Faery Worlds - Six Complete Novels (53 page)

I heard the unmistakable rumbling sound again, this time coming from a tree next to the big one with the monster in front of it. The black liquid and smoke were bleeding out of this new tree now, too. All around us, the trees were cracking, releasing the demons that had been trapped there, probably a very long time ago if the dark state of this forest was any indication.

I heard Finn's voice, but it made no words - just a sound. "Ahhhh ... " It sounded like the beginning of a song.

"What the hell?" asked Spike. "What
are
those things?"

"Orcs would be my guess," said Tony, sounding much calmer than I was feeling.

"What the fuck is an
orc?"
I asked angrily. I was feeling very strongly at that moment that Dardennes should have warned us that 'obstacles' could mean 'acid drooling orcs'. That was just common decency.

Tony sighed. "Didn't you guys watch Lord of the Rings?"

"I did," said Chase.

I glanced at Chase and saw him squeezing the handle of Becky's knife in one hand and the handle of his gun in the other, never taking his eyes off the monster.

"Any chance you can put the breaks on that green energy, healing thingy?" asked Spike with a nervous laugh.

"I'm not sure. But I don't think I should. Yes, it's releasing these ... things ... these ... orcs or demons or whatever; but if the trees are green, maybe they can help us."

"Not sure that's gonna matter too much if we have an army of these monsters against us. Vines and branches are okay for Ladies in the Lake, but probably not so much for these guys."

Spike had a point, but something told me it wasn't right to stop the awakening of the forest. It wasn't that I was willing to die for green trees or anything. My self-preservation instincts were alive and kicking, telling me to get the fuck out of there right now. But my trees hadn't let me down before. They'd even sent Robin Hood or whoever he was to help me once, so I had to keep the faith ... and probably kill off some orcs in the meantime.

The first orc we had released seemed to finally wake up to his situation. He was free of the tree that had kept him imprisoned, and there was a group of smallish pale things - us - standing in front of him.

The drool was freaking me out. "God, it keeps salivating. I think it's hungry."

"Wouldn't you be? Trapped inside that dang tree for who knows how long?" said Finn.

That was a cheery thought. I was going to be dinner, or maybe just an appetizer. Chase was more main course material.

"Stay close," said Chase. "We need to keep our backs together. If one of those gets behind us, we're done." He raised the gun up and took aim at the monster who'd taken its first step towards us.

I was just about to make a wisecrack when the thing lifted up its head and let out the most awful sound I'd ever heard. I'd thought that the water whore had the worst voice ever, but no ... this guy's was
the
worst. It sounded like a demon dinosaur. Not that I'd ever heard one of those, but it was what I imagined one would sound like. It nearly made my heart stop with fear.

Answering roars came from all around us. There were now at least thirty green trees, spewing black stuff, and ten of those piles of sludge had turned into fully formed, agitated monsters.

"
Fuck me.
This isn't possible! There are hundreds of trees in this place,
hundreds!
We don't stand a chance!" I was losing whatever cool I had left.

"Don't freak out," said Chase, the voice of reason. "We need to stay calm. Use your weapons. Go for the throat. Try to stay away from them as best you can. I think they move slow. If we can start running, we can outrun them back to the Green Forest."

"I think we should run towards the waypoint," said Finn. "How far into the Dark Forest is that last one, Jayne."

I wracked my brain trying to remember what the forest looked like when I was up in the tree. "Um, the waypoint is in the center of the dark area. Once we get to it, we'll have to go for at least a few hours to get out."

"Maybe Dardennes and his buddies will be waitin' for us there," said Finn, hopefully.

"I'm not sure that they know about or will be prepared for this little monster problem that we'll be bringing with us," said Tony.

With our luck, Tony was probably right. We couldn't expect Dardennes and his group to do anything to help us. All they'd done from the start was put us in harm's way.

The other monsters suddenly roared from behind me. The first orc roared back and then advanced toward us.

"Stay together!" yelled Chase.

I held up my sharpened stick. "Blackie, don't let me down!" I yelled, just at the moment when Chase and the monster started fighting.

The thing reached out to grab him and Chase brought his knife down, slashing the beast's hand.

I was jostled from behind and turned in time to see a slightly smaller orc, though still a foot taller than any of us, start grappling with Spike. Spike's slingshot was no help to him in this type of close-quarters combat. He landed one punch, though, at least throwing the orc back a few paces and giving Spike a temporary reprieve.

"Give me your gun!" I yelled at Chase. He handed it over without question. I turned and pushed it into Spike's hand. "I don't know how many bullets there are, so do what you can."

Spike nodded his thanks at me before shooting the orc right between the eyes when it advanced again. It stood there for a second before going down at Spike's feet. Spike shoved its shoulder with his foot, causing it to roll over and away.

One down, ninety-nine to go
.

The sounds of battle rang out around me. The guys had enveloped me in the middle of them, not letting me out to fight and not letting any monsters in to eat me. While I appreciated the sentiment, I knew I was an asset they had to use. I bent down and put my hand to the ground, checking to see if I had any connection to the newly green trees around us. I could sense something there, but it was weak. There hadn't been enough time yet for all of the things around us to come alive - with the exception of the monsters, of course.

Two orcs dropped in quick succession, arrows protruding from their gooey black bodies. One staggered away from our circle with its arm hanging, nearly severed by a blow it had received from the axe - the axe I was happy and proud to see drawing luminous blue streaks in the air each time my Tony swung it. The hum it emitted as it swooped through the air made my heart swell. It was obvious the orcs didn't like that axe one bit. They shied away from it whenever they heard its hum.

Shots rang out. An orc that had nearly grabbed Finn fell onto its back, thick blood coming from its neck in a gurgling, black tar-fountain. I worked to keep the bile in my stomach where it belonged.

The orcs were slow. It was the only reason we were still alive right now. I wasn't sure if they were always this way, though. Maybe they were still tired from being cooped up in trees all this time. We needed to press our advantage. Soon we were going to be out of bullets, arrows and energy.

"We need to try and run to the waypoint," I yelled. Maybe Dardennes would be there to help. I didn't think so, but we had to do something. If we stayed in this forest, in this spot, we were sitting ducks just begging to be exterminated. I didn't want even a single drop of that nasty acid drool to touch me if I could help it.

We went farther into the forest, staying back-to-back, moving as a group. The guys continued to fight the orcs off, while I kept trying to get a jab in with my stick when one of them got close. I wasn't very successful because the guys kept pushing me back, keeping the orcs at a distance.

Then all of a sudden, one of the orcs broke through our circle. He knocked Finn over like he was a piece of paper and came right for me. I didn't think twice, holding Blackie out in front of me, ready to meet him head-on. When he was less than a foot away, I saw his skin up close and feared that there was no way Blackie was going to penetrate that stuff. It looked like alligator hide.

Much to my surprise, Blackie didn't just penetrate it; it sunk in like a red-hot poker sliding into a stick of butter. The orc looked down, and the green light coming from my stick reflected off the slimy skin of its face. It lifted its eyes to mine and snarled, reaching its arms up. But they only made it a few inches before that glowing red light in its eyes went dark.

The orc's body went slack, and I jumped to the side as it fell to the ground, keeping a hold of my weapon. I looked down at it and saw that it was covered in black goo. The green light was still coming from inside, working to burn off the black orc blood. Within seconds, my stick was back to normal, no longer gooey and no longer glowing.

"Holy bat balls, did you
see
that Tony?!"

Tony was too busy to answer, throwing his lightsaber axe all around, slicing and dicing orcs left and right.

I stepped outside the ring of guys, confident now that my badass Blackie and I could do some damage of our own. I stood with legs spread wide, Converse sneakers gripping the forest floor beneath me. I pushed up the sleeves of my sweatshirt, quickly wiping under my nose for good measure. "Come on, you smelly bastards. Let's dance."

One of the smaller ones took me up on my challenge. He strode over, moving a little faster than the others. I could see Chase getting annoyed with me out of the corner of my eye.

"Get back in the circle, Jayne!" he ordered.

"No!" I yelled, a fever in my brain. "I'm gonna kill me some orc!"

I kept Blackie hidden by my wrist, revealing it only when the orc got close. I faked left, acting like I was going to run by it, with the intention of stabbing the orc in the side with my right hand as I passed.

My plan would have worked perfectly if the fucking orc hadn't closelined me. It stuck its arm out, making instant and direct contact with my face as I tried to run by. I went down like a ton of bricks, my stick never touching anything.

Another orc was right behind the one that had dropped me. It grabbed me by the legs and pulled. I found myself sliding across the forest floor, being dragged farther and farther away from my friends. I finally found my voice and screamed, Blackie slipping out of my hands to land in the leaves.

I kicked as hard as I could, twisting my body around and around, trying to get the orc to let me go, but the fucker had his claws good and tangled in my shoe laces and pant legs. The orc seized the front of my sweatshirt, lifting me up off the ground, and putting me into an unwelcome bear hug, pinning me to its disgusting body from behind.

The smell coming off that orc body was somethin' else. Four-day-old desert roadkill crossed with the world's worst body odor had nothin' on this guy. It was so bad I started to retch. The monster squeezed me to make me stop; and I did, but only because my olfactory nerves had gone numb. The smell was seriously that bad.

I heard some roaring and grunting as the orcs communicated with each other. Heads gestured to my friends still fighting valiantly. I felt so fucking horrible at that moment, knowing they had been doing so well, and then I had to go and screw it all up. Chase had told me to get back, and I didn't listen. He was going to hate me forever. I'd never get to kiss Spike. And Tony ... what was going to happen to my Tony?

The guys stopped fighting and the orcs backed away. One of them, a big one, was gesturing towards me. The orc that held me moved forward, showing the guys that it held me prisoner. I tried to tell them I was sorry, but the orc squeezed the breath out of me. I almost passed out before it loosened its grip. I used my eyes to transmit as much emotion as I possibly could.
I'msorryI'msorryI'msorry.

One of them grabbed some old, black vines from the forest floor and came over to me. It pulled me roughly from the other orc's grasp and shoved my shoulder to turn me around, grabbing my hands and securing them together with the vine behind me. I was now officially a prisoner of war.

The orc grunted and gestured to his friends, holding up a vine. Its intent was obvious:
tie up the others like the girl.
Now we were all going to be prisoners of war. On the bright side, though, they weren't eating us. Not yet anyway.

The guys put down their weapons and submitted themselves to our captors. Tony tried to fight a little, and one of them smacked him so hard he went down in an unconscious heap. He was so still and dead-looking, I couldn't help but cry out. The orc that had been holding me cuffed me on the side of the head, making my ears ring.

"Why you sonofa ..."

It hit me again, only harder this time, dropping me to my knees.

Spike shouted, "Stop talking, Jayne!" He ducked when one of the orcs came over to shut him up and took a hit to the shoulder.

The orc behind me pushed me, signaling me to get up and start walking.

I stood my ground. I wanted to walk with my friends. I tried to run over to them, awkwardly because my hands were tied behind my back, but I didn't make it far. One of the orcs tripped me, and I went down on my face, my mouth instantly filling with forest muck. I was lying on my side, trying to spit it out, when a pair of leathery, disgusting orc feet appeared in my vision. The last thing I saw before the lights went out was that leathery foot drawing back to kick me in the head.