The Winter Knights (37 page)

The Winter Knights watched, transfixed, as the last of the ice-cold carapace melted into thin air. From inside the grey and lumpy shell of ice, an extraordinary creature had emerged.

It was diaphanous, and translucent, as if moulded from the crystal air itself. Long, twisting tentacles fanned out from its glassy body, catching the sunbeams like a tasselled fringe of light. Its eyes were clear now, and sparkled like marsh-gems. And as the light passed through its body, it was rendered visible only by the ripples of its movement. Its mouth opened like a tremor on the surface of a crystal lake, and the cloudeater's great glassy body seemed to swell and surge forward.

All at once, with a rippling flick of its barely visible tail, the transparent fronds at the tip finally broke free from the warming sky with the sound of a thousand panes of glass shattering at the same instant. Then, with a second flick, like a fountain of crystal clear water, the mysterious cloudeater sped off into Open Sky in one long, languorous ripple of movement.

Maris turned to Quint, her eyes shining. ‘We didn't kill it, Quint,’ she said. ‘We cured it!’

•CHAPTER TWENTY TWO•
THE RATBIRD

W
ith a high-pitched screech and a flap of its leathery wings, the tiny ratbird flew up from Quint's outstretched hands and darted through the open window at the north end of the Upper Halls. For a moment, it hovered in the sky, the warm sun beating down on its small, sleek body. It looked down at the Knights Academy below; at the thirteen towers, the Lower Halls, the wide expanse of the Inner Courtyard, then up at the great yellow clouds billowing over the towers and turrets of Sanctaphrax.

‘Sky protect you, Nibblick, little friend,’ breathed Quint as the little ratbird disappeared from view. ‘I only hope my father has the answer to the question you carry.’

Then, as if making up its mind, it let out a second screech and, with a twitch of its whiskers and a flick of its tail, soared off into the sky towards the distant Deepwoods.

*

Three days earlier, a battered sky ship – its sails in shreds and its hull timbers creaking – had approached the Edge cliff through a warm sunlit sky. Far below, the Edgewater River swirled and writhed like a mighty log-worm as a vast torrent of snowmelt brought its frozen waters back to life.

At the very tip of the cliff, the great frozen pillar of water groaned and shuddered as the newly-awakened river flowed over and around it, loosening its grip. As the lone sky ship passed high overhead, there came a resounding
crack!
and the mighty pillar of ice – three times the size of the Sanctaphrax rock – finally broke free, splintering and shattering into countless million brittle shards as it tumbled down into the void below.

The sky ship continued on its lonely way, high above the frothing turmoil of the swollen river now pouring freely once more over the edge. Ahead of the battered vessel lay the Stone Gardens.

Dropping down low over the once mighty stone stacks, which stood like islands amidst the swirling snowmelt, the crew of the sky ship gathered excitedly at its balustrades and gazed down. The rocks seemed to have retained their caps of snow, yet as they drew nearer, the crew could see that this covering of white was in fact alive. Thousands of white ravens had settled – cawing and screeching on the topmost stones – and were now flapping and jostling for position.

A command from the helm sent the crew scuttling back to their stations.

With Raffix at the helm, Stope and Phin at the flight-rock and Quint and Maris at the prow, the
Cloudslayer
came down lower still as it approached the jumbled roofs and turrets of Undertown. Beneath them, the streets were alive with activity, as if some giant had just kicked over a woodant nest.

There were lugtrolls shovelling the dwindling drifts of snow away, gnokgoblins and cloddertrogs sweeping the pouring water down the drains. From the edge of every roof, icicles dripped, before shattering and breaking off as great chunks of compacted snow above them suddenly shifted, slid down the sloping tiles and tumbled noisily to the ground below. After so many months of snow and ice there was, at last, no need to remain barricaded in against the cold, and it seemed as though every door and every window in the great sprawling city had been flung wide open.

There was water everywhere, gushing down pipes and pouring along gutters, sluicing the dirt and dregs of winter away in a great frenzy of spring cleaning. And if Undertown was a changed place now that the stranglehold of ice and snow had finally released its grip, then Sanctaphrax was all but unrecognizable.

‘Look,’ gasped Maris, clutching at Quint's arm.

Melted water was pouring down from every rooftop, every gable, every ledge; every banked-lintel and flying-buttress; every archway, avenue, bridge and hanging-walkway. From the moment the thaw began, the water had been steadily seeping down into the porous floating rock and collecting in the stonecomb.

Now, all at once, the pressure which had been building suddenly became too much. With a loud hiss and a high-pitched whine, the trapped water burst out of the rock from all sides. Countless jets showered out from every crack and crevice in the vast spherical rock, filling the air with a halo of spray that, in the sunlight, turned to a magnificent rainbow which bathed the floating city in dazzling coloured light. And, as the ice continued to melt, the jets grew thicker and stronger, cascading down onto Undertown below as the great floating rock glided across the sky on the end of its anchoring chain.

With a leisurely shift of a flight-lever, Raffix brought the old sky ship round in the sky and set a course for the floating city. Ahead, the Gantry Tower stood tall above the rooftops at the eastern end of the Knights Academy. As the
Cloudslayer
approached, the smiles of its crew turned to frowns and they exchanged anxious looks. The snow might be melting, but it was clear that something was still terribly wrong in the Knights Academy below.

Take the Inner Courtyard, for example. It looked like a battlefield …

There were bodies everywhere. Some still lay where they had fallen, their bodies horribly twisted into grotesque shapes, blood staining the ground around them. Others had been moved and lay in rows, the thick white shrouds which covered them making it look, for a moment, as though the snow hadn't melted after all. At the far end of the courtyard, the great ironwood doors to the Academy Barracks hung shattered from their hinges, whilst in the distance the tilt trees were lying scattered in a mass of splinters and broken branches.

As Raffix brought the
Cloudslayer
carefully down in the sky, Phin jumped onto the landing jetty and tethered the tolley-rope to the mooring-ring of the Gantry Tower. One after the other, the Winter Knights climbed from the ship, their legs suddenly wobbly as they set foot on firm ground. The joy and elation they had all felt as they approached the academy had disappeared, to be replaced with shock and bewilderment.

Keeping close together, they trooped down the gantry steps, and in through the narrow side entrance that led to the Central Hall of the Upper Halls. As they stepped through the doorway, they were struck by the atmosphere of the place – the loud conversations, the stifling heat, the smell of blood … It was so different from the hushed, deserted hall they had left earlier that day.

The pulpits were now crowded, loud animated discussions taking place at their tops, while below them the hall resembled a vast sick-room, with low sumpwood cots laid out in rows and thick blankets draped over their occupants. High professors and Lower Hall squires alike passed among them, ministering to the wounds of the injured and closing the eyes of the dead.

At the end of one of the rows, Raffix noticed a tiny quarm crouched down at the foot of a floating cot. It was whimpering softly as it rocked slowly, back and forwards, back and forwards. The body of a second quarm lay nestled in the arms of the cot's occupant.

‘Fabius Dydex,’ Raffix whispered, shocked at the sight of the professor's waxen, lifeless face. He approached the cot and kneeled down, tenderly stroking the quivering head of the little quarm. ‘There, there, Howler,’ Raffix whispered. ‘Your master's gone.’

As if in answer to his words, the quarm turned and scurried up onto Raffix's shoulders and buried its head in the folds of his cape.

‘Looks like you've made a friend there,’ said an Upper Hall squire, approaching the little group now gathered around the professor's cot.

Raffix looked up. ‘Lubis?’ he said, clearly shocked by the squire's appearance. ‘Lubis, is that you?’

The Upper Hall squire attempted to smile. He was sallow and drained-looking, with hollow cheeks and sunken eyes. When he spoke, his voice was choked and raw, and the words seemed to tumble out in a torrent, like melting snow water.

‘Daxiel Xaxis and the gatekeepers locked all the doors at dawn, and we woke to the sounds of battle down in the Inner Courtyard …’ the squire began, fixing Raffix with a haunted stare. ‘We couldn't just stay locked up there. The honour of the Upper Halls was at stake. Fabius Dydex rallied us, and we fought our way down the Central Staircase, paying in blood for every step we took - but making the gatekeepers pay as well!’

Raffix nodded, his heartbeat quickening.

‘Flayle and Beltix fell on the Upper Landing,’ Lubis continued. ‘And Memdius … dear old Memdius. He died in my arms as we fought our way through the dormitory closets. But we made it out into the Inner Courtyard with Fabius Dydex at our head, and … and …’

The Upper Hall squire's face crumpled up, and he covered it with shaking, blood-stained hands.

‘That's … where … he met his death …’

The little quarm on Raffix's shoulder shivered and let out a small, mournful howl.

‘Where
were
you, Raffix,’ the squire sobbed, ‘when the Upper Halls needed you?’

The Winter Knights looked at each other. Suddenly it didn't seem right to boast of their great triumph out in Open Sky – not here in this place of death and suffering.

The blood had drained from Raffix's face and his eyes sparkled from behind his spectacles.

‘I was in the Gantry Tower, aboard the
Cloudslayer
…’ he began, but the Upper Hall squire wasn't listening.

Slumped at the foot of the floating cot, he was sobbing and rocking back and forth, just as the little quarm had done.

Quint laid an arm on his friend's shoulder and led him away. ‘Leave him, Raff,’ he said gently. ‘He won't understand right now, but there
is
someone who will.’

‘Philius Embertine!’ said Phin. ‘Come on, we must tell him that everything the barkscroll said was true, and more!’

The five of them set off, hurrying from the Upper Halls, down the stairs and along the dark, narrow corridors towards the Hall of High Cloud, and the small, forgotten room where Philius Embertine was being held prisoner. Every step of the way was punctuated with the aftermath of the great battle they had missed – smashed doors, broken bits of weaponry and the discarded robes of the gatekeepers, their logworm insignias now torn and blood-spattered.