Read Online The Silver Door by Emily Rodda - Free Book Online Page A

the creature back. I have a skimmer hook—’
    â€˜Throw it away!’ Sonia screamed. ‘The metal will affect the magic of the hood!’
    â€˜The magic is affected already!’ Dirk roared back. ‘I could see you—only faintly, but enough! This weapon is our only chance! By a miracle I spied it lying among the rocks. One of the Wall worker volunteers who chose the silver Door must have come to grief—’
    His voice was lost in a tumult of sound. Suddenly the monster’s wingbeats were like thunder above them, blasting them with a freezing, stinking gale that seemed thick with malice. And at that moment Rye was swept by the knowledge that this beast was no mere hunter of the air. It was an evil, unnatural thing, a creature of the dark power he had sensed in his dream.
    He felt Dirk struggling to resist the wind, to wield the great hook, and knew it was hopeless. In despair he heard Dirk’s curse, and a dull clang, and guessed that the weapon had been swept from his brother’s hand.
    Then the bird was upon them. With sharp, cracking sounds the terrible beak snapped shut once, twice, three times. Talons rasped on stone again and again. A long, grating screech split the air.
    Rye lay locked in a daze of horror, feeling Sonia quaking beside him, waiting for the cry of agony that would tell him Dirk had been taken, waiting for themonster’s talons to rake his own back.
    But it did not happen. The sounds continued, the moments passed … and it did not happen.
    And then, abruptly, the deafening screeches and the sounds of attacking beak and talons ceased. The pounding of giant wings began again. Again, a great wind beat down on the rocks. Then the gale became less, and the pounding grew fainter. And at last, there was silence.
    Rye felt Dirk roll away from him. Hardly daring to believe that the ordeal was over, he sat up, blinking.
    Dirk was tugging at the skimmer hook, which had landed some distance away and was jammed between two rocks. The monstrous bird was flying back the way it had come. As Rye watched, it wheeled to the left and for a split second he saw its hideous shape silhouetted against the grey sky. Then it soared into the cloud, and was gone.
    â€˜What happened?’ he asked blankly. ‘Why did it stop attacking us?’
    â€˜It has gone, that is all I care about,’ Sonia groaned, climbing painfully to her feet. ‘Oh, I am bruised all over!’
    â€˜Be grateful you were not torn to pieces,’ Dirk growled, striding back to them with the great hook in his hand. ‘By the Wall, Rye, do you not see now how insane it was for you and the girl to come here? You must go back!’
    â€˜We arrived knowing that this place must bedangerous,’ Sonia replied coldly. ‘And as for going back … Rye is free to do as he likes, but I have no intention of letting you beat me to the source of the skimmers, Dirk.’
    â€˜You little fool!’ shouted Dirk. ‘You have no chance whatever of destroying the Enemy! All you will do is hamper me, and in the end get us all killed! Why, what happened just now is proof of that! If it had not been for me—’
    Sonia tossed her head. ‘You did nothing just now as far as I can see, you big oaf, but fall on top of us and bruise us black and blue! The bird—’
    â€˜Stop it!’ Rye yelled at the top of his voice.
    Startled, Sonia and Dirk both turned to stare at him. He scrambled to his feet and gestured furiously at the surrounding rocks, and what remained of the pyramid. Great grooves had been carved into the stones. Thousands of snails torn away by the monster’s talons were lying in heaps on the ground.
    â€˜Are you both mad, fighting like—like a pair of ducks squabbling over a worm?’ Rye stormed. ‘We must think! Why did the bird go, when it could have killed us easily? What made it give up?’
    â€˜Well … the hood,’ Sonia said, eyeing