The Moon Stealers and The Children of the Light (22 page)

‘If we can get outside we can enter the Council Room
from behind,' shouted Tracker to Steven. 'Their focus will be on the corridor.’

In three strides they had crossed the room and were
standing at the external door. In the rapidly darkening sky the black
silhouettes of the creatures swarmed together in clouds. It was almost like
they could feel the tension unfolding in the house below them. When the time
was right they would swoop down and feed off the remains.

Tracker tried the handle of the door, it was firmly
locked. He looked around the room. There was a wooden desk with a studded green
leather top to one side of the room with a sturdy looking chair tucked beneath.
Tracker hung the strap of his gun over his shoulder and dragged the heavy chair
towards the window.

‘Wait,’ said Steven, realising what Tracker had in
mind. ‘If we smash the window the creatures will be able to get inside the
house.’

‘Two more of the survivors are down,’ shouted
Georgia
as she stepped into the room with a look of panic on
her face. ‘There’s nowhere for them to find cover in the corridor. We're too
vulnerable.’

‘
Georgia
, we’re going round the outside. As soon as we're gone
barricade the external door immediately. We have to delay the creatures getting
inside.’

‘Once we’ve got this situation under control we will
find the antibiotics. I just hope there’s enough to go around.’

Tracker and Steven lifted the chair up from both sides
and launched it towards the external door. There was an explosion of glass that
cascaded onto the paved area outside. They quickly stepped through the gap in
the door and into the garden they had been in the previous night. They edged
along the cream stone wall, past a room that had two windows overlooking the
garden, towards a series of steps that led up to the double doors of the
Council Room. In the darkness they could see the crackle of orange as shot
after shot burst from the room towards the corridor.

Tracker peered through the nearest pane of glass. He
could see four people crouched down behind the bookshelf taking it in turns
raising their guns above the furniture to fire at the survivors in the
corridor. When two of them weren’t shooting, they were loading more bullets
into their weapons. Although he recognised one person as Wanda, the leader they
had met at the Bank of England, he couldn’t see the formidable figure of
Coldred anywhere.

Steven looked up into the sky, the creatures were
venturing nearer to them, and swooping down to see what they could feast on. A
black leathery shape descended towards the shattered remains of the door behind
them. It began to crawl through the gap only to explode into a helpless mass of
flesh and liquid that drained onto the patio. Steven knew that had been the
handiwork of
Georgia
and her shotgun.

Meanwhile, Tracker had crept up to the patio doors as
stealthily and silently as a cat. He grasped the handle of one of the doors,
but it wouldn’t turn.

The constant gunfire erupting from inside the Council
Room would surely have claimed more of the survivor's life's by now.

Tracker and Steven needed to act quickly.

The castle Max and Joe approached appeared to have
curved edges on every surface. Clinging to the sand coloured blocks of the
walls was red ivy mixed with pale blue flowers that wound round and embraced
the building. The battlements around the top of the castle were unmanned, but they
could see the top of a low pitched wooden roof that stretched from the perimeter
walls to the centre of the round castle before sweeping gracefully upwards,
like the roof of a circus tent. In the centre was a narrow metal pole that
pointed towards the sky and at the very top a flag fluttered gently.

An empty moat surrounded the thick stone base of the castle
walls and seemed to cut in beneath the castle slightly so that the roots of the
ivy and grass hung limply in the air above the redundant trench. Max and Joe peered
down at the dry cracked base of the moat. It had been some time since water had
filled the trench, but in Avalon, such defences for a castle were not needed.

The path they had been following took them directly to
a fantastically ornate bridge. The sides towered high above them, as if they
had been designed to shield giants. Each side was made up of intricately woven
metal strands that twisted and turned, just like the ivy on the wall. Delicate
metal leaves burst from the strands as if they were alive. Huge statues of
knights lined the way like immovable guards to the castle. The nearer the two
boys got to the entrance of the castle the more immersed in the bridge they
became. Ahead of them, the statues of the knights had their swords, spears, and
pikes drawn and held aloft, forming a grand ceremonial arch that the boys would
have to walk beneath if they wanted to enter the castle.

With some hesitation the boys walked beneath the metal
swords, into the shadow they created and beneath the thick stone outer wall of
the castle and into a dark circular room. To the side of the room a furnace crackled
and spat as fire heated the coals and wood, making the room glow orange and creating
dancing shadows around the walls. In the centre was a tall plinth with a large
marble sphere balanced weightlessly on the top, whilst at the base a pool of
water had collected. The stone floor of the castle sloped into the water, seeming
to become progressively deeper towards the plinth. Scattered across the surface
of the water were fresh lotus flowers that seemed to be suspended in mid air,
the water flawlessly reflecting the orange glow from the light above making it
appear transparent.

Apart from the two of them, they appeared to be alone.

Above them they could see the underneath of the wooden
roof, its brown beams lined up perfectly towards the centre of the room before
bending up to a point directly above the plinth.

Max turned towards the water. He thought he had heard
the gentle sound of water being disturbed. The sea of lotus flowers began to
part as a figure of a woman slowly emerged from the water, rising as she walked
up the sloped floor towards them. Her slender body was clothed in a green dress
that clung to her. Her skin shone white whilst her black hair hung perfectly
straight over her shoulders, framing her face and the wide eyes that watched
the boys.

She walked barefoot towards them.

‘Welcome to my home.’ She spoke softly, but the sound
seemed to carry and echo around the circular room. ‘Only the paths of a few
ever find their way to my castle. And, very rarely are they the paths of living
souls.’

‘We were told to come here by Sir Edgar Gorlois, one
of King Arthur’s knights, to return one of the twelve swords of power to you,’
said Max, holding out Ethera for her to take.

But the lady did not reach out for the sword.

‘You may have seen Sir Edgar and his brothers guarding
the bridge you just passed over,’ she paused as Joe and Max simultaneously looked
back towards the entrance, surprised that they had not recognised their friend.
‘All of the knights that carried a sword have honoured you by lining the way.’

She gracefully moved around the room, picked up a jug
from a small table and poured the contents into the water around the plinth.
She then turned her back on the pool of water and walked towards the table. As
she did so, the water began to part once more, as it had done when she had
first emerged, but this time, eleven metal crosses pushed through the surface.
Within seconds, the boys realised that they were not crosses at all, but the
handles of eleven swords standing upright. The blades slid easily out of the
water, hardly disturbing the surface. As they lifted higher out of the water, they
could see that each sword was embedded within a ring of roughly cut stone. Once
they stopped moving they became aware of a rough grating sound that seemed to
be coming from somewhere near the sphere on top of the plinth. Slowly a large
gold bladed sword slid out of the sphere, its tip pointing upwards towards the
centre of the ceiling.

‘My name is Nimue, Priestess of Avalon. I forged these
swords many, many years ago, but it was the Elixir of Life that gave them their
magical powers. Over the years all of the other swords have returned to me. All
except for Ethera.’

‘Take it,’ replied Max, unsure what was about to
happen. ‘Please.’

‘No. You are the swords current owner; you must be the
one to complete the family.’

‘What do you mean?’ asked Joe.

‘Ethera is the remaining female sword. All of the
twelve swords are female, and all are paired to the greatest male sword that I
have ever forged - Excalibur, the legendary sword of King Arthur. As the last
surviving owner of one of the swords, when the family is complete you will have
complete control over all of the swords, including Excalibur. But, that power
is only temporary. Once they are united, the magic of the swords will begin to be
absorbed back into the Elixir of Life, they were only given to the guardians of
the mortal world as a gift that would eventually need to be returned.’

Max had already seen the empty stone that was waiting
to take Ethera. As soon as he placed the sword inside the stone, he would have
control over all thirteen swords. Doubts flashed through his mind - how could
he get the swords to act like Ethera had under Edgar’s control when they had
been in the forest clearing? He recalled the words that Edgar had once spoken,
if
the sword doesn’t suit the user then it is nothing more than a flat piece of
metal
. This made Max feel even more uncertain.

He wasn’t the true owner of the sword. He had just picked
it up when Edgar had fallen and brought it into Avalon. He could feel the
handle of the sword within his grip. Suddenly it felt hot, almost too hot to
hold. The future of the planet lay on his shoulders, and it was almost too much
of a responsibility to bear. But, what alternative did he have?

‘You can end this,’ said Joe, trying to reassure his
friend. ‘And then we can go home.’

Max nodded.

He stepped forward and stood behind the vacant stone.
He gripped the hilt of the sword tightly with both hands, rested it in the slot
then pushed it down as hard as he could. Half expecting there to be a flash of
lightening or something dramatic, Max was surprised when all he felt was a
tingling wave of electricity riding through his arms. But the sensation grew
and grew until it almost felt unbearable. He wanted to let go of the sword, but
it was as if his hands were glued to it. A white light began to emerge beside
each of the other swords that slowly transformed into the ghostly shape of a
knight, the spirit of each sword bearer returning to join him. Max became aware
of a white glow beside him too and the familiar, yet ghostly, figure of Edgar
looking younger and healthier.

‘Tell Ethera what to do,’ said the voice of Edgar in
Max’s head. ‘Visualize the energy that came from her when we were in the forest
clearing. See the cleansing light pulsating from the tip.’

‘I can’t,’ replied Max to himself. ‘I’m not strong
enough.’

‘You are stronger than you realise. Close your eyes.
Think of the Moon Stealers, think of the death and destruction they have caused
across our world. How many families have they ripped apart, how many children
have been orphaned. The curtain is falling on the human race, but you can wash
it away. The light has the power to disable the creatures; it will spread like
fire across the globe, igniting life once again.’

At the mention of families, Max thought of his own
parents and his four sisters. He didn’t know if any of them were alive, but
unless he did something, he would never find out. He concentrated on the metal
within the palm of his hands. He could feel a gentle vibration in the sword. He
concentrated on it, synchronising his heart beat with the sword. In his mind he
could see a tiny white spot far away in the distance, and as he watched, the
spot grew and grew as it rapidly came towards him. It was like he was standing
on a train track at night, watching the lamp of an oncoming train racing
towards him. But he didn’t move or turn away. Instead he let the white light
engulf him. His pulse quickened in time with the vibration in the sword. It was
as if the sword was an extension of his body, it lived through him.

Strangely, Max now felt calm and confident. He was
comfortable with this coexistence beside the sword. He seemed to know and
understand who the eleven knights holding the swords were, but only because
Ethera was connected to each one.

The knights waited.

Max thought back to the clearing in the forest and the
pulses of white light that had burst from Ethera, then he took that thought and
passed it to the sword. Immediately the vibrations increased until the sword
hummed gently inside the rock that was holding it. The silver blade began to
shine brighter than he had ever seen before, as did the other swords. A ring of
light suddenly burst between them, like crackles of static and electricity looking
for somewhere to go. The light shot up towards the golden blade of Excalibur which
absorbed it momentarily before a thick column of perfectly channelled pure
white energy connected the tip of Excalibur to the peak beneath the curved centre
of the roof.

Light erupted with a crackle from the flag pole in the
centre of the roof and into the sky. The pulsating vibrations carried the
energy on waves rippling out from the castle roof, over the fields, out of
Avalon and across the planet. Occasionally it was joined by static held in
clouds creating thunderstorms that violently crashed around the planet, charged
to a level higher than a storm had even been before. In cities where generators
were providing survivors with electricity, the cables crackled with charge,
overloaded the engines and caused them to burn out. As soon as one wave had
left the metal pole another would follow.

Again and again, like endless waves washing over the
land.