Syren (34 page)

As Lucy struggled up the side of the
Cerys
, an odd-looking gull with yellow feathers landed on the sandbank. It put its head to one side and looked at Jakey Fry with some interest; then it stuck its beak into the sand, pulled out a long, wriggling sand eel and gulped it down. Yuck, it
hated
sand eels. Sand eels were the worst thing about being a gull. But it couldn’t help it. As soon as it felt the shift of sand grains beneath its sensitive little flat feet something took over, and the next thing it knew it had one of the disgusting things halfway down its throat. The gull took off and flew to a nearby rock to recover.

The little yellow gull could not believe that once again its fortunes had suddenly changed. But it had had no choice, it told itself. It knew that the bossy ExtraOrdinary Wizard would indeed have kept it imprisoned in the Sealed Cell forever if it had not agreed to her terms. The gull decided that it would not be rushed. It would get moving when it had digested the sand eel and not before. It hoped its Master would be worth all the trouble, but it doubted it. Trying to ignore the sensation of sand eel wriggling in its stomach, the gull watched Lucy climb the precarious-looking rungs up the side of the
Cerys
’s hull.

At last Lucy reached the top. She peered over the gunnels. To her surprise, the deck of the
Cerys
was deserted.

Where had everyone gone?

L
ucy looked across the deck of
the
Cerys
, which she thought looked surprisingly normal, apart from some spilled paint that she had stupidly stepped in. Lucy bent to pick her trailing boot ribbons out of the annoying goop, which stuck to her fingers and—
oh
. Lucy opened her mouth to scream, only to have a smelly hand shoved over it.

“
Shh,
Lucy. Don’t scream.
Please
,” Wolf Boy hissed.

“It’s blood, it’s
blood
,” Lucy spluttered
beneath Wolf Boy’s grubby paw.

“Yeah,” muttered Wolf Boy. “There’s a lot of it around. And there’ll be even more if
they
find us.” He jerked his free thumb toward the prow of the ship. Suddenly Lucy realized that the deck was not quite as deserted as she had thought. On a large open area in front of the middle mast she could see three figures silhouetted in the light of a lamp, trying to operate the cargo-hold crane. They had not noticed the most recent arrivals on board—and if Wolf Boy had anything to do with it, they were not going to notice either. Slowly, stealthily, he walked Lucy backward to the cover of an upturned rowboat.

“No screams, okay?” he whispered.

Lucy nodded, and Wolf Boy took away his hand.

The upturned boat was on the dark side of the deck, away from the glow of the Light. Lucy slipped in behind it.

“Oh,
that’s
where you all are,” she whispered touchily. “You could have
waited
for me.”

“Didn’t think you were coming,” answered Septimus, who had rather hoped that Lucy wasn’t.

Like a curious meerkat, Lucy suddenly stuck her head above the boat and looked around excitedly. “So—what are we going to do?” she whispered eagerly, as if they were deciding
on which games to play at a picnic.

Jenna gave an angry yank on Lucy’s precious—and very stained—blue cloak. “Get down, shut up and
listen
,” she hissed. Lucy looked shocked, but she settled down without another word. Jenna turned to Septimus and Wolf Boy.

“You’re the experts,” she told them. “Tell us what to do and we’ll do it.”

Five minutes later, they had a plan. They split into two groups, one led by Septimus, the other by Wolf Boy. Septimus’s troop consisted of a grand total of one—Jenna. Wolf Boy had drawn the short straw with Lucy, but he figured Beetle made up for it. It was decided that each troop would take one side of the deck in a pincer movement that would have impressed even the Crowe twins. Wolf Boy’s band was to have the shadows of the port side and Septimus’s crew would take the more exposed starboard side, which was illuminated by the Light. When they arrived at the hold they were all to do their UnSeens. At this Lucy had protested. It wasn’t fair: everyone had an UnSeen except for her.

But Septimus had no intention of trying to teach Lucy Gringe an UnSeen, even though he had just—he
hoped—taught Beetle a very simple one.

“Look, Lucy,” whispered Jenna, “Beetle and I won’t do ours, okay? Then you won’t be the only one.”

“All right,” said Lucy grudgingly.

They set off toward the lamplit figures, picking their way through the mass of ropes and collapsed sails and stepping over ominous spatters of blood. As they inched their way forward, the worrying silence on the ship persisted—the only sound they could hear was the creaking of the overhead lifting gear that Jenna had last seen used to lower the doors of the cargo hold. She had not noticed the noise in the hubbub of the port, but now, in the silence of the night, the squeaking of the handle that turned the crane set her teeth on edge. Luckily it also drowned out the squeal that came from Lucy Gringe when she stepped on what she thought was a severed hand—which turned out to be a glove used when handling ropes.

Septimus and Wolf Boy crept forward, keeping their eyes fixed on the scene ahead. Septimus could tell that Skipper Fry was on edge. He was impatiently directing the Crowes as they tried to swing the crane into position over the cargo-hold doors, but every few seconds he cast a hasty glance around the
deck. Each time he did, the two approaching pincers froze. As soon as he turned back to the sweating Crowes and the squeaking crane, the pincers moved off once more, noiselessly slipping from pile of rope to boat to mast to capstan to hatchway, until they reached the cargo hold.

Wolf Boy’s crew slipped behind a pile of barrels, and Septimus and Jenna found cover behind a hastily lowered sail. From either side of the deck, they took in the scene. Septimus gave a thumbs-up, which Wolf Boy returned. They were ready to go. Each made a silent count of three, then slipped onto the deck and began their UnSeens, synchronized so that they could both still see each other.

Skipper Fry sniffed like a suspicious dog and his left eyebrow began to twitch. He knew what that meant.

“Stop the crane!” he yelled at the Crowes. Poised above the cargo-hatch doors, the crane creaked to a halt.

Skipper Fry listened hard. The only sound he heard was the
swash
of the sea as, far below, the tide turned and began to feel its way back toward the
Cerys
. It was a sound that told Skipper Fry he needed to get moving. But his eyebrow was twitching like a caterpillar in a hurry—and he didn’t like it. It gave Skipper Fry the creeps. He preferred Darke Magyk, and
not just because it didn’t make his eyebrow twitch—Darke Magyk did the kind of things that he liked to do.

Skipper Fry scanned the deck suspiciously. He figured that one of the crew must have used an UnSeen to escape the roundup. The
Cerys
was a fancy ship—too fancy by half, he thought—and it would not surprise him if one of her sailors was some kind of part-time Wizard. Skipper Fry despised UnSeens. If you didn’t want someone to see you, you got rid of them—much more effective and enjoyable too.

But Skipper Fry knew a few tricks and he prided himself on having outwitted some of the most Magykal of Wizards. He went over to the crane and made a great play of inspecting it—then suddenly spun around. But he saw nothing. Skipper Fry was puzzled. In his experience anyone doing an UnSeen reacted as though they could still be seen—and ran for cover. As a sailor who was used to watching the seas for hours on end, Skipper Fry was an expert at spotting a moving UnSeen, which always led to some distortion. But he could see nothing—because both Wolf Boy and Septimus were standing stock-still—instinctively obeying the Young Army rhyme: “When You Freeze, No One Sees.” Skipper Fry stared into the dark, moving his head from side to side like a pigeon
(another trick of his), and very nearly caught Septimus, who was suddenly almost overcome with a desire to laugh.

But Skipper Fry’s eyebrow still twitched. He decided to run—literally—a basic check for UnSeens. Suddenly he launched into a wild, zigzagging dance, swinging his arms like a windmill in a gale. Skipper Fry’s unorthodox approach to detecting UnSeens was surprisingly effective—Wolf Boy and Septimus only just got out of the way in time. He did in fact brush against Wolf Boy, but luckily Wolf Boy was in the process of leaping behind the main mast, and Skipper Fry mistook Wolf Boy’s elbow for a knot of rope.

Septimus was seriously considering a retreat when the dancing windmill impression stopped as abruptly as it had started—Skipper Fry had caught sight of the Crowe twins making signs to each other, indicating that their skipper’s sanity was not all it could be. Their signals touched a raw nerve.

“Bloomin’ freezing here,” he said, harrumphing and stamping his feet as if he were cold. “Get a move on, yer useless lumps.” The Crowes grinned mockingly and did not move. Skipper Fry unsheathed his cutlass and advanced on Thin Crowe. “Do as yer told or I’ll slice that stupid head off yer scrawny little chicken neck,” he growled. “An’ yer too, Fatso.”

The Crowes set to work with renewed enthusiasm.

Still troubled by his left eyebrow, Skipper Fry warily surveyed the deck while he directed the Crowes. Fat Crowe grabbed the hook on the end of the crane, pulled it down and looped it through the ring in the center of the starboard hatch.

“Stop!” yelled Skipper Fry. “Yer got pudding for brains or what? I told yer
not
to open the hatch until I said them words.” He stuffed his hand in his pocket and drew out the crumpled incantation. “Get me the lamp, chicken head,” he told Thin Crowe.
“Now!”

Thin Crowe brought the lamp. Skipper Fry smoothed his scrap of paper, coughed a little nervously and very carefully intoned,

“Yks eht ni tel,
hct
ah eht
lae
SnU,

Eil su
nee
wteb
re
irrab on tel.”

Septimus and Wolf Boy shot each other wary glances—and so did Fat and Thin Crowe. All four, for different reasons, recognized a Reverse Incantation when they heard one. Skipper Fry wiped the sweat from his brow—he hated reading—and yelled, “Don’t just stand there, pin head, open the doors!”

Thin Crowe ran to the crane and began to turn another squeaky handle.

A few minutes later the doors to the cargo hold were lifted and there was now a great dark, gaping hole in the deck. Septimus and Wolf Boy glanced at each other—this was the opportunity they had been waiting for.

Skipper Fry held up the lantern and peered down into the depths. Gingerly the Crowe twins peered in too. From behind the heaped-up sail, Jenna watched the eerie scene. It reminded her of the drawings she had seen of the midnight grave robber gang, which had terrified the Castle one winter when she was little. The next moment all resemblance to grave robbers had gone, and the scene now reminded her of the flying monkey troupe that had performed outside the Palace Gates at the Spring Equinox Fair—except this time the monkeys were bigger, uglier and made a lot more noise.

Three heavy
thud
s later the monkeys were lying on top of the massive chest at the bottom of the hold.

“Got ’em!” Septimus’s triumphant voice came from beside the crane, which began to swing down to pick up the cargo-hold doors.

Deep in the hold, Skipper Fry and the Crowes unleashed
a torrent of foul words—many of which Jenna and Beetle had not heard before—which continued until the doors were dropped firmly in place and the arm of the crane lay on top of them.

Septimus and Wolf Boy let go of their UnSeens and the five headed toward the nearest hatchway to the decks below. Septimus pushed against the small double doors, expecting them to be locked and barred. They weren’t. The doors swung open much too easily, leaving everyone wondering why no one had ventured out.

And so, as dawn approached and the sky lightened to a green-gray, one by one they left the deserted deck and followed Septimus through the hatchway, down the companionway and into the ship.

What, everyone wondered with a feeling of dread, were they going to find?

J
akey Fry leaned against his
ladder watching the sunrise. The tide was coming in and the hummock of sand he was standing on was now a small island surrounded by swirling, sandy seawater. Jakey knew that soon his island would be back below the waves where it belonged, and then what? Should he climb the ladder up to the
Cerys
or did he dare to wade out to the
Marauder
—and leave them all behind?

Jakey glanced up at the
Cerys
. He had heard the creaking of the crane and the
thud
of the hatch cover being dropped into place, but since then he had heard nothing at all. What was going on? Jakey wondered what had happened to Lucy; he figured that whatever had happened was not good—Lucy was
never
quiet.

Not so far away, perched on its rock, the yellow gull had finished digesting the sand eel. Gloomily its little bird brain ran through the agreement the interfering ExtraOrdinary Wizard had forced it to sign. If the gull could have sighed it would, but it hadn’t figured out whether that was something birds did. There was no way out. The gull took a deep breath and, with a yellow flash and a small
pop
, it Transformed.

Jakey looked out to sea. Past the gently rolling waves to the east, behind the line of rocks that led out to the Pinnacle, the sky was a beautiful milky green and promised a brilliant sunny day—a good day, thought Jakey, to be in charge of your own boat with no one shouting at you, no one ordering you about. The water lapped at Jakey’s toes and the next swash of waves covered his island and washed around his ankles. It was decision time. Jakey realized that at this moment he was free—free to leave behind all that he loathed so much. A new life beckoned, but was he brave enough to take it? The sun rose above the horizon and sent shafts of warming light across
his face. Jakey made a decision. Right now, at this moment, he
was
brave enough. He stepped off his drowned island and the water came up to his knees. Then someone tapped him on the shoulder. Jakey nearly screamed.

Jakey spun around to see a tall, willowy man in a yellow jerkin and breeches lurking in the shadows of the keel. The man was wearing the weirdest hat Jakey had ever seen in his life—or did he actually have a pile of ever-decreasing yellow doughnuts balanced on his head? Just then Jakey felt that anything was possible. He stared at the man, speechless with surprise. Jakey, who was used to sizing people up fast, could immediately tell that he was not a threat. Like an apologetic banana, the man seemed to mold himself to the contours of the ship, and as he withdrew his arm from tapping Jakey on the shoulder there was a rubbery quality to his movements.

The banana man gave Jakey a polite smile. “Excuse me, young master, be you Septimus Heap?” he asked in an oddly accented whisper.

“No,” said Jakey.

The man looked relieved. “I thought not,” he said. And then he added, “Be you the
only
young master around here?”

“No,” said Jakey.

“Oh.”

The banana man sounded disappointed. Meaning to be helpful, Jakey pointed up the ladder.

“There be
another
young master up there?” the man asked, rather reluctantly.

Jakey nodded. “Lots,” he said.

“Lots?” the man repeated dismally.

Jakey held up three fingers. “At least,” he said. “Probably more.”

The man shook his head mournfully, then he shrugged. “Could be worse, could be better,” he said. “Maybe I shall be free a little longer, maybe not.” The man looked doubtfully at the ladder, then he reached out his rubbery arms, grasped the thick ropes and put his foot on the bottom rung.

“I’ll hold it fer you,” Jakey said politely.

The man tentatively stepped on. The ladder swung away from him.

“Lean back a bit,” Jakey advised. “Much easier to climb that way.”

The man leaned out and very nearly fell off backward.

“Not so far,” cautioned Jakey. “An’ once you’ve got started,
don’t stop an’ don’t look down. You’ll be fine.”

Gingerly the man turned just enough to smile at Jakey. “Thank you,” he said. He looked at Jakey with his oddly piercing yellow eyes. “And are
you
free, young master?” he asked.

“Yes,” said Jakey with a grin. “I think I am.” Jakey stepped off his sea-washed island and waded toward the towering stern of the
Cerys
. There he plunged into the deeper water, and began swimming toward the
Marauder
, which he had left beached on a sandbar some distance from the
Cerys
. The
Marauder
was now floating in a few feet of water, tugging at her anchor, ready to go wherever Jakey wished to take her. Jakey’s smile broadened with every stroke that took him farther away from the
Cerys
. He was free at last.

As Jakey Fry swam to freedom, Jim Knee climbed onto the deserted deck of the
Cerys
. He gazed around for some minutes before deciding to sit and watch the sun rise while he considered his next move. Like all jinn, Jim Knee had the ability to track down his Master—if he absolutely had to—and he was sure his Master was on board the ship. So what, he reasoned, did a few more minutes of freedom matter? It wasn’t as if his
Master was going anywhere. No doubt he was tucked up in a warm bunk asleep—unlike his unfortunate jinnee. Jim Knee settled down on a fallen sail and closed his eyes.

Not far below Jim Knee, five figures were moving stealthily through the deserted middle deck of the
Cerys
. The ship had three decks: the top deck, which was open to the elements; the middle deck, where Milo and his guests lived in some splendor; and the lower deck, which was used for the crew’s quarters, kitchens, laundry and storage lockers. The middle and lower decks also contained the cargo hold, which descended into the very bottom of the ship.

Septimus led Jenna, Beetle, Wolf Boy and Lucy through the empty middle deck. They checked every cabin, every locker, nook and cranny as they went. Milo’s stateroom door was thrown wide, showing his hastily exited bed; Nicko’s cabin was shipshape and orderly, just as he had left it when he went up to take over the wheel for the night passage. Snorri’s cabin was equally neat, with the addition of a folded blanket laid on the floor for Ullr. The rest of the guest cabins were also empty.

They crept along the companionway toward the farthest part of the middle deck—the saloon, where Milo did his
entertaining. Warily Septimus pushed open the mahogany door and peered inside. It was deserted, but hoping for clues, maybe even a hastily scrawled note—
anything
—Septimus stepped inside. The others followed.

The saloon had been left tidy and spotless by the night steward. It lay ready for breakfast, which in normal circumstances would have been beginning soon. Somberly everyone stared at the table, laid with three place settings and a small bowl on the floor beside Snorri’s chair.

“Suppose…suppose it’s become a ghost ship,” whispered Jenna, voicing Wolf Boy’s thoughts.

“No,” said Septimus, shaking his head. “No, Jen. Ghost ships don’t exist.”

“Aunt Zelda says they do,” muttered Wolf Boy. “She knows about stuff like that. No, Lucy—
don’t
.”

Lucy Gringe looked offended. “I wasn’t
going
to scream,” she said. “I was just going to say that if it is a ghost ship, we ought to get off while we still can—
if
we still can….” Her voice faded away, leaving trails of goose bumps all over her listeners.

Jenna glanced at Septimus. They all knew the stories of ships that had somehow become ghost ships. There were
many of them reputed to sail the seven seas, fully functioning with a ghostly crew. They all also knew that once anyone came aboard they were never seen on land again, though they were sometimes glimpsed on board waving at grieving relatives who had tracked down the ship.

A sudden
thud
from the other side of the wall made everyone jump.

“What was that?” whispered Jenna.

Thud, thud, thump.

“Noisy ghosts in there,” Beetle observed.

Everyone laughed uneasily.

“That’s the cargo-hold bulkhead,” said Septimus. “It’s Fry and those Crowes. They’re trying to get out.”

Worried, Jenna glanced at Septimus. “Can they break through?” she asked.

“No
way
,” said Septimus. “Did you see the lead lining on those walls? They’d need an army to get out of there. Milo’s sealed everything—doesn’t want his precious stuff to get spoiled.”

Jenna nodded. She knew the extreme care Milo took to protect his treasures from damage—the lead linings, the
watertight doors, the strong room for his most precious objects…

“That’s
it
!” Jenna gasped. “The strong room—it’s locked from the outside and it’s
soundproof
. That’s where everyone must be. Hurry—
hurry
!”

“Okay, Jen,” said Septimus, “but what’s the panic?”

“It’s airtight, Sep.”

At the end of the saloon was a small door leading to steps down to the galley on the lower decks. Septimus threw it open and hurtled down the steps, where he stood waiting impatiently for Jenna and the others to catch up. “Lead the way, Jen,” he said urgently. “You know where it is.”

But Jenna wasn’t sure that she
did
know where the strong room was. All she could remember was feeling irritable while Milo was showing it to her and telling her how valuable all the stuff in it was—she could not remember how they had gotten there. Unlike the middle deck with its wide, bright corridors and generous portholes, the lower deck was a tangled warren of dingy, narrow passages cluttered with ropes, wires and all the workings of a complex ship like the
Cerys
. It was completely disorientating. Jenna looked around in a panic and saw
everyone staring at her expectantly. She glanced at Septimus for help—hoping maybe he could do a Find or something—and saw his Dragon Ring begin to glow with its warm yellow light. And then she remembered.

“There’s a yellow lamp outside the door,” she said quickly. “It comes on when people are in the room, in case…in case they get locked in by mistake. It’s this way.” Jenna had, to her immense relief, just seen the telltale yellow glow reflecting off a run of highly polished brass pipes at the far end of the corridor.

As they approached the end of the corridor the relief gave way to dread. Jenna remembered the room—lead-lined and airtight to protect Milo’s treasures from exposure to damaging salt air. How could anyone survive in there for long—let alone a whole ship’s company? Jenna thought of Nicko’s horror of enclosed spaces, then stopped herself—some things really did not bear thinking about.

The strong-room door was made of iron; it was narrow and covered with rivets. In the middle was a small wheel, which Wolf Boy, who knew he was the strongest, grabbed hold of and turned. The wheel spun, but the door did not move. Wolf
Boy stepped back and wiped his hands on his grubby tunic.

“Ouch,” he said. “There’s some kind of Darke Seal on the door. My hands can feel it.” Wolf Boy’s palms were very sensitive.

“No!” Jenna gasped. “There can’t be. We’ve
got
to get it open.”

Septimus placed his hands on the door and took them straight off again. “You’re right, 409,” he said. “I’ll need to do some kind of Reverse…not so easy without a Darke talisman.
Rats
.”

Jenna knew that when Septimus said “rats,” things were bad. “Sep—please, you
have
to get them out.”

“I
know,
Jen,” Septimus muttered.

“Wait,” said Wolf Boy. “I’ve got just the thing.” He opened the leather pouch that hung at his waist, and everyone reeled back.

“Eurgh!” Lucy gagged as the stench of the rotting Grim tentacle tip filled the enclosed space. “I think I’m going to be sick.”

“No, you’re not,” said Jenna briskly. “What
is
that?” she asked Wolf Boy.

“If Sep wants Darke, he’s got it,” Wolf Boy replied, lifting out the dark splotch of slime and handing it over.

“Thanks, 409,” said Septimus with a rueful grin. “Just what I always wanted.”

Septimus took the disgusting tentacle tip (which reminded him of Spit Fyre’s tail at its worst) and rubbed it all around the edge of the door, muttering something under his breath at the same time—something that he took care no one else could hear. Then, doing his best not to gag, he handed the mangled mess of flesh back to Wolf Boy.

Wolf Boy made a face and stuffed it back into his pouch.

“Do you always carry that?” asked Beetle.

Wolf Boy grimaced. “Not if I can help it. Let’s give it a push now, okay? One, two, three…”

Septimus, Beetle and Wolf Boy put their shoulders to the door. Still it did not shift.

“Let me do it,” said Jenna impatiently.

“But Jen, it’s really heavy,” said Septimus.

Jenna was exasperated. “Sep,” she said, “
listen to me
. Three words: hut, snow, Ephaniah.”