PathFinder (11 page)

Behind them they heard heavy feet pounding down the gangplank. The chase was on.

The Chase

Ferdie’s feet hardly touched
the ground as Tod and Oskar carried her between them, racing along the path that would take them back to the jetty. Behind them they heard their pursuers drawing ever closer, and as they rounded the bend, disaster struck. Their only hope of escape – Nicko and Snorri’s boat – was not there.

“They’ve gone!” Oskar gasped in dismay. “What are we going to do
now
?”

One glance at the water told Tod what had happened. The
Adventurer
was anchored in the mouth of the creek – Nicko and Snorri had had to move out into deeper water in order not to be stranded by the falling tide. Oskar had slowed down in despair and Tod found that she was dragging not only Ferdie along but Oskar, too. Tod yelled at him fiercely, “Get a move on, Oskie! They’re out in the creek. We can get to the jetty. There’s a rowing boat!”

Now Oskar understood. He picked up speed, but the long dusty path stretched out before them. The jetty seemed a million miles away and Ferdie was tiring fast.

The pounding of the pursuers’ feet was drawing ever closer. Tod glanced back and wished she hadn’t. Rounding the bend were four sailors in striped
Tristan
tops, their knives glittering in the sun.

“Those kids don’t stand a chance,” the lemonade-stall woman said to a customer.

“Oh!” said her customer. “They’ve got her.
They’ve got her!
”

“Got who, ducks?” asked the lemonade seller as her customer sprinted off. “Hey, you forgot your lemonade!”

Tod saw a familiar figure running towards them and then Jerra was there, sweeping Ferdie up into his arms as if she weighed nothing at all. “Follow me!” he yelled, and set off at a run back to the jetty. Tod and Oskar followed him down the steps and Jerra hurried them into a battered red rowing boat with
Bucket
scrawled across her stern. Gently, he lifted Ferdie in, then he and Tod pushed the
Bucket
into the water and jumped aboard. As they rowed away, their pursuers pounded on to the jetty.

Tod and Jerra pulled hard, but behind them the pursuit party had piled into a vicious-looking pointed blue boat with
TT Tristan
engraved upon the stern. They were setting off fast, and both Tod and Jerra knew that four rowers would soon easily outpace one. Meanwhile the
Bucket
was living up to her name, rocking and twisting in the turbulent waters of the outgoing tide, taking them whirling towards the
Adventurer
. And their pursuers were rapidly closing the gap.

Nicko had pulled up the anchor and Snorri was edging the
Adventurer
towards the
Bucket
. As soon as they were within range, Nicko threw a rope. Oskar caught it. He hung on tight and Nicko pulled the
Bucket
alongside the
Adventurer
. Snorri threw down a ladder and Jerra carried Ferdie up it as fast as he could.

Craaack!
The pursuit boat hit the
Bucket
and the little rowing boat went cannoning into the side of the
Adventurer
. Undeterred, Jerra was down the ladder again. He hauled Oskar up by his jacket, then helped Tod to scramble up.

The
Bucket
did not look pretty, but she was built to last, unlike the thin pursuit boat, which, in the collision, had split from end to end. Immediately
TT Tristan
began to sink and the four pursuers found themselves ignominiously clinging to the ropes that were looped around the sides of the
Bucket
, begging for help.

Nicko loved the
Bucket
but he knew what he had to do. He cut the rope and set her free. The
Bucket
was swept into the outgoing tidal stream and as the
Adventurer
set her sails and headed out to the channel through the sandbanks at the mouth of the creek, the
Bucket
followed slowly and sadly until one of its four unwilling crew managed to climb aboard and began the long row to the shore.

Sound travels easily across water, and as the
Adventurer
left the mouth of the creek and began to carefully pick its way through the sandbanks, Ferdie heard the Lady’s scream drifting down the creek.

“I want her back! Get her!”

The Adventurer

As the
Adventurer
nosed into
the deepwater channel that would take them out to sea, Jerra saw something he had not expected to see again –
Swan
. Annar was waiting for them. Jerra grinned. Suddenly, everything was pretty near perfect.

Annar waved and brought
Swan
skimming towards them. Soon she was sailing alongside. “OK?” she shouted.

“Yes, yes!” Jerra called down. “We’ve got Ferdie!”

“Wow!” Annar had not really expected them to find Ferdie. She had not even expected to see Jerra again, so convinced had she been that the Lady would capture them all. But while they were gone, Annar had been determined to do something. “I’ve got
Skimmer
back!” she called up. “I’ll take you to her!”

Jerra laughed out loud. Everything was totally perfect now.

The
Adventurer
and her crew arranged to meet up with Jerra and
Skimmer
at Goat Rock later, and then free at last, they set sail. Ferdie sat at the prow with Tod and Oskar, savouring the sun, the salt spray and the heady sense of freedom. No one said a word. They sat with their arms around one another, luxuriating in the feeling of utter happiness and relief.

They settled down to wait at Goat Rock quay. Nicko and Snorri, with the accustomed patience of those who had been at sea for a long time, occupied themselves with fishing and letting down a lobster pot on to the seabed, but Oskar was more impatient. He borrowed the telescope and climbed Goat Rock to watch for
Skimmer
, but it was not until dusk was falling that he saw a little green boat with a white sail bringing – to his surprise – Annar as well as Jerra skimming across the waves.

“No one’s following?” Ferdie asked anxiously.

Oskar shook his head. “Nope. No one.”

It was nearly dark and the sea was choppy with the onset of the evening breezes when
Skimmer
jauntily rounded Goat Rock. The smell of cooking – Nicko was making a fish stew – drifted appetisingly up from below, but Jerra refused all invitations to stay.

“We’ve got to get back,” he said. “I promised Mum we’d be home by nightfall.”

Oskar looked dubiously at
Skimmer
, which seemed very small after the
Adventurer
. “We won’t all fit in there,” he said.

“Of course we will,” Jerra said impatiently.

Ferdie was as hesitant as Oskar. She longed to see her parents, but the thought of five of them in
Skimmer
out on the open sea in the dark scared her. “Jerra,” she said. “It’s too dangerous. After all this I … I just want to get home
safely
.”

“Ferdie is right,” said Annar. “
Skimmer
will be slow and low in the water with five of us. If the wind freshens any more it could be difficult.”

Tod agreed. “The winds around the headland are always strong at this time of year,” she said. “I don’t think it would be safe.”

“It would be downright
dangerous
, if you ask me,” said Nicko. “Snorri and I will bring Tod, Oskar and Ferdie home tomorrow morning.”

“That is very kind of you, Nicko, but I promised we’d be back
tonight
,” said Jerra.

“And you
will be, Jerra,” said Annar. “But Nicko is right, it is too risky for more than two people in
Skimmer
tonight. We will go now;
Skimmer
will be light and fast and you will soon be home to tell your parents that Ferdie is free.”

And so Jerra and Annar sailed away. Tod, Oskar and Ferdie watched them until no one could see the white sail any more, then they went below to large bowls of steaming fish stew.

Goat Rock

In the early hours of the
morning, Ferdie woke. She stared up into the darkness, wondering why the
Tristan
was rocking and pitching so much. A flash of panic ran through her. What if the ship was sinking? How would she escape, shackled as she was to the floor? Ferdie’s hand found her right ankle, where the hated shackle lay, and to her amazement,
it wasn’t there
. She sat up with a start – and then she remembered where she was and a flood of joy rushed through her. Too excited to sleep, Ferdie crawled out from under her blanket and, stepping gently over Tod, climbed up to the hatch, which Nicko had left open to let the air in.

Tod was suddenly awake, aware that the space next to her was empty. She glanced up and saw Ferdie’s bare foot dis­appearing through the hatch. Very quietly, Tod tiptoed past the sleeping Oskar and followed Ferdie outside. She found her friend sitting on the cabin roof, gazing up at the beautiful dusting of stars – stars that she had not seen for more than two months. Ferdie smiled at her. “Hey, Tod,” she whispered. “Can’t you sleep either?”

Tod shook her head and sat down next to Ferdie. The warmth of the late summer’s night, the gentle creaking of the boat and the
swish-swash
of the swell lulled them into a contented silence. Behind them rose the comforting mound of Goat Rock, hiding them from the OutPost and its sinister creek. In front lay the wide expanse of the sea, and in the distance on the unseen horizon was home. Dreamily, Tod watched the water moving past the anchor chain, entranced by the tiny points of phosphorescence.

Ferdie could not take her eyes off the sky. “Aren’t the stars beautiful?” she whispered.

Tod looked up. “They are,” she agreed.

“They were like this the night … the night I was taken,” Ferdie whispered, her nervous fingers playing with the little green dragon that Oskar had jubilantly returned to her.

“Oh, Ferdie, don’t think about it,” said Tod.

Ferdie shook her head. “I … I don’t
want
to think about it, but I can’t stop. I keep seeing those horrible white heads. Hearing those clicks … I thought it was Oskie fooling around with one of his mechanical things. So I opened the window to see. And then …” Ferdie shuddered. “And then I saw them. Huge, white snake heads bobbing … I remember one of them jumping up towards me and then something white and … and slimy, falling over me, sticking to me like glue and … I couldn’t move. I couldn’t shout. I couldn’t even
breathe
. Everything was so tight. And so, so cold. Like being trapped in ice. Argh!” Ferdie screamed, leaping to her feet.
“What’s that?”

Tod jumped up, heart beating fast. “What?” she gasped. “Where?”

In the cabin below, Nicko sat up fast and hit his head on the ceiling above his bunk. Snorri managed to fall
up
the ladder. Two anxious faces appeared at the hatch.

“What is it?” Nicko asked.

“There – there’s something up here,” stammered Ferdie, pointing to the prow. “An
animal
.”

“Ullr.” Snorri sounded relieved. “Come, Ullr, come and say hello.” The black shape of a panther stood gracefully and padded silently across the deck to Snorri. She patted the panther. “Ullr keeps watch for us at night,” she said.

Both Tod and Ferdie looked puzzled – where had the panther come from?

“Your cat is called Ullr too,” Tod said.

Snorri smiled. “This
is
my cat,” she said. “Ullr is a
Transformer
. At night he becomes a panther. In the day he is my little orange cat.”

Ferdie’s shout had unsettled Nicko. After Snorri, Tod and Ferdie had gone below, Nicko climbed to the top of Goat Rock and for the rest of the night he kept watch, leaving Ullr to guard the boat. He stared out to sea but all was quiet, just the gentle
splish-splash
of waves slopping up against rock. On the horizon, where Nicko supposed the PathFinder Village to be, he could see a red glow like the first rays of the rising sun – but surely it was too early for sunrise? Nicko frowned. He had an uneasy feeling that something was wrong.