Defender of the realm, p.14
Defender of the Realm, page 14
Alfie sighed. He didn’t know whether he could stomach another argument at this time of night. But Hayley was studying the ops table map and the little model letter Xs, which marked all the places Alfie had searched and come up empty-handed.
“What have you got against Scotland, then?” she asked.
Sure enough, although there were crosses all over England and Wales, there wasn’t a single one north of the border.
“You should perhaps leave the history to me,” LC scoffed. “Alfred the Great never even went to Scotland.” But as he said it, his smile faded.
“LC?” Alfie said. “What is it?”
The Lord Chamberlain was rubbing his temples, like he was massaging the idea out of his head.
“As far as the chronicles tell, King Alfred the Great never traveled there. But his favorite grandson, Athelstan, invaded Scotland when he was king, and no one knows why. There were no battles recorded.”
“What kind of invasion doesn’t have any fighting?” Alfie asked.
LC nodded, warming to the idea. “Quite. What if Alfred entrusted a piece of the crown to him to hide later in the far north?”
“That’s pretty much what I was thinking too,” said Hayley. “If you need any more pointers, I’ll be in my office.”
She tossed a model X to the grumpy-looking Brian, who scrambled to catch it, then sauntered over to the sofa and lay down with her hands behind her head.
The Defender was flying blind. The storm front had been chasing them all the way from London, and now the rain was so heavy that he couldn’t see more than a few feet ahead. Forked lightning flared above them. Alfie knew that planes could survive being struck—he hoped it was the same with his armor. At least Wyvern seemed to know where they were going. She pointed her sleek head into the wind and powered north.
At last the clouds thinned and dawn broke over the deep pink-and-green patchwork of moorland below. The Scottish Borders. He remembered flying over them as a child, in a helicopter on the way to another summer holiday at Balmoral. It was the one place the whole family seemed to love spending time together, even his father. Weeks spent walking through sweet-smelling pine trees, making campfires in the grounds, relaxing away from the glare of the TV cameras and crowds. Richard liked to go hunting with his father, but Alfie was never that into it. He’d once told his dad it was “against his principles,” but in truth it had more to do with the fact that he was a terrible shot and scared of guns. King Henry had been heartbroken on the day they’d had to sell the entire estate to a hotel chain. Alfie recalled hearing him shouting at the prime minister on the phone about it. “The Balmoral Luxury Spa? It’s humiliating!”
“Do you read us, Iron Eagle?” Hayley laughed in his ear, shaking him from his thoughts. She’d enjoyed coming up with different code names for him—none of which LC thought were appropriate. But that didn’t stop her. Alfie liked how she made jokes no matter how serious the situation—it was her way of dealing with it, he guessed.
“I read you, Beefeater.” LC was sure to hate that too, and he could hear the smile in Hayley’s voice.
“Nice view you’ve got from up there.”
As promised, Hayley had attached a tiny camera on a headband for Alfie to wear under his armor. Brian was sure it wouldn’t work, but somehow it did and Hayley couldn’t contain her glee. “You guys should pay me to be here.” The camera meant Alfie didn’t feel so alone, now that everyone back at the Keep could see what he was seeing.
“Stand by, incoming intel.” Brian’s voice crashed the conversation. “Seismic activity, central Edinburgh, six minutes ago.”
“Seismic?” Alfie wasn’t sure if he’d heard him right. “You mean like an earthquake?”
Was it a coincidence? Or had the Black Lizard gotten there first? Wyvern adjusted her course, folded her legs up tight, and dived toward the capital.
Edinburgh looked smaller than he’d expected, nestled between the blue waters of the Firth of Forth on one side and the hulking shadows of mighty hills on the other. A cacophony of car alarms and sirens rose to greet Alfie as he approached the city center. Wyvern buzzed across neat blocks of slate-gray buildings, toward the main artery, the aptly named Princes Street. It was early, but people were pouring out of their homes, confused and scared. The groan of another tremor rattled windows and dislodged tiles from the rooftops.
“It’s coming from the castle, sir. Look sharp.” LC sounded worried, and Alfie didn’t blame him.
Edinburgh Castle sat on a giant crag overlooking the city. The Royal Mile, with its pubs and tourist shops, rose gently to meet it on one side. On the other there was nothing but the sheer rock face, leading hundreds of feet down to a park below. Alfie twitched Wyvern’s reins and she responded, descending for a low approach on the south side—that way they could rise silently up the cliff until they reached the castle walls. No one would see them coming.
As they shot up the cliff face, another tremor shook the city. Alfie thought he saw a fresh crack appear along the rock, but they were going too fast for him to be sure. Wyvern spun left as a block of stone tumbled from the battlements, missing them by inches. Rising over the wall, they found a scene of devastation. The castle’s museum building was ablaze. Fresh scorch marks crisscrossed the upper yard, as if someone had gone mad with a flamethrower. Bags and cameras lay where they had been dropped. At the Portcullis entrance gate, soldiers from the Royal Regiment of Scotland, in their tartan kilts and feathered caps, were busy evacuating the last of the tourists. The distant wails of police sirens echoed around the city.
“Alfie, be careful—the Black Lizard could be there already.” It was Hayley’s voice in his earpiece.
Wyvern spun back into Alfie’s spurs as he touched down and scanned the deserted square. The wooden doors to a very small, plain stone chapel had been smashed off their hinges.
“Yeah, you could be right about that,” said Alfie.
St. Margaret’s Chapel was the oldest building in the castle: a white-walled, simple space with room for only six pews and a small altar under an archway. Alfie couldn’t imagine why the Black Lizard would want to come in here when there were dozens of impressive banquet halls and towers to choose from on all sides. But the creature had been here all right. The altar was shoved onto its side, scattering candles and flowers, and a gaping hole had been smashed in the stone floor.
Alfie unsheathed his sword. The golden glow from the blade lit the way as he edged toward the hole, senses on high alert. As he got closer, Alfie was surprised to feel heat washing over him. He whispered as loud as he dared into his mic, “Something’s on fire down there.”
“Your armor should protect you.” It was Brian. “But I wouldn’t stand around in it too long—don’t want you getting baked.”
“Yeah, thanks. Let’s see what we’re dealing with, shall we?”
Alfie unhooked the Scout Orb from his belt and dropped it into the hole. He closed his eyes, and suddenly he could see what the Orb could see. The hole had been ripped into the roof of a tunnel, which sloped away beneath him. The only light came from the far end—a flickering, warm glow. As the Orb reached the end of the tunnel, Alfie turned his head from side to side. The Orb followed its master’s movements, swiveling to give him a better view of his surroundings.
“I think I may have just found some kind of portal to the underworld,” Alfie whispered.
The tunnel opened out into an immense cavern, lit by an intense fire burning below at a fathomless depth. He heard something—a strange scratching. Alfie willed the Orb to look up and move closer, which it did, showing him another tunnel entrance on the other side of the great chasm. Through the heat haze he could see movement … the shadow of a person bent over something, digging. As he watched, the shadow twitched and convulsed, then, with a series of hideous cracks and groans, it transformed from a human into the unmistakable form of the hulking Black Lizard.
Flames shot outward, blinding Alfie. In the chapel above, he opened his eyes and gasped—it was almost as if he’d been standing in the fire himself. A moment later the Orb whistled out of the hole in the floor and returned to his hand. It was almost too hot to hold, even through his armored glove. Alfie wiped the film of soot off its surface and hooked the Orb back onto his belt.
“What did you see, sir?” asked LC.
“He’s here. The lizard. But it was a man—the Black Lizard is a man.”
“Has he found another piece of the crown?”
“Guess not, or he’d be gone by now.” Alfie gripped the hilt of his sword. He could feel the power flowing through him and into the weapon. It didn’t get rid of his nerves entirely, but it helped. “Let’s see if I can get there first this time.”
Alfie dropped into the tunnel. He had walked into a sauna once and turned around and walked right out again. He didn’t get how anyone could find that sort of temperature fun. He’d barely been able to breathe, let alone relax. But that was nothing compared with the heat down here. Sweat cascaded down his face, so much that he had to keep shaking his head just to clear it from his eyes. And the searing heat only got worse the nearer he got to the pit at the end of the tunnel. Being careful not to slip, he craned his neck to look down at the bubbling, boiling furnace far below.
“What is that?” he whispered.
He heard LC clear his throat, a surefire warning sign of bad news. “The rock that the castle stands on forms the plug of a prehistoric volcano. The Black Lizard’s digging must have, um, opened it up.”
“And you’re only telling me this NOW?” hissed Alfie.
In the Keep, Hayley covered the microphone. “You have to get him out of there!”
LC shook his head. “Not yet. We cannot allow the lizard to retrieve any more of the crown.”
Alfie froze, trying not to make a sound. On the other side of the chasm, he could see the Black Lizard’s back, its cruel claws illuminated by the flames below. They were holding something up to the light. Alfie could see metal gleaming as the creature brushed away the dirt to reveal something golden.
A piece of Alfred the Great’s ancient crown.
It had found it! Alfie was too late. The Black Lizard brought the newly found piece together with another fragment—this one larger, the half LC had feared the creature already possessed. In a flash of light, the two pieces fused as if magnetized, reforging themselves into one. Only a quarter of the crown remained missing. In its place, strange, twisted black bones bridged the gap.
“I can smell you, knight.” The Black Lizard’s voice was low and rasping.
Alfie steadied himself and held his ground, gripping his sword tighter. “What do you want?” He tried unsuccessfully to keep the tremble out of his voice.
“What is mine.”
Flames shot up from the pit between them, sending a new wave of intense heat over Alfie. “It’s not yours. I … I command you to put it down.”
“Fool.” The lizard’s chuckle was loose and throaty. “No man commands me!”
The Black Lizard snapped its head around. It opened its mouth and launched a fireball toward Alfie. There was no room to dodge the blast—Alfie took the blow full in his chest, and it sent him hurtling end over end, back into the tunnel.
It breathed fire! It breathed fire! Alfie thought as he tumbled over.
Voices barked across each other in his earpiece, but they were distant, dipping in and out. It was all Alfie could do to look up and focus on the large, dark shape that was crawling along the tunnel toward him.
Back at the Keep, everyone else could see it too.
“GET UP! ALFIE!” Hayley’s voice came through loud and clear, screaming in his ear.
Alfie bent his knees, ignoring the burning pain from the hot scorch marks on his chest plate. He pointed his sword up and jumped. He crashed through the stone of the tunnel roof and back into the chapel, landing with a crunch on top of the upturned altar. He brought his sword around just as the floor exploded beneath him. Chunks of marble spewed in all directions as the Black Lizard burst upward, smashing a hole in the roof with its head, before landing again, pulverizing a wooden pew under its feet. Alfie could see it clearly now, but wished he couldn’t. The fearsome lizard looked somehow even bigger up here. A slimy forked tongue flicked from between razor-sharp teeth, and vicious claws scraped against the stone floor as the beast stalked toward him. Energy fizzed off it, as strong as the heat that still pumped out from under their feet.
“I killed you once. What makes you think I won’t do it again?” spat the Black Lizard.
Remembering something Brian had said in one of their late-night training sessions about attack being the best form of defense, Alfie launched himself from the altar, bringing the glowing sword down in an arc toward the lizard’s neck.
Bad move. The creature casually whipped its tail around and swatted him with such power that Alfie was knocked sideways through the chapel wall, rolling to a halt in the rubble of the upper yard.
Seconds later the Black Lizard sprang out through the chapel roof and thudded down in the courtyard. The monster raised its powerful neck to the sky and belched more flame, amusing itself like a kid with a brand-new toy.
On his back, Alfie tried to crawl away. “Er, guys, I think our lizard might actually be a dragon. Repeat: THE LIZARD IS TURNING INTO A DRAGON!”
But no one replied. His camera and mic must have been offline. He was on his own. The Black Lizard—no, Black Dragon—leapt over and planted one great talon-tipped foot onto Alfie’s chest, pinning him to the ground. Its dark, snakelike eyes gazed down at him, the deadly spiked tail weaving from side to side, ready to strike. Was this the last thing my father saw? Alfie wondered. No doubt he’d put up more of a fight. “Why are you doing this?”
The Black Dragon hesitated, as if thrown by the question. For a moment Alfie thought that he could feel the immense weight of the monster’s foot lift from his chest—perhaps he was going to let him go after all.
“Destiny … ,” sneered the Black Dragon. The hideous barbed tail stiffened, ready to pierce Alfie’s chest plate and find his heart.
The earth lurched, throwing the Black Dragon off balance. The ground was rising and falling in waves beneath them. A strange sound rose up from the depths, like a thousand plugholes sucking down water all at once. Without warning, the Black Dragon turned and bounded away, clearing the far side of the castle walls in a single leap.
Alfie just had time to wonder what could have made it flee so suddenly when a huge crater opened up, swallowing the small chapel. Alfie scrambled backward as what was left of the castle tumbled into a giant sinkhole, the outer edges of the abyss expanding fast to within inches of his feet. It seemed to Alfie more like he was perched on the edge of some desolate mountain peak than a castle. No, not a mountain, more like … the lip of a volcano.
The air turned crimson as a column of lava erupted from the sinkhole, shooting a hundred feet into the sky like a demented firework. Alfie recoiled from the blistering heat and threw himself off the battlements. Flames jetted from cracks in the cliff face, scorching his armor as he tumbled past, out of control. Spurs, spurs, spurs!! Wyvern sprang from his feet, emitting a high-pitched whinny of terror. She flew into action, dodging the fiery rocks that streaked past them like blazing meteorites.
Even through his helmet, Alfie could smell the sulfur fumes. A memory of a science lesson long ago and the sickly smell of rotten eggs popped into his head. He spotted a gap in the billowing black-and-red clouds that threatened to engulf them at any moment—a pinprick of clear sky. He pulled hard on Wyvern’s reins until she spotted it too, and they streaked toward the closing gap. Bursting from the immense fireball, Alfie looked down at the city, and a thought flashed through his mind: This must be what hell looks like.
The volcano spewed lava and ash and huge black burning rocks in all directions. On one side, the cliff face of Edinburgh Castle had become a waterfall of fire, cascading into the park below. On the other, the lava flow was traveling the only way it could—down the hill of the Royal Mile. Buildings burst into flames one by one on either side of the narrow strip as the wall of lava rolled on, consuming cars, lampposts, and anything else in its path. People ran for their lives down the hill, screaming. But most terrifying of all was what Alfie could see from his position, hovering high above the street—the lava was getting faster.
The platoon of soldiers Alfie had seen at the castle gates was now running from house to house in front of the burning tide, pulling out any stragglers, shouting at them to move, almost hurling them down the street. Most didn’t need to be told twice.
Alfie landed next to a soldier who was pounding on the door of a house. He wasn’t very old, eighteen at most, with a face of ginger freckles smeared with sweat and soot. If he was surprised to see the Defender appearing in the middle of this chaos, he didn’t show it—he had bigger things to worry about.
“I can’t get any answer!” cried the soldier.
Alfie smashed his hand through the front window and tossed in the Scout Orb. He watched as it whizzed through every room in the house and then shot back out into his waiting hand. “It’s empty!” he said.
The soldier nodded and moved on.
Alfie sent the Orb through three more houses in quick succession—in the third he found an old man huddled behind a chair.
“Bottom right!” Alfie yelled, pointing at the house. Two soldiers broke in, carried the old man outside, and helped him down the hill.
More and more people were joining the exodus, running down the street, away from the tide of lava. But a bottleneck was forming at the bottom of the hill and panic was taking hold. Alfie looked back up the street. With nowhere else to go, the lava flow was still gaining speed, eating up everything in its path. He could summon Wyvern and start carrying people away two at a time, but that would take too long. He had to slow down the lava. Unsheathing his sword, Alfie began swinging at lampposts, felling them like trees. Sparks flew as they crashed onto the cobbles one by one. Blowing the sweat from his eyes, Alfie heaved the lampposts on top of each other across the road, forming a rudimentary dam. It worked.
