‘Ah, no, you’re thinking of “Moonlight Serenade”,’ Taggie said confidently to Felix.
‘Isn’t the saxophone a bit soul-ish?’ Lantic queried.
‘Oh, sweet Heavens save us,’ Dad groaned.
Taggie looked round to see him standing in the galley’s hatchway. She wasn’t sure how long he’d been there. ‘Oh, Daddy, you know all about old music, can you think of a name for our group?’
He shook his head in dismay and backed out of the hatchway as if the galley was full of wild tigers. As he walked away they all heard him saying: ‘How long is this voyage going to last?’
On the third day out from Tarimbi the watch spotted a cloudstorm up ahead. It was a mild one, the crew kept saying. Taggie knew she didn’t ever want to see a big one.
A huge haze stretched across the sky in front of the Angelhawk. Sunlight shone across it, producing a glimmering iridescent light that just permitted a glimpse of what lay behind. But that glimpse was enough.
Individual clouds were arranged in long ragged swirls, dark and thick, ten to twenty miles across, twisting like slow-motion hurricanes. In turn, they also churned through the sky in a vast, tattered river, hundreds of miles long, that was like a barrier placed directly in their path.
‘Can we go around?’ Lantic asked, as they stood on their usual place on the upper deck. The air had been growing colder for hours as the ship sailed resolutely towards the cloudswarm.
‘We could,’ Maklepine said. ‘But that’s a wide chunk of cloud to avoid. You’d add another couple of days to the voyage.’
‘How safe is it?’ Felix asked from what had become his customary perch halfway up the net.
‘It’s not the cloud you have to worry about,’ the shipsmage said. ‘It’s what’s hidden inside it that matters. Sea globes, rock isles, a paxia hoard, all sorts.’
‘Nonsense!’ Captain Rebecca said, flying steadily along the deck. ‘Stop panicking the paying passengers. That cloudswarm is too loose to have a sea globe at the centre. Besides, we would have heard about it in Tarimbi’s port park. Don’t worry, my young friends, the only danger here is a few hidden rocks, some loxraptors and maybe some volpas.’ She ruffled Jemima’s hair as she swept by. ‘Best go put that armour on, warrior maid. It’ll snap those pesky fangs when they try to eat you.’
The captain slipped effortlessly down the ladder tube to the lower deck.
‘Loxraptors?’ Jemima asked.
‘Big birds,’ Maklepine explained. ‘They eat a lot of little birds. But volpas eat them. So the good news is that if we see loxraptors there’s probably no volpas around.’
Jemima waited until the shipsmage had gone round the upper deck. ‘Can’t you do your cloudbusting thing on them?’ she asked Taggie in a quiet voice.
‘I think this cloudswarm is too big for magic to shift,’ Taggie told her.
Earl Maril’bo came up the stairs from the lower deck. ‘Now that, my friends, is what I call one fizzy rainbow.’
‘That?’ Taggie asked in surprise, looking again at the shimmering veil of reflected sunlight. ‘That’s a rainbow?’
‘What did you like think it was?’ the elf asked.
‘Bright fog?’
‘Oh no. That’s realler than the real thing.’
Jemima grinned. ‘Take me surfing with you, please!’
Taggie wanted to stamp her foot. She’d been about to ask that!
‘Sure thing, little Princess. But we’d, like, better be quick about it.’
‘I’m ready!’
Which was why, five minutes later, Jemima was standing with wobbly legs on Earl Maril’bo’s mirror board, with the huge elf directly behind her, one arm protectively round her tummy. They were balancing on the edge of the Angelhawk’s prow as the swirl of multi-coloured light grew closer and closer until she was looking up at what must surely be the glistening roof of the universe. All she could see in every direction was swirls of colour.
Somewhere on the lower deck she heard Dad calling: ‘Jemima? Where are you? Jem?’
Now might not be the best time to tell Earl Maril’bo she hadn’t bothered asking if Dad minded her surfing.
The Angelhawk sailed cleanly into the illuminated haze surrounding the cloudstorm. Jemima felt Earl Maril’bo tense up as the warm mist swept over her.
‘Now,’ he yelled. And they slid forward, over the edge of the prow. She whooped with joy and fear, every sense telling her they would plummet for weeks until they fell into the sun. But no, the mirror board cut clean through the rainbow, and they swept away at an angle from the Angelhawk at a giddy speed.
He bent his knees, pushing the mirror board into a modest curve, and Jemima whooped again as they swooped round the Angelhawk in a wide, lazy spiral, climbing the flickering wet light with a speed and grace even the skyfolk couldn’t match. The damp air sent her hair streaming out behind her. Earl Maril’bo twisted the other way, and they were climbing parallel to the ship, zooming ahead. Jemima laughed in delight. Weird ripples of twinkling light raced away from the edge of the mirror board on either side.
‘Your turn,’ Earl Maril’bo said, and straightened his own body. They seemed to slow, moving sedately forward. ‘Use your ankles to lift your toes up so the weight’s on your heels, and shift the board like you want to dig the back in.’
Jemima carefully did as she was told, the tip of her tongue jammed in the corner of her mouth as she concentrated, and grinned appreciatively as they picked up speed again.
‘I’m doing it!’ she yelled. ‘I’m surfing a rainbow!’
With the elf guiding her, she shifted from side to side, pushing the board into gentle curves as they shot through the gleaming colours.
‘Now throw back,’ Earl Maril’bo instructed, and his arm pulled her gently, and both of them swayed on to their heels. The mirror board moved so fast the light became a smear on either side of her.
‘Look up!’ The elf laughed.
Jemima did, and squealed in outraged joy. Seemingly, directly fifty metres above her, the Angelhawk was powering towards them. They were looping right over the ship!
Earl Maril’bo shifted his position smoothly, and the mirror board twisted them into a complete roll, then plunged down to dive below the Angelhawk, splitting the rainbow into two jets of glittering light waves behind them. Jemima laughed and squealed the whole way down.
As they went under the ship she felt the elf stiffen, and the board slowed as he brought his weight forward. They drifted along, barely moving.
‘Did you hear that?’ he asked.
‘What?’ she asked, nervous now.
‘Let’s go.’ He crouched down, and the mirror board leaped forward, curving sharply. Within seconds they were level with the ship, and angling in sharply.
They landed smoothly on the prow.
‘Jemima!’ Dad’s furious shout filled the moist air.
She sighed, ready for the storm of anger. Worth it, though!
Earl Maril’bo leaned over the edge of the cabin roof, looking down to the upper deck. ‘Captain,’ he said urgently. ‘I heard loxraptors circling.’
Jemima hurried down the spindly ladder from the prow.
‘We will be discussing this on the other side of the cloudstorm,’ Dad was saying angrily as he followed her. ‘And at considerable length.’
‘Yes, Daddy,’ Jemima said meekly, and completely unrepentant.
‘Where are you going?’ Taggie asked as Jem walked past, her face set in determination.
‘To put my armour on. What do you think?’
‘We should get inside,’ Lantic said. Isairis and another crew woman, Gracieia, hurried past him on their way up to the upper deck’s two harpoon stations. Down in the lower deck, every launcher was being prepared to shoot the long metal barbs at any loxraptor that flew close. Captain Rebecca had promised a gold shilling to anyone who hit one of the predators.
‘Furl the tipsails,’ Captain Rebecca bawled. She’d taken position at the helm, both hands gripping the
wheel tight, staring up past the topdeck towards the approaching cloudswarm.
‘Yes,’ Dad said. ‘Come on, inside. And you’re not to go out again until the captain says it’s clear. Understand?’
‘Yes, Dad,’ they chorused.
The air was chilly now as Taggie made her way down to the lower deck, and the cabin she shared with Jemima and Sophie. Raindrops started to patter on the wood. Far behind them on the other side of the rainbow, the sun was nothing more than a slightly brighter circle of light.
Taggie grinned regretfully at Earl Maril’bo as he headed for his cabin.
‘Next time, little Queen,’ he said softly.
Captain Rebecca spun the wheel hard, and the Angelhawk shifted direction, curving round the fringes of the first whirling clump of dark cloud. The wind was picking up and the rain turning to slush. Taggie went into the cabin and shut the door.
Rain lashed against the hull, smearing the cabin’s small window. Taggie, Sophie and Jemima pressed their faces up against it nonetheless. The Angelhawk’s usual smooth ride had vanished. The ship was bucking about now as she rode through the turbulent winds generated by the cloudswarm. Then the sun vanished behind a dense grey bank of stormcloud. It was the first time since they’d launched that the sun was missing from the sky, and Taggie found it mildly perturbing. The Angelhawk lurched suddenly, her prow lifting so she soared past mountains of cloud. When Taggie glanced up, she saw a boulder tumbling wildly inside the grey vapour. It was close, missing the Angelhawk by less than a hundred metres. She winced. Lightning flared between the cloud tips.
Then they were past the first swirl, and into clearer air. It was still gloomy, with lightning flashes sizzling in the distance. Rain continued to pound the planks. A weird tapping noise began as something started striking the hull – coming from every direction.
‘Hailstones,’ Taggie said. ‘So that’s where they all get their ice scars from. We should have bought ourselves some of those leather hoods back in Tarimbi.’
‘Favian, get that sail furled, curse you!’ the voice of Captain Rebecca bellowed.
‘More rocks – look!’ Jemima said.
‘Those aren’t rocks,’ Sophie told her.
‘Oh sweet Heavens,’ Jemima groaned nervously. ‘That’s what Earl Maril’bo heard.’
‘Harpoons ready!’
The girls watched nervously as the flock of loxraptors arrowed in towards the Angelhawk. Flying reptile predators, with scaly, grey and green wings that were ten metres across fully extended, they opened their long, fang-lined beaks to screech their challenge at the lumbering intruder. Long, powerful fin-tipped tails lashed about frenziedly.
Then Taggie saw Favian still struggling with the tipsail, whose canvas had escaped the ropes to flap about wildly, beating at him as he desperately tried to haul it in. The loxraptors had also seen him. Three of them turned towards him and hurtled inward.
A pair of lower deck harpoons streaked out, followed seconds later by both upper-deck harpoons. Two loxraptors veered away sharply. A harpoon struck the third, its bad magic tip slicing clean through flesh and bone. The creature howled, and started to flail, slowing rapidly. Captain Rebecca sent the wheel spinning, pushing the sailtails over to their limit. The Angelhawk bucked as cold winds pummelled at it. And then Favian lost his grip. Taggie saw it happen. When the ship’s abrupt lurch came, his hand slipped on the wet spar and he went cartwheeling away from the mast, making a desperate grab for the flapping sail as he went. Somehow he managed to catch the corner of the canvas, to be tugged along by the ship as the wind buffeted it through the cloudswarm.
‘Harpoons!’ Captain Rebecca hollered above the growl of the wind and rain.
But they took time to reload, Taggie knew. She’d watched the crew practise often enough. In the meantime, Favian was swinging roughly on the end of the sail, and several loxraptors were banking sharply to line up on him.
Taggie burst out of her cabin. On her wrist the charmsward bands slid round smoothly and efficiently, their tiny symbols emitting a sharp blue light as she prepared to cast her spell. Outside, the rain struck her like a solid sheet, drenching her instantly. Hailstones hit her unprotected skin – it was like getting stung by a swarm of wasps. She hurriedly cast a shield enchantment, feeling the spell spin protectively round her.
‘Get back inside, girl!’ Captain Rebecca roared at her, wings beating steadily. Taggie ignored her. The first loxraptor was speeding forward, its wings pumping slickly, rain streaming along its scaly flanks. Favian dangled enticingly, just ahead of it. Taggie lined her hand up on the loxraptor’s powerful sinuous body, holding her forefinger rigid, pointing – ‘Droiak!’
The destruction spell ripped out of her fingertip like a bolt of sunlight, dazzling everybody. The loxraptor’s corpse tumbled away into the rain.
The rest of the flock squawked in alarm, shooting off in all directions. Except for one, which remained intent on the precariously swaying crewman.
Taggie brought her arm round, utterly determined. ‘Droiak!’ The second loxraptor disintegrated.
‘Oh yes!’ Captain Rebecca laughed uproariously, her sodden hair reduced to long worms that wiggled fast, shaking droplets from their tips. ‘That’s my sorceress girl! Send them all back to the Hell Realm where they belong.’
Lantic was at Taggie’s side, gripping the deck rail. ‘He’s falling,’ he yelled above the noise of the fierce squall. Hailstone strikes had produced several tiny cuts on his cheeks that were trickling blood down his skin.
‘Don’t you dare,’ the captain warned. ‘My charter is live passengers, not dead heroes.’
But Lantic was already running along the slippery deck towards the foot of the mast. Hailstones bounced off the deck and hull around him. The Angelhawk floundered in a wild gust of wind and the whole ship bucked, sending the prow swinging across the livid clouds. Taggie caught a glimpse of the loxraptors circling behind the stern. And Lantic had reached the mast.
‘No!’ Taggie yelled at Lantic.
He turned, the blood on his cheeks mingling with rainwater to drip off his chin. ‘He’ll fall. Nobody can hold on through this.’
‘You’ll slip off the mast and be lost. Please, Lantic! I can’t lose you.’
Lantic let out a moan of frustration.
‘I’ll go,’ Sophie said.
‘No.’ Felix came streaking nimbly along the net, his white fur slicked back flat from the rain, his tail a soggy spine. ‘My job,’ he said.
Lantic paused, then nodded. He rummaged through his satchel, and pulled out one of his little spider contraptions. ‘Here!’ He thrust it into Felix’s forepaws. He was still incanting instructions to the contraption when Felix dashed out through the net and on to the mast.
Wind, rain and hail hammered against the mast as Felix raced along it. But the squirrel kept perfect balance. Even the erratic judders that ran through the ship didn’t affect him. He reached the tip, and let go of the spider. The little metallic contraption whirled round the wood, spinning out a gossamer thread; then it was scampering down the sail, its pointed legs wiggling too fast to see. It arrived at Favian’s desperately grasping hands, and darted along his arm, still spinning out its single gossamer strand. Once it had looped the strand under his shoulders, it began to pull itself back up, towing Favian with it.
‘Come on,’ Taggie urged the little anamage contraption. She could see the loxraptors spiralling in closer to the stern as the spider gradually hoisted Favian level with the mast. The crewman wrapped his arms round the pole and began crawling back to the deck. Felix stayed with him.
‘Yes!’ Taggie exclaimed joyfully. Lantic was grinning wildly.
‘Taggie!’ Jemima screamed from the open cabin door.
Taggie was just turning when she heard the harpoon launcher on the deck above her firing. The slender metal barb flashed away, missing the loxraptor which was hurtling down vertically directly at Taggie, its beak open wide—
Just before it reached her, a blue-green
death spell hit it smack between the eyes. From being a ravenous, lethal predator it was instantly transformed into a ton of dead meat whipping past the Angelhawk.
Everyone looked round. Lord Colgath stood on the decking, his smoke cloak a-glimmer in the icy rain. An arm was extended up, bony fingers covered in elaborate rings. The diminishing death-spell wizardry clung to them like a layer of phosphorescent mist. ‘I thought you could do with some help,’ he said simply.
‘Oh sweet Heavens preserve us,’ Captain Rebecca croaked in fear.
THE ISLE OF BANMULA
‘You brought a Karrak Lord on to my ship,’ Captain Rebecca thundered. Even trepidation didn’t diminish her ire. Every strand of her black hair was sticking up stiffly, crowning her in ebony spikes.
After three hours toiling through rain and clouds, the Angelhawk had finally cleared the storm cluster, sailing out into clear skies; the warm sun drying the water from its decks and sails. Now the united crew confronted the passengers in the wardroom. Several of the crew carried enchanted daggers, though they kept them held low. Few of them dared look directly at Lord Colgath, instead focusing their anger on Dad.
‘Would you have accepted our charter if you’d known?’ Dad asked.
It was the wrong tone to take with the captain, who growled dangerously. Her wings gave a single beat which slapped the air.
Taggie was sitting at a table with Jemima, who was carefully stroking Favian’s long ice-cuts. As her finger moved over each slash, it would slowly close up, the skin knitting back together. Taggie was helping as best she could, dabbing the dried blood away with a cloth. Favian kept sighing in relief as the pain was vanquished. ‘My shoulder, Lady Jemima?’ he said hopefully. His muscles there had been badly torn as he clung to the sail. Jemima smiled and lay her hands on his shoulder.
Several of the crew were standing round the table, watching in wonder as Jemima tended to their friend. They’d left their daggers in their scabbards. Taggie was pretty sure where their sympathies lay. She stood beside Dad and confronted the captain. ‘It was Lord Colgath who killed the loxraptor.’