The 9th Fortress

positive your wings do not work angel? Let me just prod that clasp with my sword.'

'Fool,' muttered Kat, taking charge through a burrow of pulsating rocks.

'Wait!' I exclaimed. 'Just a minute, Kat. One minute. I've something…important to say.'

Kat stopped to hear but did not face me; the English knight and French angel meanwhile listened with open hearts and intrigued faces. Before we took another step in this under-realm, I felt a duty to make these newer companions aware of what they had let themselves in for. And so I told our story up to that point, the alphabet village, the Macro Mountain, the trials of Bludgeon, Scarfell, and the mission to the 9th Fortress. 'The further we go the more terrible things we see,' I concluded; 'and it's beyond me to imagine or predict what's coming next. I don't know. Now, I cannot speak for Kat, but I promise to do everything in my power to see you both safely out of here. I'm willing to put my body, or what's left of it on the line for all of you.'

Harmony and Eddinray were surprisingly calm, and unified in smiles.

'Wonderful!' Eddinray declared. 'This is truly the adventure I have been made for! Homer and Dante will weep at the stories we shall tell!'

Whispers soon killed his cheer however, the hiding voices of a thousand ghosts echoing everywhere, yet coming from nowhere. 'Four more!' they said. 'Four more! Four more! Look at that one, his armor reflects the light! And her, an exile from the Heavens! Four more! Four more! The man covets the tiny dagger! Tell! Tell! Four more! Four more! The one with the scarred face, no stranger is he! Four more! Four more!'

The cave tightened the deeper we explored it, those whispers replaced by leaking water and muffled sobs in the distance. Cautious yet curious, we paused over slippery rocks to listen.

'Help me!” it cried. “I want my mommy! Where's…my mommy?'

'A child!' exclaimed Harmony, jostling passed Kat and running ahead.

'Harmony!' I yelled. 'It could be any…'

'Never fear!' interrupted Eddinray; 'I shall fetch her!'

Scurrying for the lead, the knight slid backward for a second time, yanking Kat and me with him.

***

Harmony was alone when she came upon a child slouched against icy stone: a boy no more than four years old, hugging both arms over his head. 'Do not cower, child,' she said, softly. 'Help has arrived.'

The boy did not respond, so Harmony crouched to him and caressed his thin hair. 'There, there. You are safe. No need for tears now.'

The child grazed his tiny hand over Harmony's, and then faced her with tear-drops drying over his innocent cheeks.

'Harmony?' we hollered in the background. 'Harmony?'

'I'm fine!' she replied, returning the boy's smile. 'We both are!'

The child had no teeth in his mouth, and wore an odd smirk for an unusually long length of time. Harmony shrunk slightly as the boy tipped his head to one side, a protruding vain now bulging across his forehead. The angel glanced over her shoulder, and then all of a sudden was forced onto her wings as the boy throttled her neck, his strength far greater than that of an infant.

Once Harmony was flat on the rocks, the boy prodded each of his chubby hands inside her mouth, fidgeting them to fit. Harmony attempted to cry out, but his forcing flesh snuffed her sound. Terrified tears flowed from the angel's eyes; her fists hit out, her knees kicked and her wings flapped like trapped pigeons in their clasp, but the ghoul was too powerful.

What did have an affect on this evil was the long sword of Eddinray, lunging at last from the darkness. Violently he slashed, and the inhuman thing burst into a cloud of bats, a hundred flailing, squeaking, and biting rabid over the pair of them. They embraced, screaming until Kat's ravaging katana sent this fluttering plague out of the cave.

It was over, and with Harmony heaving and sobbing still, the tense eyed samurai scolded her. 'Choke you stupid woman! Choke! Another lesson! Another fool!'

Furious, Eddinray stood from the traumatised young woman to poke his finger into Kat's chest.

'That is quite enough from you!' he yelled. 'You sir, are a man of no honor and I shall see you in combat! Prepare yourself swine!'

Bumping his armored chest against Kat's, the samurai responded by simply pushing Eddinray to the rocks. 'If you wish to die,' he sneered, pointing his sword at Eddinray's neck; 'it will be my pleasure.'

Before a gaping mouthed Eddinray could respond, Harmony squeezed his palm. 'Do not fight, Godwin,” she whispered. 'You have already saved my life twice. Pray show the samurai mercy…'

Kat snorted, more amused than insulted.

'If that is your wish madam!' Eddinray huffed, unable to contain the pink appearing on his cheeks. 'I shall spare the samurai's soul.'

I was relieved to see Kat return the katana to his belt. 'I also have something important to say!' he suddenly growled at us, blocking the way forward. 'No-one disobeys me from this point onward! No one! No more! Peril waits beyond this cave — visible — invisible — and the safest place for all of you is behind my back. There is no good here, there is no compassion, there is no hope…and we will all have our chance to die.'

As the haunting whispers returned in the rocks, we four stood as one. 'The short samurai leads them. Four more! Spread the word! Four more!'

'One last thing,' said Harmony, lowering her head and closing her eyes. 'Angel of God, my guardian dear, to whom his will commits us here. Ever this day be at our side, to light and guard, to rule and guide. Amen.'

Eddinray and I returned the Amen; the General Kat however, preferred silence before marching his troops off to battle.

21. The Dishonorable Many

The cave brought us to the muddy banks of a lake, and source of the foul stink. The placid water was congealed like week old gravy, and over it, I noticed over fifty arms reaching out of the murky sauce.

The semi-solid lake stretched as far as the eye could see to a lingering blanket of red fog. The sky overhead was a weird, rippling mirror of jelly, reflecting all us sinners underneath it. 'Truly another world,” gawked Harmony.

Stepping foot on a muddy shore, we soon arrived at the marching men, a parade of soldiers as long as the lake itself. Millions, perhaps billions, and not one without a uniform or weapon. Harmony informed us that the diversity of this cue spanned the entire history of the Earth and other Planets. British redcoats soldiered behind modern day marines, whose khaki outfits could easily camouflage them in the woods or forests of the Distinct Earth. Scattered Roman legions followed those hollow faces and dull coloured uniforms of the Great War. The American, Russian and Chinese civil wars were represented, the French and American Revolutions too. Those of alien kind were varied in appearance, immeasurable in number, and spread indiscriminately amongst humans. There were loathsome looking creepy crawlies; a brutish race of walking tall Rhino; what can only be described as a bear having a conversation with a cricket half his size, and others with as many eyes as teeth. Those souls not soldiers sat a picture of melancholy, their spirits vanquished by a lingering bitterness in the air and heart.

We moved diligently passed and ever present along the shore was the chattering teeth and waggling tongues — strangers getting acquainted with neighbours, alien conversing with human, whilst others remained in solemn, regretful reflection.

'Called me out a cheat!' one complained to another. 'Nobody calls me a cheat!'

'How do you think I feel mate,' came the reply; 'my missus fell down the stairs but they claim I pushed her!'

Through and around them we wandered. 'How can they stand this wretched filth?' asked a disgusted Eddinray, pegging two fingers over his nostrils.

'More to the point,' I said, 'what are they waiting for?'

'Some wait to cross the lake,” answered Kat, always ahead. 'Others, the soldiers, remain in step without