Rivers of Fire (Atherton, Book 2) (17 page)

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When he was but twenty yards off he pulled up short, stunned by the absolute fury of the creatures coming toward him. He turned the bags over one at a time and let loose the fifty or more rabbits that remained. The moment they were out of the bags they spread out chaotically over the open expanse of the Flatlands.

Horace raced for the grove, looking over his shoulder as the Cleaners came upon the sea of dancing food. The creatures reared up and began trying in vain to capture the rabbits in their smashing teeth. Cleaners were fast, but rabbits were faster, and while a few were soon devoured, many more darted between and jumped over the Cleaners, sending the mad beasts into a furious rage of spinning and slashing.

"Now!" cried Horace. He reared his horse back toward the Cleaners as Gill came alongside him and handed him a long, sharp spear. All the other horsemen came up in three lines behind them as he had instructed, and Horace's army made for the mayhem in the Flatlands. The Cleaners were so busy slashing and biting at the rabbits and at each other they scarcely saw the attack coming before the horses were right in their midst.

The battle did not go well for either party. Nearly all of the Cleaners felt the sting of a spear, but only two of the eight were killed immediately with a spear to the mouth. Five of the remaining six were injured but not killed, and the last, the biggest among them, was not harmed at all.

As the rabbits became a secondary concern and moved out of harm's way, the men on horses and the stunned Cleaners went into a prolonged battle of cutting teeth and lunging

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spears. Gill was jabbing at a Cleaner before him when from behind an even larger Cleaner reared up into the air and opened its hideous mouth. It stood upright at shoulder level to Gill, dripping slime from its suction cups, and it lunged toward his back.

But Horace had seen what was happening and came galloping at a full head, and as the beast came forward, it met a spear down the throat and through the brain, tumbling down off the back of Gill's horse.

The battle raged on in the open before the grove, but the largest of the Cleaners was also the smartest, and without anyone's noticing, it moved off with surprising swiftness, away from the violence. It moved with purpose, toward the shelter of the trees where it could hide.

Finally, at great expense to man and horse, the remaining giant Cleaners were either killed or turned back. Four of the eight were dead or dying on the bloodied ground and three had been forced back with near mortal wounds. They hobbled off, barely alive, and the men who remained dismounted, trying to save those who had fallen.

"Back on your horses!" cried Horace. Of the fifty who had begun the fight, only twenty remained, and many of the horses had been felled or were running wild in the open with the rabbits.

"But we can't leave them!" said one of the men. "Some are still alive!"

Horace turned to Gill, who had remained on his horse. "There were eight. I counted them!" said Horace. "Only

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four lay dead and three have crawled away, but there were eight. I'm sure of it."

Everyone turned at once and looked toward the line of trees. Nothing was there, nothing moved.

In the end Horace left two men with the fallen army to do what they could. He took the rest on horses and sped back toward the trees.

A Cleaner--the largest among them at twelve feet--had escaped into the grove unnoticed.

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*** CHAPTER 20 A MOTHERLESS WORLD

Edgar's wrist was almost as sore as the place where his pinky was missing by the time Sir Emerik had dragged him all the way back to the opening of the main chamber in the House of Power. He had been biting the air with his teeth for the better part of two hours and his jaws were tight and sore. He felt as if he'd been chewing on a tough chunk of mutton served to the food line at Mr. Ratikan's porch, one that simply would not go down his throat no matter how hard he tried.

They'd had no light at all for a while, but Sir Emerik seemed to have gotten his bearings about the place and he strode fast and with purpose until the dim light of the source of all water could be seen. They'd gone right to it, touched the wall with the blue line, and followed it all the way out of Mead's Hollow. Edgar could tell when they'd arrived inside the House of Power

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because it was very steep there, rounding back and forth, until they arrived finally at the main chamber.

Sir Emerik threw Edgar onto the floor in front of him and climbed out of Mead's Hollow. He was breathing hard, covered in grime and sweat, licking his lips in search of water.

"Never again!" he said. "I will
never
go down there again!"

He stepped away from the opening and searched the room for water. He seemed unaware or uninterested in the amount of light that crept into the room. Finding a flint on the table and a torch with a heavy stone bucket of fuel, Sir Emerik soon had light to aid him in his search. He found a similar stone container of water beneath the table, half filled, and he gulped and coughed. It struck Edgar as odd that both containers, the one for the fuel and the one for the water, were made of thick stone with heavy wooden lids that fit tightly. It was as if someone had known Atherton would quake uncontrollably and regular buckets would tip over and spill.

Night had yet to come to Atherton, though it was nearing as Edgar leaned out the window and saw the tube of dim light pouring in from far above. The Highlands were dreadfully far belowground, hidden almost entirely in a heavy blanket of shadow. It was a desolate place, and as he looked intently along the black walls that surrounded him, he was unsure if he could climb out if given the chance.

"Anyone out there?" cried Edgar.

Sir Emerik advanced to the window and pushed the boy aside. From below there came a voice filled with surprise. "Sir Emerik? Is that you? I'm coming, sir!"

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A It was the one person who had stayed behind, and he was running through the courtyard in search of the voice. He advanced up the stairs and was soon knocking on the door to themain chamber.

"It is you!" cried Tyler when Sir Emerik opened the door. There was a big lump on his forehead, and Edgar was reminded of how he'd hit the poor man with a black fig.

Despite his hasty arrival, Tyler seemed unwilling to enter the room. "You don't look so good, Sir Emerik," he said with some unease. Sir Emerik didn't smell right, he thought. Was the man in front of him rotting away?

Emerik strode directly to Tyler, his eye twitching ever so slightly, and bellowed into the man's face, "Call me
lord,
you fool!"

Tyler stood shaking in the doorway. It had not been a good day, and the raving lunatic who stood before him was only making things worse.

"Yes," said Tyler, bowing,
"Lord
Emerik."

Sir Emerik proceeded to slam the door in Tyler's face. Then he yelled with a force that could be heard all the way into the hall outside the room. "Bring me something to eat!"

Sir Emerik strode to the wall and took the torch he'd lit. "Oh, how I've waited for this moment." The twitch returned to his eye as he waved the flame happily out in front of him. "You remember how you tied me up and burned my hair off? You remember that, don't you, Edgar?"

Edgar was breathing hard, backed up against the window. It

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was too far to jump, and he didn't think he could slither out and climb down, though the thought crossed his mind as he glanced behind him through the opening.

"Get away from the window," said Sir Emerik. He moved as fast as the Crat and poked the flame into Edgar's face until the boy was against the thick ivy on the wall. "Now," said Sir Emerik, glee building in his voice. "Now let's burn
your
hair off and see how you like it!"

Sir Emerik lunged for the boy playfully, laughing and coughing up watery blood from some broken place inside, thinking only of how grand it was going to be to torture Edgar and then kill him with his bare hands.

Edgar was nothing if not quick like a rabbit, and he dodged the oncoming flame as it was thrust toward him. Sir Emerik cackled as he prodded with the torch, hitting the drying ivy on the walls and setting off little fires around Edgar's head. Edgar lunged for the torch and nearly knocked it free from Sir Emerik's hand. He followed with a punch to Sir Emerik's stomach, and the self-proclaimed ruler of the Highlands doubled over for an instant as Edgar stepped back toward the wall.

Sir Emerik screamed, his eyes bulging wildly. He lunged forward hard and fast, almost falling headlong as Edgar darted quickly to one side. Edgar watched in stunned silence as Sir Emerik slid down the wall and crumpled into a heap on the floor, the butt of a knife sticking out of his back.

Behind him stood Dr. Harding.

"Why did you do that?" asked Edgar, as incredulous as he

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was surprised to see the man's sudden arrival. His voice was shaking and unsteady. Edgar wasn't sure if he was looking at a friend or a foe, and if the knife might be aimed at him next.

"Because I'm not who you think I am," said Dr. Harding. He slowly sat down on the floor of the main chamber and it looked to Edgar as if he were an irreparably damaged man.

Edgar was quick to action, taking the butt of the knife in his hand and pulling it free from Sir Emerik's back. He held it close to Dr. Harding's face. Was this Lord Phineus, or maybe a mad scientist who only wanted to harm him? If he could escape the room he could make it to the wall. And if he could make it to the wall, there was a chance he could get out.

"You don't want to use that," said Dr. Harding. "Let's just sit and talk a moment. I only want to help you."

This could not be Lord Phineus. There was compassion in the voice of the man slumped on the ground in front of Edgar, something not possible for Lord Phineus. Edgar placed the knife out of Dr. Harding's reach, then found the torch and came near the ailing man on the floor.

"Let me get you something to drink," said Edgar. He was reminded that Tyler might return soon with food, but he pushed the thought aside as he went to the bucket and brought back a cup of cold water. Dr. Harding gulped heartily, coughing as Sir Emerik had, and it seemed to revitalize him.

He smiled at Edgar.

"Do you know who I am?" asked Dr. Harding. He squinted at the boy in a kindly way, not sure of what Edgar knew.

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"You're Dr. Harding," said Edgar. "You made this place."

"I made more than that."

"What do you mean?"

Dr. Harding scratched at his leg and wiped his hand on his sleeve. There was a dreary pause before he spoke. "I mean I made
you,
Edgar."

Edgar was at once confused and excited by the idea. "You mean you're my
father?
How can that be?"

A moment of regret rose in Dr. Harding's eyes.

"He took you from me. I was doing all right until then, keeping my mind on the work, not reading things I shouldn't read or adding more numbers, more rooms."

"You're scaring me," said Edgar.

"Dr. Kincaid took you from me. That's what drove me to burn the journals, to burn all the numbers and the rooms in my mind. I was filled with anger for what he'd done--what they all did. They used me! And they took the one thing I cared about. They took
you."

"Are you really my father?" asked Edgar. Something about the way Dr. Harding spoke made him uneasy. He didn't
feel
like Dr. Harding's son, and this bothered him a great deal.

"That depends on what you mean by father," said Dr. Harding, looking down at the floor and scratching again at his leg.

"Are you my father or not? It's a simple question."

Dr. Harding gazed at the boy before him, full of emotion and longing. He wanted only to hold him and talk with him as he thought fathers and sons should do.

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"I made you, Edgar, like I made Atherton."

Edgar thought about this idea and didn't like it one bit. "How did you make me?"

Dr. Harding turned away, unable to look Edgar in the eye. "Well, to be fair, Dr. Kincaid helped," said Dr. Harding. "He's a smart man. I told him I wanted a companion -- a son, not a wife--and he agreed to help me. But then things began to unravel here, on Atherton. There was so much pressure to get it right, so much work to be done. He said I was neglecting you and that you might get hurt. Dr. Kincaid thought it was best to take you away, to hide you from me. He was wrong."

Edgar suddenly had a hopeful thought, one that he imagined might make him feel better. "If you made me, then who is my mother?"

If there was a question Dr. Harding had hoped to never hear, it had just been asked. Every boy wants a mother, especially one who has been living like an orphan most of his life.

"You have no mother," Dr. Harding said. "I
make
things, remember? I suppose that's my curse."

Edgar couldn't believe what he was hearing.
I'm
made--
like a house or a wooden bowl.
Had he been made with strange tools and gadgets such as the ones he'd seen in the laboratory beneath the House of Power? It was a terrible thing to realize.
Is this why I feel so lonely, why I feel happiest alone, climbing high on the cliffs of Atherton?
At that moment it felt to Edgar as if all of Atherton was motherless. No wonder it was so broken, a motherless world driven by a man of science. How could it have been any other way?