The Keeper

Quadraginta duo: Eris

If anything, the gloom intensified on the ground when we landed. I had to light my wand and it still provided only the barest illumination. I didn’t like this. An army of jabbits could be sneaking up on us right now and we’d never know it until we felt their fangs against our flesh. I grabbed Petra and pushed her to the ground as something flew over us so close that I felt the wake from whatever it was lift strands of my hair.

“Keep quiet and stay down,” I whispered to her.

I carefully lifted my head and looked around, listening intently for anything that might tell me what was out there. The next thing I heard was totally unexpected.

Laughter.

And then a voice from out of the gloom.

“Does my heart good to see the likes of them wallowing in the dirt, right where they belong no less.”

I settled on my haunches, my wand ready as I looked around. That was a male’s voice. There was someone in here with us who was not a beast. For one wild, panicked moment, I thought Thorne had escaped Luc and the other ekos and caught up to us somehow. But it wasn’t his voice.

“Who are you?” I called out.

“Trouble and strife which cuts like a knife. One who enters my ground will be hunted right down.” Laughter followed this silly song, along with a whooshing sound like the thing was whizzing overhead.

Trouble and strife, I thought. Okay, Astrea had told me about this bloke.

“Are you Eris?”

The whooshing sound stopped.

“How come you to know my name?” the voice snarled.

I thought I might give him a bit of his own medicine.

I sang, “I always know the name of one I’ve come to tame.”

Silence.

O-kay. Maybe I had gone a bit too far.

A figure started to solidify in front of me. He was like a fat baby, only with whiskers, dressed in a gray cloak with his bare feet protruding from it.

“Tame Eris?” he said, a low, malicious undertone to his words now.

I held up my wand. “Astrea Prine sends her best.”

His beady eyes on my wand and with sudden understanding in his features, he said, “Well, good luck on finding your way in the gloom. And that wand of yours will lead to your doom.”

Okay, I could figure this out, I was sure. Astrea had told me much about this bloke and the Third Circle. This place was filled with darkness, though luckily not accompanying depression as with the Second Circle. But there was something that could cut right through that darkness. What was it again? Ah, yes!

I said, “Rejoinda, cucos,” and moved my wand back toward me, as though I were pulling something in slowly and steadily.

A moment passed and then an inkling of light came out of the gloom. Then the light grew bigger, brighter and bolder. When a sliver had passed, the light had cut right through the dark.

“Blast!” screamed Eris.

The light was now like the sun coming up and burning off the moist air. The gloom was lifting everywhere. In another few moments, we were surrounded by cucos, small birdlike creatures that fluttered around, their wings glowing with light. They were brilliantly colored, as though they had small bits of rainbows embedded in them. I held out a finger and one of them perched on it. I felt my spirits rise along with the light.

Petra held out her arm and a half dozen cucos alighted there. She smiled as the illumination swept over her. “I don’t think I’ve ever felt this good.”

I had to smile, for I felt the exact same way. It was as though the full power and goodness of the sun had come to defeat the darkness.

Holding up a cucos, I looked at Eris. “Trouble and strife will not trouble my life.” I couldn’t help but grin as Eris waved a fat fist at me and then vanished.

We went back and collected the others. I ferried them up to the top of the outcrop and then down the other side. When they saw the clouds of cucos, both Lackland and Delph became giddy little males, running after the small bursts of light and letting the creatures collect on their shoulders and even their heads.

Delph said, “Never thought I’d have any fun in this place.”

With the cucos providing light, we made good progress and then stopped to make camp. As we sat around, eating our meal, I more fully recounted for the others what had happened with Eris. Petra enthusiastically joined in and gave me so many compliments that it got to be quite embarrassing.

Delph and Lackland laughed heartily when I mimed Eris’s angry exit.

Then I heard them coming.

I screamed, “Jabbits!”

The ground was actually shaking; the hisses pierced our ears. And then there were the shrieks, which could rob anyone of the last vestiges of both sanity and courage.

“What the Hel is a jabbit?” yelled Lackland. He drew his sword and stood his ground. I couldn’t say I liked the bloke all that much, but I would never question his courage.

Petra grabbed her crossbow and Delph his ax. Harry Two, as usual, was by my side. The ground was shaking so badly now that I figured there were a hundred or so of the things charging us. I squinted ahead, and though the land was flat and open, I could see nothing.

I called out, “Crystilado magnifica.”

I really wished I hadn’t.

On the positive side, it wasn’t a hundred jabbits. It was only one.

On the negative side, this particular jabbit was larger than a colossal.

The jabbit had reared up right in front of us. A hundred feet high it was, with so many serpent heads along its vast trunk that it would have been impossible to count, certainly in the time we had left to live. It was like a venomous tree with a thousand deadly branches, all of which could move with terrifying speed.

I glanced at Lackland and saw that all the color had drained from his face. He raised his sword, but I could tell by his expression that he knew it was like waving a flower in front of an army of alectos.

I saw the ax whiz past me and strike the jabbit. I looked at Delph. He had heaved the thing with all his strength. It had barely cut the serpent’s thick trunk.

Then, it struck.

“Embattlemento!” I cried out.

The jabbit had lunged at Delph, who had fallen backward. The serpent crashed into my spell shield, but it was so huge that it pushed the shield back and into Lackland, who was nearest to it. There was an almighty explosion and Lackland lay senseless on the ground. The jabbit reared up, saw me and struck again.

“Pass-pusay,” I said, tapping my wand against my leg.

The creature slammed into the spot where I had just been, burrowing a hole five feet deep.

Petra came running up and fired an arrow into one of the serpent’s eyes. The only problem was, it had hundreds of others.

Harry Two sank his teeth into the tail of the monster. Luckily, Delph was up again and raced forward and pulled my canine away before one of the heads struck out to bite Harry Two. Its slashing tail hit Delph hard and he went flying through the air with Harry Two gripped in his arms. They both landed with a thud a good hundred feet away.

I pointed my wand. “Impacto!”

The jabbit was so large that my spell did nothing but crush two of the heads on its lower trunk. When it came out of the hole and turned to me, I could tell that its fury held no boundaries. It struck. But I was gone again. It slammed into the ground once more. It rose again, only a bit dazed this time.

This strategy recalled to me what I had done against my opponents in the Duelum back in Wormwood. I would use the creature’s fury and strength against it.

Three more times it struck, and each time, I was gone a moment before impact. The thing rose up the last time, swaying and woozy. We faced off. Hundreds of eyes looked at me. I stared back at it, suddenly not nearly as afraid as I had been. I might just win this fight.

Then the wretched beast did something that totally surprised me.

It went after Lackland, now just struggling to his feet.

“No!” I cried out.

Lackland screamed and threw his sword at the thing, but it merely bounced off.

I called out, “Rejoinda, Lackland.”

Lackland flew toward me just as the jabbit attacked.

Lackland shouted as he sailed right into me, or he would have if I hadn’t ducked. I stood straight again and decided that enough was enough. I marshaled every ounce of mind, body and spirit that I could, pointed my wand and said quite firmly, “Rigamorte.”

The black light hit the enormous serpent smack in the chest as it turned to face me. For a long moment, it just swayed there, back and forth like the pendulum in a case clock. For one terrifying moment, I thought that my killing spell had not worked. And if this most powerful incantation had failed, then I knew I could not defeat the thing.

The next moment, I shouted out, “Pass-pusay,” and tapped my leg with my wand once more.

The spot where I had just been standing was crushed by the falling dead jabbit. The force with which it hit the ground knocked me off my feet and my wand sailed away.

I rolled over and found myself next to Lackland.

“Sorry, I had to do that,” I said as I sat up.

That’s when I noticed that his eyes were closed and his breathing was shallow. And one side of his face was red and swollen. And then I saw the gash in his skin, where a drop of yellow liquid sat next to it.

The jabbit’s venom. When Lackland had flown past the thing. It must have... bitten him.

I squatted down next to him. “Lackland? Lack, can you hear me?”

I touched his hand. It was growing cold.

I was in a daze; this couldn’t be. Then my senses cleared. The Adder Stone! I reached in my pocket for it. There was nothing there. Delph! I had given it to him.

“Delph!” I screamed. I looked over and saw a dazed Delph stagger up, but then he fell over again. “Delph, I need the Stone. Now!” I said, “Rejoinda, Stone,” but then I realized I didn’t have my wand.

I saw Delph push himself to his feet and put his hands in his pockets. Then he dropped to his knees and started to paw through the ground with his hands. He had evidently lost the Stone.

Petra raced over and knelt next to me. She gripped Lackland’s hand. “Lack? Lack, hang on. Hang on!” She looked at me and said frantically, “Can’t you help him?”

I didn’t understand. The bite of a jabbit instantly killed. But then I looked at his wound. It was not two bite marks representing twin fangs. It was a slash. He must have hurtled by the serpent, and one of the vile thing’s fangs must have scratched Lackland’s face somehow. As I watched horrified, the yellow liquid riding on his face was absorbed into his skin.

“NO!” I screamed, but I was too late.

Lackland started writhing and convulsing. And then, even more terrifying, he grew still, his breathing slowed, dangerously so. His eyelids started to flutter.

“Lack!” cried out Petra. “No!”

Fighting back tears, I looked wildly around for something, anything, to save him. Only I had nothing. Nothing. Where was my wand? The Stone? The fingers of my right hand started tingling. As if by its own volition, my hand reached into my cloak pocket.

I pulled it out.

The silver horn of the unicorn.

Without thinking, I pressed it against Lackland’s wounded face.

The solid horn liquefied and was absorbed, like the venom, right into Lackland’s skin. Then, with a gasp and shudder, he sat straight up so fast, our heads nearly collided. I jumped back. He looked at me; his eyes seemed to wobble in their sockets.

He said woozily, “What happened, Vega? Did we kill the thing, eh?”

Petra screamed and hugged him so hard, he fell back over.

I could think of nothing else but to throw myself on top and hug both of them.

When we all sat up, I saw that Lackland’s face was still scarred and swollen. Delph came racing over with Harry Two.

“Found it,” he said, holding up the Stone. He handed it to me along with my wand that he had obviously also found. I waved the Stone over Lackland’s face. While the skin healed some, it was still bad-looking.

I used my wand on him and the healing spell improved his face even more, though it was still scarred some.

I said, “Don’t worry, Lackland, we’ll get you back to your handsome self.”

He laughed. “Badge of honor, way I see it. Besides, a male can be too pretty, eh, Pet?”

She smiled and held up her damaged hand. “How about a female, Lack? Eh?”

“Go on with you, but it’s right better than being dead, I can tell you that.”

“Har,” said Delph as a finishing point. We all grinned.

I stood. “I think the Fourth Circle beckons,” I said, full of confidence now.

I should not have sounded so gleeful.

The Fourth Circle was where I was going to die.