Grindhelm's Key

by Nick Moseley

  With those cheerful thoughts rattling around his head, Trev assessed his remaining options. It was a short list, composed entirely of different ways in which he could be killed. Even then he wasn’t spoiled for choice. The majority involved the teeth and claws of the barghests, though for some variety there was always the possibility he’d slip on the frosty ground and break his neck while running away.

  Smith was glaring at him. Presumably he was waiting for a response to his threats from Trev, such as a witty comeback, some defiant bravado, or, at the very least, pleading for his life while sobbing. Trev didn’t do any of those things. His mind was blank. He stared back at Smith, a strange calm settling over him like a blanket. The cold, fear and fatigue fell away from him. If this was the end, he was going to stand and face it. He’d defend the helpless Granddad for as long as he could, with his bare hands if he had to.

  ‘Well?’ said Smith.

  ‘Well what?’ said Trev. He folded his arms.

  If he were to have any chance of lasting more than a few seconds, he needed to get his hands on the kris. It was demon-made, and the barghests were of that realm too; there was a chance the weapon might harm them. Reaching it would be a problem, though. As things were, Smith still seemed intent on wringing some sort of reaction from Trev before killing him. That would change – and quickly – if he went for the kris.

  ‘Nothing to say?’ Smith asked. His tone was mocking, although he couldn’t conceal an undercurrent of irritation. Trev wasn’t playing to the script. ‘No last bargaining plea? No defiance?’

  Trev didn’t reply. He rocked on his feet as if trying to stave off the cold and took a small step towards the kris. It was progress, kind of, but he wasn’t going to be able to edge all the way there. He needed a distraction. And against all his expectations, he got one.

  Two of the barghests furthest from Smith began snapping and snarling at each other. Their disagreement escalated rapidly and by the time Smith turned around to see what the noise was, the two beasts were rolling across the frozen mud, clawing and biting. The discontent spread among the other barghests like a wave. They shifted on their feet, growling.

  Smith held up his lantern. Its pulsing light washed over the barghests and one by one their eyes became focused on it. The fight broke up, the two combatants separating and turning their heads to the hypnotic purple glow. Although Smith had regained control, the incident had shown how tenuous his hold over the barghests was. In summoning so many of them, he’d come very close to over-reaching himself. His power was spread thinly.

  Trev registered the fact but he didn’t have time to explore the possibilities it presented. As soon as Smith’s back was turned he was on the move, crossing the space separating him from the kris as quickly and quietly as he could. He snatched up the weapon and gauged his chances of reaching Smith before he turned around. It was a non-starter. In reaching the kris he’d moved too far away. Instead he hurried to where Granddad lay, crouching next to him to check how he was. He hid the knife beside the old man.

  Granddad was conscious, though the blow to his head had hurt him. Blood ran down from a shallow cut just above his ear.

  ‘I’m sorry, Trevor,’ he whispered.

  ‘Don’t be daft,’ said Trev, giving him a pat on the shoulder. ‘We’ll be fine. Plan A’s buggered but we’ve still got plan B and plan C to use yet.’

  Smith was facing them again. He eyed the little tableau with open contempt. Had their positions been reversed, Trev had zero doubt Smith would’ve made a run for it and left Granddad to his fate. Trev knew he wasn’t most people’s idea of a moral example, but he was glad he wasn’t that much of a scumbag. Although “HERE LIES TREV IRWIN. HE WAS A BIT LESS OF A WANKER THAN THE CELEBRATED PSYCHOPATH JACK SMITH” was perhaps a slightly underwhelming epitaph.

  The slip in his control over the barghests had persuaded Smith not to waste any further time on conversation. He raised the lantern in Trev’s direction and the wall of angry hellhounds surged forwards as one.

  Standing his ground in that moment was the hardest thing Trev had ever done. He grabbed the kris and stood up, settling into the guard stance Mishti Desai had taught him. He was alone. No allies. No vapour weapons to help him fight. Just him.

  He was going to die, but at least it was on his own terms.

  One of the barghests separated itself from the pack. It arrowed towards Trev, spittle and black vapour trailing behind. Waiting for it to close in, Trev made a feint to his left and dodged to the right as the creature jumped. Pivoting on his right foot, he slashed at the barghest as it went past. Jagged black teeth snapped shut inches from his face and he felt the kris dig into the beast’s flank. The weapon was almost snatched from his hand. He held on to it, if barely, but lost his balance. He used the momentum to roll sideways, coming up onto one knee with the knife raised.

  An agonised howl rent the night air. The barghest Trev had hit lay in the mud on its side, dark essence streaming from the wound in a huge plume. The creature thrashed in great spasms, claws gouging the frozen earth. It howled again. The sound was weaker this time, trailing off like a siren winding down. With one last back-breaking convulsion, the barghest shuddered and lay still. The orange glow of its single eye faded and went out.

  The reaction of the other barghests was dramatic. They separated and flowed around Trev as if he were a rock in a stream, shying away from the kris in his hand. This was very good news for him, as he’d been distracted by the death throes of the beast he’d killed and forgotten to keep his guard up.

  ‘Kill him!’ roared Smith, holding up his lantern again.

  The barghests were circling Trev warily now and they surged forwards at Smith’s urging. Trev waved the kris at them and they fell back again, jostling each other and growling. They were stuck between two conflicting forces; the power of Smith’s compulsion was being cancelled out by their fear of the kris. The uneasy balance couldn’t last, however. Abruptly one of the barghests broke out of the group and threw itself at Trev.

  It was on him so quickly all he could do was fall backwards and thrust out the knife as he went. The snarling creature impaled itself on the kris and slumped on top of Trev, pinning him. He pushed frantically at the side of its head with his left hand, keeping its jaws away from him as they snapped at the night air. A second later they stopped moving. The barghest heaved a final time and its nose slumped into the mud.

  Trev rolled it off him and clambered into a crouch. He was unsteady. The two fights had been fast and brutal and he couldn’t believe he was still alive. Bad Trev was driving him on now. It pushed his fear away, replacing it with cold anger. Granddad had curled into a ball, arms up to protect his head. He peeped out at his grandson.

  ‘Stay down,’ Trev said.

  He stood up. The barghests continued to circle and Trev made sure they could see the kris. They barked and snarled at the sight of it. He extended his arm and pointed the weapon at Smith, who stared back at him in disbelief.

  Trev checked his list of options to see if they’d improved. They hadn’t. He shrugged inwardly.

  ‘Well this is fun, isn’t it?’ he said to Smith.

  Without waiting for a reply, he charged.

  Forty-Two

  As a strategy it certainly had the element of surprise going for it, although one could’ve said the same about turning up for a swordfight in just one’s underpants, armed with a baguette.

  The kris was a rather better weapon than a baguette. The downside was that its effectiveness was directly tied to the skill of its user, and Trev was a man who’d only had limited training with a sword and none whatsoever with a knife. This explained why he ran at the barghests shouting incoherently and waving the weapon like a small child with a sparkler on Bonfire Night.

  Fortunately the slavering beasts of the night seemed disinclined to give marks for technical merit. They were concerned that the kris was being waved at them, not how it was being waved. They all but climbed over each other in their haste to get
away from it, and a number of fights broke out in their ranks as a result. Trev was aware of the confusion, though only as background noise. His attention was fixed squarely on Jack Smith, who was visible beyond the jostling barghests.

  Trev drew on his limited reserves of psychic energy and gave himself a boost of speed. As he did so he was aware of a strange sensation he’d experienced a few times before; that the world was slowing down around him, his senses becoming supernaturally acute. He saw the ranks of barghests surge against each other and then part, and for a moment there was nothing except frozen mud and night air between him and Jack Smith.

  This was the moment. His window. The stars had aligned for him, giving him the opportunity to finally defeat Smith. Trev swerved a pair of brawling barghests and charged into the gap, the kris coming up in preparation for the decisive strike. Victory was just a few strides away. He saw it in Smith’s eyes, the realisation that the end had come at last. He’d spent hundreds of years of evading, deceiving and murdering the best agents the supernatural world could send against him, and he was going to die at the hands of an angry estate agent with a beer belly and a borrowed knife.

  It all came together in that moment.

  And in the next, it all came crashing apart again.

  One of the barghests, locked in combat with another, kicked out with its back legs, flinging its opponent away. The creature sprawled into Trev just as he was about to launch himself at Smith. Instinctively it bit at him, catching the right sleeve of his coat in its teeth. Trev was forced into an ungainly pirouette to avoid losing his balance. The barghest tugged at his sleeve like a playful dog with a rubber ring. The kris was in Trev’s right hand and he was unable to use it to defend himself. It was all he could do just to stay on his feet.

  Smith was quick to take advantage of Trev’s misfortune. He summoned his strength and exerted his will through the lantern, bringing the squabbling pack of barghests under his control again. They separated, their eyes drawn to the irresistible purple glow. Then, as one, their heads turned to where Trev stood, trying to escape by struggling out of his shredded coat like the world’s most uncoordinated stripper.

  He managed to extricate himself at last by punching the barghest in the eye with his left hand. The beast howled and let go, backing away. Trev spun around, looking for Smith again, and found himself being stared down by a wall of orange eyes.

  ‘Ah,’ he said. ‘Bollocks.’

  The barghests began to growl. It was low at first, but built in volume to a wave of noise that swept over Trev and set his hair on end. Even with Bad Trev urging him to stand firm, he found himself falling back as if the sound was physically pushing him. He held out the kris at arm’s length, its blade angled in a defensive posture. Not that he’d be able to do much actual defending if the whole pack rushed him at once. The best he could hope for in that scenario was that one of the creatures choked to death on his arm.

  Smith smiled. It was a horrific sight, as the effort he was exerting on the barghests had stripped away his disguise. His eyes gleamed with malice in the flaking, desiccated ruin of his face. Uneven yellow teeth showed behind his pale, cracked lips. He looked like the happiest zombie in town.

  ‘Goodbye,’ he said.

  The barghests charged.

  Trev set himself. I’ll take as many of them with me as I can, he thought, his defiance tempered somewhat by the knowledge that the total he’d probably take with him would be zero. Even so, there was no point running. He’d still die, he just wouldn’t see it coming. Whether that was a good thing or not, he was happy to leave to the philosophers.

  As the barghests charged in, Trev waited until the last second before hurling himself into a clumsy shoulder-roll. He used a little more of his precious energy reserves to absorb the impact and propel himself back onto his feet. It was ungainly, but the desperate manoeuvre had the desired effect. The barghests, moving as one, had difficulty changing direction to follow him. The bulk of the creatures skidded past him, claws scrabbling at the frozen ground. Trev lashed out at the nearest barghest, sending it howling into the mud. He spun away from two sets of gaping jaws and fended off another beast that was trying to blind-side him.

  The rest of the pack had managed to turn around and were steaming back in. Trev knew he had seconds before he was overwhelmed. The only plus point was that the barghests had completely ignored Granddad. Trev couldn’t see the old man and didn’t have time to look for him; he was otherwise occupied. He danced away from a barghest and struck out at another. He was surrounded now. He tried to dodge again and found there was nowhere to go. He went on the offensive, lunging at the beast in front of him and was struck from behind. He staggered and before he could regain his footing a second barghest slammed into him from the side. He went down heavily.

  Staying down was death, Trev knew that. The problem was he couldn’t get up. The pack was toying with him, barging him as he attempted to rise. Teeth snapped at his clothes, tearing them. The kris was knocked from his hand and disappeared under the forest of clawed feet. His face was a rictus of terror and despair.

  This was the moment he’d been expecting for so long; the moment his luck finally deserted him.

  The end.

  All thoughts of facing his death with dignity and grace were long gone. He was gripped by blind panic. He punched at the barghests with his bare hands, fighting to make space to stand. It was impossible. His coat was in tatters, and he felt the stinging pain of multiple wounds where teeth and claws had caught him. The bites weren’t deep, the beasts still just playing with him, but they burned.

  He dragged himself into a kneeling position for what seemed like the hundredth time and raised his head. A particularly large barghest faced him. Trev’s weary green eyes peered into its blazing orange one. The creature’s jaw sagged open and it angled its head, ready to seize Trev by the throat. He knew he should defend himself, but what was the point?

  ‘Come on then, I don’t have all bloody night,’ he rasped out.

  The barghest tensed, ready to leap.

  There was a flash of white light.

  Trev blinked. The beast was gone.

  ‘Get up! Up!’ called a familiar voice. Trev barely heard it over the frenzied snarling and barking of the barghests.

  The white flash came again and Trev felt the press of hairy bodies around him draw away. The white light was joined by a green one. Trev couldn’t focus his eyes. The toxic saliva of the barghests was in his system. His face felt numb and his limbs responded as if he were swimming in treacle.

  ‘Trev! Get up!’ shouted a second, female, voice. Trev recognised this one as well. He couldn’t put a name to it though. Thinking was difficult for him – even more so than usual – but the urgency of the shouts cut through the spreading dullness in his brain. He pushed against the ground and hauled himself upright. Shadows and lights danced around him, and harsh sounds assaulted his ears. He swayed on his feet, unsure what he should do next.

  ‘Here, take this!’ said the male voice he’d heard. Something cold and metal was pressed into his hand. The recognition was immediate. Trev grinned and forced a jolt of psychic energy into it.

  A bolt of lightning erupted from his hand, forming Caladbolg’s three-foot blade. The world came back into focus as the weapon’s influence resisted the effects of the barghest toxin. Trev shifted into a guard stance and assessed the chaos around him.

  The barghests were everywhere. Whatever exertion Smith had used to get them working as a unit, it had failed him. The creatures were in a frenzy, charging in all directions, snarling and barking, and fighting each other. Trev stood in a small patch of calm which was being maintained by the combined efforts of Feargal Deacon and Mishti Desai. Deacon was using his favoured vapour weapon, a long, two-handed German sword called a Zweihänder. He swung the weapon’s misty white blade in a series of broad arcs, scattering the barghests. Desai, meanwhile, wielded a rapier with a shimmering green blade. Deacon had set himself in a defensive posture,
providing a base from which Desai darted forwards in rapid counter-attacks, moving effortlessly through the melee like a dancer.

  Trev swatted a barghest aside and stepped up to join Deacon.

  ‘Better late than never,’ he shouted over the cacophony around them.

  ‘We hit problems, will explain later,’ shot back Deacon. ‘First up, we need to get to Bernard.’

  ‘Where is he?’ Trev asked.

  ‘Playing dead,’ Deacon replied. ‘Clever man. Barghests are triggered by movement. Won’t keep him alive forever though. Let’s go.’

  Trev followed Deacon as he moved forwards. Desai fell in behind them, covering their backs. The barghests couldn’t be killed by the vapour weapons, but they didn’t like being hit by them. They circled the three humans, baring their teeth and making a lot of noise but launching few real attacks. The reckless minority that did try their luck found themselves beaten back in short order.

  Trev was already worrying about his psychic energy situation. He’d started the evening with a fraction of his usual reserves and what was left was dwindling. Even using Caladbolg as sparingly as he could, he seemed to be burning through energy at an increased rate.

  You’re using some of your strength to fight off that poison, lad, Caladbolg said, as if reading his mind. It’s vile stuff. You’re lucky you didn’t get a bigger dose.

  This raised the awkward question of what would happen when Trev ran out of juice. Would he keel over on the spot as the toxin’s effects returned? Was the vapour weapon’s influence actually neutralising the poison in his system, or just suppressing it?

  He opened his mouth to ask Caladbolg that very question but Deacon interrupted him.

  ‘There!’ he said, pointing at a huddled form lying in the mud.

  The light from the vapour weapons played across Granddad’s prone body. The old man was so motionless Trev had a sickening moment of fear that he wasn’t just pretending to be dead; he really was dead. He forged ahead of Deacon, battering a pair of barghests out of the way as he went.