verything happened at once. Lucy turned to scream, only to come face to face with Sar-adin. The Demon was in his human form and had been waiting to one side of the entrance. She looked at him, confusion burning on her face, but before she could open her mouth he struck a blow to her head with his cudgel and she fell to the ground.
Fury raged through Ned and he raised his arm, a surge of pure power tearing through his nerves, and from the shimmering air he produced a set of circular spinning blades. Each one was the size of a small plate, their edges perfectly serrated for cutting, and ready to fly at the butcher.
“Arr!” snarled Gorrn.
To Ned’s side his familiar rose up angrily, his surface billowing and ready to strike.
Sar-adin stepped between them and his master, as Barbarossa watched, still eating his apple as though nothing of any interest had happened.
The Demon now faced Ned and, with his back to the butcher, he raised the cudgel till it was level with his own cruel face. But instead of bringing it down on Ned, he placed a finger to his lips and his eyes narrowed. The message was clear: “Say nothing.” Ned breathed a sigh of relief – the Demon was still on their side.
Quickly he took in the scene. Lucy was still breathing and Sar-adin had clearly held back from using his full strength. Behind the bloated evil that was Barbarossa, Ned could see a large cut in the rear of the tent, which explained how they had gained entrance, but not how the butcher hoped to leave.
“You’re mad. All I have to do is scream and they’ll come running, all of them,” Ned seethed.
“Mad? I’ve been called worse, dear boy, and by my own brother.”
His voice boomed like a deep bass drum. Ned hated him, hated him for always addressing him as though they were friends, for the smug smile etched on his face, and for even attempting to conceal his malice.
Gorrn was shaking, waiting only for Ned’s command to fly at the butcher or his Demon.
“I can assure you of two things. I am not mad, and no one is coming. No matter how loud you shout, they won’t hear you. Sar-adin has cast a silencing spell. We will hear them, they won’t hear us. And in any case, most of them, like Lucy, are unconscious with a mouth full of mud. Be a good boy and lower your toys.”
Sar-adin walked behind Ned to cover the entrance. Ned thought desperately – he could make a break for it, but that would leave Lucy with the butcher. Why had Barba taken the risk of coming, if not to kill them both? He let the blades fall. If Barba tried anything he could always make more.
“Stand down, Gorrn.”
“Unt!” his familiar refused, its starry eyes flicking between Lucy and Barbarossa.
“I said, stand down.”
Reluctantly his loyal blob oozed back to the ground and slid into Ned’s shadow.
“Very wise, dear boy, very wise,” gloated the butcher.
“What do you want, Barba?”
Barbarossa took a last bite of his apple and tossed the core aside.
“What I’ve always wanted. You wouldn’t be killed by my clowns – a terrible shame, and to think Mr Fox could be capable of such violence?”
And there it was – Sar-adin had lied to Barbarossa! The butcher, smug and cruel as he was, had a chink in his armour, even now.
“You look surprised. Yes, I know all about your poor Mr Fox. How he became an agent, the girl that was taken from him before he joined the BBB … I know it all.”
Ned remembered his mother’s training – breathe. Everything hung in the balance, Barbarossa couldn’t find out about Sar-adin, no matter how much Ned wanted to shout it loud to wipe the smug look from the monster’s face.
“After much thought, I’ve realised that you’ve done me a favour by making it this far. You’ve brought all my enemies to one place. St Albertsburg, the attack on your Nest, even the riders this morning … they were all meant to break your collective spirit.”
“It hasn’t worked!”
“No, not yet, but if you were to fall in the battle tomorrow, the Hidden would surrender.”
“Why not just kill me now?”
“If they find you dead in your tent, they will not fight, and I will waste years hunting them down one by one. But if they see you fall in the thick of battle, I shall have them, all of them, surrendering at my feet.”
Ned felt a rage brewing inside him and his Amplification-Engine started to hum.
“And what on earth, Barba, would make me do that?”
Barbarossa grinned. “Because you can’t possibly win. The forest is mine. It was a simple matter to circle around you and approach the encampment from the rear. I have Gearnish’s metal men, I have the Darklings, the Demons, and by the end of tomorrow, I shall have the Darkening King.”
Ned stared at him, defiance bubbling in the pores of his skin. They had the Heart Stone, and Ned’s Engine, and Sar-adin, and the Central Intelligence’s metal men if the Tinker was right. No matter what armies the butcher had, they could still win – the butcher was wrong. Ned allowed himself a small smile.
Barbarossa’s eyes narrowed and his great bearded mouth pursed. “A smile? Ha! Sar-adin, the boy thinks he can beat me! Because you have the Heart Stone? The Fey have had the Heart Stone for thousands of years, and no one has ever mastered it, not even Tiamat before them. You will try and you will fail.”
Ned didn’t answer.
“Help me tomorrow. Pretend to fall, and walk away. In return, I will let those that you love live. The Circus of Marvels, your parents, dear old George, I will spare them all.”
And almost on cue there was an oafish rustling outside the tent.
“Your stoopid nanas,” said the voice of Rocky. “You need meat before fight, monkey.”
“Keep your voice down – they’re trying to sleep. And anyway, meat dulls the mind, old bean. You of all people are a prime example of a fruit-deficient diet.”
Rocky laughed and thumped the great ape on the arm. “Da, George. You know, if I die tomorrow, I will miss your ugly mug.”
Barbarossa looked at Ned with almost genuine pity.
“How sweet, your two protectors, enjoying a little banter. I don’t need to kill them, Ned. I need to rule – and we both know I will, whether you pretend to fall or not.”
“Never.”
“Think on it, boy. Why waste the lives of the people you love, if the outcome is the same?”
Ned couldn’t read him. If the butcher was right and they were going to lose either way, then he might as well stop him here and now, before the beast rose.
“I’ll fight you now!” he said. “I could shred this tent with a blink – George and Rocky would see! They’d be on you in a second.”
“My Demons have them surrounded. They would be crushed. If you care about your friends at all, you’ll do nothing.”
Ned’s blood boiled. Barba had him right where he wanted him and he knew it.
As the butcher went to the tear in the tent that he and the Demon had made, he looked to Ned one last time and smiled. It was ugly and gloating, and it made Ned’s stomach turn.
“Sar-adin, our friend needs rest,” he said and promptly disappeared out of the back of the tent.
Sar-adin was close behind him and Ned could feel his breath at his back.
“Eastern tower,” whispered the Demon, barely loud enough for Ned to hear, then his cudgel fell hard on the back of Ned’s skull.
Ned’s eyes filled with stars and the tent spun into darkness.