Gargantis

by Thomas Taylor

  “We?”

  “But of course, Lady Kraken. You will be part of my operation to save Eerie-on-Sea. The monster is searching for this object, and will obliterate the town if it doesn’t find it. Every beat of its flippers creates gales; every clash of its tusks begets lightning. But with the object in your possession, we can lure Gargantis to its destruction. The fishermen stand ready to catch it once and for all. And when we are hailed as the saviours of Eerie, and the creature’s carcass is beached, I can begin manufacturing my tincture again. You will have a lifelong supply.”

  One of Lady Kraken’s crooked hands reaches towards the button she presses to summon Mr Mollusc. She turns her head to look at it, seemingly surprised to see what it’s doing. Her hand trembles above the button as if she’s struggling with conflicting emotions.

  With a slithering sound, the pink tentacle slides from Deep Hood’s hood and creeps towards Lady Kraken’s outstretched hand. I just know it’s going to press the button for her and summon Mr Mollusc – and my doom.

  “There is little time, dear lady,” says Deep Hood. “Sometimes you must sail into the storm to find your way clear.” And his tentacle, as it approaches her, marks a line of shadow through the silvery dust on the tabletop.

  “Clarity Marks!” Violet cries aloud, leaping to her feet. “Marks make it clear! That’s it, Herbie! That’s the secret of Eerie Script!”

  “!” I reply, waving my hands in the air as if I can somehow catch these strange shouted words and stop them from reaching anyone else’s ears.

  But, of course, I can’t.

  And it’s too late now, anyway. I can hear gasps of surprise from the adults below.

  “Somebody’s up there!” cries Lady Kraken. “In the attic!”

  Once again Violet has ruined a perfectly good eavesdropping session by shouting. Her eyes go wide as she realizes this, too, and she clamps her hand over her mouth.

  Down in Lady Kraken’s sitting room, I hear Deep Hood jumping to his feet.

  So we run. Run, and hope that we can reach the lift before Deep Hood catches us.

  I don’t bother with the torch – the brilliant beam of the cameraluna is bright enough to see by. We race down the attic towards the elevator, dodging crates and cobwebby furniture.

  As we pass the top of the spiral stairs, I hear them rattling. This is the fastest way to the attic from Lady K’s rooms, and I imagine Deep Hood dragging himself up these stairs by his tentacle in his fury to reach us. We fly past and sprint for the doors of the elevator.

  I jab at the button to summon the lift carriage, but the sliding doors remain closed.

  “Someone else must be using it!” I say. “But I’ve called it and it’s coming back up, Vi. I can hear it.”

  “What about Deep Hood?” Vi says.

  I look back down the attic towards the spiral stairs. The sound of feet pounding their way up is louder now, and the railings shake.

  The indicator arrow above the elevator doors is almost at the number six.

  “Herbie!”

  “We can get in the lift, shut the doors and be gone before Deep Hood reaches us, Vi, I promise.”

  And that’s when a shape appears at the top of the spiral stairs.

  Silhouetted against the intense moonlight from the cameraluna, it unfolds itself erect on the floorboards – a twisted, crooked figure that steps forward into a moonbeam so that we can see …

  … a pair of goose-pimply legs!

  “Lady Kraken!” I cry as the owner of the hotel comes into full view.

  I’m so unused to her walking that it never occurred to me it would be Lady K who was coming up the stairs.

  “Phew!” says the old lady, clutching her back. “Haven’t done that in years. Now, then, Herbert Lemon, what are you doing up here? What’s all this I’ve been hearing about you?”

  “Your Ladyness!” I say, searching frantically through my grin collection, looking for one to fit this occasion but coming up blank. “But if it was you on the stairs, then where is…?”

  I trail off.

  Right behind us the elevator lets out a cheerful ping! and the doors slide open.

  “Surprise!” burbles Deep Hood from inside the lift carriage.

  Then the tentacle bursts from his hood.

  THE BAITED HOOK

  THE FIRST THING I NOTICE is how dark it is.

  The next thing is that the floor is moving, and everything smells of fish guts and diesel.

  Then I find out how much my head hurts, and the rest doesn’t matter.

  “Bladderwracks!” I gasp. “What … what happened?”

  I get a series of flashbacks, between spasms of pain: Deep Hood bursting out of the lift; Violet’s terrified face as the tentacle shoves her into the open sarcophagus and slams the lid shut; Lady Kraken’s goose-pimply legs as she’s knocked head over heels. I remember a flash of icy moonlight in my face as I was bodily lifted up into the cameraluna mechanism. I remember the smashing of glass in the tower as I was pulled out of a window and carried away into the night.

  How long ago did all this happen?

  When was I knocked out?

  And where am I now?

  I reach up to my head and feel a lump like a boiled egg nestling in my scrappy locks. My cap is gone.

  “H-hello?”

  My voice echoes back with a metallic ring.

  I hear the heavy throb of an engine and the boom of waves against an iron hull. I know then that I’m on a boat.

  There’s a crackle of sparks as the sprightning flickers on and takes to the air, right in front of my face, flooding the place with light.

  “You’re still here, then?” I manage to say, squinting.

  There’s a crackle of sparks, as if in reply.

  “Why have you settled on my head?” I demand. “What’s so special about me?”

  A tiny arc of lightning is my only answer to this. It jumps between the sprightning and one of my uniform buttons, with a ping like a little silver bell. Then the little creature plops back down into my hair.

  I take in my surroundings. There’s a metal door – the kind that has a wheel in the middle to open it. There are piles of plastic crates and fishy nets. I struggle against the rolling motion of the boat, and the rising panic it makes me feel.

  “I’m on Bludgeon,” I say aloud to myself. “Boadicea Bates’s ship. I must be.”

  Despite everything, despite two warnings now from the mermonkey that I will meet a watery end, here I am, once more, on a boat. There seems to be an awful inevitability about the cold, dark bottom of the sea.

  I hammer on the door and shout, “Let me out!”

  With an ear-splitting creak, the wheel turns and the door swings open. A powerful torch beam shines in my face.

  “He’s awake,” says a voice. “Let’s get him ready.”

  And a rope lasso drops neatly over my head and shoulders. It’s pulled tight, trapping my arms, and I’m jerked off my feet and out through the metal door.

  “Wouldn’t it be easier if he was knocked out again?” says another voice.

  “Aye,” comes the reply. “The Gargantic Light sticks to him no matter what.”

  “But it doesn’t shine when he’s asleep, does it?” says a third voice. “Besides, we might need him to squeak to help attract the monster. He’s good at squeaking.”

  “I can hear you, you know!” I say, but the three fishermen ignore me. We’re in a metal corridor now, at the end of which is another door, letting in stormy sea air. All this is lit only by the wondrous light from my head, and the men can’t take their eyes off it.

  “What do you think will happen to the light?” says the first fisherman to the others. “Once we’ve used it to catch Gargantis, and saved the day and all.”

  “I say we keep it,” says the second. “Get it back in that bottle and use it to fish with.”

  “Aye,” says the first fisherman again. “Like Saint Dismal himself. We’ll catch more fish than ever. We’ll be the greatest
fishermen this side of Kessel Island!”

  “Greatest fishermen anywhere,” says the third fisherman, “and already heroes for saving the town! I reckon we’ve got it made.”

  “I thought you fishermen weren’t going out in the storm,” I say, trying to get the conversation back to the here and now. “I thought your diesel engines got hit by lightning.”

  The first fisherman looks down at me reluctantly.

  “You thought wrong, then,” he says. “Boadicea’s put in lightning conductors on Bludgeon. Expensive ones. Courtesy of our rich friend with the tentacle.”

  There’s a shout of “Bring the bait!” from the open door, and I’m pulled off my feet again before I can ask anything else. The first fisherman swings me up over his shoulder as if I’m a sack of spuds and carries me out onto the roaring deck. The sprightning dives into my hair again as the wind hits us. Now would be a good time for a blast of lightning, and the electrical sprite is crackling in agitation, but it also seems as groggy as I am.

  The hardest fishermen of Eerie-on-Sea are gathered there on the deck of Boadicea’s great rusty fishing vessel. They gawk at my appearance, but again it’s not really me they are staring at.

  “The Light! The Gargantic Light!”

  I get a view through the spray back along the boat, and I’m shocked at just how far away the lights of shore are. Then, before I can think anything else, I’m swung over and dumped down on the greasy, rain-soaked deck.

  “Bring the plank!” bellows a voice I know well. It’s Boadicea Bates herself.

  A couple of fishermen approach with a long plank that’s more than three times the height of the tallest man there. They lay it on the deck.

  Boadicea turns to me.

  “Lie on the plank!” she commands.

  “Don’t you mean ‘Walk the plank’?” I say. “I’m not much of a one for boats and that, but even I know that planks are for walking.”

  “Don’t try and be funny,” the first fisherman barks in my ear. “Lie on the plank, or I’ll brain you with it.”

  So I lie on the plank, face down, my head over the end. Well, I don’t really see what else I can do. Then the sailors lift the plank and the rope lasso is looped around me, lashing me tightly to the wood.

  “Still don’t seem right,” grumbles a voice, as the knots tighten. “Just a kid, that’s all.”

  There’s a rumble of uncertainty from some of the other fishermen.

  “Since the Light has bound itself to him, we have no choice,” Boadicea says, motioning to the fishermen to pick up the plank again, this time with yours truly lashed to one end. “Besides, if he’s lucky, he might not get completely eaten.”

  The fishermen seem content with this.

  “Now, run him out the bow!” cries Boadicea Bates.

  With this I’m swung forward and shoved far out over the sea beyond the prow of the boat. My head is dangling over the end of the plank, and I’m staring straight down into the churning, inky depths. My ears and hair are blasted back by the wind, and my face is stung by a thousand particles of sea spray as we plough on into the storm. I cry, “Bladderwra-a-acks!” but the word is whipped from my mouth and thrown far away.

  I force myself to look up.

  The storm is more beautiful and more terrible than ever. Towering mountains of yellow-blue clouds tumble in the skies above, alive with snakes of lightning and metallic clashes of thunder. I see something massive – a shadow – undulate through a gap in the sky mountains, propelled by one vast flipper, before vanishing into the whirling clouds again.

  Only a few hours ago I’d have said it was just the spray in my eyes making me see things. But now I know it’s not.

  I sense the sprightning getting agitated again, crackling as she clings to my hair with tiny fists.

  “The bait is set!” The voice of Boadicea reaches me against the wind. “The creature will come!”

  “Go!” I shout to the electric sprite above me. “Isn’t that what you’re looking for? That thing up there? Just go!”

  But the sprightning clings on.

  I look back and see the tall form of Deep Hood emerge from Bludgeon’s wheelhouse. He has to hold his hood down against the wind to stop it from blowing back and revealing whatever horrors are hiding beneath.

  “The whaling cannon?” he calls. “Is it ready?”

  “Aye!” comes a cry, and I see two fishermen braced beside something I never thought I’d see on an Eerie fishing boat: a gun on a swivel mounting – the type once used to hunt whales. Sticking out of it is the lethal point of a spear. And attached to the tip of the spear is something that looks a lot like a grenade.

  “Please, just go,” I say again to the sprightning on my head. “Please!”

  But my voice is lost in the wind as we power through the waves and into the heart of the storm.

  THE SIGNAL

  IT ISN’T LONG before I’m soaked through. The waves are huge now, and Bludgeon is thrown high one moment, only to plunge low the next, racing down the ocean troughs. Sometimes I’m dunked bodily in the sea, to be snapped at by the writhing shoal of fish drawn by the sprightning’s light. Then I’m raised high again, as I wobble on my plank, gasping for breath.

  My guess is, it’s only been half an hour since I was strung up like a carrot on a stick. It feels more like half a lifetime. All I can think is that somehow the mermonkey foresaw all this when it dispensed me The Cold, Dark Bottom of the Sea by Sebastian Eels. It warned me, and yet here I am anyway. An image of the cover of that book appears in my mind, but there’s an extra little white figure sinking down to be devoured in the depths now. An extra little figure in a Lost-and-Founder’s uniform…

  Then suddenly the sea stops its crazy rolling. Despite the darkness of night, the sky goes orange and strangely bright, and cloud descends in spiral stacks all around. We are entering the heart of the storm, where even the sea seems cowed into submission. Back on the deck, the crew of Bludgeon stare upwards with awestruck faces.

  “Make ready the cannon!” Boadicea calls. “Gargantis is close.”

  I look at the sky, terrified of what I might see.

  A shadow-shape coils in the clouds directly above us.

  The sprightning, drawing strength from my fear at last, emits a ferocious lightning flash, with her own boom of thunder. Then she fizzes and crackles before emitting a second, even brighter flash.

  A zig of lightning zags across the clouds above us with a sky-shattering KA-BLAM! that feels a lot like a reply. The sprightning flashes again.

  Is she … signalling?

  “Look!” calls Deep Hood.

  A shadow, darker even than the dark of night, tears the cloud apart. A monstrous fish tail sweeps low across the ocean, sending an angry wind scouring across the surface of the water. The sprightning signals again and again, as something vaster than imagination turns in the heavens.

  And that’s when I see the eye.

  Huge and terrible, a single colossal eye dawns above the cloud bank like a yellow sun rising over an alien planet. A sunspot pupil darts here and there, until it finally fixes on the little sprightning.

  And on me.

  There’s an almighty eruption of triumphant lightning, and the head of the monster is thrown into terrifying relief, its black-hole mouth agape and curling with twisted tusks.

  Gargantis!

  The monster descends upon us.

  “Fire!” screams Boadicea. “For the love of Eerie, FIRE!”

  “Wait!” Deep Hood shouts, but it’s too late.

  There’s a CRUMP! as the cannon goes off and the spear flies away, directly at the eye. The eye blinks, and the heavens fold as the monster darts away, whirling cloud. The spear vanishes into the maelstrom, and there’s a brilliant flash of light – not lightning this time, but the fire of man-made explosives.

  A tearing, elemental scream fills the sky as the storm fish takes the hit.

  “Too soon!” Deep Hood shouts. “The creature was not close enough!” />
  “It was close enough for me!” I shout, but I don’t think anyone is listening. Everyone is racing around the boat, taking up boathooks and axes, while the whaling cannon is hastily reloaded.

  “Bring us about!” cries Boadicea. “It’s turning around, getting behind us. Bring us about!”

  And sure enough, a long snaky shadow is rippling across the sky from east to west. Gargantis is swimming through the heavens.

  I test my hands. I hope that in all the excitement somehow the ropes have been worked loose, but no luck. I’m still tied fast. I feel the sprightning fall back into my hair as if exhausted, her light sputtering.

  But Gargantis knows she’s here.

  There will be no shaking the monster off now. If Boadicea and her men can’t kill it, Gargantis will surely devour us, boat and all. I struggle again at the ropes, even more urgently than before.

  And I feel something. Something spiky that scratches my wrist. I look around. Is there a nail or something sticking out of the plank? That’s what there would be if this was a story – something sharp I could use to cut through the rope and get myself free. But this isn’t a story, and my hopes sink when I see what is actually there.

  Standing over my tied hands, on four brass legs braced against the wind, is the clockwork hermit crab. It has one of its sword blades out and is waving it slowly from side to side as it creeps up my back towards my head.

  “Aargh!” I cry out, hardly able to believe that my already terrible situation has just got a whole lot worse.

  The hermit crab clambers up into my hair.

  It lowers itself spikily down my face.

  It raises the sword blade till it’s just before my eyes.

  My mind races. Surely there’s a rule of lost-and-foundering for this! But of course there isn’t. I screw my eyes shut and get ready to be sliced like salami.

  Nothing happens.

  I open my eyes and see that the hermit crab is still holding its sword arm out to me. I can see the little gleam of steel, contrasting with the brass, from the bolt I left out on my desk back in my Lost-and-Foundery. I’m going to be cut by the very sword arm I repaired!