Chasing Evil (8 page)

C
astor,” said Tanner. “Get the boys out with Gwen, before more guards come.”

“Where are you going?” he asked.

“I have to get to the next piece of the mask,” said Tanner. They'd already lost one, thanks to Geffen — he wasn't going to allow another to slip through his fingers. He turned to Corrin. “Which way to the eastern tunnels?”

The terrified boy shook his head. “You can't. That's where the Troiden lives.”

A murmur passed through the boys.

“That's where I have to go,” said Tanner.

Corrin pointed a shaky finger at one of the carts on the tracks. “That one,” he said.

“I'll come with you,” said Castor.

“You need to go to Nera,” Tanner said. “You're the only one who can make her bring down the cavern.”

He climbed into the cart. It was fastened with rope to a pulley. He lifted his sword, but Gwen caught his arm. “You don't know what's down there!”

“I do,” he said. “That's why I have to go. We can't risk Derthsin finding the next piece of the mask.”

Gwen's face softened, but she quickly clambered in beside Tanner. “There's something precious to me down there, too. My brother.”

Tanner thought about arguing, but there wasn't time. He looked at Castor. “If you hear more guards coming, you know what to do. Give Nera the word.”

“But you'll be inside!” said Castor.

“So will all the evil in Avantia,” said Tanner. “Promise me you'll do it.”

Castor, his face streaked with dirt and blood, nodded. “Good luck, Tanner.”

Tanner brought his sword down on the pulley rope, slicing through. The cart wheels began to turn on the tracks, and they were sucked into the tunnel.

The fire glow of the forges was lost as they plunged into blackness. The
rat-a-tat
of the cart wheels grew faster and faster and the air rushed overhead. Tanner leaned over the edge, and saw the dimly flashing tunnel walls streak past. They were going deep into the mountain, where their Beast protectors couldn't follow.

“What's the Troiden?” asked Gwen.

“I heard Derthsin mention it,” said Tanner, thinking back to the fear in the children's faces. “I think it's a Beast of some sort.”

Gwen didn't say more.

Sparks arced off the wheels as the cart screeched around a corner. Then the track seemed to level off.

“We're slowing down,” said Tanner.

He peered out over the rim and saw the tunnel had widened and there was a weak light ahead. Then he saw shapes looming up ahead on the track. More carts, stationary ones, and they were heading straight toward them.

“Look out!” he said, ducking back inside just as their cart clanged into another and they were thrown hard against the front.

“Nice landing,” whispered Gwen.

Tanner smiled grimly. “We must be here.”

He was about to stand when a voice nearby said, “What was that noise?”

“Looks like a loose cart,” said another, closer still. “Brutus must not be watching 'em properly up there.”

“Just a moment.” Tanner heard footsteps approaching, glimpsed the glow of a torch. He put his finger to his lips and drew his sword quietly. Gwen clutched her wolf-hilt rapier. A shadow leaned across the cart. A half grunt of surprise before Tanner smashed his hilt down on the man's temple. He flopped against the cart, and the torch fell to the ground.

“Breen?” said the other voice. “What's wrong?”

“Come on,” Gwen hissed.

Tanner snatched up the torch, and they creeped past the row of empty, waiting carts. Tanner strained his eyes and ears. The clanging of pickaxes he'd heard before seemed to have died, and he wondered if Corrin had been wrong. Perhaps these weren't the mines after all. Finally, they reached a loading area, which seemed to have been abandoned. Shovels and half-filled carts stood idle.

“Where are all the miners?” said Gwen.

Tanner was looking at the tunnel walls. Great gouges seemed to have been taken out of the rock, far too wide for any pickax to have made them. White gashes had been clawed out of the sides of the tunnel. They seemed almost … natural.

More tunnels branched off from the one they were in, all leading into blackness.

“Which way
now
?” said Gwen.

“We should take a closer look,” Tanner replied. He took a few steps into one of the branches but saw and heard nothing ahead. He went into the next. Gwen did the same in the ones on the other side of the main tunnel.

Tanner was beginning to lose hope when she called to him.

“This way!”

Tanner darted across the tunnel to where she was standing, head cocked.

“I hear something,” she said.

Tanner listened, too. She was right. Ahead was a sound like a distant grinding of machinery. Tanner found his steps quickening to a run, the fire from the torch flickering.

The sounds grew louder, and he saw more light ahead. He tossed the torch aside. They wouldn't need it now.

Suddenly, there was movement ahead.

“But I did what you asked!” shouted a voice.

Gwen let out a small whimper of fear.
Geffen.

General Gor dragged Geffen by the scruff of his collar around the corner ahead and away from them. Four guards followed in his wake.

“The thing about traitors is that they can't be trusted,” said Gor. “You have outlived your usefulness.”

“But he promised! I told you more than the map could! I — I …” His face flushed red. “I have other secrets!” he said desperately.

Gor shook his head in disgust. “You'd spill all your secrets, just like that? What a coward you are. You don't deserve to live.”

Beside Tanner, Gwen bolted out before he could pull her back.

“Let my brother go!” she said.

All six figures spun around, and the guards drew their swords. Tanner emerged beside Gwen.

“How did you get in here!” snapped Gor, his black eyes flashing. “Where's Brutus?”

“The captain's dead,” said Tanner. “Soon the armory will be buried under half a mountain, and you with it.”

Gor barked a harsh laugh. “Brutus was a weak fool. You really think Derthsin cares about the armory?” he said. “He'll soon have what he wants, and an army more powerful than any of you can imagine.”

The general pulled his cloak aside, and at his waist hung something Tanner had seen only in broken dreams: the next torn piece of the mask. This section was a cheekbone and part of the noseguard extending down the jaw. Beside it dangled the piece of the mask that Tanner had rescued, only for Geffen to steal it. Clearly, Gwen's twin had handed it over to the general.

“Your pathetic grandmother and her minion, Jonas, did well to hide the piece here,” said Gor. Jonas! So he knew about the mapmaker. “But my master will not be stopped. He grows stronger all the time.”

Tanner's anger fired his blood, and it burned through his veins.

“There are still two pieces to find,” he said. “And we have the map. We're strong, too.”

“Keep your map,” said Gor, closing his cloak. “This sniveling traitor has told us where to look. You have nothing to look forward to but your deaths.” He pointed to the guard nearest Geffen. “Bring the traitor to the Troiden. He'll appreciate a meal other than rock. The rest of you, kill these two.”

Gor turned and strode away down the tunnel. Geffen wailed as the soldier plucked him, kicking, off the floor and followed. Geffen threw a last, desperate glance in his sister's direction, but Gwen stood fixed to the spot, her eyes wide as she watched her brother being dragged away. The remaining three soldiers closed in on Tanner and Gwen, their blades glittering wickedly in the torch-lit tunnel.

T
anner and Gwen backed away, their weapons held out in front of them.

“Three of us against two,” sneered one of the soldiers. “This will be fun.”

Tanner found himself back where he'd dropped the torch. It was still lit, spitting embers on the ground. The faces of the guards were cast in deep shadows.

With every wasted moment, Gor was escaping with two pieces of the mask and Geffen's peril grew.

As Tanner stepped backward over the fallen torch, he turned to Gwen. “Ready?” he whispered.

“Let's do it!”

Tanner flicked the torch up with his toe, and it spun through the air at one of the guards. With a cry of surprise, he dodged sideways, clattering into his neighbor.

“You fool!” he said.

Tanner lunged, slicing his blade downward across the guard's face, opening up a long cut. Screaming, the injured guard clutched his face and stumbled backward. Gwen went down on one knee beneath an overhead blow, pulled out an ax from her belt, and buried the blade in the soldier's thigh. Only one enemy remained.

“The odds look better now, don't they?” said Tanner.

The last soldier looked at his own sword unsurely.

“If I let you go —” he started to offer.

“Don't you mean if
we
let
you
go?” Tanner asked. He could hardly believe how calm his own voice sounded.
I'm learning how to do this.

The man looked from Tanner to Gwen. She flicked back her cloak, and he spotted two other axes lined up in her belt, waiting to be used.

“I — I …” the man stuttered. He looked at Tanner, his eyes pleading. Then he turned and ran into the darkness.

“After him!” yelled Gwen.

Tanner and his friend sprinted along the tunnel, but the man had a head start and was soon out of sight. Tanner glanced around.
This is the way Gor left.
They caught up with other fleeing soldiers, who cast fearful glances back. Tanner heard the sudden pounding of hooves, and General Gor crashed into the guards on his black stallion. A man crumpled beneath the horse's hooves; the sound of his ribs cracking reverberated off the tunnel walls.

Gor rode on without breaking stride. Riding Varlot. There was a flicker of intelligence in the stallion's eyes as he passed, but no sign of him morphing into his Beast self.

Tanner and Gwen watched Gor galloping away. The two pieces of the mask bounced by his side, dangling from his leather belt. Tanner knew it was pointless to go after him; he couldn't outrun such a powerful Beast.

“We have to find Geffen,” he said, pointing the way Gor had come.

As he spoke, a terrible sound echoed down the tunnel. It sounded like the roar of rocks being crunched against one another. Above came the high-pitched begging of Gwen's brother. “Please, no! Please!”

Tanner and Gwen ran until they saw the figure of Gor's last soldier standing and peering over a rocky balcony. He was watching something below and didn't hear Tanner's approach until he was almost on him. As he turned, Tanner charged with Gwen, and they both pushed the guard over the ledge. He toppled, feetfirst, with a scream.

Tanner looked over and watched the guard slide down a steep, dusty slope fifteen paces high, and scramble up at the bottom. He immediately tried to climb up again, but the slope was sheer and he couldn't get a grip. Geffen was at the bottom, too, crouched in a ball and whimpering. Tanner gasped when he realized what they were both so afraid of. The Troiden.

From the dark shadows opposite, a shape emerged. The Beast was like a huge slug, pulsing with muscle. His thick, leathery skin was the same gray and black color as the rock. The creature's face, if you could call it that, consisted of twenty or so stubby tentacles, each ending with a mouth lined with triangular teeth opening and closing, searching for prey. In the center of the tentacle-mouths was a bulbous disk the size of Tanner's head, opalescent like the surface of a pearl. An eye!

The Troiden butted into the wall of the cavern, and several of his jaws clamped onto the rocks. Tanner heard the grinding noise once more, and saw the teeth sink into the rock, crushing it into showers of dust. Now Tanner understood what had made the marks on the tunnel walls — indeed, what had
made
all the tunnels. This Earth Beast was made for mining.

“Help me!” shouted the soldier, scrambling up. “Please, don't let him get me!”

The Troiden backed away, then came forward once more: slowly and deadly, feeling its way. Tanner realized why the Troiden wasn't moving straight toward Geffen and the guard.

“He's blind!” he said to Gwen.

She was staring in horror at the sight below. The soldier left his struggle to climb the wall and seized Geffen by the shoulders. He yanked the boy up and spun him around, then shoved him toward the rock-eating Beast. Geffen sprawled across the ground. He looked up at Gwen.

“Why aren't you helping me?” he called up. “Why don't you ever help me?” Gwen let out a cry of anguish and started to scramble down the wall they were leaning against. The Troiden lifted one huge eye, searching blindly for the source of the noise. Tanner gripped her by the wrist and twisted her around roughly.

“No,” he said. “I won't let you sacrifice yourself. It's too dangerous.”

Below them, Geffen curled into a terrified ball. The Troiden's tentacle-mouths moved toward him.

“I'm coming!” shouted Gwen. She pulled herself free and vaulted over the ledge, sliding down to the bottom, just managing to keep her balance.

“Gwen, no!” Tanner yelled.

Gwen rushed forward to Geffen's side and pulled her brother back as one of the mouths reached within a sword's length. “You have to get to your feet and walk!” she shouted at Geffen.

As the Beast reached for her, she slashed with her rapier, but the sharp blade hardly scratched the tentacle's thick hide. Tanner picked up rocks from the ground and pelted them one after another at the Beast. But it was hopeless. The Troiden moved on relentlessly. He was less than thirty paces from them now, and the three victims were pressed up against the slope desperately.

“You have to work together!” said Tanner. “Geffen, stand on your sister's shoulders and reach up to me!”

It took Gwen a moment to understand what he was saying. She looked up the slope, as if weighing the distance, then held her brother's face close to hers and spoke directly at him. He nodded briskly, his head jerking to look at the snorting, shuffling Troiden.

Gwen crouched, facing the slope, and Geffen managed to get both feet on her shoulders. Tanner, lodging his feet against the rock face, leaned over the ledge as far as he could and reached down. As Gwen straightened her knees, Geffen stretched up with his hands. Their fingers touched.

But the soldier below was clambering over Gwen, pushing her aside. “Let me up!” he said.

“Get off!” shouted Gwen.

The soldier didn't listen and began to pull himself over Geffen's body, too, ignoring the boy's shouts of pain. Tanner's fingers broke from Geffen's, and the soldier latched onto his wrist, heaving himself up.

Tanner tried to free his arm. As the soldier got a foot on the ledge, Tanner managed to shake himself loose from the man's grasp. He fell away with a jerk, and the soldier plummeted back into the cave. Tanner heard him hit the ground with a thud.

He jumped up and looked over once more. The soldier had fallen halfway between the slope and the advancing Beast. He lay on his back, moving his head groggily. His eyes opened, just as the first of the Troiden's mouths latched onto his shoulder. Then he screamed.

Tanner hardly dared watch as the other mouths shifted to their prey, attaching to different parts of his body. There was a dreadful slurping sound as each mouth took hold and the man's flesh started to pull and pucker, blood bursting from his pores and running down his limbs in rivulets. His head fell back on his neck and his eyes rolled back as he foamed at the mouth, the pain making his body jerk. There was a dull cracking sound, and then a shaft of white bone broke through the skin of the man's thigh. More mouths closed around him, and soon there was nothing but the awful sounds of snorting and chewing and breaking bones.

Tanner reached over again and stretched toward Geffen. Their fingertips brushed. He reached farther and grasped the boy's wrist. He leaned out with his other hand and took hold of the other wrist.

“Hold on!” he shouted

With a cry, he pulled with everything he had, gritting his teeth as the fire spread up through his elbow joints and into his shoulder. Gwen was gripping her brother's ankles.

“Pull harder!” she shouted.

Tanner saw the Troiden turn its attention from the soldier's remains and move once more toward his friend.

With his feet pressed against the wall behind, the muscles in his legs felt wrenched apart, and he thought his spine might break. But slowly Geffen was moving upward. Sweat was pouring into Tanner's eyes, and he squeezed them shut, feeling the ligaments in his wrist and elbow stretch close to snapping. But he wasn't going to let go.

Squeezing open his eyes, he saw Gwen had her feet on the slope and managed to get some purchase, lightening the load on his arm. Her long braids swung freely now. Geffen reached for the rim with one hand. Tanner let his weight shift backward and pulled him the rest of the way. Then Gwen's hand grasped the edge, too, and she heaved herself over.

At the bottom, the Troiden growled and snorted, scattering dust from the ceiling. “You saved me!” sobbed Geffen, throwing his arms around his sister's neck. His voice came out as a muffle. “You came back for me, after everything I did.”

Gwen hugged her brother tightly. “Of course I did,” she said.

Suddenly, a series of shrieks sounded through the tunnels, echoing off the walls. But the noise wasn't human.

“It's Nera!” said Tanner. “She's bringing down the caves!”