Clash of the Sky Galleons (4 page)

Some way behind him, Wind Jackal also swung clear of the tunnel, before rising up alongside Quint on the end of his own harness rope.

‘Winch, you skycurs!’ roared his father. ‘Winch us out of here!’

In front of Quint, the quarry ledges and the rock face sped past in a blur as the violent wind howled once more in his ears.

From below there came more hideous screeches, as three more creatures swooped up out of the infernal darkness. Their papery wingspans were the size of sky ships, and their gaping jaws wide enough to swallow a full-grown hammelhorn whole. Yet for all that, their white bodies were skeletally thin, and looked as delicate as a spindlebug’s. Round they circled, calling to each other, and coming ever closer to this tempting, dangling bait - so much tastier and more substantial than the dried-out morsels of carrion that the Mire mud filtered down to them in the depths below.

In their harnesses, Quint and Wind Jackal flailed desperately with their swords as the creatures swooped, dived and snapped at them with their razor-sharp teeth. Each time a creature glided past, Quint caught sight of its huge, swivelling eyes, the irises enlarging and contracting as if calculating exactly when and where to strike.

His arm was throbbing painfully now, and he was nearing exhaustion. How long could he keep these hideous creatures from the phantasmal depths at bay?

Quint glanced across at his father, dripping - like himself - with rancid tilder blood, and swinging his heavy sabre in a figure of eight in front of him. Above, the hull of the
Galerider
had come into view.

‘Not far now,’ he murmured to himself. ‘Not far now …’

‘Waaaarch!’

A
creature - the pupils of its huge eyes fully dilated -managed to avoid the flashing blade and glanced past Quint, tearing his sky pirate coat at the shoulder with trailing talons as it did so.

‘Winch! Sky take your souls!’ Wind Jackal roared up at the sky ship as another of the creatures swooped and snarled above his head.

It glided round, its eyes wide and staring, and closed in for the kill. Then suddenly, as Quint was beginning to fear the worst, a bright arc of light shot through the air and straight through the papery wings of first one, then another of the vast flapping creatures. For a moment they seemed to hover in mid air, before bursting - like great paper lanterns - into brilliant flame and hurtling down into the blackness. With a screech of alarm, the third creature broke off its attack and fled back to the safety of the void.

Moments later, Steg and Tem were hauling Quint and his father on board, looks of shock on their faces as they saw the blood-spattered state of their faces and clothes.

‘Edge wraiths,’ said Filbus Queep the quartermaster, shaking his head. ‘Foul creatures of the void …’

‘But what happened to them?’ Quint asked, clambering out of his harness with the help of Tem.

‘Harpoon dipped in flaming sumpwood tar,’ said Steg proudly.

Quint looked up to see Maris smiling down at him, trying hard to conceal the look of fear and concern on her face.

‘It was Mistress Maris’s idea, and it worked a treat,’ Steg continued. ‘Now, with your permission, Captain, perhaps we can get out of this accursed place.’

But Wind Jackal wasn’t listening. He was standing at the balustrade, gazing down into the bottomless void, his eyes glittering from beneath a mask of dried tilder blood.

‘This isn’t over,’ he muttered through clenched teeth. ‘In fact, this is just the beginning…!’

• CHAPTER TWO •
GLAVIEL GLYNTE

As he approached the heavy, studded leadwood door, the young sky pirate captain paused, raked his fingers through his unruly thatch of thick fair hair and set a bicorne hat of polished leather on his head at a jaunty angle. Adjusting his neckerchief and smoothing his ornate frock coat, he glanced up at the tavern sign creaking rhythmically as it swung back and forth in the cold northerly wind. The sign, like the tavern itself, had clearly seen better days.

The ornate ironwork was rusty, the hinges warped, while the painting itself - an image of a glistening green vine writhing over a pile of cracked skulls and bleached bones - was faded and flaked. Despite all this, the menace in the picture was unmistakable.

The tarry vine was a parasite. It lived in symbiosis with the fearful bloodoak in the darkness of the Deepwoods, its roots sunk deep into the blistered bark of the tree. Attracted to warm-blooded creatures, it would lasso prey, drag it to its host and deposit it into the
bloodoak’s great mandibled maw. Then, as the tree crushed the life out of its victim, the vine would gorge itself on the hapless creature’s blood.

The Tarry Vine tavern had been aptly named, the sky pirate thought ruefully as he stepped inside the huge slab of a building, with its rows of dimly glowing windows and shuttered roof garrets. For here, in the bustling backstreets of Undertown, the twinkling lights of those windows and roof garrets, and the heady aroma of woodhops escaping from the gently smoking brew-chimneys above, snared unsuspecting passers-by and dragged them inside with a grip as tight and unyielding as any Deepwoods tarry vine. Once inside, as the young sky pirate knew only too well, the tavern’s very own version of the bloodoak awaited …

‘Well, well, well, if it isn’t my old friend, Thaw Daggerslash!’ came a gruff voice.

A portly gnokgoblin in a high-collared jerkin lounged on a large, ornately carved throne beside a heavy tapestry curtain. A tallow lamp above his head cast a feeble yellow light over the narrow chamber.

‘Evening, Jaggs,’ said Thaw Daggerslash coolly, unbuckling his sword and handing it over.

The gnokgoblin scratched his belly and looked the sky pirate slyly up and down.

‘Covered in Mire mud, I see,’ he leered. ‘Been trying your luck at pearl-hunting, have you? A bit desperate for a fine young sky pirate captain, I’d have thought. Haven’t got a nice cosy sky ship yet, then?’ Jaggs gave a throaty chuckle and threw the sword onto the untidy pile at his feet.

The young sky pirate forced himself to smile in reply. ‘Thanks for your concern, Jaggs, old mate,’ he said. ‘Mire-pearling is for mugs. I’ve got bigger oozefish to fry.’

The gnokgoblin raised his heavy eyebrows in sarcastic surprise, then leaned across and drew back the tapestry curtain, with its woven pattern of writhing tarry vines.

‘Too high and mighty to sign on as crew,’ Jaggs taunted as Thaw pushed past him. ‘You dress up as a sky pirate captain and think you are one. Well, I’ll tell you this for nothing, it’s not as easy as that - frying oozefish or no frying oozefish!’

‘We’ll see, Jaggs, old mate,’ the sky pirate called over his shoulder as he knocked on the door in front of him.

It swung open and he stepped inside. Instantly, he found himself engulfed in the seething, heady atmosphere of the most notorious tavern in all Undertown.

A deep, rumbling cacophony of conversation was overlaid with intermittent explosions of noise: bellowing voices, raucous laughter and snatches of rousing songs. There was back-slapping and boot-stamping; there was ladle-sloshing, trough-sluicing and tankard-clunking; and the constant clatter of huge kegs being rolled over the floor, as the serving-goblins replaced the empty ones with full ones.

And as each fresh barrel was tipped into the foaming drinking troughs, so the nutty aroma of fresh woodale would join the more pungent odours of the hall. Acrid tallow smoke from the dim lanterns, roasting ironwood acorns from the hanging braziers, and the strange, musky smell of wet sky pirate coats slowly drying in the warm air,
as their owners sat hunched over the quaff-tables, slumped at the drinking-troughs or jostled each other at the huge ale vats.

Wizened quartermasters, burly deckmates and harpooneers, swaggering sky pirate captains and their hulking bodyguards - every size, shape and type of sky pirate seemed to be represented in the high-gabled, cavernous drinking hall. Thaw Daggerslash took a deep breath and, with as much swagger as he could muster, made his way through the throng.

A gangly mobgnome brushed past him, a tray of brimming tankards balanced on her upraised hand.

‘You there,’ he said, seizing her by an arm. ‘Is Glaviel Glynte in tonight?’

The mobgnome spun round, a look of irritation in her eyes - which melted away when she found herself
looking into the kind, noble face of the handsome young sky pirate captain.

‘The tavern master, sir?’ Flustered, she blushed and lowered her gaze. ‘I … I think … that is to say …’

‘Yes?’ Thaw smiled at her.

‘You could try the garrets, sir.’

The mobgnome turned and pointed up, past the rows of kegs lining the second and third storeys, towards the upper balconies, far above their heads. As she did so, the tray balanced on her hand wobbled and threatened to tumble to the floor. Thaw steadied it, his hands brushing against hers. She blushed all the more fiercely.

‘Good luck, sir,’ she said, and with that, scurried away.

Turning on his heels, Thaw Daggerslash headed for the stairs that led up to the balconies, passing through the huddled clusters of sky pirates as he went. Mingling together in the Tarry Vine tavern, there seemed to be members of every tribe and clan in the Edgelands -mobgnomes, cloddertrogs, brogtrolls, slaughterers, waifs and goblins of every type, from lop-ears and hammerheads, to long-haired and tusked.

In stark contrast, Thaw Daggerslash himself was a fourthling - and proud of it.

Unlike the tribes and clans of the Deepwoods, who identified closely with their own kind and shared fierce loyalties and cherished customs, fourthlings could not clearly be categorized. They weren’t goblins or trogs, waifs or trolls, but often had shared ancestors who were all of these and more. Kobold the Wise, leader of the
Thousand Tribes centuries before the floating city of Sanctaphrax was even dreamed of, had named these outsiders fourthlings - for the blood of the tribes from all four corners of the Edgelands mingled in their veins.

Ever since then, fourthlings had made their way in the world without the benefits of clanship and tribal protection. Instead, they worked and lived amongst their Edgeland neighbours, becoming slaughterers or woodtroll timberers as the occasion presented. The trogs and the goblin tribes of the Deepwoods refused to have anything to do with fourthlings, but in the great melting pot of Undertown, these same fourthlings prospered.

They became sky pirates and Sanctaphrax professors, leaguesmen and merchants. Here in the bustling city, tribes lost much of their importance, and power and influence was gained through guile and cunning, not clan loyalty.

Yes, Thaw Daggerslash was proud indeed to be a fourthling.

There was a smirk on his lips as he turned the corner of the long flight of stairs and, doubling back on himself, continued past the stacks of giant kegs onto the high balconies. Up there, where the rafters divided the broad ledge-like floor into garret alcoves, the light from the overhead lamps was at its brightest - though, paradoxically, it was also where the darkest shadows were cast.

Thaw Daggerslash made his way along the upper balustrade, glancing into the individual garrets, where only the most important sky pirate captains - and the occasional high leaguesman - could be glimpsed, sitting
at low tables in furtive conversation. He was halfway along the balcony when he heard the unmistakable nasal voice of Glaviel Glynte.