Dragonfang

by Paul Collins

  Chapter 18

  THE VOYAGE HOME

  A day out from Mordicar, Captain Porterby, in an uncharacteristic display of authority, sent for Jelindel. When she knocked on his door, it was Zimak who opened it and beckoned her in. He took a quick look down the companionway before closing the door.

  ‘Jaelin,’ Captain Porterby said gravely. ‘It appears all is not what it seems.’

  Jelindel looked fleetingly at Daretor and Zimak. How much had they told him? After her own deceit, she could hardly expect them to be loyal, yet … Testing her heightened senses, she knew at once that Daretor had the situation under control. Zimak was giving off frustration mingled with anger and excitement, while the captain was simply confused and saddened.

  ‘The lads have told me most of the story,’ Captain Porterby continued in the same grave manner, ‘and I must say I find it all very hard to believe.’ He paused. ‘And disappointing, Jaelin. If half of it is true, very disappointing.’

  Jelindel’s hopes soared. He was still calling her Jaelin, which meant Daretor and Zimak hadn’t given everything away.

  ‘I suppose there are the pentacle gems,’ she said, smiling in Zimak’s direction.

  ‘So you had them all along,’ the captain said. ‘That Zarian Senior Constable –’

  ‘Was right and wrong,’ Jelindel interrupted. ‘I didn’t obtain any pentacle gems until we reached Hazaria, and I didn’t steal them, either. We already had one on board. I suspect that Hargav and Larachel were the culprits back in Zaria.’

  ‘Hargav,’ the captain spluttered. ‘He’s a boy.’

  ‘And a crafty one at that,’ Jelindel said. ‘I was at the library that night, true, but I believe there were also two thieves present. One stole The Book of Alchemorum, the other a pentacle gem. Since we have only two likely suspects on board, the thieves are most likely to be Hargav and Larachel.’

  ‘Are you suggesting that they’re in league?’ Captain Porterby shook his head. ‘This is all very irregular, I must say.’

  ‘It seems highly probable,’ Jelindel conceded.

  ‘But to what end, may I ask?’

  ‘I’m not sure of Larachel’s motives, but I suspect Hargav needed the pentacle gem to trade for his father.’

  ‘And where did you say you “found” yours?’ the captain queried.

  ‘I didn’t.’ Jelindel turned to Daretor and Zimak. ‘That part of the story is personal. However, the pentacle gems have to be returned to a certain lady.’

  ‘Hmm,’ the captain mumbled. ‘What about the Preceptor? What was his part in all this?’

  Jelindel shrugged. ‘One can only assume he is after the pentacle gems.’

  ‘To what end? Talk sense.’

  ‘For absolute power – why ever else?’ Jelindel said, bemused by the captain’s confusion. ‘A ringstone powered by five pentacle gems allows travel between paraworlds.’ Before the captain could interrupt, she said, ‘Don’t even ask, Captain. Suffice to say there are other worlds within the space we occupy, and High Adepts can travel between them. But the technique is difficult and imprecise. With D’rudar’s engine, destinations can be pre-ordained, eliminating the risk of winding up in hostile lands.’

  ‘Like we did,’ Zimak said.

  ‘Indeed,’ Jelindel said, almost apologetically. ‘The Duke knew how to operate the ringstone engine. The Preceptor merely went along with him, but he had no intention of leaving without all the gems. This would explain why he had such a large guard with him. Either way, the Duke was going to fall – it was simply a matter of when.’

  ‘And just why would the Preceptor go to so much trouble to travel between these … worlds?’

  ‘To bring back armies, Captain,’ Jelindel said. ‘His resources are stretched.’ She stepped over to the captain’s chart board. With her index finger she traced out the Preceptor’s expanding territories. ‘The eastern and southern states are all that’s left, according to recent estimations. If he spreads himself any thinner, he’ll expose his flank and that will be the end of his empire. He needs new recruits.’

  The captain sat back in his chair, clearly still confused. ‘And why would anyone from another world fight for someone here?’

  ‘For the same reason as anyone else. Money, plunder, slaves.’ She turned to Zimak. ‘Tell me that you couldn’t have brought back an army on the promise of riches.’

  ‘I never got the chance,’ Zimak fumed.

  ‘Point taken,’ Jelindel said. ‘Gathering armies would have been easy. How the Preceptor expected to contain them once he conquered Q’zar is another matter, but not one that obviously concerned him.’

  Captain Porterby slapped the table with the flat of his hands. ‘Really, Jaelin, this is all too much. We have a fortune on board that we can’t spend, because there is no safe anchorage or harbour. The states the Preceptor hasn’t conquered yet are probably so full of his damnable spies that we’d be dead within an hour of stepping ashore. I have Hargav and Larachel, two devious characters who, by all accounts, have set us on a course to destruction. And we have the Preceptor and his Adept 12 scouring the seas for us.’

  ‘There is however a bright side,’ Jelindel said.

  ‘And what might that be?’ he queried.

  ‘We have the fastest vessel on the sea and more than a full crew, five pentacle gems that will ensure that no ship will sink us for fear of losing them, and some of the finest fighters on the continent.’ She eyed Daretor. ‘And let’s not forget a chest full of gold oriels.’

  Captain Porterby dismissed them and poured himself a brandy with an unsteady hand. His early retirement suddenly looked highly unlikely, or at very best, distant.

  Of all the reactions Jelindel might have expected from Hargav’s father, sullen annoyance had to be rather close to the bottom of the list. The man was courteous to everyone, yet he seemed to avoid his son, and when they did speak, Hargav could do nothing right.

  Jelindel tried her best to help, mentioning Hargav’s bravery and his quick uptake of seafaring as a career, but it did little good. If anything, it seemed to make matters worse. She thought about it for a while. By all indications the family was an old and noble one. Hargav was Augerin’s only son and destined to be the heir to his title. Yet here he was, enjoying the life of a common sailor.

  Not having a family, and not even being a boy, made it a little hard for Jelindel to be an effective counsellor in such matters. But she decided to make an attempt, anyway. She approached Hargav one morning when he was splicing rope on the foredeck.

  ‘I suppose your father will want you to give up the seafaring life,’ said Jelindel. She sat beside Hargav and picked up a rope end to unravel.

  ‘You do not have to be very bright to see that,’ replied Hargav.

  ‘Have you been arguing?’

  ‘Quite a lot. Has it been so obvious? We did keep our voices down.’

  ‘I … keep my eyes and ears open. It keeps me alive.’

  ‘You – you mean you listened in on us?’ gasped Hargav.

  ‘Not deliberately, but you might have raised your voices more than you intended, and I make it my business to sound out trouble before it gets out of hand.’

  ‘What did you hear?’

  An interesting situation, thought Jelindel. The boy obviously thought she knew more than she did. If she strung him along, she might learn quite a lot.

  ‘All the usual things that are said in such a situation,’ improvised Jelindel. ‘You are a disgrace to the family, he will never live it down, he did not need rescuing – that sort of thing.’

  ‘Ah, Jelindel, I suspect you are being discreet by not mentioning all the names that he also called me,’ Hargav sighed. ‘But, please, can you do me a little favour for the rest of the voyage?’

  ‘Anything, just ask. I would be glad to speak to your father again if –’

  ‘No. No, not that. Anyway, he would not listen. But please, when we are alone, and out of earshot of others, do call me Hargrellien.’

&
nbsp; Hargrellien. A girl’s name. The bottom promptly fell out of Jelindel’s stomach. She opened her mouth, and began to draw a breath to say ‘Oh, that’s nice,’ then decided that those three words were not at all appropriate to the moment.

  ‘And Jaelin, when I told father that I love you, I really did mean it. It breaks my heart that you had to hear the words in an argument between me and my father, but I assure you they were spoken with all possible tenderness.’

  I’ve died and gone to hell, was Jelindel’s initial thought. The words would never do, of course, so there remained the matter of what to say and how to say it.

  ‘Er … when did you, that is, realise?’

  ‘Oh, right from our first meeting. You are a true gentleman. None of the men on the ship even approaches you for gallantry, refinement, bravery and courtesy. Were I really a boy, I would want to be exactly like you.’

  Were you a boy you might find that a rather extreme length to go to, thought Jelindel.

  ‘Look … this has come as something of a shock to me,’ she admitted. ‘And, and, and I am going to have to say something that you probably don’t want to hear, but –’

  ‘Oh, I know you probably don’t love me yet, silly. That is because you have been thinking of me as a boy, but all that is past. When we are alone, and away from prying eyes, I shall take you in my arms and press you against the softness beneath my shirt. You will be truly surprised by what you feel.’

  ‘Not half as surprised as you will be,’ sighed Jelindel. ‘My real name is Jelindel, and there are breasts under my shirt, too.’

  Jelindel gained some respite from the fact that it was now Hargrellien who was dumbfounded. They continued splicing ropes.

  The minutes passed, then became an hour. Jelindel looked into the splicing basket and found that it was empty. ‘Well, at least this clarifies things between us,’ she said.

  ‘One might say that,’ muttered Hargrellien, coiling up her last length of tarry rope. ‘I should have known you were too good to be true.’

  ‘Hargrellien. That’s a pretty name.’

  ‘Fat lot of good it does me now.’

  ‘Well, you won Annatel’s heart. How do you think she will feel when she finds out?’

  ‘Can’t see what she saw in me,’ muttered Hargrellien, standing up and shrugging.

  ‘Perhaps it was a young gentleman, a little shy and vulnerable, but full of gallantry, refinement, bravery and courtesy.’

  ‘You are mocking me.’

  ‘Never. We are lucky girls, Hargrellien. We have the opportunity to see men looking at women, yet talking to us as other men. It gives one a rather brutal, but honest view of what they really think. Most of the time it is rather depressing, but just occasionally you see someone who really is gallant, refined, brave and courteous.’

  ‘How often?’

  ‘Well, I never have, I suppose, but I have met a man who was three out of four – and well, let’s face it, refined people can be so boring.’

  ‘So what now?’ asked Hargrellien.

  ‘We could always go down to my cabin, open a bottle of wine, and give the crew a rating for gallantry, refinement, bravery and courtesy.’

  ‘Only if I can put my father on the list,’ said Hargrellien.

  Chapter 19

  DRAGON VERSUS DRAGON

  The dragon attack came near Centravian, just off the coast. In all the history of naval warfare, there had never been such a strange attack on a ship, and this was in spite of some very strange battles. Jelindel had been asleep at the time, and Hargrellien came looking for her, shouting that a dragon was attacking the ship.

  Jelindel arrived on deck in time to see an enormous pair of wings holding up a small shed come sweeping over the Dragonfang. Something small, dark and trailing smoke dropped, hit the foremast and erupted into a blast of flame. Most of the burning oil and fragments of jar fell into the sea, but it was clear what the flying thing was trying to do.

  ‘A dragon, crapping fire turds!’ Captain Porterby exclaimed.

  Jelindel noted that the steersman was not making any effort to evade the attacks. This was because he had abandoned the wheel on the quarterdeck, and vanished down a hatchway. On the other hand, the flying shed was at least ten times faster than the Dragonfang, so evasion was not much of an option. Daretor appeared with the steersman, holding a knife point against the man’s back.

  ‘Is this man meant to be doing anything important?’ asked Daretor.

  ‘Get him back to his post on the quarterdeck,’ said the captain. ‘We will steer for the shallows, run the ship aground, then wade to shore and run.’

  ‘Straight into the arms of the Preceptor’s army,’ said Augerin, pointing, ‘See on the beach.’

  ‘Well better that than being burned or drowned out here,’ said the captain. ‘What is that thing?’

  ‘Something of Fa’red’s making, I think,’ Jelindel said. ‘It’s a sort of ship of the air, and rather than a catapult to throw firepots, it just drops them as it flies over the target,’ she concluded.

  ‘If it is a ship, it can be fought,’ said Daretor, ‘and we have a catapult. Captain, turn out the crewmen who wind the catapult and prime the firepots. I say we fight.’

  ‘You say we fight?’ demanded Porterby. ‘I’m the captain.’

  ‘Would you like a mutiny?’ retorted Daretor. ‘I’m willing to provide one. All those who want to jump ship in the two longboats and make for the shore, go! Your fate will be the same as if we surrendered the ship.’

  It did not take Captain Porterby long to realise that he had a problem. He had presided over quite a few surrenders, and had escaped more attacks than any other captain afloat. But here he was being offered a chance to lead his men in surrender while others made an attempt to escape. Escape was preferable to surrender, nobody could argue with that.

  The captain decided to go for a diplomatic solution.

  ‘Yours is not the only way to flee,’ he declared, grandly. ‘All right then, we fight, but I want six men standing by each longboat, dousing the timbers to keep them wet and standing ready to launch them if the ship is hit and set afire.

  ‘Catapult crewmen, place yourself under Daretor’s command. Steersman, do the same. Go ahead, young man, show us what you can do.’

  The airliner was flying at the Dragonfang at right angles when it made its attacks from a shallow dive. It was trying to start a fire on the vessel’s deck and rigging. A hit to the hull could easily be extinguished before it burned through the thick wood. As the airliner approached again, it was flying slowly, trying to get a good, steady aim. Daretor aimed the catapult directly at the front window as the thing approached, then realised that he had no idea of its true size. He could not aim accurately because he could not gauge distance. Deciding that any shot was better than no shot, he fired.

  The firepot left a thin trail of smoke as it arced through the air, making it visible to whoever was flying the thing. The same individual also panicked, banking so steeply across the bow that the starboard wingtip splashed the waves briefly. No firepot was dropped, either. The Dragonfang’s crew cheered heartily. The airliner now circled the ship several times, keeping a distance. It seemed that the steersman was reluctant to take any damage.

  ‘It’s as I thought,’ Daretor explained to Jelindel. She was stationed near him with a bucket and wet beating cloth. ‘A wolf can have a leg injured in a fight and still limp away on the other three, but hurt either one of an eagle’s wings and it can’t fly.’

  ‘An eagle is more frail than a wolf, too,’ agreed Jelindel. ‘Should I tell some of the sailors to get crossbows?’

  ‘No, no, as soon as that thing hits us, I want everyone ready with buckets and beaters. Sooner or later it will strike us, and I want us to survive those firepots.’

  At last the airliner broke off its circling and came at the Dragonfang in a long, shallow dive. This time it came in diagonally, so that the ratlines of the mainmast were in the line of fire of the catapult. It
dropped its firepot too late to hit the decks, but by sheer chance the pot of oil, pitch and sulphur hit the foremast and burst into a long tongue of flame. Most of it went into the sea, but splashes of the mixture set the spars, sails and even the top of the foremast alight. The sailors seemed almost relieved to have a threat that they could actually fight. They swarmed up the foremast’s ratlines and into the rigging with their buckets and beaters, ready to fight the flames.

  Daretor watched as the airliner circled, assessing what it had done. Were I the steersman in that thing, I would do that again, but drop the pot earlier, thought Daretor. The airliner broke off and came in again at the same trajectory.

  ‘Quickly, help me turn the catapult!’ he shouted as the winged shape loomed larger and larger on the starboard side.

  ‘But it’s coming in from starboard,’ said the ratchet winder, who began to turn the weapon anyway.

  ‘I know that,’ replied Daretor, ‘but there are no ratlines in the way if we shoot at it after it has passed over us.’

  The next firepot was dropped high and early. Almost as soon as he caught sight of its trail through the air, Daretor knew that they had the range right this time. He forced himself to ignore the firepot and kept his eye on the airliner. It had begun to flap slowly, but was still flying in a straight line. It passed over the Dragonfang just as the firepot smashed on the starboard foredeck railing, smearing flames across the foredeck’s planking.

  Daretor fired. The firepot soared up, then struck the airliner squarely in the large, down-covered backside, just below the tail feathers. Even though it was a soft target, it was sufficiently firm to burst the firepot.