Roar, page 36
Finally, he thought! A two legs that was clever enough to go away before he had to roar! Even if she was a cub. But still he thought as he watched her back away in pain, she needed some attention. And she shouldn't leave the safety of their home. She was too young to be alone. So he padded over to her and carefully started nudging her back to safety. And then when she was where she should be he pushed her gently over on to her side, making sure she understood not to leave. For some reason she kept struggling and yelling at him when he did that. But she was a cub and she didn't understand. Cubs shouldn't wander too far from their pride.
Maybe another good bath after she'd had some food would help he thought.
Chapter Thirty Nine
It was the stench that woke him. A stench that he couldn't place but which he truly hated. It made it hard to sleep even ringed in nice warm fire as he was. He uncurled from his sleeping position, stood up and scented the night air, looking for the source. Then when he found it he headed toward it. Whatever was creating the stench had to go. He had a cub to protect!
He found the foul smelling creature just as it was starting to crawl out of the hole in the ground where the last one had come through. Pushing up the rock that had once been a lake of orange fire. Immediately he saw it he roared at it, warning it, demanding that it go away. Whatever the thing was he did not want it near him or the cub.
It didn't go away though and after a while he became angry. He could tolerate the two legs; mostly. They were just annoying. But this thing reeked of something that made his fur stand on end. Something that practically made him choke. Maybe the stench it was giving off was poisonous. And there was a cub to consider. It had to go. So stood up to his full height, roared and sent a stream of fire into the newly created hole in the ground that it was crawling out of.
The creature burst into flames, screeching unpleasantly as it did so. And yet it continued its attempt to crawl out of the hole, even though it was in flames. But at least, he thought, the flames were cleansing the air so he could breathe more easily.
The strange, pale slug like thing finally died just before it made it half way up the side of the hole in the ground. But even as it did so, another began crawling up and over its brethren, similarly determined to leave the hole behind.
“By the sisters those things are foul!”
The lion looked around, surprised by the noise. It saw that the two legs cub in the funny contraption had woken up, and just like him, she too was staring down into the hole.
“Demons! Lamaia I suppose. But really giant two legged slugs – that is if those things attached to its body are legs. Don't let them touch you.” She waved her arms around and cast a spell of some sort. “It'll start feeding.”
“There. That's the first ward activated. Slowness. It should give you some time.”
He didn't know what the noises the two legs was making meant. But he noticed that the next creature crawling up the hole was suddenly climbing much more slowly. It gave him more time to incinerate it before it got above ground.
But even as it slowed further, its strength being stolen by the flames engulfing it, the next one began its slow climb. He burnt it too.
And so it went on. The foul smelling creatures kept appearing at the bottom of the hole and then swiftly caught fire when he roared at them. But even as they burnt they climbed, and more followed. As a result the sides of the hole were slowly turning orange and becoming slopes of fire. Then they started melting. Dripping away into the blackness below.
In time what had once been a hole slowly became a crater, which then started to split apart with two cracks developing almost diagonally opposite each other. But he continued to roar and the fire bursting from it leapt ever higher into the air.
“That's all right,” the two legs muttered at him. “My wards will stretch with the pit as it opens. I expected this.”
Strangely he understood that. Not the noises she was making – they continued to be meaningless as those of cubs were. But he understood that she was saying that she was fighting with him, and that things were still working.
What he didn't understand was why the ground was shaking. It was thundering as though a thousand distant monsters were trampling it. That bothered him. But for the moment he continued to roar and watch the foul creatures burn.
Out of the corner of his eye he suddenly saw something whistling towards him. He didn’t know what it was, a silvery streak of death, but he sensed that it was dangerous. Like the claws of an enemy. And he turned to roar at it. Before he had a chance to react properly however, the attack had been dealt with. Whatever had been streaking toward him never reached its destination, fizzling in the air a few feet away.
He turned in surprise, realising that the cub had somehow stopped it from hitting him. That didn't seem right. And neither did the fact that he realised it hadn't come from out of the pit. Instead it had come from the other side of the burning chasm.
“It seems we have visitors,” the two legs muttered. “Not to worry. I've got this too,” the two legs muttered at him. “You keep burning the demons, I'll deal with these bastards.”
From the two legs’ actions he understood that she intended to protect his flank as he burnt the creatures. And while that seemed strange for a cub to do, he continued with its work and ignored the rest. These foul things had to burn.
“Aston!” The two legs addressed two more two legs who had appeared on the far side of the slowly growing chasm.
He recognised one of them from when it had attacked him a little while before. But he'd thought it was gone. The other looked shiny, as its skin glinted brightly in the sunlight. But it stank like the things in the hole.
“I was wondering when you would show up.”
“Seeing Your Majesty here is a surprise,” – the cub aimed her words at the shiny one – “but then I guess the end of days is significant enough to warrant the Eternal King's attendance!” Come! Join the party!”
“Hag! You should run!”
“To where?” the cub responded. “There’s nowhere to run to. As I think I just mentioned you dimwit, this really is the end. The lamaia will continue their escape from the underworld until this world is overrun. There will be nothing left. And don’t think that you will be saved because of your king's deal with them. Demons don't honour deals. You’ll both be eaten along with everyone else. Body and soul!”
He ignored the two legs as the noises they were making didn’t seem important. Instead he concentrated on burning the horrid things before they escaped the crater. That was important. If they got out something within him told him that things would be bad. They would hurt the cub. But he was starting to realise that there was a problem. There were more of the things crawling out now. And they weren't creeping out one at a time anymore but in twos and threes. So he roared again, adding more fire to the crater and burning them faster.
“Don't you worry about me, Hag,” Aston smiled cruelly. “I have a place. As soon as this world ends I'll be going there.”
“Yes. It's called death!” The cub suddenly threw some sort of lightning at the two legs that he didn't recognise.
Her lightning didn't hit the two legs however. Instead the shiny two legs suddenly stepped in front of the other and absorbed the blast. Then it made that strange cackling sound that two legs sometimes made. But it sounded off somehow. He also noticed in that moment that the shiny two legs smelled a lot more like the things crawling out of the ground. It was then that he decided that it had to burn. It was a danger to the cub.
He let loose another angry roar, and caused the shiny two legs to take to the skies just as most other two legs had done before it, and he liked that. But it eventually starting to tumble down to the ground. A gust of air though suddenly redirected the two legs and instead of hitting hard ground it was redirected back to the crater at the heart of the slowly growing chasm. The crater that had now become a burning cauldron of lava.
The shiny two legs screamed when it hit the molten rock sides of the chasm. Screeched in truth. The other two legs cried out as well, though he didn’t understand why. But he didn't care. The foul smelling two legs should burn. So should the other one. Everything should burn.
Unfortunately it didn't. For a while the shiny two legs lay in the hole surrounded by flames and then – just like the rest of the foul creatures – it too started trying to crawl its way out of it. Meanwhile the sound of thunder coming from below had grown louder.
“What was that thing in the Eternal King’s armour?!” The cub suddenly yelled at the remaining two legs. “Because it definitely wasn’t the Etermal King. It wasn't even a man!”
The other one didn't answer her. Instead he stared at the crater and the shiny two legs inside it and seemed to almost wither. Suddenly smoke started appearing in his hair. Seeing that he realised that the two creatures were one somehow. When one burnt, so too did the other.
“Praise the Sisters!” The cub suddenly yelled. “That thing’s a demon! Which means that you must be the ancient alchemist!”
The smoking two legs still didn't answer her. It was too busy screaming as its head caught fire. It dropped to the ground and rolled around wildly even as it burnt, still screaming. And yet it wasn't consumed by the flames. Instead it just kept rolling around in the ground, clutching at its head, as flames bursting from every part of it. It burnt and yet wasn’t consumed by the flames.
“Thorm! Throw this thing into the crater with his master! Now!” The cub suddenly screamed at him.
Again he understood what the cub wanted even if he didn’t understand the noises she was making and obediently he roared at the fallen two legs. Then he watched as the flaming two legs flew through the air before landing in the fire right beside where the shiny one was. He didn't know why the cub wanted the other one in the crater but as it was also starting to smell like the others, he thought that the crater was where it belonged. It too should burn.
“Oh gods! We're in trouble!” The cub yelled at him, her voice filled with fear. “It seems that that devious bastard Aston was the Eternal King and as part of his deal with the lamaia he brought one of them through. He stuffed it in some magical armour and pretended it was the Eternal King. That means that for the last thousand years a demon has been loose in our world, doing who knows what!”
Her words meant nothing to him. But it didn’t matter as suddenly the last straight sided stone still standing near the hole suddenly cracked open and a horde of fiery winged creatures burst out of it and started streaking towards them.
“Shite! Imps!”
He roared with fury as he realised they were under attack from a whole new enemy and the sky turned to fire and ash while the wind picked up. His roar tossed the fiery flying creatures around scattering them in all directions. When they eventually came down, they fell in their hundreds, and their bodies exploded as they hit the ground. But thousands more kept bursting through the broken straight sided stone while the ground shook so violently that he thought the ground might be tearing itself apart. He knew instinctively that things were bad and that the best decision would be to run. But he didn’t though. Because he knew he couldn't. Somewhere deep inside he understood that he was meant to be here. This was his fight.
So he continued his efforts, even though he knew that this was barely the start of the battle and that things were about to get a lot worse. But that didn't matter. Because he finally understood that this was his place and his purpose. He had been born to wage war. This war. And he would do just that.
Chapter Forty
The sky above Strongheart was black and filled with fire and lightning, and the ground shook. Winds were picking up everywhere, sweeping around the outside of the magical city, sometimes howling with fury.
Not surprisingly people were frightened. They'd never known anything like this. But it was worse for Camille. Somehow she was both awake and asleep at the same time. Living in the real world and the dream world at once. And it was becoming hard for her to work out what was actually happening and what was simply the work of the Night Maiden. She was frightened.
At the same time as she was huddling in a corner, talking to Mara and the wizards at Strongheart, she found herself also looking in on her mother, Thorm and the horrible slug like demons they were fighting in the ruins of the Eternal City. The divide between reality and the Great Dream was breaking down.
She had tried to explain what was happening to the others, but couldn't tell if they even heard her. She wasn’t even sure if she was speaking to them in the real world or the dream. It was just so hard to separate the two.
But then it was the end of the world. Why should anything make sense any longer?
Still she'd told the others about the battle and the Eternal King being some sort of demon, and she thought they'd heard. As long as they weren't actually part of the great dream. Or they'd even been listening. Everyone's eyes were on the sky which could be seen so clearly through the missing roof. And then as if that wasn't enough, there was one further problem. They didn't believe her.
“We're hundreds of leagues from the Eternal City! What’s happening there can't possibly have anything to do with what’s happening here!” Mara was in no mood to listen. But then she was grumpy, probably because something had fallen from the roof as it had been blown away and connected with her forehead. Given the trickle of blood running down her face she was no doubt in considerable pain. The fact that it was cold and wet also wouldn’t have helped either. But then since the roof was missing she might just be worried about what else might be about to come tumbling down on top of them.
“It is!” She yelled at her, trying to make herself heard over the storm. “I’m telling you it is! My vision through the Great Dream shows me hordes of creatures from the underworld clawing their way out of the ground even as my mother and Thorm battle to stop them. And all the while the very land is falling away beneath their feet. The storm that you see building here is already raging completely out of control there. And it's everywhere in between. Building. Spreading.” Camille tried again to convince her and the others, practically shouting herself hoarse. But even as the words came out of her mouth she wondered why anyone would believe her. Because it did sound more than a little mad! “We need to help them!”
“And how can we do that? They're hundreds of leagues away!” Master Hale pointed out the obvious as he huddled under a table. He was surprisingly good at that. “Besides, we've got our own problems,” he shouted, pointing up at the missing section of the roof. “If this wind keeps up, we’ll not only be without a roof but also without walls as well!”
It was all too true. Bits and pieces had been coming away from the walls regularly. They had already retreated from the dining hall to the kitchen to take shelter there as more and more bits of the building came apart. They weren't alone either. All around them people were sheltering under anything and everything they could find. They needed to head for Mara's cave which she guessed would be solid enough to weather the storm. But in these winds it was just too far away.
Camille was about to reply when the ground shifted under their feet once again and more objects and debris began raining down on them. Suddenly all she could do was to hang on to something solid and try to keep her head out of the way of falling objects. It wasn't so easy to do in the darkness. Especially when the shaking was becoming more and more violent.
“There must be something you can do! Spells. Weapons. Anything!” she shouted, once the shaking had eased a little and they could hear one another again. She knew that they had to do something. The world was coming apart at the seams, and her mother was standing against a horde of demons with only a lion by her side. She could not hold out forever no matter how powerful she was. She needed help.
“Aunt Matilde!” Camille twisted to her left to call to her aunt.
“I don't know girl!” Her aunt was presently hanging on to a heavy kitchen table as she tried to keep herself from being blown around what remained of the room. “I just don't know!”
“But you do, Camille!”
Camille looked up from her position under one of the benches to see that Potaine had suddenly arrived along with a number of other oracles. Though incredibly powerful, she nonetheless looked flustered, Camille thought. That wasn’t surprising though, she supposed. Because it seemed that Potaine’s ability to remain unaffected by magic wasn't protecting her from the howling gale all around them.
“Oracle?” Camille screamed at her, wondering if she'd heard her correctly. Wondering too why Potaine wasn't alone. There were more people with her, all wearing much the same sort of robes as her, and all with their eyes burnt out and crudely stitched over. Was this the real world she wondered? Or the dream? It was becoming so hard to be sure.
Another of the oracles abruptly stepped forward. “This is what you were born for. This very moment. It is what your mother feared so greatly that it forced her to hide your gift from you. It is the thing that you and only you can do. And it's what you have to do.”
