The Nethergrim Read online

  “I can’t see.” Emma spoke in a very small voice. “I can’t see anything.”

  “Please, you have to think.” Katherine raised Emma’s hands to cut her bonds. “How many bolgugs were here?”

  Emma curled onto her side and wept without sound. Her feet were bare—a jagged splinter stuck out from one arch, broken off just above the skin. It looked like it went all the way through.

  Edmund shut one hand in a fist, then the other, back and forth. Feeling returned in the form of a hot prickle, as though he had been sleeping on both his arms at once. He reached out, still trembling, and struck Miles on the shoulder. “Tell her.”

  Miles jumped. “There were—there were five of us. Me and Geoffrey, Peter, Tilly and Emma.” He rubbed at the welts on his wrists where the bolgugs had bound him. “They came in all at once, couldn’t count them.”

  Edmund curled forward to reach for the spiked club on the ground before him. It was covered in bluish gore. He nearly vomited.

  “But I saw Peter get away.” Miles raised his head. “I saw him get out through the front before they hit me. Maybe he’s gone for help.”

  Katherine shot Edmund a warning look. “Let’s hope so.” She plucked out the spear from the side of one of the bolgugs. “Tom’s gone for help, too. It won’t be long.”

  The stars stopped shaking. Edmund tried again, and this time seized the club by the handle. He felt beside it and found Emma’s shoes laid out by the fire, and then a jug that he knew had come from the inn.

  Katherine walked over to Miles and held out the spear. Miles stared in horror at the glistening blood that dripped from its point.

  “Take it,” said Katherine.

  Miles blinked and recoiled. Tears tracked through the dirt on his cheeks. He seemed much younger than twelve.

  “Look at me.” Katherine held him in her gaze. “I need you to be brave. Take it.”

  “What do you want me to do?”

  She set the spear in his hands. “Guard us. Stand over there by the entrance and listen carefully for anyone coming. If you hear something, call for me—I’ll be near.”

  Miles stood and limped to the gates. He turned around, holding the spear as though it were a snake about to twist in his hands.

  Katherine twirled the air with her finger. “Other way, Miles. Point upward.”

  “Oh.” Miles turned the spear.

  Edmund sank back against the Wishing Stone. He shivered, and shut his eyes. The cold seeped in again.

  Breath steamed warm across his face: “Edmund!”

  He startled up. Katherine knelt over him. “Are you feeling any better?”

  “Geoffrey.” Edmund tried to struggle to his feet, braced between the club and the Wishing Stone. “We have to get after them.”

  “We will.” Katherine caught him under his arm. “The light—that was you?”

  Edmund barely had the strength to nod in reply. He staggered over next to Miles at the ruined gates. “Seen anything?”

  “I’m sorry.” Miles was crying, huffing in and crying. “We were just playing, just going to play chase-the-beggar. We shouldn’t have come. I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”

  “Miles.” Edmund felt out a space of stone to rest upon. “Have you seen anything?”

  “Just a badger. How long do we have to stay here? I want to go home!”

  Edmund peered out through the tumbled gap. He let his eyes open to the darkness until he could just make out the curve of the Tamber through the valley far below. No alarm from the village, no clamor, no shouts—no help.

  Where was Tom?

  “Emma?” Katherine spoke in gentle tones behind him. “Emma—can you see now? I’m going to have a look at your feet.” Emma let out a painful hiss that sank into a sob.

  “How bad is it?” Edmund looked back. “Can she walk?”

  Katherine ripped a sleeve from her shirt and cut it into strips with Geoffrey’s knife. She raised Emma’s foot and cradled it in her hands. “We will get out of here. I promise you.” Emma turned bloodshot eyes on her.

  Katherine placed a thumb and forefinger on the jagged end of the splinter. Emma sucked in a breath. Edmund thought of looking away a moment too late.

  It did not come out easily. Edmund hunched down and plugged his ears until the screams died away.

  Katherine splashed out the jug on Emma’s foot, then wrapped it in the strips from her shirt. “That will have to do.” She slipped a shoe on the other foot. “Here—up, now. We’re going.”

  The pain seemed to rouse Emma from her stupor. “What was that light before?”

  “We’ll talk about it later. Come on, up.”

  Edmund pushed himself halfway to standing on the stones. He reached an arm. “Miles, can you help me?”

  Miles did not answer. He stared out through the breach, eyes white and wide, mouth falling slack.

  Edmund waved his hand. “Miles?”

  Something rustled in the trees outside. Miles could scream even louder than Emma.

  “Down!” Katherine moved before Edmund had time to think. She sprang across the courtyard and shoved Miles over in the grass along the foot of the wall. She peered out, then ducked again. She gripped her sword white.

  Edmund crawled up, his heart pounding. “What’s out there?”

  “You tell me.”

  At the edge of the trees no more than ten yards distant stood something deep in shadow. It was far too tall and broad to be a man. It shifted forward—the faint light crossed its black, black eyes.

  Edmund lost a breath to terror. Katherine pulled him back into cover. “Can you manage another spell?”

  “The fire’s out.” Edmund raced through everything he had ever read, and found it all a heap of useless, fear-addled mush. “What are we going to do?”

  Leaves crunched in the dark outside. Huge shoulders rolled in the gloom.

  Miles let out a shriek and dropped his spear. “It’s coming at us!”

  The thing in the trees took a step forward—the shadows fell away from the contours of its face, revealing nothing but a mass of writhing thorns. Edmund heard another voice raised to a scream. He could not place it until he recognized it as his own.

  “Up, up—out the back!” Katherine hauled Emma from the ground. “Miles, help Edmund—hurry!”

  Miles pelted away into the dark. The tendrils at the ends of the creature’s arms spread out across the mossy scatter of stones. Edmund heaved himself up and tried to run. He made it five paces before his legs gave out.

  “Edmund!” Katherine turned at the Wishing Stone. “Miles, you left Edmund—Edmund, come on!”

  As the quiggan serves the Nethergrim in fouled water, and the stonewight in his mountainous lair—a page of the book teased at Edmund’s memory—so the thornbeast is his chief agent in vale and forest. He remembered the rest. He looked behind him.

  The thornbeast shoved what passed for a head into the breach. It was a writhen mass of vine and branch in the vague shape of a man, more than ten feet tall at its hunched shoulders. Its eyes were no more than two voids in the tangle, so absolutely dark that it was impossible to discern the substance from which they were made.

  “Hurry. Hurry!” Katherine came back, dragging Emma over one shoulder. “Edmund, take my hand.”

  “Wait.” Edmund struggled to his feet. “Don’t run.”

  “Have you gone mad?” Katherine seized his arm. “We’ve got to—”

  Edmund raised a hand. “I said wait!” Katherine kept a grip on him, but held still for the space of a terrified breath. The long, thorny filaments slithered toward them—but then they drew taut, scrabbling uselessly over the stones. It came no closer.

  “I’ve read about this.” Edmund looked at Katherine. “Thornbeasts can’t walk over stone.”

  The creeping masses that made up the thornbeast’s feet tried to touch down amongst the ruins of the entrance—then pulled up, again and again, unable to root themselves. It pulled back into the dark.

  Katherine set Emm
a down against the Wishing Stone. “Miles, don’t climb out! Stay inside.” She thumped Edmund’s shoulder. “I’d like to be there the next time your father says books aren’t good for anything.”

  Edmund could only think that she had touched him more times in a single night than in all his life before. “If I remember it right, the book says that a thornbeast can move through the trees as fast as a horse can gallop on a road. I think it was trying to scare us into leaving so it could run us down.”

  Katherine nearly laughed. “Then we hold the gates and wait for help. Nothing else we can do.”

  Edmund glanced up at the stars.

  “I know.” Katherine breathed. “He should be back by now.”

  Miles sidled up beside them. “I didn’t mean to run. I was scared. Is it gone?”

  “It’s just outside. Take your spear.” Katherine picked up the club and Geoffrey’s knife. She weighed them in her hands, then gave the knife to Edmund. “I’m going up onto the wall to watch it. When help comes, I’ll need to give a warning.”

  “There are still bolgugs out there.” Edmund sagged down into the grass. “If they come back, they’ll have no trouble with the gates.”

  “They will if we give them some.” She crossed the courtyard and scaled the wall, rolling onto her belly once she reached the top.

  Edmund crept up to the gates and took another look outside. The thornbeast kept in shadow at the edge of the clearing, just shy of the mossy scatter of stones that choked the entrance.

  “It’s still there.” He turned and sat against a clump of stones. The rush of frightened action left him weary again, dizzy and terribly cold. He put his hands up his sleeves and tried to keep from shivering. He looked down at the straggled grass at his feet. The gray tunnel returned.

  “How long have we been out here?”

  Edmund blinked. He pinched his arm to rouse himself. “Not as long as it feels.” He looked around him. Emma clung to Miles, huddled close by the foot of the wall.

  “Stay awake, Edmund.” Katherine crouched in shadow, half in view through a snaggled gap in the battlements above. She made a slow circuit along the top of the wall, from one edge of the ruined gates around to the other.

  Edmund dragged himself to standing, and found some of his strength returned. He paced around the courtyard, swinging out his arms to get the feeling back. He tried not to look at the corpses of the bolgugs. The fire had crumbled to pure white ash—it no longer even smoked. A wedge of geese flew in overhead, but veered suddenly wide of the hilltop.

  “That’s the bell.” Miles’s voice broke high. “Hear it? That’s the village bell!”

  Edmund could have jumped into the air if his weary legs would have let him. The bell atop the village hall clanged out from the valley below—once, twice and thrice.

  “There, you see?” He came back to the ruined gates. “It won’t be long. Everyone’s coming—I bet even Lord Aelfric’s heard by now. All we have to do is wait a little longer, and—”

  “On your guard, down there.” Katherine hissed across his words. “Look outside.”

  Edmund crouched at the gates and peeked out. Tendrils writhed across the open ground before the gates, ripping and churning at the soil. Miles let out a whimper.

  “What’s happening?” Emma shivered on the ground.

  “It’s coming back,” said Miles. “It’s coming closer.”

  “Steady, both of you,” said Edmund. “It can’t get us in here.”

  The thornbeast took a step forward. Thorns twisted and writhed up and down the length of its foreleg. The shadows fell away, and the contours of its face grew into horrid suggestions.

  “Don’t look. It’s just trying to make us afraid.” Edmund glanced up at Katherine. “What’s it doing?”

  She looked as frightened as he felt. “I don’t know.”

  A twig snapped in the grass some distance away—and then another, a distinct crunch of leaves.

  Emma choked. “That came from behind us!”

  “It’s the monsters!” Miles wailed. “They’re back! We’re dead, we’re all dead!”

  Edmund turned. Footsteps sounded, a dozen strong, picking their way through the brush on either side of the castle.

  “That’s too many. Katherine, there’s too many!” Edmund shot a wild look around him. There was nowhere to run. The village bell clanged out again from far below. Help might come, but it would come too late.

  Katherine scrabbled down through the rubble, coming dangerously close to the reaching tips of the thorns. “We’ve got to hold them in the breach. It’s our only chance. Miles—if they charge, come out into the entrance and brace the spear with both hands. Pick the first bolgug and let it run onto the point. Can you do that?”

  “Y-yes.”

  “I’ll be right beside you. You only need to hit it once. I’ll do the rest. Edmund—help out however you can. If they break and run, don’t follow.”

  Edmund raised his knife. The blade shuddered back and forth from the shaking of his hands. The footsteps grew louder, passing along the side walls and making their way around toward the entrance.

  The thornbeast drew closer, coming full in view. It fixed its empty eyes on Edmund. He found it hard to breathe. He felt Emma lean on him—he thought she was trying to hug him, but then she slid past and fell over.

  “Please.” Emma curled tight on the ground. “Please, I want it to be quick.”

  Miles sat down beside her. “My mama said I was too small when I was born.” He sounded calmer than he had all night. “They weren’t even sure if I would live. I always knew it, inside—I wasn’t supposed to get to grow up.”

  “Miles, stand up. We have to fight.” Katherine somehow advanced, step after step toward the gates. Edmund took up the spear and followed. If there was one thing he was going to do before he died, it was stand beside her.

  The rustling stopped. The thornbeast seemed to hesitate. It looked to one side.

  A light burst the dark, a torch tumbling end over end across the entrance. It nearly went out on the descent, but it landed true. The thornbeast turned to regard something Edmund could not see. Its back began to smolder, giving off curls of smoke.

  “Torches forward!” A familiar voice sounded from outside. “Stay together—all together, everyone. If you waver, it will kill us all. Forward!”

  The surge of hope nearly knocked Edmund flat.

  “Papa.” Katherine let her sword fall to her side. “Papa, we’re in the keep!”

  More cries came: “Miles?” “Matilda—Tilly!” “Miles!” “Emma—Emma, where are you?”

  “Father!” Miles leapt to his feet. “I’m here, Father!”

  John Marshal stepped into view through the entrance. He raised a torch and advanced on the thornbeast. “Look over here. That’s right, over here. I am dangerous. I will burn you.”

  The thornbeast heaved up its shoulders and pressed the flames deep within its body. It released, leaving a few scorched branches and a spent torch that tumbled to the ground. It reared up.

  “Papa!” Katherine rushed to the breach. Edmund found himself coming with her, though he had no idea what injury a spear might do to a ten-foot heap of thorns.

  “Follow John!” He heard his own father’s voice raised to a bark from the other side of the keep. “Curse you all, forward!”

  Two files of torches appeared at either side of the ruined entrance. The thornbeast looked even worse in better light. It advanced on John Marshal, but found a dozen torches in its path. It turned the other way—Harman’s party wavered, but held. It drew back, sinking down the slope into shadow.

  “Ha!” A lone figure broke from the crowd and stepped to the edge of the slope. “That’ll teach you!”

  “Hurry, everyone! There is still danger!” John Marshal pointed inside with his sword. “Gilbert Wainwright, Harman Bale, go in and get the children—pick them up if they cannot walk. Move, I say! Nicky Bird, you twit—get away from those trees! It is not beaten!”

&
nbsp; Harman and Gilbert rushed into the courtyard. The rest of the men milled about in the entrance. Some carried spears of widely varying lengths and states of repair, others held longbows with arrows at the string and a few had nothing but their torches held aloft against the night.

  John stepped into the gap. “Grip your spears, turn and face the trees! Keep those torches up—they are the only things keeping us alive!” The men jumped and spun about, pointing their weapons out into the gloom.

  Harman shot a look around at the dead fire, the scattered weapons and the bodies of the bolgugs. He gripped Edmund by the shoulders. “Where’s your brother?”

  Edmund felt his legs begin to buckle. “They took him, Father.”

  “It’s all right, son. I’ve got you.” Harman grabbed him around the middle and heaved him up. He stumbled back over the rubble, nearly tripping on the rough, uneven stones. Martin Upfield reached out to help them down. The ground in front of the keep had been raked bare to dirt.

  “John, I see it.” Jordan Dyer kept an arrow at full draw. “A dozen yards down, off north. It’s moving away.”

  “Just what’s going on here?” Edmund’s father got his footing on the ground. “Where did those blue things come from?”

  “Make a circle,” said John. “Keep those torches high—spread them out, make sure there are some in every quarter. Fire is the only thing it fears. There is no time to question. Do it now.”

  The farmers and tradesmen of the village did their best to obey. They pushed Katherine and Edmund in with the children and surrounded them in rough ranks. Edmund found Tom there, shivering pale beneath the moon.

  “Tom!” Katherine hugged him, then held him out to look him up and down. “Oh, I was afraid you’d died—here, help me with Edmund.”

  Tom put an arm under Edmund to bear him up. Edmund turned to accuse him, to hiss “Where were you?” in his ear, but the words died when he got a good look at the cuts running up under the sleeves of his ratty shirt and the scratch that ran from his eye to his jaw.

  John Marshal stepped out before the men. “Point your weapons outward and watch your quarter. Keep your eyes to your direction, and if you see something, the first thing you do is shout a warning. Do you all understand?”