Dragon Choir (34 page)

“
Good. Hurn can throw Delik on ship. Elrin too big, I get him
half way.”

Hurn reached
for Delik.

“
Ash it Hurn! Not me.” Delik swatted the ogre’s hands. “See
those guards up on the forecastle, near the edge? Think you could
hit one with something?”

“
Will hit.” Hurn grunted. “Head might smash.”

“
Best if it didn’t, just go easy, eh.”

They searched
around the pile of crates for some ammunition. Delik found a basket
filled with yellow melons and put one in Hurn’s sizable hand. It
fit like an apple would in his own.

“
Listen carefully, Hurn. You have to wait here. If you hear
trouble on board, if you hear us yelling, we’ll need your help to
get out. Just smash your way through anyone that gets in your way.
You understand?”

Hurn grunted
and gave Delik a solemn nod. He tested the weight of the melon,
gently tossing it from one hand to the other. “Hurn throw melon
now?”

“
When you’re ready, if it goes wide there are plenty
mo—”

The melon flew
from Hurn’s hand in a long arc through the night. It spun through
the air and smashed across the back of the guard’s head. The force
of the blow toppled him over the gunwale. His friend tried to grab
him, but only succeeded in dropping his bottle. With a great
splash, the guard hit the water. The other drunken guards ran to
find out what happened and the crew crowded around, happy for a
distraction from their labour.

Delik slapped
Hurn’s arm. “Who would believe that?”

While everyone
crowded over the edge laughing and jeering at the flailing guard in
the water, Delik and Elrin took up a crate each and walked by,
bearing their load down the pier and up the far ramp. Delik nodded
to the guards.

They didn’t
respond in kind.

***

Elrin dropped the
crate as the first guard seized Delik. He pulled his dagger and
lunged.

The shankakin
guard dodged to the side. “Easy, son, we’re on your side.”

Elrin slashed
the dagger in front of him, keeping the guards at bay. “Delik?”

Delik
chuckled. “Why are you waving your arm about like a fool? Do what
they say before we’re found out.”

Elrin flushed
with embarrassment. He had come close to stabbing one of their own
men. The dagger was invisible to them, so there was no point
arguing to recover his pride. Elrin relaxed his stance and allowed
the guards to do their work. A hood went over his head and his
hands were loosely bound behind his back. Elrin kept hold of his
dagger, just in case things went sour. He hoped it still cut even
if it was invisible.

They were
taken below decks, weaving through several corridors. Elrin soon
became disorientated. They passed through a rowdy room smelling of
stale beer and mutton. After a few more turns the drunken revelry
faded behind them.

They stopped
and a fist banged on something solid, giving Elrin a start. There
was a click then a quick metallic scrape.

A phlegmy
voice spat at them. “Bugger off!”

Their hoods
were removed. Delik stood beside Elrin and a sweaty faced jailer
scrutinised them from behind a shutter hole in a heavy studded
door.

“
This lot tried to escape,” said one of the guards. “Kobb
wants ‘em locked up.”

“
There’s no bloody room! I’m full up with Jaspa’s mates. Piss
off!” The jailor slid the shutter closed.

The guard
banged on the door again.

“
Kobb says to put them in Jaspa’s cell. There’s plenty of
room.”

The shutter
opened. “Tell Kobb he can stick any more in his own cabin!”

The door shook
and there was a grunt and a thud. “Lord’s balls afire! In and out,
in and out. I’ll be dead before I sleep.” The Jailor muttered on as
keys jingled together. A moment later the lock clunked and the door
swung open.

Elrin was
shoved through. He gripped the hilt of the dagger and tested his
bindings. Two guards stood outside Jaspa’s cell. It was furnished
with a fine upholstered chair and a small table holding a bowl of
fruit. Short stacks of books and piles of scrolls accumulated in
the corners. Jaspa sat cross-legged, reading a book illuminated by
the dying nub of a candle. Tikis and Minni were cramped into the
other cell, a quarter the size of Jaspa’s. Amber was not there.

The fat greasy
jailor shut the door and locked it behind them. With a disturbing
grunt, he hefted a timber beam to bar it shut. One of their escort
struck up a joking conversation with the jailor while the other
forced Elrin ahead to the guards at Jaspa’s cell.

One of Jaspa’s
guards gave their escort a quick wink, half-heartedly patting Delik
down. His partner was not so lax. He fingered through Elrin’s hair
and slipped his palms down to his neck and shoulders.

Elrin’s dagger
came alive and thrummed in his hand, coaxing his muscles with an
insistent hunger. The loose bindings fell away from his wrist and
the dagger lashed out, jabbing up into the guard’s chest. The man
wrapped tight fingers around Elrin’s throat, squeezing with
strength enough to snap his neck. The enchanted blade jabbed up
again, and again, searching for the guard’s heart, probing to
server anything vital, anything to release the death grip around
the young Calimskan’s neck. Time slowed, stars swam and his vision
dimmed to black. With the last of his breath Elrin pushed and
twisted the blade, willing it to end the guard and save his
life.

The hands
around his throat went limp. Elrin gasped for air, drawing it in a
rasping flurry, coughing as it inundated his lungs and brought his
vision back. He swung around on the remaining guard, brandishing
his blood-drenched blade, his red right hand eager to please the
weapon.

The guard
threw his arms up in surrender. “No! Not me, I’m with Jaspa!”

Delik eased
forward in front of the cowering guard, reaching for Elrin’s
shoulder. “It’s over lad. There now, it’s all right.” Delik pointed
to the fat jailor, slumped in his chair, waiting for Nathis to
guide his soul to his maker. The conversational escort stood over
the rotund body, wiping his blade clean on the dead man’s
tunic.

Elrin’s blade
glowed, drawing in the wet red mess from across his hand, drinking
the lifeblood and unfolding a calm, warm comfort that wrapped about
him.

Delik touched
his arm, easing him out of the red fog. “Lad? Where did you get
that?”

“
My father.” It was all he could think of.

“
A strange blade, that one. How about you rest it in your belt
for now?”

Elrin sheathed
the blade, the warmth faded as he let it go. He rushed to Minni’s
cell, clasping at the cold iron bars. “Where’s Amber? What
happened?”

Minni wrapped
her hands over his, giving them a gentle squeeze. “Kobb wouldn’t
have her put in a cell, she’s up in a cabin with Granny Shan. I
tucked her in myself, before they took us down here. She’s got a
big day ahead of her.”

Delik slid the
jailor’s key into Jaspa’s cell door and with a crisp oiled click
the door swung open. Jaspa blew out the candle and shut the book,
leaving the ribbon marking the page. Jaspa went to his son with
open arms.

Delik embraced
his father, his face a joy of teeth and dimpled stubble. “You
ready, old man?”

“
Old? Ha! I can still beat you in a wrestle.”

“
I let you get out of that pin. I didn’t want to embarrass you
in front of all your admirers.”

“
Oh, that’s what it was, eh? Ona’s arse!”

Delik clapped
his hands. Keen to get moving. “Has the lock figured out which is
the key?”

“
The time is upon us, Minella,” said Jaspa.

Minni was
quiet, staring up into Elrin’s eyes. Her clammy hands would not let
go of his. The young man was lost in her dark eyes, his heart wound
up like her wild hair. She reached forward running her caress up
his arms, behind his neck. Elrin leant in and their lips met. Dizzy
in bliss, he wanted to reach through and pull her close, return her
embrace, but his hands continued to grip the iron bars with a
nervous assurance, an anchor to ground him.

And then it
was over, all too soon. His lips wanted to feel hers again, just to
make sure it was real, to taste that delicious soft pleasure.

Minni poked
her finger at his chest. “Now, can you work out what you
missed?”

Elrin grinned,
dumb with heart’s blood flooding his thoughts.

“
It’s you, Elrin,” Minni caressed his flushed cheek. “You’re
the Key.”

“
How could it be? I’m no sorcerer. I’m nothing.”

“
The Lock to secure us shall know the Key, eyes at sunset,
heart alight.

Death bell
song stirs Choir’s wrath, false key fails dawn’s only hope.

Hand to the
Fist, Key to the Lock, captive embrace, dawning glory.”

The prophecy
was manifesting; the riddles were growing into truth, entwining
tendrils around them all.

“
It’s me?”

“
This Key might break in this Lock,” grumbled Tikis from the
back of the cell. “Smoothskins take strange mates.”

Jaspa laughed.
“Don’t listen to him, lad. Tikis is a little overprotective of our
Minella.”

“
Come on then,” said Delik. “We can to and fro once we’ve got
the choir and this bloody battle is won.”

Minni pulled
Elrin in for a parting kiss, as delicious as the first. “That’s for
luck. Return safe.”

While their
escorts wrestled with the bar holding the door shut, Jaspa and
Delik stripped the dead guards of their weapons. Delik found a
hatchet in the fat jailor’s belt. Jaspa took a cutlass from the man
Elrin had stabbed to death. They tested the weight of the weapons
then swapped with each other.

Jaspa flipped
the hatchet, caught it by the handle and made several mock cuts in
the air. “Now, this feels more like it.”

Delik slung
the sword belt around his waist and slid the cutlass through the
leather frog. “I think you’re happy with your thirsty blade too,
eh?”

Elrin touched
his father’s heirloom. “It’s kept me alive this far.”

Their escorts
waved them out the heavy door and guided them through the ship.
They travelled a convoluted way up to the gun deck, avoiding the
busy mess hall to climb a stairway at the stern of the ship. There
they squeezed through a rear cannon port, down a rope ladder and
into a waiting boat. They took the oars and rowed to an unguarded
pier near Hurn’s hiding place.

Hurn’s hulking
form backed out of the shadows behind the stack of crates and snuck
toward them as best as an ogre could. He managed it well. The
groaning timber under the Ogre’s weight blended in with the
complaining boards of every ship and walkway in the floating
village. His lumbering silhouette stood out against the sleeping
huts and hulks. He was a child’s nightmare, the melon in his hand a
victim’s skull.

As Hurn got to
the boat, a guard on patrol emerged from between two shacks at the
end of the short pier. He gave a yell, half in alarm at the monster
he had discovered, half in fear of what might become of him if he
tried to hinder Hurn’s progress.

“
Row! Get us away!” rasped Jaspa, his whisper as unnecessary
as his command.

Elrin heaved
on the oars. “Get in the middle! Sit down, before the boat tips
over. Quick!”

Hurn had a
different idea. He stepped to the middle of the boat, but instead
of sitting down he twisted and threw the melon with grace
unbecoming of his bulk. Hurn threw it so hard that the boat rocked
and he almost fell out. The melon hurtled through the air and
smashed into the guard’s head, knocking him to the creaking boards
with a grim thud.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

Free

Halfway across the
lagoon Elrin was exhausted and his back was cramping up. He wished
for a second pair of arms at the oars and grew ever more irritated
as Delik prattled on to his father. Since they were clear of
Kobbton Delik and Jaspa hadn’t shut up, barely dipping their oars
in. First they speculated on the logistics of dismantling Kobbton
and floating it to a safe harbour each season, then they started on
about the advantages of a well manned galley over a cannon-rigged
Jandan galleon.

Elrin’s
fatigued chagrin caught Hurn’s attention. “Hurn Ga Kogh row now.
Elrin rest.”

Elrin pulled
the oars in. “Thanks, Hurn. Should be easy for your big arms.”

Changing
positions was not so easy. Everyone clung on as the boat rocked
with Hurn’s shifting mass, sloshing water over the side.

Delik lost his
balance and tipped from his seat. “What in the hells are you doing?
Sit down before we’re all in the drink.”

Hurn found his
seat and the boat stabilised. Elrin couldn’t help but laugh at the
awkwardness of the seemingly simple task. Jaspa laughed too, giving
his son a hand off the bottom of the boat. Delik didn’t see the
funny side. With Hurn at the oars the boat lurched into motion,
leaping ahead with each stroke.

Elrin rubbed
the ache out of his arms. “Back there, throwing those melons. Where
did you learn to do that?”

Hurn pulled
the oars, his face blank. “Slave games.”

“
Oh,” Elrin didn’t know what to say.

“
Hurn Ga Kogh not run so fast, not lift so much, not fight so
good. Pelegrin keep because I throw iron ball, win him games, win
him bones.”