The Morrow Secrets (19 page)

Esmerelda’s story made Ruker all the more determined to organise the ramshackle party, so after breakfast she gathered everyone together. As she outlined the dangers that lay ahead, the boys started to snigger.

‘This is a serious business you two, so stop laughing and pay attention. The other night in the forest was a close shave. We must be more careful.’

‘Sorry,’ muttered Tyaas, smirking behind his hand.
‘Every climbing or pot holing expedition has a leader. That’s me, folks, and what I say goes. Neeps and I know the dangers ahead so he’ll be my deputy. I don’t want any argument when I give instructions. I’ll use this yellow chalk on the cave walls so we can follow each other and retrace our steps if necessary.’
Benedict was not paying attention. He was an unlikely adventurer with no stomach for the thrill of exploration. Ruker could not make him out at all.
‘Are we avoiding Weeping Holes?’ asked Esmerelda. ‘It’s on the map, but I’ve become lost there before.’
Ruker nodded. ‘We’ll follow your old route to the Weeping Cavern, by way of the Shapeless Map but no further. So I need you up here next to me. Benedict, you’ll come next, with Tallitha and Tyaas following, and Neeps bringing up the rear. OK?’
‘Aye, aye Captain’ said Tyaas sarcastically.
‘Stop it Tyaas. This isn’t a game!’ snapped Ruker. ‘Now let’s rope up and remember to put on an extra layer of clothing because it will be cold.’
‘There’ll be all kinds of insects and animals down there. Remember it’s their habitat, not ours, so we need to show respect,’ said Neeps. ‘Cave entrances can be home to bears and wild cats. If you see anything untoward follow my lead and give them a wide berth. Come on, let’s go.’
They stepped behind the wall of water and into the dank, dripping cave. The ground was slippery and the air was filled with a fine wet spray that hit their faces. Tallitha stared round in the gloom and shivered. The cold dark cave was even more inhospitable than she had imagined.
‘Use your lanterns, it will be pitch-black from now on,’ said Neeps urgently.
Immediately the narrow pathway sheared to one side as they descended deeper and deeper into the coal-black darkness. Fat scaly beetles and leggy-insects scurried away and black rats nosed out of their holes to see who had disturbed their slumbers. The cave opened out into a sheer drop and the travellers were forced to crawl around a narrow ledge. Below, they saw a group of wild cats catching fish at the edge of a deep pool. The cats eyed them suspiciously, hissing intermittently, but were more interested in catching their breakfast than stalking their visitors.
Down and down they trudged, ever deeper into the dripping, cold darkness. The light from their lanterns randomly danced along the cavern walls revealing patterns in the rocks the colour of wet seals. As Tallitha rounded a corner she noticed some chalky scrawled writing and tugged on Ruker’s arm.
‘They’re warnings, messages from one explorer to another,’ she explained.
‘Can they help us with the riddle?’ asked Tyaas.
‘Not that I can see,’ said Esmeralda translating the script on the walls. ‘They’re about the Mowl,’ she said guardedly.
‘What do they say?’ asked Tallitha.
‘They explain where the Mowl have struck,’ explained Esmerelda.
‘Struck?’
‘Where they’ve killed. It’s best not to know. Now come on.’
Suddenly the path became narrower and the ceiling dropped downwards. Dripping, soaking darkness surrounded them and in the slimy wetness underfoot, Esmerelda slipped.
‘Ahhhh, my ankle,’ she winced as she fell to the floor, dragging Tallitha down with her.
The noise of her piercing scream reverberated through the maze of tunnels, bouncing off the cave walls, echoing into nothingness. Esmerelda hurriedly applied the barrenwort salve to her ankle.
‘I’ll be fine. Sorry I cried out. You OK?’ she asked Tallitha.
The girl’s face was etched with fear. Being down in the steely-dark world was terrifying. Tallitha helped Esmerelda bandage her ankle and they followed the others in silence.
All at once the Skinks stopped as the path abruptly forked into two uninviting black holes, one much bigger than the other. Ruker and Neeps lifted their lanterns and began surveying both entrances.
‘Which way?’ asked Tallitha, hoping it was the larger of the two holes.
‘Down here to the right,’ said Esmerelda, peering at the map.
Tallitha recoiled. The thought of squeezing into the cramped space made her heart pound.
‘Sorry Tallitha,’ said Ruker, ‘but the other tunnel will take us back to the surface.’
‘But it’s so dark,’ she whispered peering into the blackness.
‘Crouch down on to your hands and knees. Blow out your lanterns.’
‘What!’ exclaimed Tallitha, ‘but it’s horrible in there.’
‘You won’t be able to manage a lantern in the narrow gaps,’ explained Neeps, ‘we’ll be next to each other.’
‘But...,’ said Tallitha.
‘No “buts” Tallitha,’ instructed Ruker forcefully and led the way into the seeping hole.

‘Where are we?’ asked Tyaas as he crawled into the dark wet tunnel behind Neeps.
He could hear the Skink’s heavy breathing in the slate-cold tomb.
‘Lava tubes formed through volcanic activity, millions of years ago’, Neeps coughed as grit entered his mouth.
They crawled through the tunnel, pushing their backpacks in front of them as the gap narrowed alarmingly. The tubes were rough and their hands became lacerated from the jagged rocks on the tunnel floor. Ruker called back instructions to them.
‘OK, there’s a twist ahead of you. Lie flat and be warned, it’s very tight.’
Tight! How could it get any tighter! Tallitha wondered. The sheer weight of the rock formation bore down and she felt the full force of nature all around her. As the space became ever more compact she began to feel panicky as the rock face pressed down and scraped her scalp. She imagined being trapped in the cold stone ground that would forever be her grave. Benedict was the first to complain. Tallitha heard his rapid, frightened breathing coming up behind her in the darkness.
‘It’s just like a coffin. I can’t breathe. It’s so awful. What if we get stuck?’ he cried out.
‘Just stay calm. I don’t like it either. It’ll soon be over,’ said Tallitha trying to keep her nerve steady.
‘Let’s go back. I can’t bear it,’ pleaded Benedict.
‘Stop it!’ said Tallitha pushing on his head with her feet, ‘you have to keep going.’
‘You’re nearly through. Keep moving and you’ll come out into a cave,’ whispered Ruker hoarsely into the darkness, willing the terrified Benedict to calm down.
So Benedict closed his eyes and inched forward, whimpering all the while. At last the lava tube came to an end and they climbed out into the great expanse of the Weeping Cavern, their clothes sodden and their faces smeared in dirt. They hurriedly lit their lanterns and stared at the enormous space before them. It was filled with hundreds of stalagmites and stalactites and Tyaas could not believe his eyes.
‘It’s fantastic!’ he said rubbing grit from the palms of his hands.
‘Come, follow me,’ said Ruker, ‘but be careful underfoot, it’s wet.’
They edged round the huge cavern, a small band of wary bedraggled explorers, dwarfed by the enormity of the grand cathedral-like space, tip-toeing onto the flat stones as rivulets of water ran this way and that under their feet. Tyaas lifted his lantern to scan the crevices of the ancient roof more clearly. He was fascinated by the sheer scale of the cavern with its fingers of multi-coloured gnarled rock sticking up like tentacles all around him. The rippling arched roof gleamed in the lantern-light as copper, silver and golden seams of colour glowed overhead while the ever-dripping droplets of water plopped into dark pools in the cavern floor, echoing into the sunken distance.
Something intermittently bright caught Tyaas’s eye, just for a second. There it was again, blue and shimmering, like sunlight through flimsy butterfly wings. Tyaas motioned to the others and pointed upwards. The dappling azure lights danced overhead, following them as they walked through the cave.
‘They’re like tiny stars. What are they?’ asked Tyaas scanning the roofline.
‘I’m not sure,’ said Esmerelda cautiously, grabbing Tallitha’s hand, ‘but I don’t like it.’
‘Over here,’ said Ruker making for a gap in the rocks.
They followed the Skinks behind a fissure in the rock and waited. Neeps fumbled in the backpacks. ‘We may as well eat,’ he said sharing the dried fruits and biscuits.
But Esmerelda was not hungry. She stared distractedly around her.
‘What is it?’ asked Tallitha nervously.
‘I’ve seen those blue lights before. I’m going back to see if they jog my memory.’
But before she could leave Ruker pulled her back.
‘You aren’t going anywhere alone. If for some reason we’re delayed, make camp here,’ she instructed the others.
‘Can’t I come?’ pleaded Tyaas.
‘No, definitely not,’ said Ruker firmly.
Ruker ignored Tyaas’s continued pleas, took a lantern and left the shelter with Esmerelda at her side. Once out of earshot, Esmerelda confided in Ruker.
‘Those lights are harbingers of something, I saw them when I was here with Asenathe, but I can’t remember what happened,’ she said, sounding perplexed.
They walked round the perimeter of the cave, searching the roof crevices with the lantern but the lights had vanished. The central cavern had a number of smaller enclaves and recesses. Esmerelda’s curiosity got the better of her.
‘What’s in here?’
Without waiting for Ruker’s reply, Esmerelda slipped through the opening.
‘No Esmerelda. Don’t go in there!’ exclaimed Ruker bounding after her.
But it was too late. When Ruker followed Esmerelda she was standing with her hand over her mouth, her desperate eyes reflecting the ghastly sight in front of her. She pointed to a corner of the cave where two rotting corpses were bound together in death, locked in irons, their hollowed eye sockets betraying the time they had lain there, side by side in their grizzly grave. The smell of putrid flesh and decay filled the space.
‘What is this dreadful place?’ asked Esmerelda, horrified at the sight before her.
‘I tried to stop you. It’s a Murk turrow. They keep their prey in here and feast on their bodies,’ explained Ruker. ‘It’s a gruesome pantry for the Murk Mowl and a warning to intruders.’
Esmerelda’s body trembled with shock. The loathing she felt for the Murk Mowl came bubbling up as she stumbled outside the turrow and was violently sick.
‘We can’t tell the others,’ she cried, wiping her hand across her mouth, ‘it’s so vile.’
On their return through the cavern Ruker filled the flasks and Esmerelda slapped water in her face to get rid of the smell of death. As she stood by the side of the pool, she tugged at Ruker’s shirt and pointed up at the purple-blue lights moving in and out of the rock fissures high above them.
‘There they are again,’ whispered Esmerelda, apprehensively.
‘Come on, let’s get back to the others,’ shouted Ruker, quickly grabbing Esmerelda’s hand.
They jumped over the rivulets of water with the blue lights moving in and out of the high fissures above them. But now they were certain that the lights were chasing them.
‘Quickly, they’re gaining on us,’ shouted Esmerelda desperately, as she leapt from stone to stone.
Suddenly, in a series of erratic movements, the blue lights took on grotesque bodily forms as they sprang from behind the rock face, leaping out and revealing their hideous grey torsos. Bounding downwards in swift zigzag movements the creatures scaled the rock face, landing in the encampment below and emitting a series of horrific high-pitched battle cries.
‘Run everyone, Tallitha! Tyaas! They’re coming!’ screamed Esmerelda, but it was too late.
As Ruker raced into the encampment she saw a horde of grizzly-grey creatures pinning down her friends. The fat Groats turned and hissed, spitting at Ruker and flashing their shocking blue eyes.
‘Don’t look into their eyes, keep your heads down!’ shouted Esmerelda recalling their true potency.
The azure lights were the eyes of the captors who had mesmerised Esmerelda and kidnapped Asenathe. Her cousin had not just vanished in the caves, the Groats had stolen her away and had bewitched Esmerelda, leaving her for dead.
Ruker immediately averted her eyes and punched one of the Groats hard in the back. He screeched and lurched sideways, freeing Neeps who pounced on another Groat and buried a knife deep in his bulbous leg.
‘Take that!’ he shouted as he pushed the knife deep into the flesh and pulled it out dripping with blood and gore from the Groat’s thigh.
‘Arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr,’ the creature wailed, spitting obscenities at the Skink.
There was a desperate sound of howling and moaning as the Groat clutched his bloody leg and fled, scaling the wall with his sucker-feet, dripping ooze and blood as he limped up the cave wall moaning and screeching. Ruker pulled her sword, lunged for another Groat and sliced his arm in one deft movement, blood bursting in fast spurts from the deep wound.
‘Got ya!’ she shouted, spinning round and landing a series of blows on the back of a Groat’s head.
The cave was a mess of flying bloody bodies, flashing swords and a cacophony of terrifying screaming and shouting. Tallitha leapt on a Groat who had Tyaas by the throat, but the creature flung her roughly to the ground, kicking her against a rock. She fell dazed to the floor as the Groat put his sword against her throat. Quick as a flash, Esmerelda and the Skinks fell on the Groat and dragged him away from Tallitha whilst trying to wrench Tyaas from his grasp. The Groat held the boy fast, hissed at the encroaching Skinks and delivered Esmerelda a glancing blow on the side of the head. The throng of Groats regrouped, assembled in a corner of the camp, then took flight, carrying Tyaas, limp and bleeding up the cave wall. Tallitha watched helplessly as her brother disappeared before her eyes.
‘They’ve got Tyaas!’ shouted Tallitha incredulously. ‘Help him Ruker, Neeps help him!’
Ruker grabbed her sword and began to scale the cavern wall but the sheer rock was impossible for the Skink to climb. By the time she had reached the first footholds Tyaas’s body was being dragged up the rock face high above her. Then the boy vanished behind a collection of stalagmites.
‘No, please no!’ shouted Tallitha, ‘Tyaas, Tyaas‒let him go, I beg you!’
The Groat, who had secreted Tyaas away, turned and leered at Tallitha, hanging by his long springy arms, sneering devilishly in her face, before slithering quickly away.
‘Where’s he gone? What will they do to him?’ wailed Tallitha. ‘Will they kill him?’
‘Not while we have this one, they won’t!’ said Ruker.
She pushed her foot firmly on the neck of an oily Groat who writhed on the cavern floor, foaming at the mouth and uttering Groat curses.
‘Shut up and keep still or you’ll feel this steel in your back!’ yelled Ruker.
‘Benedict, bind his arms and wrap his suckers tight so he can’t escape.’
‘Ohhh, he smells awful!’ said Neeps holding his nose.
‘Aye, he looks pitiful now his friends have gone,’ said Ruker, ‘but he still has the power to transfix us with those eyes. Blindfold him!’
Esmerelda moaned in pain and Tallitha began searching for the barrenwort slave and the bitter moonflower.
‘Essie, drink this, can you move?’
Esmerelda pulled herself up, giving the Groat a severe kick with her foot.
‘Come on, Benedict. Tie him to that rock. Tallitha, you too,’ insisted Neeps.
Tallitha leapt to her feet and began binding the Groat’s arms behind his back.
‘Where have they taken him?’ she shouted at the Groat.
His dark oily skin glistened with sweat in the lantern light. The skin hung in folds around the Groat’s face and his mouth was a gruesome envelope of skin flaps and bubbling spit. His ears sat like grey cauliflowers on each side of his bald head. As he panted he revealed his razor-sharp teeth in two rows on the top and bottom of his mouth. The Groat was injured but refused to speak.
‘Tell me,’ she cried kicking him.
‘They won’t harm Tyaas as long as we have this creature,’ said Benedict helping Tallitha bind the Groat’s arms.
Ruker raised her sword. ‘We’ve asked you once! Where have they taken him?’
With her sword pressed up against the Groat’s throat, Ruker was poised to strike. But still the Groat refused to speak.
‘Shall we kill him now? Finish him off,’ suggested Neeps with his knife pushed under the Groat’s rib cage. Ruker was enraged but shook her head.
‘First he must tell us where they’ve taken Tyaas!’ she shouted, drawing blood.
The Groat moaned as the blood trickled down between the fleshy folds of his neck.
‘Hold off Ruker!’ said Esmerelda finally coming to. ‘If he won’t talk of his own free will, I’ll make him.’
She took a phial and began to make a potion of Stinkhorn and Amethyst Deceiver to loosen the Groat’s tongue. She added water, crushed the fungi and shook the mixture furiously. The Groat pulled away, clamping his mouth tightly shut.
‘Neeps, force open his jaw,’ demanded Esmerelda. ‘Ruker, hold him!’
The Skinks held down the Groat, forcing his mouth open with the point of a knife while Esmerelda poured the green foaming liquid into the gaping hole. The Groat choked and gagged as the liquid ran down his throat. Then his eyes lolled back in his head as the potion began to take effect.
‘Come on, he’s ready now,’ said Neeps, pulling the creature to a sitting position and revealing his gruesome body covered in raised sores and battle scars which had healed badly over the years.
‘Tell us where they’ve taken our friend!’ Esmerelda demanded, shaking him.
‘I’ll take his blindfold off. He can’t do us any harm in this state,’ said Neeps.
The Groat stirred but refused to speak. His bulging hooded eyes barely flickered and bloody saliva ran from his fat grey lips. Esmerelda held his chin and slapped his face.
‘Where have they taken him? Answer me!’ she shouted.
But the Groat refused to speak. Ruker slapped him again. ‘Answer her, now!’
Ruker pushed the knife into the Groat’s belly. He groaned and blood began oozing from his wound.
‘Speak, or I’ll kill you!’ shouted Neeps. ‘I’ll slice your throat from your chin, down to your belly!’ he shouted, sticking the blade into the Groats’ neck.
‘Arrgggh, wait,’ he muttered, ‘to the... Sour Pit Chimneys,’ the Groat spat out the words like bubbling venom.
‘Why have they taken him there?’ shouted Esmerelda into the Groat’s face.
‘It’s where w-we take prisoners,’ he spluttered, coughing up more blood.
‘Where will they keep him?’
The Groat flopped forward and Ruker slapped him again. He moaned and moved his heavy head to one side.
‘In the prison caves. On the n-northern r-r-rim,’ he said slurring.
Esmerelda slapped the Groat to bring him to consciousness. ‘Keep awake, do you hear me. How do we find him?’
The Groat let out a deep, unsettling chuckle. ‘Errrrh, he’ll be n-near the top, you’ll have to climb down.’
‘Is he lying?’ asked Esmerelda looking round at the others.
‘Will they harm him?’ asked Tallitha anxiously.
‘Maybe,’ taunted the Groat. ‘Depends...,’ he smirked in his drugged stupor and his head slumped to his chest.
Tallitha made a whimpering noise and clutched Esmerelda’s hand.
‘Shuush, Tallitha,’ said Esmerelda, ‘it’ll be OK.’
Esmerelda stood in front of the Groat and lifted his head. This was her opportunity and she was not about to waste it.
‘Now listen to me! Wake up!’ she demanded, ‘you’re going to tell me what these words mean.’
The Groat smelled of stale meat and sweat and as Esmerelda moved closer to him she took a deep breath. Then she uttered the words that Tallitha had seen written down in the trance.