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chapter-9-spewing-the-bitter-poison

The Fowl Estate

Opal stood on the edge of the collapsed tunnel feeling mildly thwarted but not in the least downhearted. After all, she was a veritable dynamo of black magic for the time being, and Artemis Fowl was buried beneath a ton of rubble—if not dead, then certainly disheveled, which would vex the Mud Boy almost as much.

Whether he was dead or not, the plan remained the same.

Oro kneeled and picked up Holly’s weapon from the crumbled clay. “What is this, mistress?” Opal held the handgun cupped in her tiny hands and communicated with its energy until the energy agreed to transfer itself across to her person. It was undramatic to watch—the weapon simply exhaled and crumpled.

“I must open the second lock,” she said to Oro, refreshed by this morsel of power. “I have until morning. Then my magic will evaporate with the dawn dew, and I will be left defenseless.” “The second lock?” said Oro, Beckett’s vocal cords mangling the Gnommish. “Are you certain, mistress?” “Queen,” corrected Opal. “You will refer to me as Queen Opal. By opening the first lock of the Berserker Gate, I have bonded you to me. But I would prefer that you referred to me as little as possible, as your silly human voice box irritates me. And stop scowling. The expression looks ridiculous on your little boy face. Mommy is tempted to spank you.” “But the second lock?” persisted Oro. “That will unleash the power of Danu.” “Firstly, what did I just say about referring to me? Secondly, take a peek inside the brain of your human. A little Danu wave is the best thing for this planet.” Oro seemed puzzled, but his bonds forbade him to argue, and Opal knew that even if the Berserker could argue, his points would be presented in turgid Middle Ages prose with simplistic logic.

“Let me speak to the human boy,” she said, reasoning that a Fowl child, however young, would appreciate what she had accomplished here. Plus it would be fun to watch a human squirm.

Oro sighed, wishing that his old friend Bruin Fadda had built a little leeway into the fairy bonds, then shuddered as he allowed his own consciousness to be subsumed temporarily by Beckett Fowl’s.

The centuries dropped from Oro’s face, and Beckett emerged shiny and smiling.

“I was dreaming,” he said. “In my dream I looked like me but with more fingers.” Opal spread her arms wide, allowing the black magic to pulse in orange cables along her limbs. “Are you not terrified, boy?” Beckett hopped monkeylike into his version of a ninja pose. “Nope. You should be terror-fied.” “Me?” said Opal, laughing. “You cannot harm me. The fairy bonds prevent it.” Beckett punched Opal in the stomach, from the shoulder like Butler had taught him.

“Oh yeah. I’m pretty fast. Faster than your stupid fairy bonds. Butler says I’m a natch-u-ral.” Opal’s breath left her in a huff and she stumbled backward, cracking her elbow on the Berserker Gate’s raised dais. Luckily for her, the fairy bonds kicked in and Oro reclaimed control of the body; otherwise four-year-old Beckett Fowl might have put an end to Opal’s world domination plans right there.

Oro rushed to help Opal up. “My queen, are you harmed?”

Opal waved her hand, unable to speak, and was forced to endure several seconds of Oro pumping her torso up and down like a bellows until her breath returned.

“Release me, you stupid elf. Are you trying to break my spine?”

Oro did as he was told. “That boy is a quick one. He beat the bonds. Not many could do that.” Opal rubbed her stomach with a magic hand, just in case there was bruising.

“Are you sure you didn’t give the boy a little help?” she said suspiciously.

“Of course not, my queen,” said Oro. “Berserkers do not help humans. Do you wish to speak with the boy again?” “No!” Opal squeaked, then regained her composure. “I mean…no. The boy has served his purpose. We must move ahead with the plan.” Oro knelt, scooping a handful of loose earth. “We should at least give chase to our attackers. The elf has battle skills; the big human is also a formidable warrior. They will most definitely attempt sabotage.” Opal was prepared to concede this point. “Very well, tiresome elf. Send your craftiest lieutenant with a few soldiers. Make sure to include the other boy in your party. Fowl may be reluctant to kill his own brother.” Opal blew through her lips, a small action that made it abundantly clear that she herself would not hesitate to kill any family member were she in Fowl’s position. In fact, she would see any hesitation to hack down a sibling as a lack of commitment to the plan.

After all, she thought, did I not personally have myself killed to escape prison?

But fairies were weak, and humans were weaker. Perhaps Fowl would hold back for the second it took for his little brother to plant a dagger in his side.

“Do not waste too much time or resources. I want a circle of Berserker steel behind me while I work on the second lock. There are complex enchantments to unravel.” Oro stood, closing his eyes for a second to enjoy the breeze on his face. From beyond the walls he could hear the crackle of enormous flames, and when he opened his eyes the smolder of distant destruction licked the night clouds.

“We are eager but few, my queen. Shall there be more enemies on the way?” Opal made a sound that was almost a cackle. “Not until morning. My enemies are experiencing certain difficulties. Mommy saw to that.” The part of Oro’s mind that was still his own and not in thrall to a glowing orange pixie thought: It is unseemly that she refers to herself as our mother. She is mocking us.

But such is the strength of fairy geasa, or bonds, that even this rebellious thought caused the Berserker captain physical pain.

Opal noticed his wince. “What are you thinking, Captain? Nothing seditious, I hope?” “No, my queen,” said Oro. “This puny body is unable to contain my bloodlust.” This lie cost him another twinge, but he was ready for it and bore it without reaction.

Opal frowned. That one had ideas of his own, but no matter. Oro’s energy was already fading. The Berserkers would barely last the night, and by then the second lock would be open and the Koboi era would truly begin.

“Go, then,” she snapped. “Choose a hunting party, but your duty is to protect the gate. I have arranged for the humans to be occupied for the moment, but once the sun rises they will come in a wave of destruction to destroy the last of our kind.” Opal decided to go all Gothic, so Oro would get the point. “Without mercy in their cold merciless hearts they shall come unto us.” This kind of talk seemed to penetrate, and Oro stamped away to pick his hunting party.

The entire situation was, Opal had to admit to herself, absolutely perfect. The Berserkers would guard the perimeter, pitiful in their mistaken belief that their big gloomy gate actually led somewhere. And then they would simply evaporate into the afterlife, unaware of the unnecessary genocide they had helped to commit.

Ghosts make such unreliable tribunal witnesses, Opal thought, smirking.

But as enjoyable as self-congratulatory smirking might be, there was actual work to be done that required the entirety of her intellect. The lock remained locked, and she could only hold on to the black magic for so long before it consumed her physical body. Already she could feel blisters rising between her shoulder blades. The magic would leave her soon, but before then it would wreak havoc on her system.

Her power healed the blisters as soon as they rose, but that cost her magic, and the blisters came back anyway.

Why can’t I solve this problem by killing someone? she thought petulantly, then comforted herself with the mantra that had kept her going in prison: “Soon all the humans will be dead,” she said, droning in the time-honored fashion of gurus everywhere. “And then Opal will be loved.” And even if I’m not loved, she thought, at least all the humans will be dead.

Oro stumped on little legs down the age-old steps that ran around the Berserker Gate and for a moment remembered clearly the day when he had helped construct this squat tower. There had been more magic involved than heavy lifting, though. Old Bruin Fadda had his team pouring every spark of power they could get their hands on into the lock. A big circle of warlocks hurling lightning bolts into the stone.

Whoever opens this gate will get more than they bargained for, Bruin had promised later that week, even as Oro and his men lay dying. Bruin had been wrong. Queen Opal got exactly what she had been expecting.

How did she know? Oro wondered. I was almost certain that the world had forgotten us.

The Berserkers were bristling with repressed violence and anxious to inflict damage on humankind. They tried to stand still as Oro addressed them, but it was a struggle, especially for the pirates who were unable to stop their exposed bones from rattling.

Oro stood on a tree stump so that the small body he occupied could be seen by all, and held his fist aloft for silence.

“My warriors!” he shouted over the ranks. “Our day has finally come!”

This was met with a chorus of yells, whoops, barks, and whistles as the various creatures inhabited by the Berserkers voiced their approval. Oro could not hide a wince. These were not the warriors he remembered, who fought and suffered mortal wounds on the Plains of Taillte, but they were what they were, and the will to fight was there, if not the ability. There were foxes in their ranks, for Danu’s sake. How was a fox supposed to heft a sword? Still, better to get his warriors’ blood going with some rhetoric. Oro had always been proud of his speechifying.

“We will drink the bitter poison of our defeat and spew it at our enemies!” he shouted, his voice carrying across the meadow.

His warriors cheered, roared, and howled their approval, except for one.

“Pardon?” said his lieutenant, Gobdaw.

“What?” said Oro.

The lieutenant, who lurked inside the body of the second Mud Boy, wore a puzzled expression on his pasty face. In truth, puzzlement of any kind was new for Gobdaw. He was usually an ask no questions kind of fairy who did his talking with an ax. Generally, Gobdaw loved a nice bit of rhetoric.

“Well, Oro,” said Gobdaw, seeming a little surprised by the words coming out of his mouth, “what does that mean, exactly? Spewing the bitter poison of our defeat at our enemies?” This question took Oro by surprise. “Well, it simply means…”

“Because if you don’t mind my saying, using the word defeat in a motivational speech sends a little bit of a mixed message.” Now it was Oro’s turn to be perplexed. “Motivational? Mixed message? What do these terms even mean?” Gobdaw looked as though he might cry. “I don’t know, Captain. It’s my human host. He’s a strong one.” “Pull yourself together, Gobdaw. You have always appreciated my rhetoric.” “I did. I do, Captain. The young one refuses to be silenced.”

Oro decided to distract Gobdaw with duty. “You have the honor of leading the search for enemies. Take the hounds, Bellico, and those mariners too. Everybody else, surround the gate. Queen Opal labors at the second lock. Understood?” “Yes, Captain,” roared Gobdaw, shaking his fist. “As you command.”

Oro nodded. That was more like it.

Gobdaw, Bellico, and the Fowl hunting hounds circled the collapsed tunnel. Bellico was feeling pretty good about herself, encased as she was in the body of Juliet Butler. This was a better host than she could have hoped for; an excellent physical specimen equipped with the knowledge of several ancient fighting styles, which, thanks to Juliet’s memories, she knew how to put into practice very well indeed.

Bellico checked her reflection in the blade of a pirate’s knife and was pleased with what she saw.

Not too ugly, for a human. It is almost a pity my life force will sustain me no more than a single night. Perhaps if we had been called upon within fifty years of being laid in the ground, then the magic could have sustained us for longer, but now our spirits are weakened by time. The spell was not constructed to keep us earthbound for this long.

Bellico’s memory contained images that painted an ugly picture of Opal Koboi, but she had been warned that human visions of the fairy folk were unreliable. Such was the Mud Men’s hatred of the People that even their memories would be skewed.

The pirates were less pleased with their inherited corpses, which disintegrated even as they walked.

“It’s costing me all my magic just holding this skin sack of maggots together,” complained the one-time warrior giant Salton Finnacre, who inhabited the body of Eusebius Fowl the lung-sucking pirate.

“At least you’ve got legs,” grumbled his battle partner J’Heez Nunyon, who hobbled along on a pair of wooden stumps. “How am I supposed to do my signature dervish move on these things? I’m gonna look like a bleepin’ drunk dwarf falling over.” It was worse for the English pointer hounds, who could only form the most rudimentary sounds with their vocal cords.

“Fowl,” barked one, being very familiar with Artemis’s scent. “Fowl. Fowl.” “Good boy,” said Gobdaw, reaching up to pat the hound’s head with Myles’s little hand, which the dog did not think was very funny at all and would have bitten it had it not belonged to a superior officer.

Gobdaw called to his soldiers, “Warriors. Our noble brothers inside these beasts have picked up a trail. Our mission is to find the humans.” No one asked, What then? Everybody knew what you did to humans when you found them. Because if you didn’t do it to them, they would do it to you, and your entire species, and probably anyone your species had ever shared a flagon of beer with.

“And the elf?” asked Bellico. “What of her?”

“The elf made her choice,” said Gobdaw. “If she steps aside, then we let her live. If she stands her ground, then she becomes as a Mud Person to us.” Sweat rolled down Gobdaw’s brow though the night was growing cool, and he spoke through clenched teeth, trying to hold back Myles Fowl’s consciousness, which bubbled up inside him like mental indigestion.

This exchange was cut short when the English pointers streaked away from the collapsed tunnel mouth and across the meadow toward the large human dwelling that crested the hill.

“Ah,” said Bellico, taking off after the dogs. “The humans are in the stone temple.” Gobdaw tried to stop himself from talking but failed. “He says to tell you that it’s called a manor. And that all girls are stupid.” Artemis, Holly, and Butler squirmed along a tunnel that Mulch had assured them would emerge in the wine cellar behind a rack of Château Margaux 1995.

Artemis was horrified by this revelation. “Don’t you know that your tunnel could affect the temperature of the cellar? Not to mention the humidity? That wine is an investment.” “Don’t worry about the wine, silly Mud Boy,” said Mulch in a very patronizing tone that he had developed and practiced simply to annoy Artemis. “I drank that months ago and replaced it. It was the only responsible thing to do—after all, the cellar’s integrity had been compromised.” “Yes, by you!” Artemis frowned. “Replaced it with what?”

“Do you really want to know?” the dwarf asked, and Artemis shook his head, deciding that, given the dwarf’s history, in this particular case ignorance would be less disturbing than the truth.

“Wise decision,” said Mulch. “So, to continue. The tunnel runs to the back of the cellar, but the wall is plugged.” “Plugged with what?” asked Artemis, who could be a bit slow in spite of his genius.

The dwarf finger-combed his beard. “I refer you to my last question: Do you really want to know?” “Can we break through?” asked Butler, the pragmatist.

“Oh yes,” said Mulch. “A big strong human like you. No problem. I’d do it for you, but apparently I have this other mission.” Holly looked up from her wrist computer, which still wasn’t picking up a signal. “We need you to get the weapons in the shuttle, Mulch. Butler has some kit in the house, but Juliet could already be leading the Berserkers there. We need to move fast and on two fronts. A pincer movement.” Mulch sighed. “Pincer. I love crab. And lobster. Makes me a little gassy, but it’s worth it.” Holly slapped her knees. “Time to go,” she said.

Neither of the humans argued.

Mulch watched his friends climb into the manor tunnel and then turned back the way they had come, toward the shuttle.

I don’t like retracing my steps, he thought. Because there’s usually someone chasing after me.

So now here they were, wriggling along a claustrophobic tunnel with the heavy smell of earth in their noses and the ever-present threat of untold tonnage looming above them like a giant anvil.

Holly knew what everyone was thinking. “This tunnel is sound. Mulch is the best digger in the business,” she said between grunts and breaths.

The tunnel meandered, and their only light was from a cell phone taped to Butler’s forehead. Artemis had this sudden vision of the three of them stuck in there forever, like rodents in the belly of a snake, being slowly digested until not a trace remained.

No one will ever know what happened to us.

This was a redundant thought, Artemis knew, because if they didn’t get out of this tunnel, then in all likelihood there would be no one left to wonder what had become of their small group. And he would never know if he had failed to save his parents or if they had already been killed somehow in London.

Nevertheless, Artemis could not shake the notion that they were about to die in this vast unmarked grave, and it grew stronger with every grasping reach of his hand that drew him farther into the earth.

Artemis reached forward once more in the blackness and his scrabbling fingers met Butler’s boot.

“I think we made it,” said the bodyguard. “We’ve reached the blockage.”

“Is the blockage solid?” called Holly from the rear.

There followed a series of noises that would not sound out of place in a jelly factory, and a smell that would be totally consistent with a burst sewage pipe.

Butler coughed several times, swore at length, then said a line heavy with dreadful implication. “Only the crust is solid.” They tumbled through the hole onto a fallen rack of broken wine bottles, which had been knocked over by Butler’s hurried entry. Usually he would have inched his way through the entrance, moving the rack bit by bit, but in this case speed was more important than stealth, and so he simply crashed through Mulch’s tunnel plug and into the cellar beyond. The other two quickly followed, happy to escape the confines of the tunnel.

Artemis sniffed the liquid pooling in concave curves of broken bottle fragments. “That is most definitely not Château Margaux 1995,” he commented.

“It’s not even snake wine,” said Butler, brushing himself off. “Although I know a few mercenaries who would probably drink it.” Holly hiked up the tall seventeenth-century stone cellar steps, then pressed her ear to the door.

“I can’t hear anything,” she said after a moment. “Wind from outside, that’s all.” Butler pulled Artemis from the rack wreckage. “Let’s keep going, Artemis. We need to get to my weapons before it occurs to Juliet’s passenger.” Holly opened the door a crack and peeped through. Halfway down a corridor was a bunch of pirates armed with automatic weapons. They stood absolutely still, probably in an attempt to stop their bones from rattling.

Butler crept up behind her.

“How are we doing?” he asked.

Holly held her breath as she closed the door.

“Not great,” she said.

They squatted behind a rack of 1990s California reds and spoke in urgent whispers.

“What do we have?” asked Artemis.

Butler held up his fists. “I’ve got these. That’s it.”

Holly searched the pockets of her jumpsuit. “Some plasti-cuffs. A couple of flares. Not much of an inventory.” Artemis touched the tip of each finger against the pad of his thumb, one of his focusing exercises. “We have something else,” he said. “We have the house.”