks of light. Where the ceiling should have been there was only airy blackness, and after a short distance the floor dropped away as well. The room was but a perch in the wall of a massive hollow, a shaft that seemed to reach from the peak of the mountain to its very roots. Then Janner saw what Kalmar had smelled.

  A small group of trolls stood near the precipice, conversing in grunts that reminded the boys of Oood. But these trolls were full grown, twice Oood’s size. They stood beside a wooden platform and an enormous spool of chain. The spool laid flat on its side and a number of poles extended out from its edges. It looked like a table with spokes. There was a great metal gear beside the spool, threaded with more chain. It rotated slowly, issuing an echo of clinks throughout the chamber. The chain ascended up and up, into the shaft.

  “What are they doing?” Janner whispered.

  “I don’t know,” Kal said. He looked back down the stairway and laid his ears laid flat against his head. “They’re coming.”

  The trolls’ conversation was cut short by a change in the rattle of chain. They lumbered over to the giant spool, each troll wrapped its massive hands around one of the spokes, and they heaved, rotating the spool. As they turned it, an iron gondola—like the Black Carriage, but without wheels or horses—floated downward out of the darkness above and came to rest on the platform. The door swung open and out stepped seven Green Fangs, hissing and laughing together. They crossed the room without a glance at the trolls and exited through a doorway. The trolls made cruel faces at the Fangs’ backs, then one of them shut the gondola door and beckoned the others back to the giant spool.

  “You’re my prisoner,” Kalmar whispered.

  “What?” Janner said, then without explanation, Kalmar dragged him into the open.

  “Wait!” Kalmar called out in his gruffest voice.

  “Erp?” answered one of the trolls.

  “The Stone Keeper wants this prisoner brought to Gnag.”

  The trol
ls all narrowed their little eyes.

  “Quickly! She said there was no time to lose. She believes this”—he jerked Janner’s arm—“is one of the Jewels of Anniera. The Hollish army has infiltrated the Deeps. Hurry, fools!”

  The trolls’ eyes widened, and when sounds of the Fangs below echoed out of the passageway, they grunted and waved Kalmar and Janner into the gondola.

  “No! I’ll never go!” Janner shouted dramatically.

  “Quiet!” Kalmar barked, and shoved Janner through the door.

  By the light of the lantern inside the gondola, Janner could see the floor was covered with maggots and grime, and he gagged. The door slammed shut, the trolls heaved, and the gondola lifted from the platform and swung out into the shaft.

  “Hurry!” Kalmar shouted at the trolls, banging on the side of the box. Janner peeked through the window and saw the trolls move to another gear. They each took hold of a chain and pulled. The gondola jerked upward and sent both boys tumbling about, and then they began to slowly and steadily ascend.

  “We’ll never make it before the Fangs get here,” Kalmar said.

  “Tell them to go faster!”

  “Faster!” Kalmar shouted. “They’re coming, you fools!”

  The trolls argued with one another and pointed from the passageway to the gondola. Then one of them shrugged and crossed to a lever on the wall. There was a sign above the lever painted in a large, sloppy and childish script, which spelled “VOOM.”

  Janner followed the length of chain from the lever, along the wall to a pulley, then up to several dangling boulders. Just as the troll grabbed the lever, Janner realized what was about to happen.

  “Get down!” he shouted.

  The troll pulled the lever and the boulders plummeted into the deep. The gondola shot upward so fast that Janner and Kal were glued to the grimy floor.