Septimus Heap, Book One_ Magyk - Angie Sage [102]
Jenna saw the silver pistol glint in the moonlight. She saw the fifty-six Shield Bugs lined up ready for action and decided to keep her own bug beside her. Just in case. So she put her hand over the bug to quiet it. The bug obediently sheathed its sword and rolled into a ball. Jenna slipped the bug into her pocket. If the Hunter carried a pistol, then she would carry a bug.
With the Apprentice following in the Hunter’s footsteps as he’d been instructed, the pair crept silently up the little path that led from the landing stage to the cottage, passing the chicken boat on its way. As they reached the chicken boat the Hunter stopped. He had heard something. Human heartbeats. Three sets of very fast human heartbeats. He raised his pistol…
Aaaeeeiiiigh!!
The scream of fifty-six Shield Bugs is a terrible scream. It dislocates the three tiny bones inside the ear and creates an incredible feeling of panic. Those who know about Shield Bugs will do the only thing they can: stuff their fingers in their ears and hope to control the panic. This is what the Hunter did; he stood completely still, put his fingers deep into his ears, and if he felt a flicker of panic, it did not trouble him for more than a moment.
The Apprentice of course knew nothing about Shield Bugs. So he did what anyone would do when confronted with a swarm of small green things flying toward you, waving scalpel-sharp swords and screeching so high that your ears felt like they would burst. He ran. Faster than he had ever run before, the Apprentice hurtled down to the Mott, hoping to get into the canoe and paddle to safety.
The Hunter knew that, given a choice, a Shield Bug will always chase a moving enemy and ignore a still one, which is exactly what happened. To the Hunter’s great satisfaction, all fifty-six Shield Bugs decided that the enemy was the Apprentice and pursued him shrilly down to the Mott, where the terrified boy hurled himself into the freezing water to escape the clattering green swarm.
The intrepid Shield Bugs hurled themselves into the Mott after the Apprentice, doing what they had to do, following the enemy to the end, but unfortunately for them, the end they met was their own. As each bug hit the water it sank like a stone, its heavy green armor dragging it down to the sticky mud at the bottom of the Mott. The Apprentice, shocked and gasping with the cold, hauled himself out onto the bank and lay shivering under a bush, too afraid to move.
The Magog watched the scene with no apparent interest at all. Then, when all the fuss had died down, he started to trawl the depths of the mud with his long arms and pick out the drowned bugs one by one. He sat contentedly on the canoe, sucking the bugs dry and crunching them into a smooth green paste with his sharp yellow fangs—armor, swords and all—before he slowly sucked them down into his stomach.
The Hunter smiled and looked up at the wheelhouse of the chicken boat. He hadn’t expected it to be this easy. All three of them waiting for him like sitting ducks.
“Are you going to come down, or am I going to come up and get you?” he asked coldly.
“Run,” hissed Nicko to Jenna.
“What about you?”
“I’ll be okay. It’s you he’s after. Just go. Now.”
Nicko raised his voice and spoke to the Hunter. “Please don’t shoot. I’ll come down.”
“Not just you, sonny. You’re all coming down. The girl first.”
Nicko pushed Jenna away. “Go!” he hissed.
Jenna seemed unable to move, unwilling to leave what felt like the safety of the chicken boat. Boy 412 recognized the terror on her face. He had felt like that so many times before in the Young Army, and he knew that unless he grabbed her, just as Boy 409 had once done for him to save him from a Forest wolverine, Jenna would be unable to move. And if he didn’t grab her, the Hunter would. Quickly, Boy 412 propelled Jenna out of the