Sir Thursday(83)

‘They’re New Nithlings,’ said Arthur. ‘Almost Denizens …’

‘You don’t sound real happy, Arthur. I mean, Lord Arthur.’

‘Just call me Arthur,’ said the boy. He looked at the sword in his hand and it slowly changed back into a baton, which he thrust through his belt. Then he stood up and looked through the embrasure.

The New Nithlings were retreating in good order. Though Dame Primus had not yet attacked, she had stalked out of the sally port, with her varied troops fanning out behind her.

It was not the presence of her followers that made the Nithlings retreat. It was Dame Primus herself. Eight feet tall, and clad in a greatcoat that was surprisingly similar in colour and cut to the Piper’s, she was wreathed in a sorcerous nimbus of whirling blue and green sparks that lashed out every few seconds up to eighty feet away, striking down Nithlings. And that was just with her standing still. When she raised her Second Key-gauntleted fists and crashed them together, a whole group of at least a hundred Nithlings was suddenly lifted into the air and smashed against the rear wall of the nearest second-line bastion.

For the first time, Arthur saw what it really meant to wield the Keys. He cried out as Dame Primus took the trident of the Third Key from her belt and waved it negligently, all the fluid in the bodies of several hundred Nithlings leaving them in a ghastly spray that splashed onto a burning walkway nearby, almost extinguishing the flames.

‘Let them retreat!’ shouted Arthur. ‘Let them go!’

No one could hear him. Even Sunscorch, only a few yards away, was busy shouting at the mortar crews, telling them to fire farther out.

Arthur took the baton of the Fourth Key from his belt and held it up.

‘Magnify my voice,’ he said. ‘And cast light upon the field.’

The baton did the latter first. It merely glowed itself, but in answer the newly risen moon shone suddenly brighter, its green light becoming bright enough in a few seconds to cast shadows.

‘Let the New Nithlings retreat to their trench lines!’ said Arthur, at normal volume. But as his words left his mouth, they became much, much louder, louder even than the booming mortars and cannons. ‘Cease fire and let them go!’

His voice was so loud, an echo came back from the new mountain range that had moved in at sunset.

‘Go … go … go … go …’ The bright moon faded, and there was sudden quiet.

‘They are going,’ said Marshal Dusk, relief in his voice. ‘I wonder if they will be back.’

‘It all depends on the Piper,’ said Arthur, his voice heavy and slow with extreme exhaustion. ‘But with Dame Primus here as well as me, and all four Keys, and our extra troops … I think he will either make peace or retreat to where he came from and prepare for another go.’

‘But with the tiles moving …’

‘He has an Ephemeris,’ said Arthur. ‘I saw the corner of it sticking out of his greatcoat pocket. And we’re in no shape to pursue them, are we?’

Suiting action to words, Arthur slumped down with his back against the battlements. Many followed his example, but Marshal Dusk remained standing, and Sunscorch busied himself directing the mortar crews to swab out and clean their massive wooden barrels.

‘Just a moment of peace,’ muttered Arthur. ‘Before Dame Primus gets here. Just one moment of peace, that’s all I want…’

His voice trailed off and his head slumped forward, as sleep claimed him.

On his finger, the crocodile ring glinted in the moonlight.

It was now exactly one-half pure gold.





Thirty





LEAF WOKE IN a panic, choking. Before she could work out where she was and what she was choking on, a stream of clear fluid gushed out of her nose and into a bucket that was being held in front of her, and her head was held over it.

‘Keep still,’ said a calm female voice. ‘This will last about five minutes.’

‘Eerggh, ick, eurch,’ spat Leaf as the stuff just kept coming, flowing fast enough that some of it washed back down her throat. That was what made her cough.

‘You’ve just come out of sedation,’ the voice continued. ‘This clear fluid is a mixture of an agent we’ve used to flush a foreign … well, fungoid, out of you and the denatured fungoid itself. Once it’s out, you’ll be fine.’

‘Oh ish sho horrigle,’ gasped Leaf. She felt weak and flaky and very disoriented and her sinus cavities really hurt. She was in a bed, that was clear, but the roof was green and very low and kind of saggy, and there were clear plastic walls everywhere.

She turned her head and saw it was a nurse holding her head and the bucket. A nurse in a biohazard suit, her face indistinct behind a double visor.