The Ancient Ones (The Legacy Trilogy Book 3)

by Michael Foster

‘Don’t start!’ Orrell blared. ‘My love has become a maddened witch. I tied her down myself. She would chew my ear off if I dared near her. Given the chance she would stab me in the back and dance on my corpse. She would do anything to get out of that room—believe me! She’s tried already.’

  ‘She did?’

  ‘I went to her in secret,’ Orrell admitted. ‘She said such lovely things, everything I wanted to hear ...’

  ‘I understand,’ Leopold told him. ‘But just think how terrible it must be for Jessicah to be forced to do those things—to hurt the one she loves in return.’

  ‘I thought of freeing her,’ Orrell revealed, almost a whisper. ‘I took out my knife and put it to her throat, and she laughed and begged me to do it. I beat her, Leopold, oh how I beat her, trying to compel the witch out of her, but she only thanked me as I struck. Jessicah forgave me even as I pummelled her, while the witch cackled with glee inside. Only my men stopped me, Leopold, or I might have killed her. Do you understand what I say? If not for them I might have killed her!’

  ‘But you did not, Captain, and what you did is understandable, although regrettable. There is still hope for her. You can never give up on that.’

  As the captain stared at Leopold, some spark of insight teetered on the edge of his awareness. ‘I—,’ he had just begun to say, when a boom sounded from below and the ship shivered.

  Leopold stumbled on his plate as he regained his balance, smashing it under his boot.

  Orrell glared around, searching for the source. ‘What by the nine was that?’

  Men everywhere were on their feet with alarm. Another, much louder explosion sounded, shaking the timbers under their feet and causing the Farstride to moan as she listed, in her huge, unhurried way.

  ‘Gods!’ someone yelled from along the deck. ‘It’s the black powder!’

  Panic erupted, dinners thrown aside and trampled as everyone rushed to their stations.

  Smoke poured from one of the deck hatches. A figure stumbled out, waving his arms to breathe. ‘Fire in the hold!’ he bellowed through his coughing.

  ‘Get the buckets, get below!’ Mister Chapman was shouting. ‘See to it before we’re all blown to smithers!’

  More men came choking and staggering from the passage. ‘It’s too thick. Everything’s ablaze!’ cried one.

  ‘Try the other hatches!’ Orrell called down and Mister Chapman nodded in reply, setting his men scurrying as directed.

  Leopold went to move, but was startled when he realised Samuel was right beside him.

  ‘Poltamir’s work?’ Captain Orrell asked of the magician. The threat of danger seemed to have shaken much of the grog from his mind, yet he remained unsteady on his feet.

  ‘Perhaps.’

  ‘Those fires will be hell to contain, Samuel,’ Orrell stated. ‘The black powder is spread out, but even one store going up could spell disaster for the ship. Can you help us?’

  Another hollow thumping passed through their feet and a muffled boom accompanied it.

  ‘That was from the forward store,’ the captain noted with distress. ‘One fire cannot have spread so quickly. Someone is trying to kill us.’

  Samuel vaulted down to the main deck and disappeared into the nearest billowing hatch in one movement, even as more men came hurrying out, blackened and gasping for air.

  ‘Fire!’ came a distant yell from the front of the ship. ‘Fire on the starboard side!’

  ‘There, too?’ Orrell asked. ‘Leopold, our end may have come to find us early. Stay here. Remain out of danger. I will see what I can do.’ With that, he hurried down the stairs to join Captain Merryweather, Mister Chapman beside him, talking animatedly.

  The crew rallied marvellously to battle the blazes, forming lines of buckets, filling them from the deckside pumps and passing them along, re-enacting countless drills since leaving Amandia.

  The lithe form of Kali bounded up the stairs. ‘What is happening?’ she asked of Leopold.

  ‘There are fires below decks,’ he answered. ‘Some black powder has exploded.’ He scanned the ship with concern. ‘Where’s Toby?’

  ‘I haven’t seen him,’ the Koian woman admitted.

  The next explosion sent them stumbling into the railing, and the Farstride rolled heavily, her timbers howling with strain. Smoke streamed from the side of the fo’c’sle, halfway to the waterline. A gaping hole marked the side of the ship and flames were licking out, blooming and flickering as they met the fresh night air.

  ‘We have to find him,’ Leopold declared worriedly. ‘He won’t know what to do.’

  He started quickly away with Kali close behind. His body busied itself in the search, yet his mind was distracted, obsessing with the possibility that this would be the death of her, that Kali would perish aboard the ship, crushed by timbers or burned by fire as they hunted for the boy.

  Keep it out of your mind, he commanded himself. Nothing is inevitable. Everything can be changed. Damn the magician to hell!

  They ran down the stairs and hurried to Leopold’s cabin. The smell of smoke was intense. Kicking open the door, Kali sprang in first. Leopold followed, lurching to a halt inside the empty room.

  ‘Where could he be?’ Kali asked.

  Leopold scoured his brain, then it came to him. ‘I think I know.’

  They hurried again, past frantic crewmen, finding the stairs up to the third level and rushing along the halls. Smoke was thick, clogging the air, curling and gathering—a sentient creature prowling the ceilings. Flames ascended the air chutes, invaded the recesses in the walls. Spot fires erupted sporadically all over the ship with no apparent cause, and the crew fought back desperately, leaping to action at each discovery.

  Leopold and Kali sped along the passages, pushing past men with buckets, towards the magician’s quarters. The corridor lay empty, Jessicah’s guards unseen and the sight prompted Leopold to think of her. Surely the guards’ absence meant she was already taken to safety; he threw open the door to be sure. Thankfully, the bed was empty.

  Smoke was issuing from under Samuel’s door and when they opened it, they found the room ablaze, full of black smoke and licking, yellow flames. Toby was beside the casket, staring at it intently as he sputtered and coughed, ignorant to the blaze around him. A pile of objects was stacked in the corner, alien to the room, a dozen squat barrels, painted red and black. Flames lapped around them, the wood already alight. Leopold’s mind fumbled the pieces together: barrels, black powder, fire ... boom.

  ‘Quickly!’ Leopold cried. ‘Get him out!’

  Kali was past him and carrying the boy in a flash. Leopold’s thoughts were of extinguishing the fire and saving the ship. He thought feverishly to construct a solution. After dancing about pointlessly, he realised it was futile. The heat was too much.

  He turned instead to the casket. Mindful of an imminent explosion, he strained against the heavy vessel, unable to move it even the slightest. Again he heaved, now running behind it to push.

  ‘What are you doing?’ Kali shouted at him from the doorway, now free of Toby.

  ‘We need to save it. Salu is inside.’ He shoved at it again without result, forced to admit it was too heavy to move alone. ‘Help me!’

  She came to his side, but placed her hands on Leopold’s and gently prised them away. ‘Leave it.’

  ‘We can’t!’

  ‘There’s no time, but we can save the old man.’ Opening the latches, she reached in and dragged Salu out. He was tranquil, as if sleeping, but Leopold knew Salu was gone. Only his vacant shell remained.

  Kali carried him from the room, hung over her shoulder, and Leopold trailed closely behind.

  ‘Run!’ she shouted.

  They broke into open air as the black powder ignited and Leopold’s ears were hammered in by the blast. A boiling kettle was whistling in his head and he only realised he was lying on the balcony decking when Kali began slapping his face.

  ‘Get up!’ she told him, and Leopold struggled to his feet, shak
ing the blackness from the edge of his vision, willing the whining from his ears.

  Another muffled boom sounded and the Farstride lurched. There she stayed, hunched over like a wounded old woman, moaning as the fire chewed away at her innards, gutting her.

  ‘Out the way!’ cried a crewman, rushing by.

  Toby was on the main deck, pointing with mirth at the flames now playing in the masts. The soldier Ferl was with him, keeping him firmly in hand. The roof above Samuel’s cabin was splintered upwards and folded out like countless broken twigs, and half the top deck was gone with it. Flames billowed out the hole, twisting and lapping at the night sky. Streams of brilliant red sparks flew towards the stars, churning furiously with the rising heat.

  Samuel was with the command staff, watching Kali and Leopold’s approach with concern. He took Salu’s body from Kali and, ‘Put him in that boat,’ he told a nearby soldier, who struggled to take the load. ‘The boy, too,’ he demanded, glaring at Ferl.

  ‘Samuel, your casket is lost,’ Leopold stated, the brilliant glow of the fire on his face, its heat on his skin.

  ‘I know,’ the magician responded, looking none too happy about it, scowling as he observed the burning ship.

  ‘We’ve been sabotaged,’ Captain Merryweather declared. ‘The hull is breached and we’re taking on water. Someone has spread black powder all around the ship and set it afire. It’s blowing us to pieces.’ As if to illustrate his words, a good section of the fo’c’sle exploded into the air, sounding thunder and showering them with debris.

  ‘How ridiculous,’ Leopold heard himself say as the rain of wood and matter fell around them, ‘that a boat can burn when it is surrounded by water.’

  ‘I cannot be everywhere at once to put out the fires,’ Samuel declared angrily, ‘and the hull is perforated all over. And given Poltamir holds our anchors, I cannot lift the damned ship to stop it sinking.’

  ‘Then sever the bloody anchors!’ Daneel fumed.

  ‘Very well,’ the angered magician agreed. He leapt up onto the side railing and cast his gaze along the side of the ship, where it fell upon the first great length of steel links. He flicked a finger and there was a hellish clatter as one ring of metal was cut cleanly in two. The seaward half of the chain vanished into the depths, the remaining half flew upwards with surprising force, smashing through its housing and wrapping itself around half the deck, destroying everything beneath it. The boat rocked with the suddenly released tension.

  ‘Cut the other!’ Daneel called.

  ‘I will have to take more care or it will tip the boat,’ Samuel shouted in reply. ‘Whatever holds us from below is pulling tighter in response.’

  It was during his closing words that a sinuous black shadow rose from the water behind him. Men yelled and pointed, before it slapped down and grabbed the deck in a tight embrace, forcing the magician to dart aside. It was as thick as a man is tall and covered in pulsating sucking parts, squelching as they grabbed the timber and held firm.

  ‘What is that?’ Captain Merryweather asked, incredulous at the sight, his voice tight with dismay.

  ‘Whatever was holding us,’ Samuel sounded back. He gestured again with the back of his hand and the enormous tentacle sliced neatly in two, leaving the fallen end curling up into a spiral on the deck. The remainder withdrew into the sea, spewing black fluid from its severed stump.

  The fires grew and men worked tirelessly at their losing battle.

  ‘Samuel!’ Captain Orrell declared. ‘The ship is burning!’

  ‘I cannot do ten things at once!’

  ‘Then do something right!’ the man declared.

  The boat lurched again and everyone fell to their faces as the ship listed sharply in the opposite direction to before.

  Three more tentacles snaked out of the sea and commenced entwining themselves around the masts. With one snap, one of the structures broke free, pulled beneath the water. Another snakelike arm wrapped around the hull and squeezed, snapping timbers and sending pieces exploding away into the sea.

  ‘Captain, get your men off the ship,’ the magician ordered, landing lightly beside them.

  Merryweather was shocked. ‘And go where, Lord Samuel? Into the sea with that thing?’

  ‘I don’t see we have much choice. Launch the shore boats. The men must take their chances.’

  Reality took its time dawning on him. ‘Mister Chapman!’ Merryweather bellowed, taking a half step from the group. ‘Abandon ship!’

  The distant figure of Mister Chapman paused in the act of passing a water-filled bucket. He digested the command, as did most of the crew on deck who had heard, then the bosun dropped his load and shouted himself hoarse repeating the order.

  ‘Abandon ship!’ he boomed. ‘Ready the boats! Clear the decks! Pass the word! No one gets left behind!’

  Men set to work, readying the longboats and smaller cockboats over the side. Many looked as if they thought the command was long overdue, for the Farstride was in full flames, burning in every direction, more timber afire than not.

  A dozen appendages of various sizes latched onto the deck, intent on tearing strips from it, grabbing crewmen that ventured too near, squeezing them to a screaming death. Samuel set his spells against them, vaulting through the air.

  Men fought their way into the escape boats, scrambling past the dual threat of fire and beast. For every tentacle that Samuel destroyed, three more came crawling from beneath the waves.

  One thick, coiling arm snaked its way out of a hatchway and Samuel sliced it down the middle with nothing but a scathing glance. It thrashed, retracting itself back from view.

  Again the ship tilted abruptly, throwing many from their legs. Leopold reached out for something to hold onto, and found the nearest fixed object unexpectedly out of reach. His feet jigged beneath him, unable to stop him from toppling back. He watched helplessly as the others receded, and he slid away and over the side of the deck.

  ‘No you don’t!’ sounded an insistent cry, and Leopold jolted to a halt, his arm nearly snapping from the shoulder. Something—someone—had him by the hand: Daneel. The man was lying flat on his chest, reaching over the side of the ship and clutching onto Leopold’s wrist. ‘Get back up here,’ he gasped. With an arduous heave he pulled Leopold up until the Emperor could grasp the railing with his other hand and clamber back onto his feet.

  ‘I—I don’t know how to thank you,’ Leopold stammered, getting over the shock.

  ‘Then don’t,’ the one-eyed man declared darkly, no time for small talk.

  ‘Leopold, where is Jessicah?’ Samuel asked, landing beside them, no hint in his voice that he had witnessed the Emperor’s near demise.

  Leopold glanced at everyone, wondering why they were looking at him. ‘I don’t know,’ he admitted. ‘I thought one of you had her.’

  ‘Gods!’ Captain Orrell swore.

  ‘I have not seen her guards,’ reported Daneel steadfastly, ‘but they could be anywhere, busy fighting the fire.’

  Samuel looked set to explode with anger.

  ‘Don’t you know where she is?’ Daneel asked him.

  ‘I cannot feel her,’ he replied. ‘Which means that somehow, and for some reason, she is hiding or being hidden.’

  ‘Poltamir!’ Leopold gasped. ‘This is a diversion to steal her away.’

  ‘Possibly,’ Samuel responded, ‘or she could have done it herself.’

  ‘Are you saying Jessicah may have sabotaged us?’ Captain Orrell asked, flustered.

  ‘No, Captain,’ Samuel replied. ‘I would expect it from Rei, but Jessicah would not do such a thing.’

  ‘But Rei has no power, Samuel,’ Leopold offered. ‘You took it. You said so yourself.’

  The magician looked elsewhere, lost in a sea of troubled thoughts. ‘It’s possible she found a way to use Jessicah’s power.’

  ‘Jessicah’s power?’ Leopold asked. ‘Once again I find myself asking: does everyone here but me have some incredible hidden ability? If so, ple
ase speak up now and save us the surprise.’

  ‘Enough!’ Samuel’s tone silenced Leopold immediately. ‘Everyone has some potential inside of them, Leopold, but Jessicah is something special—I am only coming to terms with that now. I don’t know how exactly, but some latent force has long been buried away inside of her, and Rei may have found a way to awaken it.’

  ‘There is nothing we can do about her now,’ Daneel said. ‘The ship is sinking. We have to save the men and look for her after.’

  Boats dropped, in controlled free-fall as much as was possible, their passengers holding on for grim death. As they hit the water, the ropes were raised and other ships were lowered. The process was not keeping ahead of the fire, so they started pushing empty boats over the edge, men diving into the sea and clambering into them, despite the threat of whatever creature lurked beneath. Islands of burning debris littered the water, illuminating the scene from all angles.

  ‘Captain, tell your men to head away from the city. If they stray too near, they will be overcome. They should hide, away in the hills, or as far as possible—anywhere they cannot fall victim to Poltamir’s call.’

  Merryweather nodded and hurried to pass the word.

  ‘Leopold. Go,’ Samuel said and he was all but dragging the Emperor into the longboat where Salu’s body was waiting. Toby was sitting patiently beside him, keenly watching the activity. Kali leapt in beside him, followed by Daneel and Captain Orrell. Once seated, the crew lowered them over the side. As they reached the water and disengaged the hooks, Samuel dropped lightly beside them.

  The tiny fleet made its way southwards, away from the city, with more boats and men dropping from the Farstride all the while. Leopold’s vessel split from the others, driven by Samuel’s magic and pointed towards the distant dome of Poltamir’s palace.

  Behind them, tentacles curled up, ever greater in size, systematically tearing strips from the Farstride, oblivious to the fire. They hurled huge pieces of timber, flying away, each chunk trailing glowing hot sparks, roaring with flame—hissing and quenched on contact with the sea.

  It was surprisingly quiet once away from the ship, with only the occasional distant pop of another cask of black powder going off, or the crack of the tentacles snapping the Farstride’s mighty ribs in two.