Cloudfyre Falling - a dark fairy tale (69 page)

Suddenly she noticed the hand
clasping the tower were no longer part of a detached wrist—an arm
had grown out into the sky, buried away in the clouds. The fingers
were beginning to move, flexing, as if altering their grip. In its
efforts the hand slid down the tower about twenty feet, leaving the
windows free. And Melai saw it then, in the hollow of the tower
through its tall arched windows once concealed by those fingers. A
tongue dangling out of that face. A vast, horrible wet beast,
barbed with hooks and hanging from them were thousands of bodies.
And at her level, she could see the dead forms of her sisters,
hanging there, eyes open, staring at her.

She squealed.

And on that moment, for the first
time in days, the Death Bell tolled.

8

Melai took the full brunt. The
mere sound wave alone shredded her wings and tore them from her
body, and away she were flung into Vol Mothaak, tumbling head over
foot. Had it not been for her crushing collision against one of the
great oaks, she might have flown on for a thousand leagues, lost
and sunk down in the depths of the Grass Sea never to be
found.

Below, the Strom Haven talismans
were blown to bits and Hawkmoth, Gargaron and Locke all succumbed
to the shockwave, thrown off into the woods like mere dolls of
straw caught on a cyclonic gale.

The faceless Angels of the woods,
clinging upside-down to tree trunks, remained utterly unaffected.
As if, for them, the shockwave did not exist. And from their perch,
they watched the intruders upon their realm sail wildly and
mercilessly through the woodland.

1

LONG after the shockwave had swept
away, Gargaron lay in the leaf litter moaning, unsure what had hit
him. He opened his eyes and gazed up into the trees. His vision
were blurred. He blinked and lifted his hand to rub his eyes but
his arm felt as heavy as stone.

After a while, and with great
effort, he sat up, aching from toe to chin. Blood dripped down his
face. He blinked, hoping to clear his vision. But his left eye were
gummed up with some sort of warm sticky substance. He tried wiping
it away but pain came back at him. Gently he fingered his eye
socket. His eye were naught but mush, and the bone were shattered,
crumpled, caved-in.

He looked around. Uncertain where
he were. Gargantuan woodland trees rose up about him, so tall he
could not see where they ended. He took his gourd from his belt
only to find it bashed in somehow and without its lid. It held but
two or three sips of water. Which he tipped into his
mouth.

He took some deep breaths then
staggered to his feet. Weak, he stumbled. One of his legs shot up
with excruciating pain. He grimaced. Using trees around him for
support he managed to stay upright. He strained his good eye,
hoping to focus his vision. It did not matter, the world around him
remained a haze.

2

Absently clasping his empty gourd,
he vacated the tree against which he were leaning. He held his arms
out in front of him. He stumbled into another trunk. And held
himself to it as if to let go would mean falling down and never
getting up again. He steadied himself, took long breaths, tried
focusing his good eye. Blood ran down his face.

He slid down the tree to his rump
and sat there panting. He smudged the blood from his face. There
were a hundred other bleeding wounds across his body. They itched
and stung. He reached for his pack, not even sure if it were still
clung to him. He sighed with relief when he felt it there, strapped
across his back. Unhitching it took tremendous effort. The strap
were caught on his shoulder. He hung his head, panting, spit
swinging from his lips in bloody tendrils. Eventually he wrestled
the pack into his lap. He did not notice that Drenvel’s Bane were
missing. He were concerned only with fetching out his medicinal
satchel. From inside he took a small black-glass jar. He screwed
the stopper with his thumb and finger back and forth until it came
free. Dropping the cork he upended a handful of miniscule primate
like critters into his palm. None of them were any bigger than the
Ladybird Beetles that his dear Veleyal liked to collect on spring
mornings.

He picked one up in his fingers
and placed it as near as he could estimate to the gushing wound on
his forehead. He had to do it by touch. Though his fingertips felt
numb. Still, he knew once the scent of blood brought the critter
from its stasis, the critter would need no help seeking the
wound.

He felt it move, felt it waking.
Felt it clambering across his brow like an ant. Then felt it at his
wound—a sensation like a mad bee sting and then a satisfying
tingling sensation and a gradual numbing of pain.

He placed others across his body.
Through blurred sight he watched them awaken. They scurried about
him in search of ruptured flesh. When they sniffed out a bloodied
wound they opened their ravenous mouths and sunk their fangs
in.

Gargaron let the Zombeez cavort
over his body, their rampant appetites driving them to his wounds,
where they drank and ate. The giant’s physiology were no friend to
them however. Their saliva stimulated Gargaron’s immune system and
flaps of his skin folded over each of the undead creatures,
absorbing them into his flesh thus arresting blood flow and sealing
each wound.

He sat back, moved to take another
draught of water. None remained. He dropped the empty gourd and
closed his eyes, grimacing, hoping, praying that he had not lost
too much blood. Above him the two suns beat down through Vol
Mothaak’s canopy, hot and oppressive.

3

Sometime later, once the Zombeez
had done their business, Gargaron tried standing again. Using the
nearest tree for support, he climbed to his feet but when he
stepped forward his legs crumpled beneath him and he collapsed into
the leaf matter. He lay there panting. Sweat ran into his good eye.
He smudged it away with his wrist. He climbed to his feet again,
gripping the smooth bark of the trees about him. He stepped
forward, one foot at a time.

He stumbled aimlessly, looking
about, trying to gain his bearings. ‘Melai,’ he tried calling
though his voice were reduced to mere croaks. ‘Hawkmoth. Locke.
Where be you?’

He were never certain which way he
were heading. He thought of the tower. Where did it stand? If he
could only glimpse it through the woods he might gather his
bearings. Unless of course his friends had succeeded in pulling it
to ground. His memory, his mind, everything were an utter mess. He
were certain of nothing.

There were little sound, little
breeze; his footfalls were muffled. The suns remained directly
overhead, beaming down hot and harsh, the glaring sunlight pained
his eye. He ached. His bones hurt.

Exhausted, he
fell against yet another tree trunk, panting, spit running from his
mouth. ‘
Thronir, help me find a way from
this nightmare
,’ he whispered desperately,
his bloodied lips pushed against the rough bark. It were then he
heard a faint swishing noise. And a glooping liquid sound,
something splashing, splatting.

He grimaced as he turned himself
about, slumping spine-first against the trunk. With his one good
eye he peered out into the blurred realm before him.

He saw… movement. Thirty yards
away he judged. He could not tell however what he were looking at.
But the swishing sounds, the splashing noises, seemed to come from
that direction.

‘
Hawkmoth?’ he croaked. ‘Melai?
Locke? Be that you?’

If it were, none answered
him.

He pushed away from the tree,
again hands held out in front of him. The conspicuous movement
ahead did not cease. He pushed closer. His vision could still not
make out what it were. ‘Melai,’ he croaked. ‘Hawkmoth. Somebody
answer me.’

He saw those strange beings clung
to tree trunks. The faceless ones, Star Angels as Hawkmoth had
called them. And he gasped when he recognised the sorcerer sprawled
across a twisted bed of roots. The angels had him surrounded. And
though the scene were fuzzy, Gargaron realised what were happening:
the angles were jabbing him with spears. Retracting… jabbing…
retracting… jabbing… again and again and again, like knives into a
hoardog.

4

Gargaron, alarmed, reached for his
sword but it were not on him and could not recall when he last had
it. He looked about, thinking it may have only recently fallen from
him. But if it lay in his vicinity, such were his eyesight, that he
could not distinguish it from stick nor branch.

Without thinking, he shoved his
way before these Star Angels, attempting to ward off their attacks
with naught but his arms. He found himself amidst a flurry of
spikes that pierced his clothing and his leather arm-guards, that
punctured his skin and muscle. As they retracted from his flesh,
pulsing jets of blood spurted into the air.

He staggered backwards into the
ancient gnarled bark of a tree, his boots splashing through thick
pools of sorcerer blood. He watched the Star Angels with his
compromised vision. They clung to the tree trunks around Hawkmoth,
dangling upside-down, jabbing their long spikes at him
still.

They possessed no arms with which
to wield weapons. And only tentacles for legs. But he saw upon
their featureless faces a large obscene orifice that spat out a
tusk as long and straight as his very own great sword. They stabbed
Hawkmoth repeatedly and as they retracted, drawing fresh spurts of
blood, these spike drew back somehow into heads no larger than
Gargaron’s.

5

Gargaron crouched and grabbed the
sorcerer. Amidst a flurry of spear strikes he hefted Hawkmoth into
his grasp and hauled him backwards.

Sweat drained into his eye. He
wiped it off but it smudged with blood and made his eyesight worse.
He reached again for his sword. It were not on him. He considered
Drenvel’s Bane. He reached for it. But could not feel it in his
pack. He searched the ground around him hoping maybe it had slipped
out when he’d grabbed hold of Hawkmoth. There were lots of blurred
objects. But nothing his fingers touched were the hammer
hilt.

He grabbed the sorcerer by the
wrists, gathering his strength to haul him into his arms and run
off with him. But he realised the onslaught had abated.

He looked up.

The angels clung to their trees.
Motionless.

Gargaron waited
for the attack to kick off again. But it did not come.
Why would they stop?
he
wondered.
Unless… unless Hawkmoth were
finished.

‘
Hawkmoth?’ Gargaron croaked.
‘Hawkmoth, do you hear me?’ He could make out no detail other than
large blurred patches of red upon his friend’s body that were
probably blood and flesh. When his hands found them, these areas
they were pulpy and wet and warm.

‘
Hawkmoth?’ Gargaron groaned.
‘Hawkmoth! Hear me now.’

The sorcerer were unmoving. He
were sprawled and his limbs loose and unresponsive. Gargaron
lowered his ear to Hawkmoth’s chest, listening.

It were faint, but there were a
heartbeat.

‘
Hawkmoth,’ he said close to the
sorcerer’s face. ‘Stay with me. Do not leave. I be here at your
side. You are not alone.’ He glanced up at the Angels. They were
gone he realised. He looked about. The woodland were a blur but he
saw no movement.

He turned back to Hawkmoth,
wondering if some tincture in the sorcerer’s sidepack might work to
bring the sorcerer round. Yet he knew nothing of Hawkmoth’s
peculiar potions. Even after spending so much time in his company.
He did not want to administer something that might kill the
sorcerer outright. Not if there were some small chance that he
might recover.

Gargaron considered his own
remedies: his Zombeez, his skin grafts, and the various potions and
ointments engineered by his village druids. Nearly all were giant
specific. Meant only for his kind. And yet, there were Lyfen
Essence.

Will it work on
Hawkmoth though?
he wondered. It had
failed to save the elven woman who had ridden Grimah to
him.

6

He took it from his pack,
identifying it by feeling for its horizontal bottle. He fished it
into his grasp, and held it before his face, unstoppering it,
sniffing it. Like some blinds truck soul, he felt around for
Hawkmoth’s face, then his mouth. He brought the bottle to
Hawkmoth’s lips and dripped in what he thought would be two or
three drops.

He sat there then, wondering what
to do next. A thought came to him. He lifted the vial to his face
and let fall a drop into both eyes. There proved no change in his
left eye; it remained spongy, broken, pulverised, unseeing. Yet,
more swift than he would’ve thought possible, his good eye began to
clear; the blur of the woodland realm all about him coalesced into
vibrant clarity.

He gazed down at the sorcerer and
gasped when he noted the extent of Hawkmoth’s injuries. The
sorcerer were a bloodied mess of broken limbs and punctured flesh.
The side of his head had been torn open, one ear entirely gone. His
jaw were broken. Or horribly dislocated for it hung at a horrific
angle. His eyes were shut but puddled in drying blood. His arms
were twisted and bent. There were a huge rent up the side of his
body where even the stone skin had cracked open like a foul
egg.