Seven Sorcerers (42 page)

The passage ended in an open space, the soil held at bay by two of the light-cones. But beyond those the golden light ended and there was only rock.

‘The sea is just there, behind the cliff face, but how do we get out? The rock could be feet thick.’

Taggit was studying the cones. In between them was a hole in the ground, full of gold-lit water.

‘My guess? Beneath ’ere is an underwater cave that leads out through the cliff face into the sea. This ’ole goes through the floor inter the cave, see? The ’ole is ’eld open by a cone, like the passage, but I’m bettin’ the tunnel underneath is natural.’

Peering into the hole, Nin saw shadowy traces of the rocky floor, its echo still there, occupying the same space as the sea water lapping at her feet. There was a single light-cone keeping the rock at bay, set into a niche in the walls of the hole.

‘Can yer all swim?’ Skerridge asked.

‘You’ve got to be kidding!’

‘Nope. The Way goes on under water, right? So tha’s where we gotta go too. We’ll come out by the beach jus’ below the cliffs.’

‘She was a good swimmer, Seraphine,’ said Taggit reflectively. ‘Everyone knew that.’

‘NO!’ said Nin. ‘Jik can’t go, so I won’t.’

Jik went to the edge of the hole and looked at it
thoughtfully. He shrugged. ‘Wik kik gik bik.’

‘Ya looks kinda harder t’ me,’ said Skerridge. ‘Gravelly like, specially wiv the new top layer. If we wraps yer in everyfin’ we got, ya might jus’ make it.’

There was a long silence while Nin struggled with the knowledge that to save Toby and Jonas she might have to lose Jik.

‘OK,’ said Jonas at last, ‘here’s the plan. We wrap Jik up tight then strap him to Skerridge’s back. Skerridge can move fast so he can get Jik out as quick as possible. Then Taggit can take Nin and Toby and I’ll take Hss. I’m guessing you can’t swim?’

‘Nss.’

Jonas took off his coat. ‘We can use this.’

‘This first, then the coat.’ Taggit dragged off his T-shirt. It was huge. Jonas laid it on the floor and Jik settled in the middle of it. It went round him three times.

‘OK?’

‘Yik,’ said Jik, his voice muffled by the layers.

Nin pulled off her pinafore and turned her back on the others to fumble under her long skirt and drag off her petticoat. When they had added those to the T-shirt they wrapped the whole bundle in Jonas’s coat. Then Hss webbed the lot into a silvery package.

‘Looks like one o’ them chrysalis things,’ said Skerridge. ‘Strap ’im on then.’ He stood still while they fastened Jik on with some more webbing.

As soon as they were done, Skerridge said. ‘See yer on the ovver side,’ and jumped.

‘Look kid,’ said Taggit to Jonas. ‘You go next. That way, if you get into trouble I can pick you up on my way through.’

Jonas nodded and Hss clambered on to his shoulders. A splash and they were gone.

Nin glanced uneasily over her shoulder. She could hear something weird, like a muffled hissing or spitting sound. Crackling perhaps, like a buried firework.

Taggit paused in the middle of settling Toby on his hip with the boy’s arms around his chest. He looked at Nin. She looked at him.

‘Better move it, kid,’ he said evenly, just as the earth behind her began to boil and crumble.

Something bright shot out of the soil, followed by a hand that grabbed it, dulling its brilliance, turning it back into a metal star even as it burned the flesh that held it. Strood tumbled into the hollow. For a moment Nin barely recognised him. He was in tatters. His clothes were rags and his skin not much better. The venom had seen to that. On his left side, some ribs were visible, he was missing an eye and one leg was doing its best to grow back, but it couldn’t quite manage because the venom was still at work. It was mostly bone.

There was a moment of stunned silence.

Strood’s remaining eye fixed Nin with a glittering stare she would never forget. He grinned with a mouth that was barely there any more. Slowly he raised the throwing star.

‘Got you,’ he said, and threw.

The star curved though the air towards Nin, its light fierce again, sending out sparks like hot knives. She screamed and leapt at Taggit who grabbed her round the waist with his free arm and swung her out of the way. She felt the star’s heat as it flew past, sparks ripping her thick servant’s skirt to rags and burning her legs.

It circled them, arching high, then swooping down again, burning a line in the air as it came for her.

I’ve killed us all, thought Nin, I should have run the other way, drawn the fire so that Taggit could get Toby to freedom.

With a roar, Taggit spun around. On his other side, Toby hung on grimly, arms and legs wound tight around the goblin’s massive chest. The star swerved behind them, missing Nin again, its jagged sparks slashing the air and cutting a bloody rift across Taggit’s back and Toby’s wrist.

‘Kill her! KILL HER,’ yelled Strood crazily. He was almost dancing on the spot, his eye bright with excitement.

Skimming the floor, the star swung upwards. As it went, the rim of sparks brushed one of the light cones, knocking it from its plinth and sending it flying point first towards the earthy walls.

‘Breathe!’ yelled Taggit and jumped.

In that single moment, hanging half upside down, fingers knotted into Taggit’s belt, Nin felt as if she could see every grain of soil in the walls, hear each separate breath as they all filled their lungs. The air in her chest
was like hot fog and her blood hurtled through her veins like fire. She heard Strood howling with triumph, felt the star burning towards her back, and the air swirling past her face as they plunged towards the only way out.

But what filled her with terror was the sight of the cone flying through the air to bed itself in the wall, its tip digging into the soil.

The cone earthed. And Skerridge had been right, they were all linked. Power streamed down the passage draining from cone to cone, running out of the earthed tip like bath water down a plughole. Golden light drenched the air as the magic poured back into the Land.

Nin sent a last look at Strood before the water closed over them. She saw his face change, his glittering eye go cold and hard as it fixed on hers. And as they passed through the hole into the cavern below, she felt the last of the power drain out of the cones and the golden light switch off.

With the magic gone, the soil snapped back into its rightful place, suddenly very there and most definitely earthy. The star, caught halfway through the hole just as the rocky floor refilled it, came to a sudden halt.

Silence descended. And darkness. Lots of darkness.

Buried alive, deep in the foundations of the House and packed so tightly in earth that he couldn’t even blink, Arafin Strood pondered his next move.

There didn’t seem to be many options.

The sea was shockingly cold. Taggit paused just long enough to rearrange Nin so that she was hanging on around his neck, leaving his arms free. As they swam away, Nin took one look up to see that the roof of the cave was unbroken, the hole gone as if it had never been. All she could feel was relief that the rock had only been a layer. Any thicker and they would have been encased in it the moment the magic earthed. Fossils forever locked in stone.

To reach the cavern entrance, deep below the sea, Taggit had to swim down before he could swim up. Holding her breath was beginning to be a struggle. As well as Jik, Nin was worried about Toby because he was so small and surely wouldn’t be able to last as long. If he got panicky and struggled he’d slow them down and if he breathed in water, he’d drown. She couldn’t bear to lose him all over again.

And what about Jonas? He wasn’t a Fabulous, he couldn’t swim as fast as Taggit and Skerridge. And he had been carrying Hss. What if they came across him now? Floating here, drowned in the cave?

Her lungs were at bursting point when Taggit curved steeply up, the darkness around them grew lighter and a moment later they broke into the air and she could breathe again.

The first thing she heard was Toby coughing.

Taggit waded up to the beach, one arm around Nin
and the other holding Toby. Just beyond the water’s edge, he dropped them gently on to the sand. Jonas and Hss were already there, gathered around Skerridge. Jonas looked up as they arrived, a smile wiping the fear from his face. He came over.

Nin hugged him hard, then hurried to Toby. He seemed all right and gave her a smile, so she rumpled his wet hair and went to Skerridge. The bogeyman was breathing flames on to a mess of burnt cloth and silken thread on the ground. Another burst of fire-breath and the wrappings were gone.

They stared in horror at what was left of Jik.

As tightly as they had wrapped him, water had found its way in. He had no arms and no legs and his body was eaten away on the surface as if by acid. His face and head were damaged, with half the back of his mud skull melted away.

‘His eyes are still lit,’ said Taggit.

He was right, but Nin had never seen them so low, barely glowing at all. She dropped on to one knee and looked into the dull coal eyes.

‘We can sort it.’ She looked up. ‘Everybody get mud. Don’t be fussy about where from, we just need to be fast.’

Overhead the sun shone and a warm breeze blew in waves topped by frothy horses. The clouds raced on white wings and over them towered the great cliff, silent and dark against the sky. They worked in silence, mixing sandy earth with seawater. Hss and Jonas prepared the
mud, while Skerridge and Taggit pressed it into arms and legs. Toby handed scoops of it to Nin, who covered Jik’s body and head with a fresh coat and filled out the missing part of his skull. As they gave him shape and form, she was sure the lights of his eyes grew brighter. When they were done they stood back and looked.

‘I think we made him a bit bigger.’

‘Uh-huh. His legs are longer. And his arms. Still, won’t do any harm.’

Next they collected as much dead wood and twigs as they could. There wasn’t much on the beach and Skerridge had to superspeed inland a couple of times. They built it all in a pyre around Jik and Skerridge set it alight.

Then they watched him burn.

‘Well, Ninevah Redstone,’ said the bogeyman edging closer to the roaring fire, ‘it’s been fun, what wiv everyfin’. Even the scary bits, an’ there’ve been plenny enuff o’ those. But yer got what yer was after in the end.’ Skerridge sniggered. ‘An’ yer gave Mr Strood a knockin’ while yer was about it too! So what’s next, huh?’

Nin looked at him and smiled. ‘We all go home,’ she said.