The White Fox (30 page)

Then, through the haze of fear, an idea occurred to Jack. “Everyone, link arms.”

Bál looked incensed. “A love-in with greenskins is one thing, but there is no way—”

“Just do it!”

This time, he obeyed.

Jack hooked his arms through Lucy’s and Bál’s and steadied his breathing. These were creatures of pure Darkness, as Sardâr had said. So, the only thing that could harm them was pure Light. He now understood what Alex must have done to the bullets in his handgun, what Sardâr must have done on the balcony only hours ago—and, he supposed, what he must have done to his sword fighting the lobster demon.

It didn’t take much effort. He could feel the power flowing through the Seventh Shard around his neck, waiting to be challenged. He let it rush outwards, tapping into the essence of the elements around him—the rubble for earth, the humid moisture for water, the billowing clouds for air, and the burning debris scattered around for fire. Combined, they formed bright white Light, and it was this that every scimitar, axe, and sword in their circle now shone with incandescently.

“That is
so
cool,” Lucy breathed beside him.

The others looked equally impressed with their newly empowered weapons, even Bál, who Jack knew shunned any kind of alchemy on principle.

The demons looked momentarily perturbed, but with their numbers swelled, renewed their assault. Another hellhound leapt at Bál, but this time he was ready. Rolling forward to meet it under the highest point of its arc, he plunged his shining axe upwards. The hellhound gave an unearthly shriek as the weapon sliced through it like gas, the creature evaporating into black smoke and disappearing.

The remaining demons froze, snarling, coming no closer. They could not be described as a single conscious being, but the primal Darkness that made up their instincts recognized the power of the Light they now faced.

The group of elves, dwarves, and goblins began backing away from them, all waving their weapons like flaming torches in front of them as deterrents.

Jack heard a shout from somewhere behind. He turned his head and saw that their path to the bridge was now clear. Moreover, there were people in the middle of it, though these were not demons—he could make out the tall figure of Sardâr amongst others. “This way,” he yelled.

With a last wave of their weapons, they all turned and sprinted towards the bridge.

Jack did not look back to see whether the demons were following them or not. But he could see that the others were some distance in front of him. He stumbled and fell, breathing heavily, his skull feeling more and more as if there was some great pressure on it from the inside. He heard a call from Bál to the others up ahead and became dimly aware of the dwarf running back to him.

“Come on, elf … whatever you are. We’re not leaving you here.”

And Jack was slung over Bál’s shoulder and carried at a run towards the bridge. A moment later, he was thrown down on the rubble-dusted bridge flagons, Bál breathing heavily next to him.

Jack’s head was still pounding. “I … I can’t sustain it,” he gasped, and with a rush he felt the pressure lift from his skull. He leapt to his feet, suddenly wide awake.

“Of course,
now
you’re fine …”

But Jack ignored him, staring at Bál’s weapon. The gleam around it was fading and dying, returning to its normal state, losing its ability to destroy demons. Bál noticed what he was looking at, and, glancing back the way they had come, he saw that the demons had noticed it too and were now charging, slithering, or in some cases flying towards them at extreme speed.

“Come on,” Jack called to him, and they both sprinted the length of the bridge side by side towards the group Lucy and the others had joined.

They ground to a halt as soon as they got there and drew their weapons once more. The warriors they were now amongst were a mixture of dwarves and goblins, all looking distinctly battle weary, though none seriously wounded. Bál’s regiment and the goblins they had met previously had joined their fellows in slumping against the sides of the bridge and exchanging information about the battle.

Sardâr stood in the center with Lucy, Adâ, and Hakim. And behind them—Jack had to blink to make sure this was what he was really seeing—Ruth and what seemed to be most of the crew of
The Golden Turtle.
They turned as the two stragglers reached them.

“You shouldn’t have done that,” Sardâr reprimanded him.

Jack shrugged. “We couldn’t just stay in there and do nothing. What have the last three weeks been for? Besides, it was Lucy’s idea.”

She pushed him in mock anger. Her broadsword had stopped glowing too.

“And what are
you
doing here?” he directed at Ruth.

“Helping out, of course,” she replied, grinning. It took Jack a moment to notice that she and all her crew looked suspiciously elf-like now: Middle Eastern complexion and hair, and significantly taller.

“But how did you know to come?”

“I called them,” Sardâr answered for Ruth, holding up the alchemy-powered golden egg Adâ had used to transform Jack and Lucy into the likeness of elves.

Ruth dug into a pouch on her belt and pulled out an identical egg. “Such a good investment,” she said, regarding it proudly. “Oh, and I thought you might want these …” She beckoned to one of her crew members, who had a large bag slung over his shoulder, and took out two rapier-style swords, handing them to Jack and Lucy.

They discarded their medieval broadswords with relief and weighed their new weapons. The rapiers were much lighter and easier to handle.

“Well, this is odd,” Adâ remarked, glancing between the dwarves and goblins.

“Nothing like a common enemy to unite old foes,” Hakim commented.

Sardâr was exchanging notes on the course of the battle with Bál, as the most senior commander present. Then, as they shook hands as a gesture of respect, something began to glow. Jack immediately thought it was the weapons lighting up again but turned to see something on Sardâr’s chest shining with fiery red light. As it unstrapped itself from around his neck, Jack saw that it was the other Shard, almost identical to his. Even as he watched, it glided smoothly across to connect around Bál’s neck.

This had attracted the attention of most of the band of warriors. All of them, including Sardâr, looked nonplussed as to what had happened. Bál looked the most surprised; he had evidently done nothing out of the ordinary to cause this to happen.

“What in the sacred name of Rofhæle—?”

But his words were cut short by a cry from one of the goblins. They turned to look back the way they had come. The demons were much closer, gushing down the bridge like a tightly packed swarm of locusts, their crimson eye maws fixed unflinchingly on their victims like a single collective being.

“We can still run,” Ruth called out over the noise of the impending storm of Darkness.

“No,” Sardâr replied, drawing his blade. “We need to fight this out. There are people in that fortress who we have a duty not to abandon.”

Jack, Lucy, Adâ, Hakim, and Bál all nodded. Vodnik, meanwhile, seemed to have assumed command of all the goblin troops. He ordered them to draw their weapons and keep their ground, then took to the front line with the elves and dwarves.
The Golden Turtle
crew seemed remarkably unperturbed by the apparent wave of death that was washing towards them. They produced similar rapiers to the ones Jack and Lucy had been given. Ruth took her place between Hakim and Bál, her sword held ready in front of her.

“Just worry about your own weapon this time,” Sardâr muttered to Jack, standing next to him. As he did so, with no apparent effort, every axe, scimitar, and rapier around them flared up with the same white light as before.

Once again, Jack calmed his breathing and focussed his mind. It took a lot less doing this time. Within seconds his new sword was shining with the same light as everyone else’s.

They steeled themselves, and soon the demon horde was upon them.

Jack was only dimly aware of what was going on around him. He could see Adâ ahead, carving swathes through the darkness with her shimmering blades. The very sky seemed to be obscured by rushing black smoke as demons materialized everywhere. Jack took a swipe at one in front of him, slicing through it successfully, and it dissolved with a shriek.

He hit out at another demon, and an idea occurred to him. Summoning a core of Light energy in his right hand, he raised it above his head and tossed it like a tennis ball. The effect was like a grenade—an explosion and a surge of light as the demons in the immediate areas were extinguished. He jumped backwards, and, remembering what Alex had done, conjured five star-shaped shruriken in his hand, hurling them towards an oncoming group of bat-like flyers. Only two hit, but they hit well, sending the demons tumbling into the abyss below.

After a few minutes of frantic fighting, the wave of Darkness retreated, and the mortals regrouped, all breathing heavily. Two dwarves and a goblin were missing, either flung over the side of the bridge or dragged off amongst the horde.

“What are they doing?” Ruth hissed, but no one seemed to know. The demons were not only withdrawing but issuing back into a mass of obsidian smoke, which was pouring over the edge of the gorge into the pit below.

Sardâr turned to look out over the edge and shouted out in horror.

The gorge was no longer a deep, dull pit but a seething lake of dark energy, frothing and boiling like lava. Waves cascaded on the rocks around, disintegrating them. There was a deep rumbling sound. A column of dark energy, burning with the ferocity of a raging furnace, blasted upwards towards the broken sky. It was spinning together, the horde of demons dissolving their physical forms and amalgamating themselves into a single monstrous entity. A gigantic pincer, the size of a car, whipped out of the black tornado and clamped onto the side of the bridge, forcing them all to jump back. In its wake, charred exoskeleton pulsating with flames, its body no longer anchored in rock but free to move in the lake, rose the giant demon of the volcano.

The massive crustacean demon towered over them, its eyes burning with that demonic light that seemed simultaneously to be both darkness visible and an incandescent glow.
“Little mortals,”
it roared in the same mind voice as Inari but with a repulsive taste,
“We admire your perseverance. You would make good servants. Join the right side: only death awaits you here. We can give you power beyond your wildest dreams. You can become lords of this world, conquer many others, if you align yourselves with the Darkness …”

The voice seemed to be moving from addressing all of them to speaking to Jack individually. He felt the pressure of the creature as it entered his mind.

“Do not make the mistake of your friend. Put away your weak little Light, and step into the Dark. That Light cannot help you, but we can make everything you could possibly wish for come to pass. You will return home. Your friends will be unharmed and waiting for you. All very easy. All you need to do is put away the Light. Put away the Light …”

The world around Jack seemed to fade into monochrome, a great weight compressing his mind. His head was so heavy, he couldn’t think straight. If he gave in it would all be over, and he could sleep. He was
so
very tired. It would be so easy to hand over the Shard, and his troubles would be gone. He could take Lucy with him and find Alex. Leave these fools to their petty conceits …

Then he could just sleep.

Then he could just …

“Jack!” shouted Lucy.

His eyes snapped open, and he realized he had sunk into a kneeling position. The monstrosity was still above him, the twin cores of ethereal glow fixed upon him, but he forced himself not to look at them. To his left, Lucy, Sardâr, and Ruth were flattened against the bridge, compressed onto the stone by the weight of the multitude of thick, sinuous tendrils projected from the demon’s pincer. On his right, he saw some goblins and dwarves disappearing under the other pincer. And right next to him was Bál, still standing but lulled into the same half sleep as he had been. He wondered why the creature had not captured either of them, but he found the answer almost immediately. At his and Bál’s necks, shining with bright white and red light respectively, were the Shards of the Risa Star.