The Seven Swords (5 page)

8 - HOW ARTIE AND CREW ENJOY CROSSING OVER TO NORTHERN SWEDEN

Erik chose a chain mail
shirt, a thin but sturdy dagger, and a truly frightening war hammer as long as his leg. He figured he'd done well with the carpenter's hammer against the dragonflies, so he'd probably do even better with the kind that was meant for battle.

All the same, he was a little freaked out about the prospect of hitting something as hard as he could with a hammer.

While Artie and Thumb huddled over the iPad, studying the map of Sweden, Bedevere and Lance gave Erik some last-minute fighting tips (how to parry a thrust, how to duck a swipe, how to use the war hammer like a staff, and, most important, to remember that in hand-to-hand combat a fighter's first weapon was his feet—keep them moving at all times, and run if necessary). Kay sat next to her brother, coiling a long length of rope. They'd really needed rope when they were making their way down to Tiberius's cave a few weeks back, and they weren't going to forget it this time.

Thumb pointed at the map on the iPad. “For Gram, we have to start in the Otherworld land of Surmik, where we can open a crossover to northern Sweden. All we have to do is punch coordinates into this app and it will show us exactly where we need to go on this side.”

Artie entered the Swedish coordinates, and a blue circle snapped to the middle of the screen as Sweden dissolved into a map of Surmik, the circle still intact.

“There it is!” Artie exclaimed.

“Looks like a pretty happening place,” Kay said sarcastically, peering over Artie's shoulder at an icy, barren landscape.

“You're right that it isn't, Sir Kay,” Thumb replied with a smirk. “It's big and cold. Lots of animals and very few people.”

“Which I guess makes it a little like Sweden, huh?” Artie mused.

“Nah, Sweden's cool,” Erik interjected, taking a break from swinging his war hammer. “We went there when I was eight. In the summer the sun never goes down, and in the winter it never comes up.”

“For real?” Kay asked.

“For real,” Erik said. “Since it's September, it should still be sunny most of the time.”

“Cool,” Kay said, putting the rope in the infinite backpack.

Artie smiled. “Definitely. Lance? Bedevere? You guys ready?”

“Yes, sire,” Bedevere said.

“You know it,” Lance boomed. “I need to see me some more of this Otherworld ASAP. I still can't believe I'm finally here!”

Artie turned to Thumb. “When will you and Tiberius leave for Leagon?”

“Right after you.”

“Good. How long before you return?”

“Unsure, lad,” Thumb said. “Dealing with fairies can be tricky.”

“All right, but don't take long. We've got only nine days,” Artie said despondently. He knew that they were going to be the hardest nine days of his young, regal life. Artie reached into his coat and pulled out the precious pommel. “Hey, Erik, you ready to go through your first moongate?” The other one didn't count since Erik had been knocked out.

“I guess I have to be, right?”

Lance clapped a hand on Erik's shoulder. “Stick with me, dude. You'll be fine.”

The pommel warmed in Artie's hand. He closed his eyes.

“Here we go!” Kay barked.

“Good-bye, knights! Good luck! Don't lose any more extremities!” Bercilak said encouragingly, though Erik was about as far from encouraged by this advice as he could possibly be.

“Good luck, lads,” Thumb intoned.

“
Lunae lumen!
” Artie exclaimed.

The moongate flickered open, and then just as quickly snapped shut around them.

 

Artie, Kay, Erik, Lance, and Bedevere found themselves in the middle of a vast, trough-shaped plain. A serpentine river flowed farther downhill. Rising in the distance were mountains shaped like upside-down bowls. Snow capped the peaks, and tendrils of white reached down their sides like crooked fingers. Across the river an ancient pine forest carpeted the land with millions of green, spear-shaped trees.

Not used to moongating, Erik fell onto his bottom as they materialized in Surmik. Feeling like he'd just been punched in the nose, he shook his head and said, “Whoa.”

“Welcome to the King Artie Kingfisher Express,” Kay said.

Erik rubbed his face. “Tell me you get used to that.”

“You do, Sir Erik, you do,” Bedevere consoled.

Lance was the only one facing uphill, and after he'd shaken off the moongate effect, he said, “Uh, guys, I think you should turn around.”

They did.

About fifty yards away was a gigantic herd of bovine creatures. At well over six feet tall, they were easily twice the size of large bulls, and each had long, pointed horns. Most were bent to the ground eating grass, but a few had raised heads, their eyes trained on the knights.

“What the . . .” Kay trailed off.

“Aurochs,” Artie said. “Basically cows that went extinct on our side. They used to roam all over Europe.”

“And you know this how?” Erik asked.

“Excalibur taught me a lot about animals that have gone extinct on our side but that migrated to the Otherworld. Back when I had Excalibur . . . ,” Artie said longingly before shaking it off. “Don't worry. I don't think they'll bother us. They're basically cows.”

“Shall we look for the crossover markers, sire?” Bedevere asked, unimpressed by the aurochs. He
was
the proud owner of a saber-toothed tiger, after all.

“Yeah,” Artie answered.

Artie, Kay, and Bedevere searched the ground for the pair of plate-sized rocks that would indicate the crossover. Lance watched the herd. Erik, still figuring it all out, barely moved an inch.

“Sire! Over here!” Bedevere finally announced, pointing his claymore at the ground.

“Good job,” Artie said.

Just then thunder rolled underfoot. Artie and Kay each felt the other's heart sink, as they were briefly reminded of the earthen thumping that had announced the arrival of Twrch Trwyth, the horrible, divine boar.

“Guys?” Lance said urgently. “Hurry up.”

Something had spooked the herd, causing it to shudder and move as dust swam in the air. The ground shook some more.

“What'd you do, Lance?” Kay asked plaintively.

“Nothing!”

Through the aurochs' chestnut-brown hides, something large and white could be seen moving in the distance.

“What's that?” Kay asked.

“Dunno,” Artie said a little nervously.

But they didn't have much time to think about it because the three closest aurochs stamped their feet. Then the one in the middle took a few steps forward and made a series of gruff snorts. A silvery ball of snot shot from his nose, landing with a loud
splat
on the ground.

“Bedevere, you stand there,” Artie said, indicating one of the crossover's disklike rocks. He moved to the other disk, pommel in hand.

The three closest aurochs jumped toward Lance. He stood his ground and nocked an arrow. “Hurry up, dude,” he said.

“
Lunae lumen!
” Artie whispered fiercely.

The dark pommel swirled with a blue glow. It became very cold, and then a beam of light shot from it in two directions. One end passed through Artie's hand—which tickled a little—striking the ground a few feet behind him. The other arced through the air, bending down and hitting a spot the same distance behind Bedevere.

Half ovals of light spun like gyroscopes between these two points. The air around them shimmered, and a twinkling curtain fell into place. It hit the ground, and a shock wave of silence shot away in all directions, striking the knights' eardrums like a sudden drop in air pressure.

When this burst of silence hit the three aurochs, they shook their great, blocklike heads in confusion. When it reached the rest of the herd, it caused something like a mass panic. The beasts scattered in all directions, some of the larger ones awkwardly trampling over the smaller ones.

And that was when they finally saw the white creature. It was a regal-looking stag with at least thirty points on his rack of horns.

For a moment it surveyed the turmoil around it, like a general watching a field of battle. Then it looked at Bedevere, then Artie, then Bedevere again. And then, Artie swore, it realized what they were doing.

It recognized the crossover point.

The stag reared like a horse in an old western before taking off, driving a group of aurochs right toward the gate.

The knights had to get out of there.

Pronto.

Artie and Bedevere pivoted through the crossover gate. Next came Kay, followed quickly by Lance, who had Erik by the arm. Erik was looking over his shoulder, his face twisted and frantic.

And just like that, they were in Sweden, on another barren slope above a river. In the distance was an identical boreal pine forest.

They flanked the crossover point for a few seconds. No sign of the aurochs or the stag. No miniature thunder underfoot. No snotty snorting sounds. But then about a dozen of the animals burst through the gate and bolted past them. Bringing up the rear was the stag. It split the aurochs into two groups and continued full-bore downhill.

“Whoa!” Lance said.

“Should we let the aurochs cross, sire?” Bedevere wondered.

“I don't know,” Artie admitted.

“We couldn't stop them if we wanted to,” Erik observed. “I mean, they make cows look like calves! Besides, they seem right at home.” The land around them was basically the same as Surmik, and the animals had trotted downhill a way, stopped, and begun to graze.

All this was fine by Artie. He wasn't concerned with the aurochs anymore. He was more interested in the white stag, now a speck moving at breakneck speed toward the river.

Erik, also dismissing the aurochs, stepped next to Artie and said, “That thing's fast.”

“Yeah.” Artie stuffed the pommel inside his shirt. The forest in the distance looked limitless and dark and more than a little spooky. Erik made a low humming sound and Artie asked, “What is it?”

“I've got a funny feeling, that's all,” Erik said a little nervously.

Artie smiled. “Funny feelings are good.”

Erik turned to Artie. “I'm not sure how,” he said weakly, “but I know how to find Gram.”

“We track that stag, right?”

“Right.”

Artie bit some loose skin off his bottom lip and spit it at the ground. “Let's get tracking, then.”

9 - IN WHICH THE PARTY SPLITS UP, AND HOW MAYBE THAT ISN'T SUCH A SMART IDEA

Artie kept it to himself,
but he knew that a white stag had lived in the forest around Camelot back in the old King Arthur days and that the knights of the Round Table saw it quite a bit. It was so beautiful that, being knights, all they wanted was to kill it, stuff it, and put it on display in the court, but no matter how often they tried no one ever managed to catch it. Like a unicorn or a selkie, the white stag was magical in its ability to evade capture. This was because the white deer was more than just an animal; it was a symbol of the Otherworld itself.

Artie Kingfisher took this as a good sign. It was his turn to follow the white deer into the woods, his knights at his side. Unlike the knights of old, he didn't want to capture it and mount its head in his game room; he just wanted to follow its magical—even mythical—footprints.

Footprints that would lead them right to Gram.

It took the knights an hour to cover the distance that the stag had gone in about twenty minutes. When they finally reached the river's edge, Lance said, “Man, this river's a lot bigger than I thought.”

Which was true. They'd watched the stag swim across it successfully but with effort. In crossing, it had been carried downriver about five hundred feet.

“No way we can do what that deer did,” Erik said feebly.

Bedevere rolled his armless shoulder and eyed the churning water. “I don't think I could cross that with
two
arms.”

They were silent for a moment. Artie leaned on his spear. The banks were littered with large rocks and much larger tree trunks. “Get out the rope, Kay. Let's see what my spear can do.”

“You got it, Art,” Kay said.

She swung the infinite backpack from her shoulders and dug out the rope. Artie tied some kind of crazy knot around the spear's shaft and cinched it tight. He said, “Beddy, Lance—I want you guys to stay here. We're going to set up a river crossing, and I don't want anything messing it up. Plus, we should keep an eye on that crossover. If Morgaine's power is so tied to them like Merlin said, she might send someone to check it out. If anyone bad-looking comes out of that thing, stop them.”

“Roger that, dude,” Lance said as Bedevere nodded.

Artie weighed his spear in his hand and eyed a tree trunk across the river. “Sis, take the free end of the rope and stand back there. When I launch the spear, let the rope uncoil, but don't let it go.”

“Check,” Kay said.

They gave Artie some room. He held the spear over his shoulder, turned sideways to the bank, and took a few jogs toward the target. When he had some momentum, he planted his left foot and let the spear fly with a grunt.

It absolutely flew out of his hand, true and on target. It crossed the river, and with a loud
thwack
Rhongomyniad drove deep into the tree trunk.

“Well done, sire!” Bedevere shouted.

Artie waved him off and took the free end of the rope from his sister. “Sis, can you use Cleomede to cut a hole in that rock?” He pointed at a large spur on the ground.

“Sure,” Kay said eagerly.

“Wait—what?” Erik bleated.

Instead of answering, Kay pushed Cleomede into the rock and gave it a full turn. Crushed sand and pebbles fell from the hole on either side.

“Whoa,” was all Erik could manage.

Kay shot Erik a smile and said, “Pretty neat, huh?”

“Is my sword going to be able to do that?”

Kay pulled Cleomede free and sheathed it. As Artie threaded the rope through the hole, he said, “Only one way to find out!”

A look of wonder crossed Erik's face as Artie pulled the rope taut and tied it off with another fancy knot. Artie tested it, grabbed it with both hands, then swung underneath and flung a leg over the line, holding it in the bend of his knee. He pulled himself along hand over hand and moved over the river. The rope sagged heavily in the middle, but both ends held and he reached the other side safely.

Then Kay and Erik crossed, both without any hiccups. Once assembled, Artie, Kay, and Erik looked up the slope toward the towering wall of ancient trees and took off.

 

They'd been moving fast for about thirty minutes when Kay said, “I feel like we're in the second
Lord of the Rings
movie!”

Artie laughed and said, “Hey, at least we're not hunting orcs.” He took a gulp of water from his canteen.

“You said it,” Kay replied, winking at her brother.

Erik didn't say anything. Since dragons existed, orcs probably did too. He hadn't even
thought
of that. Erik didn't want to meet an orc. Ever.

The threesome kept trekking and eventually they crossed into the old forest. The woods were hushed and tranquil. All around them, towering firs and hemlocks reached up to a pale-blue evening sky that peeked through here and there.

Artie stayed in front, followed by Erik, who held his heavy hammer across his body with both hands, and Kay brought up the rear. The soft ground was clear of underbrush and carpeted with rust-colored needles.

Eventually they stopped in front of a massive fallen tree, its trunk at least ten feet in diameter. It smelled dank but pleasant. The deer's tracks went right up to the tree and disappeared.

“Looks like it walked
through
this thing, huh?” Kay said.

“Naw, I think he jumped it,” Artie said. He pointed at the tracks behind him and added, “See here, how its tracks get farther apart, like it started to run?”

“You really think he could have cleared this?” Erik asked, slapping the tree's damp bark.

“Must've,” Artie said. As he stopped speaking, the silence of the woods overcame them. The forest seemed endless and empty. Then a loud twang, like a giant guitar string had been plucked, echoed through the woods, followed by a high-pitched squeal.

A chill ran down Kay's spine, and Artie felt it. The Kingfishers locked eyes. Kay drew Cleomede, and Artie pulled Flixith halfway out of its sheath.

Erik, however, ignored the sounds and clambered over the tree. “C'mon,” he called. Artie and Kay followed and they dropped down the other side, landing behind a tangle of branches. Erik stepped forward and parted them like he was peeking at an audience from behind a curtain.

About a hundred yards away, the great deer hung in the air by one of its hind legs. It was alive, but its hip looked horribly out of joint.

It had been snared in a trap.

Kay whispered, “Poor guy,” but Erik shushed her.

Emerging from the trees came a thing that looked like a reindeer walking on its hind legs. It had a reindeer's head, shaggy rack, and gray hide. But as it got closer, they saw boots. And gloves. And a belt.

And it was smoking a pipe.

It was the trapper. He walked under the deer and let out a long whistle, clearly impressed by his catch. Then he did a little jig and disappeared behind a tree.

The stag was lowered until its horns just touched the ground. The trapper reemerged and spoke to the animal with clicks and coos. He bound its front hooves. Then he tied a rope to the stag's horns and cinched this through the coil around the hooves, giving the animal a harsh crook in its neck. The man disappeared again and lowered the animal to the ground. Still talking to it, he gingerly relocated the stag's hip and tied its rear feet together.

Then he did something pretty incredible.

He picked the thing up and threw it over his shoulders, and started to walk back from where he came.

Artie, Kay, and Erik looked at each other in disbelief. The stag had to weigh at least a thousand pounds. The trapper was burly but didn't look
that
strong. They remained quiet until he was out of sight, and then Kay whispered, “Now what?”

Artie looked at Erik and said, “We follow him.”

 

A short while later, the three found themselves hiding at the edge of a big bowl in the earth. Below was a camp with a single tepee-like tent, its flap thrown wide; a big stone fire pit; and lots of stacks of chopped wood. Bleached animal skulls of varying sizes were arranged all over the place. A little log storehouse at the far end of the bowl stood high off the ground on six tall posts.

The stag hung upside down from a spit. It looked strangely calm considering the trapper was not more than a dozen paces away sharpening some tools on a stone.

The most remarkable thing about the camp, though, was a gnarled beech tree at its center. It was only about forty feet high, but it had a huge, elephantine trunk and tons of crooked branches. Clearly, it was super old. Its leaves had turned to pale copper for the fall—or perhaps they were always this way, forever old, withering, and fragile.

Erik pointed his chin at it. Sticking out of the trunk on the side closest to them was a completely unremarkable-looking sword.

“There it is,” Erik said with equal measures of awe and disbelief. “There's Gram.”

“How the heck are we going to get it without that guy noticing?” Kay wondered.

“I don't know,” Artie answered.

“We could wait for him to go to sleep,” Erik suggested.

They watched as the trapper slid a long knife with a white bone handle over the sharpening stone.

“It doesn't look like that's going to happen anytime soon,” Artie observed. “I think he's about to slaughter that deer.”

Erik eyed Gram. “You sure I'm going to be able to pull that thing out?”

“Sure I'm sure,” Artie said, trying to sound positive.

The woodsman stopped sharpening and cocked an ear in their direction, and they scootched out of sight, but as Erik slid back, he snapped a twig. They held their breaths and waited. Artie and Kay each had their weapons drawn fast in front of their faces.

They lay there frozen for several minutes. Finally Artie inched back to the edge of the camp and peeked in.

The man was gone.

The knife lay on a stump next to the sharpening stone. The beech tree, Barnstokk, shed a few of its copper leaves.

Erik slid next to Artie, and again his eyes locked on the sword. They became freakishly wide and bloodshot. Artie put his hand on Erik's arm. Erik was beginning to shake furiously.

For some reason the sight of Erik's sword was sending him into a rage.

Before Artie could do anything, Erik stood and ran into the camp, making a beeline for Gram.

Kay yelped, “Fudge,” as she jumped to her feet and followed, Artie right on her heels.

They dropped into the camp and Erik was almost to the deer when a pile of leaves exploded in front of him. The trapper had been hiding in a little trench in the ground, and now he was blocking their path to the tree.

Erik swung his war hammer at the stout man's head, but the trapper caught it with one hand and kicked something on the ground, and all of a sudden the three knights were whisked into the air in a jumble. Cleomede sliced deep into Artie's calf, which healed quickly thanks to the scabbard strapped to his back.

When the dust settled, they found themselves in a rope net about fifteen feet above the ground. Artie and Kay were ready to cut it to pieces when the trapper pulled hard on another line, cinching the webbing so tight around them that they could barely move.

“Erik!” Kay scolded, her arm twisted behind her uncomfortably. “That was
so
not cool!”

Erik, still coming down from his rage, just moaned.

Artie remained silent and eyed the woodsman intently.

The man was a shade over five feet tall with bright blue eyes and leathery skin. He had a beard that was more like a bird's nest, what with all the twigs and leaves in it. His expression was one of simple curiosity. He looked neither mean nor kind.

Artie, who was at the bottom of the snare, commanded, “Let us down right now!”

If the man understood, he didn't show it.

“I said, let us down!” Artie repeated.

The man still said nothing. He pushed his toes into the ground, where some of Artie's blood had fallen. He knelt, scooped some blood onto a filthy finger, and put it in his mouth. He stood, made a sucking sound, and considered Artie.

“What's going on down there?” Kay asked. She was on top and didn't have a good view of the ground. Erik whimpered from in between the Kingfishers.

Artie ignored Kay, looked their captor square in the eye, and said coolly, “I am Artie Kingfisher, and I demand that you release us. The longer you hold us like this, the worse it will be for you later.”

That did it. The man's face snapped into an amused smile, revealing a mouth with only a few crooked, yellow teeth. His eyes brightened. His nose turned red.

“I am Sami,” the man said with a lilting Swedish accent as he jabbed Artie hard in the leg with Erik's hammer. “And
I
demand to know how you healed your leg, or it will get much, much worse for
you
right now.”