R.B. Ashton
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Enter the Nidings: Chapter 13
🕑 Added 2021-10-18 10:01:01 +0000 UTC***Part 13 of 17. The team are captured by the cruel Queen Serin, where their only hope of leaving may be when she chooses to eat them...***
“I told you where they were,” Harper shouted desperately, held by the waist before the thundress queen’s face. “Put me down!”
Her struggling only amused Serin, who replied with a faint smile, “Yes. You betrayed your friends. What else do you have to say?”
“If I talk, you won’t hurt me?” Harper bargained.
Arabel edged back in the chest, watching tensely. Grawn came to her side, expression mirroring her own hopelessness. The walls of their wooden prison were twenty feet high, and any movement they made would be seen by the looming giantess. She put a hand down to her pocket, feeling inside for Eko. Eko pushed back, letting her know she was there, alive at least. Staying hidden.
“It wasn’t the king that sent us, if that matters,” Harper was saying. “It was Baron Ratcel, trying to curry favour. The king might pay your ransom yet. You let me go, I can take a message back –”
“That’s enough,” Serin said, disinterested. “It doesn’t matter where you came from. It was a mistake to think humans could show respect and it would be a mistake to listen to someone who would so quickly betray her friends.”
“What?” Harper exclaimed. “I’m telling the truth, listen to me!”
Serin ignored her, though, looking down at her other captives thoughtfully, and Harper renewed her struggles in the giant fingers. The thief’s top slipped open, and the tiny lady in a pink dress broke desperately free to climb up Harper’s lapel. Harper flinched and snarled at her, unnoticed by Serin, whose daunting gaze studied Arabel, Grawn and Caracae. The queen lifted Harper closer to her face, under her nose, and the pink-dressed woman kicked and scratched up Harper’s cheek. The thief struggled to swat at her, snapping, “No – get off – you bitch!”
Serin took a deep sniff of her captive and the tiny lady was pulled off Harper with a cry – inhaled straight into the queen’s nostril. The woman was sucked to the back of Serin’s throat, making the queen flinch with surprise. She swallowed and frowned at the thief. Harper stared back in shock.
“I should know better,” Serin grumbled. “Dirty little things.”
“I – you –” Harper replied nonsensically, stunned by seeing her own little captive sucked into the giantess’s nose. She barely got her senses back to scream as Serin opened her mouth and tossed the thief in. Arabel cringed at the sight of Harper kicking as she landed on the monster’s tongue – trying to turn back, but gone in an instant as the thundress’s lips closed. The queen savoured her mouthful for just a moment, then swallowed, with the little bulge descending her throat the last anyone would see of Harper. Arabel caught her breath, horrified, as Serin leant in closer, a hand on the edge of the chest, and smiled down at them.
“Mm,” Serin said, “perhaps just one more.”
Her eyes were already fixed on Arabel, and the others in the chest knew it, all moving deeper into their respective corners. Serin’s huge hand came down into the chest, fingers spreading, and Arabel flattened herself against the rear wall, throwing quick looks side to side, nowhere to run. Grawn jumped in front of her, saying, “Miss, get down –”
But Serin’s hand flicked to the side, no more effort than brushing off a fly, and sent him rolling across the floor. The distraction gave Arabel only enough time to crouch and raise one hand as she used the other to pull Eko from her pocket and drop her, to at least save the huntress. The queen’s finger knocked her clear of the wall, to stumble into the tip of the thumb. Serin’s index finger clamped on her shoulder and Arabel was lifted. She kicked her legs, crying out, reaching for Grawn or one of the others or anything – nothing but empty space in grasp. Failing that, she shot a hand back to hold her glasses in place. She was lifted higher, clear of the box, up to the giantess’s face, and was inspected for a moment before Serin rested back and opened her mouth hugely.
It was a cavern that could take three people whole, and Arabel could see right past the boulders of teeth and the enormous tongue into Serin’s throat – a living, wet tunnel whose sides pulsed with anticipation of her arrival. Arabel clutched the thumb on her chest, crying out, “No, please! Don’t eat me!”
The queen slowed down, the corners of her open mouth tightening slightly with amusement, but she continued lowering Arabel. The air was hot and damp where Arabel’s feet dropped between Serin’s lips.
“Wait, wait!” Arabel shrieked. “I have authority to negotiate! From the king himself! I have an offer!”
Serin paused, with Arabel still precariously above the pit of her mouth. The queen’s huge eyes rested on her expectantly and Arabel cleared her throat to go on.
“The King sent us,” she said quickly. “I won’t lie to you – our first objective was to rescue the princess, unseen. But if that failed, I have permission to offer you something in return for our safe release. Not the Clear Valley territories.” The lies came quickly and easily, somehow, as if Arabel’s instincts knew exactly what this crisis required. There was no sense making outrageous claims, it had to be believable. “But there’s a way we can both be satisfied. He may give you free access to the frontier lands, if not dominion. More importantly, we have the Rake Stone. It is a very valuable artefact, I’m sure you’re aware of it.”
Serin’s eyes narrowed, suspiciously. Thankfully, someone in the chest made a hushed comment – one of the princess’s men, shocked at what Arabel was suggesting. It made the queen close her mouth and look down, convinced this was worth listening to.
“Please at least consider it,” Arabel said. “This is something that could benefit everyone here, and I understood that the Thundress Tribe worked as a community. You should at least discuss it with your lieutenants. If that’s true.”
Serin gave Arabel a sideways look and she feared for a moment she’d pushed too far. But the amusement came back to the queen’s eye, as she asked, “And who are you, to make such claims?”
“Arabel – Arabel Sloane,” Arabel stuttered. “No one really. A scholar of Burgwec University. I’ve studied your people for years. Of course, if I’m mistaken, correct me. I’m at your mercy.”
“Indeed you are,” Serin said. She looked into the box again, then down to her breasts, and the cage, where Arabel saw the princess was looking up at her, with hope. Finally, Serin sighed. “I suppose I am quite full already. I can take a walk and, as you say, discuss this. We can continue this when I get back.”
Arabel held in her relief, knowing a continuation could as easily mean her being eaten as talked to. But the queen lowered her into the chest and released her, a little above the floor, so she tripped and tumbled.
“Rest well, Arabel Sloane,” Serin advised.
As Grawn hurried to Arabel’s side, the great lid of the chest came down on them, cutting off all light. Grawn helped her up to her haunches as the thundress walked loudly out of the room.
There was a snap and a spark of light, then a warm yellow glow came from one corner. One of the other captives, a long-haired man in royal livery, held up an oil lantern as he walked towards them. The others converged, too; a stocky man with short grey hair and a woman in a rough dress, a peasant.
“Is this all of you?” the man with the lantern asked. “The whole rescue operation? Captured?”
“All but one,” Grawn said. “We had a monster hunter, but she’s very small.”
Arabel quickly tried to regain her composure. A moment away from being eaten. She couldn’t get the image of that waiting throat out of her mind. A living tunnel, incredible in its size, if terrifying in where it led.
“I’m Fell,” the man with the lantern said. “This is Vunce and Lier.” He gestured respectively to the grey-haired man, who crouched over Caracae, and the woman.
“Magic-nullifier,” Vunce commented, rattling the chain around Caracae. “Any of you got a pick? Hairpin?”
Arabel patted herself as Grawn shook his head. Harper would’ve been able to open the lock. But maybe one of her buttons would work? Her belt buckle? Too thick.
As Vunce jangled the chain, Caracae stirred and pushed up with a dazed groan. She pushed him back suddenly, and squinted at the light, then at each of the people near her. She growled, “You were all captured?” But she recognised who was missing. “The thief?”
“Eaten,” Grawn said.
Arabel winced at how simply the knight put it. Caracae merely huffed, pushing up to her feet. She looked around the box and for a moment Arabel thought she might have an idea, some kind of plan. The witch said, “Well unless someone can break locks, I suppose we’re relying on the queen’s goodwill to let us out?”
“Actually,” Eko said, stepping into the light. “I think I can get that off.”
The woman, Lier, gasped and stepped back with surprise, while Fell threw Arabel a questioning frown. What the hell kind of rescue operation was this?
“Please,” Caracae said, crouching before the monster hunter. “Be my guest.”
Eko approached her warily, drawing her oversized sword. “And once you’re free?”
“I’m not sure,” Caracae looked up. “Without my power, I can’t sense how hard it will be to open this chest. Is it locked?”
“No,” Fell said. “She never locks it. Not like we have the strength to open it. Or could climb up there. Sometimes she even leaves it open.”
“Enjoys toying with us,” Vunce added. “Giving us hope. Laughing at any attempts to resist us. They’re cruel, monstrous bitches and you shouldn’t have anything to do with them.” He directed that accusingly at Arabel, angry at her attempt to negotiate.
“I was only trying to buy us time,” Arabel said, watching Eko rather than meeting the man’s eyes. He’d been through hell, for sure, and she could only imagine how it must feel to think the king might seriously negotiate with the giants that had killed his friends.
Caracae laid a hand on the floor for Eko to step into and the monster hunter did so warily. Then the witch raised her to the chain and held her by the lock. Eko peered into the hole and nodded satisfaction, then reached an arm in.
“Could you lift the lid?” Arabel asked. “Once you’re free?”
“If I get free,” Caracae said. “Yes. I think I could float us all out of here.”
“Then what?” Grawn asked. Eko huffed as she tried to manoeuvre the mechanism. “Fly home without the princess?”
“Unless you have a better idea?”
“We’re still here with a mission to complete,” the knight said, testily.
“There!” Eko said, with triumphant surprise, and the lock clicked. It split, and the chain fell away to clatter on the floor.
Caracae stood, staggering Eko in her palm, and the witch reconsidered the chest around them. Everyone watched with anticipation she started nodding. Her familiar, sly smile stretched across her face.
“You can get us out?” Arabel asked, hopefully.
Caracae’s hand closed suddenly, catching Eko in her fist, pinning her arms to her side. She held the monster hunter to her face, little legs kicking from under the fingers, and said, “I can. I just need a bite to eat, first.”
