Cloudfyre Falling - a dark fairy tale (43 page)

What Gargaron saw next he saw in
dead silence. A mighty white light spewed from Rashel’s mouth, as
if she had regurgitated some mighty dinner, and like a ripple on a
pond, a shimmering wave pushed out through the rain… and slammed
into the star demon.

Jhegoth staggered… flames flaring
and billowing skywards.

Sound roared back into the ears of
Gargaron, Melai and Locke as the darkened sky lit up with blue
fire.

Hawkmoth were not
done. Again he spun his staff. Again he slammed it to
earyth
, again Rashel
squealed, sucking the air once more from giant, nymph and crabman.
And once more a wave of shimmering white light vomited from
Rashel’s mouth and again the wave crashed around the star demon
like titanic ocean waves on a rocky shore.

Jhegoth let out a
mighty roar. It shook the terminus and train yards, shook the
very
earyth
. Yet
Jhegoth hung its head, as if struck by a mighty blow… and fell to
its knee.

Hawkmoth wasted not a moment. He
climbed back into Razor’s saddle and took off once more for the
garetrain.

15

The others were
just off the train’s tail now, galloping, slithering. Avoiding the
line-beam, Melai swooped down and landed heavily on carriage roof,
rolling awkwardly but gripping the knotted mass of vines that still
clung to the carriage, preventing herself spilling over the side.
Below her, Gargaron brought Grimah alongside the rear carriage
where he reached out and grabbed the railing before sliding from
saddle onto back of train. He came aware of some commotion behind
him. When he turned, he saw Hawkmoth and Razor coming up on Zebra’s
swishing tail, but just behind them were a pack of scrambling
ghost-hounds.
Do they never give
up?
Gargaron wondered.

‘
Oh, you bring us left overs, I
see,’ Locke called to Hawkmoth, pulling his blowflute into
play.

‘
Aye,’ Hawkmoth called back.
‘Don’t say I never give you anything.’

Locke blew off a round of darts.
Again they buried into the bodies of the coming hounds, and again,
as far as Gargaron could see, they had no effect.

‘
The idea be to kill them,
crabman,’ Hawkmoth reminded him, waving his staff at them. Rashel
spat out a mouthful of seeds that tumbled across ground before
bursting to life, shooting out a hundred branches in but a
sunflare, spearing the hounds through skull and torso, stopping
them dead in their tracks.

More were on their way. And in the
distance behind them, Jhegoth were slowly lifting itself to its
feet.

‘
Take them down,’ Hawkmoth yelled,
kicking Razor into greater pace.

‘
Oh? And where are you going?’
Locke wanted to know.

‘
To the locomotive,’ Hawkmoth
answered. ‘We need this train at a quicker speed. Jhegoth will
surely catch us if not.’ Now he turned his attention on Gargaron.
‘Get the carriage open giant, and the steeds on board. Razor will
drop back once he has carried me forward. Yar!’ He kicked Razor’s
ribs and the steed thundered forward.

Melai wedged her feet beneath one
of the vines, and fluttered her wings to remain as stationary as
she could. Here she deployed her bow.

The hounds advanced quickly. As
Melai fired at them, Zebra railroaded them, tripping them up.
Though they were quickly back on their feet. Melai took some of
them out with incendiary arrows but many reached the train and,
like spiders, clambered up the sides of the carriage. Gargaron
thrust his sword at them, Grimah snapped at them as he galloped
along.

They bore down on Melai. She leapt
into the air, they leapt after her, she fired punch arrows that
blasted them backwards into the line-beam where they were sliced in
half instantly, their two halves, aflame, tumbling away to ground.
Three successive beasts she sent into the beam.

Locke had to duck to avoid being
hit by one, hauling Zebra away from the train. Hounds went after
him. One clawing its way up Zebra’s scaly hide. Locke fired his
blowflute at it and Gargaron saw the darts lob deep into the
beast’s chest. Gargaron were about to tell Locke to give up on his
glorified “harp” when something happened: the ghost-hound suddenly
caved in on itself, as if a hundred years of desiccation besieged
it in but mere moments. It let go of Zebra and crashed to ground
where it split apart like an old carcass, flames roared and its
bones went flicking off in every direction.

‘
Ha
,’ yelled Locke,
‘
see how you like that!
’ and he blew out another flurry of magic darts and another
handful of beasts crumpled and crippled and ploughed into the
gravel, bursting bones all over the place, fire curling into the
sky.

Gargaron turned for the carriage’s
rear door. As the good sorcerer had said, they needed to get their
mounts on board. A boxcar would have been ideal but they had to
work with what they had. That meant going through this door. Though
the vines still barricaded the entrance point.

Bolts of blue fire suddenly pelted
the train and the land about it. Gargaron glanced over his shoulder
and saw Jhegoth again pursuing the garetrain. Gaining speed. It
would catch them soon if Hawkmoth did not have this vehicle pick up
its pace. And its projectiles would sooner or later have the train
in ruin.

Gargaron slashed his great sword
through the vines. As before, there came a howl of anger from
within the carriage and the “arms” recoiled. He lifted his leg and
one well timed boot had the door off its hinges and punched back
into the carriage. He stooped and peered in.

He saw it now. The entity that had
not so long ago claimed these carriages as its own, the ones whose
many varied limbs had held the train like a clutch of strangling
brambles. A strange looking beast it were, a torso with a head and
a myriad arms. It hung there at opposite end of carriage like a
spider in its web. And it eyed Gargaron with loathing.

16

Gargaron put the star demon from
his mind. He hefted up shield and sword, and edged slowly down
carriage interior toward the peculiar fiend.

It watched him coming. It were the
colour of clammy bones. Yellowish, mapped with hundreds of hairline
cracks. Its eyes were watery and red, and the moment Gargaron were
in range its jaw parted and out punched a long, pointed
tongue.

Gargaron deflected it with his
shield, but the tongue were so sharp and quick it punctured the
metal plate on shield’s front.

It retracted with blurring speed
and twice more it fired and cut through the shield, but a third
strike saw Gargaron dart left and slice it off.

The entity squealed and threw a
hundred arms at the giant, hauling him up against the train’s
windows, arms curling about his neck, fingers poking into his mouth
and down his throat.

17

Beyond the carriage Melai and
Locke had gained the upper hand over the hounds. But the star demon
were rushing toward them with great speed. Suddenly there came a
squeal of metal and the train shunted violently and Gargaron
hurtled forward, all his weight slamming against the entity at
front of carriage, crushing its skull beneath him. Yellow gunk
oozed from the critter’s brain, and the garetrain groaned to a
shuddering halt.

There were great
commotion beyond the train. He heard Locke yell,
‘
Dark Ones!
’

Gargaron pulled himself from the
fiend’s embrace and ran the length of the carriage and emerged onto
the verandah at back of train. Here he saw them. It were almost
enough to sink his heart. Cresting Devil’s Knee were Dark Ones so
tall and immense they matched almost the star demon for
size.

Gargaron leapt from the motionless
train. Locke were firing his blowflute at a handful of ghost-hounds
still charging toward train. Gargaron looked about. He could see no
Melai. No Hawkmoth.

‘
At front of train,’ Locke called
out to him.

Gargaron turned and spotted Melai
flying toward the head of the locomotive. He raced after her,
thinking something had happened to the sorcerer but he found
Hawkmoth trying some spell to push a boulder free.

‘
Whatever you lot are doing,’ came
Locke’s voice, ‘you might wish to hurry it up. Those Dark fiends
look eager to join this party.’

Gargaron did not even think. He
strode up to the boulder that were lodged there in their way and
with sheer brute force hefted it aside.

Hawkmoth lowered his staff. ‘Right
then,’ he said. ‘That’s one way to do it. Now, let’s keep moving.’
He climbed the locomotive back to the driver’s compartment and
inside he dropped himself into driver’s seat and fired the
engines.

Melai and Gargaron returned to
rear of train where Locke were fighting off another handful of
ghost-hounds, firing his blow dart, taking them down in great
clumps. More were on their way.

The garetrain had begun to
move.

‘
Locke!’ Gargaron called as he
guided Grimah and Razor up verandah and into carriage. ‘We are
leaving.’

Locke blew his magic darts at
anything that flew at him. The train were picking up pace. Melai
flew up and perched on the verandah railing, firing her
arrows.

‘
Come now!’ Gargaron
called.

Locke whistled for Zebra who had
been busy biting hounds in half; as she slithered by him he leapt
into saddle.

The train built speed rapidly,
though not so swift yet that Zebra could not catch it. She
slithered forward, lifting her head as she drew close, allowing
Locke to scramble along her neck and jump from saddle. He landed
deftly upon the spacious verandah at rear of carriage.

‘
Hurry girl!’ Locke commanded and
Zebra snaked her bulky body alongside the train and then squirmed
up through one of the carriage’s large windows, blown open by the
star demon’s fire bolts. The garetrain continued to gain more and
more speed and the last of the ghost-hounds on their tail began to
lose ground.

They stood there, Locke and
Gargaron, on the verandah, with Melai perched on the handrail, and
they gazed back at the Dark Ones, watching them march down Devil’s
Knee hefting enormous war hammers.

1

BLEAK countryside rushed by. Rain
didn’t let up. A roadway trailed the railcourse for some miles
before it turned away through hills and were lost to the deluge.
Gargaron remained at the train’s rear, watching the Dark Ones
through his spyglass. He were intrigued by what he
witnessed.

He watched as they trudged toward
the star demon. And were puzzled as they took their warhammers to
it. ‘What do you see?’ Locke asked.

Gargaron handed him the spyglass.
‘I do not know.’

2

In the driver’s compartment,
Hawkmoth maintained an eye as much as he could on the rail line
ahead—he and his friends did not need another obstacle to derail
their getaway. Still, for a time he stood with the cabin door ajar,
wind and rain gushing in, and with his own spyglass he watched the
colossal Harbingers batter Jhegoth into the hill.

The scene left him with a measure of
disquiet.

Eventually he put away his
spyglass and shut the door to the elements. He sat there in the
driver’s seat, contemplating things as the garetrain sped
onward.

3

The rain did not peter out till
evening. As such there were not much to see by way of scenery; most
of the land they passed were hidden beyond the deluge. Gargaron and
his companions spent much of this time seeing to wounds and
scratches.

Gargaron patched the gashes in his
flesh, stripping grafts of skin from his lower belly and pressing
them over his wounds.

Locke studied the giant with great
intrigue. Yet the way Locke dealt with his own wounds were equally
as intriguing to Gargaron. Locke had sustained cracks and rents in
his claws and crab legs. He used barnacles, stored inside a
saddlebag, to patch them up, pressing them against his wounds and
waiting until they attached, much like Gargaron’s skin
grafts.

Melai watched them both in
silence. ‘This world certainly produces strange folk,’ she said.
Her own wounds were minor; except for some dark green bruising to
her head she had come through the scrap virtually
unscathed.

Once done, Gargaron, Melai and
Locke did their best at pulling the deceased spider fiend from
train’s rear carriage. Both Grimah and Razor were not happy with
its presence; remaining at the back of carriage, sniffing the air.
Zebra did not seem to care; she rolled about it like a dog in dirt.
Locke simply laughed at her. But there were an unpleasant stink
about it. So all agreed it would be worth getting rid of
it.

Hacking its dead limbs from where
they were still tangled across ceiling and floor, they tossed
chunks of it from the back of train, and watched its bony body go
rolling and crashing across stony ground.

As they worked, Gargaron indicated
Locke’s blow flute. ‘I know now, a lute that not be.’