Keeper of the Realms: The Dark Army (Book 2) (33 page)

With a roar Charlie flung Edge Darkmount through the
Portal. He landed in a cloud of dust and rolled several times before coming to a stop. Charlie took Crumble’s small knife and a gourd of water from Jensen. She threw both through the Portal to land next to the fallen bishop.

‘No matter how hard you push me, no matter how hard Bane or Bellania pushes me or how brutal the challenges that come my way, I’ll never become as twisted as you and for that you should count your blessings.’

With a clap of her hands she allowed the Portal to snap shut.

45

Pigtails

The Tremen had done remarkably well. Driven by fear and anger and spurred on by the necessity of defending their home, they had thinned the Stoman ranks.

Scores of dead formed ghastly mounds that had at first slowed the approach of the enemy, tripping and entangling their legs and feet so that the endless Stoman charges had swiftly turned into blundering and poorly executed attacks. But as the numbers of enemy dead had risen this paradoxically worked in their favour. Bodies plugged the trenches and as they continued to pile higher and higher they formed ramps that were used to scale the sides of the Treman defences.

The tide began to turn. And what had at first been a simple act of turning back the enemy swiftly grew into a desperate affair. Enraged Stomen began to push past defenders and here and there small groups of the enemy managed to plunge all the way past the first line of Treman soldiers before being hurled back.

Then suddenly they were through and the Treman defence crumbled entirely.

A shocked warrior grabbed Kelko by the arm. ‘Back!
We’ve got ta pull back!’ Without waiting to see if Kelko would join him, the man sprinted off.

Others swiftly followed suit and cries of ‘Back!’ and ‘Retreat!’ filled the air.

Kelko wanted to wait for the sound of the horn that would officially signal the retreat, but it never came.

‘Wot are ya waiting for, fool?’ gasped an older veteran as he staggered by.

‘There’s been no call for retreat!’ protested Kelko.

‘There won’t be,’ shouted the veteran as he disappeared behind the trees. His voice came echoing back. ‘The high command has been slaughtered! Retreat! Retreat ta Sylvaris. We’ll make our stand there!’

‘Blight my Leaf!’ cursed Kelko.

He had to duck suddenly to avoid getting his head cut off as a rider swished his halberd through the air. Ducking and rolling, Kelko sliced off several of the rhinospider’s angular legs then, bunching his feet beneath him, raced after the retreating soldiers. As his feet pounded the leaf-littered forest floor and the dappled sunlight speared through the canopy, despair slowly coiled its fingers round his heart. Deepforest had fallen.

‘What?’ Charlie demanded as she realized Crumble and Jensen were staring at her. ‘He’ll escape from those bonds. It might take him an hour or so but with the knife in easy reach it won’t take him all day.’

‘It’s not that –’ began Jensen.

‘And at least he’s got enough water to last him a day or two. That should be more than enough to find an oasis or something.’

‘It’s not –’

‘Do you think I let him off too easily?’

‘It’s –’

Charlie sighed. ‘You’re right. I didn’t punish him enough, did I?’ Summoning her Will she reopened the Portal.

Darkmount froze as he realized people were watching his embarrassing attempts to squirm like a caterpillar towards the knife. Humiliated and infuriated he fixed Charlie with a stare that could have broken boulders.

‘Darkmount?’ called Charlie. ‘Before we leave you for good I thought it would be best to remind you that you were beaten by me, Charlie Keeper. A fourteen-year-old girl who you liked to call “naive, innocent, stupid and immature”. And just to recap that in case you didn’t get it the first time: I’m a girl, I’m fourteen, I occasionally like to put my hair in pigtails and I just beat you.’ Then with a final impudent wave that she knew would have him grinding his teeth for years to come she closed the Portal.

She turned to Crumble and Jensen. ‘Better?’

Jensen and Crumble shared a what-happened-there look and a did-that-really-happen shrug.

‘I, uh, I was going ta say that I was proud of ya for not taking it so far. I wanted ta say that if yer parents were here they would have been proud that ya haven’t turned inta a bad apple.’

‘So it wasn’t that I didn’t punish him enough?’

‘Um … no.’

Again there was a pause as Crumble and Jensen shared yet another look.

‘I did kind of like the bit about the pigtails,’ said Crumble.

Jensen nodded in appreciation. ‘And rubbing yer age in his face too. That was, uh … unusual.’

‘But effective,’ said Crumble.

Jensen blew air between his teeth. ‘Uh … effective. Yes.’

Charlie decided that the less said about the matter the better. Ignoring the gestures that Jensen and Crumble were making to one another she opened her fist for a better look at the heart.

She regretted it almost immediately. The heart, on closer inspection, was even more disgusting than she had first thought. Trying to force down a sense of revulsion as it wrapped one of its tendrils round her little finger, she rummaged through her pockets. Finding nothing useful she wandered over to Crumble.

‘Do you have any food on you?’

Crumble pulled a strip of dried meat from his pouch. Charlie broke off a small piece and tried to feed it to the heart, but it didn’t appear interested.

‘How am I supposed to do this,’ muttered Charlie, ‘if it doesn’t even have a mouth?’

‘Sweet Sap, Charlie, didn’t yer parents tell ya any fairy tales when ya were younger?’ protested Jensen with a woeful shake of his head. Walking to the altar he broke one of the bowls that lay on its surface. Using one of the sharper fragments to prick his finger he went to Charlie’s side. ‘Bit obvious when ya think about it. Hold yer hand up.’

He allowed several drops of blood to drip from his finger
on to the heart. It reacted immediately. Pulsing faster on Charlie’s hand it squirmed and tried to latch several tendrils round Jensen’s finger, but he was careful to keep his hand out of reach.

‘Uck, it feels so gross,’ grumbled Charlie. She unwrapped the tendril that had twined round her finger. ‘Do you think that’s it? Is that all it’s going to need?’

‘I don’t know. Wanna try a little more?’

‘Go for it.’

Jensen let drop some more blood.

Once again the heart reacted. Wriggling and writhing, it desperately tried to reach Jensen’s finger.

‘It wants to touch you,’ observed Charlie. ‘Do you think we should let it?’

‘Wot? Are ya nuts? Everyone knows not ta do something like that.’

‘They do?’

‘Of course!’

‘Why?’

‘Yer joking right? Ya must have read enough myths and legends ta know better than that. Even those cheesy horror movies yer’ve got on Earth make it easy enough ta understand. Ya don’t give monsters enough food ta grow big enough ta eat ya. Ya don’t let them touch ya when yer bleeding, particularly the weird ones like this with tentacles cos they always try ta stick them right in yer veins and drink ya dry.’

‘Or they control your mind,’ said Crumble.

‘Right,’ said Jensen nodding his head in agreement. ‘Or they turn ya inta a zombie.’

‘Or they turn your hand against you so that you have to cut it off,’ said Crumble. ‘But even then it crawls around on its fingers and still tries to kill you.’

‘Right!’ said Jensen with another enthusiastic nod. ‘Or they –’

‘OK, I think I get it,’ interrupted Charlie. ‘So we can’t give it too much of your blood. But how do we know we’ve got enough? Does it look satisfied to you?’

Crumble and Jensen looked warily at the heart, which continued to wriggle on Charlie’s hand.

‘Uh … no. It still looks kinda hungry ta me.’

‘Me too,’ admitted Crumble.

‘OK, you big sissies, I’ve got a better idea,’ said Charlie. ‘Crumble do you still have all that money on you?’

‘Yes.’

‘Good.’ Charlie opened a Portal that led to Opal Hold. ‘Can you grab us a couple of steaks and another waist pouch like yours?’

‘Sure.’

‘Excellent. Do you think anyone will recognize you and cause trouble?’

Crumble looked down at himself. ‘I think I’m a little too muddy.’

‘Uh … good point. Hang on, will anyone serve you looking like that?’

‘I’ve never known a merchant to turn down business as long as there’s gold to be gained.’ Crumble flicked a coin in the air. ‘And thanks to you we’ve still got some money to our name.’

‘Great.’ Charlie frowned as she eyed the Portal. ‘Don’t be
long, Opal Hold is further away from here than Shidden Vale was and, uh … well the Portal feels a bit heavier.’

‘Heavier?’

‘Yeah. Harder to hold open.’

‘OK, I’ll be quick.’ Crumble darted through.

‘Think ya can hold that without having ta look at it?’

Charlie gave it some thought then nodded.

‘Then follow me.’

Jensen led her to the tent opening. Together they looked out into the torrential rain and at the precise ranks of the silent army. ‘Are ya thinking wot I’ve been thinking?’

Charlie stared at Jensen then turned to look once more at the long lines of gargorillas disappearing into the downpour.

‘Sylvaris,’ she said with a jubilant grin.

‘Right,’ said Jensen, his white teeth breaking the mask of his muddy face.

A new sense of purpose filled Charlie. Since Jensen had first broken the news of Sylvaris’s imminent doom, a feeling of urgency had filled her. At first she had hoped to confront Bane in his palace, maybe stop him in his tracks. Then, learning that there was still a chance to retrieve her pendant, she had been filled with dreams of freeing the Winged Ones in time to save Sylvaris. But as the reality of the distances and time involved became apparent those hopes had slowly crumbled. All along she had assumed that she would be fighting a losing battle to save Sylvaris and Bellania from the Stoman Lord, but now in one swoop of luck she had changed everything.

Charlie’s smile grew as she looked at the long line of
gargorillas. If she really could control them with that yucky heart she had a strong chance of doing some real good. ‘So we get to give Bane a taste of his own medicine at last.’

‘About time,’ said Jensen, perhaps a little louder than he should. The idea of saving his beloved city rode high in his heart. ‘Me little Hippotomi, if only Azariah could see ya now he’d be proud of ya.’

‘If there’s a Will there’s a Way,’ said Charlie as she fondly remembered Azariah’s teaching.

‘Yes!’ said Jensen, his voice rising as he got caught in the moment. ‘Yes! If there’s a Will there’s a Way!’

One of the stone soldiers near the tent shifted its head as the sound of Jensen’s excited voice carried above the noise of the storm.

‘Uh-oh,’ said Jensen. He pulled Charlie back from the entrance as the thing knuckled over to investigate the disturbance. Keeping to the shadows the two held their breath as it approached.

Although the thing had definite similarities to the stone behemoth that Charlie had seen in the courtyard, it certainly had a gorilla-ness to it. Gargorilla was definitely an appropriate name. It had short, almost deformed rear legs, a narrow waist that led to a broad and powerful chest that in turn was supported by long and heavily muscled arms that thudded, fist first, into the ground with every step. Its craggy head had limited features, a crude slit for a mouth, a hint of a nose and broad eyebrows that overhung poorly defined eyes. All in all it looked like a half-baked and half-glazed pottery figure crafted by either an enthusiastic seven-year-old or a mad artist.
Or in this case
, thought Charlie,
a mad Stoman bishop
.

Brutal and at the same time eerie-looking, the gargorilla pushed its way into the tent. Charlie and Jensen, quiet as mice, tiptoed backwards.

The gargorilla saw the Portal hanging at the back of the tent. Suspecting that something was amiss it croaked out a tortured call. Two of its comrades answered and thudded their way into the tent. Making odd snuffling, sniffing noises they spread out and began to investigate.

46

The Dark Army

Jensen put his finger to his lips, indicating the need for silence. Taking Charlie by the arm he led her towards their initial entrance point. Pushing Charlie through the slit in the tent he followed after. They waited in the narrow channel that lay between the two walls.

The sniffing noises grew closer, so too the
thud-thud-thud
of heavy movement. A shadow loomed close. Charlie and Jensen pressed themselves to the floor and held their breath as it passed.

‘Wot are we gonna do about the Portal?’ whispered Jensen. ‘And wot about Crumble? We’re gonna have ta warn him somehow.’

‘How about if we –’

A huge fist punched through the canvas mere inches above Charlie’s face. She squawked and rolled out of the way.

‘Jens–’

‘Shh!’ said Jensen. With agitated gestures he indicated that they should crawl further along the perimeter.

Keeping as low and as silent as possible they scurried along on their hands and knees. Charlie turned to Jensen with eyes as wide as saucers.