The Devil in Green (42 page)

One of the girls fainted, hitting the turf as a dead weight. Mallory could
feel the desperate eyes of the other travellers heavy on him.

The thing fell down on the corpse, tearing with its talons in a frenzy
until the body fell apart. Then it ducked down into the soft tissue and
began to feed so ravenously that the blood flew like rain.

Mallory's first reaction was to look after himself, but he couldn't do it.
He gripped the sword with both hands and took a step forwards.

At Mallory's movement, the creature raised its head, the bone now
stained scarlet. Mallory wished it would let out some growl so he could
characterise it as flesh and blood, but it was as silent as the grave. It
launched itself towards him, eerily lighter than air as it tore across the
distance between them.

The ghostliness wrong-footed him so that he wasn't ready for the force
of impact. It felt as if someone had thrown a full oil drum at him. He went
down underneath it as screams erupted all around.

It didn't use its talons immediately. Instead, those seething red eyes
began to inspect him. Mallory had the feeling of being dissected, his hopes
torn apart and thrown away, his fears peeled back. He could smell the
traveller's fresh blood, but beneath it there was the odour of loam and
rotting vegetation. It opened its mouth briefly, then closed it with a clack of
bare teeth.

Mallory acted just as it launched its attack. When it shifted its weight to
raise a bony hand he rolled to one side, brought up his knee and levered it
off him. The thing was already flinging itself back at him like a cornered
wildcat. He tried to bring up the sword, but there wasn't room and he
could only jam it crossways between them awkwardly. The creature's
talons were just a flash. If Mallory hadn't snatched his head away
instinctively it would now be bouncing alongside the traveller's.

He tried to fend it off with his left arm, but to his horror it brought its
skull down sharply and closed those ferocious jaws on his forearm. He
yelled with pain, but at the same time seized his opportunity to arc the
sword around into the creature's ribs. It felt as if he'd swung it into the
trunk of an oak tree.

But it did enough. The creature released its grip on his arm and recoiled,
still silent even when Mallory yanked the sword out, bringing part of a
bone with it. In that instant, Mallory knew no earthly sword would have
had any effect; the dragon-sword sang in his hands, setting his nerve
endings alight.

Now the thing hung back, floating eerily from side to side, its hideous
red-stained skull cocked as it surveyed him in a new light. It only took a
moment to size him up before it attacked again, unannounced and with
rattlesnake speed. Mallory had the merest instant to respond; he shifted
weight, parried, but it was like trying to fence with a cloud of claws and
snapping jaws.

For fifteen minutes the battle raged back and forth. Occasionally,
Mallory would sneak through the creature's defences to slice into his
unbelievably dense body. More often it would catch him a glancing blow
that would make his teeth ring, or raise droplets of blood with a rake of
its talons. But with each wound, Mallory felt the dull rage within him
grow colder and harder, focusing his mind, sharpening his reactions. He
couldn't see Sophie or the travellers - even their cries were lost to him.
Everything was centred on the grinning skull, the abomination that had no
right to cause suffering when so much already existed.

He saw the opening, instantly dissected tactics and all possible
responses, then acted with a swiftness that turned his sword arm to a
blur. The dragon-sword drove into the creature's chest, and then Mallory
gripped it with both hands and drove down with all his strength. It felt as if
he was forcing the blade through stone.

As the thing began to split in two, Mallory snatched the sword free and
slashed. The red skull flew free, rattled on to the ground and bounced
across the turf.

Mallory staggered back, catching his breath after the exertion, still
shaking with the battle rage. Sophie stepped in to support him.

'Are you OK?' she said, with deep concern.

He steadied himself, then quickly herded her away from the carcass, still
quivering with its death throes. 'Let's get moving.'

'You need to rest. We've got to treat your wounds.' She gently dabbed
at a deep cut on his forehead.

'Too risky. Anything else out here won't give us time to rest.'

Reluctantly, she agreed. The travellers, who were now looking at
Mallory with new eyes, grateful but awed, picked up Miller's stretcher
and set off as fast as their weary legs would muster.

They hadn't gone far when the girl who had fainted cried out once
more. Mallory followed the line of her pointing finger to the place of his
battle. In a pool of moonlight, the creature was rising up from the ground,
body rejoined, skull firmly reattached. It steadied itself for a second, then
turned towards them.

'It's not going to let us go,' the girl moaned.

Mallory cursed, feared he wouldn't have the strength and the luck to
defeat it again, wondered how many times he'd have to attempt it before
the bony jaws were feeding on his own lights.

'Get moving,' he said.

'What are you going to do?' Sophie said.

'Just get moving. I'll catch you up.'

'You're stupid—'

Eyes blazing, he spun round, but his voice was low and moderated.
'You've got a responsibility to these people who trust you. And you need
to get Miller back. This is my job, for better or worse. You do yours.'

She marshalled the others without further discussion. They headed
off, but her voice floated back to him. 'Catch us up, Mallory. We need
you.'

Then it was just him and the thing sweeping over the grass, black
shroud flapping in the wind, jaw open in a silent scream.

He fought for a half-hour this time, eventually stabbing the sword through
its right eye socket before shattering its skull. He spent the next ten
minutes chopping the body into chunks no bigger than a bag of sugar
before lurching away, exhausted.

He caught up with the others, and this time they had fifteen minutes'
grace before the thing came at them again.

Three more times he battled it. Each fight lasted longer, each time he grew
weaker, picked up more wounds, undoing all the good works of the Court
of Peaceful Days. After the last one he was convinced he wouldn't be able
to do it again.

Sophie remained silent, but her eyes never left him. She understood his
suffering, knew there was no point in discussing it, but in her silence there
was a support that gave him an added reserve of strength.

The fluttering silhouette was against the now clear sky of the horizon when
they came over a rise to find serendipity. Scattered across the downward
slope were the picked-clean bones of soldiers, their shredded uniforms
blowing in the breeze. A tank stood silently, a hole rupturing its side;
Mallory had no idea what could have committed such a devastating attack.
And beyond it was a covered truck, the driver's door sagging open where
the occupant had been torn out.

Sophie saw it too, their hopes too fragile to voice. They ran down the
slope towards it with the last of their energy. Mallory scrambled in and
ducked under the steering column just as the creature whisked over the
rise. He ripped out the ignition wires with ease - he'd done it enough times
before - and sparked them. The lorry coughed, then fired.