Emily Rodda - Sister Of The South

Have strength. Make haste. The beast is upon me …

The topaz burned beneath his hand. He felt a great surge of power, and with a thunderous crash the last of the wall burst inward.

The two-faced beast howled and screeched as great stones smashed its shapeless body down. And then, before Lief could gather his wits, there was a blur of gold and the flash of mighty talons, and he was raked, tumbling and gasping, out of the cavern and into the open air.

He lay choking, shuddering, half-buried in the dusty soil that the dragon’s talons had clawed out with him. He was lying face down, pressed against one of the dragon’s forelegs. Its scales felt slippery wet, and he could smell fresh blood. The song of the Sister filled his ears and his brain. It was louder—louder than ever.

And yet—yet surely he was further away from the Sister now. He was out of the cavern beneath the chapel. It was still within. Why …?

He forced his eyes open and his stomach turned over. The Sister was no longer underground. It was lying just outside the ruined palace wall, its red veins blazing through a fine coating of dust.

Intentionally or by accident, the dragon had pulled it out of the cavern with him. It was very near. Its evil was battering him into the earth.

And not only him. For now Lief became aware of sobbing and crying, groans of terror and despair. The sounds seemed to be coming from above. Making an enormous effort, he rolled on his side and looked up.

He and the dragon were at the bottom of the great pit the dragon had dug to expose the underground wall of the cavern. Above them, crowded around the edges of the pit were hundreds of people in red masks.

Many were palace guards, but many were not. People had come running from the city, full of courage, determined to defend the palace against the dragon. But now they were on their knees, moaning and sobbing, their hands pressed to their ears. The evil power of the Sister had beaten them down.

Only three people were still standing, huddled together on the side of the hole that was nearest to the back of the palace. They were right at the edge, but, squinting into the sun, Lief could not make out who one of them was. It was someone tall, in any case, standing a little behind the others. Doom, he guessed uncertainly.

But there was no mistaking the two at the front.

The two at the front were Barda and Jasmine. Jasmine was holding Barda’s arm. Her hair was whipping in the wind. She was swaying where she stood, and her face glimmered pale as moonlight. But she was alive. Alive!

Alive, only to die of the plague, a cold voice in his mind reminded him. Like Barda. Like you.

He shook the thought away. Whatever was to come, he was fiercely glad that his companions were with him now. He was glad that the enemy who had tried to destroy them was lying crushed and dead beneath the stones of the fallen wall.

If I survive this, I will know at last who our hidden enemy was, he thought. The guardian’s true form will be revealed in death. I will know …

Now, king of Deltora, while I still have the strength.

The dragon’s voice was faint, but still Lief heard it. He knew what was going to happen next. The dragon was going to use the last of its strength to destroy the Sister. It was going to rid its land of the menace that had invaded it, burn the evil thing to ashes.

He pressed his left hand to the dragon’s leg, and his right to the topaz. He stared with loathing at the Sister of the South, lying exposed in the dust.

For centuries it had poured misery into mourners in the chapel above its hiding place, and infected with despair the prisoners in the dungeons beside it. For centuries its poison had seeped through the earth into Del, into the Forests of Silence, into the Os-Mine hills, the farms, the shore, the sea, weakening what was good, strengthening what was bad.

Now its time was over.

He felt the dragon gathering its strength. He held his breath, bracing himself for the first blazing rush of heat.

Then he blinked. His mouth fell open and he moaned in disbelieving horror.

The gap in the palace wall behind the Sister was filling with oily blackness. He could actually see more of the liquid evil oozing from between the fallen stones inside the cavity, and joining the black mass in the gap. The two-faced beast had not been destroyed! It was forming again as he watched.

The black mass bulged outward, spilled onto the earth. The beast rose, vast and glistening in the sunlight, stingers budding in their hundreds from its shapeless body. Horribly, its two faces began to form—the dog face snapping and foaming, the red eyes of the bird face burning with hatred.

But even as the faces were still writhing into being, the beast was charging, stingers whipping the air.

Lief rolled desperately aside as, with a roar, the dragon half-spread its wings and rose on its hind legs to meet its foe. Flame gushed from the dragon’s jaws and the rippling flesh of the two-faced beast sizzled, quivered and shrank beneath the searing blast.

The beast howled, but this time it did not retreat. It lunged forward again, stingers slashing at the soft, pale underside of the dragon’s neck till the scales were crisscrossed with streaming lines of blood.

The dragon bared its shining, needle-sharp fangs, preparing to strike.

No! Do not bite! Lief thought frantically, struggling to reach his sword. That is what it wants you to do. It will fill your throat, stop your breath. Do not—

The dragon faltered, its spiked tail lashing uselessly against the earth walls of the pit. Then it drew back and again it roared, breathing a jet of fire. Again there was a hideous sizzling sound. The dog face howled ferociously as dozens of stingers withered and fell to dust and the flesh beneath them stiffened and burned.

Then without warning, the beast sprang. It surged forward like a great black wave, wrapping itself around the dragon’s neck. The dragon tried to free itself, clawing at its clinging attacker, cutting through stingers by the dozen. But the deep channels its talons carved in the oily, rippling flesh closed instantly, and for every stinger that fell, another grew, to join the others coiled around the dragon’s neck, cutting and tightening.

The dragon bellowed in agony. Its forelegs crashed to the ground. Still struggling, it rolled heavily onto its side.

‘No!’ Lief shrieked. At last he managed to grasp his sword, pull it free. Sweat pouring from his brow he staggered to his feet, and threw himself at the beast, slashing at it wildly.

The beast’s neck swivelled. The mad eyes of the dog face blazed at Lief. Foam sprayed from its snarling, snapping jaws. And at the same moment, the bird face gave a blood-curdling screech of triumph, and its cruel, hooked beak began to tear at the dragon’s throat.

14 - The Battle of the Pit

There was a bellowing roar from above, and the pit was suddenly flooded with blazing yellow light. The head of the beast jerked upward, the beak of the bird face dripping with blood.

Lief heard Jasmine’s scream of warning, heard something huge crashing down into the pit behind him. Before he could think, before he could move, a giant, clawed hand had sent him flying.

He landed heavily halfway up the sloping wall of the pit. Dazed, he looked down.

A golden giant with a wild mane of dark brown hair was attacking the beast, slashing its stingers with claws as sharp as knives, tearing its quivering flesh apart.

‘Nevets!’ Lief gasped.

Through a haze he saw Steven stumbling down the hill of earth, following the deep track carved by his savage brother.

Perhaps Nevets was not affected by the Sister of the South, but Steven clearly was. Yet, sword in his hand, he staggered on, his eyes fixed on his brother.