The Last Guardian of Everness (War of the Dreaming 1) (32 page)

The torch, huge as a tree trunk, came smashing down. Lancelot parried and rolled, coming to rest on his knees again, where he struck over his shoulder at another two fleeing creatures, who fell dead. The giant, pierced through the wrist, jerked back his mighty hand, bellowing, and the chamber was darkened.

“Doctor! Is me, Raven!”

“Help me to rise, good man.”

“How can you fight like this?”

“Reputation, my dear fellow. You have heard legends that I cannot be defeated in battle? Well, legendary creatures must abide by the legends, you know.”

The creatures had fled, some through doors into interior parts of the house, others rushed back outside. So great was the press of monsters fighting
to escape that the fiery giant was forced back away from the doors and driven many huge steps toward the seawall.

Consequently, when Raven, his shoulder under Lancelot’s left shoulder, helped him hop out into the courtyard, no creature of the darkness was underneath Lemuel Waylock’s snoring body, swaying on the rope to which Tom O’Lantern clung.

Raven rushed forward, dragging Lancelot, and caught the old man about the legs just as Tom, startled and blinded by Lancelot’s sword, let go and scampered back up the rope. Raven, overbalanced by the sudden weight, and desperate to prevent the grandfather’s fall to the flagstones, fell to the ground with the old man on top of him.

Lancelot wobbled but did not fall. At that moment, a group of men and women in purple robes, armed with hunting rifles and handguns, came running around the corner, shouting, “Azrael! Azrael! The Dark Messiah comes!”

Because he was on the ground, he was not shot when the robed men shouted, “Death to the infidel!” and opened fire on Lancelot. The gunfire seemed to have no effect on Lancelot; the bullets seemed not even to touch him. Lancelot, smiling, waved his sword in the air as if he were parrying, and the cultists slowed, gasping. One woman threw down her pistol and ran away.

A knight on a rotting horse leapt over the small wall separating this courtyard from the fountain surrounded by zodiacal statues. His helmet had three plumes floating from it, and his shield bore the image of a rotting leprous face.

“Traitor knight!” he called. “Infidel, lecher, and false friend to your lord! Turn and face me once more! My sword, Corruption, has drunk your blood before; now it will drink your life!”

He dismounted and drew his sword. Blood and mucus bled from the blade. “Turn and face me!”

Raven spoke from the ground, “Run!”

Lancelot turned toward the evil knight. ‘Ah, no, my good man,” he said
softly to Raven. “To be protected by legends, you have to live up to them, you see.” His face, blackened, eyeless, and scarred as it was, nonetheless looked young when he smiled.

The two knights exchanged swift blows, and, even though Lancelot could neither lunge, retreat, nor see, his skill and bravery were enough to keep the evil knight at bay. The poisonous sword of leprosy struck near him once and twice, scratching Lancelot’s armor to leave trails of stinking blood, but not penetrating.

Raven, on his back, could see Azrael coming over the rooftop of the south wing, swift as a falling star, flying on the back of a winged charger, and the steed’s wide pinions were luminous with light.

Wendy, from an upper window, leaning over the shoulder of a suit of samurai armor, shouted, “Raven! Where have you been? Look out! Azrael’s coming!” In her hand was a white spiral baton, tipped with silver.

Azrael whipped his steed with the broomstick he held, bruising her flanks. The slim colt folded her wings and dove toward Wendy.

Azrael was staring only at the spiral horn . . .

He flew to the window where Wendy was, and, sparing only a moment’s glance down to Lancelot, he casually touched his necklace and pointed below.

Azrael’s voice: “I revoke the protection of this house! The son of the Lake is now fully in the waking world and subject to its laws! Morpheus!”

Wendy drooped; Raven felt a powerful fatigue begin to close his eyes. Lancelot swayed, dropping his sword, and would have fallen, except that the evil knight embraced him and drove the poisoned blade full into his body with such force that the metal snapped, leaving a length of putrid blade within the wound.

Raven held up his hand as he had seen Peter do, with his middle fingers curled, other fingers extended, and repeated the names he’d heard Peter use: “Apollo! Hyperion!” Now he yawned, and forced through his numb jaws: “Helion. . .!”

One of the cultists fired and missed, then another fired. The bullet did not touch the evil knight but blew a bloody hole through Lancelot’s left arm.

Raven pointed at Lancelot, then at Wendy with his fingers. Lancelot woke, but the evil knight embraced him, pinning both his arms, and lifting his foot from the ground, and tore at the wound in Lancelot’s side with his fingers. The evil knight called to the cultists, “Put him from the misery of life!”

Lancelot raised his burned and bleeding head, calling out, “Face me blade to blade, cowards! Or do you fear a blind man?”

The cultists opened fire again. Lancelot’s bloody body was flung across the courtyard, his armor rent in pieces, while the evil knight, in the midst of the hail of bullets, was untouched.

Wendy woke just as Azrael, leaning in the window from the back of his hovering steed, grabbed her arm. “Yield me Clavargent!” Bullets flew over Raven’s head, as cultists continued to fire and fire at the fallen body of Lancelot. He did not get up.

The evil knight stood, facing Lancelot, murmuring some pious, condescending speech about the wisdom of death and the sinful selfishness of desiring to live.

Lancelot’s weak voice spoke, trembling and sighing, “Lady! I die in thy service . . . I pray thee now mine final prayer . . .”

Wendy shouted, “House! Help me! I’ve got the magic wand!”

Azrael said, “You must freely give it me, or I will dash you to the stones below.” And he started to drag her headlong out of the window.

A small, shrill voice with an Irish lilt called out from behind her: “Lass, call for the stones to rise up and defend their land in the name of the White Hart’s Horn!”

Wendy shrieked: “Stones! Like he said!”

The empty samurai suit of armor next to Wendy drew its katana and saluted. From the courtyard next to Raven, he heard the noises of lions roaring, pincers snapping, goats bleating, a bowstring singing, a bull lowing, and then the sound of stone on stone, as if an avalanche were marching.

Azrael laughed, ignoring the samurai’s drawn blade. “Fool! The stones may not shed the blood of Everness, nor that of the steeds of Celebradon! You may not strike me!”

The samurai suit of armor leaned out and slashed the reins in Azrael’s hand. Azrael was not struck, merely the reins, which parted. The winged colt reared backward, neighing, and Azrael let go of Wendy to clutch at the white mane with both hands.

Lancelot whispered, “Take me into thy realm, Lady, to the place appointed me, if at last thy forgiveness allow, that I might be healed of the great wound given me.”

The winged colt spun and danced in midair, wilder than a snowflake spinning in a winter storm, high in the air above the ocean.

Azrael screamed, “Euryale! By oaths from the World’s Birth I compel you! You are in service to the blood of Everness!”

The winged horse sang, “Older oaths than this bind us to the Champions of Day! In patience and faithfulness we wait, we wait until their need is great, and other duties then are dropped away!” And she kicked Azrael from her back, and he fell screaming into the sea.

The giant with the twin torches turned and watched Azrael fall.

Over the little wall from the other courtyard came a fantastic army. A stone lion, a statue with a water jug, a blindfold marble maiden with a balance scales in hand, a scorpion of rock, a marble bull. And many others.

“Well! Looks like someone remembered what the second defense of Everness is, I am thinking,” Raven muttered to himself. “But I thought that was Tom’s voice, and him a traitor and all. . .”

The cultists in the purple robes shot and shot again at the oncoming cavalcade of statues. Bullets bounced off stone or chipped away small shards. Two cultists ran away. The others were crushed beneath stone paws, pincers, and hoofs. Raven saw a stone lion pouncing, its marble legs red with fresh blood.

Now Raven reached out, grasped the evil knight by the foot, and stood.

The knight called out, “Do not be so proud! We are meant to suffer!” He kicked Raven’s face and forced him to release him, and slashed at him with the stump of his bleeding sword.

Raven had been in brawls before. While he knew nothing of swordplay, this was like a knifefight, since the blade was so short.

The knight stabbed. Raven caught his wrist as it went by, grabbed the shoulder, broke the man’s elbow over his knee. The knight shrieked and went limp, half-fainting. “Thank you!” he gasped.

Raven grasped him by the shoulder and hip, lifted him overhead, and dashed him headfirst into the ground. There was a sickening snap. Raven did not know or care if he were dead; he shouted upward: “Are you okay?”

“Don’t ask stupid questions! What’s happened to the doctor?” Wendy said back.

The fire-giant turned and raised its torches, crossing the courtyard in a single step. Raven picked up Lancelot’s sword and brandished it. The fire- giant squinted, hands held before its eyes, and the statue of a huge crab came suddenly out from the trees behind and hamstrung him with a sweep of its claws. Sparks, smoke, and blood spurted from the giant’s leg, a blood that caught fire when exposed to air. When the giant fell, a scorpion came toward its face, and a centaur with a bow and arrow leaped upon the giant’s chest.

Raven heard the sound of a gunshot from another wing of the house. There were calls and hoots from not far away; yet he ran to Lancelot’s side.

As he looked down at the still and bleeding body, a soft, warm light seemed to come around him. It was the light from the wings of the dream- colt, landing softly as a butterfly.

She said in a voice like silver: “Put him across my back. Swiftly! Dawn is but a prayer away, and I must outfly the gates of day!”

Raven slung Lancelot across her saddle and lashed the stirrup straps about his waist to secure him.

Then he looked at the gleaming blade in his hand. It was only thing he had seen that could draw blood from these unearthly monsters. Merely the gleam of it maddened them.

The colt said sharply: “Surrender the sword! Not for you came it from
heaven’s horde, nor will it shine again until its master is restored. Condemn would you this knight to the fate of luckless Freyr, to come to the final fight with nothing in hand but air?”

“But, um, I am thinking, you know, I could put it back later, after . . .”

“Steal no celestial weapon! I see you are your father’s son; it is his weapon you must find, a bolt more fitted to your kind, ere all is done.”

“What? Who . . .?” said Raven.

Wendy shouted from the window, “Raven! Give her that sword and get up here! I think there are people coming! Besides, you don’t fence.”

With ill grace, frowning, Raven thrust the sword roughly into the scabbard.

There were gunshots again; the sound of singing, praising the darkness. The fire-giant rose up and toppled backwards hugely over the seawall. The marble centaur bounded to the wall’s top and fired an arrow of stone down after him.

Raven rested his hand for a moment on Lancelot’s bloody back. He whispered a brief goodbye; the dream-colt was already rising into the air, surrounded by a halo of light. A sweet, refreshing scent came from her. “A better world receives him now, a shore which death knows not; use well the moment his life’s blood bought, a moment only will your enemies allow.”

“Wait! Can’t you help us! At least give me a ride up there so I don’t have to climb the rope!”

Magnificent, she spread her wings, and silver rainbows played across her feathers. Light as thistledown she rose, falling up away from earth. And when she beat her wings and galloped up toward the fading stars, it seemed as if the red beams of dawn pursued her, though she sped at comet’s speed. She dwindled to a star, fled north into the Little Dipper, twinkled, and was gone.

“Oh, Raven, how beautiful! But he’s gone,” said Wendy, beginning to cry. “He’s gone and will never come back! The poor old ladies in England will be so sad, the one with the cats, and the museum clerk and everything! They’ll miss him so . . .”

20

“My
Dwelling
Is in
Skule Skerry”

I

There was still noise of fighting coming from the house and grounds. Raven heard the distant sounds of bullets bouncing off stone, screams.

The sky above had streamers of red light fanning through black clouds, but the earth still was dark. Sunrise was still some minutes away.

“Climb the rope!” said Wendy, waving her arm. “Get up here quick! I’ve missed you!”

Raven stooped, picked up Lemuel Waylock, put the old man over his shoulder, and took the rope in one hand.

At that moment, Raven heard a ringing, thunderous report, an automatic rifle close at hand, firing a short, controlled burst of bullets. From a breach in the House’s walls made by the giant, he heard Peter’s voice, sounding
nearby: “Never check someone’s pockets ‘til you’re sure they’re dead, punk.”

An angry shout, another gunshot, whining as it ricocheted. Peter’s voice: “Control your aim. Like this.” A short, controlled burst of gunfire rang out, then a rapid clicking, as of an empty weapon.

Peter’s voice came again: “Okay, punk. Are you going to shoot, or what? Your friends are dead. Something wrong? It’s not so easy to kill a man in cold blood, is it?”

Raven, with Lemuel still over his shoulder, ran into the Chamber of Middle Dreaming. He found a door on this floor directly beneath the musicians’ gallery, one that, logically, should lead to the bottom of the stairs down which Peter fell.

But the short, curving corridor beyond was filled with carven masks hanging on the walls, and beyond was an archway leading to a beautiful library with carven shelves, where two seals in sailor’s uniforms, their backs to Raven, were throwing books into a fireplace.