Rise of the Reaper Read online

  ‘Yeah, Katrina was on about that. It would be cool.’

  ‘Yes, it would. So no. Whatever it is.’

  ‘Just bored,’ Danny said, picking at a small hole in his jeans.

  ‘Try something new. Like reading a book.’

  Danny’s eyes narrowed. ‘I fucking read,’ he hissed. ‘I’ve read all Dad’s books tons of times.’ He looked angry and hurt.

  ‘I meant … I just mean read something now. Away from me.’ Russell felt a knot of anxiety – he hadn’t meant to offend him. ‘Look.’ He pulled a book from the table. ‘This one Thom gave me about time magic sounds really good.’

  Danny traced a finger over the worn lilac cover. ‘Why? Not as if I’ll ever need it.’

  ‘It’s interesting.’ Russell frowned. ‘Well, there are more.’ He poked through the pile. ‘There are books about the Mage Wars, about dangerous animals …’ He gave up. Danny clearly had other ideas, and Russell sat back, knowing he was about to hear one, whether he wanted to or not.

  ‘We could take a walk. To the city.’

  Russell stared at Danny. He was actually serious. ‘The city. You mean the big city in the Lands? Lallial. Where Pete and Jen went on the way to the tower.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Why? What for? We’re not allowed!’ Russell started to trip over his own incredulity. How could Danny just casually suggest something like that?

  ‘I want to go and see that Oracle. I want to find Mum.’

  ‘Your dad is on his way to find her. Why can’t you just wait?’ Exasperation tainted his tone.

  ‘I don’t want to sit around and wait. Besides, that beacon signal is damaged as it is. What if they don’t hear back from her, then what? We’re back to square one,’ Danny said.

  ‘They’ll figure something out.’

  ‘It’s been five years and they haven’t,’ said Danny, picking a piece of battered leather off the end of Russell’s book. Russell whipped it away from him and examined the bare patch on the spine with horror.

  ‘That’s not fair, Danny. They’ve never given up looking. They haven’t been sitting around, you know.’

  ‘Well I’m not going to, either. Call it insurance. It will be a few days before they even get to the tower, Thom said, then they have to try and send a message and maybe wait for her reply – if she even can reply. So I’m going to see the Oracle.’

  ‘No you are not,’ hissed Russell, casting a swift glance around. ‘You’ve never been to the Lands before; you know hardly anything about them other than people carry swords and blades, and there’s magic and—’

  ‘No better way of finding out, is there?’ Danny grinned. For a moment, the charming smile, so like Peter’s, nearly swayed him, but Russell snapped his book shut and stood up.

  ‘You know how pissed off my dad will be if I bugger off into a strange land where I could get killed.’

  ‘Statistically, more accidents occur in the home.’

  ‘Don’t be obtuse,’ Russell snapped, finding Danny’s dismissive humour irritating. ‘You know what I mean. This is dangerous.’

  ‘We could get back before your dad finds out.’

  ‘No, we can’t. Thom will tell him,’ said Russell.

  ‘He might not. He doesn’t even like your dad.’

  ‘That’s it, I’m sitting outside.’ Russell gathered his stack of books and stalked away. Why couldn’t he just enjoy what they had, what they were doing? With everything that had happened, it was more than enough to deal with.

  He wandered across the chequered slabs of a small paved area, flanked by shrubs, miscellaneous junk, and pots of herbs, and sat down on a picnic bench next to Katrina, who was playing with a pocket mirror that Thom had given her. ‘Hey.’

  ‘Hey,’ she said, giving him a huge smile. ‘It’s a nice view, isn’t it?’

  Russell nodded, looking out beyond the slabs and over the lush clearing that chased a river around several twists before eventually dissolving among the trees.

  ‘Thom says maybe I’ll have mirror magic because that’s what Mum has,’ Katrina said.

  ‘Yes, I’ve been reading that your magic type can be influenced by what your parents have. Dad has earth magic, according to Thom. Dad uses it in his sculptures, shaping the metal and all that.’ Russell couldn’t help but let a touch of pride slip into his voice, and Katrina’s smile gave him an odd flutter inside.

  ‘His sculptures are awesome, so intricate. It makes sense.’

  Russell felt as though his chest would burst, and he grinned. ‘Thanks. What are you doing?’ He watched her brush her fingers over the surface of the small mirror, stirring up a faint light.

  ‘Trying to get this to work. It’s hard to concentrate and get the hang of it. But if I’m a Mirror Mage I should be able to drag the mirror up in that weird silvery way, like Thom did earlier.’

  Russell was about to ask more when Danny plopped down on the other side of the picnic bench.

  ‘So, did he tell you about the plan to sneak off to see this fancy big city?’ Danny said.

  Russell’s mouth fell open and, in his shock, his words stumbled over his tongue. Katrina regarded him with increasing curiosity and respect.

  ‘No way? Seriously? Why didn’t you tell me?’

  ‘It’s not my bloody plan, it’s his,’ Russell hissed, the huge grin on Danny’s face only aggravating him further. ‘And he’s only just ambushed me with it. It’s stupid and I told him no.’

  Katrina looked disappointed.

  ‘It’s not stupid,’ said Danny, folding his arms. ‘I want to go and see the Oracle, find out where Mum is in case Dad can’t. Anyway, you’re saying there’s nothing you’d want to ask someone who can see the past, present, and future?’

  Katrina looked thoughtful and Russell’s mind instantly leapt to his mother. His father refused to speak about her, always changing the subject when he tried. Perhaps it was to do with the need to keep the Lands a secret, but it bothered him.

  After she had left, his father had treated his mother’s things as if they were contaminated. He had thrown out all but a trunk, which was locked and kept in a wardrobe – Russell had been grounded for a month for trying to open it, two years previously. His dad had smashed all the mirrors in the house and placed every shard in a large bin, into which he had poured black paint.

  Something was wrong – it always had been – and now he could find out what. Find out where she had gone and why she hadn’t come back to see him. Had his father prevented her? Why didn’t she care? The loss sliced through him like it always did, and he held back the pain, not wanting the others to see it on his face.

  His father hadn’t known that he’d kept a few of her things in a little treasure box under his bed. Russell would take them out sometimes and look at them and wonder, combing over the memories he had of her and risking the empty grief for a glimpse of the past. To have answers was a compelling reason to listen to Danny.

  The crack was all Danny needed and he forced his way into it. ‘We can leave really early in the morning, while Thom is asleep. We’ll be careful. Thom said that the city is only about an hour at most from the place where the portal comes out.’

  ‘How do we get to this city? Where is it? Do we need money? What sort of money do they have, because something tells me that pound sterling won’t work.’ Russell became irritated again. Did no one think of these things?

  ‘We can ask someone …’ said Danny.

  ‘Who? Where? We don’t even know where that portal comes out, Danny. Besides, it could be dangerous.’

  ‘What could?’ Poppy dropped down onto the bench next to Danny.

  ‘Buggering off to the city of Lallial to find that Oracle, somehow,’ Russell said, expecting her to snort and agree that it was stupid. To his dismay she looked pensive. ‘Poppy? It is stupid, right? I mean, anything could happen.’

  ‘And we could get killed crossing a road back home,’ said Katrina, turning her mirror over in her hands. ‘There’s always danger
, just different kinds.’

  ‘You think this is a good idea?’ He should have known she’d side with Danny – she was as bad as he was, although more from a whimsical, adventurous angle than sheer devilment.

  ‘Aside from being grounded forever, we could get lost, trapped, imprisoned, sucked into a mirror, fried by a dragon—’

  ‘They’re nearly all dead,’ Katrina said. ‘I asked Thom.’

  Russell was momentarily thrown off.

  ‘How would we get the Oracle to speak to us, if we can even find her?’ Poppy said, playing with her charm bracelet.

  ‘Thom’s paper said that she will be staying as an honoured guest of the Sentrum – some guy who runs everything, I think,’ said Danny.

  ‘So she’s in some government or military building?’ Russell banged his book down in disgust. ‘That makes it all so much easier then.’

  ‘You know what? Fine. I’ll go by myself.’ Danny got up and stormed away across the clearing, vanishing among the trees along the river. Poppy stared after him for a moment and then followed. Russell left Katrina lost in thought and tried to refocus on his book, attempting to put Danny’s plan out of his head.

  *

  ‘That’s a lovely picture.’ Poppy made Danny jump as she sat down beside him on the riverbank. The clearing was just visible through the trees, which was just as well – they’d been warned after breakfast not to wander too far. Flowers nodded lazily in the faint breeze and warmth trickled over her neck and arms as she enjoyed the calm.

  Danny looked back at the photo in his hand and nodded, touching the faces again. It was him and his parents, laughing and happy – Danny was young, perhaps three or four, and had a toy glove with claws on the end that he was waving in glee.

  His mother was beautiful, just as Poppy remembered her. The long, silvery blonde hair, slightly crooked smile, and smattering of freckles on her nose adding to the warmth she radiated. She shared Pete’s sense of humour and kindness, and had always exuded a wicked sense of fun and passion, and Poppy felt a pang of sadness at her absence.

  ‘You all look so happy there.’

  ‘We were,’ Danny whispered. ‘I will find her.’

  ‘I believe you.’ And she did. Pete was stubborn, but his son was doubly so.

  ‘Thom said that my dad lived and breathed the city. It was one of his favourite places. He knew every nook and cranny because he went there all the time with Pete, Jen, and Thom,’ Poppy said. She paused a moment before letting her curiosity out. ‘It really is close then?’

  ‘Yeah. Thom said that the portal Dad and Jen took comes out in a hidden place, in somewhere called The Hall of the Ancients,’ Danny said. ‘Would you do it if it were your mother?’ The grey eyes flicked to her, studying her face.

  ‘Yes,’ said Poppy. ‘In a heartbeat.’

  ‘I’m going early, just letting you know. And don’t tell Thom.’

  She nodded, and Danny went back to his photo.

  Poppy fished in her bag and pulled out the small photo album Thom had given her and thumbed through it for the thousandth time. Her father looking out over a snow-peaked valley; her father, perhaps mid-teens, with Jen on his shoulders stealing fruit from the first-floor balcony of a shop in a tight, cobbled street; her father wrestling with Thom, somewhere in the Gateway; her father on horseback, sword at his side, powerful in his stunning velvety midnight-blue military jacket; her father collecting the highest award in the Lands in a packed outdoor venue.

  She would never hear the stories from him, never know him, but she could love what he loved, step where he had stepped and, in doing so, bring him closer to her. She was going.

  ‘I’ll meet you at six a.m. outside our rooms. I’ll save some food from dinner to take with us. Don’t be late, or I’ll be going without you.’ She slid her album into her pocket and marched off along the riverbank to where Thom was sitting, dangling his bare feet in the water. She could feel Danny’s eyes following her and smiled to herself.

  *

  ‘You’re actually all doing this? Do you know how stupid this is?’

  Katrina shrugged off Russell’s protestations – it was too early for his complaints – and double-checked her rucksack, into which had been stuffed crisps and sandwiches, before shrugging on a cloak that had been borrowed from one of the many wardrobes and cupboards in the Gateway’s abandoned, junk-filled rooms.

  ‘Why are you here, then?’ Danny said, stuffing a sandwich into his mouth and sweeping on a cloak.

  ‘Your alarm bloody woke me, you idiot. And what’s that for? To help you blend in?’ Russell stared at the cloaks with incredulity.

  ‘We got one for you.’ Danny held one out and Russell snatched it away. ‘They wear jeans and stuff in the Lands – they call them blues, Thom said. And we’re going to a major city. There will be people there from all walks of life and different Lands, so we won’t stick out.’

  ‘You stole it, you mean, and I don’t care.’

  Katrina fastened her own cloak and wondered how much of Russell’s reaction was anger and how much was covering up his desire to go. He had eventually confided as much in her the previous day, but she kept it to herself. Russell was a private person, like his father, and if he didn’t want to talk to anyone else about his mother, then she wasn’t going to say.

  His hair was fluffy from sleep and sticking up at odd angles, which made him look surprisingly sweet. If his green eyes weren’t so angry, he would have looked very nice, she considered, feeling a pang of sadness that he wasn’t going.

  ‘Well, we’ll bring you back some rock.’ Danny trotted down the hall and paused in front of the mirror at the far end, which would take them several floors down and on a winding route that Thom had taken them the previous evening to the cavernous grand hall.

  ‘Sorry, Russell.’ Katrina gave him an apologetic smile and ran after Danny. When she looked back, Russell was gone and Poppy had caught them up.

  ‘We need to move fast, remember. When we threw that rock in the pond with the underwater portal yesterday, Thom sensed that it had been activated,’ Poppy said.

  ‘We don’t know that for sure,’ Danny called back over his shoulder. He was shushed by Poppy, who Katrina had noticed was now enjoying the situation enough to have taken over.

  They worked their way down through the Gatehouse, navigating stairwells and the occasional hidden shortcut, and emerged onto a short landing not far up the curving staircase in the grand hall.

  ‘I think the slopes down to the hedge are that way.’ Danny pointed toward a large archway, through which weak sunlight was starting to crawl, and practically bounced down the stairs.

  ‘You could have waited, you bastards.’

  Katrina turned around at the entrance and saw Russell hopping down the last few stairs, trying to pull on his socks. His shoes were jammed under his arm and he had his rucksack on upside down. Poppy grinned at her and even Danny looked pleased, despite bouncing on his toes while Russell laced up his boots and sorted out his pack.

  ‘Right, bloody come on,’ said Danny.

  ‘I’m only coming under protest, you know.’

  Katrina caught Danny’s sidelong glance and grinned.

  ‘You’ll just get into shit,’ Russell said.

  There was silence as they emerged from the Gatehouse and headed along the track down the slopes to the distant hedge. This was really it. Katrina’s heart leapt into her throat and she shared a wild grin with Danny, whose eyes were shining.

  ‘I haven’t cleaned my teeth yet,’ grumbled Russell.

  ‘We’ll buy you a bloody toothbrush,’ said Katrina, drinking in the scene.

  ‘With what? And you don’t even know if they have toothbrushes.’

  Katrina turned to respond when there was movement beside her. Danny was gone, hurtling down the slopes to the hedge, cloak streaming behind him, and, without a thought, she took off after him.

  ‘Hey!’ Russell shouted after them, but the breeze sang in her ears and adventure snag
ged her soul. She wouldn’t have stopped for the world. Any world.

  Chapter 7

  ◊

  THOM STIRRED FROM DREAMS of dark mirrors and blood, of Blake, of blades, and a call for help – dreams that had been increasingly plaguing him. He sat up and scrubbed a hand through his hair, wishing that the butterflies in his stomach, caused by the dreams, would vanish, but the feeling was different this time. Prickly, tingly … That feeling. A portal.

  Thom let his magic wake up and spread out. That portal. The one they all used the most. Lallienns and her capital, Lallial. His hand froze in his hair. There was no one in the Gateway. No one had come through, but also, there was no one there.

  What had just happened hit him like a train. He slumped back down, hands over his face, before rolling out of the bed, half-tangled in the sheets, and struggled into his jeans. ‘Fuck, fuck, fuck. No. What do they think they’re doing?’

  As he yanked on a fresh shirt, his eyes lit on a photo of Connie, the Oracle he’d fallen in love with two years previously. It was hanging on the wall among the sea of pictures of his friends that he surrounded himself with. And suddenly he knew why they had gone.

  *

  Danny plunged into darkness and then emerged into a dim light; he careened off a statue before he could stop and crashed to the floor beside the plinth. His heart was pounding but he laughed with exhilaration as Katrina hurtled out of the portal and fell over him. Before she could scramble up, Poppy and Russell emerged and tripped over the pair of them in the confusion. Russell’s breathing was ragged.

  ‘What … hell … doing … dick,’ he panted, scrabbling in his pocket for his inhaler. Danny got to his feet and looked around as Katrina helped Russell up. They were here, he thought, heart singing.

  They were in a narrow corridor that curved away in both directions; it was lit by torches and lined with solemn stone statues. The low light glittered on armour and weapons presented in intermittent sconces, and Danny wondered briefly if he could take one of the blades.