The Cornerstone (33 page)

‘No!’ he screamed, jumping from the table and fighting his way past the throng of Dwellers in an attempt to reach Merelie.

The choir grew louder and The Cornerstone glowed like a silver sun.

Max could see the bones in Merelie’s hand like an x-ray, as the light from the book grew more intense.

Its Morodai counterpart started to shake and twist under Merelie’s other hand, protesting against the bullying it was getting from its brother.

‘Send them back!’ Merelie screamed one last time.

She was blasted away from the books as lightning flashes of pure Wordcraft exploded from both.

The lightning arced back and forth between Cornerstones as they tried to overpower one another.

The battle was even, neither able to dominate.

Max looked up from the light show. More and more Dwellers were almost through the barrier – and Lucas Morodai was right behind them.

If this goes on much longer, we’re dead.

He made a split second decision and let the force field drop completely. At the same time he reached out, snatching a bolt of lightning in his hand as it crackled from one book to the other.

‘Here,’ he said to his Cornerstone, ‘let me give you a hand, buddy.’

Max slammed his fist, sizzling with pure Wordcraft, into the centre of the Morodai Cornerstone.

That seemed to do the trick.

Max was thrown away as a vortex of sickening purple light started to spin up from Morodai’s book where his fist had struck. The cyclone blossomed upwards, spinning faster and faster as it grew in size and speed. Fingers of lightning erupted from the core of the vortex, the whip-crack of energy echoing through the cavernous hall.

Max, knowing how a vacuum cleaner worked, had a fairly good idea what was coming next.

‘Er… we may all want to take cover!’ he shouted, grabbing the Carvallen Cornerstone before it got caught up in the maelstrom.

He dropped flat on his face, hoping a Dweller wasn’t about to jump on his back.

They were in no position to attack however, the vortex was seeing to that.

The creature inhabiting Bethan Falion’s body was the first to be pulled into the seething mass. She looked up from the fight with Imelda, saw the tornado of dark energy whirling from the golden Cornerstone and tried to crawl away, moaning in terror.

Living smoke started to boil from the Chapter Lord’s eyes, pulled inexorably towards the spiralling light.

With one last reluctant howl, the Dweller inside Falion was ripped from its host and sucked into the ever expanding cyclone.

In fact, all the Dwellers were now being drawn from their hosts in the same way. The cacophony of howling monsters was almost too much to bear as each tried to escape the pull exerted by the whirlpool of purple light. Long, thick tendrils of smoke whipped and writhed in the air as the disembodied creatures were sucked back into the cold, dark void they’d come from.

As each Dweller was extracted, the victim’s body bucked and thrashed, collapsing when it was freed from bondage, the smoke gone.

The vortex continued to grow to a huge size as it ate more and more Dwellers, reaching the high ceiling of the Great Hall. The Morodai Cornerstone swelled and rippled, trying to cope with the influx of smoke creatures.

Finally, the last monster was dragged from its human host and sucked into the vortex.

Max stood, expecting to see the golden Cornerstone snap shut, its job done.

‘Um… it’s not stopping,’ he said to no-one in particular.

‘I rather think that’s because it isn’t finished yet,’ Jacob warned, indicating a build up of living smoke at one of the high, plate glass windows in the domed ceiling above.

‘What the hell?’

‘Oh Writer,’ moaned Merelie.

Imelda grabbed Max’s arm. ‘We should probably get back before - ’

The glass dome shattered, sending razor sharp shards raining down on them. Max was forced to erect the force field again to prevent everyone being cut to pieces.

‘It’s drawing them all back!’ Merelie screamed, ‘from across the whole Chapter Lands!’

‘How long is that likely to take?’ growled Max, getting sick of being the magic shield boy.

‘Not long by the look of it,’ said Jacob.

A flood of Dweller smoke streamed through the broken ceiling into the Great Hall.

Even that hole wasn’t big enough. The smoke started to build up against the side of the Chapter House.

Part of the building gave way as the flood became a torrent - cracks in the stonework widening and splitting as the spirits of thousands of Dwellers flowed toward the vortex.

The entire room was now a whirling hurricane of smoke and debris. Everyone had to seek cover as huge chunks of stone and glass were caught in the maelstrom - the Chapter House around them disintegrating under the stress exerted by the cyclone of energy.

Imelda was lucky not to be crushed by a section of wall about ten feet across as it hurtled past her head and slammed into the floor, tearing a massive hole through to the lower levels.

In the tumult, all Max and his friends could do was hold on and hope to come out the other side unscathed.

- 3 -

It didn’t happen quite that way.

Max suffered a rather painful blow to his shoulder from a piece of masonry, and Jacob would wear a long scar down the left side of his face for the rest of his life from a splinter of glass whipped up in the storm.

The vortex started to slow, having completed its task of returning every Dweller to the void they'd erupted from.

The spinning tornado dissipated entirely and the Morodai Cornerstone slammed shut in an appropriately dramatic fashion, smoking slightly from the torment it had been subjected to.

Silence descended as those left alive and intact took stock.

Lucas Morodai was the first to act.

The Chapter Lord had hidden himself under the marble centre table. With a howl of rage, he leapt over to his golden Cornerstone and gathered it up, letting out another howl - this time of pain as his hand burned on the scorching hot book.

Sucking his fingers, Morodai struck the most dramatic pose he could. ‘This doesn’t end here!’ he snarled at all of them, tucking the book into his robes.

‘You’re right about that, you raving psycho!’ roared Max. ‘It’s about time somebody took you down a peg or two.’ He gathered his power, as did Imelda, Merelie and her father.

Morodai then did what any self respecting villain would do in such a situation: he legged it.

Pulling another book from beneath his long coat, he gave Max one last look of utter hate before flicking the small volume open and disappearing from sight.

‘He’s got a League Book!’ Merelie cried.

‘A what?!’ said Max, running to where the Chapter Lord had stood. All that remained was the League Book, lying on a pile of rubble. It had ‘The Library of Chapter House Morodai’ written on the cover.

‘Where the hell did he get that?’ Max ranted.

‘He must have had it on him the whole time,’ Jacob said, joining his wife as she climbed from her refuge underneath a row of seats. Borne followed, brushing grit and dust from his massive shoulders.

‘Well… that’s just not fair!’ Max yelled, not quite going so far as to stamp his feet. He picked up the League Book and opened it. ‘Take me where he went!’ he ordered.

Nothing happened.

‘Fabulous, we’ve let him get away!’ he groaned, smacking the League Book against an overturned chair a couple of times in impotent fury.

‘See if The Cornerstone can make it work,’ Merelie suggested. ‘It seems to like bullying its own kind around.’

Max nodded and took The Cornerstone.

He then froze in place.

I’m about to order one book to bully another book into teleporting me across thousands of miles, to what will no doubt be a trap of some kind. All this so I can stop a mad wizard.

I’m on the other side of existence from everything I know… and I can do magic.

‘What’s wrong?’ Merelie asked.

Max stared into space for a second. ‘I really do hope this is all happening, otherwise I’ve gone stark raving bonkers,’ he told her in a dreamy voice.

He breathed deeply and shook himself out of it. ‘Never mind… Let’s do this.’

He put the League Book on the ground, holding it open with a couple of handy rocks and placed the opened Cornerstone next to it, putting his hands on both. ‘Corny?’ The book gave an eager silver flash. ‘Can you make this thing transport me to wherever Morodai's gone?’

Corny flashed in assent.

Max’s universe hadn’t exploded for quite a while, so it really enjoyed the chance to do it one more time.

- 4 -

The light dimmed and Max found himself in a dark, square room.

Rather than stone, it was constructed of iron and looked like the inside of a battleship. Red fingers of rust ran down the dark grey walls and there was a dry, metallic taste in the air.

The Cornerstone had also made the trip and the League Book they’d used was sat on an iron shelf to one side. Next to it were several others, going to places with names Max either couldn’t pronounce or didn’t like the sound of.

He picked up the League Book going back to Carvallen, tucked it into his waistband and crept over to the only doorway out of this strange little room.

He peeked out cautiously.

It was different to the Carvallen Library.

There were bookshelves of course, heaving with many volumes, but these were constructed from the same rusting iron as the room Max stood in.

He didn’t know it, but Morodai Wordsmiths thought metal was a better conductor for word power than wood. Whether this was true or not was debatable, but they believed it, so did everything they could to incorporate metal into their Wordcraft. They even went as far as coating the books themselves in it.

This was why Morodai Wordsmiths tended to be more muscular than their counterparts in other Chapter Houses; having to lug heavy, iron-clad books around all the time is a good work-out, if nothing else.

There was no mist hanging above Max's head - that must be a peculiarity of Carvallen’s Chapter House. In fact, he could clearly see the ceiling, which continued the lovely rusting iron aesthetic.

A sickly orange light permeated the racks, coming from an unidentifiable source.

Word shaping should be easier here with all these books.

Max walked out along the aisle, watching for any signs of ambush and peering down through the metal grating at more levels of the Library below.

It looked like he was on the top floor of a building that extended at least five or six floors down. He fancied he could see movement below - dark shapes moving between the racks, partially hidden in the tangle of corroded iron.

It’s hard to creep about on big, clanking metal grates, so it wasn’t too long before Max’s presence was discovered.

When attack did come it wasn’t from Lucas Morodai, but rather his Library custodians - the equivalent of Garrowain and his ilk.

Unlike the wise old men of Carvallen, these custodians were - and there’s no better way of describing them than this - evil, dribbling midgets.

They wore thick black overalls and round gold metal helmets. Piggy eyes stared out from smooth, round faces and an almost constant stream of spittle clung to their pointy little chins. 

Max decided he could make short work of the six nasty little dwarves dashing towards him and tried to spin up some Wordcraft before they had a chance to bite his ankles.

There wasn’t any… not one drop of power to be pulled from the ranks of books around him.

Max desperately trawled the area with his mind, but couldn’t detect a hint of the stuff anywhere.

The Morodai custodians reached him and started smacking him as hard as they could with their tiny fists. He could have probably fought one off, but six of the nightmarish little goblins had no trouble subduing him with a few well timed slaps across the face and kicks to the shins.

‘Stop it! Stop it! Ow! You little sod!’ he shouted in pain, dropping to one knee.

They grabbed both his arms and held him down. The dwarves may have been small, but they were also phenomenally strong. Max was stuck fast.

Dozens more of the evil critters swarmed onto the walkway, eager to get a front row seat for the upcoming show.

One of the custodians wrenched The Cornerstone from Max and sprinted over to where Lucas Morodai had appeared at the end of the aisle. He took the book from his little servant, the reptilian grin reappearing on his face.

‘What’s wrong, boy? No power to draw from?’ Morodai ambled forward, once again enjoying the chance for a good gloat. ‘I wouldn’t imagine there would be. This is my Library and I say who gets to tap its power and who doesn’t.’

The Chapter Lord bent down and hit Max across the face with The Cornerstone.

‘Maybe I should have planned this better,’ Max said, spitting blood onto the grating below.

‘Yes, maybe you should have.’

Morodai hit him across the face again, droplets of blood splashing The Cornerstone’s cover as a fresh cut opened in Max’s bottom lip.

‘You and your friends ruined a carefully constructed plan. I was very close to having the Chapter Lands in my power forever,’ Morodai told him, a scowl on his face.

Max chuckled. ‘Would you have gotten away with it if it hadn’t been for those damn kids?’ he said and grinned, his teeth stained red.

Morodai didn’t understand, but recognised back chat when he heard it. Another smack across the face rocked Max’s head to the left, wiping the smile from his face. Morodai then held The Cornerstone out like it was a rotting piece of fish.

‘This thing is at the centre of all my problems, isn’t it?’ he said. ‘Carvallen’s damned Cornerstone.’

He dropped it, and in a childish display of temper, stamped on the book three times, sending loud echoes through the Library. He kicked it to one side - where it came to rest against a book shelf with the cover open - a large, black bootprint stamped across the page.

‘I’ll think of a way to destroy that filthy thing later, but first… I do believe I’d like to take some of my understandable frustration out on you, Mr Bloom.’