Simon Green - Property of a Lady Faire

The pack split suddenly in two as it drew nearer, the wolves swinging out and around us, closing in from all sides, until they were running in a great circle around us. Molly and I moved to stand back to back. The wolves kept moving, speeding across the snow, endlessly circling. Watching us with unblinking crimson eyes, searching for some sign of weakness.

“They look . . . hungry,” I said.

“Much as I hate to admit it,” said Molly, “I am seriously low on magic, and running on fumes. I have a few useful items about my person, but that’s pretty much it. And there are an awful lot of them . . .”

“Maybe if I kill a few, the others will get the message and leave us alone,” I said.

“Worth a try,” said Molly.

“Okay,” I said. “Leave this to me . . .”

“Hell with that!” Molly said immediately. “I can handle a few wolves!”

“Wouldn’t doubt it for a minute,” I said. “But it’s not just a few wolves. And you need to hang on to your remaining magics. Never know when you might need them.”

I was thinking of Ultima Thule, and I knew she was too. When she spoke again, her voice was worryingly quiet.

“It’s nice you’re still assuming we’ll both get that far, Eddie. But those are really big, really vicious-looking wolves, and you’re the only one with armour. I’m not feeling as . . . dangerous as I usually do. I’m just . . . tired.”

I’d never heard her say that before. Never heard her sound like that before. A chill ran down my spine.

“It’s just the cold getting to you,” I said. “Stay put, while I go teach these wolves a few manners.”

I charged forward through the packed snow, sending it flying in all directions. Every single wolf stopped dead in its tracks to look at me, but I was bearing down on the nearest wolf before it had time to do more than bare its nasty teeth at me. I grabbed it by the tail, jerked it up off the ground, and swung it round and round my head. It howled miserably as I put some muscle into it, until it was just a grey blur on the air. And then I let go of the tail, and the wolf flew off into the distance. It travelled quite a way before it finally crashed back to earth, burying itself in the snow. All the other wolves turned their heads to watch it fly and land and not move again, and then they all turned their shaggy grey heads back to look at me. They held themselves perfectly still, as though communing on some deep level, and then they all moved purposefully forward, heading straight for me.

“Now, you see?” I said, my voice hard and flat on the quiet. “Any rational creature would have taken the hint. It’s no wonder you guys are nearly extinct.”

Half a dozen wolves surged forward, crossing the intervening snow with incredible speed. I stood my ground, waiting. They all hit me at once, each going for a different target. Their jaws snapped closed on arms and wrists, legs and groin, and one went straight for my throat. Their teeth clattered harmlessly against my armour, and they all fell back, yelping in a hurt and confused sort of way. I smashed their skulls, one at a time in swift succession, with brutal efficiency. I wasn’t in the mood to mess around. Molly needed me.

More wolves hit me, from behind this time, scrambling all over me as they tried to force a way through my armour with their teeth and claws. I grabbed them, one at a time, snapped their necks, and threw the limp bodies away from me. Dead wolves lay broken in the snow all around. And still the rest of the pack held their ground, watching me with cold, implacable crimson eyes.

Two wolves shot in from the side, ignoring me and going straight for Molly. She threw something at them. There was a sudden explosion, and both wolves were blown apart. Bits of bloody meat and smouldering fur rained down across the snow, staining it in ugly scarlet Rorschach blots. Molly grinned at me.

“Incendiaries are our friends. Never leave home without them.”

The wolf pack fell back on two sides, presenting us with an opening in the circle, a way out. I went back to Molly and offered her my hand, pulling her up out of the trench I’d made. I led the way slowly forward, heading for the opening, looking quickly back and forth, ready for any movement by the wolves. Molly trudged along through the snow, sticking close to me. The wolves let us pass, but we’d hardly made a dozen paces beyond the circle before they came stalking after us. Moving slowly, silently, maintaining a respectful distance but still following.

“They’re not giving up,” I said quietly to Molly. “Why aren’t they giving up?”

“Why do you keep asking me questions you know I don’t know the answers to?” said Molly.

“Just to annoy you,” I said.

“Then it’s working. They must be really hungry . . . Wait a minute-can you feel something?”

“Like what?”

“Hold up a moment.”

We both stopped and looked around us. I couldn’t see a damned thing anywhere in the whole snowy landscape, apart from the wolves behind us and the Gateway up ahead. But the wolves all had their heads up, looking nervously about them, ignoring Molly and me. They looked disturbed, and frightened, making darting little runs this way and that, as though not sure where to go for the best.

“Come on, you have to feel that!” said Molly. “Vibrations, deep in the ground, under the snow.”

“Yes . . . ,” I said. “Like an underground train . . . But there’s no subway system all the way out here. Is there?”

“There you go with the questions again,” said Molly. “The vibrations are getting stronger! Whatever’s down below, it must be pretty damned big. And heading straight for us.”

“You know,” I said, “for a deserted Siberian tundra, there’s a hell of a lot going on here.”

The ground exploded before us, snow and earth and rocks blasting up into the air and falling back again. The wolves scattered and ran, as something huge and nasty burst up out of the broken earth to tower over us. Twenty feet tall and still rising, covered in dark brown scales, a living column four to five feet in diameter, a terrible creature from the depths of the earth, still rising up and up into the air before us. The great blunt head unfolded suddenly, blossoming like some fleshy flower, revealing flapping pink petals of dark-veined flesh, surrounding great circular jaws packed with teeth, swirling round and round like a meat grinder.

The creature made an insanely loud sound, like some awful factory siren in Hell. The thing had no eyes, or any other sensory organs, but it was obvious it could sense its prey. The great flowering head slammed down, the body bending in an arch, and the grinding teeth fell upon a running wolf, picking it off with flawless accuracy. The creature snapped up the wolf and swallowed it whole as it straightened up again, leaving just a few spatters of blood on the snow where the wolf had been, its paw-prints just suddenly stopping.

“What the hell is that thing?” said Molly.

“Siberian Death Wurm!” I said. “I thought they were extinct!”

“Has anyone told it that?” said Molly.

The ground shook heavily, and Molly and I had to grab each other to keep our feet. The earth exploded again and again, snow and dirt flying into the air, as more and more of the awful creatures erupted from below. Until we were surrounded by ten of the huge, openmouthed Wurms, their heads swaying high in the air above us. The wolves were running in all directions now, running hard for their lives, but the Wurms just slammed their heads down and picked the wolves off neatly, one by one. Swallowing them whole, to be ripped apart by the swirling, grinding teeth, until there were no wolves left at all. The Wurms swayed around us like a living forest of tall scaly columns, sending their deafening screams out to each other. They sounded horribly triumphant.