The Count and his two remaining companions slipped cautiously through the recently deserted oak wood at the base of Claremont Crag. The arrival of the spirits of Halloween had thrown a very satisfactory degree of confusion into Winter's assault. Colonel Frost was obliged to conduct a hasty rearrangement of his forces and suddenly the men found themselves free of encircling ice warriors. They took the opportunity to make a run for the trees where they were hidden from view. Now they were looking for the way to the Temple.
"There is only one route which leads to the top of the Crag," the Count said. "It is called Sandy Gate road and it begins near a small lake known as Cross Pool."
A few minutes later they saw a white expanse of flat ice. The shallow mere was frozen over with only a few dark green reeds breaking through the slippery surface. They skirted the edge of Cross Pool and began their ascent of the Crag.
The Sandy Gate road was rough, poorly maintained and full of pot holes. It looked as if it had been subjected to years of Winter's abuse rather than the few days it had actually endured.
I really should get this road repaired when conditions return to normal, the Count thought irrelevantly to himself in a rare moment of distraction from the matter in hand.
In the black welkin, two weather systems now clashed like a hammer and an anvil. The Halloween horde liked to work under the cover of their own gothic storm and they had brought it with them. Sheet lightning flashed from cloud to cloud and peels of thunder rang out loudly like cannon fire. The Winter wind was meeting bitter opposition from Autumn's rallying warm air masses. Snow and hail fought with will-o-the-wisp ball lightning and driving rain that occasionally blasted the ground only to be driven back into the sky.
The road wound between giant gritstone boulders taking an undulating but steadily rising course for a few hundred metres then suddenly turning a hairpin bend into a much steeper ascent. It ran under towering escarpments and circled all the way round the Crag three times before it reached the top. Fortunately, in almost all places the route was out of the direct line of sight of the Temple approaches. Nevertheless the Count and his men were very wary and crossed the short exposed stretches rapidly. The Colonel might not be able to see them but he would surely be expecting them.
Something nasty followed the men slowly up the Sandy Gate road. It had no true name but we can call it the Swamp Thing. The Swamp Thing was a long time resident of the Autumn Country and a lesser known member of the Halloween horde. It lived in the warm depths of the forest where it swallowed careless travellers whole and reduced them to mulch. It was the essence of squelch and it lived off anything that rotted away. And if victims weren't rotting away before they met the Swamp Thing then they usually were soon after. The Swamp Thing wasn't a fussy eater - rotten fruit and rotting flesh were all the same to the Swamp Thing - food. The Swamp Thing thrived on the heat at the heart of compost heaps. It loved sucking bogs warmed by hot Autumn sunlight, the stench of night soil from unsanitary cess pits and the sweet sickness of overripe middens. Its breath carried the vile aroma of putrefaction and its metabolism ran on decay and marsh gas. Clouds of flies followed it, wherever it went and mould and fungi grew from the weeping sores of its body.
The Swamp Thing had an ancient enemy and that enemy was frost. Frost hardened the squishy edges of marshes where the Swamp Thing lay in wait for prey and helped to keep them out of its deadly clutches. Even worse, frost slowed the very processes of decay, cooling the warm heart that kept the Swamp Thing alive. Frost preserved things and in the eye of the Swamp Thing, preservation was a very bad thing indeed. Preservation was a swear word to the Swamp Thing in the same way that the name of the Swamp Thing would have been a swear word to every other living thing, if only it had had a name.
The Swamp Thing was not smart but it was always hungry and it was vengeful. It could feel with a primitive part of its being that Jack Frost himself was abroad in the land and it hated him. It was painful for the Swamp Thing to drag itself up the bitterly cold Sandy Gate road. This was horribly harsh territory. But the Swamp thing sensed a chance to strike at its ancient enemy whilst its ancient enemy was on Autumn Country soil. The Swamp Thing was hunting.
It was astonishing how quickly the fortunes of battle could be reversed, Colonel Frost reflected bitterly. Only a short while ago it had seemed as if the fight was almost over but now the conflict was raging more fiercely than ever and Winter was definitely losing out.
"We need some more appropriate defences against these Autumn Country pests," the Colonel said. "Tarragon, you are the local expert. I want you to set up wards to keep us safe from them. So long as we continue to direct the ice warriors we have a chance. Do you think you can do that?"
"Well…" Tarragon said, "normally, I must admit that I only have to deal with one or two at a time. The Count has really stirred things up here. I don't really have the capability to set up wards to resist the entire Halloween army."
"Do your best then," the Colonel said. He hadn’t expected anything better.
"Eryndra and Sunanon. Your ice warriors are defeated and you have already proved that you have no competence in controlling the ice captains battle. I want you to go through the Christmas Passage and find the Proton King. Give him my token and tell him to get here as quickly as he can. We need him."
The Colonel handed a shiny silver star to the two agents, taking it from his top pocket. It was a sign of his desperation that he even contemplated handing over his own personal signature to mere Agents. As things stood there was no choice. The ice warriors were broken. Only the Proton King could fight this enemy.
"The rest of you, stick with me. We just have to keep the Halloween army away from Claremont Crag until the Proton King can get here. I'm relying on you to hold this position. Don't fail me."
"Rub some of this on your face," A'lekim said. He took a tiny glass bottle out of one of the many pockets of his brightly coloured battle suit. It was stopped with a cork and contained a thin purple liquid.
"Only a drop or two mind!" he insisted as he passed it to the Count and then on to Harry.
"What is it?" Harry asked suspiciously, sniffing the liquid.
"Pheromones. They're for protection. You won't be able to smell them but I have some little friends who can."
He took the bottle back and stowed it carefully away again. They were only a few metres away from the top of the Crag and round the next bend they would be in full view of the Temple precincts. They fingered their weapons cautiously.
Two tall stones made a natural gateway to the Temple precincts. The road narrowed to pass between them and at this point it was only wide enough for one man at a time to stand and fight.
"Looking for us?" Browning said. "Well you've found us, haven't you?"
The Agent was waiting for them in the gap with his sword drawn. Behind Browning, Jepson had his weapons ready and beyond them the Count could see Tarragon pacing anxiously round the precincts. He could also see Colonel Frost and Kark but these two had left the immediate defence of the Temple to their juniors and were staring out over the moors, concentrating on organising their icy army to resist the Halloween horde's assaults at the base of the Crag.
Harry was the one to close with Browning. He stepped into the breech without orders, almost eager for a fight with someone human that he could understand. The Dragon guns were abandoned. This was to be swords and shields only.
"We've coome to evict you," Harry said nastily. "The Count doesn't like noo squaaters in his Temple."
It was a fierce little fight and until it was resolved time stood still for the rest of the potential combatants. Neither side could get at the other whilst the two battling warriors blocked the road, although A'lekim was making some rapid preparations and fiddling with the pack on his back.
The clash of metal on metal was interrupted only by grunts of exertion from Harry and the enemy Agent. But Browning had overestimated himself. Or rather Browning had been pushed into overestimation by Colonel Frost, who had no compunction in spending the forces he had in any way necessary to buy time. Browning was only a thug, whereas Harry, for all his apparent deliberation and lack of speed was a trained soldier. Harry knew how to feint and pretend to weakness. He knew how to lure his opponent into making mistakes and he could change pace without warning suddenly speeding up to bring his weapon to bear when his enemy least expected it. He ran Browning through with a single decisive thrust and watched him fall to the ground.
He shouldn't have watched. That was a mistake that a trained soldier ought not to make. Harry was tired by a long combination of the day's battle, the bitter cold, the quick march up the Sandy Gate road and the fight he had just ended so conclusively. He made that mistake and it was a fatal one.
Jepson was waiting right behind Browning and in the few seconds it took for Browning to expire the fat brawler stepped over the body and drove his own sword deep into Harry's chest, dispatching the Autumn Country soldier and readying himself to face the others.
"Soorry Count," Harry managed with a last gurgling hiss of breath as in his turn he slumped down to die.
The bald man was breathing heavily and there was a foul leer smeared across his face. He strode the sprawling tangle of limbs that belonged to the two dead bodies and taunted the Count and A'lekim
"Come on then. Who wants it? Who's next!"
A'lekim made a gesture of contempt but it was something else as well. It was a signal. From the back of his pack a black cloud rose and swirled angrily. It was the swarm of tiny insect sinukas. They had been bounced unhappily around all day though the heart of the battle, kept in their hive on A'lekim's back only by the fierce discipline of scent. They were cold but the cold had not made them torpid, it had made them angry. Now they had a chance to vent their anger.
"My little equalisers," A'lekim smiled grimly. "Go get 'em boys and girls!"
The cloud hesitated only for a moment and then it went forth in the direction of the Temple looking for anything that wasn't wearing protective pheromones. A substantial portion of the cloud fastened on Jepson and begin to sting.
The fat man squealed and maddened with rage he clutched his face and stumbled over the bodies coming directly at A'lekim and waving his sword like an enraged wild boar. A'lekim was ready for this. He had a slim foil which he whipped quickly out of its sheath. He made no mistakes, quick and clean with blade as he side stepped the onrushing thug. Seconds later, Jepson had joined his companion in death and the musician, only now shaking slightly with the release of tension was withdrawing his blood soaked weapon from the body.
The way was open for the last two Autumn Country warriors to enter the Temple.
The sinukas struck fiercely and without warning. As the Count and A'lekim stepped into the Temple precincts they had already begun to sting Kark and Tarragon. Colonel Frost, they avoided. The deadly degree of cold which radiated from his body deterred them and sent them in search of other victims.
Kark and Tarragon fled, running for their lives into the Temple and beating frantically at the vicious insects. The Colonel turned to face the intruders, his own concentration on the battle below the Crag now disturbed. Instinctively, he unleashed a white bolt of cold from his fingers straight at A'lekim's chest. The musician never stood a chance. This wasn't like an attack from one of the ice warriors. It didn't just paralyse, wound or cauterise, it was a whole lot colder than that. A'lekim had no time to feel pain. The blood went solid in his veins and his heart ruptured. He froze rigid, where he stood, an icy statue striding forever into nothingness.
The Count rushed forward. He dropped his sword and brought his Dragon gun to bear again. He fired. A wave of intense flame burst around the white suited figure. It divided before it met him to flow around the far side and leave him unharmed. In the middle of the flames, Colonel Frost grinned.
"Count Arcturus, I presume. How nice to meet you. I had hoped you would show me a little more respect, though. I am the field commander of the army of Winter. You can't defeat me with the same weapons you use on my ice warriors."
The flames died and Colonel Frost raised his hand again. The Count hastily brought his shield to bear, bringing it squarely round between them. The bolt struck the shield full on and even behind it, the Count felt an agonising wave of cold. The front of the shield was instantly coated with ice, a thick layer which suddenly fell to the ground and shattered loudly. To the Count's amazement the shield itself had survived the attack and he was still alive. The Colonel frowned.
"Let's fight," he said.
Down below on the moor, the ice captains wavered. Suddenly deprived of the guiding intelligence of their Colonel and of Kark they were thrown back on their own limited capabilities. They struggled to group together but they had no means of communicating at any level above a few small cadres. They fell apart rapidly and the ruthless monsters of Autumn cut them up, shattered them, melted them and vaporised them, savouring their vengeance with malicious glee.
On the steps of the Temple, Tarragon stood his ground for a moment. Only three or four of the little attacking insects had kept pace with his rapid flight and were still inflicting their painful stings. He had a precious few seconds of relative calm before the chasing cloud that marked the ominous bulk of the swarm caught up with him. He scrabbled around inside his cloak, breathing heavily. He was an old man. He shouldn’t have to endure this kind of attack! He found what he was looking for. A tiny glass phial of a silver liquid. He crushed it quickly between his thumb and forefinger and a thick fog of warm black smoke erupted into the glacial air. The sinukas hesitated and backed off, buzzing angrily around the outside of the billowing smog. Tarragon gasped for air and coughed horribly. It wasn't just the sinukas who found the scent of this smoke repulsive. Still, it did seem to prevent them from stinging him and he had to be grateful for that. As an improvised defence it was the best he could come up with. He climbed cautiously towards the Temple, taking care to keep the phial close and his own body in the middle of the fog.
There was a frantic pounding of feet and Kark joined him on the steps. The Agent had seen Tarragon's actions and guessed their intent even as he had been harried by his own sinukas and sought desperately for some form of escape.
"Nice work, old man," Kark said grudgingly. He stuck his own head deep into the noxious vapours of black smoke and was already feeling the mixed blessing of relief from the insect stings at the price of distressed breathing which resulted from the poisonous fumes.
"There's a better way," Tarragon coughed. "We can kill them if we can get to the door way. I just need a few moments to prepare."
They shuffled carefully up the remaining steps, almost choking and constantly aware of the furious nemesis which hung around their heads.
In the door way, they stopped, letting the black fumes gather strength around them and block the insects entry into the Temple. Now Tarragon fumbled in his capacious pockets once again. This time he produced a packet of fine red powder.
"What are you doing old man?" Kark husked anxiously. "Whatever it is, hurry up! I can't stand this stuff much longer!"
"Shut up!" Tarragon said. He hated Kark for the casual way the Agent had thrown away the Recorder Token. Ignorant brute! For now though, they were comrades in adversity. Tarragon feared that he might need Kark in case Count Arcturus ever caught up with him. Unbelievably his former boss had somehow fought his way through the ice warriors and up to the Temple. All being well, Colonel Frost should be able to deal with Count Arcturus but Tarragon wasn't confident any more.
The Count had summoned the Halloween horde, after all! The idiot! It was a lot easier to stir the horde up than it was to pacify them when you no longer required their services. They weren't like some dog, you could send for from the kennels, set on your enemies and then pat it on the head and send it back to sleep again. Oh no. Once the horde was out, they were usually out until they decided to go back and not before. Tarragon had never expected that the Count would dare to summon the horde. He was frightened.
With trembling fingers Tarragon coated the powder carefully round the door jamb and in a line on the floor to seal the threshold. He struck a match and set it to the powder which burned quickly all the way round the open rectangle of air before sputtering out. Tarragon nodded in satisfaction. He applied a second yellow paste and this time, touched the line with a single drop of blue liquid from another of the many phials of chemicals that he always carried. Tarragon was a walking laboratory. All at once a pearl white glow filled the space in the doorway.
Tarragon dropped the smoke generating phial, grabbed Kark by the arm and dragged them both back from the door, leaving the black smoke and the strange pearl glow to ward it. The sinukas saw that their prey had come out into the open and that if they could break through the fog they would have them at their mercy again. The swarm gathered its strength and swirled impatiently for a few seconds then surged though the doorway. Every insect that passed though the pearl field died instantly. There was a short rainfall of black and coloured winged bodies and then silence.
Kark breathed deeply. He laughed with relief.
"Well that's taken care of them!"
"I wouldn't laugh so loudly if I were you," Tarragon said. "The wretched sinukas aren't exactly our only problem, you know. Half the hell spawn of the Realm is out there after our blood and I hadn't finished setting even a token ward when we were so rudely interrupted."
"Can you ward the Temple?" Kark asked.
"No", Tarragon answered emphatically. "I already told Colonel Frost that. The forces outside are too strong for normal wardings."
"Well have a go anyway," Kark said. "I think we'll leave Colonel Frost to sort out Count Arcturus, don't you? I say we sit tight now and wait for the Proton King to come and rescue us. In the mean time there is some other business I can take care of…"
Tarragon began to wander listlessly round the inside of the Temple making half hearted attempts to seal the building against spiritual invasion. He finally slumped down behind the black altar at the Broken Gate. He was tired and it was getting desperate. If the Proton King didn’t get here soon, the whole invasion force would be utterly routed.
Kark was thinking out his 'other business'. With that precious Sunanon out of the way he was going to do what should have been done all along. It was time to dispose of the prisoners. When Sunanon got back it could all be explained as part of the inevitable fog of war. If he didn’t like it, too bad.
