Raven Rise (28 page)

T
hey say the truth hurts.

They're right. I've been getting hit with a lot of truths lately, and it hurts. I didn't realize just how badly I had messed things up until the moment I hit Denduron. Yeah, things got worse. What can I say? I was an idiot. I was kidding myself. I gave up. I was tired. Guilty guilty guilty. On all counts. I'm not trying to defend myself or justify what I did, but for the record, I truly thought I was doing the right thing by burying the flume on Ibara and trying to trap Saint Dane. It wasn't about being selfish. Okay, maybe it was a little bit, but I really thought it was the right thing to do.

I was wrong.

As I write this journal, I can only say that I now know
how
wrong I was. Saint Dane will not be defeated by a single clever move. It's gone way beyond that. The only way I will be able to stop him now is to destroy him. Mark, Courtney, I don't know if you'll ever get the chance to read this, but I want you to know that I've finally come to the realization that he's been manipulating me from the very beginning. I don't know if things have gone exactly as he planned, but that doesn't really matter. What counts now is that the battle is nearing its completion, and unless I can do something more than I've done, he will win. The Convergence has begun. The territories are tumbling toward chaos. The one glimmer of hope I have is that as far as I know, things haven't hit bottom. Yet. That's a scary thought, because things have gotten pretty bad. We're on a path that's leading toward the complete breakdown of Halla, so that Saint Dane can remold it the way he chooses. As grim as that sounds, at least we haven't reached the end of that path yet. I've got to try and stop him before we do.

For that, I will have to crush him.

When the flume dropped me at the gate on Denduron, it first looked as if I wouldn't be doing much of anything anymore. Normally the end of a flume ride is marked by a gentle deposit. I didn't expect this arrival to be any different.

Wrong. Again. My feet touched the ground, gravity took over, and all hell broke loose. I was ramrodded square in the chest and knocked back into the flume. It happened so quickly I didn't know what hit me. That's not just a figure of speech. I really didn't know what hit me. I was slammed down onto the hard rock floor of the flume, wishing that the receding light would have been thoughtful enough to take me back along with it. It didn't. I was stuck with whatever it was that wasn't happy about my arrival. Before I had the chance to see what had slammed me, I heard it. It was a growl. A familiar growl. It took all of two seconds for me to put it together.

The quigs were back on Denduron.

I didn't try to figure out what that might mean. There would be time for that later, assuming I could get out of there and create a “later” for myself. I didn't jump to my feet. I didn't want to be a threat. At least not yet. I lay on my back and twisted my head to try and see my nemesis. My eyes hadn't adjusted yet to the dark, so all I saw at the mouth of the flume were two eyes. Yellow eyes. They seemed to be floating in the air. I knew they weren't. They were inside the head of a quig-bear. Locked on me. I heard its heavy breathing. This thing was going to attack again, and there was no place for me to go. I couldn't even activate the flume and travel somewhere else. By the time the light came for me, I would be hamburger. I couldn't just lie there either. It would be the easiest meal that quig ever had. There weren't a lot of options. Actually, there was only one option. Attack.

I rolled forward and leaped for the mouth of the flume. It was a totally insane move, but the only thing I had going for me was surprise. I hoped that jumping at the monster would be the last thing it expected.

“Ahhhh!” I screamed, trying to sound more threatening than I was. Between my sudden move and the lame scream, I bought myself a second to act. That's about how long the quig hesitated. I lunged at the eyes, but I wasn't about to grab it. That would have been suicide. I remembered the multiple rows of sharp teeth set into the strong jaw of those prehistoric bears. It would have bitten my head off before my hands could reach its throat. The quig didn't know that. For that one second it must have felt threatened, because it didn't move. Or maybe it just couldn't believe I was being such an idiot. Didn't matter to me. I had bought another second to do something. That was the good news. I cut hard to my left, trying to get past the beast. I almost made it too. Almost. That was the bad news.

Two seconds isn't a very long time. I had drawn parallel with the quig, thinking I might get past it. That hope didn't last long. The beast realized I wasn't a threat and made its own move. It lashed out with one oversized paw and slashed my left shoulder. It clubbed me so hard that the impact spun me around. I found myself reeling backward again. I desperately tried to keep my balance, but couldn't stop from slamming the back of my head on the rock wall on the far side of the gate cavern. I forced myself to stay focused, because I knew if I didn't, the next thing I'd hear was the sound of the quig chewing on me. Followed by my own screams. I looked up to see the beast on all fours near the mouth of the flume. It was exactly as I remembered the quigs from Denduron. It was a brute of a mutant bear with long bonelike spikes rising from its back. Though it was one of the smaller quigs, it had to be six hundred pounds. Its jaws were impossibly huge for its head. So were its teeth. So were its eyes, and they were looking right at me. I don't know why it didn't pounce right away. Maybe it was still surprised that I had the guts to try to escape. Or maybe it knew there was no rush. I was helpless. And hurt.

I forgot to mention that. It hadn't just clubbed me with its paw. My adrenaline was pumping so hard I didn't realize it at first, but it had sliced right through the thin material of my shirt from Ibara with its sharp claws. It had also sliced right through my shoulder. When I tried to push up on my left arm, I felt the pain. A quick look down showed me the grim reality. I was bleeding. Badly. The tattered shirt was already soaked with my brown blood and the wet patch was growing fast. I remembered back to when Uncle Press had speared the quig that had been chasing us down the snowy mountain as we escaped on a sled. The other quigs smelled the blood and attacked. They went after the wounded quig with a horrifying, cannibalistic bloodlust. I'll never forget the pained screams of the injured quig as it was eaten alive by its buddies.

The quig in front of me had the same idea. I saw its big nose working, sucking in the blood smell that was filling the cavern. In a few seconds its own blood would start to boil. A few seconds after that the rest of my blood would start to spill. I only had a few seconds to save myself. Looking around quickly, I saw something that made absolutely no sense, but I didn't stop to try to figure out the explanation. Lying in the dirt, not five feet from me, were four dado-killing rods from Quillan. Instinct took over. I rolled for the long, metal spears.

The quig let out a screeching bellow that made me shudder. I didn't let it stop me though. It was coming for me. I would have only one shot. I grabbed for one of the rods. I needed two hands to control it, but didn't have two hands. My shoulder burned with pain. It was useless. Too bad for me. The quig charged. It was making the first move. If there was anything I learned from Loor and Alder at the warrior training camp of Mooraj, it was to never make the first move. Lucky for me the quig hadn't trained there as well. Since my back was to the beast, I had to sense its movement. My hope was, in its mindless bloodlust, it would attack without thinking. I swept up the long rod, clutched it with one fist, and spun around.

It all happened so fast it's hard to describe exactly
what
happened. I remember seeing its eyes flash yellow. I also remember seeing its jaws opened wide, ready to chomp. In that brief flash of a moment, I remember thinking that it must have had a few hundred teeth in its mouth. Every last one looked sharp. For me, it was a target. I whipped the rod around and jammed it into the beast's throat. I could feel the solid rod pierce flesh. The beast howled and gasped but didn't stop its charge. It was the worst thing it could have done. The back end of the rod was planted against the rock wall of the cave, so the only place the other end could go was through the beast's neck. I jumped out of the way and quickly grabbed another rod off the ground. The quig whipped its head back and forth, as if trying to shake the dado rod loose.

I quickly realized that the quig was just as dangerous that way as when it thought it was in control. The monster was in pain. It was angry. At me. The fight wasn't over. I grabbed the second rod and did something that, as I write this now, seems too hideous to even consider, let alone pull off. But you do strange things when you're fighting for survival. I lifted the weapon high like a javelin, but didn't throw it. The chance of missing was too great. I had to make sure this weapon found its mark. I ran forward, timing my move so that I attacked at the exact moment the quig shook its head away from me. When it whipped its head back my way, I jammed the dado rod straight into its eye. The beast screamed. I didn't back off. I forced the weapon farther in, no doubt piercing its brain. Gross? Well, yeah, but so what? It was him or me. Thinking back now, it kind of makes my stomach turn, but at the time all I could think of was killing that bad boy. It's hard to describe the feeling. My heart was racing, obviously. I was desperate, but if I were to be honest, I'd have to say that I was also a little out of my mind.

It was a quig. A freakin' quig! We had won Denduron. Its turning point had passed. Why was a quig guarding the flume? The monster stumbled. It may have been done, but I wasn't. I had to make sure. I let go of the dado rod I had drilled through its brain and grabbed another. The beast fell onto its side. I didn't hesitate. With my one good arm, I raised the third rod high and stabbed it down through its chest, where I imagined its black heart was beating. Now that I look back, I'm sort of ashamed to admit this, but writing these journals is about telling the truth for the ages, right? I stabbed the beast once, pulled out the rod, and stabbed it again, and again. I don't know how many times I pierced the monster. More than I had to. At that point it was more about anger than self-preservation.

With each thrust I gritted my teeth and snarled, “I…am…not…done…yet!”

I stood over the dying beast, covered with blood, not sure how much was mine and how much was the monster's. I had beaten it. I had survived. I wanted to stumble back into the flume and get out of there, but that wasn't an option. Saint Dane had said that the first domino of Halla to fall would be Denduron. I thought we had prevented that many years before. As I stood looking down at the dying quig, I knew I was wrong. Denduron was back in play. I was in the right place. I also realized that Alder was on Denduron. The dado weapons were proof of that. They were the weapons he was supposed to return to Quillan. Why he hadn't done that, I had no idea, but I was glad he hadn't. They saved my life.

Once I calmed down, I realized I wasn't out of danger. Far from it. If there was one quig, there would be more. If they smelled blood, they'd come running, looking for a frenzy feed. Since I was bleeding, I'd be on the menu. I had to be gone. I started to go for the leather and fur Denduron clothes that were lying around the flume cave, but soon realized I had a bigger problem. I was seriously hurting. If I wanted to make it out of that cave and down to the Milago village, I had to stop the blood flow. I pulled off my Ibara shirt, which wasn't easy, because my left arm was useless. The pain from the slash felt like fire. Loque's shirt was a rotted mess. That helped. I was able to half-pull and half-tear it off. Once I wrestled off the shirt, I saw two deep gouges that ran across my shoulder and my left pec. They were deep, too. Muscle was cut. I was in a bad way. How the heck was I supposed to bandage that up? Since my arm was useless anyway, I used the old shirt like a bandage and wrapped it around the top of my arm. That only covered half the wound. I looked around the cavern and saw some wide leather straps that could have been belts. I tied those under my armpits and around my chest. Would that stop the blood flow? I didn't know. It was better than nothing.

The next trick was to get dressed. I knew it would be freezing outside, and I had to protect myself, so I worked my way into some of the leather clothes I found lying around. The toughest part was lacing up the leather shoes. At least my left hand still worked. Between that, my good right hand, and my teeth, I was able to strap myself up. The final touch was a furry cloak that I threw over my shoulders. I hoped it would be enough. There were no sleds in the cave. I was going to have to walk down that mountain, through the snow. It was going to be cold. Really cold. I picked up the final dado weapon, thinking I could use it as a walking stick. I leaned on the long rod, testing to see if I could hold my own weight. It wasn't perfect, but it would have to do. It was time to get going. As I stepped out of the dark cavern, into the bright light of the three suns of Denduron, I had real doubts about whether or not I would be able to make it down that mountain.

My confidence bottomed out when I saw the bony spikes of quig spines sticking up in various places around the snowfield in front of me. At least they hadn't yet smelled the blood that was pooling inside the cavern. I knew that would only be a matter of time, and wind direction. I had to move. Walking across the snow was hard. There was a thin crust of ice on top that wasn't strong enough to hold my weight. I'd take a step and plant my foot, but as soon as I put weight on it, I'd break through the top layer and sink down to midcalf. Every time. Over and over. It was like walking in cold mud. I was glad I had grabbed the dado rod. It was the only thing that kept me from toppling. If I had gone over, I didn't think I'd be able to pull myself back up.