Clash of the Sky Galleons

by Paul Stewart;Chris Riddell

  The Stone Pilot hurried back to the flight-rock platform and searched it for the elusive shryke tooth. But all to no avail. Finally, she sat slumped at the foot of the mast, her conical hood drooping dejectedly.

  On the aft-deck, Maris stepped forward. She was about to make her choice when she caught Thaw looking up at the flight-rock platform, a look of malevolent glee on his handsome face. He noticed her glance out of the corner of his eye and instantly composed his features into a look of polite concern. Spillins looked up at her with his deep, dark, worried-looking eyes, and instantly Maris knew what she had to do.

  ‘Quint,’ she said, turning away. ‘This is for you.’ And with those words, she placed the shryke tooth in his outstretched hand.

  A momentary look of absolute devastation passed over Thaw Daggerslash’s face. The next instant, it was gone, supplanted with an expression of brave disappointment.

  ‘Well done, Quint,’ he said, offering his hand to be shaken, ‘or should I say, Captain Cloud Wolf!’

  He flashed them all a dazzling smile and strode from the deck. Spillins stared after him, his eyes wide with horror. The aura surrounding the young sky pirate was now a hideous boiling red.

  No one saw Thaw Dagger-slash leave, but the following morning a disappointed Duggin reported to Captain Cloud Wolf that the Mireraider was no longer tethered beside his sky ferry.

  Quint shook his head. ‘I was going to offer him a position as my quartermaster …’

  ‘I think it was captain or nothing for Thaw Daggerslash, judging by the look on his face,’ said Maris.

  All at once, there came a cry that dispelled all thought of Thaw Daggerslash. Spillins, up in his caternest with his telescope trained ahead, had spotted a sight to gladden all their hearts.

  ‘Undertown!’ he shouted out, his voice strident and cracked. ‘Undertown ahead!’

  The crew rushed from their posts to cluster at the balustrades on deck. And there it was, sprawled out beneath a grimy sky on the far side of the Mire - the great centre of commerce and industry: Undertown. A cheer went up, and Tem Barkwater lost his wide-brimmed hammelhorn felt hat as he tossed it into the air - only to have it snatched away by the wind.

  The next moment, though, the atmosphere changed. Certainly it was Undertown that lay before them, but it was a very different Undertown from the one they had left all those long weeks before.

  • CHAPTER NINETEEN •

  CLASH OF THE SKY GALLEONS

  In the great glass-domed chamber at the top of the magnificent Leagues Palace, Ruptus Pentephraxis, High Master of the United Leagues of Undertown Free Merchants, stared out across the rooftops. A pall of dark, swirling smoke hung over the city, cutting out the sunlight from above and casting everything below in ominous shadow. In places, the unnatural greyness was broken by pinpoints of dazzling light, glittering like marsh-gems in Mire mud, where great fires blazed.

  ‘The Sallowdrop inn, the Hammelhorn tavern, the Fromp, the Sky’s Rest and the most treacherous of them all, the Tarry Vine tavern…’ Ruptus growled in his deep, rasping voice, counting off the blazing buildings he could see, one by one. ‘Verminous nests of sky piracy cleansed! We have done well, my fellow leaguesmasters -putting aside our differences and acting together for once. But this great purge of sky piracy is not yet over …’

  The High Master turned and, with his one good eye, glowered at the assembled high-hats seated around the huge circular leagues table. A massive figure, as tall as a banderbear, his mighty paunch encased in battle-dented armour and his shaven head criss-crossed with scars, Ruptus towered over his fellow leaguesmasters without the aid of his own hat - the highest of them all - which sat by his side.

  ‘Even as their Undertown dens burn, the sky pirates are setting sail for the Edgelands and their impregnable stronghold at Wilderness Lair where they’ll skulk, like storm-scattered ratbirds, until they judge it safe to return…’

  All round the table, the high-hats nodded.

  ‘Just as they always do,’ muttered Padget Pyreglave, weasel-faced Master of the League of Rilkers and Renderers.

  ‘Same after every purge - and I’ve seen a few in my time,’ agreed the corpulent Renton Brankridge of the Wheelers and Wedgers, his chins wobbling.

  ‘Our leagues fleet is assembling in the boom-docks and is preparing to set sail in pursuit. Every league of Undertown has suspended commerce and contributed their finest vessels to our cause.’

  ‘But what’s the use, if they won’t come out of Wilderness Lair and fight?’ Padget Pyreglave’s whining voice broke in. ‘They know we can’t sail into the Edgelands after them. Our league ships aren’t built for it, and our leagues captains lack the skill…’

  ‘As we speak, the last sky pirate vessel has left for Wilderness Lair,’ Ruptus continued, glaring at the weasel-faced leaguesmaster on the other side of the table with ill-disguised contempt. ‘Its young captain delivered a load of bloodoak timber to our colleague Thelvis Hollrig’s sky-shipyard, perhaps the most important cargo ever carried. Now he is hurrying back to his fellow sky pirates at Wilderness Lair with news of our leagues fleet.’

  ‘And you let him go?’ gasped Padget in disbelief.

  ‘Of course!’ roared Ruptus, raising his gauntleted fist. ‘We needed him to tell the others. The sky pirates won’t be able to resist! When they hear that our leagues fleet has set sail, they’ll come out to meet us in open battle, confident that, once again, they’ll scatter our ships and bloody our noses with their sleek sky ships and superior skysailing skills.’

  The high-hats nodded uncertainly. What, they wondered, was to stop that actually happening?

  ‘As usual, those arrogant upstarts will expect us to flee back to Undertown to lick our wounds,’ Ruptus went on. ‘Then, little by little, the leagues’ resolve will weaken and we’ll begin to use their services again - just as we always have. And before we know it, they’ll be back in Undertown, in their taverns, smirking at us behind our backs … But not this time!’ he bellowed.

  Ruptus brought his huge fist down on the table with a resounding crash that set the high hats of the leagues-masters trembling on their heads like startled reed eels.

  ‘This time it’ll be different!’

  ‘But how?’ queried Renton Brankridge, his large flabby face reddening. ‘High Master Marl Mankroyd tried smashing the sky pirates in “the Battle of the Great Sky Whale,” and perished in the attempt … You should remember that, High Master. After all, you were there … How will this battle be any different?’

  Ruptus’s own face reddened and contorted with suppressed rage at the painful memory of that defeat, and his own humiliation at the hands of the great sky pirate captain, Wind Jackal. His great fists clenched, his one good eye blazed - and Renton Brankridge’s high hat trembled uncontrollably.

  Just then, from the far side of the table, there came the teeth-jarring sound of sharp ened finger-spikes being scraped across ironwood. All eyes turned in the direction of the appalling sound.

  Ruptus’s deputy, Imbix Hoth, the High Master of the Leagues of Flight, stood up and crossed the chamber to the tall windows and threw one open. Far below, from the direction of the sky-shipyards in Eastern Undertown, came the sounds of sawing, drilling and frenzied hammerblows as priceless bloodoak timber was fashioned and worked, and fitted into place.

  ‘How will this battle be different?’ Imbix Hoth sneered, his features twisted into an unpleasant leer as he pointed towards the great sky cradles in the distance with his long, cruel finger-spikes. ‘Let me tell you …’

  A short while later, the magnificent curved stairway was full of clamour and uproar as the high-hatted leagues-masters clattered down its steps, chattering excitedly.

  ‘Plunder for all!’ babbled Ellerex Earthclay, the young Master of the League of Melders and Moulders. ‘The sky pirate armada to be split up between the leagues!’

  ‘We’ll smash a few,’ laughed Rustus Xintax, a wizened master of a minor barrel and cask-making league. ‘But th
e rest’ll surrender. I’ve my eye on the Fogscythe. Make a perfect slave-rider!’ He chuckled nastily.

  ‘There’ll be plenty to go round!’ laughed his companion as they joined the high-hatted throng spilling through the great door of the Leagues Palace, down the statue-lined steps and off towards the bustling boom-docks.

  From the doorway, Ruptus Pentephraxis and Imbix Hoth watched them go, looks of sly satisfaction on their faces.

  ‘Stupid, greedy fools,’ sneered Imbix, with a thin smile. ‘Once the sky pirates are crushed …’

  ‘We shall take the sky pirate armada for ourselves, dear Imbix,’ growled Pentephraxis. ‘And then our plans can really grow.’

  Imbix followed the brutish leaguesmaster’s gaze upwards towards the great floating city of Sanctaphrax, and stifled a high-pitched giggle.

  ‘Indeed, Ruptus, and I look forward to that,’ he said. He turned. ‘Now, if you’ll excuse me, I must gather my hatch-lings and prepare for our voyage … Brummel, my hat!’

  Imbix’s hat-tipper raised his staff and steadied the leaguesmaster’s hat as he hurried down the steps after him. Ruptus remained for a moment staring up at the floating city, a faraway look in his eye, before a hand on his shoulder brought him back down to earth.

  ‘Father!’ came a gruff voice. ‘There’s someone I’d like you to meet.’

  Ruptus turned to see his son, Ulbus - stocky, thin-lipped and hard-eyed - staring back at him. The lad was as brutal and cruel as his father but sadly lacked both his tactical brilliance and driving ambition.

  ‘What do you want, Ulbus?’ Ruptus snarled. ‘The fleet’s about to set sail.’

  ‘Come with me, Father,’ said Ulbus, eager as always to win his father’s approval, ‘down to the cellars …’

  ‘The cellars?’ said Ruptus impatiently.

  ‘It’ll be worth it, I promise!’ urged Ulbus, pulling his father by the arm.

  Grumbling in his deep growling voice, Ruptus followed his son back inside the Leagues Palace and down the steps into the vast kitchen in the cellars, where brow-beaten goblin matrons scuttled away into the shadows at their approach. In a gloomy recess by the great furnace, a figure in a heavy coat -collar raised and wide-brimmed hat pulled low over his face - sat hunched on a copperwood chopping-stump.

  ‘Father,’ said Ulbus, ‘allow me to introduce Turbot Smeal…’

  Ruptus stared at the shadowy figure, then recoiled as the flickering furnace light illuminated a hideous, pitted face - deep sunken eye-sockets and glinting fangs. As if aware of his disfigurement, the figure looked down, pulling his coat collar up further and hunching his shoulders.

  ‘Torcher of the Western Quays!’ Ruptus growled. ‘What brings you back to Undertown after so many years? The smell of burning taverns?’

  Turbot Smeal shook his head, reached into his greatcoat and drew out a blood-stained bicorne hat. He threw it at Ruptus’s feet. The High Master bent down and picked it up.

  ‘Wind Jackal’s hat,’ he murmured, turning it over in his great gauntleted hands. ‘This can only mean…’

  ‘Dead!’ rasped Turbot Smeal from the shadows, his voice muffled but distinct. ‘By my hand.’

  Ruptus smiled and nodded his great scarred head.

  ‘I knew you’d be pleased, Father,’ broke in Ulbus, excitedly. ‘Turbot found me in the boom-docks, told me all about it! How he’d hunted Wind Jackal down, lured him to a sky wreck and cut him down! He’s heard of the purge and the leagues fleet, and he wants to sail with us, Father…’

  Ruptus raised his hand to silence his son, and turned to Smeal.

  ‘Turbot Smeal, traitor, fire-starter and assassin…’ he growled, his one good eye glinting in the furnace light. ‘Most hated and reviled individual in all of Undertown…’ Ruptus paused, then laughed unpleasantly. ‘I like your style. Tell me, what price do you put on your services?’

  The hunched figure rose, and once more shot a look of hideous disfigurement towards the High Master in the flickering light.

  ‘The Galerider,’ he rasped.

  ‘The gloamglozer rock!’ shouted Spillins from the cater-nest, as the sinister-shaped landmark came into view. ‘Two hundred strides, and closing …’

  The winds howled across the Edgeland pavement as the Galerider plunged into swirling cloud so thick that, for a moment, everything disappeared from view. At the helm, the young sky pirate captain swallowed anxiously.

  ‘Father, watch over and protect me,’ he muttered under his breath. ‘Protect us all…’

  Quint let his fingers play over the flight-levers. He brought in the sails slightly so that they wouldn’t become saturated. He raised the prow-weights and lowered those at the stern - all just as Wind Jackal had taught him. This was his first time without his father that he was attempting to enter Wilderness Lair on his own.

  What if he judged it wrongly and the Galerider hit the looming gloamglozer rock that rose up from the very edge? Or worse, what if he set too much sail and the howling winds drove them far out beyond the edge and off to a point of no return?

  Quint swallowed again. He was Captain Cloud Wolf now, young sky pirate captain of the Galerider, and his crew were depending on him. There was Hubble the banderbear, his new bodyguard, standing behind him -massive, yet still only half grown. Maris, quartermistress and ship’s doctor, wise beyond her years, and faithful old Spillins, ship’s elder, on constant watch above. Good old Duggin, now a deckhand and second-mate to young Tem Barkwater, the harpooneer. The Stone Pilot, behind her hood, was as inscrutable as ever, but now fully recovered, the most dependable member of the crew. And then there were the three new recruits …

  Quint smiled and his heart leaped. Stope, Raffix and Phin. The Winter Knights!

  When Quint had delivered the consignment of blood-oak timber to the sky-shipyard, honouring his father’s contract, the sinister yardmaster, Thelvis Hollrig, had let slip that a purge of sky pirates was about to begin and that they should get out of town. Quint hadn’t needed telling twice. He’d taken the Galerider - light now without its great load - up into the sky as the first tavern fires had begun.

  Hollrig, counting out a fortune in gold, had gleefully mentioned the great leagues fleet gathering in the boom-docks, and Quint knew he had to warn the sky pirates fleeing to Wilderness Lair of its approach. It would be a hard, tiring flight out to the Edgelands, and the Galerider‘s depleted crew would not be enough …

  There was only one place to go.

  Quint had flown up to the floating city and sought the help of his old comrades at the Knights Academy. Stope, master forge-hand, dropped his tools at once and came running. He would man the aft-deck and grappling-hooks. Phin, the academic-at-arms, left the Academy Barracks and took up his position beside Tem at the harpoon, with the great crossbow and fore-deck hooks now under his control. Then there was Raffix - proud young knight academic - as Quint’s second-in-command, ready to take the helm or lead a boarding-party as the occasion demanded.

  The three of them had come gladly and without so much as a backward glance, delighted to help an old comrade in his hour of need - even though Quint knew how much the great floating rock meant to them. He swallowed hard again as the clouds thinned. Whatever lay ahead, he was determined not to let any of them down. He would get the Winter Knights safely back to Sanctaphrax once this voyage was over.

  ‘Father, protect us all,’ he murmured again, fingering the blackwood amulet which hung around his neck.

  ‘Wilderness Lair, thirty degrees to port!’ Spillins shouted down from the caternest as the clouds continued to thin, the closer the Galerider got to the very edge.

  Quint stared down at the scene below him as he brought the Galerider round in a sharp curve to port, his heart singing. It occurred to him that, with the exception of Spillins, he was the only one on board who had seen the sight of Wilderness Lair before - and what a sight it was!

  Far beneath, where the rock cliff dropped away into nothing, was a great gathering of sky pirate ships. There we
re already over two hundred there, with more latecomers emerging from the boiling clouds. Some had already moored, attaching themselves to the great steel eyelets that had been sunk into the rock. Others were coming in to land, making pinpoint adjustments to their sails and hull-weights as they battled with the unpredictable winds and air currents that threatened at any moment to dash them against the rock face. Inching closer by degrees, they would nuzzle up close to the rock and lower themselves into any gaps in the great flotilla.

  ‘Easy does it!’ Spillins shouted down as Quint brought his own vessel down close to the others. ‘Starboard a touch. That’s it. A little more …’ His voice was soft, encouraging. ‘Right, now hard to port and down.’

  Both Quint at the helm and the Stone Pilot at the flight-rock platform reacted to his sudden command. Quint shoved three of the flight-levers forward, lowering all the port-hull-weights, while the Stone Pilot gave the rock a sudden blast of heat from the burners.

  ‘Down, down …’ Spillins coaxed. ‘Lovely job. Mooring-ring directly in front,’ he called out.

  But Quint shook his head. His father had never used mooring-rings that were already in place in the rock face. It was too much of a risk, he’d always said. The spikes could have rusted beneath the surface; the hot and cold of night and day might have shattered the slabs of rock which, if untested, were likely to break off at any moment and hurtle down into the void - taking any hapless sky pirate ship with it.

  Save a minute and lose a life. The words Quint had heard Wind Jackal say so many times now echoed round his head.

  ‘Tem! Duggin!’ he called. ‘Fire the fasting-spikes!’

  The pair of them primed and fired the crossbows, shooting long, sharp metal spikes at the wall of rock up above them. With a grinding thud, they both sank into the craggy overhang.

  ‘Launch the grappling-hooks!’ shouted Quint.

  With pinpoint precision, the two sky pirates sent the grappling-irons soaring off into the air, where they caught hold of the rings at the end of the fasting-spikes. Then, with the pair of them tugging the tolley-ropes, they pulled the hovering sky pirate ship in, until the prow was snug against the jutting rock.