Into Tordon Read online

  She grabbed his shirt to help keep him steady. ‘Stuff like what?’

  ‘Obstacle courses. Survival camps. Rock climbing, like this! They all suck.’

  ‘He takes you with him?’

  ‘Unfortunately.’ There, his feet caught the bulge.

  Beth shuffled back. ‘Sounds good to me—my dad prefers watching TV in the lounge room.’

  Zane was almost at the top. ‘So do I,’ he huffed. ‘It’s where our computer lives. That’s the problem.’

  Zane’s stats flashed in her mind. He played Tordon more than she did. If his dad really was a marine, he probably hated his son lazing at a computer all day.

  Snap!

  A twig broke nearby. Zane froze in fear and stared up

  at Beth, his eyes huge. She reached down and grasped the back of his shirt again. Then another twig snapped, nearer this time. Beth stiffened and she could see Zane grit his teeth. He was concealed by long shadows cast by the surrounding trees—as long as he kept completely still.

  How long could he stick there, though, without moving?

  She closed her eyes tight and her fingers tighter as something moved closer.

  Chapter 5

  Footsteps shuffled, paused, then moved on. Lots of footsteps. Beth counted but lost track of her tally. The whole tribe seemed to be searching the forest together.

  She waited until the last set of footsteps shuffled into the distance, then opened her eyes again. Pain lanced through her stiff fingers. Sweat poured down Zane’s back and he was shaking uncontrollably. Then suddenly with a groan, he slid to the ground, down the rockface to land between the boulders, at the same time as the sound of sobbing rose from a nearby bush.

  He immediately froze again with his back to the rockface.

  The bush shook, then a tribesman stumbled out, crying. This close, his features looked almost human. In fact, when he removed his horned headdress to wipe his face and remove his fake tail so he could slump to the ground, he was human—as pale, and as much a kid as herself.

  She narrowed her eyes. He also looked familiar. His red hair and blue eyes reminded her of someone from Tordon, whose avatar always wore a leather necklace with a four-rods Rune of Death pendant. What was his name? Ah yes, DaveT. He had boasted to the chatroom that he’d made the necklace himself. This tribesman had the exact same necklace, and looked exactly like DaveT.

  ‘DaveT?’ Beth called, scrambling down the rockface to join Zane.

  Zane scowled and elbowed her, but it was too late. The tribesman had seen them.

  DaveT stepped closer and dragged his arm across his face. ‘Who are you?’

  ‘I’m BGwarrior—Beth. This is Zane007. I was at the bottom of The Chameleon Chart’s top ten when you won last month.’

  DaveT shook his head and sniffed. ‘Last month? I won a few days ago.’

  ‘Dude, you’re confused,’ said Zane.

  Beth looked at Zane, willing him to be quiet. ‘It doesn’t matter. It only matters how we get home.’

  ‘Home?’ said DaveT. ‘Do you know the way back? There was this flash of lightning or something, then I was here. The Witheng have been great and all, but…’

  ‘The what?’ snapped Zane.

  ‘The Witheng tribesmen. But they don’t know the way back home.’

  ‘We’re trying to find a way back ourselves,’ said Beth. ‘There’s got to be a way, if this is where Kaleski got his inspiration for Tordon.’

  ‘It is!’ DaveT said, excited. ‘I’ve seen him once, I think, looking for ideas.’

  Beth nodded. ‘Each new upgrade seems to have different stuff.’

  ‘Moving between worlds for inspiration,’ Zane gazed around him, ‘what a way to live.’

  ‘This,’ Beth laughed, waving at her scratched and bloody arms, ‘is no way to live!’

  ‘It could be,’ Zane screwed up his face. ‘Better than being forced to march all day. What are you rushing home for anyway? To hang out with your loser dad?’

  ‘He’s not a loser.’ Beth glared at him.

  ‘It’s not so bad here,’ DaveT said, looking around.

  ‘Look at these trees!’

  ‘But you just said you want to go home.’

  ‘I do now, because I lost Athul. The Witheng gave him to me after I learnt their ways.’

  Beth stared in disbelief. ‘But how could you have learnt their ways if you just got here?’

  DaveT blinked. ‘I never thought of that.’ He blinked again. ‘Still, I loved my mutt. He was my best friend, before he was killed.’ He wiped his eyes. ‘Murdered!’

  ‘Best friend?’ Beth repeated, a sinking feeling growing in her stomach. Once a killing, twice a killing. When a friend dies, it hurts those who loved them too.

  ‘Yeah,’ murmured DaveT, ‘the mutts here are practically human. They have a unique language, simple to understand if you listen. Funny how they look exactly like those in Tordon. Much friendlier of course!’ He sighed. ‘The Witheng are taking Athul’s body for burial while I hunt the killers.’ He picked up his spear and shook it. ‘It’s my responsibility to find them, and kill them!’ DaveT shook his spear again. ‘Will you help me? If I don’t find them, they’ll attack our families in their sleep.’ He looked worried.

  Beth took a deep breath.

  ‘Don’t!’ hissed Zane.

  ‘DaveT,’ she began, reaching to pat his hairy arm then thinking better of it, ‘there aren’t any killers.’ She waited until he looked into her eyes. ‘Zane…accidentally killed your mutt. And we’re both very sorry. But the good news is: you don’t have to keep hunting anyone.’

  Zane groaned. ‘Now you’ve done it.’

  Beth ignored him. ‘Go find your tribe and tell him they can sleep safe tonight. We’re no danger to anyone.’

  DaveT glanced at Zane, then back at Beth, anger clouding his expression.

  ‘We thought your mutt was attacking us,’ explained Beth quickly. ‘It ran at us!’

  DaveT backed away like she was a monster. ‘It ran at you because he’s friendly!’

  ‘Everyone just calm down,’ Zane said. ‘This is just one big misunderstanding. We didn’t know your mutt was friendly.’

  ‘You killed Athul!’ DaveT shouted. ‘And you attacked my tribe? You?’ He shook his head. ‘Over here!’ he shouted over his shoulder. ‘I found them!’

  ‘No, wait!’ Beth said. ‘You don’t understand—we were scared!’

  ‘We thought he was going to kill us!’ said Zane.

  ‘Kill you?’ DaveT’s face screwed up in disgust. ‘He would never do that.’

  ‘It looked like it to me.’ Zane folded his arms. ‘It was self-defence!’

  ‘We were very confused,’ Beth added. ‘Please try to understand. Weren’t you afraid when you first came here?’

  DaveT’s face crumpled and he looked away down the hillside. ‘It’s going to be cold tonight without Athul.’

  Beth felt sick with guilt. ‘Why don’t you come with us?’ she suggested. ‘We’re searching for a way back home and need your help. Do you know what these are, for instance?’ She held up her hands.

  DaveT stared at the sheer webbing coating his own hands. ‘Mine are like that too. I forget they’re there now.’

  Beth squinted at the faint glow on his wristbands. ‘But your circles aren’t the same as ours. There are segments missing. Look, Zane,’ she said, comparing their hands, ‘they’re diff…’

  Snap!

  The bushes rustled and Zane immediately reached for his sword, but wasn’t fast enough. A Witheng tribesman pounced out pointing a spear. He had a feline look about him, with short horns protruding from his forehead.

  ‘Wait!’ cried DaveT.

  The tribesman glared at him, but didn’t lower his weapon. DaveT gestured for calm and they spoke to one side in low mutters. Beth hoped DaveT was explaining things properly.

  More Witheng appeared, encircling them with spears. Two carried a heavy weight wrapped in white sackcloth— it had to be poor Athul.
DaveT spoke quietly to them also, but Beth could only make out the occasional repeated phrase: once a killing, twice the killing.

  ‘You should’ve kept quiet,’ Zane hissed at her.

  ‘But don’t you think it’s odd how DaveT has no idea of time passing?’

  DaveT turned then and shook his head gravely. ‘I regret to tell you this, but because you entered our camp and killed Mutt Athul…’

  ‘For which,’ Beth interrupted, ‘we are really, really sorry.’

  ‘…you are deemed guilty.’

  The tribesman cheered.

  DaveT thumped his spear on the ground. ‘The Witheng have passed judgement—once a killing, twice the killing. We will execute you both.’

  Chapter 6

  ‘What?’ Beth shouted at the tribesmen surrounding them in the forest dell. She stepped around the boulders towards DaveT. ‘They can’t kill us both! I didn’t do anything!’

  ‘There is an alternative,’ DaveT pointed at Zane. ‘You, Beth, can execute him. If you take his life, it would fit the law.’

  Beth glared at Zane. ‘Don’t tempt me!’

  ‘But it was self defence!’ Zane said, glaring back at Beth, then DaveT. ‘Just like your tribe killed that tree-octopus thing.’

  ‘That is different,’ said DaveT, shuddering. ‘And we didn’t kill it, we only stopped it for now. That creature is an evil curse on the forest. It steals our strength and feeds on our children. We wound it, kill it, burn it, yet it returns more powerful than its last shape. It will return again and be even more deadly. At first it could only climb up and down the trees. Now it can swing between them on vines, even jump short distances over the ground. One day it will probably be able to run!’

  ‘Okay, so how about,’ Zane wiped his palms down his top, ‘how about we slay your monster for you, once and for all, instead of you killing us—deal?’

  Beth stared at Zane, lost for words.

  DaveT’s eyes widened. ‘You want to slay the Hupuleq for us? It’s impossible!’

  ‘At least it gives us a fighting chance! Better than a straight-out execution, right Beth?’

  ‘Um,’ Beth murmured, blinking. Executions? Slayings? What kind of place was this? Of course she couldn’t kill Zane, but fighting an indestructible monster?

  Taking her silence as agreement, DaveT turned to the Witheng, but apart from their shocked expressions, they seemed impressed with Zane’s offer. The horned tribesman stepped forward.

  ‘We agree. Your lives will be spared if you destroy the Hupuleq curse. This obeys our law. But there is one condition—he must witness the battle.’ He pointed at DaveT.

  ‘Agreed,’ said Zane.

  Beth’s mouth gaped open as her thoughts tumbled around. She had to get away! Perhaps without all the Witheng watching, they could escape? DaveT wouldn’t really make her fight a monster, would he? She took a steadying breath, repeating Kumdo’s philosophy in her mind—discipline, concentration , endurance . She needed to keep a cool head.

  Zane muttered something about needing weapons and Beth nodded. They’d need weapons so they could pretend they were going to kill this thing. DaveT took some of the Witheng’s spears as Zane swung his sword around like he was warming up his muscles. Beth knew he was showing off, but it worked. The crowd was impressed.

  DaveT blinked then, his expression changing, lifting as if seeing them for the first time. ‘Do I know you?’

  Beth smiled. ‘Yes, it’s Beth and Zane.’

  DaveT frowned until the feline tribesman stamped his spear on the ground. ‘We must hurry. Lately, each of the Hupuleq’s new shapes have been more horrible, vicious and deadly than the one before. It’s attracted by blood, so we must first bury our dead.’

  Beth glanced at the wrap covering Athul’s body and the red, wet stain seeping over it.

  ‘This way.’ DaveT gestured down the slope and they moved off.

  The tree canopy above them was green and lush, yet it hid so many deadly secrets. Had forests always been this way? Is that why they were farmed back home?

  At the bottom of the slope, DaveT veered left. ‘Our burial place is just along the stream.’

  The sound of rushing water was close. They rounded a mossy bend to see a magnificent waterfall gush from the hillside just in front of them, crashing with thunder onto rocks below. A rippling stream flowed out and sparkled in the late afternoon sun. Further along, another water source rushed from between the trees to join the stream, and where the two streams joined was an enormous roiling pool, its dark water laced with foam.

  ‘This is our burial place,’ DaveT told them. ‘The Gateway. The Witheng believe it leads to the next life. Don’t slip though. If you fall, the Gateway quickens so we can’t rescue you.’

  Gateway? Beth wondered, then sniffed. There was an odd odour—fresh, but at the same time metallic, like overheated wires? She sniffed again. When her dad had worked for the tree farm years ago, he’d brought home some work equipment to weld in the shed. She remembered sparks flying as he melted metal together, and this same sort of smell.

  Four tribesmen, DaveT among them, shifted along the mossy banks of the pool, holding Athul’s sackcloth-wrapped body. Once they’d reached a rocky ledge sticking out over the water, the bearers lifted the body high and the Witheng sang a short guttural tune before dropping their burden into the whirling currents. As soon as it hit, the pool swirled faster and faster, then flashed white, nearly blinding them.

  Beth blinked.

  DaveT walked back to Beth and Zane as they stood rubbing their eyes. ‘Athul will be released from his body now to live again.’

  ‘Did you see that flash?’ Beth whispered to Zane. ‘What if this isn’t a gateway to an afterlife, but to another world—our world? Remember earlier, when DaveT said he’d seen a flash when he arrived here? I swear I saw a flash too, when we fell through Kaleski’s front door. This could be our way back home!’

  Zane stared downward. ‘Looks like a whirlpool to me.’ ‘Dave,’ said Beth, ‘tell us more about this place?’

  ‘The water has healing powers, that’s all I know. The Gateway leads to the next life where the souls of the dead are healed.’

  ‘Don’t you think it’s strange the Witheng use the word “gateway”?’ She looked around the forest. ‘Couldn’t it be a —’

  Before she could finish her sentence, the Witheng started pointing and shouting at the treetops. With a shriek, a huge tentacled monstrosity dropped among them, landing on the tribesmen who’d carried Athul into the water. Its scaly-plated new body crushed them instantly. Even though it was bigger than before, with more tentacles, Beth could tell this was the same creature. It gave her the same sick feeling in her stomach.

  The Witheng threw their spears, but their weapons bounced off its impenetrable scales. It humped across to a hanging vine, gripped it and hauled itself up, for a moment revealing a soft underbelly. Once suspended, however, it moved quickly again, slashing tentacles lined with claws at one tribesman and then another. They screamed and the rest of the tribe scattered into the trees, crying out in panic. Only DaveT, Beth and Zane were left behind, standing away from the trees near the water.

  For a moment the monster clung in the trees, watching them with its multiple eyes.

  ‘It can’t move fast without vines,’ whispered Beth. She wondered how far it could jump. ‘Hey!’ she screamed.

  ‘Over here!’

  ‘What are you doing?’ hissed Zane.

  ‘We need to get it off the vines. I saw its belly before—

  it’s soft!’

  He shook his head. ‘It’s all too much. Too much!’ Beth gripped her sword. This was no time to fall apart. ‘When it jumps down to attack us, hit it from underneath.’

  Zane puffed his cheeks and crept forward, holding out a shaking spear.

  ‘Ready, DaveT?’ Beth said, before taking a deep breath and screaming as loud as she could.

  The Hupuleq’s eyes rolled wildly. It lengthened its tentacles, producing
sharp talons at their ends.

  She yelled again and it leapt towards them like a toad, landing nearby but not close enough to attack. Beth spied the same soft patch of underbelly before it prepared to pounce again.

  ‘Ready?’ she yelled, re-gripping her sword.

  It sprang, forcing them to crouch under its swiping limbs. Beth aimed a jab at its underside as a spear thrust past her, striking the same place. DaveT gave a triumphant war cry as the creature slumped sideways, bleeding.

  ‘We did it!’ yelled Zane.

  Beth grinned, until the blood oozing from the creature’s side solidified and grew into a scaly new tentacle. Its body spasmed as it pulled itself upright.

  ‘Now!’ yelled DaveT. ‘While it’s still weak!’

  Beth ran forward, jabbing the Hupuleq as Zane swung his sword to slice the new tentacle in half, then whatever else he could reach. Soon they were sweating and huffing among a mess of hairy tentacles, scales and blood. It looked like they’d diced the creature enough to fill some giant’s chunky steak pie.

  ‘Awesome!’ Zane panted, surveying his handiwork. ‘Who’s lazy now, eh Dad?’

  Beth shook her head. Whatever fantasy Zane was living right now, dicing monsters was not her idea of exercise. Nor had it worked. ‘Watch out!’ she screamed as the monster regrew new tentacles, as well as a second mouth of piercing fangs.

  ‘Let it come!’ Zane bellowed, hacking at another limb. ‘No wonder Kaleski got his inspiration from here! This is epic.’

  ‘But look what you’re doing!’ Beth shouted. Four tentacles were already eight, rapidly changing into sixteen. If Zane kept going, soon there’d be over fifty. ‘You’re making it worse!’ Wait, maybe that’s what the engraving meant? Kill something once here, and you only have to kill it again, twice as much and twice as hard. ‘Zane, you’ve got to stop!’

  ‘But I can chop them all!’

  ‘Look!’ she screamed, pointing as the monster grew larger, its arms forming quicker and longer.

  Zane’s expression shifted. ‘How…?’

  ‘That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you!’