01 Wing Warrior (26 page)

Nimbus nodded miserably. ‘I know. I don’t want the sword any more. I never really wanted it.’

‘That’s good, very wise.’ Guide held out his hand for Nimbus to take. ‘Come on.’

‘We’re going again?’

‘I have to get you home.’

Nimbus glanced at the sword before walking on. The blade glowed faintly, like it wanted to show him something almost forgotten, or something that was very far away.

***

Tidal didn’t know how far they had gone into the sewer, splashing blindly through the dirty water, but it was not far enough to muffle Cloud’s terrible scream of pain as it echoed behind them.

Tidal stopped, leaning against the damp wall of the tunnel. Glass was still clinging to his back, her breath trembling and full of fear. He gripped Sky’s hand as freezing water rushed around their knees.

‘Is everybody okay?’ he asked. He tried to sound as brave as he could, but his stomach was doing back–flips. In the darkness, the girls were nothing more than terrified breathing; just pounding heartbeats in the earth.

‘I’m okay,’ Sky said.

‘What was that scream?’ Glass whispered.

‘It was...’ Sky began, but she couldn’t think of a suitably convincing lie.

‘It was nothing,’ Tidal interrupted.

‘Was that Daddy?’

‘No, Glass. It wasn’t anything. Probably just an owl.’

Glass was quiet for a moment. Thoughtful.

Rats came scampering out of holes in the walls to ask the children who they were and what they were doing there, but as the children couldn’t speak in Rat, all they heard was a series of unpleasant squeaks and chitters that made them feel even more uncomfortable and afraid than they had been before.

‘Do you think Daddy could win?’ Glass asked, eventually.

Sky and Tidal moved closer together in the dark. Tidal could not see her face, but he could tell that she was crying softly.

He realised then that he had become the leader of the group. Nimbus and Cloud were gone. Now the girls would be looking to him for guidance. For strength. He couldn’t let them down.

‘Could he win?’ Glass pressed.

‘Your dad is a true Wing Warrior,’ Tidal said. ‘There isn’t anything he can’t do.’

A sad silence descended on the group. Even the rats got bored of being ignored and ran off to find something more interesting to do. The darkness pressed closer. Sky wondered whether there would be anything other than darkness ever again.

‘We should keep moving,’ Tidal said, adopting a tone he felt best suited his new position of responsibility.

‘We’re going to get lost down here,’ Sky said.

‘And it smells funny,’ Glass said.

Tidal grinned. ‘This is a sewer, think yourself lucky you don’t have to stand in the water like us.’

‘We need a lantern,’ Sky said.

‘Maybe Glass can help,’ Tidal said. ‘Do you think you could conjure up some more light, like you did when the goblins were attacking us?’

Glass gripped around his neck a little tighter. He could feel her heart thudding against his back. ‘I don’t know how I did that. I don’t think I can do it again.’

‘Can you try?’

‘I don’t... I wouldn’t know how to. I just thought about light. But I never... I didn’t...’

‘It’s okay,’ Sky said, touching Glass’s cheek. ‘You don’t have to be afraid. But you could really help us out here. Would you try to light our way?’

‘I don’t want to do it again,’ Glass whispered. ‘Please don’t make me.’

‘Oh, come on,’ Tidal snapped. ‘Grow up.’

‘Hey.’ Sky punched him in the arm. ‘There’s no need to be like that. Can’t you see she’s frightened?’

‘I can’t see anything. That’s the problem.’

There was a deep rumbling from the direction of the sewer entrance: The sound of rocks tumbling and thumping against each other. A rush of air came down the tunnel.

‘What now?’ Sky said.

‘I think we should run,’ Tidal said.

‘Why?’

‘I think Sorrow’s caved in the sewer.’

‘But what about a light?’

‘Forget a light. Cloud said to follow the tunnel until we reached a junction. I’ll hold on to the wall, you two hold on to me. We’ll feel our way out of this place.’

There was another crash as more stone collapsed into the tunnel, completely sealing off the way back.

‘I’m not afraid,’ Glass said.

Tidal grabbed Sky’s hand. ‘Good. Don’t be afraid.’

He started running as fast as he could, and behind him he could hear Sorrow’s throaty laugh: a wicked sound that made it obvious Cloud was no longer going to be able to help them.

They were truly on their own.

CHAPTER THIRTY

Cloud watched helplessly as Sorrow destroyed the entrance to the sewer with great swings of her dangerously large claws. She had discarded him among nearby stones, bashed and bruised but still alive. He knew that wasn’t an accident. She was keeping him alive for a reason. She intended to make him suffer.

‘You said you would leave the children,’ he shouted, when the shards of rubble finished clattering around him.

‘I am leaving them,’ Sorrow chuckled. ‘I am leaving them to rot down there in the dark.’

As she approached, the ground shook and ripples trembled on the surface of the lake. Her talons scraped and sparked on the rocks. Her tongue lashed hungrily. The whole world was cast in her bleak shadow. ‘You should be glad they will not have to face the same fate as you.’

‘You’re a coward,’ Cloud spat, bracing himself as Sorrow picked him up.

‘You dare to call me a coward after what you did?’

‘That was a long time ago.’

‘Hundreds of years is but a blink of an eye to an immortal dragon. And I remember everything like it was only yesterday.’

‘I did what I had to do.’

‘You hunted me, Cloud. When I was wounded, in pain, defenceless. I crawled on my belly, scraping away my scales on the rocks, but no matter how far I crawled, you were never more than a day behind me. Relentless and spiteful.’

‘You killed them. All of the dragons and all of the Wing Warriors. What was I supposed to do?’

Sorrow ran her tongue around her fangs. There were fragments of bones and meat between her teeth. ‘I had to travel to the very deepest place under the mountain to escape you.’

Cloud wriggled in the dragon’s grip. It felt like his insides were going to implode, and it was getting harder for him to catch his breath. ‘I didn’t chase you far enough,’ he wheezed.

Sorrow’s eyes narrowed. Her nostrils flared, billowing puffs of smog. ‘What kind of man are you? You lured me into your sneaky little trap, let all your friends die by tooth and claw, and then when I was weak and tired, you chased me, and you chased me, and you chased me.’

‘My friends knew the risk they were taking when they fought you. And I knew what I had to do to make sure they didn’t give up their lives for no reason.’

‘Are you sure you weren’t just trying to prove something?’

Cloud coughed and writhed. He could taste his own blood in his mouth. ‘I had nothing to prove.’

‘I think you had everything to prove. After all, you were Mother’s Wing Warrior.’ Cloud closed his eyes to disguise the pain and shame he felt. ‘You never told the children that part of the story, did you?’

‘Mother’s disappearance wasn’t my fault.’

‘But how humiliating... a Wing Warrior with no dragon.’

‘I woke up and she was already gone.’

‘I believe you made an oath, didn’t you? You all did. Twelve dragons, and twelve men. Fates intertwined. A knight for every dragon, and a dragon for every knight. Man and beast living together. Dying together.’

‘There was nothing I could have done. Nobody knows what happened to Mother.’

‘Legend has it that the dragons looked into the hearts of the men who travelled to speak with them, and they each picked the warrior who was most like them.’

‘You don’t know anything.’

‘You then spent every day and night with the dragon who had picked you, learning from them, growing with them, until each man was just as much dragon, and each dragon just as much man.’

‘Shut up.’

‘Losing the dragon must have been like losing a part of yourself.’

‘Shut up, Lizard.’

‘You must have felt so useless afterwards, so pathetic and weak. How could you be a Wing Warrior after such a failure? How could you be deserving of such an honour?’

‘I looked for her. I would have looked forever if it hadn’t been for you.’

Sorrow threw back her head and bellowed a heart–stopping laugh. ‘And wasn’t I a useful distraction? A perfect target for you to direct all of your hatred and self–loathing at.’

‘I had to make sure you would never come back.’

‘That was your excuse, how you rationalised your actions. But that’s not why you did it. Your pride made you bitter and angry, and pride can be so dangerous, can’t it? It can lead a man to ruin.’

Sorrow released Cloud and he flopped among the rocks, limp as a rag doll. There was dust and blood in his nose.

‘The boy, Tidal, is the same way,’ Sorrow said, lowering her head to speak into Cloud’s ear. Her voice had the quality of undrinkable water rolling over sharp stones. ‘He is desperate to prove his worth, to impress his friends. It will destroy him as it destroyed you.’

‘I’m not destroyed yet, Sorrow.’

‘Oh, but you are, Cloud. Just look at you. Destroyed by pride, and vengeance, and...’ She sniffed him. ‘Fear. So much fear. How delightful. What is it, Cloud? What scares you?’ She put one huge claw on his chest and pressed down. His ribs creaked under the pressure. ‘What made you become the pathetic thing I see before me?’

‘Death,’ Cloud gasped. ‘Endless death.’

‘Go on.’

‘The power of the Wing Warrior sword showed me a future that might come to pass. It showed me a lone Wing Warrior locked away in a dungeon. For hundreds of years I thought the Wing Warrior in that vision was me, and the thought of living an immortal life in a cage was too much to bear. I gave up being a hero. I became just a man. It was only many lifetimes later that I had a son and I realised it may have been his fate I had seen in the vision, not my own.’

‘A son? Of course. The young whelp who attacked me in the village. You wanted to protect him, so you kept your past hidden. And now he is dead anyway. Dead because you had not passed on your training. How tragic.’ The dragon’s eyes flashed. ‘But as much as I enjoy your misery, I feel our game is coming to an end, and you must tell me what it is I need to know. There is something you have been hiding from me. I have been able to smell it since I woke in the mountains. Something magical. Its power vibrates through the air. My scales are tingling.’ She ran one claw down the side of Cloud’s face. Her touch was repulsive and dangerous. ‘What is it? What are you hiding?’

Cloud closed his eyes and tried to concentrate through the heavy, flat pain in his chest. He had to keep Sorrow talking. The longer she talked, the longer Landmark survived, and the more time Tidal and the girls had to free Cumulo.

He licked his lips. The darkness of the night slowly began to thin out into the cold grey of the morning.

‘The disappearance of the dragons was more damaging than I had imagined it might be,’ he said. ‘The magic became unbalanced, and the vile taste of power turned many of the mages and wizards to thoughts of conquest. They started to tear the land apart. The fort became a strategic vantage point during the civil war, and I could not risk the Wing Warrior armour falling into the hands of a tyrant.’

‘So you moved it.’

‘I broke into the fort and took it away. I hid it far under the ground, burying it as deeply as I had hoped I buried you. I put it in a place that was haunted by the memory of legends.’

‘But why go to such efforts, Cloud? The weapons of a Wing Warrior are nothing without legends to breathe their magic into them. What else were you protecting?’ She removed her claw from his chest and moved her head so her snout was almost touching his face. ‘What are you plotting?’

Quick as a flash of lightning, Cloud snatched up a handful of dust and shingle, dashing it in Sorrow’s eyes. She recoiled with a scream of anger.

Using the last of his failing strength, Cloud pulled himself to his feet and began staggering away. If he could find some cave, some small alcove in the rock, perhaps he could hide.

He looked left, right. He was so faint the world was starting to spin dizzyingly. The rocks became grey and beige streaks in an insubstantial dreamland. Although the new day was fast approaching, everything seemed to be getting darker.

‘Cloud,’ Sorrow hissed, blinking the dirt out of her eyes. ‘That wasn’t very sporting.’

Cloud felt the terrible chill of the dragon’s shadow fall over him. He kept moving, barely faster than a crawl. Stumbling, scuffing his knees. There was no way he could escape. He was too tired.

Too weak.

‘You don’t die as easy as the other Wing Warriors did,’ Sorrow said. ‘I have to admit, you’re even more trouble to kill than the dragons were.’

She snatched up Cloud, looking at him closely. Despite everything, he allowed himself a small laughter of defiance.

‘Is something amusing?’ Sorrow asked.

‘The other dragons,’ he said, before finally passing out. ‘They’re not really dead.’

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

Tidal looked up. Shattered beams of smoky light filtered down through a metal grille, cutting out parts of his face from the clammy darkness of the sewer tunnel.

A rusting ladder, thick with moss and dripping sludge, was bolted into the wall, and led up to the grille. He squinted, but couldn’t see anything. Up there could be a prison, a warehouse, a coal cellar, or a room full of Lord Citrine’s finest soldiers.

‘This must be it,’ he said uncertainly, pulling on the ladder to make sure it wouldn’t come away from the wall under his weight. ‘We go up from here.’

‘Thank goodness for that,’ Sky said. ‘I’m not sure I could have coped with much more of this sewer.’

‘Can we go home?’ Glass asked.

Sky took her hand. ‘Soon, Glass. Soon.’

‘It smells bad down here, and there are rats.’