The Keeper (3 page)

“Aye, which means we have no idea what’s coming, Vega Jane, once we get away from here.”

If
we get away from here,
I thought miserably.

T
HE PLACE WE
were taken was a large, low-ceilinged cave roughly forty feet long and twenty wide. Light came from fired smoky candles that were lined up on a table struck from solid rock, with rough-hewn wooden chairs all around.

Thorne pointed to the seats and said, “Please, be comfortable. The meal will be along presently.”

He took a seat at the head of the table. There was a large
T
carved in the back of his seat. For the king, I imagined. Delph and I shared a contemptuous look. What a ginked-up git.

I said, “The grass that grows on the ekos?”

Thorne smiled approvingly. “Oh, you noticed that, did you?”

Well, I could hardly miss it,
I thought. “So what is its purpose?”

“It helps them do what they do,” he replied in a casual tone.

A noise in the doorway made us turn in time to see four ekos carrying in a large platter. As they drew closer into the spread of candlelight, I could see what was on it: great clumps and claws of some beast with feather and fur still attached. My stomach gave a lurch. But around the “meat” were potatoes and asparagus and beans and peppers and purple onions. And I was fairly certain that was a rutabaga staring out at me from under what looked to be a furry thigh.

“Blimey,” breathed Delph with a disgusted look.

Metal plates were thrust in front of us, with rude forks and knives metal-forged as well. One ekos, the tall one from before, served Thorne personally. Then I reckoned it was up to us to do the same for ourselves.

I avoided the clumps and claws and filled my plate with the vegetables and covered them with what I recognized as parsley and basil leaves. Delph did likewise, though I did see him tear off a chunk of meat that looked rather well smoked. A goblet of water was placed next to my plate by the hand of an ekos, so I got a much better look at the grass growing on it. In fact, some of it brushed against my hand. It felt hard and prickly.

I drank some of the water, and Delph did also. I let a bit of my rutabaga fall to the floor for Harry Two. Delph followed with a slice of his meat.

“A fine canine,” said Thorne as he worked on what looked to be a wing, casually plucking off feathers as he did so.

“Thank you. So you have water resources here?” It was not an idle question. We needed water to survive our journey through the Quag.

“An underground stream. Quite tasty.”

Delph spat a piece of hardened skin from his mouth and muttered something about, “And why can’t the bloody food be the same?”

Thorne pointed to the half-eaten joint of meat in Delph’s large hand. “What you have is a bit of attercop. Don’t actually care for it myself. But the buggers are plentiful up on the surface of the Quag and quite easy to trap.”

“Attercop?” said Delph quizzically. “Never heard of it.”

“Well, you might know it by another term: spider?”

With an enormous cough, Delph expelled his mouthful of meat and it hit the wall opposite.

I looked at Thorne, fearing his reaction to this.

For a long moment, Thorne simply stared at Delph, and then he looked at the slop of spider meat sliding down the wall of his eating room. When he glanced back, he burst into a fit of laughter, which we soon both joined.

After we had quieted, Thorne rubbed his eyes. “Delightful,” he said. “Never cared much for spider myself, as I said. Chewy, you know. And then of course, there is the question of the venom. Stick to the rutabagas. They never lead you astray, the noble rutabaga. Nothing dodgy about dear old rutabagas.”

We continued to eat our meal, now chatting pleasantly.

I said, “You mentioned there were other things living down here?”

“Well, there are the ekos of course. Quite civilized.” He stroked his beard with his index finger. “Then there are the gnomes.”

“The
gnomes
?” I said. I had never heard the term.

“Yes, yes. Well, sometimes I call them the unders, you know, because, well, they dig
under
the rock for things that we require. Quite the sharp claws they have.”

“And that’s all the creatures living down here?” I said in a prompting tone.

He scowled. “Well, there are the bloody grubbs.”

“Grubbs? What do they do for you?”

“Do for us?” He bent forward and his expression became so still, it was like he had been transformed to rock. “They attack us,” he said quietly.

“Attack you?”

“Yes,” he said, his eyes narrowed to slits. “They want to kill me.”

“But why?” I asked.

He turned back to his meal without answering. Delph and I exchanged a puzzled glance. This bloke was definitely mental. I felt the hairs on my neck start to tingle.

“And what do the grubbs look like?” Delph asked nervously.

Thorne turned a very serious eye to him. “They look like the last thing you would ever want to see coming at you from out of the dark, milad. Bloody ger-rubbs,” he added in a disgusted voice.

“Where are they?” I said breathlessly. “Down here somewhere?”

“I’ll tell you where they are. They are where you least expect them to be.” He struck the stone tablet a sharp blow with his palm, which caused Delph and me to jump nearly out of our chairs. Delph accidentally spilled some of his water. Harry Two immediately started lapping it up.

“Now you must give me news of good old Wormwood,” said Thorne as he washed down a mouthful of food with the contents of his goblet. I wasn’t convinced he was drinking simply water, for he filled his goblet from time to time from a silver flask resting at his elbow. “For instance, who is Chief of Council now?” he asked.

“Thansius.”

“Good for him. Well done, Thansius.”

“So you knew him?” I asked.

“Yes. He was a good friend of Virgil’s too.” He took a sip from his goblet.

“And Morrigone’s,” I added.

This had a remarkable effect on the Wug. The color drained from his face and he choked on his draft. Regaining his breath, he said, “Morrigone, eh?”

“If it was a long time ago that you left, she might have still been very young. Or perhaps not even born yet.”

“Yes, I do believe that she was born actually.”

Watching him curiously, I said, “Morrigone is on Council now.”

He chortled, but there was no mirth in his eyes. “What else?” he asked.

Delph said, “Well, we been building this —”

I cut in. “I worked at Stacks, as a Finisher, as I said. Delph was at the Mill.”

Delph shot me an inquiring glance, but I ignored him. The truth was I didn’t want Thorne to know about the Wall. If Thorne was an Outlier or his mind had been taken over by them, the last thing I wanted was for him to learn about the enormous wall we were constructing around Wormwood to keep those very Outliers out!

I decided to get to the most important issue I wanted to ask him about. “I never heard of any other Wug heading into the Quag. It is forbidden.”

“Many things were forbidden,” replied Thorne in a more sober tone. “And yet
you
appear on
my
doorstep. What cause brings you into the mysterious Quag?”

“Curiosity,” I said immediately. “We wanted to see what was in here.”

“And beyond,” added Delph. My kick was too slow to forestall him.

“There is
nothing
beyond the Quag,” said Thorne sharply, eyeing us warily.

“So you’ve been to the other side of the Quag?” I asked innocently.

“No, I’ve never been past here.”

“Then how do you know there —”

He rose abruptly. “I believe that we all are extremely tired. Now your sleeping quarters are ready.” He grunted and the same large ekos appeared.

“Luc here will show you where. Off you go and pleasant sleep to you both.” He hurried away.

Luc grunted once. Harry Two gave a bark in reply. Apparently satisfied that we understood, Luc turned and walked through the passageway. We hurried after the creature with grass for skin and grunts for words.

Delph whispered, “Are you sure ’bout all this?”

“I’m sure of nothing, Delph. Absolutely nothing.”

I had never spoken truer words.

W
E WERE LED
to a chamber that was cold and filled with shadows that seemed to flicker and move about. There was one torch on the wall and a lit candle on a wooden box next to a hard pallet on which lay a blanket and a pillow.

I looked at Delph, who stood in the doorway.

“Is it just the one, then, for the both of us?” he said, eyeing me nervously.

When I shot him a glance, I had to hide a smile because his face turned scarlet and the big Wug quickly glanced away.

Males.

However, Luc was already pulling on his arm and pointing farther down the passage and grunting quite madly.

“Guess not,” I said with a tiny wave. “Suppose these are just my digs.”

I thought I saw Delph let out a sigh of relief, which I wasn’t quite happy about for some reason.

He said, “Look, anything comes up, just give a holler. I’ll be here faster than … well, pretty bloody fast, I can tell you that,” said Delph, somewhat anticlimactically.

“Brilliant, you do the same,” I said, feeling uneasy even as I said the words.

Delph disappeared with Luc, and Harry Two came over and settled down next to the wooden pallet. I dropped my tuck in the corner, sat on the rude bed and took off my cloak. Underneath was my chain, which I would not be taking off. In the pocket of my cloak was the Adder Stone, which healed pretty much anything. Along with the Stone was the glove. My shrunken Elemental was in my other pocket.

I pulled from my cloak the ring Thansius had sent me before I escaped into the Quag. It had belonged to my grandfather. It had been found at Quentin Herms’s cottage. I was told my grandfather had suffered an Event, which basically meant that one vanished into, well, nothing. But that had been a lie. I had learned that my grandfather had left Wormwood of his own accord.

On the ring was the symbol of the three hooks. I had no idea what it meant. I thought I might find out in the Quag. I thought I might learn a lot in the Quag. If the place didn’t kill me first.

I lay back on the bed and held the ring up to the flickering candle. The hooks glistened and glowed in the soft, bluish light. My grandfather had the very same symbol on the back of his hand. I had also seen this exact same ring on the finger of the dying female warrior who had given me the Elemental.

I put the ring on. It was too large for any of my fingers except my thumb, where it rode snugly. As I looked at it on me, I couldn’t help but think that I had just made some sort of unconscious decision committing me to something.

I felt my eyes close, the rise and fall of my chest started to slow and I collapsed into a deep sleep. But right before I completely drifted off, I could hear Harry Two’s contented snores as he lay beside me on the floor.

My dreams were not pleasant ones. In every crevice of my mind, I seemed to encounter danger. Time passed and I slept on. When I finally awoke, I started to rise, but something held me back. I opened my eyes. And gasped.

I was in a cage!

I sat up and looked around. Delph was lying next to me, still asleep. What had been keeping me from rising was Harry Two. His paw was still protectively on my shoulder. The bars of the cage were stark white. As I drew closer to them, I could see why. They were made of bones.

I instantly drew back when I heard a laugh, a familiar one.

I looked to the right and there sat Thorne on a huge chair carved from still more bones. And all around the cage were ekos bearing weapons.

He pointed at the cage bars. “As you can see, we do make use of our little, uh, trophies here in the Kingdom of Cataphile.”

With a thrill of horror, I saw four items resting on a slab of rock next to his seat. Destin, my chain, the Adder Stone, my grandfather’s ring and the glove I had to use when holding the Elemental. I touched my cloak and felt the small outline of the shrunken Elemental still in my pocket. They must not have noticed it or else thought it of no importance.

I spoke loudly. “Why are we in here? And why did you take my things?”

This roused Delph, who slowly sat up and then leapt to his feet.

“What the —” he began, but I shushed him and then turned back to Thorne.

“Why are you doing this to fellow Wugmorts?”

Thorne pointed in turn to the Adder Stone, the chain, the ring and the glove.

“What are these things, Vega Jane? I would dearly like to know.”

“Why?”

“Well, how else can I make use of them?”

“You’re
not
to make use of them. They’re mine,” I said heatedly. I felt woozy in the head and I suddenly knew why. “You put something in our water to make us fall asleep,” I said accusingly.

He picked up the ring. “I have seen this before. On your grandfather’s finger.”

I grabbed the bars of bones and shook them. “Let us out of here! Now!”

“You are in no position to make demands, my silly little female.”

“I’m not silly and I’m definitely not little,” I shot back.

“To me, you’re nearly invisible, so insignificant are you.”

“Well, then I guess you don’t need me to tell you what they are, if I’m so bloody insignificant.”

He stood up and strolled over to the cage, stopping a foot away, and smiled maliciously.

“You must think things through a little better.”

He pointed at Luc, who held a bow with an arrow perched on the string.

He grunted and Luc came forward.

Thorne said, “I just ordered Luc to kill the canine.”

“No!” I screamed and immediately thrust myself between Luc and Harry Two as Luc began to take aim.

“Move out of the way, Vega, it’s only a blasted canine,” said Thorne.

“He’s
my
canine and I’m not moving. So you can just go to Hel!”

He grunted again and four more ekos came forward with their bows and surrounded the cage. They all took aim at Harry Two. I couldn’t be in four different places at once, so I ended up covering him entirely with my body.

“Vega Jane!” shouted Delph, and he put his big body over both of us.

Thorne drew closer to the bones, a dangerous smile playing over his lips. “There is a mile-long drop from a cliff when entering the Quag to get to my kingdom. How did you manage it?”

My glance betrayed me. I looked past him, to the objects he’d taken.

“I see,” he said. “Now, which one?” When I didn’t answer, he pointed at Luc while keeping his gaze directly upon me. “One grunt from me, Vega, and Delph is no more. I will add his bones to your cage. With his size, they’ll fill all the bloody gaps. Now, which one?”

“Vega Jane, don’t,” shouted Delph.

Thinking quickly, and already having sized up Thorne as vain and arrogant, I said, “I’m sure
your
secrets are far more amazing than my pitiful ones.”

Thorne appraised me for about a sliver. “You know, I think you’ve hit on something there. I actually think it appropriate to show you how my mind works. Then you will understand that it is futile to resist me.”

He grunted in rapid succession and the ekos sprang into action.

The bone cage was opened, and with pokes and prods from swords and spears, we were herded out of it.

Delph grew close to me and whispered, “He’s a mad ’un, Vega Jane.”

“I know he is.”

“We got to get out of here.”

I nodded again, but I couldn’t think of a single way for us to accomplish it.

Thorne led us down another passageway until we came to a far larger cave than the one we had left. I heard the sound of something pounding into rock long before we reached it. As we came into the space, I could barely believe my eyes.

It was a mountain of rock underground. And swarming over it were little creatures in work clothes and sporting red woolen caps and high leather boots that covered most of their short legs.

“The aforementioned gnomes,” said Thorne, pleasantly enough.

The gnomes stopped what they were doing and turned as though hooked together, to stare down at us from their mountain.

“Come closer,” said Thorne enticingly. “I’m sure our little friends would simply love to meet you.”

Well, neither Delph nor I wanted to move closer and meet anything, but the prods in the back from the ekos forced the issue.

When the gnomes came more fully into view, I flinched. It wasn’t just that their faces were deathly pale and prunish and evil-looking. It was their hands. Or, rather, where their hands should have been.

Instead, they had long claws that looked as strong as metal. They were curved and deadly sharp, although they were covered in dirt from their work on the rock.

Their lips curled back like attack canines, revealing yellowish-black teeth that were rotted and misshapen. I put a hand down in front of Harry Two because I was afraid he might go after them. And as strong and brave as he was, he would have no chance against a hundred gnomes with sabers for hands.

Thorne grunted rapidly and the gnomes fell back as the armed ekos advanced on them. So, I thought, the gnomes were obviously kept in check by force.

I glanced at Delph and could tell he was thinking the same thing.

Thorne said, “Do you know what they’re mining off that rock?”

I looked at him. “No.”

He clapped his hands together and one of the gnomes ran off but was back in a jiffy, hefting a large bucket made of wood and encircled with metal bands.

Thorne took it from him as the gnome respectfully swept off his cap and bowed. I could see that his hair was bushy and filthy. And from the smells wafting off the thing, I could tell that bathing did not occupy a sliver of the creature’s time.

Thorne held up the bucket so that I could see inside. It was filled with blackish powder.

“Still don’t know what it is?” asked the king in an amused tone.

Delph answered, “Looks like morta powder.”

Thorne seemed impressed. “Well, well, brains and brawn. But you’re not exactly right. It’s not
yet
morta powder, but it will be.” He pointed to the high rock the gnomes were working. “That stone has two of the three elements necessary to make the powder. The third is charcoal, which must come from trees on the Quag’s surface. I brought the requisite formula with me here, and the ekos, once I trained them up a bit, are delightfully efficient in doing the appropriate mixing, compression and other tasks necessary. Indeed, they are quite good at building many things.” He thrust the bucket back into the gnome’s claws and waved him off with a casual flick of his hand.

The creature instantly obeyed, but as I kept my gaze on him, I could see him look back with a sullen expression as he clacked his claws ominously against the bucket’s side.

Thorne clapped his hands, and the gnomes returned to their work. I marveled at how rapidly they tore through the rock and dirt with their claws. They were like ants flitting through grains of sand.

Thorne led the way down another passage. We arrived at a large, stout wooden door with a blackened iron keyhole. Thorne produced a key and opened it. We filed inside and as I saw what was there, I gasped.

It was a large room, and from floor to ceiling, it was filled with mortas. Tall, short and even some in-between models I had never seen before. They were all shiny and looked in perfect working order.

“You would need furnaces and Dactyls to make these,” I noted.

“We have both,” replied Thorne. “Plus a great many other skilled ekos. They have proven themselves quite adaptable to my teachings.”

Thorne walked over to a corner and patted a thick-barreled contraption that was bracketed by two wooden wheels. “We call this a cannon,” he said. He pointed to another section of wall, where many crates were stacked. “And powder and ammunition for the weapons.”

Delph was staring upward at the shelves and stacks of shiny mortas.

He said, “What d’ya need all these for?”

But somehow I already knew the answer.

“War,” I said. “You’re planning on going to war.”

Thorne smiled, even as Delph exclaimed, “Cor blimey!”

I added, “And you’re not going to war against beasts in the Quag.”

Thorne shook his head and smiled even more broadly. “What would be the point?”

I finished my horrible thought. “You’re going to war against Wormwood.”