The Nethergrim (11 page)

Chapter
10

E
dmund froze, his gaze held by the creature’s liquid yellow eyes. It reached out to touch his face, the backs of its long fingers brushing his cheek—then it grasped him by the neck. He sucked in a gasp and tried to struggle free, but found himself helpless in its grip. With a push of its thumb against his chin it exposed his throat and pulled him closer. He flailed out with Geoffrey’s knife, but struck the trunk of the tree beside him. The jaws swung wide—its teeth were arranged in two rows, one staggered behind the other. Its breath was sweet and sour, and very warm.

There was a rush of air above. Something landed on the creature, driving it to the ground and jerking Edmund forward. He smashed his shoulder into the trunk of a tree, then the creature loosed its hold and he sank down, choking for breath. Two figures rolled through the weeds before him. One of them gained the upper hand and pinned the other down—it was Katherine. She raised her sword, but the creature was as quick as it was strong. It lashed out from shadow and struck her across the jaw, then shifted its weight and dumped her on top of Edmund, squashing him down into the mulch. The sword tumbled end over end through the air and fell into the bushes by the lip of the trail.

The creature was wiry and muscular, curled and hunched but still tall as a man. It wore a vest made of slick, blackened skin from some unguessable source. Filthy cloth breeches clad its upper legs, ripped and ragged at the ends and held up by a belt made of dark rope. It held a hand clamped over a wound at its side—it drew a dagger in the other hand and advanced on them with a bouncing, bow-legged shuffle, spitting and gurgling in rage.

Tom rushed to stand over his friends, swinging his shepherd’s crook in wild arcs. The creature wove and dodged, stabbing viciously at Tom, slicing into his improvised staff and driving him back. Katherine rolled off Edmund and aimed a kick at its belly right where it was wounded. The huge yellow eyes bulged wide—it let out a scream and stumbled back, giving Katherine a moment to scramble to her feet. Edmund tried to struggle up behind her, but his shoulder gave out beneath him.

The creature spun away from the swing of Tom’s crook and leapt onto a boulder across the trail. The blood that seeped from the wound around its hand glistened blue near to black, a shade or two darker than its skin. It sprang at Katherine with its blade thrust out—she ducked out of the line of its charge and tripped it, slinging it over Edmund and off through the trees downhill. The creature flailed its limbs as it disappeared into the dark. There came a crunch, then the crackling slither of something falling through branches to the ground—then silence.

“Are you all right? Are you hurt?” Katherine dragged Edmund to his feet. Her hair fell in wild dark tangles around her face. There was an ugly, swelling bruise on her jaw.

“I’m fine.” Edmund could not stop shaking. He rubbed at his shoulder. “I’m fine. Where is it?”

“Down there. It’s not moving.” Tom stood at the edge of the trail, looking down the steep slope of the hill.

Edmund grabbed for a branch and leaned out. The creature lay crumpled at the base of a tree far below. “I think you killed it.”

“Let’s get it into the light and see.” Katherine pulled Geoffrey’s knife from the tree trunk where it had stuck. She handed it to Edmund. “You cover us. If it twitches, stab it.”

They descended the slope and approached the creature, casting wary glances all around. Katherine and Tom grabbed it by the ankles and dragged it back up onto the trail next to Peter. It was indeed dead—its mouth hung open and its yellow eyes stared at nothing, just as Peter’s had.

“What is it?” said Katherine.

Edmund nudged it with his foot. “A bolgug, I think. I’ve seen drawings.”

“A bolgug?” Katherine drew its long knife from the ground—it was as near a sword as a dagger, heavy bladed and made for thrusting. “That’s not possible. The bolgugs served the Nethergrim, and the Nethergrim is dead.”

Edmund did not know how such a thing could be possible, either—and yet there the creature was, lying sprawled at his feet. He knelt down next to it and gave it another tentative prod, and when it did not react, he turned its head to examine its face.

“Look at those teeth!” He ran his fingers along the bolgug’s wiry blue torso and felt the wound at its side. The breeches it wore had been made for a boy, far too short but just wide enough for its sinewy thighs. The belt around its waist had been fashioned from a braid of long brown hair.

Katherine crouched over him. “Did you stab it?”

“No—Peter must have.”

“Peter was running downhill.” Tom spoke from a few yards up the path, bent low to examine the ground in the feeble light. “He must have been coming from the keep. This thing chased him down.”

Edmund looked down at Geoffrey’s knife. His guts gave a squeeze. “My brother must be up there!”

“And it was a girl who screamed, I’m sure of it.” Katherine plunged about in the bushes for her sword. “Tom, you’re the fastest. Go for help.”

Tom glanced back at the corpse of the bolgug. “What if there are more of these things?”

“Then we will need the whole village in arms, and quickly. Go on.”

Tom dropped his crook. “Be careful—both of you.” He turned to run back down the hill. Edmund followed Katherine the other way.

The trail wound upward to the summit, emerging at the blasted, broken gates of the old fortress. Light from within the courtyard crowned the ruined walls. Edmund dropped to a crouch next to Katherine in the last stand of trees. “That’s a fire. A big one.”

Katherine pushed her hair behind her ear. “Footsteps.” She leaned out. “Two at least—maybe more.”

“There, in the entrance.” Edmund pointed. Another bolgug stepped out over the tumbled stones that choked the gates and peered around it, then made an awful clacking noise with its teeth. It bore a crude, broad-bladed spear in its hands.

Katherine sized up the bolgug, then gazed along the top of the wall. She chewed at the nail of her thumb.

“Geoffrey, you twit.” Edmund muttered it under his breath. “What were you doing up here?”

“Playing and dreaming,” said Katherine. “Same as us.”

Edmund had a momentary vision of his mother holding him and weeping—oh, Edmund, don’t blame yourself, there was nothing you could have done. Then his father put a hand to his shoulder—no sense throwing your life away, son. At least we still have you.

A new sound reached his ears—a frightened, very human whimpering. “Please, please don’t. I don’t know what you are, but please don’t—”

“That sounds like Emma Russet.” Katherine pulled up her sword.

Edmund started moving, and only then understood that he had chosen to risk his life. “There’s a place around the back where the wall’s crumbled down. Maybe we can sneak in.”

They crept north through the trees, past the place where they had found the bones of Hugh Jocelyn’s pigs. Katherine leaned out from cover, looking for any sign that they had been spotted by the guard. She waved Edmund on; he followed at a crouching run, along the side wall and around the tallest standing tower to the back.

“Here.” He stopped at the place where the wall had collapsed until it was little more than twice the height of a man. Emma let out another wail from inside, a cry for her mother, someone, anyone. A bolgug cut her off with a grating squeal.

Katherine knelt and made a step with her hands. Edmund stepped in and Katherine hauled him up the face until he stood on her palms. He reached above him and felt for a handhold amongst the jagged stones that surmounted the wall. He found one and pulled—the stone came loose and rushed past his head, thudding into the grass below.

“Careful!” Katherine sucked in an alarmed, shuddering breath, but held him firm.

Edmund dug his fingers in and found a precarious foothold. He strained and dragged himself onto the broken top of the wall as quickly as he dared, then looked down into the courtyard.

A bonfire blazed beside the tall dark Wishing Stone. Miles Twintree lay beside it, bound hand and foot—he seemed to be making furtive struggles against his bonds. Emma Russet squirmed and sobbed, trying to crawl away from beneath a bolgug who seemed intent on shaking her into submission. The bolgug with the spear stood aside from the entrance to let four others pass by into the dark. These four walked in pairs, each pair carrying a child slung from a stick on their shoulders. One of the children had curly red hair.

Edmund’s stomach dropped. He leaned out to whisper down to Katherine. “They’re taking Geoffrey!”

“Not if I can help it.” Katherine drew her sword and raced back around the fortress.

“No, Katherine, wait—there are too many!” Edmund flung out a hand, but by then she was gone from sight. He turned back to the courtyard, sick with fear. There was nothing he could do.

“Get—off!” Geoffrey kicked and squirmed. “Let go, let—somebody, help!” His captors dragged him away into the dark beyond the entrance.

Pages flicked in a blur through Edmund’s thoughts. It was madness, utter madness—he had never cast a proper spell in his life, could not even coax a candle flame, and now he was going to try something that might set an untrained apprentice on fire. But Katherine, Geoffrey—he had to try.

“Hey!” He stood up on the wall. “Hey, you—ugly face, over here!”

The bolgug holding Emma dropped her to the ground and drew a knife. It opened its wide mouth to scream an alarm. The guard at the entrance turned and brought its spear up to its shoulder. A third leapt out from the shadow of the Wishing Stone with a nasty-looking spiked club in its hands.

Edmund watched the flame in the courtyard until he knew it, until its roving form was the face of an old friend. He made the sign for Fire—a red star ignited behind his eyes. He turned through the sign for Quickening, felt a rushing tingle on his skin, then smoothly on to Light, and this time felt it glow in unearthly harmony. There was no time to try the spell in any way but the most dangerous, no place to anchor it but within himself. Words came to him—they carved strange vibrations in the still night air:

“BY FIRE LIGHT IS BORN. IN LIGHT THE DARKNESS FLIES!”

Painful heat coursed up through his body. He felt as though a bellows had sucked all the air from him and replaced it with something dry and hot beyond words. He felt his heart give a lurch, then stop. He collapsed.

The fire exploded in utter silence, sending off a pulse of light that slapped the clouds.

Edmund heaved and gasped for breath. His heart started beating again—every thready pulse sent more pain through him. A gray tunnel formed at the edges of the world and drew inward. He struggled over onto his side. The nearer two bolgugs lay on their backs, clutching at their faces and squealing. The guard tottered, spear still raised, waving its dark blue hand before its face. It blinked its yellow eyes, squinted at Edmund and made ready to throw, but by then Katherine was upon it.

Katherine ripped the spear from its hands, turned it and drove the point into its belly. She pulled it out, throwing the shrieking creature to the ground. The other two bolgugs regained their feet. They raised their weapons, but they passed their long fingers before their eyes and gibbered in confusion. Katherine hurled the spear at one, drew her sword and rushed the other.

The tunnel closed across Edmund’s sight. He sank down. The pain left him. He knew he lay on stones but could not feel it. A scuffle reached his ears—then a squeal, or a scream. “Katherine? Katherine, I can’t see.”

Chapter
11

E
dmund. Edmund!”

Edmund felt his bed shaking. He shifted, then groaned. “No. Don’t feel well.” His eyelids fluttered.

Someone touched his head, then gripped him by the shoulder. “Edmund!”

“Mum, no—let me sleep—” He opened his eyes. It was dark—he lay on dirt. His memory returned. They had taken his brother.

“Geoffrey!” He tried to sit up—everything went gray. He clutched at his head and sank back to the ground.

“I couldn’t catch them.” Katherine raised him to sitting. “I couldn’t leave you here. I’m sorry.”

Edmund blinked the motes from his sight. The fire was dying fast—it gave off rolls of a curiously thick and sodden smoke. Puffs of white ash rose in the plume, then broke and fell to dust the grass around the Wishing Stone.

As soon as Katherine let go, he slumped back down again. Nothing worked right. If he thought hard about one limb, he could move it, but then he forgot about the others. They twitched and shuddered on their own—they were cold. He was cold, so cold that he burned, but when he shut his eyes, it all went away.

“Please, Edmund.”

Edmund. He spoke the name in his mind. He liked the sound of it, but did not know why it was his.

“Please. I need your help.”

Edmund forced his eyes open. Katherine had a cut across the knuckles of her sword hand. The stars seemed to be vibrating. Miles Twintree sat ashen beside him, knees hugged in to his chest. Emma lay where she had been dropped next to the two dead bolgugs by the fire. She stared into the sky with blank, wide eyes.

“Up—I’m up.” Edmund pushed himself onto one arm. He touched along his brow and drew his hand away to examine the blood. When had he hit his head?

Katherine propped him against the Wishing Stone. “What’s the matter with you?”

“Spell. Don’t know. I’m cold.”

“How long until you can walk?”

Edmund shrugged—it nearly slid him sideways to the ground again.

Katherine caught him. “Tell me if you start to feel better.” She stood and towed the bolgugs away from the fire. “Emma, Miles—I want you both to think back. How many kids were up here with you?”

Miles buried his head in his arms. Tears streamed out along Emma’s lashes and down the sides of her face, running back into her ears and her leaf-strewn hair.

“I can’t see.” Emma spoke in a very small voice. “I can’t see anything.”

“Please, you have to think.” Katherine raised Emma’s hands to cut her bonds. “How many bolgugs were here?”

Emma curled onto her side and wept without sound. Her feet were bare—a jagged splinter stuck out from one arch, broken off just above the skin. It looked like it went all the way through.

Edmund shut one hand in a fist, then the other, back and forth. Feeling returned in the form of a hot prickle, as though he had been sleeping on both his arms at once. He reached out, still trembling, and struck Miles on the shoulder. “Tell her.”

Miles jumped. “There were—there were five of us. Me and Geoffrey, Peter, Tilly and Emma.” He rubbed at the welts on his wrists where the bolgugs had bound him. “They came in all at once, couldn’t count them.”

Edmund curled forward to reach for the spiked club on the ground before him. It was covered in bluish gore. He nearly vomited.

“But I saw Peter get away.” Miles raised his head. “I saw him get out through the front before they hit me. Maybe he’s gone for help.”

Katherine shot Edmund a warning look. “Let’s hope so.” She plucked out the spear from the side of one of the bolgugs. “Tom’s gone for help, too. It won’t be long.”

The stars stopped shaking. Edmund tried again, and this time seized the club by the handle. He felt beside it and found Emma’s shoes laid out by the fire, and then a jug that he knew had come from the inn.

Katherine walked over to Miles and held out the spear. Miles stared in horror at the glistening blood that dripped from its point.

“Take it,” said Katherine.

Miles blinked and recoiled. Tears tracked through the dirt on his cheeks. He seemed much younger than twelve.

“Look at me.” Katherine held him in her gaze. “I need you to be brave. Take it.”

“What do you want me to do?”

She set the spear in his hands. “Guard us. Stand over there by the entrance and listen carefully for anyone coming. If you hear something, call for me—I’ll be near.”

Miles stood and limped to the gates. He turned around, holding the spear as though it were a snake about to twist in his hands.

Katherine twirled the air with her finger. “Other way, Miles. Point upward.”

“Oh.” Miles turned the spear.

Edmund sank back against the Wishing Stone. He shivered, and shut his eyes. The cold seeped in again.

Breath steamed warm across his face: “Edmund!”

He startled up. Katherine knelt over him. “Are you feeling any better?”

“Geoffrey.” Edmund tried to struggle to his feet, braced between the club and the Wishing Stone. “We have to get after them.”

“We will.” Katherine caught him under his arm. “The light—that was you?”

Edmund barely had the strength to nod in reply. He staggered over next to Miles at the ruined gates. “Seen anything?”

“I’m sorry.” Miles was crying, huffing in and crying. “We were just playing, just going to play chase-the-beggar. We shouldn’t have come. I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”

“Miles.” Edmund felt out a space of stone to rest upon. “Have you seen anything?”

“Just a badger. How long do we have to stay here? I want to go home!”

Edmund peered out through the tumbled gap. He let his eyes open to the darkness until he could just make out the curve of the Tamber through the valley far below. No alarm from the village, no clamor, no shouts—no help.

Where was Tom?

“Emma?” Katherine spoke in gentle tones behind him. “Emma—can you see now? I’m going to have a look at your feet.” Emma let out a painful hiss that sank into a sob.

“How bad is it?” Edmund looked back. “Can she walk?”

Katherine ripped a sleeve from her shirt and cut it into strips with Geoffrey’s knife. She raised Emma’s foot and cradled it in her hands. “We will get out of here. I promise you.” Emma turned bloodshot eyes on her.

Katherine placed a thumb and forefinger on the jagged end of the splinter. Emma sucked in a breath. Edmund thought of looking away a moment too late.

It did not come out easily. Edmund hunched down and plugged his ears until the screams died away.

Katherine splashed out the jug on Emma’s foot, then wrapped it in the strips from her shirt. “That will have to do.” She slipped a shoe on the other foot. “Here—up, now. We’re going.”

The pain seemed to rouse Emma from her stupor. “What was that light before?”

“We’ll talk about it later. Come on, up.”

Edmund pushed himself halfway to standing on the stones. He reached an arm. “Miles, can you help me?”

Miles did not answer. He stared out through the breach, eyes white and wide, mouth falling slack.

Edmund waved his hand. “Miles?”

Something rustled in the trees outside. Miles could scream even louder than Emma.

“Down!” Katherine moved before Edmund had time to think. She sprang across the courtyard and shoved Miles over in the grass along the foot of the wall. She peered out, then ducked again. She gripped her sword white.

Edmund crawled up, his heart pounding. “What’s out there?”

“You tell me.”

At the edge of the trees no more than ten yards distant stood something deep in shadow. It was far too tall and broad to be a man. It shifted forward—the faint light crossed its black, black eyes.

Edmund lost a breath to terror. Katherine pulled him back into cover. “Can you manage another spell?”

“The fire’s out.” Edmund raced through everything he had ever read, and found it all a heap of useless, fear-addled mush. “What are we going to do?”

Leaves crunched in the dark outside. Huge shoulders rolled in the gloom.

Miles let out a shriek and dropped his spear. “It’s coming at us!”

The thing in the trees took a step forward—the shadows fell away from the contours of its face, revealing nothing but a mass of writhing thorns. Edmund heard another voice raised to a scream. He could not place it until he recognized it as his own.

“Up, up—out the back!” Katherine hauled Emma from the ground. “Miles, help Edmund—hurry!”

Miles pelted away into the dark. The tendrils at the ends of the creature’s arms spread out across the mossy scatter of stones. Edmund heaved himself up and tried to run. He made it five paces before his legs gave out.

“Edmund!” Katherine turned at the Wishing Stone. “Miles, you left Edmund—Edmund, come on!”

As the quiggan serves the Nethergrim in fouled water, and the stonewight in his mountainous lair
—a page of the book teased at Edmund’s memory—
so the thornbeast is his chief agent in vale and forest.
He remembered the rest. He looked behind him.

The thornbeast shoved what passed for a head into the breach. It was a writhen mass of vine and branch in the vague shape of a man, more than ten feet tall at its hunched shoulders. Its eyes were no more than two voids in the tangle, so absolutely dark that it was impossible to discern the substance from which they were made.

“Hurry. Hurry!” Katherine came back, dragging Emma over one shoulder. “Edmund, take my hand.”

“Wait.” Edmund struggled to his feet. “Don’t run.”

“Have you gone mad?” Katherine seized his arm. “We’ve got to—”

Edmund raised a hand. “I said wait!” Katherine kept a grip on him, but held still for the space of a terrified breath. The long, thorny filaments slithered toward them—but then they drew taut, scrabbling uselessly over the stones. It came no closer.

“I’ve read about this.” Edmund looked at Katherine. “Thornbeasts can’t walk over stone.”

The creeping masses that made up the thornbeast’s feet tried to touch down amongst the ruins of the entrance—then pulled up, again and again, unable to root themselves. It pulled back into the dark.

Katherine set Emma down against the Wishing Stone. “Miles, don’t climb out! Stay inside.” She thumped Edmund’s shoulder. “I’d like to be there the next time your father says books aren’t good for anything.”

Edmund could only think that she had touched him more times in a single night than in all his life before. “If I remember it right, the book says that a thornbeast can move through the trees as fast as a horse can gallop on a road. I think it was trying to scare us into leaving so it could run us down.”

Katherine nearly laughed. “Then we hold the gates and wait for help. Nothing else we can do.”

Edmund glanced up at the stars.

“I know.” Katherine breathed. “He should be back by now.”

Miles sidled up beside them. “I didn’t mean to run. I was scared. Is it gone?”

“It’s just outside. Take your spear.” Katherine picked up the club and Geoffrey’s knife. She weighed them in her hands, then gave the knife to Edmund. “I’m going up onto the wall to watch it. When help comes, I’ll need to give a warning.”

“There are still bolgugs out there.” Edmund sagged down into the grass. “If they come back, they’ll have no trouble with the gates.”

“They will if we give them some.” She crossed the courtyard and scaled the wall, rolling onto her belly once she reached the top.

Edmund crept up to the gates and took another look outside. The thornbeast kept in shadow at the edge of the clearing, just shy of the mossy scatter of stones that choked the entrance.

“It’s still there.” He turned and sat against a clump of stones. The rush of frightened action left him weary again, dizzy and terribly cold. He put his hands up his sleeves and tried to keep from shivering. He looked down at the straggled grass at his feet. The gray tunnel returned.

“How long have we been out here?”

Edmund blinked. He pinched his arm to rouse himself. “Not as long as it feels.” He looked around him. Emma clung to Miles, huddled close by the foot of the wall.

“Stay awake, Edmund.” Katherine crouched in shadow, half in view through a snaggled gap in the battlements above. She made a slow circuit along the top of the wall, from one edge of the ruined gates around to the other.

Edmund dragged himself to standing, and found some of his strength returned. He paced around the courtyard, swinging out his arms to get the feeling back. He tried not to look at the corpses of the bolgugs. The fire had crumbled to pure white ash—it no longer even smoked. A wedge of geese flew in overhead, but veered suddenly wide of the hilltop.

“That’s the bell.” Miles’s voice broke high. “Hear it? That’s the village bell!”

Edmund could have jumped into the air if his weary legs would have let him. The bell atop the village hall clanged out from the valley below—once, twice and thrice.

“There, you see?” He came back to the ruined gates. “It won’t be long. Everyone’s coming—I bet even Lord Aelfric’s heard by now. All we have to do is wait a little longer, and—”

“On your guard, down there.” Katherine hissed across his words. “Look outside.”

Edmund crouched at the gates and peeked out. Tendrils writhed across the open ground before the gates, ripping and churning at the soil. Miles let out a whimper.