The League of Doorways (A Book of Vampires, Werewolves & Black Magic) (The Doorways Trilogy - Book Two) (13 page)

“Yes, the others will push their levers back into place – or maybe not?” he said thoughtfully. “We don’t have to worry about them.”

“So what happens now?” Willow asked him.

“We make our way to the station in Endra – in our
when
,” he smiled at her.

“We have a station like this back home?”

“Yes,” he said. “It’s part of the Great Wasteland Railroad. We need to be ready to push the leavers back into place when this boy Zachary Black hands the box to our Queen.”

“How will we know when the Queen is in possession of the box?” Willow asked, following Wally out of the railway station.

“We’ll know, all right,” he smiled, and then set off back down the railway tracks.

Chapter Twenty-Five

“We’re heading for the Craggy Canyon,” the voice spoke out of the dust, which hovered like a swarm of bees above Throat’s head.

“Very good,” Throat smiled beneath his hood. “You have done well. Was Cribbot at the farm house? Is he dead?”

“No, he wasn’t there,” the voice echoed through the black grains of dust. “
But there is another friend of Cribbot’s named Tamrus Turanion who might know what happened to him.”

“If Cribbot is alive, he could be a threat to us,” Throat gagged, as if he had phlegm wrapped around his wind pipe.”  

“When will you restore my people?” the voice asked.

“Soon,” Throat rasped.

“How soon?” the voice pushed.

Throat turned his back on the dust and moved across the chamber. He didn’t like being pressured. He would do things in his own time and way. The candles attached to the walls flickered as the dust followed him, casting a shadow across the grey stone walls.

“When I have the box in my hands, that is when I will set your people free,” Throat said, his voice rattling like a box of rusty nails.

“But you said I just had to keep the key safe and deliver Zach Black to the canyon,” the voice complained.

“So I have changed the terms of our agreement,” Throat spat back. “Pray that I don’t change them any further.”

“Why is the canyon so important?” the voice asked.

“It’s what lies beneath the canyon that matters,” Throat said.

“And what is that?” the voice asked.

“That is no concern of yours, my friend,” Throat chuckled. “Now steer the boy and the others towards the canyon. I will have a reception party waiting for you.”

The dust separated above his writhing hood and vanished like smoke on the air. Staring down at the Queen, his puckered lips twisted into a leer as his shrunk
en heart raced with excitement.

Fandel Black guided the Mortality Crow over the vast desert plains of Endra. From so high above, even he was staggered by how much of Endra had been eaten up by the vast desert. It looked as if the world below was being sucked dry. In every direction, the land was thirsty, arid, and cracked. He knew that Throat’s black magic was responsible, but Fandel secretly wondered how much of a kingdom there would be left to rule. He wasn’t sure if he wanted to reign over nothing more than a vast wasteland.

The Delf held onto him, her arms circling his waist. She didn’t need to hold on so tight, but she enjoyed the feeling of being so close to him. The Delf longed for that human touch again. As she leaned against him, she brushed her cheek against his, knocking the tops of the boils which festered on her face. The Delf couldn’t help but notice Fandel recoil away in disgust. He wouldn’t always be so revolted by her, the Delf thought. But how much longer would it take for her beauty to be restored? Even she was starting to become sickened by her ugliness, the stench of excrement that wafted out of her mouth every time she spoke, and her constant farting. She couldn’t even begin to describe that stench. She didn’t blame Fandel for being repulsed by her – but that would all change soon. Then, spying a line of rafter horses in the distance, she knew that she might not have to wait too long after all.

The Delf gripped Fandel’s shoulder and he flinched away, nearly toppling from the giant crow he sat astride.

“What do you want?” he hissed over the sound of the crow’s beating wings.

“Look,” she breathed in his ear. “I spy some peacekeepers. They must be heading for the canyon. They’re going to join the boy – Zachary Black.”

Fandel guided the crow downwards, its jet-black wings, folding backwards against its body.

Chapter Twenty-Six

Zach waited until sundown, and then woke Neanna. Faraday had spent the rest of the day rummaging downstairs in the basement – looking for anything that might suggest how he came about. It seemed obvious to Zach that Faraday was nothing more than a series of cogs, wheels, pistons, and springs that all worked together to give him some kind of life. But he knew that Faraday believed himself to be more than just a mechanical man. It was like Faraday was searching for his soul down in that basement beneath Der Cribbot’s farmhouse.

William finally fell asleep in the armchair across from Zach’s, where his eyes felt so heavy that he finally gave in and slept too. Bom woke them as night fell outside. Neanna smiled up at Zach as she pulled her cloak from over her head and let it drape about her shoulders.

“What time is it?” she asked him.

“Dunno,” Zach said back. “But it’s time to leave.”

“Did you find anything which might help us get across the Outer-Rim?” she asked, sitting up and combing her long, black hair with her fingers.

“We haven’t found a way to turn off the machines,” Zach told her, then continued to explain about what he and Faraday had discovered in the basement and the photograph of Der Cribbot and the Boulder man named Tamrus Turanion. Zach watched Neanna stretch and stand up, then an ear-piercing scream came from outside. William leapt from the armchair and Bom went to the window and pulled back the curtains.

“Get Faraday,” he barked.

But Faraday had heard the screaming too, and Zach could hear his feet thundering up the stairs from the basement. With his crossbows drawn, Zach dashed into the hallway to find the front door thrown wide open, and Faraday running up the garden path. Zach went to the
open door and could see that one of the Butter-Flyer machines was being eaten by what looked like an alligator.

Zach raced down the front path, and drawing nearer, he could see that the alligator had a long yellowy-green body, but with as many legs as a centipede. Each leg was long and spindly, like the teeth of a giant comb. They flexed back and forth as the creature tussled with the Butter-Flyer.     

The alligator – if that’s what it was, had jaws which appeared to be made of a rusty metal and snapped open and closed like a mantrap. The alligator clamped its jaws down on one of the Butter-Flyer machines, and it let out a high-pitched mewing sound as it screamed for its life. Its wings fluttered frantically up and down, and the alligator rolled it over onto its back as he fought to hold on.

“We’ve got to help it!” Neanna shouted, joining the others on the pathway.

Zach raised his crossbows and took aim, but Faraday was quicker than him to react.  Faraday pulled the skin from his right hand like a glove, revealing his mechanical arm once again. With a flick of his wrist, the arm hummed and whizzed into life. A series of cutters and tools sprung from Faraday’s forearm and fingers. He raced across the front garden and leapt over the front gate. Before his feet had even landed in the ash, Faraday had lashed out at the alligator and sliced the creature in two.

The alligator’s tail snapped about in the air in jerky movements, its spindly legs twitching until it fell still. Zach glanced over at Neanna who was sitting in the ash and cradling the dying Butter-Flyer in her arms. William approached Neanna and knelt beside her.
She gently stroked the machine until it fell still. The others were surprised by the affection she had shown it.

Neanna caught them staring at her and said, “It might have looked like a machine, but it was a living thing. Couldn’t you hear its screams? It was in pain.”

There was a moment’s silence as Faraday pulled the waxy-looking flesh back over his hand and arm. Then without a hint of emotion in his synthesized voice, he said, “We’d better get going then.”

With the Seek-Wasp buzzing excitedly above their heads, Zach turned to Faraday and said, “And that’s why I can’t say you are like a human. Humans have feelings.”

Without saying another word, Zach took the reins of one of the Butter-Flyers and climbed on. Neanna stood, and brushing the ash from her cloak, she climbed on board behind him. Faraday said nothing, but stood staring at Zach. Then, slowly he turned and went to the last of the Butter-Flyer machines. Yelping like a scared pup, William leapt onto the butterfly – sandwiched between Bom and Faraday. With her arms wrapped around Zach’s waist, she peered over his shoulder and watched as he gently pulled back on the ropes that were attached to the Butter-Flyer’s head. They slowly rose into the air, the creature’s wings beating delicately on either side of them as they gained momentum and soared towards the clouds.

As Zach and his friends raced into the evening sky behind the Seek-Wasp, Zach noticed that the sky had become overcast with a bank of drab-looking cloud. Zach looked at them. He couldn’t be sure of it and he doubted that it could be possible, but the clouds were changing colour. They weren’t reflecting the colour of the dying sun, but they were turning grey, dark grey, charcoal, and then black. Then to his amazement, the clouds suddenly began to separate, as if falling apart into smaller chunks. These chunks then broke up into smaller pieces, then into just wispy black fragments.

Neanna tapped Zach on the shoulder and shouted into his ear, “Look! Look at the clouds!”

“What’s happening?” Zach yelled as he drew his Butter-Flyer alongside Faraday’s.

“Arthropods,” Faraday said, banking his Butter-Flyer quickly to the right. William howled in fear, throwing his long arms around Faraday.

“Arthur who?”
Bom shouted.

“Arthropods,” Faraday said again. Then as if to clarify what it was he meant, he added, “Giant flying spiders.” 

“Ah you’ve got to be kidding me!” Zach shouted. But as he looked ahead, he knew Faraday was telling the truth. The clouds he thought he had seen were in fact finely woven webs. Spread out across the sky, each of them was filled with thousands of silky-looking eggs which were waiting to hatch. As they drew nearer, Zach noticed each piece, which had broken away, was in fact a giant spider.

These spidery-looking creatures with webbed-shaped wings swarmed around in the air as if forming some aerial formation, then to everyone’s horror
, they came racing towards them. And as they raced across the evening sky, they made hideous squawking sounds that pierced the air. There were hundreds of them and as they swarmed nearer and nearer, Zach could see that their bodies were black, hairy, and bloated. Although they closely resembled giant tarantulas, they only had six black bony legs and a set of wings that were transparent and covered in bristly-looking hair. But this wasn’t what made Zach and his friends’

skin
crawl; it was the sight of the dead peacekeepers, who sat astride each of the flying spiders. Just like the dead peacekeepers who had ridden the tiger-bikes, their faces were covered with those creepy-looking respirators.

The flying spiders were nearly upon Zach and his friends as they released a volley of darts from black coloured fangs.

“Don’t get shot by one of those darts!” Faraday shouted, as he screamed past on his Butter-Flyer.

“Why?” Bom roared back.

“Because it would be very bad.”

“How bad?”
William howled.

“Those darts are covered in a deadly venom,” Faraday shouted over his shoulder.

“That’s bad!” Bom grunted, as he now gripped hold of William.

Without any warning, Neanna placed one of her hands over Zach’s and yanked violently on the reins of the
Butter-Flyer. The creature rolled to the left and sharply lost altitude. Zach felt his stomach leap into his throat and he fought desperately not to be sick. Neanna banked the Butter-Flyer round then threw her arms tightly about Zach’s waist again.

“What are you playing at?” Zach roared back
at her, once again in control of the machine. 

“You had two of those spiders coming up fast!” Neanna shouted in his ear, her cloak flapping about her shoulders. 

Zach glanced to his right and saw more of the flying spiders racing towards them. But before he had a chance to react, Neanna had gripped his hands again and was sending the Butter-Flyer racing downwards.

“I have everything under control!” Zach shouted back at her. “You don’t have to keep taking hold of my hands. I don’t like it!”

“That’s not what I heard you tell Faraday,” she whispered in Zach’s ear.

“Oh, my god, you were listening!” Zach cried, his cheeks flushing scarlet. “That was a private conversation!”

“Not that private,” she smiled to herself, and yanked on his hands again, pulling the reins upwards. “I was lying on the sofa.”

“You weren’t meant to have heard how I feel about you,” Zach shouted over the sound of the volley of darts that whizzed just past them.

“Get a life, Zachary Black!” she said, her cheek pressed against his, as she reached over him and pulled at the reins. “You were hoping I would overhear you.”

“And why would I have wanted that?” he snapped, snatching hold of one of his
crossbows and firing it at an approaching dead peacekeeper.

“Because you didn’t have the guts to tell me to my face,” she whispered in his ear. Then, kissing him softly on the cheek, she said, “Swap places with me. You can’t steer and shoot at the same time.”

Zach glanced sideways at her, the touch of her lips still making his cheek tingle. He looked into her brilliant blue eyes and Neanna stared back. He wanted to say something – anything – but he didn’t know what.

“Stop staring at me and shoot!” Neanna shouted, pulling him from his trance.

“Oh, yeah – sure,” Zach mumbled as Neanna brushed past him, taking the reins. With lightning speed, he pulled his other crossbow free and unleashed wave after wave of stakes at the approaching flying spiders.

To their right, Zach and Neanna heard Faraday shout, “Get down! Get down!” 

William and Bom both crouched low on the Butter-Flyer as a volley of poisonous darts were spat from the spider-ship’s fangs and tore through the sky just inches above their heads. Neanna reared up on the reins and the butterfly machine climbed sharply upwards as several of the spiders zoomed beneath them and smashed into each other head-on. Zach glanced back to see them spin out of control as they dropped through the sky towards the ground.

Faraday spun his Butter-Flyer around and shouted, “There are too many of them!”

“Can’t you conjure up your doorway or something?” Neanna squealed over her shoulder at Zach.

“I don’t know how to,” he shouted.

“Some peacekeeper!” Bom roared.

“Even if I could, God only knows what you would change into on the other side!” Zach scowled at him.

No sooner were the words out of his mouth, then Neanna was corkscrewing their butterfly through the air in a desperate attempt to avoid another onslaught of darts that raced towards them. Zach screwed up his eyes and took aim as more spider-ships approached. Faraday raced his butterfly machine towards the ground with such speed, that Bom’s feet lifted into the air. William howled in terror as Bom held onto him.

“We’re gonna die!” Bom roared.

Hearing this, Faraday reached round and snatched the catapult from William’s pocket. In an instant he had whirled William around, forced the catapult into his claws, and said, “Stop your howling and fight, or you will most certainly die.”

Numbly, William took hold of the catapult and nodded, his long, brown dreadlocks flowing back from his face.  Looking over the side of the Butter-Flyer, his eyes burning bright, he spotted several of the spider-ships and took aim. He released the inferno berry and it whizzed through the air, imbedding itself into the bloated belly of one of the spiders. The sound of its body exploding filled the sky like a rumble of thunder. Its white, milky-looking innards erupted into the night, throwing the dead peacekeeper clear. Hungry green flames tore through the darkness like lighting, as the aftershock of the explosion sliced several of the spider-ships and the dead peacekeepers into pieces.

Zach spun around on the Butter-Flyer, and leaning over Neanna’s shoulder, he released a torrent of stakes into an approaching spider-ship. The spider shrieked as if in agony and then dropped through the air. The dead peacekeeper riding the ship hurriedly jumped up. Taking aim again, Zach fired into the respirator covering its face. The mask came free, revealing the pale face of the dead peacekeeper. It clawed at the air as if unable to breathe, its wide, open mouth flapping widely. Another of the flying spiders zoomed in close to Zach and Neanna, its web-like wings beating furiously.

“We’re outnumbered!” Zach shouted at Faraday as he went soaring past William
, who was leaning against Bom as he released another inferno berry from his catapult.

Within moments
, the night sky was shaking and glowing bright green, as a mass of the spider-ships erupted into flames.  Another of the spiders raced towards Faraday’s Butter-Flyer. It released a wave of darts. Faraday banked the Butter-Flyer to the right as the darts roared past.

“Take the reins,” Faraday shouted back at Bom.

“Why, where are you going?” Bom roared, fear brimming in his eyes. “You’re not leaving us, are you?”

“Just take them,” Faraday insisted, shoving the reins into Bom’s hands.