Ash Mistry and the Savage Fortress (20 page)

hope you didn’t have any relatives in Rajasthan,” said Jimmy, peering out of the window.

They’d flown over the city of Jaisalmer and continued west, deep into the Thar Desert. Dozens of villages blazed below them, forming a pattern of golden dots across the black landscape. Dense columns of smoke rose in a swirling mass above them. Distant lightning flashed among the massive clouds that gathered in from the horizon.

“The gods are angry,” said Ash.

“No,” Parvati replied, removing her glasses to stare out of the small porthole window. “They are afraid.”

They’re not the only ones.

Ash could barely speak, his mouth was so dry. The feeling had built as the hours had passed. He was in over his head. Out there were demons, monsters and chaos. How could they hope to fight them all? How had it come to this? Just a few weeks ago his biggest worry was low battery power on his Nintendo DS. Parvati looked cool and collected. Ash, on the other hand, wanted to be violently sick.

“Is now a bad time to mention I’m risk intolerant?” said Ash.

Parvati twisted round. “What?”

“Risk intolerant. It’s a real condition,” said Ash. “My doctor said I should avoid all situations involving mortal danger and acts of heroism. They’re really bad for my health.”

“Yes, now is a bad time to mention it.” She shifted back into her seat. “So don’t.”

Further to the west, on the horizon, the sky glowed orange. Parvati tapped Jimmy’s shoulder and pointed. “That’s where we’re going.”

Ash knew that there were no cities this far west, so the intense light could only mean one thing: Savage’s excavations. And Ravana.

He thought back to his dream. Rama’s plan had worked, almost. It had taken over four thousand years for someone to find Ravana’s tomb. Countless historians and archaeolo
gists, like Uncle Vik, had spent their entire lives trying to find out how and why an entire civilisation, the most advanced of its age, had disappeared so completely.

And now Ash knew. The Harappans had imprisoned Ravana and wanted to leave no trace of him, or themselves. They had
chosen
extinction.

They’d given up their entire way of existence. Huge cities left to ruin, all their culture, their language, abandoned. All their greatest allowed to fade away.

He searched the burning horizon. Lucky was somewhere out there. Did she know he was coming? Or had she given up all hope?

Ash couldn’t bear the idea of losing her. He’d been brought up knowing it was his job to look after her. At times he’d seen it as a burden and a chore, but now he knew it was his honour. Lucky was a great sister, they were as close as any siblings could be. If anything happened to Lucky, he didn’t know what he’d do.

And if he couldn’t be brave for himself, he had to be brave for her.

It didn’t take long to cover the last fifty miles, but the night caught up quickly. The fires were denser now and Ash realised that some of them were torches: a procession. Like
a nest of snakes, long lines of fires wove their way across the dark desert towards the ancient city of Ravana.

Below them Ash watched large, winged creatures glide across the smoking fires. They were too large to be normal birds, even vultures. He saw wild packs of jackal-human hybrids hunting through the villages, feasting and tearing at those who’d been too slow or weak to flee. Monstrous serpents, their fangs catching the firelight and their scales glimmering with ever-changing colours, slithered across the sands leaving half-devoured corpses in their wake.

And this was just the beginning.

Parvati pointed to an area below, dark and empty. “Land there,” she said, comparing Rishi’s map to the landscape below. “We’ll walk the last few miles.”

Ash, up in the cockpit now, gazed out at the flame-lit black buildings and strange, ruined towers that stood half-buried in the sands.

“You sure you want to do this?” asked Jimmy. “Looks like a very bad idea to me.”

“No one’s asking you to come,” said Parvati.

“Good, I wasn’t planning to,” said Jimmy with a resigned sigh, then drew the control column down. “May the gods be with you.”

The gods? Ash looked down at the endless stream of monsters marching towards their master. They looked ready to burn the world.

If the gods had any sense, they’d be a long way from here.

The plane bounced on the rocky earth and the engine screamed as it went into reverse. The fuselage vibrated like a washing machine. It felt like the plane was going to shake itself apart. After all this, it would be such a stupid way to go – in a plane crash. Then the plane slowed, the engines quietened, and the plane rolled forward and stopped.

Parvati kicked open the door and tossed out her canvas bag. She jumped down and moved away from the buzzing propellers. Ash hopped out next.

“Do you want me to wait?” shouted Jimmy over the rumbling propeller engines.

“Do you want to?” asked Parvati.

“No!” He laughed.

Parvati tossed the bag of gems into the plane.

“What d’you do that for?” Ash shouted over the roaring propellers. “We could have saved those for the future!”

Parvati looked towards the far fires. “You think you’ve got a future?”

Jimmy gave a final wave and pulled the door shut. The engines rose to an ear-piercing pitch as the plane slowly turned, ploughing up clouds of sand. Ash and Parvati watched it through narrowed eyes as it began to accelerate. It hopped once, twice, then jumped into the air, dipped, and finally rose. Within a few minutes the only thing Ash could see was the red tail light. Then that too was eaten up in the clouds.

Parvati unzipped her bag and pulled out weapons, one by one: two pairs of swords, a dagger, and a steel whip, made up of four long flexible strips of steel coming out of a standard sword handle.

“The
urumi
,” said Ash. He picked it up and then flinched. Blood dripped from his finger where the edge of one of the lashes had cut it.

“You know what it is?” said Parvati. She carefully wound the two-metre-long steel around her waist – on top of her sash to prevent the metal cutting her skin – then held it in place with the hilt.

“The serpent sword,” said Ash. “I saw one. In a dream, once.”

“Strange dream.”

“You were in it too.”

Parvati laughed. “I’m sure I was.”

“No, you don’t understand. It wasn’t like that at all.” What was with Parvati? Did she think he fancied her?
As if
. But he still blushed. “Forget it.”

Ash looked at the weapons, all razor-sharp and ready for use. He tried one of the swords and drew half the blade from the scabbard. The cold steel edge was mirror-bright.

“Take it,” said Parvati.

He put it back down. “What we need is a nuke.”

“I knew I’d forgotten something,” she said. She’d ditched her sunglasses and loosened the knot in her hair. The long, silky black tresses blew in the wind as she inspected the weapons. “This might suit you better.” She handed him a punch dagger. “Let’s go.”

Ash followed her gaze to the distant horizon. The fear that had been bubbling away deep in his guts now boiled into terror. His legs wobbled, and his skin was coated in cold sweat.

“Ash? What’s wrong?”

“I feel sick.”

“Best get it out of your system.” Parvati pointed to a rock. “Vomit over there if you want.”

Ash bent over, gasping and trying to dislodge the lump
of dread in his throat. His head pounded hard, like his brain was pulsing away within, ready to burst.

Oh, God, how had it come to this? Now, more than ever, he just wanted to go home. He thought of his mates, laughing and belching and crowded around the videogame console with their bargain buckets of KFC. He thought about Gemma. All those years of being in the same class, of sitting next to her in maths, and he’d never asked her out. If he wasn’t even brave enough to speak to a girl, how on earth was he going to face down a rakshasa king?

All those things he’d done, or not done. His life flashed before his eyes, and it didn’t take long. He’d achieved so little, thinking it was going to go on and on. And it wasn’t. It was going to end tonight, right here.

Slowly he straightened and met Parvati’s gaze. She watched him curiously.

“You don’t feel fear, do you?” he asked.

She blinked her slow, reptilian blink. “What is it you’re afraid of?”

“What else? Death.”

“No. You’re afraid of what you’ll miss, being dead.”

“Yeah, that too.” He looked around, lost. “I’m not even fourteen. I’ve never kissed a girl. Not been to first base, let
alone anywhere beyond that. Not one decent kiss, and here I am, trying to save the world!”

“Look, I’ll kiss you if it’s so important,” said Parvati, flicking her hair out of her face. “But then can we get a move on, please?”

“Stop right there,” said Ash. “A charity snog wouldn’t count. Anyway, knowing my luck, you’d bite my tongue and kill me.”

Parvati shrugged and began walking. Ash, after a moment, hurried up and fell into step beside her. She looked at him out of the corner of her eye.

“We could hold hands, if you like,” she said.

“Just shut up, Parvati.”

his would be so much simpler if Rama had used the Kali-aastra like he was told to,” said Ash. “Then we wouldn’t be in this mess.”

“He couldn’t kill his brother,” Parvati replied. “Would you kill Lucky, if it meant destroying Ravana?”

“No. Never.”

“Well then,” said Parvati. “Only humans feel love. It is what we demons hate most about you.” Her brow creased in pain. “You don’t know how lucky you are.” She whispered the last sentence with such longing.

So that was why she so wanted to be human. He hadn’t understood why, until now. Parvati was beautiful, super-fast,
super-cool – and immortal, yet there was something missing. She couldn’t feel love. How must it feel to live through all those centuries, alone? To be feared by those you wanted to be close to?

Ash coughed and moved the conversation along. “What would have happened if Rama
had
fired the Kali-aastra at Ravana?”

“He would have become a thing of Kali. The perfect killer. Eventually he would have turned into a monster more terrible than the ones he fought.”

“Great. Then how are we going to beat Savage?”

“Leave that to me.”

“He must have a thousand rakshasas surrounding him by now. You can’t take them all.”

“I won’t need to. We just need to get in close. Who’ll notice another rakshasa among all of my father’s followers?” Parvati ran her tongue over her fangs. Each was only half-extended. Her hands rested comfortably on the hilt of the urumi.

She truly was born to end men’s lives.

If only he had an ounce of her courage. If only his heart wasn’t panicking like a terrified fox being chased by hounds. If only his skin was as cool and dry as hers, not hot and
slick with sweat and fear. The rumbling thunder above him made him shiver. Gods and monsters. This was their war, and he was neither.

Ash laughed. “You know what? I just realised something. I’m the side-kick, aren’t I?”

“What?”

He pointed at her. “You. Batman. Cool. Hard as nails.” He pointed to himself. “Me. Robin. I get to wear green shorts. No one is cool in green shorts. Just not possible.”

Parvati frowned. “Let’s just hope you’re not a red shirt.”

Ash had seen enough episodes of
Star Trek
to know anyone in a red shirt was a phaser magnet. “Wow, I never figured you for a Trekkie. Popular among rakshasas, is it?”

“You’d be surprised.”

Ash fell a few paces behind. Parvati strode over the cracked and uneven earth without faltering, while he stubbed his toe and tripped over every unseen rock. But he followed her, step by step. Ever closer to Ravana. Ever closer to his sister.

I’m coming, Lucky. No matter what else, I keep my promises.

They marched silently across the desert. The wind hurled dense clouds of skin-cutting sand at them, forcing them to fight for every step.

Thunder rattled overhead and the sky glowed with lightning. They held hands as they battled against the encroaching storm. Ash’s skin itched with the building charge of power. The gods waited.

Parvati drew him under a rocky outcrop. She tugged down the scarf she’d wrapped across her face.

“This is your last chance, Ash. Stay here until it’s over,” she shouted, even though she was only a hand’s breath away.

Ash, throat too parched to reply, just shook his head. Parvati gave a brief nod. She gripped his arms and stared deep into his eyes.

“Stay focused. My father’s realm was one of pure chaos. You’ll see things that will… disturb you.”

Coughing out sand, Ash managed to speak. “Like what?”

“Whatever you can imagine, it will be worse. He can, he will, alter reality to suit his whims,” she said. “He can turn the skies to flame, the rain to blood, and twist everything you see, feel, even think. No mortal mind can cope. He will change the world into one of ever-evolving madness.”

“Why?”

“Because he is Ravana. Because he can. Because he thinks he is more powerful than the gods, and he intends to prove
it. He will not bow to any law. It is the way of all kings. They make the rules; they don’t follow them.”

“It’s insane.”

“Yes, it is. And don’t forget it. If you give in to his insanity, you will be lost for ever.”

“I’m not afraid.”

“There’s a thin line between bravery and stupidity.” Parvati’s eyes glistened. “Can you guess which side you’re on?”

The storm abated as they came to the outskirts of Savage’s excavations. They passed an abandoned campsite where tents, pulled loose from their pegs, flapped crazily in the winds and the door of a cabin banged and clattered against its frame. Lines of cars, all bearing the Savage logo, stood parked in neat rows, covered in sand and grit.

“Where are all the workers?” asked Ash. There were the dying embers of campfires, pots and pans. Sacks of rice and boxes of fruit had been blown over, disgorging their contents over the rocky ground. The workforce must have been in the hundreds.

“There,” said Parvati, pointing ahead.

As they approached the excavated ruins Ash saw a city unlike anything he’d ever seen. The flat ground ahead was
covered with a neat lattice of trenches and low walls. Mud bricks outlined the buildings and streets of a city that had died over four thousand years ago. Ragged lines of sand lay blown across the flagstones, leaving indecipherable patterns.

But the city was alive. People, mostly men, haunted the doorways, the streets and alleys, brandishing torches. They still wore torn remnants of uniforms, their badges decorated with the poppies and swords of the Savage family crest. Their bodies were twisted backwards, their limbs at odd angles. They walked, crawled, slithered. Some lay curled up, sobbing. Some moaned and others screamed, nothing more than tormented things, driven insane by their transformations.

“These people worked here, didn’t they?” asked Ash. “What’s happened to them?”

“The Iron Gates are weakening. The Kali-aastra must be near. My father’s magic is already seeping out, transforming the world,” said Parvati, keeping them both hidden in the shadows of a partially fallen wall. “This is only the beginning. Once he’s free, this will seem like a garden, a paradise, in comparison.”

Animals snarled and crept along the shadowy paths, some with two heads, others skinless but alive, their bodies turned inside out so their guts and arteries hung loose in the dust.
The smell was a miasma of putrid gases and hot, rotting offal. The biting wind couldn’t lift it – it hung over the city like a foul fog.

Ash gripped his punch dagger tight. Otherwise it would have shaken like a tree branch. He had clamped his mouth shut to stop himself from puking. He stepped on something that slithered under his foot and squealed. He didn’t look. Lucky was somewhere in this place. If he did nothing else, he had to get her out.

Two long lines of blazing bonfires stood along either side of what must once have been the royal avenue. Ash and Parvati headed towards the centre of the city. Closer up, Ash realised they were funeral pyres. Even through the near-blinding flames, he could see human bodies twisted in torment, their limbs chained. So that was what had happened to the rest of the workers: they’d been thrown on to the blazing logs while still alive.

Ash could barely bring himself to move forward. He looked up at Parvati. Her ivory fangs were fully extended and oily with venom.

“Don’t let that happen to me, OK?” he said. “If you know what I mean.”

“You won’t feel a thing,” Parvati promised. She would
finish him off. Better that than suffer the fate of those poor souls.

Screams, chants and cries echoed all around as the damned called up to the heavens. The clouds above them trembled. Wind roared through the streets, carrying clouds of dust.

“So this is Hell,” whispered Ash.

He felt a rush of air and pulled Parvati hard up against the side of a building. They just got into the shadows as a creature landed on top of a nearby wall.

The monster squatted, chewing some lump of meat. Its beak was black and slick with gristle, its scaled head decorated with globules of blood. The talons on its feet scratched the hard-mud bricks. The wings, dark and shiny, looked like those of a giant crow, and it clutched something in its claws.

Ash held his breath, squeezing Parvati’s hand. He watched the demon tear strips of flesh off the thing in its claws, cracking bones to get at the marrow and tossing back its head to gulp down the morsels. Then with a snap of its beak, it dropped the meal, spread out its wings and, with a triumphant cry, leaped skyward.

Ash let out a puff of breath and released Parvati. His gaze fell on the thing the crow-rakshasa had been eating.

A hand.

“There are patrols everywhere.” Parvati scanned the sky. “Above ground, on it, and no doubt below too. Savage isn’t taking any chances.”

She was right. Closer to the city centre Ash saw lumbering creatures barging their way through the mutated humans, scanning them and attacking at random. They tossed one man back and forth between them, his body flying and cart-wheeling through the air.

“What are we going to do?” Ash asked.

“What else?” Parvati unhooked the serpent sword. She shook out the coils and the steel edges hissed against each other.

“Wait,” said Ash. There had to be a better way of finding Savage than wandering aimlessly around the excavations. Ash searched his memory. All the Harappan cities had been designed the same way; he had heard his uncle talk about it. This one, the city chosen to be Ravana’s tomb, was on a far larger scale, but seemed to have the standard layout. They were in what archaeologists called the Lower City, the residential district for the main, common, population. The houses here were basic, two or three storeys high, and all built on a grid system. This wasn’t where they’d find Ravana. The tomb would be nearer the heart, where the more important buildings stood.

“He’s up in the citadel,” said Ash.

He pointed up the main road to the heart of the city. At its end was the huge central square, featureless but for a single black building. The square itself was surrounded by a deep moat and could only be reached by a single bridge.

Between it and them were ten thousand demons.

Parvati followed his gaze, and her serpent sword twitched, eager for battle. Ash had seen her fight: she was death incarnate, wrapped in the body of a teenage girl with pale skin and cobra eyes. Still, despite four and a half thousand years of fighting experience, even she couldn’t beat these odds.

What they needed was a diversion.

“I know what you’re thinking,” she said. “You’re thinking this needs someone to do something brave, bold and stupid.”

“That’s me,” said Ash. “Just promise me you’ll save Lucky.”

Parvati’s irises dilated, then narrowed into the thinnest of slivers. “You’re going to die,” she said. “You know that, don’t you?”

Ash nodded once, unable to speak. He tried to smile, to act as though it was no big deal. If he were really brave, he’d make some cool joke and not stand there, trembling with fear, his throat as dry as ash.

“Just give me ten minutes to get closer to the tomb. Then create your diversion.” Parvati put her hand on his cheek, her palm cool and dry. “I’ll save her, I promise.”

“Then get a move on before I change my mind.”

She kissed him.

It took his breath away, his heart quickening as her lips pressed against his. When she stepped back the soft touch lingered and there was just the faintest scent, like grass after the rains, old but still fresh and ever renewed.

His first, and last, kiss.

Parvati tied her hair up into a knot, getting it out of her eyes, and retreated into the shadows. “Goodbye, Ash,” she said. The darkness thickened around her. “We will meet again.”

Then she was gone. Ash heard the softest of footfalls and the scrap of blade against blade, then nothing.

Perhaps they would meet again.

But not in this lifetime.