Rise of Allies (The Gryphon Chronicles, Book 4) (21 page)

Jake winced and tried to shield his eyes, but the burst of brilliance was gone as quickly as it appeared. When his vision readjusted, he saw once again, as yesterday, a pulsating circle of thick, clear, almost liquid-looking energy before them, like a hole in the fabric of reality, shimmering with delicate colors, as if to beckon them in.

Perfectly round, the portal reminded Jake of a manmade pond filled with very pure water, little waves and ripples playing across its surface—except that it stood upright rather than lying flat.

Through this watery window, a strange silver tunnel opened up. Beyond it, he could just make out a rugged landscape of misty mountains and forests waiting for them.

The Green Man peered over Derek’s shoulder into the portal. “See any dragons basking near our landing point?”

“Don’t worry,” the Guardian replied, “there’s a barrier around the waypoint to keep them off.”

“They’re still dragons,” the veterinarian muttered.

“Aw, settle your branches, Doc. We’ll be fine.”

“So what do we do?” Jake asked Tex.

“Just step in. She won’t hurt ya, long as you’re with me.”

Derek shrugged the sack of equipment higher onto his shoulder, then stepped up to the portal. “See you on the other side, boys.”

Jake watched, heart pounding, as Derek’s body blurred into streaks and disappeared in the twinkling of an eye as he went shooting off through the Grid.

Maddox and Jake glanced at each other in alarm.

Jake stepped back. “You’re next, not me.”

“Go on, kid. Time’s a-wastin’,” said Tex.

“Yes, sir.” Maddox visibly braced himself, then went up to the portal.

Cautiously, he poked his finger into the swirling energy field to test it. But with a sudden yelp, Maddox went flying into the tunnel, as though the Grid itself had caught him by the arm and thrown him down the ley line’s energy highway.

Tex just chuckled as Maddox blurred and whizzed off into the distance.

Jake turned anxiously to the Lightrider. “Is he going to be all right?”

“’Course he is. Doc, you go next.”

The Green Man let out a large sigh and gazed at the portal for a moment. “Go easy on me, Gaia.” Clutching his doctor bag, he closed his eyes, stepped into the circle, and swiftly vanished like the others had.

“Your turn, kid.”

“Er, all right.” Heart thumping, Jake stepped up nervously to the pulsating circle of energy. “That’s all I have to do, then? Step in?”

“I gen’rally find it helps to yell ‘
Yee-haw
.’”

“Why? What does that mean?”

“No idea.”

“Is it a spell?” he asked hopefully.

“Naw, it’s just fun to say. Now go on, boy! Quit stallin’. You’ll be there in two shakes of an armadillo’s tail. Go on, now, make yer daddy proud.”

“Right,” Jake forced out, but still, he could not force himself to go. Odd to find himself so terrified. This was, after all, a foretaste of his greatest dream in life. Yet his very knees were shaking.

What if something went wrong?

He cleared his throat. “Yee-haw,” he attempted, his voice barely a whisper, dry-mouthed as he was with mingled fear and excitement.

“Whatcha waiting for, son, the Rapture?”

“Huh?”

Tex’s shrewd stare homed in on him. “Now, I ain’t one to criticize. But I’d go, if I were you. Otherwise, that other kid, he’s gonna think yer yella.”

Jake slanted him a sharp look. Tex grinned.

Oh, that canny Lightrider knew just what to say. But maybe it was good to have a rival because, without further hesitation, he kicked his fear away and leaped at the portal, yelling out the words the cowboy had suggested.

“Yeeeee…”

To his confusion, time slowed down to an inchworm’s crawl just inside the tunnel, and silence blotted out the birdsong.

No, not silence, Jake realized as he floated in mid-jump. He could hear a deep hum, a pulsating rhythm of energy like a heartbeat. The very frequencies of the planet.

In that first sliver of delayed non-time, even his own voice came out slow and distorted.

But it didn’t last. Time snapped back on itself; his molecules blurred into long colored streaks, as did the grounds of Merlin Hall behind him.

Then—
whoosh!

The Grid sent him careening headlong at the speed of light nearly to the other side of the Continent.

“…
haaaaaw!
”

He was still shouting the cowboy’s silly phrase when he tumbled out of the Grid onto a desolate hilltop in Romania. He rolled across the rocky ground and stopped himself a few feet from the waypoint sunk into the earth.

The others were there, too, but Jake was too much in shock to pay them any mind. He felt foggy-headed and shaken as Derek picked him up by one arm and moved him out of the way.

“D-do I have all my m-molecules?” Jake mumbled, glancing down at himself. Two arms, two legs. All his bits seemed to have arrived in the right place, properly connected.

He noted that his companions were likewise intact when the nausea suddenly caught up with him. Perhaps his stomach had been the last to arrive, for it revolted without warning. He stumbled a few feet away from the others and vomited into the underbrush.

Belatedly, he remembered what Finnderool had said about the first few jumps making someone queasy.

Happy birthday to me,
Jake thought, then puked again.

It was somewhat mollifying, though, to notice that Maddox was leaning on a nearby boulder, also retching his guts out.
Ha. Not so tough now, are you, Mr. Invincible?
Still, Jake couldn’t help seeing a certain humor in them both being sick.

“You knew we’d puke, didn’t you?” he accused Derek a few minutes later, after he had recovered and rejoined their party.

“It’s nothing to be embarrassed about,” he answered. “Most people do.”

Dr. Plantagenet offered the boys a piece of candied ginger. “Here. It’ll help to settle your stomachs.”

“Thanks.” Maddox and he both took a piece.

Then Tex arrived, stepping out of the watery-wavy circle as smoothly as you please. He pulled up his sleeve again and punched a quartz crystal button in the middle of the Flower of Life implant, closing the portal behind them. “So, how’d we all do? You boys look a little green around the gills.”

They muttered that they were all right, though Jake still felt woozy and discombobulated.

“You git used to it,” Tex assured them. “That’s just your molecules settling down again where they’re supposed to be. So, what’s the plan, Doc?”

“The dragon pox is highly contagious,” the Green Man said as he untied the top of his big rope-netting bag. “And I regret to say, it tends to make a dragon very grumpy. Not that they need any help in that department.”

“This virus, it doesn’t spread to people, does it?” Maddox asked.

“Not a virus, a bacterium. If this were a virus—in a lizard species—we’d be in real trouble. And no, it doesn’t.”

“Bacterium?” Jake echoed. He recalled Archie rambling on in his laboratory back home about some newfangled “germ” theory of disease.

It was hard to believe that people in hospital could get sick enough to die from something as insignificant as surgeons not washing their hands between patients. But that was the latest, shocking claim by the scientists.

“The only thing worse than an especially grumpy dragon,” the Green Man said as he passed out stinkberry bracelets, “is a whole colony of them.”

Jake put it on but winced at the smell.

“So,” the veterinarian continued, “we need to scout them out and quarantine the infected beasts to stop the pox from spreading to the rest. Because if
that
happens…ho, ho.” He shuddered with dread. “There’ll be dragons attacking villages all along the edges of these forests faster than you can say St. George. Here, everybody take one of these, too.” He pulled a stack of round shields out of the rope sack. “They’re fireproof.”

Derek nodded to the boys, who each accepted a shield, just in case. As for himself, he was starting to look a little concerned. “Don’t dragons usually crawl into one of their caves or retreats and hide when they’re feeling ill?”

“Normally, yes,” Dr. Plantagenet replied while Maddox practiced lifting the shield, getting a feel for its weight. “But, er…this particular infection also tends to stimulate the appetite.”

“What?” Tex turned to him and stared. “Now he tells us! Extra-hungry dragons on the loose? Aw, that’s real nice, Doc.” The Lightrider waved off the offered shield with a scowl. “You coulda told us that before we brought these boys along, ya overgrown broccoli! I should turn around and take these two young’uns back now.”

“No! Please!” said Jake. “It’s my birthday!”

“You wanna live to see the next one?” Tex retorted.

“Don’t worry, Munroe, they’re not getting anywhere near the dragons,” Derek assured him. “That’s what you and I are here for. The boys will stay back. You and I can assist the doctor.”

“Huh.” Tex still frowned and looked from Derek to the boys. He rested his hands on his hips, pushing back his long coat just enough to reveal the gleaming pair of Colt revolvers holstered at his hips.

Of course, the pistols wouldn’t do him much good against a dragon, Jake supposed. He had seen one before, in Giant Land. Even the giants had been afraid of Old Smokey.

Nevertheless.

“If Derek says we’re safe, then I’m sure we are. He’s saved my life loads of times,” Jake assured the frowning cowboy.

And himself.

Derek nodded. “I’m not worried. The dracosaurs
are
one of the tamer dragon species, and the colony here is used to seeing people from the Order moving through.”

“Well, you don’t have to worry about me,” Maddox said coolly. “I can take care of myself.”

“Me, too!” Jake chimed in. “I’ve already dealt with giants, after all. And Loki, a crazy Norse god, and his fire wolf, who was as big as a building! And Gar—” He almost mentioned Garnock, but caught himself at the last moment, remembering that nobody outside their main group was supposed to know about his recent battle against the founder of the Dark Druids.

The long-dead (sort of) alchemist had almost made it back from the grave with the help of some unholy black magic.

“Never mind,” Jake mumbled, dropping the subject.

Derek looked at Tex. “With reasonable precautions, I’m confident the boys will be quite safe.”

“Well, it’s your call, Stone. They’re your charges.”

“And the dracosaurs are mine, and I must see to them. Come. Time is of the essence,” said the doctor. “We mustn’t waste the light.”

“He’s right,” Derek said. “We’ve got a lot of forest to cover. Let’s go find our patients.”

With that, he picked up the rope-sack again, slung it over his shoulder, and marched out past the dragon-proof barrier.

Maddox immediately followed him down the mountain into the forest. Jake clutched his fireproof shield, heart pounding, and hurried after them.

It was time to hunt for dragons.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

The Tower

T
he trail wound down the mountainside, back and forth among the gnarled trees and wind-whipped pines. They walked single file, carrying their shields and equipment. Jake scanned the woods constantly for the dracosaurs, his nerves jangling with a mix of dread and eagerness.

Dr. Plantagenet had said the colony spent most of their daylight hours sunning themselves and dozing on the rocks around the river that ran down the middle of the valley.

Lazy in the daytime, the dracosaurs preferred to hunt at night and fed mostly on the forest animals, deer and such, although they were also known to eat fish and even turtles. But they must have picked off lost peasants once upon a time because the villagers for miles around had stopped coming into this valley centuries ago, according to Dr. Plantagenet. Local lore warned that death lurked in that valley between the two mountains.

Pondering all this as he walked deeper into the valley in question, Jake felt a surge of terror quickening his heartbeat.
What am I doing? This is insane.

Thankfully, Maddox spoke up before his imagination ran away with him. “Guardian Stone? Question on procedure.”

“Aye?”

“Is it correct to say that, in the event of an emergency—say, if the dragons charged us—we’re to make Mr. Munroe our top priority?”

Derek glanced back at him with a curious smile. “You tell me.”

“I believe that’s the case. After all, if Mr. Munroe gets eaten, the rest of the party is stuck here.”

“You are correct,” Derek said in approval, while Tex let out a short bark of laughter.

The Green Man instantly scolded him. “Shh! We’re trying to sneak up on these animals, remember?”

“So? I like the way this kid thinks,” Tex drawled, grinning at Maddox. “Yep, save the Lightrider first. That’d be my vote.”

Derek snorted, then glanced back wryly at Maddox. “Since some Lightriders are more prone to trouble than others, you’ll want to stick close to the one you’re assigned to, whatever the mission. The fact that your Lightrider happens to be your ride home is merely added incentive to keep him or her alive.”

The veterinarian huffed. “And I thought you were here to protect
me
.”

“Aw, don’t ya fret, thar, leafy boy.” Tex was clearly enjoying all this, even though the tall, slightly crazy gunslinger looked well able to take care of himself. “If things get hot, at least
you
can make like a tree and leave. Get it? Heh, heh.”

“Whoa! What is
that
?” Jake stopped and pointed at a knee-high, brown, stinking mass on the side of the trail ahead.

Maddox looked at him. “You’re joking, right?”

Jake held his nose as his nausea from the Grid jump threatened to return. He started gagging.

“Figure it out yet?” Derek asked. Even he winced at the stench.

“Dragon poop,” Jake said in a nasally voice, still holding his nose. “Ugh, get me out of here.”

Eyes watering, he hurried past the huge mound of scat and only breathed normally again once they had emerged from the woods a hundred yards or so away.

The path now led them out along a precarious stretch, with a steep rock face on their right and a sharp drop-off into the valley on their left. Jake gratefully inhaled the fresh wind that blew through his hair and paused to marvel at the dramatic mountain view. The others did the same, scanning the landscape for dragons.

Everybody shouted in surprise when they suddenly saw one jump from hilltop to hilltop in the distance and disappear again into the trees.

“Not one of the dracosaurs,” the Green Man said. “That looked like one of the larger, winged species around here.”

“Maybe a Leaping Blue?” Derek asked.

The veterinarian nodded his leafy head and set his equipment on the ground to rest for a moment. “Could be.”

Then Maddox pointed at the sky, where another dragon with a slim body and a very wide wingspan was soaring high above the ground like an eagle riding the currents of air.

“Look at that!”

“Ah, beautiful, isn’t he?” Derek said with a smile. “The Feathered Falcondrake is one of my favorites. I always wished I could’ve had one for a pet when I was a boy.”

Jake grinned at him. He had long since noticed that the Guardian was quite the dragon enthusiast.

“I didn’t realize there were so many kinds of dragons around here,” Maddox said.

“Hope they all hate these god-awful stinkberries,” Tex muttered.

“They do,” Dr. Plantagenet assured him. “They’ve learned over time that the whole plant is very toxic to them. But don’t worry. We’re in the dracosaurs’ territory. The other breeds should keep their distance.”

“Are they scared of them?” Jake asked. “I thought you said the dracosaurs were relatively peaceful.”

“Yes, but all dragons are highly territorial,” Derek answered. “Most know to stay off each other’s land unless they want a fight. They usually save the fire-breathing routine for other dragons who challenge them.”

“Well, that’s good to know,” Jake murmured. Then, searching the vista before him for more dragons, he spotted a formidable stone tower whose hulking silhouette poked above the trees on the mountain across from them. “Hey, there’s a castle or something over there!” He pointed it out to the others. “I wonder if they’ve noticed they’re, er, living in a dragon-infested forest.”

“You’d think,” Maddox agreed. “Why would anybody choose to live there? It seems awfully dangerous.”

“Oh ho, my boy, the people in there aren’t going anywhere soon,” said the Green Man. “That’s no ordinary castle, but one of the Order’s most formidable dungeons.”

“Really?” Jake said in surprise, looking at it again. “A jail?”

“Housing only the Order’s most dangerous prisoners. The warden keeps an eye on the dragon population for me,” Dr. Plantagenet added. “After all, the beasts
are
a calculated part of the tower defenses—a great deterrent to those who might otherwise try to escape. Prisoners don’t even bother trying to get out, considering it means crossing dragon country, on foot and alone, after dark.”

“I should think so,” Jake murmured.

“The warden of that dungeon is actually the one who sent me the Inkbug this morning about one of the dracosaur females showing signs of the dragon pox,” the doctor said. “You can imagine the disaster we’d have on our hands if it spread to other breeds.”

“On that note, we should go,” Derek said grimly. “The sooner you treat your scaly patient, the safer they’ll all be. Let’s press on.”

Something in his voice made Jake glance over at him. “Is something wrong?”

“No. Let’s keep moving.”

Guardians weren’t very good liars. Jake looked again at the tower, and, suddenly, understanding dawned. “Wait a second… Is that the jail where Uncle Waldrick’s locked up?”

“Come on, Jake,” Derek said in a low tone, turning away.

Instead of following him, Jake stared out across the valley with an icy sensation creeping down his limbs. He did not like thinking about his murderous uncle, but he belatedly recalled hearing about a year ago that the villain had been locked up in dragon country somewhere after his crimes had been exposed. There had been a trial in the Yew Court and everything, but Great-Great Aunt Ramona had shielded Jake from all the unpleasantness at the time.

At least now Jake had seen the great, green maze and met the Old Yew, who had been Uncle Waldrick’s judge at his trial before the Elders.
They must have used the open space of the Field of Challenge as the courtroom,
he thought, recalling Sir Peter Quince’s instant magical renovations. The Elders could probably change the setting of the field to serve as any sort of space they needed.

“You might as well admit it!” Jake prompted, catching up to Derek. “I know that’s the place.”

Derek paused and sent him a dark glance that showed the master Guardian did not like recalling those days any more than he did. “Aye. That’s the place.”

“I knew it!” Jake murmured, then he stared at the bleak, distant tower with cold memories of hatred rumbling through his soul like thunderclouds.

Jake had managed not to think about how his uncle had ruined his life in quite a while, getting used to his new existence, reunited with his relatives.

It had been a drastic change, to be sure, going from a penniless, orphaned pickpocket to a boy-earl. But his distraction during this period of adjustment did not mean he had forgotten any of the wrongs done to him. Any of the pain. Any of the loss. Like the fact that he never even would have
been
an orphan if it hadn’t been for Uncle Waldrick and his greed.

And now, there the man was once more, just across the valley. Jake couldn’t believe he was looking at the very jail where his horrible excuse for a kinsman was incarcerated. How he used to strut around London like a master of the Earth. Oh, how the mighty had fallen!

He gritted his teeth with rage at the memory of Uncle Waldrick’s haughty face, with its constant expression of sneering superiority. The man had
loved
being the Earl of Griffon for those eleven years when Jake, the rightful heir, was missing—before Derek had tracked him down on the streets of London.

It had been a very narrow rescue, too. Waldrick’s plans for Jake had been pretty straightforward, considering he had ordered his henchmen to cut his throat.

Jake turned to the Guardian who had saved his life that awful day. “I want to see him,” he said coldly. “Take me over there when we’re done with the dragons.”

“No.”

“Why not?” he demanded.

Derek looked at him, visibly striving for patience. “It’s probably bad enough that I’ve brought you into dragon country, Jake. I’m not taking a kid into a prison.”

He scoffed. “I’ve been to jail before, remember? Or did you forget the time we both got thrown into Newgate?”

Maddox glanced from him to Derek in surprise.

“Forget? Hardly,” the big man muttered.

Thankfully, Jake’s telekinesis had proved pretty handy at getting them both out of a jail cell.

“Why in the world would you even want to see him?” Derek asked, nodding toward the tower.

“Just to spit in his face. And see him behind bars. And tell him how much I despise him. And how much I’m enjoying the life he tried to steal from me!”

Derek shook his head. “Not going to happen. Come on. Let it go for now. We’ve got work to do.”

“Derek!”

“Jake. You wanted to know what it’s like to be a Lightrider. That’s your birthday present. Coming on this mission with us. Not seeing your uncle. So, no, we’re not going over to see him. Come on. We’ve got to carry out our mission and get out of here before it starts getting dark. You want us all to get eaten?”

He heaved a disgruntled sigh, but gave up the argument and followed. “Fine.”

Dr. Plantagenet lifted the medicine sprayer back up onto his shoulder. Tex, bringing up the rear, scowled at the tower in the distance, mumbling under his moustache about lowdown, no-account rattlesnakes.

The path ahead led into another section of the forest.

As they continued down the sloping trail, Maddox fell back to walk beside Jake. “So what’s all this about? What did your uncle do to land in a godforsaken Order prison?”

“He killed my parents and tried to murder me,” Jake muttered, still upset. “He would’ve succeeded, too, if it weren’t for Derek arriving just in time.”

“He killed your parents?” he echoed in shock.

“Aye, fratricide. My father was Uncle Waldrick’s elder brother.”

“Why on earth did he kill his own brother? To get the title?”

“In part.” Jake heaved a sigh. There was nothing else to do on their hike through the woods, so he told Maddox the story in the briefest possible terms. “My father had telekinesis. That’s where I get it from. But Waldrick inherited a related talent called pyrokinesis—the fire gift.”