The Wand & the Sea

by Claire M. Caterer

  Belowdecks, Almaric was huddled low against one bunk next to the prince, who looked quite green, and Ranulf was pacing. “Have they boarded us yet?” he demanded as soon as Everett showed his face.

  “No, and don’t bother going on deck. You’ll only get in the way.”

  “If they try to board us, they will pay,” he said tightly. He had drawn Claeve-Bryna, which gleamed and sparked impatiently. “ ’Tis folly to sit here doing nothing, no matter the captain’s orders.”

  “I’ve got something that will help.” Everett threaded his way along the narrow passageway and down another level. “I saw them back here.”

  “Everett, whither goest?” Avery asked. He stood up, weaving, and then was promptly sick at Almaric’s feet.

  “Your Highness, do sit down!” Everett heard Almaric say. But then Avery’s footsteps came up behind him.

  He joined them as Everett stopped in the dark corner just short of the brig. In front of them was the barrel of gunpowder.

  “What the . . .” Ben didn’t bother to finish his sentence. The barrel spoke for itself. “How can they have this?”

  “The Sea Witch isn’t from this world,” Everett said. He was only now realizing it. “And neither is the Black Dragon. They were stolen from our world, like the crew—like Pike and Cook.”

  “What nonsense do you speak?”

  “It’s true,” Everett said to Avery. “It must be. These ships are from our world, and so’s the gunpowder. Remember? Morgan said Pike and Cook were picked up somewhere else? I’m thinking Morgan can somehow sail to our world. She took the ship from there, or someplace like it. She must’ve left the cannons and such because she didn’t know what to do with them. And this gunpowder’s just been sitting here. They must’ve forgotten about it. But look what else is still here.” He pulled aside the sacks of rice and flour to reveal the muskets.

  “What be these?” Avery asked. “Magic sticks?”

  “Magic sticks?” Ben scoffed. “Those are guns.”

  “Brown Bess muskets,” Everett explained. “They’re primitive, but they could help. The Black Dragon won’t have them.”

  “But how do you know?” Ben asked. “If that ship’s from our world too, it could have a whole load of weapons.”

  “It doesn’t. Otherwise they’d have used them by now. They’re trying to destroy us, so why hold off if they’ve got cannons? Look, here’s the charges.”

  Everett picked up the hip satchel filled with little rolls of paper.

  “What’re these for?” Ben asked, pulling one out.

  “It’s what you load the muskets with,” said Everett.

  “You know how to load a musket?”

  “It’s not hard. I’ve seen demonstrations.”

  Avery stepped forward. “Give me one of the sticks, Everett. I shall defend the Sea Witch and Her Ladyship, the both!”

  “One each,” Everett said, handing a musket to Ben and another to Avery.

  “Just hold up, use your head a second,” said Ben. The ship lurched and they all stumbled toward the brig. “We don’t know how old these things are, how they work—”

  “I do,” Everett said with confidence. He grabbed the satchel full of charges. “Now, are we helping or not?”

  Chapter 42

  * * *

  Aloft

  Holly had never felt so cold. Under the tropical sun, the wind and even the seawater should have been warm, but the winds that assailed them came from some different place. Their northern bite cut through her thin shirt, and though the crew hurled waves and ice as quickly as they could, only five of them had that ability. Now that the ships were nearly alongside each other, the men could only manipulate the sails to keep the Sea Witch from crashing broadside into the schooner.

  Holly shivered, gripping the base of the wand as tightly as she dared, for fear that some breaking wave or whirlwind would wrench it from her grasp. Her fingertips were turning blue; her legs shook beneath her. One minute she was following Morgan’s barking orders—“swell off the starboard; now one astern; send that one clear over their bow! Harder now!”—and the next she was standing stock-still, having forgotten the last several minutes. How had the foremast broken? Were there holes in the deck? Water was pouring over them from every corner. She could only hope Ben and the others were all right, but there was no time to worry about them now.

  She shook her head. She’d thought Kai was up in the crow’s nest, but the crow’s nest was in pieces, and there was Kai on the starboard side, shouting and flinging shards of ice at the schooner, which suddenly loomed within a hundred feet of the Sea Witch. And still, along the decks, Holly couldn’t quite see the Dragon’s crew; they seemed to fade into mist as she followed them, dozens of people, and yet not solid, somehow. A shrouded, inky figure, thin and towering, stood at the schooner’s helm. Holly tried to make out who it was, but an icy blast of wind and water assaulted her. She swayed at Morgan’s side.

  Jade was close at her heels, concentrating, boosting her powers with his own. His black fur was slicked against his head, making his green eyes more huge and brilliant. She glanced down at him and realized suddenly that he had been calling her name for a couple of minutes now.

  “You are tired, you must get belowdecks, my lady!” he was saying.

  “She’s not goin’ nowhere, not when there’s battle to be waged,” Morgan growled. “What’s wrong with ye? I said whitecaps astern!”

  “She cannot go on, no matter how you browbeat her,” Jade said.

  “Don’t think ye’re takin’ the coward’s way!” Morgan yanked Holly’s wand arm, and she cried out. It was so sore. Jade reared back, hissing; Holly swayed, so dazed she didn’t know which way to run. Vaguely she felt Áedán scamper up her pant leg to her shoulder, then remembered she had tucked him in a corner beneath the gunwale when she’d needed to summon the waves. She warmed for a moment beneath his touch but then staggered again. Her eyes fluttered closed, then open, and the sky turned dark, then light, then clouded with stars . . . but no it hadn’t, that was her, that was the inside of her eyelids. . . .

  She couldn’t tell if she was asleep or awake. She felt scuffling at her feet, and in a sudden burst of awareness, saw Jade sink his teeth into the captain’s ankle. Morgan bellowed and shoved Holly away from her. Holly wavered and then, with the next roll of the ship, tumbled down the steps of the poop deck. In a moment Jade was after her, leaping onto her chest, breathing into her face.

  “I’m okay, Jade. . . . I’m . . .” What was the word? She couldn’t remember it now. She was very, very cold. If she could just find someplace out of the wind and rain. How could it be raining, when the sky was so clear? She curled up on the deck, which was slick from the shards of ice that had broken around them.

  “Belowdecks,” Jade kept saying in her ear, tugging on her shirtsleeve. If only he would be quiet and let her sleep. “You will freeze here . . . Rowan, Her Ladyship needs aid. . . .”

  But Rowan had no time to help her. Holly stretched her fingers forward, trying to crawl. The slivers of ice bored into her temples now; she could barely concentrate through the pain. The deck tipped, listing nearly perpendicular to the sea, and Holly slid like a sack of flour along the planks. Someone trampled her outstretched fingers, and she thought dully how lucky it was that her wand had not broken. Then she realized Jade had it clenched between his teeth.

  On her shoulder, Áedán felt like a cold, wet lump. Could he live through so much ice? She touched him lightly, but he didn’t move. “Áedán . . .”

  “The water has weakened him,” said Jade. “Come, the hatch is just a bit farther. I shall call Ranulf to come help you.” The cat darted away, and she heard anxious voices below. The deck shuddered; Ranulf was somewhere nearby.

  The hatch was thrown open with a boom, and Holly raised her head, hoping to find Ranulf’s strong arms reaching out to her. But instead, all three of the boys scrambled up onto the deck, each holding something long and thin. Her mind was so fuzzy; those
couldn’t be . . .

  Another splash of water revived her a little, and her eyes grew wide when she saw Everett shoulder what looked like a hunting rifle in one hand, while chewing a wad of paper that he’d stuffed in his mouth. She couldn’t make sense of it. Where were Ranulf and Jade? The boys were going to be hurt, the missiles . . .

  Something cold and very wet, yet solid and pressing like fingers, gathered beneath her. Had someone come to help at last? Her mind must be going; she heard Everett saying ridiculous things: “No, don’t swallow it; bite it, I said! Now pour a little bit in here . . . just enough to fill it . . . and close it. Ben, yours isn’t shut all the way, here, let me . . .”

  The cold fingers lifted her.

  “Now pull that rod thing off—see it underneath? Turn it round . . . no, around . . . yeah. No, this way, Avery . . .”

  Her fingers closed over Áedán. She didn’t want him to fall off. They were rising; it must be Ranulf, helping her to the hatch. But she couldn’t move.

  “Stick it back on there, you don’t want to leave it in the barrel. . . . Now cock it. Pull it all the way back—that’s only halfway. Yes, Ben, that’s got it. Up to your shoulder . . . rather like a bow, Avery . . . good . . .”

  Then Holly’s stomach dropped the same way it did when she’d looked down from the crow’s nest, but Ranulf couldn’t be lifting her that high. She was so very wet; she was floating in water. She opened her eyes, calling for Ranulf and for Jade, but they couldn’t hear her; she was so far above them.

  Above them?

  Her mind cleared for one crystal moment, suspended, and she saw what had happened: She was floating far above the Sea Witch. On the tiny deck below the boys raised the rifles to their shoulders, and she heard a feeble shout: “Fire!” There was a satisfying explosion and a huge puff of smoke as Everett cheered; but the next moment Kailani screamed and fell onto the deck. Everett darted forward. Avery fired his weapon, aiming for the schooner, but instead lit one of the Sea Witch’s last remaining sails aflame; Ben peered up into the sky—to her—and she saw him through a wavy mirror—no, through a wall of water—and he called out to her.

  He shoved Everett out of the way and started yelling at Avery, who pulled something red from his pockets.

  Was it Everett’s wand? The one wrapped in the red scarf?

  Holly looked around. Where was she?

  She was sitting on water.

  A tender wave cradled her in what seemed to be a hand, but it was so cold, she had gone numb. She held Áedán tight, waiting to be flung into the sea. Instead the wave suspended them in the air, high above the melee. Avery stepped forward and thrust his right arm into the sky. How small, how fragile the wand looked, with its red scarf fluttering off one end. Where was her wand? She scrambled to find it, but then remembered Jade, with the wand in his teeth.

  She was a prisoner of the wave.

  It had started to move now, bearing her away from the brigantine, toward the higher mast and black sails of the schooner. Avery was doing something—she wasn’t sure what—but she felt a tugging back toward the Sea Witch. The wave resisted, and the tension was horrible, like she was a fish on a line, but she moved closer to the boys and dipped lower in the sky. If it drops me now, she thought, I’ll still land on the deck. Or they can pull me out of the sea.

  She felt a sharp pop. Avery’s spell snapped like an overstretched rubber band. The wave broke free, bearing her aloft. She could just see Avery cursing, waving the wand in futility, Everett grabbing it from him and trying to ape his movements, but she was out of their range now, if there was such a thing as range. She could feel it: the defeat.

  She was descending—no, falling—now, through the fountain of water. The masts rushed up to meet her, the rigging of the Black Dragon threatening to slice her in two. She heard a final gunshot echo off the bow, and she landed on the deck.

  Everything—the world—went dark.

  Chapter 43

  * * *

  Nursing Wounds

  “How could they be gone? Where did they go?” Ben babbled to Everett, who heard him as so much static on a radio. All Everett could do was gaze at the empty sea. The Black Dragon had vanished.

  And Holly with it.

  Everett stood staring at the sky, the wand limp in his hand. Nothing he had tried had done any good. A horrible, airless feeling overcame him, like being slugged hard in the stomach. Near the stern, Kailani was moaning. Quelch bent over her. He ripped the sleeve off his shirt and wrapped it around her shoulder where Everett’s musket ball had nicked her. She was lucky to be alive. Avery’s shot had set a sail ablaze, though a wave had broken over the side the next moment and dampened it. And then the impossible: A huge, watery hand had scooped Holly right off the deck and into the sky. Ranulf, who had just arrived at the hatch, clutched at her hand but just missed it; Almaric cried out behind him. Jade made a mighty leap—Everett had never seen a cat jump like that—but was tossed back to the deck like a wet rag.

  That’s when Ben went mad and shoved Everett out of the way and yelled at Avery—what was wrong with him, why wasn’t he using the stupid wand to save her? And Avery, for once, didn’t question him but yanked the wand out of his pocket and tried. He did try.

  At first it seemed to be working. His eyes were fixed on the giant water hand, and he muttered something low, making a pulling motion with his wand hand. Holly floated closer to them, and Everett held his breath. It might work; she’d be dropped and might be hurt, but she’d be all right. . . .

  Avery’s jaw clenched. He panted between his teeth; his knees shook. It was like a tug of war. Then with a gasp, he fell backward to the deck, and Everett seized the wand.

  But whatever Avery had been doing, it didn’t work for Everett. Holly had floated away on a geyser of water, all the way to the deck of the Black Dragon. A moment later, a great whirlpool had opened in the sea like a crater, and the schooner had disappeared into it as if down an enormous drain.

  The sea was calm. The air was warm.

  Ben collapsed onto the deck, crying. Almaric crawled out of the hatch and tried to comfort him. Jade looked utterly defeated. He dropped Holly’s wand with a light clatter.

  Only Morgan acted like nothing was wrong. She walked the length of the deck, inspecting the tattered sails and broken masts. She checked on Kailani and praised Quelch for his quick thinking. Eventually she made her way to the fore hatch, where the rest of them were assembled in a shell-shocked heap.

  She didn’t even mention Holly. Instead she reached out a webbed hand and grasped Everett around his shirt collar, hauling him to his feet. “Mutinous dog, shew me yer weaponry!” Then, eyeing the muskets lying on the deck, she shoved Everett aside and picked one up.

  “We did essay to aid the Sea Witch in battle,” said Avery, standing up rather bravely to face her. “ ’Twas not against you, Captain.”

  She grunted, seeming to realize this. “Are ye an Elemental, that ye spew fire such as this?” she asked, peering down the barrel. It made Everett nervous, even though the musket wasn’t loaded.

  “It came from the hold, Captain,” he said. “It was down near the brig. Left over from . . . wherever you got this ship.”

  Her eyes narrowed, then gazed off as she tried to recall having seen them before.

  “Who cares about the muskets?” Ben cried. “We have to get Holly back! Do your submarine thing and follow that ship!”

  “Do ye dare to command me?”

  “Yeah, I do! We need to get my sister back now!” Ben stood up and glared at Morgan, breathing hard.

  The captain brought her hand back as if to strike Ben, but Ranulf suddenly appeared and drew his sword. “The time has come to show some honor, Captain. The Lady Adept fought well alongside you. Perhaps she even saved your ship. Now you must return the favor.”

  “Put yer cutlass away,” growled Morgan. “D’ye not think I’d follow if I could? ’Tis not a matter of opening a portal wherever one wishes. I cannot follow in the wake of the Bl
ack Dragon. I know not whither she sails.”

  Everett bent his head. Suddenly he was so very tired. Idly, he pulled the locket from inside his shirt and worried his thumb over the raised symbols. He heard a gasp and looked up. The captain was gazing hungrily at the compass.

  “I cannot trace the path of the Black Dragon,” she said softly, then crouched on one knee and took the locket gently from Everett’s hand. “But you, laddie—you can.”

  But the Sea Witch wasn’t going anywhere soon. Large holes were punched in the brigantine’s hull and decking, the railings broken, the masts in stumps, its sails in pieces. The ship limped back to the island’s lagoon, and the crew quietly set about repairing the damage.

  They were a sober lot. Frigg and Gawks, who had been manning the foresails, had been swept overboard during the attack. Oggler, who’d been near the stern, had caught one leg in the rigging, which had snapped it in more than one place. Quelch tried to set it, but he muttered privately that the leg would have to come off at the knee as soon as they located the hacksaw. Kailani’s wound ought to have been minor, Everett thought desperately, since the lead ball had only grazed her. But the musket, Innes explained, shot fire, and Kai was a Water Elemental. The wound was deep and painful, and though Innes thought she would recover, it would take some time.

  Everett and the other passengers sat around a bleak campfire on the beach as night fell.

  “It isn’t perhaps as bad as we fear,” Almaric said at last. “The Sea Witch is no ordinary vessel. Morgan has formidable magic at her command.”

  Oggler’s moaning floated across the beach.

  Everett felt sick in his stomach.

  “The longer we wait, the harder it will be to find Holly,” he said in a low voice. “That’s right, isn’t it?”

  “Your compass will find the Black Dragon wherever she may be,” said Jade. “If a sea portal can be opened, why . . .” He trailed off, as if too drained of hope to continue.