The Lost Realm Read online

“I’m tired,” said Ossilius. “You must be too. Stop imagining things and go back to bed. Everything will seem clearer in the morning.”

  Gulph was about to protest, then thought better of it. “All right, Ossilius. Maybe that’s for the best.”

  He crossed the dormitory to his bed. But he didn’t get under the covers, just sat there, waiting. When Ossilius began to snore, Gulph picked up the bundle of clothes and food he’d gathered together earlier, and tiptoed out of the room.

  First I’ll find my friends, he thought. Then I’ll come back for you and Sidebottom John. My mother, too.

  Outside the house, he paused to check his bundle was wrapped tightly enough. On one side he’d improvised a pouch to hold his crown. As he touched its gold rim, he wondered if he was doing the right thing.

  What if they make me undead? What if Brutan gets his hands on the crown again?

  But he couldn’t leave it here. It was part of him now.

  Where the crown goes, I go.

  Gulph crept along the path toward the lake. He was confident he could steal a boat without anyone seeing. If I have to, I’ll just turn myself invisible. But what about when he’d paddled it to the crystal column that supported the ceiling? Climbing the column was one thing; reaching the crack through which he and his companions had fallen was quite another.

  I’ll be hanging upside down, like a spider. And if I lose my grip . . .

  He shivered as he remembered his plummet into the cold water, how he’d nearly drowned as he fought his way to the surface. He realized now how lucky they’d been to be picked up so quickly by the couple in the boat. If they’d stayed in the water much longer, they might have encountered something far more dangerous.

  The bakaliss!

  He reached the shore. The silver water stretched before him, a smooth mirror reflecting the scintillating purple of the crystal ceiling. It looked as beautiful as it was perilous.

  Several narrow-hulled boats were moored nearby. Gulph was halfway to the nearest one when a cloaked figure advanced out of the shadows. He backtracked, but the figure darted forward with uncanny speed and grabbed his elbow.

  With a toss of its head, the figure threw back its hood, revealing a familiar scarred face and mane of red-gold hair.

  “Mother!” he blurted.

  “Don’t call me that,” said Kalia. “And what are you doing here? The lake is dangerous.”

  “I . . . I couldn’t sleep. I thought a walk might help.”

  “You are lying.” His mother’s tone was matter-of-fact. “I am not surprised you want to leave Celestis. Your friends are in danger and you want to help them. I understand. You are brave—I saw that when you were faced with the undead ones. You will need that bravery if you are to defy the command of Lady Redina.”

  “How do you . . . ?”

  “Hush. We have things to discuss, but not here. Come with me.”

  “But I . . .”

  “Come.”

  Gulph followed her wordlessly as she led him along the shore to a small house made of yellow crystal. He felt confused and thrilled in equal measure. How did she know so much about him? Could he trust her? What did she want to talk about?

  Shining through all these dark doubts was a single, brilliant thought:

  She’s my mother!

  Kalia’s home was small and cramped. Candles burned in alcoves set into the walls. The crystal magnified their light, so that the whole interior was filled with a cascade of flaming yellow. More alcoves contained jars and bottles. In the middle of the floor, a small black cauldron hung over the embers of a fire. It was half-full of a thick, green broth.

  The home of a witch!

  Kalia busied herself with the fire, adding more kindling and blowing on the embers until fresh flames burst forth. She seemed to have forgotten Gulph was there.

  “Uh, what did you want to talk about?” he said at last.

  “Be patient,” the witch replied.

  Gulph circled the little room, restraining the urge to touch everything. Kalia bustled to and fro, snatching jars from the walls and emptying their contents into the cauldron. To Gulph’s surprise, most of the jars contained not liquid but sand of many colors.

  In the flickering light—and despite the burn scars—Kalia’s face looked very soft and very beautiful. Gulph thought about all the years they’d spent apart, and his heart ached.

  If only I’d known you then. And if only you knew me now.

  Soon the fire was ablaze. The heat was immense, and sweat broke out on Gulph’s face. The sweet-smelling stuff in the cauldron started to bubble.

  Kalia rummaged in a box and brought out a short crystal sword. The blade was gray and dull. She dipped it into the cauldron and brought it out dripping.

  “This quickens the blade.” She thrust the sword into the fire. “And this binds the potion.”

  She held the sword in the flames for a moment, then handed it to Gulph. He took it hesitantly, expecting the hilt to be hot. Instead it was icy cold.

  “Brave you may be,” said Kalia, “but bravery alone will not defeat the undead. This blade will.”

  Gulph swung the sword experimentally. He fancied he could hear the blade hiss as it moved through the air. “Is this like the sword you used the other day?”

  Kalia nodded. “Like yours, my blade is bewitched.” She handed Gulph a belt from which hung a thick leather sheath. He put it on and slipped the sword inside.

  “I can’t believe you’re not going to stop me leaving.”

  “Why would I do that?”

  “But why would you help me?”

  Kalia’s hand closed on his wrist. “Because I want you to come back. You have a good heart—I can see it.”

  Before he knew what he was doing, Gulph had wrapped his arms around her and was hugging her tight, putting all the lost years into that embrace. When he let go, he realized that his cheeks were wet with tears.

  Kalia laughed—a rich, tinkling sound.

  “If I did have a son, I would wish him to be like you.”

  You do. And he is.

  Gulph wiped his face with the sleeve of his tunic.

  “I wish I knew why you cry so.”

  “And I wish—” he began, only to have Kalia cut him off briskly.

  “No more words. There isn’t time. What you wish is to go, and go you must. Now.”

  Before Gulph knew it, she’d bustled him out into the endless Celestian twilight.

  “Go back to the shore. Take the first boat you find. Go with my blessing, boy. And make sure you return!”

  Feeling a little dazed, Gulph trotted back toward the silver lake. All the way there, he kept his hand resting lightly on the hilt of the sword Kalia had given him.

  His fingers fumbled as he untied the boat from its mooring. He clambered into its narrow hull and picked up the long pole that was lying there. Standing precariously, he held the pole over the side of the boat and let it slide down through his fingers. When he felt it hit the lake bed, he pushed backward, trying to imitate the smooth, rolling motion used by the man and woman who’d rescued them.

  The boat slipped silently out onto the flat, silver water. Gaining confidence in his technique, Gulph worked his arms slowly and steadily, counting as he went, and hoped nobody was watching.

  When he’d worked the pole one hundred times, he glanced back over his shoulder. The island had shrunk to a mere outcrop of crystal.

  Looking ahead once more, he located the pillar of blue crystal he’d identified as offering the best escape route. It was thick at the base and narrowed to a slender waist before flaring wide again where it met the ceiling. The closer he came to the pillar, the more daunting was the prospect of climbing it.

  I must be crazy, he thought.

  He put both hands back on the pole, but just as he began to push down on it, a wave rolled out of the twilight and slapped the hull. The boat rocked sideways. By now the pole was slippery with water along most of its length, and Gulph lost his grip. He clawed
desperately as it slithered through his fingers, and watched in despair as it toppled over the side and vanished underwater.

  Crouching, he grabbed the side of the boat and peered into the water. The pole was nowhere to be seen. He searched the boat for some other means of propulsion—a paddle, perhaps—but in vain.

  Gradually the rocking subsided. Gulph slumped in the back of the boat, staring at the crystal pillar. He’d made good progress across the lake, but he was still only halfway there. And now he was marooned.

  His despair turned to fear as a new thought rose up to haunt him.

  What caused the wave?

  Forgetting the pole, he leaned once more over the edge of the boat. The old story whirled around his head.

  The bakaliss killed the king . . . the bakaliss killed the king . . .

  Would he see the bakaliss coming? Where did it live? Did it have a lair, some underwater cave? Or did it spend its time swimming just below the surface, waiting to drag its next victim into the deep?

  The boat’s hull was as slimy as the pole, and Gulph’s hand slipped momentarily overboard and into the water. He jerked it back at once, but not before he’d glimpsed something.

  A face? Was it a face, looking up at me?

  He scolded himself. He’d seen nothing but his own reflection, and his overheated imagination had done the rest.

  But it didn’t look like me.

  Tentatively, he dipped his fingers in the water again. The face appeared once more: the face of a boy, gazing up at him with intense, black eyes. His hair was a wild mane of red-gold that reached down to his shoulders.

  Exactly like my mother’s hair. And the same color as mine.

  Gulph’s heart was racing. The water lapped against his fingers. He stared deep into those coal-black eyes. He knew this boy. This boy was . . .

  . . . my brother!

  With a start Gulph realized he’d seen him before.

  The battle. The giant bird. You were riding on the giant bird. It flew past when my father was coming for me.

  Our father.

  The face began to move. The eyebrows rose and fell; the mouth opened and closed. The semblance of life was startling. Gulph submerged his hand completely, reaching for his brother, wanting after all these lost years to make contact with someone who might know him, might remember him, might love him. . . .

  The image splintered like a broken mirror.

  Something bright red burst from the lake’s shattered surface: a climbing, writhing wall of scales that reared up and over Gulph’s head. It hung over him, dripping silver water, then smashed down onto the boat like a huge ruby hammer.

  The impact catapulted Gulph into the air and turned the boat to splinters. As he flew he flung out his arms, controlling his tumble, but there was no avoiding the landing. He splashed down headfirst and the silver waters swallowed him.

  He sank deep, grimacing as the water pressed into his ears. Thrashing, he pulled his way back toward the surface, but not before he’d glimpsed the red shape sliding past beneath him. Now it wasn’t a hammer but a snake. It moved with sinuous grace, massive muscles flexing easily beneath its scaly skin. A forest of sharp orange quills sprouted from its back, waving in the current like lethal seaweed.

  Gulph couldn’t see its head. He didn’t need to. He knew exactly what it was.

  The bakaliss!

  He broke the surface and began to tread water, looking frantically around in all directions.

  Two breaths later a knot of red coils erupted from the depths, just a stone’s throw away. The coils untangled, revealing long reptilian jaws lined with teeth that looked more like curved blades. Above the bakaliss’s orange snout hung two enormous, colorless eyes. They had no pupils; they were pale and dull, like the eyes of a corpse.

  The beast started gliding toward him, jaws agape. Waves grew around it. The silver water surged into its mouth, streaming out through a complex set of gills sitting just below its eyes. To Gulph those gills looked like slashes made by the claws of the world’s biggest bear. Kicking his legs frantically to keep afloat, he fumbled for Kalia’s sword. It had power over the undead. Could it help him against this monster?

  But a splinter of wood from the smashed boat had wedged itself between the sword and its scabbard, jamming it in place. As he struggled to free the blade, his head dropped below the waves. He lunged upward, spitting out water with an anguished cry.

  The bakaliss came on. Now Gulph could see every scale on its streamlined snout, every scratch on every tooth in its gaping mouth. Its eyes were vast and bland and uncaring, empty holes into which he might fall . . .

  Panic seized him. Water splashed once more into his mouth; once more he spat it out, marveling at how hot it was. Everything was hot. This wasn’t a lake—it was a cauldron.

  Mother’s magic, he thought incoherently.

  Gulph saw his hands turn translucent. For an instant they looked like crystal. Then they were invisible.

  Not her magic! Mine!

  The bakaliss was almost upon him. Was that confusion in its big, blank eyes? Impossible to tell.

  Get away, get away, get away!

  Gulph rolled onto his front, was about to thrash his way clear, changed his mind.

  The more I thrash, the more I splash, he thought, suppressing hysterical laughter that was an eye blink short of madness.

  Slowly, screaming silently inside, he paddled his way sideways, sliding out of the path of the oncoming bakaliss, careful not to raise a single ripple in the silver water. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the monster first hesitate, then halt. It swung its massive neck back and forth like a scaly pendulum.

  Gulph swam on, not breathing, panic burning him as the sun burns the desert.

  From behind him came a gargling groan, then an unspeakable sniffing that sounded more like grinding machinery than anything living. Warm wind sucked at the back of Gulph’s head.

  He immersed himself deeper into his own internal heat and kept paddling.

  The lake’s surface grew calmer. Gulph swam on, not daring to look back. Again he heard those dreadful, clattering sniffs. Another groan. A hissing noise, and a soft splash.

  Now the water was mirror flat. Still he kept going, moving his arms and legs smoothly in a slow, steady rhythm that belied the terror still gripping his thoughts.

  Don’t look back, he kept telling himself. Whatever you do, don’t look back.

  In the end, of course, he did.

  The bakaliss was gone.

  Not trusting his eyes, Gulph continued to swim. Was the beast below him, waiting for the perfect moment to rise up and tear him to pieces? Was it behind him, tracking his every move, ready to bite him in half? Or was it ahead, poised to rear out of the water with its jaws split wide and swallow him whole?

  His left hand touched something hard and cold. He bit back a scream, then saw it was a shelf of blue crystal.

  The pillar!

  He hauled himself out of the water and onto the tiny ledge at the base of the pillar, slithering like an eel and trying to make as little noise as possible. He was becoming visible again; the realization brought relief as he gradually began to accept the idea that he was safe.

  Clinging to the pillar, he looked back across the lake. The crystal island on which the Celestians lived—and where his companions still slept—was a distant pebble. The cavern ceiling was an immense twilit sky dusted with sparkling points of light.

  Of the bakaliss there was no sign at all. It had vanished, just as if it had never been there.

  His heart slowing at last, Gulph turned his back on the silver Celestian lake and began to climb.

  CHAPTER 15

  Cedric? Are you all right?”

  Elodie spurred Huntress—one of her favorite mares from the Vicerin stables—until they were trotting alongside Cedric’s mount. He was slumped in the saddle. The rain, which had been falling all day, had plastered his dark hair to his head. Elodie didn’t like his chalky complexion or the red rings under
his eyes.

  “I’m fine,” Cedric replied. His voice wavered. Momentarily he let go of his reins to cradle the stump of his arm.

  “I’ll ride with you.”

  “You don’t have to do that.”

  “I want to.”

  They rode side by side in silence for a while, heads bent beneath the rain. Elodie wished Samial was sitting behind her, but he was back at the castle, finding out what he could about Fessan.

  The convoy stretched along the muddy road as far as Elodie could see, both in front and behind. It comprised one-quarter of the Vicerin army—both foot soldiers and cavalry—supported by a seemingly endless train of supply wagons.

  The wagons were draped with thick furs. Beneath these, pouches of animal fat had been laced together to form insulating quilts. Squat chimneys jutted from their roofs, ready to carry away the smoke from the big braziers within. At the moment the braziers weren’t lit.

  When the wagons entered the Icy Wastes, they would be ablaze.

  “They look like bears with wheels,” Elodie said in an effort to raise Cedric’s spirits.

  “They look ridiculous,” Cedric replied.

  “At least they’ll keep the soldiers warm.”

  “They still look ridiculous.”

  Elodie gave up.

  The convoy crested a low hill. A village came into view. It was the fifth they’d passed since setting out from the castle. “This will be a victory parade,” Lord Vicerin had reminded Elodie as they’d passed through the gates, “so be sure to hold your head high.”

  As they entered the village, the standard-bearers raised the blue Vicerin flags. The village—Elodie didn’t know its name—looked deserted. Burned buildings sagged in the rain; a dog slunk through the empty main street; fearful faces peered from behind broken doors.

  This doesn’t feel much like victory to me.

  There was a stack of bodies beside one building. Elodie had seen such piles before, but the sight of it still took her breath away. So many dead, all of them awaiting burial. The war was spoken of with such casual ease in Castle Vicerin, yet here was the shocking reality.

  Cedric was shaking.

  “Are you all right?” Elodie asked again. “What is it?”