Return to Deltora

The chapel was cold and empty as Lief crawled from the secret tunnel and slid the marble tile that had concealed it back into place. Shivering, he pushed open the chapel door and climbed the dark steps beyond, with Kree perched firmly on his arm.

Lief had no plan. No plan at all. But somehow it seemed right that he was here. Where this story began, so it will end, he thought. One way or another.

He peered from the darkness of the steps into the huge space beyond. The ground floor of the palace seemed deserted. But echoing down the vast stairway which wound up to the top floors was a distant, murmuring sound. The sound of a huge crowd.

Lief knew where the sound was coming from. It was floating through the huge open windows of the great hall on the first floor. The people of Del were thronging the hill beyond the palace garden. They were looking up at the Place of Punishment. This was a wooden platform supported on great poles, stretching all the way from the windows of the great hall to the wall that ringed the palace garden. The flag of the Shadowlands, a red hand on a grey background, hung from a flagpole directly above it.

The Place had been built when the Shadow Lord came. The sight of it, even from a distance, had chilled Lief from babyhood. For even tiny children were forced to witness the executions that took place there, and forbidden to turn their heads away. The Shadow Lord wanted all in Del to know the price of rebellion.

And so they did. Once or twice a year they saw terrible sights at the Place of Punishment, and in between those times it remained a constant reminder. The ground below it was heaped with bones. The wall was spiked with skulls. And the edge of the platform itself was hung with a thick fringe of dangling, rotting bodies, each branded with the Shadow Lord’s mark.

“People of Del! Behold these traitors!” Lief gripped his sword as the thin, penetrating voice echoed faintly down the stairway. Fallow himself was standing on the Place, addressing the crowd. Usually, one of the Grey Guards conducted the executions. But this, of course, was a special occasion.

Running the secret way, Lief had reached the palace very quickly. Toiling the long way, up the hill, the Guards who had raided the forge could not yet have arrived. But Fallow had six other examples to show the crowd while he waited for news of the capture of those he wanted the most.

Rapidly, Lief looked around him. He knew that there was no chance of reaching the Place from inside the palace. Guards and palace servants always clustered in the windows that edged the platform.

But from what his father had told him, he knew that the kitchens were near. And they would be empty, for all the servants would be upstairs. He could run through the kitchens, outside, and around to where the Place towered. He could climb one of the poles that supported the stage from below.

But — the Place was always well lit. The Guards who stood at the platform’s edge would see him the moment his head appeared. They would all have blisters ready in their slings, too, and plentiful supplies in boxes behind them. It was their task to hurl blisters into the crowd at any sign of disobedience.

“If only I could fly like you, Kree,” he muttered, glancing at the bird perched rigidly on his arm. “Then I could surprise them from above.”

Kree blinked, and cocked his head. Then Lief saw what he must do.

In moments he was in the open air. The dark red clouds hung heavily overhead, casting an eerie glow over the earth. He could hear Fallow’s voice clearly.

“… joined in a plot to overthrow our great leader. A plot doomed to failure, as all such evil is doomed.”

Lief shut the sound from his mind.

Hurry!

The palace loomed above him. Dark, but with plenty of windows, ornaments, and other footholds.

He began to climb. Up, up, past the first floor windows, then up again to the narrow ledge that ran under the windows on the second floor.

The servants who cleaned the windows sat on the ledge often, no doubt. But Lief was standing, and his stomach knotted as he carefully turned until his back was to the wall. Then he began to move, edging along to the corner of the building, around to the side …

And below, far to his left, the Place of Punishment stood in a blaze of light.

He edged close. Closer …

The Place was thick with Guards. Torches flamed, lighting the darkness. Large red cones stood on each end of the platform. Lief had never seen their like before, and could not imagine their purpose. To one side was a huge metal pot of burning coals. Lief gritted his teeth. He knew its purpose only too well.

Fallow was in the center of the stage, holding two chains that were fastened to the necks of a pair of prisoners sprawled at his feet. Six more chained figures stood in a ragged line behind him. Glock. Zeean. Manus. Nanion. Gla-Thon. Fardeep. All were wounded. Zeean was swaying. Glock could barely stand. Fallow stabbed at them with a bony finger.

“See them, people of Del?” he shrieked. “See these strangers? See their ugly bodies? Their twisted, evil faces? Monsters! Invaders of Del! Double branding, and death!”

A sickening wave of dizziness seized Lief. He pressed his back against the wall, panting. His throat had tightened so that he could hardly breath.

Six Guards strode forward and plunged iron branding rods into the pot of coals. They laughed and spat on the heating metal. Their turn for amusement had arrived.

The Guards facing the crowd raised their slings threateningly.

“Double branding and death!” chanted the people.

Lief gazed desperately over the sea of upturned, shouting faces. He saw no grins of glee or scowls of anger. The faces were absolutely blank — the faces of people beyond hope, beyond despair.

Suddenly, Fallow glanced behind him, at the windows of the great hall. Guards were moving there, stumbling out of the way of another Guard hurrying through. The newcomer signalled to Fallow, nodding excitedly, pointing behind him. Fallow’s face changed. A triumphant smile spread over his face and he glanced upward. Lief caught his breath and flattened himself even further against the wall.

But Fallow did not see him. He was looking much higher — to the tower. Seven huge birds perched on the tower roof, their cruel, curved beaks outlined against the scarlet sky. Inside, where once the Belt of Deltora had lain in its glass case, red smoke swirled. And a shadowy figure stood motionless. Watching. Waiting …

Lief sidled further along the ledge. Now he was exactly where he wanted to be — on a small stone platform directly above the Place of Punishment, and beside the metal pole that bore the flag of the Shadowlands. Forcing his shaking hands to do his bidding, he pulled his coil of rope from his belt and tied one end of it to the flagpole. He tugged it gently, and knew it would hold.

Fallow swung back to face the crowd. He gestured, and the Guards pulled the six condemned prisoners roughly back, to stand against the palace wall.

“Their punishment can wait!” Fallow cried, his voice cracking with glee. “I can now announce, that, by my orders, our three greatest enemies have been captured! I knew it would be so!”

His face dark with spite and anger, he bent to heave up the crumpled figures at his feet.

And Lief’s breath caught in his throat as he saw that the helpless couple were his mother and father. Ragged, gaunt, they sagged in Fallow’s cruel hands.

He shook them by their iron collars, as a dog shakes a rat, then set them back on their feet. They stood, swaying. “These two wretches will see their son before they die!” he snarled. “Behold them! The father and mother of treachery! Now they will pay for the evil they have caused, the lies they have told!”

There was a terrible roaring in Lief’s ears. He saw the crowd staring at the prisoners. He saw many of the blank faces crease with pain as they recognized the kind, quiet man and the sweet, lively woman from the blacksmith’s forge. Some, perhaps, did not even know their names. But they knew their natures. And so they grieved, hopelessly, for what was to come.

And Lief — Lief slowly unclasped the Belt of Deltora and put it down at his feet. It would have helped him in the fight ahead, but he knew that this was a fight that in the end he could not win. If he was to die, he would not die wearing the Belt. He would not allow it to be part of his defeat and pain. Or let his parents see it trodden into the dust.

He stared down at the precious, mysterious thing that had brought them all to this. It was complete. And it was powerful. Powerful enough to kill Dain. Powerful enough to feel the presence of the heir. And yet … somehow it was not perfect. Somehow, they had not discovered its final secret. He was tormented by the feeling that the answer was before his eyes, if only he could see it.

The gems lay gleaming in their steel medallions. The topaz. The ruby. The opal. The lapis lazuli. The emerald. The amethyst. The diamond.

Lief remembered the winning of every one — what he had felt as each stone was added to the chain in turn.

Added … in turn …

His scalp began to prickle. Well-remembered words from The Belt of Deltora swam into his mind:

† Each gem has its own magic, but together the seven make a spell that is far more powerful than the sum of its parts. Only the Belt of Deltora, complete as it was first fashioned by Adin and worn by Adin’s true heir, has the power to defeat the Enemy.

… complete as it was first fashioned by Adin …

… together the seven make a spell … a spell … SPELL!

Lief pulled out his dagger, crouched over the Belt. His fingertips tingled as quickly, quickly, he used the dagger’s tip to lever the gems from their places, one by one. It seemed to him that they came easily, helping him. Helping him again as he replaced them — but this time in a different order. The right order.

Diamond. Emerald. Lapis lazuli. Topaz. Opal. Ruby. Amethyst.

DELTORA.

With a great sigh, Lief stood up, the Belt of Deltora gleaming in his hands. His breathing had slowed. His hands were steady. He knew, beyond doubt, that at last the Belt was as it should be. Now it was as it had been when first fashioned by Adin, who had used the first letters of the seven tribes’ talismans to form the name of their united land. Now it was ready to be claimed by Adin’s true heir.

And Jasmine was coming. At any moment she would be dragged onto the platform. Now Lief knew why he had been led to this place. Now he had a plan.