Discworld and Member Articles
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Written by TheJackal
Monday, 29 August 2005 |
If Ron had been anxious before about leaving, then now he was positively tetchy. In truth, you would need a new word to describe how he was feeling, one that took in the emotions of nervousness, impatience, anxiety and anger.
At first Brother Ron Stevens thought his eyes were deceiving him, but they weren’t. Ten seconds after Pre and Nemoy had left them, Gee was not following suit and getting as far away from Sleepy Falls as his old legs could carry him. Instead, he was doing what any insane individual would do: boiling the kettle.
‘What the hell are you doing?’ shouted Ron.
‘Boiling the kettle, lad,’ replied Gee simply.
‘But we have got to get out of here!’
‘We’ve loads of time yet,’ said Brother Kalem, sitting down. ‘Well, minutes anyways.’
What were they playing at? thought Ron. One might go as far as thinking that they wanted to be caught! Ron felt like having a cry out of frustration. Instead, he banged his fists on the table, with the resulting vibration knocking off a cup in the process. The flying cup duly broke as gravity had its fun. Bending low to retrieve the bigger shards of glass, Ron realised that broken china was at the bottom of his troubles, for his eyes caught sight of the person he feared the second most in the whole world: Brother Salem Troy.
Oh Gods, we’re dead now, thought Ron.
Kalem stood up quickly when they saw the figure standing in the kitchen doorway. Gee remained seated.
‘Please, do not get up on my account,’ said Troy.
‘Wasn’t going to,’ said Gee unfazed.
‘That is your right, of course, being retired from the Order.’
Troy observed the room’s inhabitants. He was only slight surprised to see Brother Kalem Asphalt, whom he knew to be a close friend of Gilbert ‘Gee’ Adams. The latter of whom, was sitting up straight, his gaze fixed on Troy. Lastly, he looked at Ron Stevens, who seemed to be the only one shocked by Troy’s presence. They must not have told Ron he was coming, which rather amused him.
‘You got my note, then?’ asked Gee.
‘Yes,’ replied the Brother Reverent. ‘That is why you are not being tied up as we speak. I hope you don’t mind, but I brought along some company.’
Two men stepped out from the shadows behind the door. Each had offensive looking weapons, the kind which suggested that any clumsy movements would not be a good idea.
‘Merely a precaution, but I’d hate to have any funny business.’
Troy knew there would not be any. If Gee and the others wanted to be away from here, they would have left long ago, never dreaming of a confrontation with him.
‘I thought the news would grab your interest alright,’ said Gee. ‘It certainly caught mine earlier today.’
‘What note?’ asked Ron oblivious to Troy’s meaning. ‘What news?’
‘Then you believe it to be true?’ asked Brother Troy, ignoring Ron. ‘You see, I’m rather of the opinion that you are wrong. I mean, who has ever heard of power being sent from a dead man into a live one? Dead men have no power; that is why they are dead!’
‘You would be foolish to think so,’ spoke Kalem for the first time since the Brother Reverent’s arrival. ‘You see, I got it from a very good source.’
‘And who would that be, then?’ asked Troy.
Kalem recounted to him what he had got out of the snivelling coward of a man, Brother Smeer. By the time he was finished, Troy was a reluctant believer.
‘I did always wondered why Master Rubeus had given Smeer such a high-ranking position. He must have wanted him close at hand, to stop Smeer shooting his mouth off.’ Troy smiled at this point. ‘I guess that was one thing he failed at anyway.’
Ron was standing in absolute silence. But whereas his body was still, his mind was sprinting to wild conclusions: Gee had communicated with the enemy. Via a note! This meant he must have told Troy about the secret entrance. Kalem was in on it too, and that explained why neither of them had been in a hurry to leave.
‘You realise then, that we need to take action,’ continued Gee. ‘We cannot afford to let Grand Master Rubeus become more powerful. He’s already unstoppable.’
‘Oh no, I would not say unstoppable. He seems pretty invincible but he has his weaknesses.’ Whilst Troy had just said this out loud, for the life of him, he could not think what those weaknesses were. And it would be his life on the line if he could not think of them quickly and how to exploit them.
‘Well first up, we need to make sure the Grand Master does not get his hands on Nemoy. I’ve seen to that, for the moment at least.’
‘Er, that could actually be a problem,’ said Troy guiltily.
‘Why, what did you do?’ asked Gee, rising from his chair.
‘Well, I saw Nemoy and another fellow come out of the tunnel and take off in a carriage. Told my men to capture them when they got down the road a bit and bring Nemoy straight to Rubeus.’
‘What?’ shouted Gee angrily. ‘But my note explained things.’
‘That’s my job! Until just now, anyway. I got your note but it didn’t mean much at the time. You could have been lying or something; all seemed a bit far fetched.’
‘Oh damn, oh damn,’ said Ron. ‘We’re all going to die.’
‘Shut up,’ said Kalem.
‘Yes, we need clear heads. We’re only dead if we panic. What we need now,’ said Gee, ‘is a damn good plan.’
The carriage was moving fast now through the countryside, with the driver, urging the horses on. A crack of the whip ensured they sped up to meet an oncoming incline head on.
Goodbyes had been short before leaving the three Brothers. Now it was only Nemoy and Pre Wexley. The idea was that nobody would be expecting Nemoy to be travelling in a posh coach, with his very own driver at the helm. Hopefully, if the enemy spotted the vehicle, they would think it to be a rich nob, and not their man.
Back inside the carriage, Nemoy was still rather stunned. You didn’t find out every day that you were immortal, and needless to say, it had come as quite a shock. It all seemed so unreal, yet Nemoy couldn’t help feeling that he should have known the truth all along. After all, he probably should have died when he was stabbed in the tavern, and he definitely shouldn’t have survived falling off the cliff.
A ferocious jolt caught Nemoy off guard and shot him forward in the carriage. Nemoy instinctively shot his arms out in front of him to help cushion the impact somewhat. It took Nemoy a few seconds to grasp what had happened. The driver had stopped very suddenly. Something was wrong. Nemoy slowly got to his feet, opened the door of the carriage, and cautiously popped his head out to investigate.
This was not a good idea.
For the second time today, Nemoy was struck over the head, this time with a wooden club. He fell swiftly forward, out onto the muddy ground. A second strike finished the job and knocked Nemoy into the land of dreams and nightmares.
Pre Wexley had known of the possible dangers which his job might entail tonight. Gee had contacted him out of the blue, in need of urgent help. Pre was never the one to let a friend down, especially such an old, dear buddy like Gee, a fellow retiree from the Order.
Pre’s mission was simple: drive his carriage like a demon out of hell and get Nemoy to safety. Under no circumstances was Pre to stop on the way. Obstacles were to be avoided; stragglers on the road run over if needed be.
Gee had absolutely not pointed out what to do if you suddenly found yourself surrounded by forty or so men, each carrying crossbows and other offensive looking armaments. Pre would definitely have remembered if Gee had mentioned this possibility.
It was immediately apparent to Pre that things were not going to smoothly. First off, Gee was sure he had seen Brother Salem Troy as just after leaving the area where the secret tunnel was located. Pre had heard of how smart a leader Troy was, and why consequently he was Grand Master Rubeus’ number one man for important tasks.
Not to be outdone by forty men who meant business, Pre gallantly tried to break through the blockade. He urged his four horses forward, trying to gain some speed. But the poor animals were going berserk with fear. It was impossible to control them into making a cohered, forward movement.
Pre took out one of the assailants with a crossbow that he always kept handy by his feet. But there were too many. Far too many.
Pre had gone to meet his maker after three blows to the chest. Falling hard from the driver’s seat, he rolled into some long grass at the roadside and lay dying. It turned out that Pre’s maker could not make his appointment just then, as he was out, so Pre left a message saying he was in some considerable pain and would bloody well appreciate if the guy hurried up.
An hour later, Pre regained consciousness. On one hand, he was lucky to be alive; on the other, the extreme pain in his chest did not leave Pre with a lasting sense of joy. Blood was starting to congeal around his wound and Pre thought it better to leave the offending arrows in his midriff for the time being. He did not want his life fluid spraying all over the place; wherever this place was.
He must have been more than three kilometres from Gee’s home. It may as well have been a hundred for Pre was in no condition to make the journey. That being said, life is full of things we do not want to do, so Pre just got on with it. Staggered step by staggered step, Pre inched his way back to Gee to tell him what had happened.
He could never have known that Gee was already privy to that information.
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