Clash of the Sky Galleons

by Paul Stewart;Chris Riddell

  Returning to the helm, Wind Jackal surveyed the scene for a moment, then shook his head. ‘We’re stormlashed,’ he said. ‘But the storm’s still not reached its peak.’ He frowned. ‘The safest option is to disembark till it blows over.’

  ‘Disembark?’ said Maris and Quint together, horrified by the thought.

  ‘It’s a risk we’ll have to take,’ said Wind Jackal quietly. He raised his head and bellowed to the rest of the crew of the Galerider. ‘Prepare to disembark!’

  Quint untied the rope that had prevented him from being swept overboard, then turned to help Maris with hers.

  ‘You go first, son,’ said Wind Jackal. Quint nodded. ‘And take Maris with you.’

  Quint did as he was told without further question. With Maris behind him, he climbed down from the helm - taking care not to lose his footing as the sky ship lurched and rolled. At the fore-deck, he unfurled the rope-ladder coiled up by the balustrade, and dropped it over the side. It hung down in the air like the lolling tongue of a halitoad, swaying in the rain-drenched gale.

  Slowly, carefully, he lowered himself down the ladder, rung after perilous rung, until the upper leaves of the blackwood tree started slapping against his legs. Lower he went, coming a moment later to an immense, almost horizontal branch, with another one growing out of it, which he could hold onto. He eased himself across and looked up.

  ‘Come on, Maris,’ he called, his heart thumping. ‘You can do it…’

  As he watched her climb down the rope-ladder, gripping tenaciously as she took the slippery rungs, one after the other, Quint realized all over again just how brave she was. When she reached the branch, he held out a hand for her to take, and felt a wave of relief as she grasped it.

  He glanced up to see Tem Barkwater just climbing over the balustrade.

  The tall, lanky youth was about to put his foot on the top rung, when there was a loud, crackling sound up in the sky, far, far above their heads. Quint and Maris both turned to see a vast and dazzling bolt of lightning come hurtling down through the mist and cloud. It punctured the thick air, leaving a trail of steam in its wake and …

  Crash!

  The point of the bolt skewered the ironwood mast of the Galerider. The newly varnished wood smoked and flared - but, as the torrential rain beat down, there was a hiss and the flames were extinguished before they could take hold.

  As the lightning faded, a great rumbling noise started overhead, which suddenly exploded with ear-splitting loudness. And as it did so, Quint saw the flight-burners on the Galerider’s flight-rock platform flicker and go out. The flight-rock gave a long loud hiss as the freezing rain hit it.

  The next instant, there was the sound of splintering wood and Maris and Quint felt violent tremors as the grappling-hooks were torn from the branches of the tree. As they looked helplessly on, the Galerider was swept up and away into the turbulent storm.

  Maris turned to Quint as it disappeared.

  ‘Oh, Quint,’ she whispered. ‘What now?’

  • CHAPTER TEN •

  THE ANGLER

  For a few moments, Quint said nothing. He was frozen in a crouching position, one arm round Maris, the other clutching the overhanging branch above. His face betrayed no emotion as his dark indigo eyes stared unblinkingly at the boiling black clouds into which the Galerider had vanished.

  Beside him, Maris pulled her coat tightly around her as the wind howled and the rain lashed down, making the branches of the huge tree buck and bow. Dazzling lightning bolts illuminated the tangle of branches and leaves, which trembled and shook a moment later as colossal claps of thunder broke.

  ‘What do we do now?’ Maris shouted as the rumble died away.

  ‘There’s nothing we can do,’ replied Quint, his eyes still fixed on the horizon. ‘We must stay here until the storm passes, and pray …’

  ‘Pray?’ Maris questioned, the word snatched away by a blast of wind so violent, it tore the silvery heart-shaped leaves from the surrounding branches, pitching them into the maelstrom.

  ‘Pray that the Galerider survives,’ Quint told her, his voice loud above the tumult of the storm, ‘because we don’t stand a chance out here without her.’

  Just then a great jagged bolt of lightning came crashing down out of the sky. It filled the air with thick mist and the tang of toasted almonds - and struck a tree some thirty or so strides to their right. As the blinding light faded, the turbulent sky seemed even darker than it had been before. Night was falling - and fast.

  ‘How long do we have to stay up here?’ asked Maris.

  Quint shrugged. ‘We’re safer up here than down on the forest floor,’ he said. ‘The Deepwoods are dangerous enough at the best of times, but at night…’ He shuddered. ‘Better lash ourselves down and try to get as comfortable as we can.’

  The rain continued to fall as Quint made preparations for the long night ahead. He swung the coiled rope from his shoulder and, having secured one end to the overhanging branch above, tied the other end around Maris’s waist. For himself, he used his grappling-iron, plunging the sharp barbed hooks into the bark and then tying the stout line at the other end to his belt.

  ‘Now, give me your parawings,’ Quint said, turning to Maris, who was soaked to the bone and shivering uncontrollably.

  With trembling fingers, Maris did as she was told, taking care not to let the wind tear the precious wings from her grasp as she did so. She leaned across to Quint, who had also removed his own, and pushed them into his outstretched hands.

  Quint set to work, his fingers, stiff with cold, battling with the fiddly cords and strings. Using the hooks at the outermost edges of the wings, he secured the two sets of parawings to the branch above his head. Then he reached across and, by twisting the shoulder-straps round, managed to tie the pair of them together. He motioned Maris to join him beneath the dangling wings.

  She crouched down beside him, her eyes wide with a mixture of curiosity and unease.

  Next, reaching up, Quint tugged on the two release-levers. The black spider-silk wings instantly unfurled and billowed out. Quint grasped one of the outstretched wing-tips, Maris grasped the other, and together they pulled the two ends round to form a bell-shaped tent, which Quint knotted securely in front of them.

  At last, they were out of the driving rain and wind. Quint slumped down next to Maris and let out a weary sigh.

  ‘Try to get some sleep, Maris,’ he said, putting an arm round her and feeling the shivering begin to subside. ‘We’ll need all our strength tomorrow if we’re to light a beacon.’

  ‘A beacon?’ said Maris, stifling a yawn. ‘But how … ?’

  ‘First, we’ll have to climb an ironwood pine. The tallest we can find,’ Quint said. ‘Then we set fire to the top - the resin in the pinecones burns for days - and just hope that the Galerider spots it. That is,’ he added glumly, ‘if the Galerider isn’t already a pile of shattered timbers by now …’

  Quint felt Maris’s hand close over his own and squeeze it tightly.

  ‘Try not to think about it,’ she whispered. ‘And get some sleep yourself. It’ll all seem much better in the morning … it always does …’ she added with a wide yawn.

  After a while, from beside him, there came the sound of gentle snoring and Quint became conscious that Maris had nuzzled up close, her breathing soft and regular as she slept. He wrapped his greatcoat around her and cushioned her head on his shoulder. All around him, mingling with the rush and roar of the storm, he could hear the nighttime sounds of the forest creatures.

  Quint shrank into himself, his skin cold and clammy with fear. Many was the time the Galerider had anchored for the night in the Deepwoods, securing its tolley-ropes to the anchor-rings, rocky crags or ironwood pines that lay along the flight paths. But on those occasions, he’d been inside his cabin, tucked up in his hammock, the air filled with the reassuring sounds of the rest of the sleeping crew.

  Here, inside this makeshift parawing tent that flexed and strained with the batter
ing wind, it was different. He felt exposed and vulnerable. Razorflits screeched as they wheeled through the air; rotsuckers flapped past on padded wings, their lamp-like eyes scanning the forest. Fromps coughed, quarms squealed, manticrakes gibbered and croaked, while somewhere far, far away, a solitary banderbear yodelled out to the storm-filled sky…

  Although Quint had no memory of dropping off to sleep, he must have, for the next thing he knew, a loud winnik-winnik-winnik call was dragging him back to consciousness. He opened his eyes and peered blearily out of the tent to see a sleek lorrel in a nearby treetop calling to the early morning dawn as it groomed its golden fur.

  He looked down to see Maris fast asleep, her head in his lap. ‘Maris,’ he whispered. ‘Maris, it’s morning …’

  Maris’s eyes snapped open. ‘Wh … what … where am I?’ she said.

  Quint untied the parawings, which fell open to reveal the Deepwoods outside. Maris sat up. The rain had stopped and, although the wind was still blowing hard, it was no longer a threat to the trees - or to themselves. As she looked about her, however, Maris noticed various bare patches in the surrounding canopy where some of the greatest trees had come crashing down, bringing others with them.

  Everything - from the leaves and bark, to the sky itself - gleamed and glinted, as though the heavy downpour had burnished the entire forest. Up above their heads, the remnants of the great gathering of stormclouds scudded quickly across the sky. One moment, the sun beat down; the next, everything was cast in shadow.

  ‘The Deepwoods,’ Maris breathed. ‘They’re … they’re beautiful.’

  ‘They might be beautiful,’ said Quint, as he unhitched the parawings and separated them. He slipped his own over his shoulders, and helped Maris on with hers. ‘But remember, Maris, the Deepwoods are deadly. We have to find an ironwood pine, and that means climbing down to the forest floor and trekking. When we do, you must promise me …’

  ‘Promise you what?’ said Maris, wide-eyed.

  ‘That you’ll stay close to me. We must keep to the shadows - and don’t touch or eat or drink anything, no matter how hungry or thirsty you get.’

  ‘But—’ Maris began.

  ‘Nothing!’ insisted Quint, seizing her by the shoulders and staring into her eyes. ‘Not a dew-filled seedpod, not a succulent delberry … Nothing at all! The Deepwoods cannot be trusted!’

  Maris stared back into Quint’s eyes, so full of concern and anxiety. She nodded slowly.

  ‘I promise,’ she said.

  Without further delay, they began climbing down the huge blackwood tree, leaving those great gnarled branches where they’d weathered the storm. Quint went first, finding handholds and footholds on the broad pitted expanse of the trunk, and pausing on branches to help Maris down after him. Occasionally, she would slip - but Quint’s reassuring hand was always there in an instant, gripping a wrist or an ankle to steady her.

  The lower they got, the easier the climb, as the broad trunk of the blackwood tree became ever more gnarled and encrusted with handy knots and whorls. Maris began to relax, and paused now and again to look around.

  ‘Oh, Quint, what are they?’ she asked as they passed a bough full of tiny hovering birds of iridescent green.

  ‘Emerald mossbirds, I think,’ said Quint. ‘Though sky pirates call them skull-peckers.’

  ‘What a horrible name for such beautiful birds,’ said Maris, resuming her descent.

  Quint smiled, and decided not to tell her about the unfortunate habit they had of pecking out the eyes of any creature foolish enough to venture onto their nesting branch.

  ‘What’s this?’ Maris asked a moment later, pointing at the long thin insect running across the branch by her hand. She giggled. ‘Look at all its little legs going!’

  ‘A hairy thousandfoot,’ Quint replied, adding matter-of-factly: ‘And they can strip the flesh off a finger in seconds …’

  Maris gave a small yelp of alarm and quickly withdrew her hand as the orange and grey mottled creature disappeared into a crack in the blackwood bark.

  As they got closer to the ground, the forest around them became darker and colder, with the low sun unable to penetrate the depths of the forest. Finally, they reached the base of the tree, where the great gnarled roots fanned out from the huge trunk and sloped down towards the shadowy forest floor below. There, they disappeared deep into the rich earth, anchoring the mighty blackwood tree securely enough to withstand all but the most ferocious Deepwoods storms.

  Quint paused and peered down into the gloom. Anything could be down there, lurking in the shadows -packs of voracious wig-wigs with their fluffy bodies and knife-like teeth; poison-tentacled hoverworms or death-breathed halitoads …

  He took a deep breath, grasped Maris’s arm and quietly slid down a long, snaking root towards the forest floor. Their feet hit the mossy ground with a soft ploff at exactly the same moment, and they tumbled forwards. Instantly, Quint sprang to his feet and grasped Maris’s arm once more, pulling her into the shadows beneath a cluster of huge toadstools. He glanced around furtively, then motioned to Maris to follow him.

  ‘Keep your eyes and ears open, and stay close!’ he instructed, before setting off at a brisk pace. ‘And try to touch as little as possible. Flowers can sting, thorns can poison, vines can scratch and snag …’

  Maris hurried after Quint, her face taut with fear.

  ‘And as for the creatures,’ Quint continued, skirting round a clump of milkwort fronds, ‘they’re best avoided, however small and innocent-looking they may appear. Remember, Maris, out here in the Deepwoods, nothing is what it seems!’

  Maris stared about her, Quint’s ominous words echoing inside her head. It was difficult to imagine that it was quite as dangerous as he maintained. The shadowy undergrowth was shot with shafts of dazzling sunlight. Magnificent tree-trunks were everywhere, some with sleek silvery bark, some with velvety golden bark, and some with dark rough bark out of which grew mossy fronds, multi-coloured lichens and delicate blooms that fluttered in the fading wind.

  There were banks of moonbells and dewdrops, tumbledown-furze and comb-bushes which, as the wind blew, filled the air with soft music - an ever-changing chorus of delicate chimes and plangent humming. And the smells! Every footstep they took brought new ones - the sweet fruity aromas of limeweed and woodapple blossom, laced with the the sour odour of stinkwood and decay.

  So much beauty thought Maris, as she followed Quint through a small glade and back into the undergrowth, yet shot with so much danger … Suddenly, out of the corner of her eye, she saw a flash of blue.

  ‘Quint,’ Maris said, her voice hushed and urgent. ‘Look over there. Lemkins!’

  Quint followed her gaze, to see three lemkins - their bright fur glinting in the shafts of sunlight like sapphires -frolicking together in a clearing just ahead. Over and over they tumbled, pulling one another’s ears and tails, and chirruping with delight.

  ‘Just like Digit,’ Maris whispered. ‘You remember Digit, my little lemkin pet? He died last winter - and I still miss him …’

  Suddenly, in the blink of an eye, one of the lemkins shot through the air, as if sky-fired, and disappeared into the shadows beneath a comb-bush. The bush shook violently, as though it was alive, and the air filled with a hideous wheezing sound. The other two lemkins raced up the nearest tree, making their distinctive whaa-iiii kha-kha-kha-kha calls of distress.

  ‘Run!’ Quint shouted. ‘It’s a halitoad!’

  Maris stared at the comb-bush as its broad serrated fronds parted and a hideous creature with warty skin and bulging eyes waddled out into the sunlight, its mottled chest inflating like a tilder-bladder balloon, and its long sticky tongue licking its gaping needle-fanged mouth.

  Quint grabbed her arm and, dragging her with him, dashed across the clearing as fast as he could. They had just entered the surrounding trees when, from behind them, they heard a rasping blast as the halitoad exhaled.

  ‘Hold your breath!’ Quint told her, as he pulled his
collar up to cover his mouth and pinched his nose shut. Beside him, Maris did the same, and the pair of them continued running through the trees until their lungs were bursting. Then, unable to go a step further, they tumbled to the ground and sucked in a lungful of air.

  ‘Urgh-gh-gh …’ Maris gagged, and began spluttering with disgust as a foul and fetid stench caught in the back of her throat. ‘… That smell…’ she cried, her eyes watering.

  Quint nodded grimly. The halitoad’s breath is fatal. Any closer and we’d be as dead as that lemkin,’ he said. ‘We were lucky. Very lucky’

  Looking around, Quint set off again, with Maris close beside him.

  They went deeper into the woods and as they did so, although the sun was now much higher in the sky, when the canopy closed above their heads, the forest floor became as dark as in the middle of the night.

  ‘All these trees,’ Quint muttered. ‘Blackwood, redoak, leadwood and lullabee; sapwood, sallowdrop and weeping-willoak …’ He shook his head. ‘Yet not a single ironwood pine.’

  They went on in silence, trudging through the dense undergrowth, their feet sinking into the thick mattress of fallen leaves. Maris had no idea how long they trekked through the gloom, avoiding the enticing sunlit glades that looked so beautiful, but were so deadly.

  Then suddenly, up ahead, there was a shaft of light. Golden beams of sunlight were streaming down from above. As they approached, Maris and Quint saw that a line in the forest had been cleared. The reason became apparent as they got nearer. A huge tree had come down in the previous night’s storm and, as it fell, it had taken a dozen or so others with it.

  ‘Typical,’ Quint snorted, as they approached the gigantic trunk.

  ‘What?’ said Maris.

  ‘First ironwood pine we find,’ he said, ‘and it’s lying on its side.’

  Together, they made their way cautiously to the edge of the vast pit where the tree had been been uprooted and looked down. The taproot of the colossal tree had gone down into the earth almost as far as its trunk had grown up, and now the hole it left was immense. Dark and smelling of rot and fungus, the rainwater which had collected like a small lake at the bottom glinted in the sunlight.