Rachel Golden and the Retriever of Sin (11 page)

‘I think I know what this is.’ Everyone turned to look at Caroline. ‘I heard about this from another Safeguarder. The cat said you’ve been “served”, right?’ Rachel nodded slowly. ‘Well,’ the other girl went on, ‘I think it means that someone here in this Altworld is looking for you. And now they can find you.’ She nodded at Rachel’s hand.

Rachel scowled at the hand Kel was studying. She had tried to scrub the red off, but it was like it was tattooed on there. ‘But who would want to find me?’ she asked. ‘Who even knows I’m here? I thought we were just supposed to be finding out where the unicorns were going?’

Kel gave her back her hand and exhaled. ‘Yeah, but obviously
someone
knows you’re here. And probably wants to catch you as well. Remember that guy Toby mentioned? El? Seems kinda logical that he would be behind this. He already tried to trap us once.’

Rachel nodded. She also thought about the prospect of there being a spy on the Council. Should they say anything to Caroline and Rain? Kel was watching her and gave a tiny shake of his head. There he went again, reading her mind. But she supposed he was right. Could they even trust this other Hero party? Probably not. Until they knew what was going on, they really couldn’t trust
anyone
.

Rain cleared her throat. ‘Well, look, I’m really sorry about your hand—and thanks for the food—but we really need to get going on our own mission. We shouldn’t have stopped for this long.’ She looked over at Caroline, who was staring dreamily at Kel, and rolled her eyes.

Rachel thanked them for the antibiotics and wished them luck on their mission, which was returned. And then to her annoyance, before the other party left, Caroline leaned in and kissed Kel on the cheek. Rachel could feel her hands balling into fists. She had to force herself to breathe and calm down.

As soon as the two girls had left Rachel turned on Kel. ‘And just what the hell was that all about?’ she demanded. ‘So, what, she’s like your girlfriend or something? And when were you gonna tell
me
about her?’ She was almost shouting and Kel looked terrified. He held up his hands in a pacifying gesture.

‘Look, Rach, I would have told you about her, honest, but there’s really nothing to tell! We were at training together, that’s all.’ Rachel didn’t look like she was buying it. ‘And, well, um, we might have… kissed. But just once!’ He added quickly, seeing the flash of fury in Rachel’s eyes.

She turned away from him, hurt and upset, but determined not to show it. [I think you’ve already shown it, Rach –Narrator] ‘I don’t even care anyway,’ she said. ‘Whatever you did with her is your business.’ Part of her was annoyed that he hadn’t told her. She’d
thought
they had no secrets. She took a deep breath and turned around to face him again. She managed a weak smile. ‘I’m sorry. It’s none of my business. It’s in the past now, so let’s just forget about it.’

Suddenly Kel looked even more uncomfortable. He shuffled his feet nervously. ‘Um, well, yeah,
but
… We kind of kept in touch since training.’ He tensed up as he said it, like he was afraid of getting hit. And Rachel had to admit, she felt like hitting him. She folded her arms and stared at him, waiting for an explanation. ‘By email. And on Facebook.’

Rachel was about to go off again, but stopped, momentarily thrown. ‘Facebook? I thought they were from another dimension? She said their mission was in “our world”. Like “not theirs”. How are you Facebooking someone from another world?’

Kel started to explain about the server on the Council’s world, and how it allowed everyone to keep in touch even though they were in separate dimensions, but Ros coughed loudly. ‘Sorry, don’t mean to interrupt this little discussion, but shouldn’t we be doing something about that?’ He nodded at Rachel’s hand. Rachel and Kel looked at it, then at each other, and felt a little foolish. The dog was right. There would be plenty of time to kill the Safeguarder if and when they got out of this.

‘And I think Caroline was right,’ Ros went on. ‘That’s definitely a mark of being served. Whoever tried to trap you before, well, now they know exactly where you are at all times. And will, until we get the frick off this Altworld.’ He was looking very nervous, and chewing his doggy lip. ‘Ever hear the expression “caught red-handed”? Well that’s where it comes from. It’s not about being caught in the act, it means that once you get served, your ass is grass.’

***

‘What does this mean, “your ass is grass”? I am not familiar with this expression.’

El turned to look at the Overlord. It was weird hearing him say ‘your ass is grass’ in a voice like Darth Vader. They had been watching the scene in the globe. ‘You know,’ he said. ‘Smoked.’ The Overlord eyeballed him, and El felt his palms get slick with sweat.

‘I’m quite sure I don’t know,’ the unicorn growled. He turned back to the globe. They had been watching the Hero party ever since McKitten and Turtle had served the Rachel. The moment her hand turned red, the Overlords’ globe had flickered into life and pinpointed their exact position in the Altworld. And they could see and hear their every move. ‘Come,’ the shiny white unicorn said to El. ‘I want to introduce you to our successors. Once we have gone to feed in the Hero’s world, they will rule this one. You will serve them as you have served us.’

El had to bite his tongue.
Serve
them? Ha! That was a joke. He’d been using them all along to get what he wanted. Who did this circus horse think he was talking to? As soon as he had the girl and the Retriever of Sin, El would be out of there. He couldn’t wait to see what kind of inferior mule the Overlord expected him to ‘serve’ after they had left for Rachel’s world. As it happened, he could have waited. He could have waited a very long time. What the Overlord showed him was the most horrific thing he’d ever seen.

El followed the shining white unicorn deep into the dungeons and cellars of the castle. He watched him in fascination as they descended spiraling stone staircases. ‘Why are you staring at my feet?’ the Overlord asked in leaden tones. Oops. Though he was behind the creature, El hadn’t realized that he could see him. That’s what having eyes on the side of your head is for. He coughed nervously.

‘Sorry,’ he said, ‘I’ve just never seen a horse go down stairs before. I didn’t know you could.’

The Overlord stopped and fixed him with a steely glare. ‘I am
not
a horse, human.’ El swallowed hard.

‘No, no, of course not. I just meant… Sorry. You were going to introduce me to my new masters?’ The unicorn stared for another minute, probably thinking about eating El, then continued down the steps. El breathed a sigh of relief, and followed.

Down in the deepest part of the castle dungeons, only a few torches lit the corridors. El shivered and his breath fogged up in the damp chilly air. There was another white unicorn down here, smaller than the Overlord that was leading El, and who seemed to be a guard of some kind. It was a tricky hierarchy to figure out. As far as he could tell, the white storybook unicorns ruled the land. They were in charge of the feral unicorns, the scruffy scraggly ones with the rhino horns. But there also seemed to be a power system within the Overlord race themselves. Sort of like royalty, as far as El could work out. Still, none of it would matter pretty soon…

‘Do you have it?’ the Overlord asked the guard. The other unicorn nodded.

‘It’s tied up outside cell number four,’ he said, snapping off what could loosely be called a salute. The Overlord nodded and beckoned El down the corridor. He didn’t think he’s ever get used to the way these creatures moved. Their arms—if they could be called that—were oddly jointed, and allowed them a much wider range of movement than a normal horse. And their hooves were split in the middle. It allowed them to grip objects and hold tools and weapons. El supposed this was why they’d risen above the feral unicorns: Opposable hooves.

Outside the fourth cell down the row, an old feral unicorn was tied to a metal ring set in the wall. He was skinny, and sick looking. El noticed that patches of its hair had fallen out, and its eyes had that milky look of cataracts. He looked like he was about to keel over any second.

The Overlord untied the wild unicorn, and unlocked the cell door. El was very confused. What exactly was he supposed to be seeing here? The superior unicorn pushed the old one inside the cell and slammed and locked the door behind him. The confusion must have shown on El’s face. ‘Watch,’ the Overlord said.

He picked El up by the collar of his shirt and held his face in front of the small barred window in the door. It took a few seconds for El’s eyes to adjust to the gloom in the cell, but he thought he could make out the shape of another unicorn in there. But this one was
huge.
It snorted, then stamped a hoof with a deafening crash. The feral unicorn was physically shaking in the pool of light that fell through the window into the cell. As the other beast stepped forward, El noticed the jet-black horn on its head, shining like onyx. It inhaled the smell of the newcomer deeply, then lowered its head and gored the poor creature, straight through the chest.

El screwed up his eyes as the black unicorn began to devour its prey, but that didn’t stop the hideous crunching and ripping sounds from reaching his ears. ‘El,’ the Overlord said, giving the man a little shake, ‘I’d like you to meet the Dark Ones.’ El risked opening one eye. The black unicorn, or Dark One, had stopped feeding and had pressed its own eye to the window in the cell door. It shone red, and steaming blood dripped from its fanged mouth. With a snort it let out a blast of orange flame from both nostrils, and El screamed.

The Overlord, still holding El by his collar, turned around. The corridor, which was so long that El couldn’t see the end of it, was lined on both sides with identical cells. Occasionally a blast of flame would shoot from one of the barred windows. There must have been hundreds of Dark Ones down there. ‘When we are gone, they will be your new masters,’ he said. ‘Up until now we have had an accord with the Dark Ones. We feed them, and they do our bidding. When we leave for the human world, they will be released. You would be wise to treat them with respect.’

There was a wet splattering sound. The Overlord looked down. ‘Oh. You appear to be leaking liquid from your trousers.’ He put the man down and opened cell number four. ‘Dark One,’ he said to the massive black fire-breathing unicorn, ‘we have a job for you. There is a Hero that needs to be collected. Soon after that, you will be free. All the unicorns of this world will be yours.’ With another snort of flame the unicorn stamped again, cracking the thick stone floor as it did so.

***

‘Um, I think your hand is scaring them,’ Kel said, trying to be tactful. Rachel turned and shot him a filthy look. She was still sore about the whole Caroline business, but they didn’t have time to get into it right then. She was trying to untie the unicorns so that they could get moving. Ros was pretty sure that they should expect some unpleasant company since Rachel had been served, but the unicorns were spooked and wouldn’t let her near them. ‘Let me try,’ Kel said, warily.

‘It’s not your hand that scares us.’ Everyone stared at the unicorn that had spoken. Oh great, Rachel thought. Another talking animal.

‘Is there anything on this Altworld that
doesn’t
frickin’ talk?’ she asked. ‘And WHY do you all speak English?’ she demanded, whirling around to Ros and AC. ‘Shouldn’t you be talking some magical language or something?’

Ros raised his paw timidly. ‘I speak a little Spanish, if you’d prefer? And I told you: Temporal echoes. They speak English because
you
speak English.’ Rachel growled and felt like tearing her hair out. This was all way too much for her. She took a deep breath. Okay, one thing at a time. She turned back to the unicorn.

‘So you can speak? Since when? And didn’t anyone think it was important enough to mention?’

Now Kel raised his hand. ‘I didn’t know, I swear. And as far as I know no one else knows either.’ Ros was nodding frantically.

‘We have always been able to speak,’ the unicorn said. ‘It’s just that no one ever asked us.’ He shook his mane.

‘Okay,’ Rachel said, ‘so why are you speaking now?’

‘Two reasons.’ It was the piebald unicorn speaking. ‘One, we’re scared; and two, we want to help you.’

Rachel was hurt, and a little surprised. ‘Scared?’ she asked, looking at her red hand. ‘Of this?’

‘No. Of what that will bring. You are in danger now.’

Rachel had the feeling she already knew that. ‘And why do you want to help us then?’

‘You were kind to us. We are second class citizens in this world. That’s why we don’t speak. The Overlords use us as slaves, and… other things.’ He whinnied nervously. ‘They make us eat garbage. Do you think we
like
living that way? Treated like vermin by the other races? You gave us oats, and brushed us, and treated us with kindness. We’d like to repay that.’

Rachel looked at the others. Kel and Ros looked like they didn’t know what to say, and were feeling a little guilty about not being nicer to the animals. Assorted Colors wasn’t paying attention, most likely because the conversation wasn’t about food. She didn’t know why, and this was probably against her better judgment, but she felt she could trust the unicorns. ‘What are you scared of?’ she asked.

‘The Dark Ones.’ At this, the second unicorn, the dappled gray, reared up on his hind legs.

‘Sorry about that,’ he said, ‘I can’t help it sometimes if someone mentions the D-A-R-K Ones. We work at the castle. The one you were talking about.’ He pointed with his hoof at the map AC had scratched into the dirt. ‘We were told to help Toby, so when he whistled, we came. But now that he’s failed to bring you to the castle, the Overlords will send Dark Ones.’

‘And what will these “Dark Ones” do to us?’ Rachel asked.

‘To you? Nothing, as long as you cooperate. They’ll just bring you to the castle, I should think. But to us? We’ll be… punished.’

‘Hold on a minute,’ Rachel said. She was getting confused. ‘If these Dark Ones are so badass, why didn’t they just send them after us in the first place? Why bother screwing around with Toby and (no offence) you guys?’