The Deptford Mice 3: The Final Reckoning (33 page)

The huge spirit screeched as they speared into him. Golden lightning bristled from his chest and he rocked precariously on the misshapen dome.

‘I cannot die!’ he screamed, ‘I am Jupiter – Lord of Death!’

The crackling yellow bolts wrapped round his body, tormenting him with their heat. At once the battle on the Cutty Sark ceased as the ghosts dropped their weapons and the starfire spluttered in their breasts. Thomas stared at the storm beleaguered hill breathlessly – the fate of the world depended on the outcome of what was happening there. Suddenly the starfire welled up inside the spectres once more and all hope died in the midshipmouse.

Jupiter raked his claws through his spectral fur and the flames died. He drew himself up to his full height and laughed harshly. The Book of Hrethel had not been strong enough.

From out of his vastness two brittle-winged shapes flew. Orfeo and Eldritch were covered in scales of frost. Jerkily they careered through the air, gliding fitfully on frozen wings. But they were not carrying Oswald. The albino was lost, swallowed by the abyss of the eternal void. The Unbeest’s might had proved too strong a force and the valiant mouse’s sacrifice had been in vain – the attack had failed and Oswald was no more.

Jupiter watched the bats fleeing aimlessly and chuckled to himself, secure in the sweet knowledge that nothing could hurt him now. A deadly silence fell, he turned back to the crimson sun and lifted his claw. The Starglass blazed and the horrendous spell continued. The sky became livid as the sun turned a sickly purple. Jupiter had won.

Hathkin laboured through patches of freezing fog, his foxy head pulled into his strong shoulders as he flew blindly against the storm. Audrey held on grimly as the wind tossed and battered them.

Suddenly Orfeo and Eldritch burst out of the mist, their bodies withered by ice. With stiff, creaking wings, the brothers lurched through the gale, spinning uncontrollably with the snow. Their eyes were huge and stared madly, terror was graven in their petrified faces and they whined piteously.

‘Orfeo,’ cried Hathkin fearfully. ‘Eldritch, what has happened?’

The horror stricken bats circled clumsily round and shrieked desperately,
‘He
has won,’ wailed Eldritch, ‘the Unbeest has triumphed over the power of Hrethel.’

‘We are all doomed,’ wept Orfeo despondently. ‘What about Oswald? demanded Audrey. ‘Where is he?’

They shook their heads and Orfeo howled, ‘Pink Eyes is gone. The gateway to the void opened and the white one was sucked from our grasp.’

Eldritch sobbed with anguish. ‘He has crossed over,’ he said, ‘departed from this world forever.’

Pangs of sorrow blistered through Audrey’s heart. ‘Poor Oswald,’ she whispered.

‘But whither are you going?’ asked Orfeo urgently. ‘Surely you are not flying to Him!’

Eldritch fluttered his frost bitten wings in dismay. ‘You must not go that way,’ he warned. ‘We must escape before the darkness comes.’

‘We go on,’ Audrey said coldly, ‘there is no way back for me – my fate is tied to Jupiter.’

‘Then may the Lady bless you child,’ stammered Orfeo nervously, ‘for never would I face that again.’

‘Nor I,’ trembled his brother.

Hathkin listened to them gravely and gulped. ‘Mistress,’ he began doubtfully, ‘I fear they might; be right, should we not abandon . . .’

‘If you want to go back then you can,’ snapped: Audrey, ‘but to what? Soon it will be too cold to live. Run if you like but put me down first because I won’t. I must see Jupiter before the end.’

Hathkin blushed. ‘You shame me Mistress,’ he said. ‘I shall not desert you now, come.’ He beat his wings and with a last look back called, ‘Farewell my brethren.’ Both he and Audrey soared into the fog and disappeared. Eldritch and Orfeo wheeled shakily away and prayed for them.

The observatory rose like a blurred, grey castle out of the mist but it was surmounted by the towering cliff of Jupiter. The silence was deafening and only the sound of his cackling voice marred the unearthly quiet.

He was intoning the spell of ruin – the sky was now black and the sun was dim and ghastly. The world shuddered as darkness started to fall. It was a solid thing that seeped over the land and consumed all light. Jupiter crowed with satisfaction.

Hathkin and Audrey sped up the hill, over the fallen trees and gaping fissures, over the tangle of railings that had tumbled down the devastated path and over the fallen statue that Arthur and Thomas had once hidden beneath. The bat gazed on the strength of Jupiter in awe; the colossal spirit was the most terrible thing he could ever imagine. Audrey looked at the Unbeest but was not daunted, she had been through too much to give in now.

‘Take me up to his head,’ she instructed Hathkin.

The bat shot high over the dome. They flashed by Jupiter’s enormous, thrashing tail and ascended quickly.

A glint of blue shone from the mist above them. Before Hathkin knew what was happening an ice spear ripped savagely through one of his wings.

‘Aaarrgghh!’ he cried as the leathery shreds flapped uselessly in the gale. He thrashed them feverishly but it was no good and they began to lose height. The wind screamed brutally in their ears as both mouse and bat plunged, somersaulting in the air. Audrey’s stomach churned over and she saw the white ground rush up to meet them. A fountain of snow sprayed out as the tumbling figures crashed down.

Audrey groaned. The impact had been cushioned by the deep, drifting snow but she ached all over. ‘Hathkin?’ she murmured hoarsely, ‘Where are you?’

A frightened whimper answered her. She picked herself up stiffly and crawled over the snow to where the bat lay. His body had struck the bough of a tree and had hit the ground awkwardly. He was twisted at an impossible angle – Audrey realized that Hathkin had broken his back.

A sad smile twitched over his tortured face – he too knew the extent of his injuries. ‘I fear I am no longer the swiftest,’ he said feebly. ‘I cannot move either my wings or my feet.’ He shivered suddenly and when he next turned his eyes to Audrey they were filled with tears. ‘You must forgive me, for now I have to leave you Mistress,’ he said in a croaking whisper, ‘in the Green hereafter may we meet again . . .’ and with that his eyes closed and he was at peace.

Audrey knelt beside him. ‘Brave moon rider,’ she breathed softly, ‘you have won renown indeed.’

High above her, she heard the voice of Jupiter revel in the destruction he was causing. The desperate urge to confront him flared up again and she leapt to her feet. With a final, sad look at Hathkin she ran swiftly to the base of the observatory and searched for a way up.

* * *

Arthur had climbed down the rope and slowly made his way round the fierce battle that was still raging. The bats were being defeated; heaps of their bodies were piled on the deck as the phantoms struck out with spear and claw. Arthur clambered onto the rail and from there he could see the blue, woollen hat of Mr Triton surrounded by the ghoulish, clamouring spectres. Thomas was in the thick of the battle. His sword strokes sent many wraiths back to the grave but the enchanted parchment on the tip of his blade was getting smaller with every swipe. The ghosts knew this and they taunted the midshipmouse so that he wasted his blows; they punched him in the back and leapt out of the way when he swung round. The paper glowed fiercely, gradually consuming itself, and they waited eagerly to drink his blood.

A scream tore Arthur’s attention from the vile butchery. The cry had come from the hold and he leant over the rail and exclaimed in fear: the apparitions had broken through the side of the ship and even as he looked were crawling through the jagged holes they had made. Another scream rang out – it was Mrs Chitter’s voice.

‘Mr Triton!’ shouted Arthur at the top of his voice. In the circle of spectres that drew closer with every failing flicker of the parchment Thomas heard his name and looked up. ‘They’ve broken into the hold,’ Arthur called to him.

Thomas’s face fell, ‘Gwennie!’ he cried in anguish. The midshipmouse spun round and charged through the gibbering wraiths, slicing one of them in half as he ran. He fought his way out of the battle and sped to the hatch. Arthur met him there and with a quick, backward glance at the slaughter continuing on deck they descended into the gloom.

‘Mr Chitter and Master Oldnose have already gone down,’ Arthur told him hurriedly.

‘If those things harm a hair of her head,’ hissed Thomas leaping down the steps and flexing his sword, the tiny piece of parchment bobbing before them like a firefly.

‘I hope that stuff lasts,’ Arthur said nervously.

Gwen Brown stared fixedly ahead. A ragged slash had been torn in the hull, and through it, greedy phantoms were pouring. The hundred or so mice backed away, but they were cornered. Mr Cockle and the other husbands shielded their wives with their bodies as the troops advanced wickedly and waved their claws before them. Mrs Chitter had stopped screaming; she whimpered against Gwen’s shoulder and trembled. The Raddle sisters held on to each other, their faces lifted in prayer. On came the spectres, stalking nearer and sniggering with voices of death as they drew out their gleaming ice spears.

Suddenly two shouts issued behind the unholy warriors as down the steps jumped Mr Chitter and Master Oldnose.

‘Jacob,’ gasped Mrs Chitter, ‘oh save us.’

The spirits turned as the two, frightened mice halted in their tracks and gazed desperately on the evil scene before them. ‘Quick,’ wailed Master Oldnose grabbing Jacob Chitter’s paw and dragging him round the edge of the seething legion.

They ran as fast as they could, dodging the claws that snatched at them until they joined the others. Mrs Chitter wrapped her arms about her husband and kissed him. ‘We’ll die together,’ she wept.

The ghosts flicked their tongues in and out as they prepared to move in for the kill. With a hideous yell one pounced on Mr Cockle and threw him to the floor. That was it – the phantoms all screeched and charged. Paws and claws thrashed and struggled as the wraiths swamped the defenceless mice. Algy Coltfoot was the first victim, caught between two apparitions which splayed their claws and gored into his belly. The terrified mice screamed and struck out bravely with whatever weapons they had, but the spectres laughed at their pathetic attempts. Master Oldnose struggled boldly through the battle to protect the beleaguered Raddle sisters, but one of the spectres brought out a spear and callously rammed it straight through the poor mouse’s chest. Master Oldnose crashed to the floor, dead, and the fiends trampled over his body.

‘Maggot fodder!’ bellowed a voice in the uproar. ‘We’ll beat you yet!’ Into the hold rushed Thomas and Arthur, shrieking terrible war cries as they ploughed into the centre of the ghosts. The sword sliced through them neatly and the spirits howled in alarm as they crackled and disappeared. The midshipmouse lunged and countered, thrust and chopped at the grisly horde and the fragment of paper shone. He barbed, he spiked, he stabbed, he pierced and the wraiths recoiled from his formidable onslaught, groaning and whining. Thomas’s face was terrible to behold, such was the fury that blazed in his heart. He dealt his blows savagely, cutting a swathe through the unhappy enemy till he and Arthur reached the trapped and injured mice on the far side.

Arthur ran to his mother and Thomas’s blade dispatched the spectre that was hovering over her with spear raised eager for the kill. Gwen sighed, relieved to see her son and the midshipmouse still alive. She did not complain about the wounds that gashed down her side, but wept for Algy and Master Oldnose when she saw their bodies.

Thomas launched himself at the spectres that were still menacing the rest of the mice; his arm swooped down on them and they vanished. Like one possessed, the midshipmouse battled on, and then it happened. With a final spark of power the glowing parchment dissolved and the sword passed harmlessly through the ghosts.

‘Hell’s bells,’ muttered Thomas, as the spirits laughed at him and closed ranks once more.

* * *

The sun spluttered in the black sky and Greenwich was steeped in a blind, paralysing darkness. Audrey reached up and her fingers scrabbled for something to hold on to as she looked down the walls of the observatory stretched below her. Her paws bled from the frost and from the sharp edges of broken bricks, but the balcony that ran round the base of the dome was just a short way off now. Straining and gritting her teeth, she wrenched herself over the edge and rolled onto her back, panting wearily.

Her eyes stared into the pitch black heavens and the vastness of Jupiter towered over her. His voluminous bulk reared massively into space, clouds of mist wreathed his distant shoulders like a kingly robe and the lightning that burned on his brow shone out like the light of a phantom lighthouse perched on a stupendous mountain. The mouse felt giddy just looking at this vast Leviathan of Night.

The Unbeest was facing west where the dying sun choked and waned. So intent was his concentration that he did not see the miniscule figure gasping for breath beneath his feet. His claws clung grimly round the dome, larger than whale bones and sharper than his servants’ spears. Great fissures had been gouged in the building and the dome was battered beyond all recognition. It was just as well, for if it had remained intact Audrey would have found it impossible to climb its smooth, curved sides. She staggered to her feet and took steadying breaths. This was the end of everything for her – she knew she had to face the cat god and was prepared to die doing so. She had to see Jupiter for one last time and curse him with all her strength. The splintered balcony creaked beneath her feet as she walked round.

‘Sssssaaaahhhh!’ hissed a guttural voice from the darkness.

Audrey hesitated, as around the corner came a pallid radiance. It was the light from a flame of starfire – one of Jupiter’s ghosts was up there with her! The light grew as the unseen spirit closed on her and Audrey cried out in horror as the glow lit the ghastly spectre’s face – it was Piccadilly.

The shade of the city mouse was terrifying. His hair was matted down with gouts of black blood and in his freckled face the sockets of his eyes gaped hollowly; his lips were drawn back over his teeth which were now sharp and fang-like and in his paws he carried an ice spear. He prowled across the balcony and crept nearer to Audrey who was too sickened and petrified to move.

‘Ssssss,’ the wraith spat at her. ‘Piccadilly,’ she managed to utter, ‘it’s me, Audrey.’ He did not hear her and sucked the dribbling saliva through his fangs as the spear was raised.

‘Piccadilly!’ she cried. ‘Stop, please.’

But the phantom came on and the spear left its paws. Audrey dived down but its bitter spike caught and tangled in her hair, mercilessly pinning her to the balcony rail. Audrey twisted and squirmed to free herself but the pinnacle of ice was embedded deep into the stout balustrade.

The ghost of Piccadilly snarled and flung itself on her. Audrey wept and struggled but cold paws found her throat. She looked into the black, empty spaces where the city mouse’s eyes had been and sobbed, ‘Please Piccadilly, stop.’ The chill fingers slowly began to strangle her and a harsh laugh echoed from the phantom’s mouth.