The Barker Street Irregulars Case 3 The Malicious Book

[Stella Gaslight]

Toby was having a very hard time keeping himself from bolting as the vines entwined him. He had expected thorns but the touch was soft and strong, leaving him wondering if he could get loose on his own if he tried.  Slow as flowers follow the sun he was pulled inside.  Secretly he hoped he had not bitten of more than he could chew, but maybe with Mama it would be all right.  He powers were lessened her but even so she knew far more magic than he did.

[MWBailey]

"That's good, lad, keep wary. Don't lash out, especially with any fire magic; plant entities tend to react rathe rstrongly to such, and unless you can and do start a major conflagration proportional to the size of the entity -!"

"Less' jus' say barbecued Celia en't what we're aimin for an' ave done, Li'l bruvver." Bill cut in and opined from Toby's elbow.

"Bill, can you start talking to the bees? not turn into one, but just kind of make suggestions?"

"Already been doin', ye jus' can't 'ear it 'cause it en't all spoke lingo. They say there's a new two legs asleep in th' corner over by the windhole - meanin' th' fireplace an' 'arth," Bill said

He added seriously and calmly, though with an unmistakable intensity, "Now, the way ter do this is tae take it slow, like movin' through water in a pond, or swimming' in quicksand. Movin' loik ye're made o' molasses, I means, Toby lad. All smooth flowin' movement, no jerkin' about, even if ye gets stuck by a thorn or stung by summat. I've asked the bees tae be tolerant, so no worries there 'bout them, but there's other things in a rose-vine, so be careful. There's an open space the bees say, roight next tae the fireplace an' what I fink 's yer Mum."

"Me an' Marley can hop the branches, the bees say, there're birds o' all sorts in an' out agin all th' bleedin'; toime. but you needs tae move loik I said. Now, for it, take her slow..."

[walking stick]

Verity drew.  She needed to know more about this plant.  Was it all one monstrous growth or several?  The viciously decadent image of herself had been upsetting enough when she believed they had defeated it. Now, as the pattern became clear, she was frightened anew. It was all over the forrest! The sweet scent of roses drifted in from every direction tainted with another scent. The smell of rot.

[Stella Gaslight]

The roses were overjoyed with the fresh dreamer they caught.  They welcomed him with beguiling scents but there was something beneath it, like old bones that all the flowers in the world could not cover. For a moment he almost broke free of the vines as mama came in to view.  "My sweet boy come here."  She said holding her eyes open for him. But something was wrong with Celia's eyes and Toby found himself edging away without even thinking.

[MWBailey]

Toby was caught; in their massive hubris, they thought that they could simply defeat the Rose Queen with simple subterfuge and guile -  but they had in fact been beguiled themselves. "Looks Loike it's jus' us now, li'l bruvver," Bill quipped, zapping back a cluster of tendrils that tried to encircle him.

"That's done it, now, Bill," Marley snapped, "They know we're not just birds, Thanks to that lightning. Well, they know it already, so let';s just go ahead and burn a few vines, shall we?" the roiling ball of hellfire appeared in front of Marley's beak, and bolts of plasmic fire hotter than the surface of the sun shot forth in several directions; the air became thick not only with smoke, but also a stench as of burning corpses.

"Crikey! D'you smell 'at stink? tha's not a smell what belongs in th' forest!"

"Seems the Lady o' the Forest is beset by enemies not of her choosing," Marley exclaimed. "But how to find them, and help her win free (and free our friends, of course)? Who is powerful enough to subvert the forest?"

"No toime fer tha' stuff righ'nowe, we got tae get outta here, or foind a way ter free Toby! No offense, Looby, but yer li'l ball o' hellfire's nae gonna get 'Imself loose wit'out burnin' 'Imself 'long with Celia and the Roses, nof my lightnings neither.!"

They stood perched back to back on the remains of the room's fireplace's mantle ledge, blasting back the tendrils and suckers that quested their way. Mistress Beety, we need a rescue, Marley sent along the Flock link. I can keep throwing hellfire for a long time, but... hang on, what's that...

A melody had begun to play. Bill had assumed his human form, and brought out a harp from somewhere; the shimmering, mesmerizing melody came from the harp's strings as he caressed the tune from them, singing softly but with building strength of the beauty of roses, coupled with strength of purpose and aid for the forest. The vines drew back and seemed somehow to be listening...considering...

Can you hear that, Miss Beety? Marley sent again. Can you or Miss Verity do anything to augment it from your side?

[walking stick]

At the sound of the song Beety and Verity took heart.  Beety produced a bodhran* and began playing a rhythm that strengthened the tune.  

Verity began a new pattern of intertwined roses,  flowers, thorns, leaves, stems and even roots, represented by a white pattern on a soft earth brown background, forming a series of elegant curves.  The twisted roses began to sigh and stretch like someone who had been imprisoned in a cramped cell finally able to breath free.  Now the two scents were separating, roses and the dangerous smell of death magic.


*For any of you who didn't know, bodhran (pronounced borran to rhyme with Anne) flat, hand held, drum, usually played with a double ended stick.

[MWBailey]

Bill picked up the beat from outside and picked up the pace slightly to match it; the roses actually began to bob in time...

[Stella Gaslight]

Toby read the page with Celia meeting the roses and let out a gasp.  "Someone has ruined the story. The lonely roses in the story are only supposed to put people to sleep not eat them.  You sound more like carnivorous swamp vines someone tarted up" Mama would not approve of that language but Toby had a plan.  The vines rustled as the more malevolent parts of the magic gathered to strike at him.  It launched at him sharp as a spear only to find him gone and crash through the floor revealing the noxious dark vines strangling the roses as their roots.

[CPT_J_Percell]

The wolf growled and took a step towards the tower from his place on the edge of the clearing.
"No we mustn't" squeaked the fairy beside him.
"Something is wrong here, they are in trouble." The wolf growled back.
"It is not your place to judge."
"I can not just stay here."
They are the chosen, it is their trial."

[MWBailey]

"Toby, have you your jacknife?" Marley called out. he morphed to human form and pulled his trusty spanner from his vest pocket. he rang it thrice upon thehearth, reciting the proper words, but this time with a slight diffrence; instead of a sword, the wrench wrought itself into a hatchet.

"Better yet lad, have a go at the roots with this!" Marley ducked under two wildly lashing tendrils and handed the hatchet to Toby, while firing off hellfire at the evilly questing tendrils, burning them back to the main stem as the vine actually shrieked. "I'M Sorry, Milady Rose, but unless you can fight the pestilence yourself, we'll have to fight for you with what little we have! I assure you we are on your side in this!" Marley shouted, praying that the being trapped within the subverted roses heard and understood.

[Stella Gaslight]

Toby could feel anger building as he spotted the dark tendrils greedily feeding of the dark figure of his mother.  The figure above shook becoming bushes where Celia had once stood.  Under attack the roses were too strained to hold the form.  Flames flickered between Toby's clenched fingers, magic called by emotion and only half controlled.  "Let my mother go!" He screamed swinging at the thick black vines trying to encircle him.

[MWBailey]

A sound like two loudly-whispering voices warring for dominance filled the vine-choked room; half the vines loosened their hold on CCelia, even as still others tightened their grip.

"Cinders and shavings," Marley muttered, " I'll do it, then," and leapt into the hole, producing a bladelike spear of hellfire and slashing carefully at the vine that strangled the rosebushes. Slowly, the rosebush roots began to come free...

[Stella Gaslight]

Hungry for magic the dark vines focused on the boy who was leaking tremendous power.  Toby had not realised it but he was the perfect distraction.  While their fight raged on Celia moaned feeling the grip on her mind loosen. Bright pollen fell from the roses like snow makeing everything it touched dazzle with light.   They didn't have much left but the roses were joining the fight.

[walking stick]

Verity's hand moved in time to the music as she added tiny flecks of brightness to her picture.  The white roots seemed to surge deeper into the warm brown earth and the rich flowers to stretch upwards in living hope.

[MWBailey]

lowly, Marley made headway through the choking, strangling vine roots as the roses grew stronger. the vine kept putting forth new growth; it was almost like rampant Keloid scar growth around an infected sword wound in a live person. That's it!, Marley thought. He kicked and scrabbled at the dirt at the base of the vine root and found one of the main roots; he drew back his arm, and with a mighty slash chopped through the root. A different voice than that of the roses screamed; it seemed to come from all around at once, as the vines around Celia suddenly withered in part, as though their supporting root had been severed....

[Stella Gaslight]

Toby lashed out with fire half coated in the roses dazzling pollen. Ablaze with light he tore at the roots not noticing the ground shift under him until he half tumbled in to a hole that opened at his feet. Roots reached for him and it looked like he had no clear escape but then he was haled back by his collar and fell backwards in to his mother's lap.  Celia had seen better days her skin was covered in angry red marks from the roots feeding on her and her clothes were torn and dirty but she was the most wonderful sight Toby had seen in a good while.  Viciously sharp looking roots tried to strike at them but they met a shield that looked no stronger than a soap bubble but managed to turn them away.  "We are going to have to get out of here quickly darling.  This is a hard thing for me to hold."

[MWBailey]

"Bill! Play us a doorway, will you?!" Marley called out, and Bill changed the tune slightly and sang or fresh fields and sunlight, and wind and sun streaming through happy portals. The rose-vines drew aside, and red and white buds opened, showing the path while simultaneously crowding aside the vines that still strove to subvert the Rose Queen's will..

[Stella Gaslight]

Celia ran as fast as her weary feet could carry her, Toby nestled in to her chest safe and sound.  She collapsed outside the tower panting with exhaustion.  "I am so sorry Lady Rose you offered me rest and the decay got to both of us."  Looking around she noticed she was not alone.  "Is every one all right?"

[MWBailey]

"Near enough for Bill and I," Marley answered, smirking as Bill turned back into a youngish raven and perched on the Knight Temporal's shoulder. The harp was nowhere to be seen.

[Stella Gaslight]

"Thank goodness."  Celia said getting to her feet and setting Toby beside her with a kiss on the top of his head.  From a tattered and dirty bag on her back Celia produced a book that was almost a perfect copy of the one Toby held. "Ah then I was right and this is not the proper book of the wood.  That would explain why it keeps leading me in to traps."  Celia threw the book as hard as she could in to the surrounding woods and counted to ten then checked her bag again.  "Lovely it is cursed to boot." She said book reappearing in her hand.

[MWBailey]

"Perhaps we can turn the curse to your, and thus our, advantage," Marley said, a thoughtful and somewhat distracted tone in his voice. "The book seems determined to be uncooperative and do precisely what we do not wnt it to. Hmmm..."

He thought a moment, biting his index finger, deep in thought, then brightened and exclaimed,"If one wants to make an uncooperative mule go up the path, but it keeps trying to go teh other way, what does one do...?"

[walking stick]

Verity produced the book of improving tales she'd been drawn to on her last excursion in London.  "I think this might be the carrot for that particular donkey."

[Stella Gaslight]

"Then we can match tale for tale and hopefully avoid the cursed book's pitfalls but there are still the natural trials of the wood.  They follow the old forms so as long as we are brave, clever and kind we should make it out just fine.  We need to find the center of the wood and move toward it. It will be tricky because the paths move."  She worried a bit at Toby being here stories liked children and the were everywhere in the wood looking for people to draw in and act them out.  As London even here she had some strenght but some stories were older than the city and there power could match hers at the best of times.

[MWBailey]

"Well, now, lets see what kind of tale we can counter this latest one with, shall we?" Marley said, a decidedly ravenish glint in his eye.

"Wha've you got up yer sleeve, Looby?" Bill intoned from Toby's shoulder.

"Milady," Marley asked Celia, "We're in a wood, yes? And we have Oak, Ash, and Thorn close at hand, or should, at any rate...?"

[Stella Gaslight]

"Yes but remember to use the most polite forms of asking for their aid.  The forest has a long memory and a short temper." Celia moved to look at the book Verity held.  Toby was listening to the forest and finding he could follow the movements of the animals thought the growth and almost hear a voice murmuring something just outside of his understanding.