The Destruction of the Books

by Mel Odom

  Navin and a few of the other sailors who had stood watch on deck and listened to the wails insisted the Stalkers made them. No one on watch saw anything in the water or on land all through the night, but the men who talked so long and so loud of the Stalkers insisted that the creatures lived in underwater pockets along the shore. The living arrangements, if they were true, reminded Juhg of crayfish, and he couldn’t help picturing the Stalkers as that. With his imaginative eye, he saw the Stalkers as human-sized crayfish with skull-like features and dead-white flesh. But hands had shaped the iron frameworks and black stone slabs, not pincers.

  The sailors also held forth that only blood in the water would make the Stalkers leave their desolate island. Like sharks, the Stalkers were supposed to be able to smell the blood in the water for miles. Juhg desperately hoped that weren’t true.

  Ornne shifted beside Juhg, catching his arm in his hand and tugging to get his attention.

  Following the boy’s line of sight, Juhg spotted the soot-streaked sails standing proudly aboard the ship that rounded the southeastern tip of Iron Rose Island.

  “Do ye see the ship?” Ornne asked in a quick, nervous voice.

  “I do,” Juhg agreed. “It’s there.” Fear took a proper hold of him then, stronger than anything he’d felt through the night.

  Ornne lifted his voice, shouting, “Sails! Sails ho, lads!” and Windchaser became a bustle of activity as she prepared for war.

  7

  “Boarders Away!”

  “Battle stations!” Captain Attikus roared from the stern deck. He stood solid and unbending, a force now rather than a man, and Juhg knew when the time came to write of this battle—provided he lived through it, of course—then he would describe the man as that. “Raise the sails! Fill those ’yards with canvas!”

  Navin repeated the captain’s orders, bellowing them out in his stentorian voice and adding colorful threats to individual crewmembers as he strode amidships with a cutlass in his hands. Gust trailed along through the rigging above the first mate’s head. The monk shook his gnarled hand threateningly, in an exact mimicry of Navin’s efforts.

  Instantly, the ship’s crew pulled the ropes that raised the canvas and stretched it tight between the halyards along all three masts. Luck stayed with them in spite of the inclement weather: Most of the wind drove from the east, spitting rain toward the west so that the ship could run full-out toward the goblin vessel.

  As the wind caught the rising canvas and pressed it out full-bellied, Windchaser surged forward, straining at her anchor. The prow nosed down and the stern threatened to come about as she twisted to be free.

  “Haul that anchor!” Navin crossed the deck at a full run and oversaw the crewmen winding the great wheel that drew up the heavy anchor. Timbers creaked, splintering the noise of the canvas cracking in the wind, and whitecaps retreating from the mainland hammered the ship’s stern so hard that the ship shuddered.

  “Hard to port,” Ornne yelled through his cupped hands. “Hard to port. Blowfly’s makin’ good time, she is, an’ she’s runnin’.”

  “Has she seen us yet, Ornne?” Captain Attikus demanded.

  “No, Cap’n, but she’s makin’ a good head all the same.”

  “Let me know the instant those goblins see us.”

  “I will, Cap’n.”

  Navin roared the order to pull the sheets to port louder. The canvas crew adjusted the sails. Windchaser heeled over hard to port as she was torn between wind and water and the dead weight of the anchor pulling free of the seabed.

  Ornne turned to Juhg, but his sharp eyes never left the goblin ship. “Ye get along on, now. I can keep track of our prize, right enough, meownself.”

  Juhg hesitated, glancing down the rigging and seeing the ship’s deck so far below. Windchaser twisted and fought to gain her head with all the canvas throwing her forward. As he looked down, an unaccustomed feeling of vertigo slammed through Juhg.

  “Get on with ye,” Ornne growled, pushing at Juhg’s shoulder with an open hand. “Just mind yer step on the way down an’ ye’ll be fine.” He grinned with childlike delight. “It’s not that fall ye have so much to worry about, Juhg. It’s that sudden stop what’s at the end.”

  Juhg sincerely believed the young lookout’s sense of humor was misplaced. Asking the Old Ones to watch over him, since they were supposed to have some mercy toward dwellers because they’d created them and given them such mild natures, Juhg grabbed the lines and prepared for the descent.

  He swung a leg out over the crow’s-nest and started down the rigging. Pouring through the square openings of the rigging, the wind clawed at Juhg in a frenzy. He’d never been aloft in a blow, and even though this was not truly a blow now, he had never before felt the wind so strong. The rough hemp chewed at his hands like rat’s teeth. Hours of working with inks and quills hadn’t given him the calluses the other sailors had.

  Moving quickly, only slipping once so that he dangled above the deck so far below and scraped one cheek against the rope, Juhg made his way down. At the bottom, he dropped to the heaving deck and had to catch himself with his hands.

  Peering west-southwest, where he knew the goblin vessel was, Juhg only saw the heaving sea looking like it towered nearly as tall as the mainmast. Windchaser occupied the bottom of a trough of a wave. Blown by the wind and going out with the tide, the wave retreated and brought the ship along with it.

  Then the wind caught the sails more surely and pushed Windchaser up from the trough onto the wave’s back amid the white curlers. The ship crested the wave, hanging high for a moment so that Juhg glimpsed Blowfly in the distance. Juhg stared at the goblinkin ship and tried to push all the old fears and memories back wherever they’d come from.

  I won’t be a goblin slave again, he promised himself. No matter what else happens in my life, I’ll never suffer that again. I would rather die first.

  Then, with sickening speed, Windchaser crested the wave and slammed back down onto the front side of the wave. The deck tilted sharp enough that every hand aboard her had to grab hold of support to keep from tumbling.

  Juhg made his way to the mainmast, staying beneath the main boom and the lines as the sails crews kept the canvas tight and in the correct position to best take advantage of the wind. He crouched by the mast, one hand around it to steady himself. The polished wood felt wet and cold.

  “Archers, make ready!” Captain Attikus roared, and the command was picked up at once by the first mate.

  Immediately, the men aboardship who were designated archers took their mighty Ardynwood bows from oilskin pouches. They braced the bows against the deck and used one hand to bend the bows and the other hand to string the weapons, working from bottom to top. They’d kept the bows and the strings dry so they would not stretch out in the humid weather. The bowmen showed skill, and if it hadn’t been for the fact that goblin archers would shoot back, Juhg would have felt more relieved to witness the practiced maneuvers.

  Raisho stood among the archers. He reached over his shoulder and took a cloth-yard shaft from the quiver he wore. With practiced ease, he nocked an arrow to string and waited with his knees slightly bent so he rode out Windchaser’s movements easily.

  Watching his friend, Juhg knew that when the battle was done and he could write of the experience, he would draw Raisho as he saw him now. He just hoped they all survived.

  Windchaser cleaved the water, running full-out now. Even though the waves retreated before them, the ship overtook the water and spray burst over the prow. Juhg tasted the wet brine on his lips and felt it burn his eyes. Fearing the worst, he felt his heart hammering inside his chest.

  “Cap’n!” Ornne squalled.

  “Aye,” Captain Attikus roared back.

  “Blowfly’s done went and seen us, Cap’n!”

  Peering ahead as Windchaser crested another wave, Juhg watched goblin activity suddenly boiling on Blowfly’s deck. They came to port to stare out at the approaching vessel.

  “Cap’n,�
�� Navin called up. “Shall we show ’em our colors?”

  Captain Attikus nodded gravely. “Run them up, Navin. Declare our intentions and let’s see if any of those goblins have a spine.”

  They have a wizard, Juhg thought glumly. He remembered the heat of the fireball two nights ago when it narrowly missed him.

  Navin bellowed out more orders. Four sailors ran to the aft mast while another retreated belowdecks. Windchaser kept her pirate’s flag stowed in a hidden compartment below. A few cities along the coastline, most of them human, maintained a harbor patrol that required searches of all arriving ships. Trading in those ports was necessary, and Captain Attikus didn’t want to have to explain that they weren’t quite pirates. And he couldn’t explain about Greydawn Moors anyway because the island’s—and the Vault of All Known Knowledge’s—existence had to remain secret.

  The sailor reappeared from belowdecks in a moment. The black flag was attached to the line, then ran up to flutter in the galling winds beneath the stormy sky.

  The grinning skull and crossbones stood out proudly on the field of black. An eyepatch covered one hollow socket, and two gold teeth marked the grin.

  “All right, laddies,” Navin bellowed above the howling wind, “it’s pirates ye be, an’ proper pirates too. Up agin them despicable goblinkin, ye are, an’ I’ll not tolerate any man shirkin’ his bounden duty to create despair an’ sorrow among them awful creatures.”

  The crew shouted in excitement, but Juhg saw fear in some of them too. He’d seen that emotion among human crews in the past. Humans, at least on the surface, seemed so warlike. Many of them, of course, were, but they knew fear as well. Dwarves lived to fight, and showed no real fear, accepting death as part of the price that was paid for being warriors. Elves, smug in their arrogance, did not believe they could be bested in physical prowess or cleverness until their deaths were upon them.

  The dwarves and elves seldom fought, only over matters that truly concerned them: land holdings and border disputes primarily, and against goblinkin, because those races detested each other, and when their senses of honor compelled them to take up axes or swords or bows against those who would sully them.

  However, even dwarven and elven battles with goblinkin occurred only after long and careful consideration of the potential outcomes because of the cost in lives. That was one of the reasons the wizards who had organized the defense of the lands and the building of the Vault of All Known Knowledge had trouble rallying the elves and dwarves to their cause.

  But humans, with their fiery tempers and short span of years, fought for almost any reason at all: out of anger, pride, jealousy, fear, want, need, and love. In the Library, Juhg had studied many histories, and he best loved those of the humans and their toils. Sadly, human historians rarely maintained a properly long view of an epoch or an era. Their lives were simply too short and their vision too narrow.

  Dinraldo, one of the oldest sailors aboard Windchaser, raised his voice in song. He was a long, thin reed of a man with iron-gray hair down to his shoulders, a scarlet kerchief tied round his throat, gold earrings, and the weathered walnut skin of a man who had known only life out on the salt.

  Gather round, me hearties,

  An’ stan’ up straight an’ true,

  ’Cause they ain’t no sailin’ man

  What comes rougher’n tougher’n you!

  The crew cheered and supported the old sailor’s song.

  Don’t want to go down on me dyin’ day

  Lyin’ abed an’ a-wastin’ away.

  So give me a blade an’ a fair wind

  An’ I’ll take up piratin’ agin!

  So stan’ me to a drink an’ gi’ me a blade

  An’ I’ll fight aside ye, dogs, I’ll fight aside ye!

  Until them goblins or this ol’ seadog is daid,

  Ye can count on me to give ’em a lick or three!

  Give ’em a lick or three! The crew sang the refrain, going through it again and again while the waves crashed liked thunder against the bows as they neared their prize.

  Juhg knew the crew’s voices carried across the water and that the goblins could hear them. Part of him couldn’t help but take pride in the crew, but he was afraid for them at the same time. During the long days of the voyage, he had ended up sketching everyone in the crew and telling them stories of far-off places and deeds of derring-do. He knew them, and he had listened to their stories of places and people they had met over their years of voyaging.

  Occasionally, he had even told them of voyages he had accompanied Grandmagister Lamplighter on, although he changed the names because the Grandmagister didn’t like for many to know everything he had done or where he had traveled. During those times, the crew had surprised Juhg by their insistence that the two Librarians in the story were so brave. For one, they were—of course—dwellers, which made bravery an awfully rare thing. And second, the “adventures” were fraught with peril and hardship, and so well detailed that it was hard to think of them simply as stories.

  During those times—then, as now—Juhg’s only consistent thought was of a way to survive. But he couldn’t help thinking of the book the goblins held captive on the ship. He wrapped his arms around the mainmast and held on. The book couldn’t be allowed to stay with the goblins.

  As Windchaser crested the next wave, the sound of throbbing drums echoed in Juhg’s ears. The basso pounding sounded ominous and threatening and discordant, and a moment later the noise was punctuated by the wild screams of the goblins stoking up to a battle rage, which was a terrible thing in a goblin when that goblin had nowhere to escape. Each ship’s crew tried to drown out the other and earn a psychological advantage.

  To Juhg, the efforts were all barbarous, little above the keening and growling of animals.

  Despite the threatening noise made by the goblin crew, Blowfly tried to run for the open sea. She turned and made haste to the west, giving up hugging the coastline for the moment. The goblin crew wouldn’t run too far, Juhg knew, because the goblinkin weren’t as adept at steering by the stars as the humans. As soon as the creatures became afraid of getting lost, the goblins would reverse direction and speed toward the rising sun.

  “They’re runnin’, lads!” Navin whooped, raising his cutlass high.

  Juhg clung to the mainmast and felt dry-mouthed. His stomach flipped over as Windchaser rose and fell with the ocean. Blowfly appeared and disappeared as the waves separated the two ships. But Juhg knew it was only a matter of time till Windchaser caught her prey. Windchaser was a faster ship and more expertly handled.

  Captain Attikus remained calm in spite of the goblin crew’s rising bloodlust. He called out orders, which Navin relayed, and brought Windchaser smartly up behind the goblinkin ship. In a short time, Windchaser slid into place behind Blowfly and stole her wind. When the goblin ship’s canvas started to collapse and hang limply from the ’yards, a thunderous cheer rose from Windchaser’s decks.

  “Ornne,” Captain Attikus called.

  “Aye, Cap’n.”

  “Do you see that wizard?”

  “No, sir.”

  The mere mention of the word wizard caused Juhg’s stomach to curdle. If a fireball took them at sea and they couldn’t put the flames out, they’d burn down to the waterline. Out on the open sea as they were, there was nowhere to go. Iron Rose Island was too far away unless some of the longboats survived.

  “Archers,” Captain Attikus ordered, “prepare to fire on my order.”

  Raisho and the other archers drew back till the arrow fletchings touched their cheeks.

  The goblins raised bows too, and a few of them fired prematurely. Most of the heavy shafts were poorly aimed or didn’t have the necessary distance to reach Windchaser, but a few thudded into the ship’s prow or tangled in the forward sails.

  “Helmsman, bring us to her port side,” Captain Attikus ordered.

  “Aye, aye, Cap’n.” The helmsman yanked on the great wheel as sail crews yanked the booms and adjusted
the ’yards to present the canvas so the ship turned hard to port.

  Blowfly, without the favor of the wind, appeared dead in the water. The goblin crew pushed and shoved against each other in the stern as they fired their bows.

  Arrows flew all about Windchaser. Several caught in her canvas or struck her side. Juhg glanced up at Captain Attikus, wondering when he was going to give the order to shoot.

  “Ornne,” the captain called up. An arrow struck the stern deck only inches below his feet. In the next second, two more arrows lodged in the wood of the railing that fronted the stern deck. Captain Attikus stood his ground. Juhg knew the captain had no choice. If he elected to hide or flinch, his crew would lose faith in him and themselves.

  The goblins had the distance now, but still lacked skill as true archers.

  Elven bowmen, Juhg knew from experience, could have been at three times the distance and picked off their targets easily even as the sea rose and fell. He slid around the base of the mainmast, putting the thick column of wood between himself and the attack. Arrows slapped into the wood and Juhg felt the vibration of the impacts against his back.

  “Ornne,” Captain Attikus called. “Find me that wizard.”

  “Cap’n,” Ornne protested from the crow’s-nest, which was festooned with arrows, “mayhap that wizard ain’t with them.”

  Two sailors aboard Windchaser went down with arrows through them. They yelled in fear and agony as they flopped on the deck.

  “Cap’n,” Navin called back, pacing nervously at the back of his crew. “We need to strike back.”

  “Patience, Navin,” the captain said, his gaze never leaving the goblin ship. “Would you rather face a wizard or a goblin crew?”

  Navin scowled and cursed beneath his breath.

  Back to the mainmast, Juhg peered at the goblin ship. The two ships rode nearly the same wave now, but Blowfly remained ahead of Windchaser, rising on the crest for a little while longer. By the time Windchaser came down after the goblin ship, her position on the wave put her almost on top of the other vessel. Several times while gazing over the ship’s side, Juhg had the distinct belief that Windchaser was going to crash down on top of Blowfly and crush both ships.