Saving Thanehaven Read Online Free Page B

explain. “I’d be surprised if that drawbridge has ever been lowered before. I doubt it was even designed to be used.”
    Noble shakes his head. “It’s a
drawbridge
, Rufus. Drawbridges go up and down. Otherwise they wouldn’t be drawbridges.”
    “Theoretically, yes. But not this one.” Before Noble can open his mouth to protest, Rufus continues. “Think about it. Would you ever have come this way without me? You’d have taken a boat or tried the rear entrance. You wouldn’t have walked up to the front gate.”
    Noble can’t understand this. It makes no sense to him. “So what?” he growls impatiently. “The fortress wasn’t put here for my benefit.”
    “Yes, it was,” Rufus insists but doesn’t explain further. Instead he indicates the yawning gateway at the end of the drawbridge. “I’ll go first, okay? Seems to me that they’re extending an invitation.”
    Noble is so confused that he doesn’t object. He just follows Rufus across the drawbridge, beneath the raised portcullis, and into a vaulted passage that’s dense with shadows. Noble can hardly see. Though Rufus is only a couple of paces in front, his slight figure soon grows indistinct. The daylight falling through the arched portal behind them seems paleand weak—no match for the black depths up ahead. Not a single torch or lamp is burning to light their way.
    Noble doesn’t like the darkness. It unnerves him.
Anything
could jump out of it. He’s surrounded by whispers and rustling.
    “Can you hear that?” he asks Rufus.
    “Yeah.” Rufus raises his voice. “Who’s there? Hello?”
    “Come along … come this way … come …” The words seem to be fluttering around like moths, whisking past Noble’s ear before he can catch them.
    Rufus stops dead in his tracks.
    “No,” he says. “We’re staying right here until we have a bit of light. Otherwise we’re going to break our necks.” Abruptly, the whispering stops, and silence descends like a candle snuffer. “Why don’t you open a window, or something?”
    “Windows … no windows … no windows here …” The air is thick with soft hisses. Then Noble becomes aware of a faint, eerie glow. As he looks around to pinpoint its source, Rufus suddenly cries,
“Eeww!”
and points straight up.
    Half a dozen luminous grubs are squirming through cracks in the ceiling. Each grub is about the size of Noble’s arm. They’re shedding a sickly, greenish light that’s barely strong enough to illumine all the insects that cover the walls. Most of these insects are very large and flat, like stink bugs withlegs. They have sickle-shaped pincers, clusters of red eyes, and a death’s-head pattern on their wing casings.
    They whisper and rustle as they scurry out of reach.
    “Oh, man.” Rufus laughs in an appalled kind of way. “This game is
so sick
!”
    Noble sets his jaw. He’s noticed that the grubs overhead are inching along the passage in a kind of loose formation. “I think we’re supposed to follow the light,” he suggests. And the insects back him up.
    “Follow the light … the light … follow …,” they confirm, their pincers clicking.
    Noble tries to ignore them. He stomps after the gleaming grubs, past a series of alcoves. Each alcove contains a suit of armor, though it’s not armor that he could wear himself. The helmets are fitted with strange, curling crests. The greaves come in sets of six. The hauberks are long and scaly, while the plate armor includes wing shields, as if the suits have been designed for a battalion of mutant grasshoppers.
    “You know what?” Rufus remarks, from behind Noble. “If you were fighting your way through this tunnel, those things would be attacking you by now.”
    Noble pauses. “But they’re empty suits. Aren’t they?” he says, glancing back at Rufus.
    “Empty suits or not, I bet they’d still attack you. If there’s one thing I can always spot, it’s a scoring opportunity.” As Noble sets off again, Rufus