Kal Moonheart Trilogy: Dragon Killer, Roll the Bones & Sirensbane (66 page)

She charged through the jungle like a tropical storm. Tree roots and vines twisted aside to get out of her way. Ferns and leaves curled clear, snakes slithered away, and vivid green parrots flew before her, only dispersing into the sky when they reached the beach.

Lula stepped out onto the burning sand and pulled up short. Standing in her way to the sea was a ship sitting on a sandbar. She stopped and smiled at the sight of its colourful sails and the jaunty cut of its jib. The crew were walking up the sand toward her: a picturesque collection of laughing rapscallions. They wore striped gay-coloured shirts, spotted handkerchiefs on their heads, and shiny buckles at their belts. They clapped and cheered when they saw Lula emerge from the trees. One of them took up a fiddle and started to play a sprightly sea shanty. Some of the others began to sing.

Their leader, a jolly fat man with red cheeks and a twinkle in his eye, stepped forward to greet Lula. She tried hard to calm her raging heart and patiently treated him to her best benevolent smile. As the fat man approached, though, it suddenly became clear to Lula that he wasn’t going to stop and kneel … he was going to reach out and
touch
her.

‘Bow down before me!’ she roared. ‘I am your queen!’

* * *

Something smacked Lula. She opened her eyes and got smacked again. And again: by a stinging slop of seawater that almost blinded her. She swallowed a mouthful, and got a good deal up her nose, so the next minute or so was a noisy battle of spluttering, blinking and snorting to regain her senses.

She tried to turn away to avoid the next wave, but found her movement constricted. She took the next wave on the side of her cheek. Looking down, as the surf drained off her body, she saw that her waist was wrapped in chains. Where the hell was she? A horrible grinding, screeching sound from nearby was making it hard for her to think.

She managed to twist her body around within the loops of chains, and found herself face to face with Kal. The waves fell one by one on Kal’s face, but she didn’t seem to mind: she was unconscious.

Kal was on the opposite side of—and resting her sunburned face against—a foot-thick wooden tree trunk. The trunk was sprouting out of the sand at the shoreline, and the two women had been chained to it. The wood was dark and smooth, as if it had been … varnished.

One clear thought penetrated the mud of Lula’s mind: they were chained to the foremast (or, more likely, the spare foremast) of the
Swordfish
!

As Lula slowly regained her awareness, she managed to make some kind of sense of her situation. The top of the foremast had been driven into the sand, and the anchor chain had been wrapped tight around Lula’s waist, Kal’s waist and the mast. The
Swordfish
itself was still resting on its sandbar about thirty yards away, and was the source of the painful screeching sound. The ship’s doctor was on deck, abusing his fiddle.

Lula let loose a wordless yell at the enthusiastic musician. The scraping halted for a moment, then was taken up again with renewed vigour. The sound of it was like claws being dragged across Lula’s skull.

Her tongue was swollen and numb. She worked her jaw in circles to try and get some feeling back. When she could finally speak, she said, ‘Kal!’

No response. Kal was dead to the world.

‘Kal, wake up,’ Lula urged. How could Kal still be out of it? Lula’s limbs ached, her head was pounding and her throat was so dry it hurt to breathe. Kal seemed like she was in the middle of a happy dream, though, and she blew bubbles through the foam of the surf that had gathered around her lips.

Lula struggled at her bonds, but it was no good; now that the surge of strength that the Sirensbane had provided her with had run dry, she was as weak and helpless as a child. She felt like screaming like a child, too; she could feel herself weeping like one. To crave a hit so bad, but to be confined and helpless, was the absolute worst feeling in the world. It was like being trapped frozen in a waking dream, or like lying alive in a close-fitting coffin with the sun and air six feet out of reach.

As the tide moved up the beach, the waves let up, and Lula and Kal were soon waist-deep in the sea. The
Swordfish
lowered its launch, and Lula could see the fat red-faced man being rowed out to meet them. It was Kal’s revolting friend, Captain Dogwood. He had a horrible leering grin plastered all over his face.

‘Unchain us!’ Lula ordered. She didn’t mean it to, but it came out as an aggressive howl.

‘Can’t,’ Dogwood smirked, as the little boat came up alongside them. Pip, the cabin boy, was at the oars. Dogwood dug into his pockets and pulled out a bag. Plunging his hand into it, he produced a heap of Sirensbane.

Lula went wild, and shook her chains so hard that the mast wobbled, and Kal groaned. ‘Give me some!’ Lula pleaded.

Dogwood shook his head. ‘Can’t,’ he repeated, and he tipped his palm and let the black glass shards slide into the sea. They hissed and fizzed as they dissolved. He made as if to empty the rest of the bag—

‘No, wait!’ Lula screamed in horror. ‘I’ll pay you. I’ll make you rich!’

This time Dogwood laughed; an irritating high-pitched giggle. ‘You already did,
my queen
,’ he mocked, looking over to the beach. Lula followed his gaze: emerging from the jungle were four of the crew, hauling a massive chest between them. They lowered it onto the sand the first chance they got, and opened it up to show the rest of their friends. Pretty soon, most of the crew were gathered around, handing out golden treasures and letting waterfalls of coins slip through their fingers. Another team plunged into the jungle, ropes wrapped around their shoulders. The doctor changed his tune to a frisky jig, and the sailors began to sing lustily:

‘A friendly fish, a mermaid’s kiss. Who could wish for more than this?’

It was all too much. Lula managed to control her rising anger and distress just long enough to look Dogwood in the eye and utter three words she would regret for the rest of her life. ‘I’ll kill you,’ she hissed. She meant it, too.

But Dogwood only seemed amused. ‘Yes, you said you’d say that.’

‘What?’ Lula was confused.

Dogwood dipped into his pocket again, and this time produced a scrap of paper. He cleared his throat and, standing up in the prow of the little boat, almost threatening to capsize it, he read aloud:

‘If you are reading this then it is probably because we are out of our heads on Sirensbane. Do not give us any more, no matter how much we beg you. Chain us up for at least two days. If we promise you money, ignore us. If we threaten to kill you, ignore us. Whatever we say, ignore us! Follow these instructions, and we will be in your debt forever.

‘Your friends, Lula Pearl and Kal Moonheart.’

Dogwood folded up the note neatly and put it away, but he tipped out the last of the ship’s supply of Sirensbane into the sea. Lula felt too hollow and empty to react, but Kal had finally awoken, and the sight and smell of the fizzing Sirensbane prompted her to start moaning and wailing.

‘Kal, Kal,’ Lula soothed. ‘It’s alright. Calm down.’

But Kal wouldn’t be calmed, and she screamed all night long. The tide came up to their necks before it began to recede, and the cold rain fell once more. But neither the sea nor the shower could quench Lula’s fever. The
Swordfish
, once free of the sandbar, moved further around the coast to get away. Until then, the doctor played his fiddle nonstop to drown out the pathetic cries of anguish from the two broken women chained up on the beach.

END OF PART THREE

PART FOUR

THE ARMADA

So trim the sails and run out the brass,

And nail your colours to the mast.

Fight on rum and salt sea air,

For victory favours those who dare.

IV.i

A Fatal Kiss

Kal walked ten paces up the snowy slope, then stopped and looked back.

Deros was still standing by the tree line. He was shivering. Was he cold or frightened?

‘Come on!’ Kal shouted. ‘If we’re going to find
real
treasure, it will be further up the mountain!’

Her words echoed around the grey peaks. Deros cursed and ran up to meet her. ‘We’ll find real
monsters
, that’s for sure.’

‘So what?’ Kal said. ‘We’ve got weapons.’ Kal had a small axe and Deros had a large stick. ‘You said you chased off a goblin once, so they’ll probably stay well clear of you!’

Deros’s face twisted with the agony of being caught out in a lie. ‘How do we even know where we’ll find treasure anyway?’ he said.

‘Doesn’t matter,’ Kal said cheerfully. ‘
Real
adventure is in the looking, not the finding! Anyway, whatever happens, I promise you a reward.’

‘What?’ Deros said cautiously.

‘A kiss,’ Kal said. ‘From me.’ She turned her back on him and continued up the slope. She didn’t look back; she knew he would follow.

Kal started to wish she had brought her bearskin hat. The wind above the tree line was fierce and biting. The snow was probably ten feet deep, but it had been here since autumn and had frozen almost solid, so she could walk on top of it. It was hard, sloping and slippy, though, and once she had passed the Watcher Tree there was a mile of frozen emptiness to cross.

She kept her eyes down, occasionally raising them to the dark line ahead that marked the top of the wide open slope. The terrain was more aggressive and dangerous ahead, but among the jagged spurs and folds of rock were the entrances to some of the passes that led between the peaks. No one from the village ever had reason to use them though—it wasn’t as if you could actually
cross
the Starfinger Mountains. There was nothing beyond them. It was mountains beyond mountains, miles upon miles, all the way to the Improbable Mountain at the top of the World. That place, the ancient home of the Gods, was said to be a magic mountain where the laws of nature did not apply.

Refuge’s new young Schoolmaster, Ben, had told Kal some fantastical story about how swirling lava deep underground had turned the entire world into a giant magnet, and the Improbable Mountain was one of the poles. Although it was hard to take him seriously when he didn’t sound like he believed it himself. Science classes weren’t his strong point. Stories and legends of the gods sounded more real when coming from Ben’s mouth. Kal still held out hope that the Improbable Mountain
was
magic, and that maybe she would find an enchanted trinket or relic that had rolled down or been blown off the peak.

She reached the top of the field of ice. Deros was close behind. They stood together, taking deep breaths of the cold mountain air, and watching the steam from their mouths disappear into the star-sprinkled dusk. ‘What a view!’ Deros exclaimed. ‘I think I can see my house from here.’ Lights were coming on down in the village, and tendrils of woodsmoke rose straight up into the sky like strings of grey wool.

‘It’s beautiful,’ Kal agreed. ‘But cold!’ Now that she had stopped moving, the chill had a chance to grab her.

‘Kissing is supposed to warm you up!’ Deros said optimistically.

Kal shook her head. ‘Save it for when we’re freezing to death under an avalanche.’

‘Huh!’ Deros snorted. ‘You’re just like this mountain, Kal: beautiful but cold!’

Kal gave him a sharp look. What had prompted that? She had only been trying to be funny.

Deros looked a bit embarrassed. Had he been trying to give her a back-handed compliment? She turned her back on his awkwardness, and faced the mountain pass that lay before them.

A corridor of hard rock lay before them, twisting off to the left out of sight some hundred yards in. Broken layers of rock hid the entrances to dozens of hidden cave entrances on either side. Drifts of snow concealed dangerous fissures and sudden drops, as the route rose and fell like a road shattered by an earthquake.

Kal stepped forward.

Deros was not so quick to follow. ‘Wait,’ he said. He struggled to conceal his fear. ‘Okay, if we run into a monster—a troll, a wolverine or a goblin—we need a plan. I’ll wave my stick in figure eights to confuse it, while you sneak round and whack it in the back with your axe.’

Kal laughed. ‘If we see a monster, we run,’ she said. ‘We can slide all the way back to the village. Get to my house—it’s the nearest. My dad will deal with the monsters. He’s got a bigger axe than me.’

She pressed on through the snow, lifting each foot high, stretching forward and placing it down carefully, breaking the sparkling white crust of ice. Deros literally followed in her footsteps.

It was hard to see in the gathering gloom. Kal knew that they should turn back before it got too dark. But she just wanted to see around the next bend; to see something new, some new revealing aspect that would redraw the borders of the map of her world, and make it that tiny fraction bigger. That would be worth more than any treasure.

Around the bend in the pass, she met a pair of eyes staring right back at her.

She froze. Deros, too busy looking down at his feet, walked into the back of her. He yelled out, but the thing watching them didn’t react.

It was a head … the head of someone buried up to the neck in the snow.

With a morbid fascination, Kal approached. The head was frozen solid, the skin and hair white, the eyes open but still pale blue. Kal bent down until its nose almost touched hers.

‘It’s Mister Speckle,’ Kal said. ‘The baker.’

Deros came up to look, his curiosity getting the better of his fear. ‘He’s been missing for a year!’ he said. ‘My dad said he ran off with a young strumpet. I’m not sure what a strumpet is … Some kind of goblin?’ he looked around nervously.

‘If there were monsters around, he’d have been eaten by now,’ Kal said. ‘Looks like he froze to death up here. Come on, help me dig him out!’

‘What?’ Deros said.