Freeglader (21 page)

As the fire crackled, the swords clashed and the laughter continued, Rook looked about him. To his left, the wall was covered with a spectacular mural. It was a townscape, with tall, elegant towers and magnificent palaces, and a river running through it all. In the sky above was a swirling flock of ratbirds, a sky pirate ship, and a great caterbird flapping endlessly across the shimmering blue heavens; while in the foreground, staring ahead, were eight figures. A mother and father; six brothers.

Rook took a few steps towards the wall and raised a hand to touch its painted surface. As he did so, the paint seemed to blister and boil, the colours turning dark and the image of the family disappearing before his eyes.

Smoke – suddenly, there was thick dark smoke coiling up from the floor.

Rook could hear terrified screams and calls for help. He turned and ran blindly across the tiled floor, desperately searching for a way out amidst the thick blanket of choking smoke.

The next moment, everything was in flames – the rugs, the tapestries, the curtains, the chairs. And the smoke grew denser, and the heat more intense.

Rook was shouting now, with all his might, but no sound came out. He sank to his knees, the acrid smell of the smoke in his nostrils and the roar of the flames in his ears. Sadness overwhelmed him, like raindrops pouring down a window-pane. It was as if he could touch it, smell it. He was racked by silent sobs.

Then everything went black…

Rook's body felt light, like a fragment of soot or a burnt ember. He was being blown away on a cool wind, a speck amongst the ashes of the terrible fire which had now burned itself out. He was floating, high above the roofs, towers and minarets of a great city. He peered down.

Far below, there was someone on a rooftop amidst the smoking buildings. It was one of the brothers. The youngest one. Crouched beside a shattered skylight, tears streaming down his cheeks, he hugged his knees closely to his chest and rocked slowly to and fro, to and fro…

Rook flew on, light as air, in and out of huge tumbling clouds. And as he did so, he felt an elation growing; a wild, exhilarating excitement!

Suddenly, he was on a sky ship in full sail, its deck rolling and bucking as the mighty ship sliced through the clouds. He clutched the stout lufwood mast to steady himself and looked up at the aft-deck.

There, standing proudly in the elegant clothes of a sky

pirate, was a lad with dark wavy hair. Beside him stood the sky pirate captain with the plaited beard and waxed moustache. He was leaning over the youth, guiding and advising him, as the lad – his eyes gleaming and his mouth smiling – steered the sky ship, turning the wheel and adjusting the flight-levers.

As he watched, Rook felt the father's love for his son, and the bond between the two. A heavy lump swelled in his throat and his eyes misted with tears…

Rook shivered. He was no longer on the sky ship in Open Sky, but inside a tall, draughty building. Looking up, he saw a long, curved staircase, twisting away into dark shadows. Halfway up – a tray clasped in its front claws – a huge, translucent spindlebug slowly climbed the stairs. Rook could see the blood pumping through its veins, the three bulbous lungs rising and falling, the two hearts slowly beating as, eventually, the creature reached a landing and approached a large ironwood door.

It knocked and waited – one, two, three, four, five seconds; Rook counted them – before seizing the handle and entering.

A girl with dark plaits and large green eyes looked up and smiled as the spindlebug approached with its tray. She was at a table, making a vast mosaic picture out of thousands of pieces of coloured crystal. Standing beside her, looking out of place and ill at ease, was a young sky pirate of about Rook's age, with dark wavy hair. He kept glancing over towards the balcony windows, where Rook glimpsed the backs of a sky pirate captain and a tall academic, the two of them deep in conversation.

Out beyond them, past the ornate balcony balustrade, Rook could see a magnificent skyline. To the left, a dome-shaped building with a huge bowl at its top, rose up from the rows of spiky towers around it, whilst in the distance, a mighty viaduct set upon a series of gigantic arched supports snaked through the city. To the right, twin towers, their upper ramparts topped with curious spinning, net-like minarets, stood out black against the billowing clouds.

‘The mist-sifting towers of the School of Mist,’ breathed Rook.

There was no doubt about it. He'd seen them in the ancient barkscrolls. Somehow, he was standing looking out over old Sanctaphrax…

Rook shivered again, this time violently. It was suddenly icy cold, and he was in a great circular space, buildings towering above him on all sides. Snow was falling. It fluttered down in large feathery flakes, covering
every walkway, every rooftop, every road. Giant icicles hung from the eaves and sills. Looking up, Rook saw the youth again, at the top of what seemed to be the tallest tower of them all, so high above the ground it made Rook reel with dizziness just to watch him.

With one hand he gripped the balustrade; with the other, the hand of a girl as she dangled precariously over the edge. Clouds of condensation billowed from her lips, as she screamed and Rook could see her mouth forming three little words, over and over.

‘Save yourself, Quint!’

But the snow got thicker and heavier, a great white blinding blizzard, until all at once it obliterated everything from sight…

Then Rook heard sobbing. Quiet, muffled sobbing. The dappled sunlight dazzled him for a moment but, as he shielded his eyes and looked around him, Rook realized that he was in the Deepwoods, and that the sobbing was coming from a stooped figure on a path, just ahead of him.

His instinct was to approach and ask what the matter was. But something made him hang back. The figure seemed so distraught, so inconsolable as it hugged a small bundle and swayed backwards and forwards, its heavy hooded cloak flapping. Just then, a tall sky pirate brushed past him and approached the figure. Rook heard sharp words and urgent whispers, and the sobbing grew louder.

Suddenly, the sobbing figure knelt down, and placed the bundle gently at the foot of a tree, before straightening
up. Its hood fell back and Rook glimpsed a gaunt, dark-eyed face. The sobbing stopped. The sky pirate held out a hand and the cloaked figure took it and, as Rook watched, they walked silently away, not once looking back. Curious, Rook approached the foot of the tree and looked down at the bundle. He gasped.

It was a baby! A small baby, wrapped up in square of cloth, intricately embroidered with the picture of a lullabee tree. Its dark eyes stared back at him.

A sound made Rook look up, and with a jolt of surprise, he noticed a wooden cabin nestling in the branches of the tree above. Its circular door was opening. In the trees all around him, other small, rounded cabins were secured to the upper branches, purple smoke coiling from pipe-chimneys, and lights appearing at windows.

A stocky woodtroll-matron emerged from the door and climbed down the lufwood tree, huffing and puffing. Reaching the ground, she let out a shriek of surprise, before picking the bundle up. Rook felt a warm surge of love replace the icy chill in his chest. Before him, the woodtroll mother cradled the foundling, whispering sweet lullabies and tickling him under his chin. The baby cooed with delight…

The light faded and Rook was in the depths of the Deepwoods once more, tramping on through the night, his legs aching and his feet hurting. He was alone and without hope.

Suddenly, he felt a hand on his shoulder, and he found himself looking up into a kind, gentle face. It was the cloaked figure, but instead of the sky pirate with her, she was surrounded by young'uns of every description. Mobgnomes, cloddertrogs and red-haired individuals who hadn't yet turned termagant; woodtrolls, lugtrolls, gabtrolls and goblin young'uns from each major tribe; hammerhead and long-haired, lop-eared and tusked.

They
were happy, and so was she, her eyes burning with joy. Rook found himself laughing and dancing in the sunlight in the midst of the throng of young'uns. They were beside a lake – one of three, stretched out in a line – with a towering cave-studded cliff behind them and a tall, imposing ironwood glade far to their left. And as they danced in a big circle – laughing and singing – the cloaked figure looked on, a huge spindlebug by her side…

The sounds of laughter faded and were replaced by beautiful music and turquoise light.

He was in a lullabee grove, not in a cocoon high in the branches, but on the forest floor. Suddenly, all round him, he could hear thrashing and tearing and muffled cries. And he looked up to see a majestic bird standing on one of the branches, high above his head. Beside it, the cocoon from which it had just hatched swayed emptily in the gentle breeze.

It was a caterbird.

It preened its violet-black feathers and scratched at its snowy white chest with long, jagged talons for a moment. Then, turning its head to one side, it looked
down, and fixed him with a long, unblinking stare.

Rook stared back at it and felt his head begin to spin under its hypnotic gaze…

The next moment, Rook became conscious of beating wings, and the air whistling past. To his right and left, huge black wings pumped up and down, up and down, driving him on through the air. Below him, the forest canopy flashed past – greens, blues, yellows – an ocean of foliage.

He
was a caterbird! It was
his
wings beating;
his
beak open wide and
his
strange echoing cry.

Looking back over his shoulder, he saw a sky ship, with its billowing sails and sparkling varnished masts and hull soaring through the air behind him. And no wonder, he realized a moment later, for it was attached to a rope tied around his middle.

He was pulling the magnificent sky ship across the sky!

He opened his beak and gave another triumphant cry. The young sky pirate captain at the helm waved and shouted in reply. Rook turned back and flapped his wings, soaring ahead, resplendent against the sparkling sky.

But wait! What was that up ahead? A vast, swirling vortex of cloud and wind was hurtling towards him, and there was nothing he could do. He and the sky ship were heading straight for it.