Stormchaser (18 page)

• CHAPTER ELEVEN •
T
HE
E
YE OF THE
S
TORM

T
wig lay some way from Mugbutt's filthy straw- covered quarters. He was still pretending to be unconscious. Each time the
Stormchaser
pitched and tossed he would roll over a little further, hoping that the flat-head would assume it was the movement of the boat shifting him across the floor. Slowly – painfully slowly – he was manoeuvring himself towards the staircase. One chance at escape, that was all he would get.

Stupid! Stupid! Stupid! he told himself. Not only had he disobeyed his father, but he’d left him at the mercy of treacherous mutineers – just as Cloud Wolf had feared might happen.

The sky ship lurched sharply to the left and Twig rolled over twice. The stairs were getting closer.

It was so obvious that Spleethe was up to no good, Twig continued angrily to himself. He never liked you.
You should’ve realized why he was being so friendly! ‘Oh, Sky above,’ he murmured. ‘What have I done?’

The sky ship listed to starboard and Twig had to brace himself against the floor to stop himself being propelled back to Mugbutt's berth. Through the crack in his eye-lids he watched the flat-head snuffling through the soiled straw for any bits of meat he might have missed.

Disgusting creature, he thought, and trembled. And a formidable fighter…

At that moment, the
Stormchaser
reared up like a prowlgrin charger, tilted abruptly to port and dropped in the sky. With his heart in his mouth, Twig rolled the last few yards towards the bottom of the stairs. There he hesitated and looked back. The sky ship reared up a second time and there was a loud crash as Mugbutt lost his balance and tumbled to the floor.

Now! Twig said to himself. Get out while you can.

He leapt to his feet, gripped the wooden rails fiercely and climbed the steep set of stairs as quickly as his trembling legs would allow.

‘
OY
!’ Mugbutt bellowed, when he realized what was happening. ‘Where are you going?’

Twig didn’t wait to reply. ‘Come on!’ he urged himself desperately. He was halfway up the stairs, yet the hatch at the top looked no nearer. ‘Come
on
!’

Already, Mugbutt had climbed to his feet, vaulted over the bars which enclosed his berth and was racing headlong towards him. Six more steps he had to go, and Mugbutt was there at the bottom. Five … four … Twig could feel the entire staircase tremble as the heavy flat-head hurried up behind him. Three … two…

‘Nearly there,’ Twig muttered. ‘One more step and…’ All at once, he felt the horny hand of the flat-head goblin grasping at his ankle. ‘No!’ he screamed and kicked back with both legs.

Shoving the hinged hatch open with shaking hands, Twig launched himself up and pulled himself through the narrow opening. He knelt down beside the hole. Mugbutt's spatula fingers appeared at the rim. Twig leaned forwards, seized the hatch door and slammed it down with all his strength.

There was an agonizing cry. The fingers disappeared from view and from below the hatch came the muffled sound of Mugbutt tumbling back down the staircase. Twig had done it! He’d escaped – yet already, he could hear the flat-head pounding back up the stairs.

With his heart thumping, Twig slid the heavy bolts across the hatchway and, to make doubly sure, heaved a huge barrel of pickled tripweed across the floor until it came to rest on the hatch door. Then, leaping to his feet, he headed for the next flight of stairs – the flight which would take him up on to the deck itself. As he began climbing, the sound of furious hammering and cursing exploded behind him.

Let the hatch hold, Twig prayed. Please!

Up on deck and completely unaware of the drama that had been unfolding below them, the captain and crew of
the
Stormchaser
were struggling to keep the sky ship airborne as the mighty ball of cloud crackled and flashed across the sky.

‘Double bind the tolley-ropes,’ Cloud Wolf bellowed as the Great Storm hurtled on towards the Twilight Woods. It was essential that he maintain the
Stormchaser
's position at its very centre. ‘Draw in the studsail. Untangle those jib lines!’

The atmosphere was, in every sense, electric. Tiny filaments of hissing blue light fuzzed the outline of the sky ship. They fizzed. They sparked. They danced on every surface, from bowsprit to rudder-wheel, masthead to hull. They danced on the sails, the ropes, the decks. And they danced on the sky pirates themselves – on their beards, their clothes, their fingers and toes; setting their entire bodies tingling.

Tem Barkwater was turning a handspike. ‘Can’t say as I like this over-much,’ he grumbled as the sparking blue light played all round his hands.

Stope Boltjaw looked up from the skysail he was busy repairing. ‘It's
ah
playing ha-
ah
-voc with my
ah
jaw,’ he gasped.

Tem grinned.

‘It's not
ah
fu-
ah
-nny!’ he complained.

‘But it is!’ Tem Barkwater chuckled as his shipmate's lower jaw continued to open and close with a will of its own.

Years earlier, Stope Boltjaw had lost his lower jaw during a fierce battle between his sky pirate ship and two league ships. A notoriously ruthless leaguesman by
the name of Ulbus Pentephraxis had crept up on him with his hunting axe, and struck him a savage blow which had caught him sideways on, just below his ear.

When he recovered, Stope had fashioned a replacement from a piece of ironwood. So long as he remembered to keep the bolts well oiled, the false jaw served him well enough – at least, it had done up until now. From the moment the
Stormchaser
penetrated the Great Storm, the curious electrical force had caused it to gape wide and slam shut, time and again – and there was nothing Stope Boltjaw could do to stop it.

‘How
ah
much longer
ah
is this going on?’ he groaned.

‘Till we get to the Twilight Woods, I reckon,’ said Tem Barkwater.

‘Which will be in approximately … nine minutes,’ Spiker called down from the rigging.

‘Nine minutes,’ Slyvo Spleethe repeated gleefully under his breath. The quartermaster, who had been sent to check that the mooring-cleats were holding up, but was now leaning against the poop-deck handrail gazing idly into the hypnotic swirl of the clouds all round them, glanced round.

‘Keep it up, Quintinius Verginix,’ he sneered. ‘Complete your journey to the Twilight Woods. Recover
the stormphrax. Then I shall make my move. And woe betide anyone who…’ He gasped. ‘What in Sky's name?’

The sight of Twig, standing in the doorway of the little cabin above the staircase, filled Spleethe with an uncontrolled rage. If Cloud Wolf should also see him, then all would be lost. Without a moment's thought, Spleethe dashed off towards him.

Twig looked about him in a state of bewildered excitement. His narrow escape from the flat-head goblin had left him breathless and edgy. Now, as he took in his surroundings, his heart clamoured more urgently than ever.

The air was purple; it smelled of sulphur, of burnt milk. All around the sky ship, the enveloping clouds boiled and writhed and crackled with blinding lightning. His body tingled as tentacles of blue light wrapped themselves around him, causing every hair to stand on end.

This
was stormchasing!

The crew were feverishly busy, with Hubble, the ferocious albino banderbear, tethered to the helm, and Cloud Wolf fully occupied with the sail and weight levers as he
struggled to maintain both speed and lift. What a time to have to reveal that he had stowed away on board; what a moment to have to break the news of the impending mutiny.

‘Yet I have no choice,’ Twig muttered grimly. Already, he could hear the wooden hatchway splintering below him. It was only a matter of time before Mugbutt emerged on board. Twig knew that if he didn’t speak up now then his father would surely end up dead. He shuddered miserably. ‘And it’ll all be my fault!’

Bracing himself for the short yet perilous journey from stair-head to helm, Twig was about to set off when a heavy hand slammed down on his shoulders and yanked him back. An ice-cold blade pressed hard at the base of his neck.

‘One move, one sound,
Master
Twig, and I’ll slit your throat,’ Spleethe hissed. ‘Understood?’

‘Yes,’ Twig whispered.

The next instant, he heard a click behind him and found himself being shoved roughly into a store-cupboard filled with buckets and mops, lengths of rope and spare sailcloth. He tumbled backwards and landed heavily in the corner. The door slammed shut.

‘Five minutes and counting!’ the oakelf's strident voice announced.

Twig climbed shakily to his feet and pressed his ear against the locked door. He could just make out two voices speaking in conspiratorial whispers above the continuing roar and rattle. One was Spleethe's. The other was Mugbutt's.

‘I’m not to blame,’ the flat-head was whining. ‘He’d escaped before I had a chance to stop him.’

‘You should have kept him tied up,’ came Spleethe's irritated reply. ‘Curse that Twig!’ he said. ‘Someone's bound to find him before the stormphrax has been retrieved…’