‘But there’s movement on the decks!’ shouted another.
Without warning, a flight of creatures launched themselves off the deck of the black ship and came speeding across the gulf between the two craft. They were about the size of monkeys, with red fur and bat wings, with large jaws and a vast number of claws on each hand.
Sailors screamed in shock and anger and began fighting back. Archers shot at the creatures, most missing, but when a steel-headed shaft struck the red creatures, they burst into flames. The clamour on the deck of the strange ship rose in volume as more monsters came swarming up out from below decks.
Reinman shouted, ‘Turn us and make all speed!’ He looked to the drunken weather-magician. ‘Bellard, as swift a following wind as you can muster without ripping our masts out.’
The magician’s face was devoid of colour. Whatever he had endured in the service to the Crown previously hadn’t prepared him for what he saw prancing and leaping on the deck opposite: nightmare shapes of every description. ‘Demons,’ he said.
Reinman looked at the magician and realized he had been frightened sober and would therefore be of no use.
Then grappling hooks from the black ship snaked out and bit into the side of the Messenger. They were outmanned, out of position, and had no advantage. Reinman shouted, ‘Prepare to repel borders!’ drew his cutlass and hurried down to the main deck.
Looking down from the castle above the headlands, Brendan said, ‘What is going on?’
‘Demons!’ said Amirantha.
Sandreena regarded her former lover. ‘You’re certain?’
‘I can feel them. There must be dozens.’
Sandreena looked at Ruffio. ‘Either we let them all die, or we get down there. They’re no match for a crew of demons.’
Ruffio closed his eyes for a moment, then said, ‘Help will be on the way soon.’ He reached out and Sandreena, Brendan, and Amirantha joined hands.
Instantly they were on the quarterdeck of the Royal Messenger. Chaos was erupting on all sides. Brendan lashed out at the first flying creature that came his way, severing its wing. It flopped to the deck and fluttered around, smoke flowing from the wound, then suddenly erupted into a small green-blue flame and vanished.
Amirantha had been frustrated for years that he could no longer control demons, but he still knew how to banish them back to the fifth realm. He lashed out with a spell aimed at three large brutes which were poised to leap from the deck of the massive black ship onto the Messenger and instantly they were gone in a puff of black smoke. He concentrated on banishing the larger and more dangerous of the demons he could see. Within another minute, a half-dozen of the most loathsome of the creatures were gone.
Ruffio blasted a group on the lower deck, freeing up beleaguered seamen so that they could better coordinate the defence of their ship.
‘We’ve got to get over to the other ship!’ shouted Sandreena.
‘Why?’ asked Ruffio.
‘Demons don’t sail ships,’ she said, crushing the skull of an unfortunate flyer that had sped too close to her. ‘Something over there is controlling them.’
Ruffio craned his neck and saw that the upper wheel-deck of the other ship was empty. He reached out, they joined hands and suddenly they were on the other ship.
Brendan knew little of magic, but just placing his feet on the deck of this vessel made his skin crawl. He looked around frantically to see if their presence had been detected yet. The horrors on the deck were swarming over the rails, leaping aboard the Royal Messenger.
Amirantha said, ‘Whatever’s controlling this vessel and crew is below.’
They hurried down the short ladder to the main deck and opened a companionway door that led down. Below, they found the first level of the rowers’ deck; down the middle ran a large walkway from stern to bow. As miserable a crew of slaves as one could imagine were pulling the oars. Half a dozen demons raced along the central walkway whipping the slaves, who appeared to be mostly human. Amirantha took aim at one particularly noxious creature carrying a massive, bloody whip and incanted a spell of banishment. Suddenly he was gone.
‘You go and find the source of this magic,’ he said to Sandreena and Ruffio. ‘I’ll deal with this lot.’
‘I’ll stay here.’ Brendan said, brandishing his blade.
Sandreena said, ‘I wish I’d had time to don my full armour before we left.’
Ruffio said, ‘I wish I’d brought along a dozen other magicians, but we make do.’
Heading for the bow, they found a large foredeck, and there a creature of darkness sat on a raised dais, around which three of the mindless Panath-Tiandn sat, casting their weather-energy. The figure in the middle was featureless, a thing of shadows and darker blacks, yet it conveyed shape and dimension, contour and features. Eyes that were blazing red coals looked at the two humans and when it started to rise, they could see it was easily seven feet in height. Ruffio shouted, ‘It’s a Dreadmaster!’
The Dreadmaster extended an arm, hand palm out, and unleashed a massive wave of magic at them, howling, ‘Die!’
Ruffio had begun casting his counter-spell the moment he recognized the creature for what it was, not knowing what the attack would be, but certain it would come. Cascading energies washed around Sandreena, who would have been reduced to ash had he not been there to protect her. The magician threw himself to one side and avoided the energies that splashed off his shield, shouting, ‘Don’t let it touch you! It can wither you where you stand. But it hates the touch of cold iron!’
As soon as the energy dissipated, Sandreena swung her mace with both hands and struck the extended arm. The Dreadmaster cried out in agony as hot white sparks erupted where Sandreena’s mace struck. Where normally she would expect to hear cracking bones and the wet sound of crushed flesh, she heard an ear-shattering clang of metal on metal as shock ran up her arm: it was like hitting an anvil!
Ruffio extended his hand and sent out a glob of shimmering white light through which black flashes streaked. It struck the Dreadmaster while it was distracted by Sandreena and the creature was engulfed by a cocoon of energy. It fell to the deck, rolling in a paroxysm of pain, its body contorting wildly. Sandreena didn’t hesitate and slammed her mace down on the creature’s head.
The Dreadmaster recoiled from the blow, moving backward like a captured insect rolling in a spider’s cocoon, then it flexed and the imprisoning energies exploded around it. Odd howling sounds erupted from the creature as it rose again to confront its attackers. Sandreena knew it was an illusion of light and shadows in the darkened rowers’ deck, but the creature looked as if it was even bigger than it had been moments before.
Ruffio then shot out a bolt of red liquid. The evil fluid burned whatever it touched, causing smoke to rise up from where it splashed the decks and huge blisters to erupt on the body of the Dreadmaster, who contorted in agony, smoke issuing from the lesions. It fell over backwards, crushing one of the three Shangri beneath its huge form.
As it was trying to rise, Sandreena knelt and expertly struck at the back of its knee, and again white-hot sparks exploded and the creature fell once more. Ruffio struck with another spell, and by then Brendan and Amirantha had arrived. Brendan wasted no time and stabbed at the creature, almost getting his arm yanked off for his troubles. The Dreadmaster shrieked in pain, then bellowed a challenge, and its voice rang out, an echo of something unnatural from a place beyond sanity: ‘You dare? You pathetic creatures, know pain!’
With a wave of his hand, the Dreadmaster caused the air to bend, sending a wave of force that picked up the four humans and flung them back as if they were nothing more than flies. Sandreena, Ruffio, and Amirantha were knocked straight back, but Brendan was sent careening towards the edge of the catwalk above the rowing deck. He flailed out with his left hand, grabbed the edge of the rail and felt his shoulder yanked as if someone was trying to pull his arm out of its socket.
Sandreena shouted, ‘Brendan, look out!’
He l
ooked up and saw the malevolent creature rearing above him. The Dreadmaster reached toward Brendan, who was left with no other choice but to let go. He fell back, landing on two rowers in the upper tier of oars
Emaciated, filthy arms sought to grab Brendan to hold him down or to help him up – he had no idea. He struggled to his feet, pushing past the shouting and pleading men. ‘Set us free!’ and ‘Help us!’ they cried, and entreaties in languages Brendan didn’t understand.
He navigated past more men chained to benches and glanced up. Having eluded the Dreadmaster, Brendan saw that the monster had returned its attention to Ruffio, Sandreena, and Amirantha. The sergeant-adamant fought as best she could with mace and shield, and Brendan now also wished she had been able to fully don her armour. There was nothing remotely vulnerable about Sandreena, but as stalwart and determined as she was, he’d have felt more reassured of her chances of survival if she wasn’t attired in only a tunic and trousers.
He surveyed his surroundings. The rowers’ deck was a good twenty feet below the walkway above. There were three banks of oars on each side of the ship, with three rowers on every oar, the benches being staggered one above the next so each man had room to row without having to duck his head. The rowers were settled on simple wooden benches, secured by heavy braces along each side from bow to stern, and above and below by supports, with a massive chain down the middle. For a brief instant Brendan wondered what would happen to the hull if all this was set afire, then he realized that would prove a death sentence to the hundred and twenty or so slaves chained there.
He turned to the stern and saw the ladder that led up to the supervising catwalk. He took a step and his toe struck something that clanged. He glanced down and saw a ring of keys. Picking them up, he looked at the chain that ran through the length of the ship. Another chain at every bench was secured in place, bolted to the hull on one side, anchored in place by a large iron ring through which the first chain passed. By removing the long chain, rowers could be changed when one died or could not row.
Brendan hurried toward the ladder and saw a heavy wooden door on the left side, with a barred window. He peered through and saw about another dozen slaves huddled miserably on the floor, wincing in terror at every crash and bellow from above. Brendan saw the door lock and quickly tried several keys until he could open it.
He tossed the keys at the first startled slave and hoped he understood the King’s Tongue. ‘Free yourself, then unchain the others.’
He didn’t wait for a reply but climbed the ladder to the catwalk.
Brendan turned from the ladder just in time to be blinded by a flash of light so intense it left his eyes watering and his vision floating with afterimages. A raging scream from the Dreadmaster shook the hold of the ship.
Blinking furiously, Brendan crouched with his sword at the ready and waited until he could make sense of the scene.
The Dreadmaster was entangled in some sort of mystic web, thousands of silver-and-white shreds of energy that were contracting around him. Bits of the mystic stuff would tear, sending tatters of it away from him, blinking out of existence moments later. Brendan kept blinking and saw that the more the Dreadmaster struggled, the tighter the web became, and more and more strands were binding him.
He moved forward and took up a position on Sandreena’s left. ‘Wondered where you’d got to,’ she said, panting.
‘Landed on some poor sod below,’ said Brendan. ‘Thought while I was down there I’d free the slaves.’
‘Nicely done,’ said Sandreena, ‘but if they’re breaking free, who’s rowing the ship?’
‘We can worry about that when we get up on deck,’ said Amirantha from behind.
Ruffio was completely focused on the spell he had finally contrived to neutralize the Dreadmaster. The creature from the void bellowed enraged threats and promises of destruction, but ever more it struggled in confinement, and finally it teetered then crashed to the deck.
Brendan heard shouts and looked to the rear to see the first of the freed slaves clambering up the ladder. With his sword-point, Brendan indicated the companionway to the upper deck. ‘Hurry!’ he shouted. The first slave nodded and took the lead, the others following. Brendan returned his attention to the conflict before him.
The Dreadmaster lay thrashing and roaring as Amirantha tried a variety of spells, a few of which seemed to injure the creature, while Ruffio held him confined. The magician appeared exhausted by his efforts to keep the Dreadmaster immobile as Sandreena and Brendan dodged in and out, striking and cutting.
‘It’s like hewing wood!’ shouted Brendan after his first blow sent a shock up his arm. ‘This thing will not die.’
Sandreena crashed her mace down on the Dreadmaster for perhaps the tenth time. ‘It’s like hitting rock!’
The Dreadmaster tried to rise again, and Brendan swung low to hamstring it. For his troubles he got swatted away like an insect and rolled hard into the bulkhead. His entire body arched in agony from the thing’s brief touch: it felt as if something had attempted to reach inside and tear out his heart. He struggled to regain control of his body, but the best he could manage was to roll over and vomit all over the deck.
Sandreena stayed focused on weakening and not being struck. The creature appeared to be faltering, but so was she. Her arms felt leaden and her back hurt, for while she had fought for longer periods in battle before, she had never struck anything that caused shock to course up her arms and shoulders like this creature did. Even the wooden pells used for arms practice were more yielding than this monster. But with dogged will she continued to strike at it. The weakened Dreadmaster was now turning its attention from fighting to escape. It thrashed around, causing everyone to move away.
Brendan managed to sit up with his shoulders against the bulkhead as his head began to clear. He felt sick and weak, as if he had just awoken from a fever.
Abruptly, the Dreadmaster gave up thrashing, flipped around and rolled right at Sandreena and Amirantha. The warlock beat a hasty retreat back down the centre section of the catwalk, while Sandreena managed a huge leap into the air, allowing the monster to roll beneath her. She hit the deck, turned and saw an opening.
Running up behind the Dreadmaster while it rolled to the edge of the open decking, she launched a massive underhand blow that struck it on the back of the head. The extra force caused the brute to roll farther than anticipated and suddenly it was falling onto the rowing benches below.
The Dreadmaster crashed onto the remaining slaves attempting to flee. Men screamed in agony as the very touch of the thing of the void sucked life from their bodies.
Brendan forced himself to his feet and half-staggered over to where three Shangri lay sprawled, their lives taken by the flailing Dreadmaster they had served.
Sandreena looked at Ruffio. He nodded once and she quickly crushed the skulls of all three to make sure they were in fact dead.
Abruptly a violent thrumming began to shake the ship. ‘What is that?’ asked Sandreena.
‘I have no idea,’ said Ruffio, ‘but I think we need to be off this ship.’
They hurried back to where Amirantha stood, looking down at the havoc caused by the thrashing Dreadmaster. Brendan shouted, ‘What do we do?’
Without warning, there was a monstrous cracking sound, as if someone had smashed open a gigantic walnut with a massive hammer, and water started rushing up from the bilges below the slaves.
‘That damn thing put its foot through the hull!’ shouted Sandreena.
Brendan’s eyes widened as he saw the Dreadmaster thrash around, still grievously injured, but powerful enough that it was indeed tearing a hole in the ship. The few remaining slaves looked up and reached out to him in panic, as if he could somehow lean down and grip their hands and haul them to safety, while others frantically tried to leap over or dodge around the thrashing Dreadmaster, only to die at its touch.
Ruffio shouted, ‘We leave now!’ He reached out to gather Sandreena, Amirantha, and Brendan close,
then suddenly they were again on the tower in the castle.
Brendan said, ‘Those men …’
‘It couldn’t be helped,’ said Ruffio, then his eyes rolled up in his head and he collapsed. Amirantha grabbed him, sparing him a hard fall, and lowered him to the stones of the tower.
They watched as the massive ship started to roll slowly.
Jason Reinman slashed at another growling horror with a bull’s head, cutting it with his cutlass. It howled in pain and retreated a step. Then he heard the loud cracking sound.
The bull-headed monster was distracted for a moment, looking to see where the sound came from, and Reinman hacked halfway through its neck.
The captain of the Royal Messenger looked around at a deck awash in blood and took a moment to appraise the situation. His men were holding their own against the monsters. The magic-users had been effective in eliminating most of the seriously dangerous creatures, and now his crew was dealing with those left behind. They were powerfully strong, but apparently not overly intelligent, and his crew was among the most highly trained and disciplined in the Royal Navy. The archers in the rigging were picking off any demon that presented itself on the edge of the crowd, and his own men had established a line behind which the wounded could crawl for respite.
He saw that the massive ship, which looked like a Quegan trireme magically enlarged and refitted, was ever so slowly capsizing. ‘Mr Williams!’ he shouted.
‘Mr Williams is dead, Captain!’ shouted a voice from the press on the main deck.
Ignoring the sinking feeling in his stomach – Williams had been his first mate for sixteen years and he’d find time to mourn him later, if he survived this battle – he shouted, ‘Mr Baintree!’
‘Aye, Captain!’ came the shout from his second mate, a short, dark, bull-necked man who was as tough in a brawl as any man Reinman knew.
‘We need to cut loose!’
‘Cut loose!’ shouted Mr Baintree.
A few sailors dodged past the demons to slash at the grappling ropes, but they were quickly overcome by the creatures still attempting to swarm the Messenger.