Key the Steampunk Vampire Girl and the Tower Tomb of Time (9781941240076) (2 page)

After that, up the Cursed Stairwell, was the Viciously Attacking Voodoo Vines; and after that was the Maniacal Mud; and after that was a Hall of Macabre Mirrors, which would make anyone who looked at their reflection instantly regret that they had.

There were so many curses to get through to be free of Despair that Key began to understand why no one had come down to the dungeon to visit her – all except Miss Broomble, and of course Warhag the castle cat, who (Key had no doubt) probably went up and down the Cursed Stairwell as freely as she liked. Everything in the Necropolis feared her.

Finally, the three companions came to the top of the stairwell and Miss Broomble stood before the dungeon door that had once been called “massumongous,” but now appeared to be lying in ruins. Someone or something had torn it from its hinges. Key was about to go through the doorway, when she and Miss Broomble both paused, as the familiar voice of an old man began speaking.

“I fear we have bigger problems, my dear Miss Broomble.”

Key knew the voice. It belonged to none other than Mr. Fuddlebee, the elderly ghost who had brought her to the Necropolis on the night she was turned into a vampire. But she did not know where his voice was coming from. Unlike Pega or any other castle servant, Mr. Fuddlebee was a ghost of much authority (being the head of SPOOK). Not required to follow the castle rules, he could appear and disappear whenever he liked. For all Key knew, he could have been right behind her. But his voice at present seemed to be coming from a circular device on Miss Broomble’s wrist.

“It would seem that Old Queen Crinkle has caused a greater disturbance in the Necropolis tonight than we first surmised,” his soft voice said, crackling through the peculiar device. “I have confirmed that Crinkle has hired Silas to help her escape the Hand of DIOS. However, it would seem that Silas’s rampage has also awoken two groups of Mostly Dead Mystical Creatures from their graves – the Goblin Gang and the Medieval Monster Mob. And both have a rather acute penchant for hating one another. The Monster Mob is presently roving about the Necropolis streets looking for anyone to poke with their swords while the Goblin Gang is looking for anyone wearing a wimple.”

Miss Broomble spoke into the circular black device on her wrist. “Any news on the Queen?”

“Why, yes,” replied the voice of Mr. Fuddlebee in an optimistic tone. “It would seem that she quite enjoys the taste of Snuckle Truffles. Every now and again, as she flees through the castle, she keeps pausing for a bite of one, especially the one flavored with the Blood of the Butterscotch Banshee. Not my particular favorite. I rather prefer Peppermint Pandemic.”

His voice fizzled away.

Key marveled at the way Miss Broomble and Mr. Fuddlebee were communicating. She had never seen anything like it.

“How did you speak with him? Magic?”

“Scuttlecom,” said Miss Broomble matter-of-factly, as though Key knew what a Scuttlecom was. “Compliments of the GadgetTronic Brothers,” she added, but before she could explain any further, another explosion shook the castle.

“Silas is searching for the Queen,” the witch said under her breath, looking up cautiously, as though the Cybernetic Cyclops might make the castle collapse upon their heads with the next blow. “Come on,” she said, now returning her attention to Key, grabbing her hand to lead her through the dungeon door. “I’ll explain more later. For now, let’s hurry.”

— CHAPTER TWO —

A Magical Incantation

Key took Miss Broomble’s hand and followed after her. The witch had just gone through the dungeon door when she almost collided into two other vampires who happened to be hurrying past right at that very moment. Key, however, was not so fortunate.

CRASH!

The two other vampires plowed straight into her and all three went tumbling along the floor. Key was not hurt badly, and was back on her feet in an instant. Then she saw the two others she’d collided with, and to her dismay, she knew them.

Raithe and Crudgel.

Raithe was the frail, pale vampire girl with thin lips, a pointed nose, short blonde hair, and dark rings around her eyes, who had called Key a “troll” exactly two hundred and fifty years ago – a wretched nickname that had stuck ever since. By all outward appearances, Raithe seemed only a few years older than Key, but for all she knew, Raithe could have been centuries older. Regardless of this, there had never seemed a more scheming, crueler, heartless vampire than Raithe – aside from Old Queen Crinkle, that is.

Crudgel was more like Raithe’s pet than her friend. Looking a little older than her, he was tall and thick, with long black hair and a ring in his nose like a bull. To Key he smelled like a bull, too, for he seemed to know as much about bathtubs as he knew about geometry or knitting.

He got to his feet quickly, but Raithe stayed on the ground, moaning, trying to tell Crudgel how she must have been run over by the Barely Dead Beast of Blackpool. She was just explaining how she could have easily leaped out of its way but chose to take the hit for his sake, when she happened to notice that he wasn’t paying any attention to her. Instead he was staring at Key in puzzlement.

“Aren’t you listening to me?” she demanded. “I saved your —” she had started to say, but stopped and followed his gaze.

For a moment or two, Raithe and Crudgel gaped at Key, as if she were a ghost servant who had just materialized. They appeared to be pondering all sorts of punishments they could lawfully (and perhaps unlawfully) inflict upon her, but then they realized that she wasn’t a ghost. Was she a goblin? No. An ogre? No. A troll? Maybe. They had no idea who or what she was. Then, slowly, a look of recollection spread across Raithe’s face, which melted almost that same instant into a look of unhidden disgust. Her eyes narrowed into a menacing glare as she pointed her thin finger at Key.

“Who let you out of the dungeon, Troll,” she growled.

Tudwal growled back at her in response. Oh, if only there had been a half-moon that night, he would have promptly transformed into a twelve-foot tall wolf monster and bitten her into tomorrow. But even as a puppy, his growl did sound threatening enough to make Raithe crawl backwards and hide behind Crudgel – and by the speed with which she moved, you might have thought Warhag had just crossed the hallway.

Raithe started shoving Crudgel from behind, cajoling him, insisting that only real vampires hit puppies.

Tudwal snarled at him upon hearing this.

As Crudgel was only slightly more afraid of Raithe than he was of Tudwal, he started timidly creeping towards the immortal puppy. Fortunately for him, he could breathe a sigh of relief when Miss Broomble stepped between them.

Being much taller than both Raithe and Crudgel, the witch had no fear of either. Key had known her friend for almost a century, and she had an idea that she was indeed brave, but she had not seen her fearlessness in action until now.

“Key is with me,” Miss Broomble said through her half-mask, boldly staring down Raithe and Crudgel.

They blinked in some confusion. Then they glanced at one another with questioning expressions, mouthing, “Key who?”

Miss Broomble gave them a withering look as she gestured towards Key. “She’s the one you refer to as a
troll
,” she said, not bothering to hide the irritation in her voice.

“Oh right,” said Raithe and Crudgel together, trying to be uncommonly polite, even though Key could tell they still didn’t remember her name.

“Besides,” said Miss Broomble, “I think you’ve got bigger problems. A Cybernetic Cyclops is attacking your castle.”

“Silas?” asked Raithe, now in an incredulous tone.

As if on cue, another shudder suddenly rocked the castle. It sounded farther in the distance, but no less threatening. Silas had moved his attack to another part of the castle.

“Your home might not last long against him,” Miss Broomble remarked. “If all you Keepers of the Dead – including you two Deadlings – don’t defend it, there might not be much of a resting place for you before the end of this night.”

“But,” Crudgel complained, “Galfridus said we could stay in and play Pundicle.”

“Hush,” hissed Raithe as she glared at Miss Broomble. “How do you know it’s Silas?”

“I’ve seen him,” said Key, which was half-true. When Silas had knocked a hole in the dungeon, she had seen only his giant legs. One was flesh and bone; the other was made of moving parts like wheels and gears and a locomotive engine.

“That Old Queen stole my plan to take over the Necropolis,” gasped Raithe in disbelief, turning to Crudgel with a horrified look. “Did you tell her?”

His eyes went wide with fear and he started fidgeting. “Well,” he muttered nervously, “it might have slipped out a few nights ago, when I had too much strawberry blood nectar. Sorry.”

Raithe looked so angry her white face turned as red as a blister. “When this is all over,” she hissed at him, “I’m going to turn you into a —”

But he never got to hear whether she might turn him into a newt or a rhinoceros (which she’d done on a few occasions, usually at potion parties), for right at that moment, several large explosions thundering in the distance were so powerful that the whole castle shook.

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!!!

“Oh no!” yipped Crudgel in alarm. “The kitchen is being attacked. All those delicious blood foods are being wasted!”

“Do you only think of your stomach?” Raithe criticized.
 

But he didn’t seem to hear her as he was hurriedly lumbering off down the hall.

“Perhaps,” suggested Miss Broomble, smirking at the frail, pale vampire girl, “you might consider enlisting the aid of the Toags, or maybe even begging some assistance from Warhag – if she’s feeling merciful and doesn’t eat you first.”

Raithe then faced Miss Broomble and Key. Anger blazed in her eyes as she focused all her outrage on them. “I don’t care if a giant destroys the whole castle. Don’t think you’ll get away with letting the troll out of the dungeon. Just because you are a witch doesn’t mean you’re the only one who can use magic.”

Raithe then held out her hand, cleared her throat, and recited, “Fire, fire, burning ire, fry my foes within your pyre.” A purple flame appeared on the palm of her hand and she started to throw it at Key.

Now, Miss Broomble was a very skilled witch – “the best there is,” Mr. Fuddlebee used to say – and in her long lifetime, she had been in many Magical Duels with many Mystical Creatures much more skilled with incantations than Raithe. So it was with little effort that the witch now waved her hand at Raithe’s small magic fire and incanted, “
Sana me DIOS
.”

The purple flame in Raithe’s hand vanished in a puff of smoke. Her eyes went wide with surprise and sudden pain. She grabbed her wrist in shock and she fell to her knees. But this only seemed to kindle her anger even more. With a burst of hate she spat out another strike of magic.

“Wind of power, wind of might, blow away my foes this very night.”

Hardly before she’d finished speaking, Miss Broomble started to intone the first few words of another incantation, but she was cut short, too, when Key stepped forward.
 

Keeping eye contact with Raithe, pointing past her shoulder, Key incanted in a powerful voice: “
DIOS ut liberes me
.”

As if lifted up and carried by a forceful wind that Key could not feel, Raithe was suddenly hurtled far down the long hallway like a tumbleweed. The blast sent her so far off into the distant darkness that Key lost complete sight of her.

— CHAPTER THREE —

The Dimensionally Intelligent Operating System

Tudwal began chasing after Raithe, thinking that it was time to play fetch, but Key called him back. He whimpered and hung his head dejectedly, evidently quite upset that he could not bring the frail vampire girl back like a stick.

“The decimation of the castle isn’t playtime,” Miss Broomble said to him as she fixed her eyes on Key with a look of astonishment. “Where did you learn magic?”

“That’s the only incantation I know,” Key confessed. “I read about it in
Wanda Wickery’s History of the Necropolis
, the little book Mr. Fuddlebee gave me long ago. It was lost when the dungeon flooded, or else I’d show you where I found that incantation. It had been in the part about Modwenna, the first witch buried in the Necropolis, though I think it was called the ‘Catacombs’ then.”

“Modwenna used to love that incantation,” Miss Broomble reflected in a distant voice, as if recalling a long forgotten memory of that ancient witch.

“Modwenna.” Key recalled the name. She’d always thought it had a lovely sound. But it also seemed as if Miss Broomble were quite familiar with it, too.

“Did you know the first witch?”

“I’m not that old,” chuckled Miss Broomble, although her amusement was fleeting. The next moment she became rather somber. “I’ve read Wanda Wickery’s book several times. I don’t recall that incantation being in her story.” Miss Broomble considered this very briefly right before another explosion shook the castle again. Taking Key’s hand, the witch began leading her away from the dungeon door, towards the less perilous parts of the castle.

Yet even though there were fewer dangers along Miss Broomble’s route, it was still quite deadly, and once or twice Key almost lost a finger or an arm, and Tudwal a leg. There were the usual Red Rodents and Shadow Spiders that Key had encountered in the dungeon. But there were also deadly tricks of the light and poisonous whispers in the dark. Cursed stones would fling themselves at Key’s head. Hexed torch sconces in the shape of claws would snatch at Miss Broomble’s neck. Living shadows leered at Tudwal and salivated with hunger.

While they hurried, Key thought back on how she had read the words, how they had danced off the page in shapes of sparkling dust, and how they had swirled around her like snow in a globe, forming images of the very things she read about. Yes, indeed, Key had seen that incantation written perhaps not in the book, but most definitely in the shimmering words.

“I’m not lying,” she insisted. “The incantation was in the book.”

“I believe you,” Miss Broomble reassured her as she purposefully smashed a magic mirror, wherein her reflection was inviting her to have a sit down with arsenic tea. “Sometimes books show readers different things.”