Read Online The Call by Michael Grant - Free Book Online Page A

Stefan asked.

Eleven
    A REALLY, REALLY LONG TIME AGO…
    â€œW hat know you of the conjurer’s tongue?” the man in mismatched armor asked Grimluk.
    â€œIs it missing?” Grimluk asked.
    The man in the mismatched armor—so-called because he wore a helmet that was obviously too large for his rather small head and a chain mail shirt so small it was tied together in the back with pieces ofyarn—stared at him as if he were mad. Crazy mad, not angry mad.
    â€œThe tongue, fool. The language. Vargran, the tongue of power.”
    Something about the phrase the tongue of power struck Grimluk as funny. He grinned, revealing his five intact teeth.
    This proved to be a mistake. The man in the mismatched armor socked Grimluk in the mouth, hard, with an armored fist.
    â€œNot so toothy now, are you?”
    â€œHey!” Grimluk found the detached tooth heading down his throat. He stopped it by gagging and then spit it out into his hand. “You had no right to punch me!”
    â€œYou stupid bumpkin,” the man snarled. “Do you think this is some mummer’s game?”
    Grimluk wasn’t sure. He didn’t know what a mummer’s game might be, and millennia would pass slowly by before Google would be created to answer questions such as this.
    â€œDo you not know that all the world stands as if on the edge of a cliff eleven feet tall? And that all we know and hold dearest is in danger?”
    â€œI know of the Pale Queen.”
    â€œYou know nothing.”
    â€œI have seen her daughter. The Princess. Or so she called herself.”
    The man in the mismatched armor took a step back. “Do you say that you have seen Princess Ereskigal?” He got a shrewd look on his face, or at least as much of his face as was visible beneath the brim of his helmet. “Tell me of her appearance.”
    â€œVery beautiful. With hair the color of a flame. And she ate the head of a terrifying beast like a grasshopper standing on its hind legs.”
    â€œEreskigal!” the man said, and Grimluk saw that his hands shook. “This is dire news. Follow me. Come! You must go before the gerandon !”
    â€œWhat’s a gerandon ?”
    â€œIn the Vargran tongue its meaning is ‘conclave.’ Bumpkin! Do you know nothing?” He set off at a quick walk from the gate of the castle down a winding pathway overshadowed by high stone walls. With each step Grimluk was watched by alert archers who were ready to rain arrows down on him— into him, actually—if he made one false move.
    The gerandon held court in the castle’s keep.Grimluk had never been anywhere so grand. It was at least eleven times more magnificent than the baron’s castle. For one thing, there were no farm animals in the room at all. For another thing, the walls were staggeringly tall. They seemed to go up and up forever before culminating in an arched roof that rested on massive buttresses.
    At the farthest end of the room was an impressive throne of timber and leather, covered with animal pelts. It was currently unoccupied. It seemed that the king, the usual occupant of the throne, had discovered a pressing need to visit another country. He had discovered this pressing need approximately four seconds after hearing that the Pale Queen was on her way.
    In the center of the room was a long, rectangular table. Placed around this table were high-backed chairs, and in the chairs sat a motley assortment of six men and one woman. Grimluk would have guessed even without being told that the men were wizards. All had long beards, varying from wispy and dark to full and gray to patchy and red. The woman did not have a beard, just a slight mustache.
    She had to be a witch, Grimluk realized nervously.There weren’t many career paths that could put a woman into a position of power in those days. She was either a witch or a queen, and she didn’t look like a queen.
    It was she who spoke.
    â€œWhat