Chapter 28: Undercover Knights
As Kendra, Seth and Warren all passed through the portal in their new adlet bodies, they experienced the sensation of their surroundings suddenly shifting from the vibrant yard at Fablehaven into a vast, dank cavern.
"What is this place?" asked Kendra, looking around as the portal closed on its own behind them. No doubt Bright had triggered the portal to automatically close after a set period of time.
Seth gazed around the large cavern. The place was huge. If the rugged floor had instead been flat, and wasn't littered with boulders and stalagmites, the cavern itself would've been large enough to play a game of football in.
"It's looks like were in some underground grotto," said Seth.
"Well, we need to look for a way out," said Warren. "Of course, given the way we got in here, there may not even be a physical exit from this place."
"You mean we're trapped?" asked Kendra.
"Who knows?" replied Seth. "Besides, if there really isn't a way out of here, we'll just return to Fablehaven and try another portal."
Kendra, Seth and Warren all proceeded to walk along the uneven floor of the cavern, hoping to potentially discover a way out along one of the walls. Before they could get very far, the floor started to rumble.
"What's going on?" exclaimed Kendra, struggling to keep her balance among all the vibration.
Without any warning, a large figure burst out of the floor, stretching up towards the ceiling of the cavern. Possessing two heads, the gargantuan, furry brown creature sported a single red eye on each of its heads, crocodilian snouts, and large spines protruding from various spots on its body, the lower half of which was still concealed beneath the floor.
The creature peered down at Kendra, Seth and Warren with both of its heads, leering at them with its two glowing eyeballs, each one the size of a car. It then unleashed a booming growl at the three knights.
"Hey, cut it out!" said Seth.
"Seth understands it?!" gasped Kendra, speaking softly so that only Warren could hear her.
"What are you three doing here?" asked the creature through both of its mouths simultaneously, whose speech Kendra and Warren were unable to interpret.
"Take it easy," said Seth, trying to sound confident. Don't you know who we are?"
"I don't care," snorted the creature. "Nobody trespasses through my lair!"
"Look out!" screamed Seth, as the creature's two heads both lunged towards the group. Not needing directions, the three knights all darted away from the incoming heads.
"I'll get you!" roared the creature. Seth looked back as he ran, watching as the creature proceeded to open both of its mouths, then expelled twin streams of some clear liquid towards the group.
"Missed us," said Warren, as they neared a wall of the cave.
"Thank goodness!" said Kendra, as the liquid quickly dissolved the rocks it landed upon.
"We need to find an exit," said Seth, as they came across a wall. At the same time, the creature proceeded to crawl towards them, spewing more acid in their direction.
"Is there an exit?" asked Kendra, as the group ran alongside the wall. "Maybe we should head back and try again?"
"The fear this thing is radiating may overwhelm the fairies!" exclaimed Warren, just as a stream of acid flew in front of them, stopping them in their tracks.
"Now what?" asked Kendra, eyeing the acid puddle that was eating away at the floor in front of them.
"Jump for it!" cried Warren, taking a leap over the several foot long puddle.
Just as the creature prepared to expel another blast of acid at the group, Kendra and Seth both followed Warren's lead and bolted themselves over the acid puddle to the other side.
"I see an exit!" cried Kendra, as she noticed a small tunnel that was formed within the upcoming wall.
Scurrying as fast as their legs could carry them, Kendra, Seth and Warren darted into the tunnel, which was far too small for the huge creature to follow them through.
"I hope this isn't a dead end," said Seth, as the group continued their sprint into the tunnel.
"Who cares?" said Kendra, "I'll take a dead end over being dead meat for staying around with that abomination."
"So much for asking for directions," said Seth.
"Well, maybe we'll find some other monsters that aren't so mean," said Warren.
"I get the impression that all the monsters here are mean," said Seth.
"Yeah, but we can still try to find some smaller, less dangerous monsters."
Kendra, Seth and Warren continued to walk through the tunnel, hoping that it would at least lead them somewhere.
"Man," said Seth after a few minutes. "This tunnel must go on forever." Seth then felt an urge overcome him, and he allowed himself to fall down onto all fours.
"Seth, what are you doing?" asked Kendra.
"The real adlets were able to run fast when they got down on all fours. So, I figured I might as well give it a try."
Allowing the instincts of his wolf-like body to kick in, Seth proceeded to dash down the tunnel, ahead of Kendra and Warren. The feeling was exuberant. His body was clearly built for speed, not walking on his hind legs.
"Seth!" cried Kendra, "Wait up."
"Why wait for Seth to wait up when we can catch up?" asked Warren, getting down onto his paws and scurrying after Seth.
"Boys," said Kendra, as she then got down on her paws and trailed after Warren.
Seth waited for Warren and Kendra to catch up with him, before the three adlets proceeded to scamper off further down the tunnel.
Before long, they soon emerged from the tunnel and into an underground chasm, with seemingly no way across.
"Where do we go from here?" asked Seth, stopping at the edge of the cliff.
"It's too far for us to jump," said Kendra, noticing that the chasm was far too vast for them to leap across, even as adlets.
"And it'd be in our best interest if we didn't fall," said Warren, directing Seth and Kendra to the lava flow that occupied the bottom of the chasm, several dozen feet beneath them.
"But where are we supposed to go?" asked Kendra. "This was the only path we had, and I don't want to go back to that crazy two-headed monster."
"Maybe we should just go home and try another portal," said Seth. "Otherwise we're trapped."
"We'd be starting over again from square one," said Warren.
"There's a tunnel on the far side of the chasm," said Kendra, "if only we could get to it, we could continue forward."
"But this place isn't a vault like Eerie Mountain," said Seth. "Don't count on there being some invisible bridge for us to just walk across."
"We've still got the fairies with us," said Kendra. "Maybe they can help us get across."
"I'd rather avoid exhausting their energy until we really need it," said Warren.
"I think now's a good time to really need it," said Seth, gazing down at the vast lava pool. "We're trapped otherwise."
"We may already have their help," said Warren, jamming his front claws into a wall. The fairies gave us these new bodies, why not make some use of them?"
Warren then dug his hind claws into the wall, and was now clinging on by all fours.
"Interesting," said Kendra, inserting her own claws into the wall with relative ease. "This is actually kinda fun."
"How's climbing this wall going to help us cross the chasm?" asked Seth. "It won't lead us to the other side, and I don't feel safe trying to shimmy across the ceiling."
"At this rate we might as well explore our surroundings," said Warren, as he and Kendra proceeded to climb up and along the wall.
Seth joined in, and soon the group was clinging to the wall, crossing over a section where there were no ledges beneath them. To fall from this point would result in a lava bath.
"This is better than rock climbing," said Seth, thinking back to when his father had taken him and Kendra to a rock climbing center to climb up a thirty-foot wall, attached to a harness.
"Hey, there's a passage up ahead," said Warren, pointing to a small hole in the wall that was close to the ceiling.
"Go for it!" said Seth, as Warren led him and Kendra into the narrow hole, which was barely wide enough to contain their heavy adlet bodies.
The adlets climbed through the hole for several minutes, as it twisted and turned in an upwards direction for several minutes.
"There's a light at the end of this tunnel!" exclaimed Warren. After another minute or so of climbing, Warren emerged from the exit and waited as Seth and Kendra crawled out as well.
"We made it!" exclaimed Kendra, once she emerged from the tunnel and climbed out onto the surface of the ground at some unknown point in the Demon Domain.
"We're still lost, though," said Warren.
"Guess we might as well just start exploring," said Kendra, as she proceeded to run off in a seemingly random direction, prompting Seth and Warren to follow her lead.
After running for a few minutes, they came across a small pit, roughly the size of the basement of a two-story house. In the pit lay an elephant-sized monster with a long, giraffe-like neck, dark purple scales and a head that mostly consisted of a wide mouth like a lamprey's, with no visible eyes.
The monster raised its head up towards the group and unleashed a menacing screech, revealing that its mouth possessed several rows of jagged teeth.
"Why are you here?" boomed the monster, in a voice that only Seth's ears could interpret. Sure, the monster was a lot larger and stronger than himself, but Seth wasn't going to just give in like he had with the previous one. He was a shadow charmer. Surely there was something he could do.
"Answer me!" roared the monster.
"Seth..." said Kendra softly. "Let's get out of here!"
Seth focused on the monster, and concentrated on thinking of the darkness within his soul. "OBEY ME!" snapped Seth, allowing his darkness to overwhelm the monster.
"What is your command, master?" asked the monster.
"What's it saying?" asked Warren in a near-whisper.
"Where is Murdred's castle?" asked Seth.
"What kind of question is that?" growled the monster. "You are Murdred's underlings. Surely you must know."
"I said TELL US!" blared Seth. "I COMMAND IT!"
"Very well," said the monster. "Since you asked so politely. Murdred's castle is in that direction."
As the monster spoke, he turned his head to one side.
"You'd better be correct," said Seth. "Or we'll come looking for you."
"Understood."
"Good. Then I will release you from my grasp."
Seth dropped his hold on the monster, allowing it to lower its head back down towards the rest of its body. "Come on, Xipp and Xillch. Let's go."
"That was awesome," said Warren, as the three adlets continued in the direction that the monster had pointed them in.
"Seth, if you could only overwhelm Murdred and his crew the way you did that monster back there," said Kendra, "this whole mission would be over fast."
Seth scoffed. "That would be too easy. But unfortunately, this stupid mission is stuck on hard mode."
"Look at it this way," said Warren, "at least we've found a way to cheat. At this rate, we might even make it into Murdred's castle this time. Kendra and I, that is. You've already been."
"Twice," said Seth. "But I don't know the layout all too well. Hopefully we'll still be able to get through the place."
After scampering across the Demon Domain for what felt like miles, Murdred's castle could eventually be seen at the end of the horizon.
"That's it!" exclaimed Seth, raising his claw to point forward. "That's Murdred's castle up ahead! You guys see it?"
"We see it," said Kendra, as she and Warren both nodded while in mid-run.
Hurrying as fast as their adlet legs could carry them, Seth, Kendra and Warren made a mad dash towards the castle. Eventually they came across the moat, where they came to a stop.
"This place is huge," said Kendra, gazing up at the towering architecture of the castle.
"Not to mention dangerous," said Warren, looking down at the lava that was flowing along the bottom of the moat, far beneath where they were standing.
"We need to get inside," said Seth, gesturing for Kendra and Warren to follow him along the edge of the moat. Once they had walked more than a quarter of the way around the perimeter of the castle, they arrived at the bridge that connected the outer edge of the moat to the front door.
"Looks like they've done some repairs since I was here last," said Seth, taking a good look at the newly-rebuilt bridge that had previously been destroyed by the real adlets.
Seth then scampered along the bridge, with Kendra and Warren following directly behind his lead. Once they reached the other side of the bridge, the sentry that was at his post gave them a stern look.
"What are you doing here?" asked the sentry, who was standing next to the front door of the castle. His voice sounded like nothing but snorting to Kendra, and presumably Warren.
"We're on a mission," said Seth. "Let us through."
"Okay," moaned the sentry. "I wasn't exactly expecting you three."
"Mind your own business," said Seth, sounding rather annoyed. "We don't have time for this."
The sentry turned his head away from the knights, implying that they were free to enter the castle. They then stepped in through the front door and had emerged inside the spacious entry hall.
"You know, I kinda like being a sheep in wolf's clothing," said Warren in a near whisper.
"Where do we go from here?" asked Kendra in a soft voice, hoping that there was nobody else nearby to hear her ask such a suspicious question.
"I'm not entirely sure," replied Seth. "Not only do we need to stop Murdred, but we also need to rescue Sarah. I just hope that we're not already too late to do either of those things."
"I want to say that rescuing Sarah is more important," said Warren, "but if we're too late to save her, what good will our rescue have been?"
"On top of that," said Seth, "We don't know what Murdred could've done with Sarah since we lost her."
"Still, we owe it to Sarah to at least make an effort," said Kendra. "Even if that effort ends up being in vain."
"I guess the best place to search for Sarah would be downstairs in the dungeon. There's another sentry down there, but I'm afraid to ask him about Sarah if she's not there, since he probably figures that the real adlets already know where she really is."
Seth thought back to the first time when he and Sarah had escape from the dungeon. He envisioned the steps they took from that outing, hoping that his memory would lead him to the dungeon from which they arose.
Seth led Kendra and Warren down a hallway and followed it for a moment or so. He then stopped in front of a wide doorway. On the other side was a staircase spiraling downwards.
"I think this is it," said Seth, trying to gaze down the stairs as far as he could, only for his perspective to be cut off by the circular formation of the staircase.
Seth then trotted down the staircase, followed by Kendra and Warren. After going down a fair way, they had emerged in a small hallway that seemed all too familiar to Seth. Standing at the far end of the hallway was the sentry that guarded the dungeon.
"What brings you three here?" asked the sentry. "There's no one in here."
"So why are you still here?"
"I'm only here on standby because the dungeon's been busy lately."
"It's about the prisoner," said Seth, trying to think up an excuse in his mind that wouldn't give anything away.
"What about the prisoner?"
"We've got reason to believe that somebody may have left something in their cell."
"Are you sure?" asked the sentry, as he crossed his hefty grey arms.
"Just let us check, all right?" asked Seth, as he proceeded to walk past the sentry and into center of the dungeon, where the row of cells was located.
"There's nothing in there," said the sentry. "Don't you idiots think that I'd check the cells once they're empty?"
"Maybe you missed something," said Seth, as he peered through the barred window of the closest cell. Kendra then peered into the next cell over, but saw nobody inside. Likewise, Warren had looked into another cell himself.
"Those cells haven't been used in years," said the sentry.
"Well sor-ree," said Seth. "We can't all be as intelligent as you. I mean, why else would Murdred hold us in higher regard than he does of you?"
"You think I'm stupid? All I need to do is sit around here all day. You three are constantly taking orders from Murdred. I don't care if he does treat you guys better. I've got it made."
"Look, can Mr. Competent just tell us what happened with the last prisoner who was here?"
"They escaped. And last I heard, they fell into the moat when you three destroyed the bridge. But did you make any effort to fix it? No!"
Seth thought to himself. According to the sentry, Sarah couldn't be down here, and hadn't been since yesterday. Where was she?
"Okay," said Seth. "I guess you're right again. Come on, Xipp and Xillch. Let's go."
Kendra, Seth and Warren all turned around and proceeded to head back towards the stairs leading upwards. What had happened to Sarah? Were they already too late?