Blue Dome (The Blue Dome Series) (31 page)

“Justin?” I turned to
Freya for an explanation. “Justin’s a
Shard
?”

Demarge laughed,
interjecting before Freya could speak.

“Yes, funny isn’t it? I
must admit, I thought it quite hilarious when he started working for me,” said
Demarge.

“I’m a what?” said
Justin.

I knew exactly how I
wanted to answer that question but I bit my lip.

“I’ll explain later,”
Daden muttered to him. I caught Daden’s eye. I definitely wanted to hear that
explanation too.

“Let us pass,” said
Freya, bringing the conversation back to Demarge.

He stared at her coldly,
making no attempt to hide his contempt.

“Oddly enough, I was just
discussing that very issue with your friend here,” he said, giving a cursory
nod to Daden. “Unfortunately, I’m not really in the
mood
for moving
today.”

“Well then, you leave us
little choice,” said Freya, a ball of sizzling gold light erupting in her
hands.

Demarge yawned. “Throw
that and your precious Shards go up in smoke,” he said.

Daden shot Freya a
warning glance. Demarge had called her bluff, they both knew it. Demarge smiled
smugly at his gloved fingers, inspecting them as if he had all the time in the
world. We were now well and truly reached stalemate. The fact that Demarge was
so obviously getting a kick out of it was starting to get on my nerves. So he
wanted me to go with him
that
badly? Fine, two could play at that game.
I stepped forward.

“If I came with you,
would you stop the police hounding my brother and let the others go?” I said.

“No Clare!” Freya and
Daden shouted in unison.

“That’s completely out of
the question,” said Freya. “She’s just a child, she has no idea what she’s
saying.” She was looking at me as if I’d lost my mind.

Demarge slowly, very
slowly, rolled his gaze from the tips of his fingers, locking his eyes onto
mine. The savage intensity of his gaze sent a shiver down my spine, making me
want to look anywhere except at him. But I couldn’t shift my gaze, it was as if
my eyes were paralysed. Demarge raised his right eye-brow in what looked like
genuine surprise.

“Oh, I think she knows
exactly
the bargain she’s offered,” said Demarge, as if carefully picking his words.
“It’s certainly an interesting proposition.” He paused, took a deep breath and
exhaled slowly. “Yes Clare, if you came with me of your own free will, I would
let the others go.”

“And Bede?” I prompted.

“Would be free. I’d see to it myself.” Demarge turned to Daden and
Freya, smiling slyly. “If Clare wants the bargain you know you can’t stop her.
Let her go and you can take the others, I won’t try to follow you.”

Daden glared at Demarge.
“That’s utterly ridiculous and you know it,” he said.

Demarge laughed. “You
might not like the deal, Daden, but it’s the only one on the table. I think the
mortals call it ‘utilitarianism’ – the greatest benefit for the greatest
number? Quaint, but it works.”

Freya’s eyes had now been
whittled down to two sharp pieces of flint.

“Stop playing games
Demarge,” she said, ushering me back down the stairs behind her. “You know
we’ll never let Clare go.”

Demarge shrugged. “Well, Queen
of the Aeons, it looks like we’re at an impasse. No one’s going home to the
Slipworld tonight. Tell me, how are Min-Isis and Thomas coping with the effects
of tungsten poisoning? It won’t be much longer before you and Daden are also
too weak to stand, much less, defend the Shards. Then there’ll be no need to
negotiate. I’ll simply take all of them.”

“You haven’t won yet,”
said Freya quietly.

The atmosphere was so
thick I could almost smell it: pungent, cloying, like a dense perfume. From
where I was standing I could see Daden shift his gaze slowly towards Freya. His
eyes flickered for the tiniest of seconds, that at first I thought he was just
blinking. Then I realised there was something else going on. Freya was hatching
a plan.

I tried to sneak a
sidelong glance at Calix and
Troy
, wondering if they’d clocked what was happening, but they were
standing too far in front of me to catch their eyes. Daden was now fixing Freya
with a hard stare. Whatever she was planning to do, he clearly wasn’t happy
about it. Before he could do anything to stop her though, Freya suddenly
imploded into a large ball of silvery-gold light and drove at Demarge.

“Move!” Daden shouted, as
he quickly shouldered Bede and Justin against the side of the stairwell.

There was a loud sucking
noise, as the wall caved like rubber, engulfing the bodies into the depths of
the plaster. It happened so fast that everything melded into one big blur of
colour.

 “Calix, give me your
hand,” Daden screamed.

She glanced uncertainly
at
Troy
and I, then turned to
Daden.

“Take these guys first!”
she screamed back.

“Don’t be stupid,” said
Troy
, stepping back and pushing Calix up
the stairwell.

“Come on, Calix, now!”
Daden screamed.

Calix lunged up the
stairs, her fingertips straining to reach Daden’s. He caught her, but she
slipped from his grasp and fell backwards into me. I stumbled further down the
stairwell, half falling, half jumping, before finally grabbing hold of the
banister and managing to stop myself. I looked around for
Troy
. He was nowhere.

“We’ve lost
Troy
!” I shouted.

“What?” said Calix,
turning to me with panic-stricken eyes.

“I can’t see him
anywhere,” I said.

“We’ve got to find him,”
said Calix, running down the stairs towards me.

“Leave him, there’s no
time!” said a voice in the stairwell above us.

Calix paused abruptly and
my eyes shot towards Freya, who was standing between us and Demarge like a
shield. Daden lurched forward and stretched out his hand.

“Grab hold!” he shouted.

Calix turned and reached
down the stairwell to grab my jacket.

“C’mon!” she screamed.

“Calix, no!” said Daden.
“You’ll never make it back together. Leave Clare with Freya.”

Calix’s eyes flitted towards
Daden, then back at me. She looked like a startled rabbit that didn’t know
which way to run.

“Go!” I screamed at her.

Calix paused and for a
horrible second I thought she was about to come down the stairwell after me.

 “Go!” I screamed at her
again.

Calix took a deep breath,
her eyes full of apologies.

“We’ll be waiting for you,”
she said, turning to run up the stairs.

She’d only taken a couple
of steps when a jagged bolt of lightning came hurtling past her head. She
lurched sideways, missing it just in time.

“The lightning’s too
fast, I can’t outrun it!” she screamed.

“Yes you can!” Daden
reached a hand towards her. “Quick, now!”

Calix was about to step
forward again when another bolt of lightning whistled past her eyes. It struck
the wall, and a great sheet of plaster fell away, smashing onto the steps. A
cloud of chalky dust billowed out of the wall and into the stairwell, making it
difficult to see more than a few steps ahead. I coughed as the dust began to
fill my lungs, waving my arms in a vain attempt to clear the air. As I squinted
in the haze I saw a third bolt of lightning heading straight for Calix.

“Look out!” I screamed.

But it was too late. As
Calix tried to duck the missile hit her shoulder and ricocheted into the wall
behind her. She screamed as a thin spiral of black smoke rose from the charred
hole in her jacket.

“Calix!” someone shouted,
his voice disembodied by the dust. A hand reached out and I saw her snatch on
to it, her whole body disappearing into the white cloud. There was the loud
sucking noise again, as the plaster opened and closed, and I felt myself go
weak with relief. I still had no idea how badly Calix had been hurt but at
least she’d escaped.

Now there was just Daden,
Freya and me left, surrounded by the maniacal sound of Demarge’s laughter
bounding off the walls of the stairwell.

“Why laugh, Demarge?
You’ve just lost another Shard,” said Freya.

“So? I’ve still got the
one I actually want.”

“You’ll never have
Clare,” Freya retorted.

In the haze I could see
Daden’s hands framing a ball of light. It was spitting silvery-red filaments
into the shaft of the stairwell. Demarge arched his right eyebrow as the
beginnings of a smirk played on his lips.

“If the stairwell
collapses, it won’t be me who suffers,” he said.

“I’ll take the risk,”
said Daden. He drew back his arm like a spring-loaded weapon and hurled the
ball at Demarge’s chest.

Demarge stepped neatly
sideways, flattening himself against the wall opposite the entrance to the Slipworld.
He calmly raised his palms like a shield and a wall of white light erupted instantly
in front of him. As the missile drew closer, I could see the muscles in
Demarge’s face grow taut, the white light pushing back against the red.

It was the distraction
I’d been waiting for. Without stopping to think, I ran up the stairs as fast as
I could towards Daden. As my foot hit the middle step, something incredibly heavy
thudded against me and I fell, helplessly, uncontrollably, against what felt
like the most luxuriously comfortable bed I’d ever lain down on. Every muscle
in my body began to relax and my eyelids grew heavy, as if I had been
anaesthetised. In the last few seconds, as I struggled to keep my eyes open, I
saw that I was now surrounded by silvery-gold light, swirling around me like
ink tipped in water. It was only once I’d given into an overwhelming desire to
sleep that I had the vague realisation that Freya must have been following
closely behind me. I smiled inwardly and waited for the soft landing of the
Slipworld. We’d done it, we were safe.

Then, all of a sudden, I
felt a violent jolt as something gripped hold of my arm. I tried to open my
eyes but for some reason I couldn’t. They were locked shut and there was
nothing I could do about it. Blinded, I began to panic, thrashing wildly to
free myself from whatever had grabbed me. But it was impossible. Something, or
someone, had me firmly anchored in the world of matter. And now they were
starting to drag me back.

“Let me go!” I screamed,
but my voice was ripped from me, swallowed in a vacuum of nothingness, as the
grip on my arm grew tighter and tighter. I was now so desperate to see what was
happening that I could feel my eyeballs straining against the insides of my
eyelids. Then, all of a sudden, my eyes flew open and a pang of intense relief
pounded through my body. But it was momentary, replaced almost instantly with
the horror of realising that I was now being pulled back through the wall of
the stairwell and into the Cathedral. Suddenly everything stopped. My feet were
back on solid ground and I felt unbelievably cold. As I glanced down, I saw a
black glove clasped tightly around my wrist. My whole body bristled with horror
as I twisted my arm frantically, trying to wrench myself free.

“Welcome back,” said
Demarge.

I glared at him, but
before I could actually say anything I suddenly felt something grab hold of my
other arm and yank me backwards. I craned my neck to see that Freya was halfway
out of the Slipworld and had looped her arm inside mine.

“She’s coming with me,
Demarge.”

He snorted dismissively.
“Is that so?” he said, wrenching my other arm so I stumbled towards him.

“Let me go!” I screamed.

“You’re staying, Clare,”
said Demarge, his eyes locked against Freya’s.

Where are you Daden?
I thought, as I desperately scanned the stairwell for him. It took
me a couple of seconds to notice the glowing ball of red light hovering a few
steps above. I barely had time to whisper his name, when he suddenly came
hurtling towards us. Demarge was either going to have to let me go, or have his
arm burnt through. It was a risky plan, relying solely on Daden’s ability to
call Demarge’s bluff. The ball of red light was now travelling so fast that I
doubt Daden could have stopped, even if he’d wanted to. I glanced at Demarge,
trying to predict what he was going to do, but his eyes were inscrutable.

“Very well, Daden. Burn
the girl alive then.”

I screamed as Demarge
stepped backwards sharply, jerking me directly into Daden’s line of fire. The
ball of light was now so close I could feel its heat, the glare so blindingly
bright that it was impossible for me to keep my eyes open without squinting.
Freya pulled back on my arm but it was hopeless. No matter how strong she was,
Demarge was stronger.

“Give her to me!” she
screamed.

“She’s
mine
!”
Demarge snarled back.