The Snowy Tower (20 page)

The skeletons jerked ever more frantically, waving their arms about threateningly. Saxon lifted his lantern higher, his sword in his right hand.

‘Look,’ Saxon whispered, pointing with his
sword. ‘There is a string or something attached to the hand.’

Now that Saxon had mentioned it, everyone could see a slight gleam of lantern light reflecting off something in a very faint line. Aisha had reached the skeletons now. She sniffed inquisitively. The skeletons kept dancing frenetically. Aisha jumped up on one, knocking it flying. The skeleton jangled back to its feet, a bit lopsided.

‘Aisha, leave it,’ called Lily. Reluctantly Aisha stopped sniffing the smaller figure and returned to heel. The four children and Fox moved slowly and carefully towards the two skeletons, weapons ready and eyes peeled. The skeletons jerked and leapt wildly. Just as the children came within a metre of them, they suddenly fell lifeless to the ground. Ethan dropped on one knee to examine the bones.

‘They’re human bones all right,’ said Fox, poking the rib cage with his cutlass.

‘But someone or something was helping them to jig,’ Ethan added, lifting a fine black twine, which made the child’s small hand wave up and down.

‘The strings are looped over that black pole,’ cried Saxon, indicating a thin black pole, supported by two black posts, invisible from a distance in the
dimness. ‘It works like a macabre puppet show. Now who would rig this up, and why?’

‘Someone who wanted to scare off unwanted visitors?’ Lily glanced around nervously.

‘Whoever it was must be very close by,’ Fox whispered, scanning the shadows for clues.

‘The strings seem to lead over there,’ observed Roana, pointing to a slightly raised ridge about six metres away.

‘Ethan and Saxon, I want you to take the princess and Lily back to Caspar and George, while I investigate,’ Fox ordered. ‘No, don’t argue,’ he added as Ethan opened his mouth to do exactly that.

Reluctantly, Ethan, Roana, Lily and Saxon turned to obey. They had not taken more than half a dozen steps when a high-pitched shriek sounded behind them. They whirled around in time to see a horde of a hundred or more small green creatures hurl themselves over the ridge. Each one was the size of a small child, with huge round eyes, large flapping ears and a pointy nose. Their skin was slimy like a frog and covered with warty protrusions. Each one held a weapon in its small webbed hands, raised above their heads menacingly.

‘Hobgoblins,’ shrieked Lily. ‘A whole army of them!’

Fox raised his fingers to his mouth and whistled sharply, the signal to call his men to his side. The whistle reverberated around the huge cavern, calling the rebels to crawl and clamber as fast as they could up to the peak of the rubbish mountain. In their haste, many slipped and fell, sinking to their thighs in the unstable terrain.

The hobgoblins ran to the small group of children huddled behind Fox, their weapons waving and jabbing wildly. They carried scythes, cudgels, pike staffs, spears and daggers, all fashioned from the broken debris of the city above.

‘Weapons ready?’ called Fox. Ethan, Lily and Roana readied their bows and nocked their arrows obediently. Saxon hefted his sword. ‘Aim, fire.’

Ethan, Lily and Roana loosed a volley of arrows, aiming for the heart of the hobgoblin army. A few hobgoblins fell, shrieking in distress, but the majority ran on. The three children kept firing as fast as they could reload their arrows. The first of the rebels reached the group of children and surrounded them with a ring of muscled bodies and glinting weapons. George carried Caspar on his shoulders and deposited him safely in the centre of the human fort.

‘Look at that,’ yelled Roana, dropping her bow. As
the hobgoblins ran closer, they could see a taller hobgoblin in the centre, urging on his army. This hobgoblin carried a different weapon, which he struggled to hold aloft. The king of the hobgoblins carried a massive sword, dull, slightly rusty, but formidable nonetheless. The sword they had travelled so far to find. The Sun Sword – denuded of its gems, its lustre and its power but beautiful all the same.

Roana swallowed, her heart surging with determination. They had to get that sword back. In a moment the army was upon them. Rebels hacked and fought with their swords. There was blood and screams and chaos and confusion. The king of the hobgoblins stayed towards the back, screaming unintelligible orders and urging his lackeys on.

Roana did not take her eyes off him as the battle raged and ebbed around her. The little hobgoblin king jumped up on a barrel, screaming with rage, spittle bubbling at his lips, waving his heavy sword precariously. Roana took careful aim. She breathed slowly and shot. The silver arrow spun through the air, above the battle, and found its mark. The hobgoblin king screamed and fell, the arrow pierced through his sword arm. The Sun Sword dropped below him.

With their king wounded, the tide of the battle was turned. One by one the hobgoblins dropped their weapons and scampered for the far ridge, leaving their injured comrades behind. Regardless of the retreating hobgoblins and the bodies lying all around her, Roana ran for the place where the wounded king lay. She grabbed a sword from a hurt rebel as she passed.

‘Roana. Princess,’ yelled Fox. ‘Stop. Come back!’

Roana ignored him and kept running, with Aisha close behind. Ethan, Saxon, Lily and Fox chased after her as fast as they could.

Roana stood over the fallen hobgoblin king, the sword pointing at his chest.

‘May I please have my father’s sword?’ Roana asked politely. The hobgoblin croaked and shrieked. The warty bubbles on his skin opened to release a bitter, burning acid with an acrid smell. The creature rolled over painfully, grabbed the massive sword with his uninjured arm and lunged at Roana, aiming for her heart. Roana’s hours of training with Fox kicked in automatically. She did not have time to think or analyse or plan. She simply darted forward, straight into the line of that lethal sword, and crashed the blade with her own. The wounded king was too weak to withstand the
force of Roana’s blow, and he dropped the Sun Sword with a screech, rolling over and scuttling away after his defeated army.

Roana bent down and lifted the Sun Sword. Joy filled her heart as she felt the power of the sword surge through her hands and up her arms. She lifted the sword above her head, with tears of elation streaming down her face. Ethan, Lily and Saxon jumped around her, hugging her, squeezing her, slapping her on the back and dancing an ecstatic jig. Aisha barked wildly, leaping up, wagging her tail and licking everyone in sight.

‘We did it! We have the Sun Sword!’ squealed the four excited voices.

Everyone looked closely at the sword they had searched for so long and so hard. The blade was dull and pitted with spots of rust. Two ugly wounds showed where the Sun Gem and Moon Pearl had been wrenched free. Smaller pits marked the spots where the Star Diamonds had once sparkled. The handle was dirty and scorched from the hobgoblin acid.

‘It does not look much, does it?’ Roana offered, a touch crestfallen. ‘I doubt it has any power in this state.’

George the blacksmith pushed forward to examine the blade.

‘I think I can help you with that,’ George offered. ‘Of course I can’t do much about the missing gems, but I can polish up the blade and fix the handle. It won’t take me long at all.’

Everyone turned to George in excitement.

‘Oh, but I have the gems here,’ cried Roana in delight. ‘They are sewn into the hem of my cloak.’

There was shocked silence for a moment, then an excited babble from the rebels all around.

The party retreated to the cavern floor, where George directed a large, hot fire to be built, using any flammable material they could find. George did not have his bellows or anvil or any of his tools, so he had to make do with the treasures he could salvage from the rubbish around him.

While the fire was burning down to white hot coals, George set to work polishing the blade and handle. He started rubbing with a small, smooth pebble and some oil, which he gently scrubbed over the rust spots and acid scorches.

Roana jiggled from foot to foot. ‘George, hurry, please hurry,’ she begged.

‘Your highness, I’m going as fast as I can,’ George replied, inspecting the blade’s surface carefully. ‘You jiggling up and down won’t make it happen any faster.’

For the next stage George rubbed a mixture of sand and water over the blade with wet rags.

Roana marched up and down, impatient words bubbling in her throat.

‘Your highness, perhaps it’s best if you sit down and rest,’ Fox suggested with a chuckle. ‘You’re driving us all crazy and George might ruin that beautiful sword of yours.’

‘Come and cuddle Charcoal, Roana,’ Lily suggested. ‘You know that always calms you.’

Roana snorted in a very un-princesslike way, but sat down and scooped Charcoal into her lap for a soothing stroke. Charcoal purred happily, always keen for a cuddle.

Last, George used clean wet rags to make the blade and handle sparkle once more. It was not a perfect job, but it was a vast improvement. Then when the fire was ready he used the white-hot coals to soften and melt the gold of the gem settings.

George was not a goldsmith, so his work was not as fine as the court jeweller’s would have been, but he understood metallurgy and fire and his large hands were surprisingly capable of such delicate work. It took him two hours to set the gems back in the handle and finish the polishing. The others could do nothing but rest and watch and give their
help when George needed it – fanning the fire, fetching more fuel, pouring the oil and rinsing the rags in the rivulets in the tunnel.

At last George was satisfied. The Sun Sword gleamed in the firelight, the Sun Gem ruby glowing like a blood-red heart. On the reverse side the Moon Pearl glinted with a luminous shimmer, surrounded by twinkling Star Diamonds.

Roana picked it up reverently. ‘Thank you, George,’ she breathed. A jolt of power surged through her body, filling her with courage, assurance, love and hope. Roana buckled on a belt and sheathed the sword in a plain leather scabbard she had borrowed from one of the rebels.

‘Let us go now and free my mother, Queen Ashana,’ said Roana with calm authority. ‘The Sedahs have had their way for far too long in our land.’

Roana led the way, followed by Ethan, Lily, Saxon, Caspar, Fox and George. The rebels followed Roana without question. They marched back down, past the moving walls of cockroaches, down the twisting steps along the passageway to where the tunnel forked.

Here they took the left-hand tunnel, which meandered downhill. After a few minutes the
tunnel started to climb steeply, then turned to slippery steps. They climbed eagerly, knowing they were now only minutes from the end of their journey.

At last they came to the shallow arched niche on the right-hand side of the tunnel. Above the arch was a carved depiction of a sun, with rays flaming around it.

Without hesitation, Roana pushed the rounded sphere of the sun in the centre. The depressed sphere operated a lever, which released the back of the archway with a shuddering, grinding noise. The door slid aside to reveal a secret opening, leading directly into the storerooms below the palace. Roana held a finger to her lips to indicate total silence. The signal was passed back along the line of men. One by one they stepped through the opening and climbed into the dusty storeroom.

The palace’s reception hall was packed with Sedah soldiers, all dressed in their black dress uniforms, and a handful of Tiregian ladies dressed in silk gowns. Heavily armed guards stood about the hall, in case of any trouble from the conquered Tiregians. At one end stood the seven Sedah priests, waiting in their long black gowns. To the side was a small table with two crowns placed on it. One crown was large and gold and ornate, studded with jewels. The other crown was small and silver and quite modest.

A group of trumpets played a stirring fanfare. When the music stopped the two huge doors at the
opposite end were flung open by uniformed page boys. A procession of page boys in pairs walked down the central corridor between the onlookers. The trumpets burst forth once more. Governor Lazlac strode into the hall, his waxy face burning with zealous satisfaction. He nodded to left and right as he marched up the corridor, to the cheers of the Sedah soldiers.

A few metres behind him floated a tall, regal figure completely draped in crimson. A young handmaiden led before her, as it was impossible for the queen to see more than a few steps in front of her, through the gauzy veil. Many of the Tiregian ladies were openly weeping as their queen was led through the crowd to her fate. The rear of the procession was more page boys, all dressed in the severe black of the Sedah livery.

Queen Ashana, as directed, stopped in front of the Sedah priests, at Lord Lazlac’s side.

The Head Priest stepped forward.

‘Do you, Governor Lazlac, come before me to wed this woman, Ashana, in the name of Krad?’ the priest intoned in a heavy, ceremonial voice.

‘In the name of Krad, I, Governor Lazlac, wish to marry this woman, Ashana,’ agreed Lord Lazlac.

The priest stepped forward and flung back the
veil that hid the queen’s face. Queen Ashana looked at the priest steadily, her face proud and calm. The sound of loud sobs could be heard from the audience behind them.

‘Is this the said woman Ashana?’ asked the Head Priest. Lord Lazlac looked possessively at Queen Ashana, his face grimacing in his parody of a smile. The queen returned his scrutiny, but her face was cold and impassive.

‘It is she,’ Lord Lazlac crowed.

‘Then I bind this woman, Ashana, to you in marriage, in the name of Krad and his fearful Emperor Raef,’ the priest continued. Apparently it was not Sedah tradition to ask the bride if she wished to be married to the groom. The priest took a long crimson ribbon and bound it tightly around Queen Ashana’s wrist, then bound her right wrist to Lord Lazlac’s left wrist to symbolise the binding of the marriage.

‘Be it so,’ the Head Priest intoned. The Sedah’s cheering and wolf whistles drowned out the sound of sobbing.

‘In the name of his most fearful majesty Emperor Raef, I take this opportunity to crown you as the new king of Tiregian,’ the priest continued when the exuberant cheering had died down. He lifted the
large ornate crown and placed it firmly on the groom’s head. ‘Henceforth, you shall be known as His Royal Highness King Lazlac of Tiregian, in the dominion of Sedah and the Nine Isles.’

The cheering rose to even higher levels. The priest turned to the bride and placed the silver crown on her head.

‘I hereby take this opportunity to crown you Queen Ashana, the new queen of Tiregian, in the dominion of Sedah and the Nine Isles.’

The queen swallowed. King Lazlac turned to his new bride and swept a low, flourishing bow. ‘My queen, shall we attend our wedding feast?’

Queen Ashana nodded and was led back down through the cheering black crowds, still bound to King Lazlac by the crimson ribbon. Sedah tradition was to keep the bride and groom bound together until the clock struck midnight, to symbolise their new marriage. The wedding party retired to the Great Hall and sat at the long bridal table. The cheerful guests followed and took their places at the other long tables.

Many guests came to offer their congratulations to the newly married couple, with much back-slapping, toasts of cherry wine and well-worn jokes. King Lazlac grimaced happily. His plan had
succeeded – he was now King of Tiregian, and lord of all he surveyed, including the very beautiful Queen Ashana. He tugged playfully on the crimson ribbon that bound her to his wrist.

Queen Ashana bit her lip, staring down at the gold cutlery on the table. She was queen once more, but there was little joy in that.

Down in the guardroom in the dungeons, a group of seven Sedah guards grumpily played cards. They were disappointed to be missing out on the feast in the palace above, and they were naturally slightly mollified when four pretty maid servants came from the kitchens carrying a barrel of cherry wine.

‘King Lazlac sends his compliments and said to tell you to drink up to celebrate his wedding and coronation,’ Jess announced with a simpering smile and a flutter of eyelashes.

The seven guards complied happily, smashing their mugs together in a toast.

‘To King Lazlac and his beautiful new bride. Krad be praised.’

They drained the mugs in one gulp and filled them up again before the maid servants had even left the room.

Similar barrels were also being delivered to the Sedah sentries on the three city gates and to the soldiers on the palace gates. Today was a happy day for Sedah and for the new king. It was a day for celebrations.

In the Great Hall vast quantities of cherry wine and ale had already been consumed.

No-one noticed that the cherry wine tasted slightly different this evening, or that the ale was having a very rapid effect on the revellers.

Servants now scurried about serving huge steaming tureens of spicy wild mushroom soup. It was served with lashings of cream and wedges of lemon.

‘Try the soup, my sweet,’ suggested King Lazlac to Queen Ashana.

‘Thank you, my lord,’ Queen Ashana replied with a forced smile. ‘But I am saving my appetite for the roast duck, which is simply superb.’

‘No, no,’ King Lazlac cried. ‘I insist. Serve the queen some soup.’

A servant immediately obeyed, placing a bowl of creamy grey soup in front of Queen Ashana.

‘Thank you kindly,’ she replied, obediently lifting
the spoon to her lips. ‘Mmmm, quite delicious, although very spicy.’

King Lazlac nodded his satisfaction and returned to speaking to his advisors on his right-hand side. He did not notice that Queen Ashana did not actually taste the soup, simply playing with the spoon and occasionally lifting it to her lips.

Marnie was seated at one of the lower tables with a number of ladies-in-waiting and Sedah officers, but she occasionally wandered over to the bridal table to check on the queen and give her courage. Both of them felt sick with nerves. Would this evening never end?

Jess crept down into the guardroom, carrying a large bundle in one arm and a jug of warm water in the other. There she found seven sentries collapsed on the floor, snoring happily. She nodded to herself, put the jug and bundle down on the table and immediately hurried down towards the storerooms on the southern side of the underground complex.

She whistled a merry tune as she ran down the passageway. Fox heard the prearranged signal and popped his head out of the storeroom, where they
were all waiting. Mia waved cheekily from his shoulder and blew Jess a kiss.

‘The marriage and coronation are finished and the feast has begun,’ Jess explained quickly. There was a sharp intake of breath from Roana, as she realised that her mother was now married to the despicable Lord Lazlac. ‘The guards are unconscious so we can release the prisoners from the dungeons,’ Jess continued. ‘Come this way.’

Fox and the rebels, disguised in Sedah uniforms, followed Jess back down the corridor to the central guardroom. The unconscious Sedah guards were relieved of their keys, their weapons and their uniforms. Fox changed into one of the black Sedah uniforms, fastening the armour tightly.

Roana looked longingly at the steps leading up to the palace.

‘First things first, Roana,’ Fox reminded her, buckling on a helmet. ‘These prisoners have been locked up for many weeks. We must set them free.’

The keys were divvied out by Fox, and then everyone helped to unlock the cells and warn the prisoners to be quiet.

Aisha picked up a scent she recognised and ran to sniff at the bottom of a cell door. Ethan and Lily
ran to investigate, their hearts pounding with anticipation. They unlocked the door to discover a number of prisoners, including Willem, who was sitting in the corner completely shocked to find his prison door opened by his two children.

Willem was bruised and puffy around the face, but he was strong and fit from his work on the temple, and tanned a deep brown by the sun.

‘Dadda,’ cried Lily running across the cell to throw her arms around him. Aisha bounded over to lick him on the face. Willem still could not speak.

‘Are you all right, Dadda?’ begged Ethan in concern, searching his father’s face with one arm flung around his shoulder. He was terrified that the incarceration in the dungeons had taken its toll on his father’s wits.

Willem shook himself vigorously, then squeezed both children in a gigantic bear hug.

‘You are real,’ Willem breathed. ‘Thank the Sun Lord. I thought I’d finally gone mad and was just imagining you here.’ He reached over and tickled Aisha, who rolled on her back, exposing her white belly for a rub, her tail thumping the stone floor with glee.

‘Come on,’ called Fox from the doorway. ‘No time for family reunions. We have a battle to fight.’

Everyone jumped up and followed Fox out into the milling crowd. Roana and Saxon were tying a band of crimson ribbon onto the left arms of each of the rebels dressed in Sedah uniform.

‘This is how you will know who is a real Sedah soldier and who is a disguised Tiregian rebel,’ Saxon explained to the soldiers.

The real Sedah sentries were locked together in a cell in their underwear to sleep off the drugged cherry wine. Then all the prisoners were kitted out with weapons from the armoury. Willem was dressed in a Sedah uniform and helped himself to a fine bow and a quiver full of arrows. He strung the bow and carefully tested the draw weight. He felt a thrill of excitement surge through him to be holding a bow in his hands once more.

‘All the released prisoners should stay here hiding in the outer corridor,’ Fox ordered. ‘We will leave six of our men here disguised as Sedah soldiers, in case anyone comes down to check. The rest will come with me, including the children. Jess, where are those servant clothes?’

Jess opened the bundle she had been carrying, to reveal three black page boy outfits, two maid servant gowns and some clean rags.

‘Looks like it might be time for you to become a
girl again, Roana?’ grinned Lily.

‘Cookie’s been trying to get me back in a dress for ages,’ agreed Roana, laughing, holding the dark skirts against her legs. ‘Actually I can’t wait to get out of these stinking clothes. I can still smell the garbage pit all around me.’

The children hurriedly washed their hands and faces with the warm water and cloths Jess had brought down, and then changed into the clothes.

Soon Ethan, Saxon and Caspar were wearing black shirts, jackets and breeches, with small tricorn hats. Lily and Roana were wearing dark blue dresses with full skirts, white petticoats, white aprons and white mob caps. Roana buckled the leather belt and leather scabbard, holding the Sun Sword around her narrow waist. She pinned the skirt around the scabbard to hide it.