“Come on boys, I don’t want to miss out.“ Minni hurried them up the stairs, eager to take control of the mutiny before an opportunistic junior officer did.
“Don’t wait around for us, we won’t keep you from your fun,“ said Delik, moving up the stairs.
Minni didn’t wait; she slipped away into the shadows and chaos.
***
Delik got to the top of the stairs and shook his head; she’d disappeared again. That woman would be the end of him. Her wicked, self-bloody-satisfied smile would be the last thing he saw before death. She was too damn sure of everything for her age. The truth is she didn’t know the half of it and was ignorant of the rest.
This mutiny had to be controlled before it fell into the hands of some petty officer wanting to jump rank. Bet she hadn’t planned that—or the lad. What was she thinking, getting him all mixed up in this? The fool had to run into the fire. Typical human; racing into every stupid impulse without any measure of the way ahead.
“Come on then, lad,” urged Delik. “Here’s the adventure you were looking for.”
Elrin’s smile was weak with nerves and he held his sword like a limp fish.
“First off, hold it like this.” Delik grabbed Elrin’s hand and moved it on the grip. “These blades are hangers, you’ve got no reach against an officer’s sabre. You’ve got to slip inside their reach. Cut and thrust, in close quarters.” Delik demonstrated. “Cut. Thrust. Got it?”
“I think so.”
“Right then, let’s get you some practice.”
Delik charged forward, hoping Elrin was following behind. There was no time to baby him; he’d have to sink or swim. Sure enough he kept close—a little too close though—hugging Delik’s shadow like a cautious toddler chasing his mother’s skirts. There was something about the lad, something larger than his awkward naivety allowed. He doubted Elrin was what Minni hoped for, but he might prove useful nonetheless. Either way, Ona was busy enough with the bodies of those already fallen to the butchers. So many had died against the Jandan scum, she didn’t need any richer soil today.
Up on the main deck the mutinous crew had pinned down a unit of marines. The Jandans were in disarray with mixed commands from conflicting junior officers. Without Commodore Pelegrin’s authority behind them, the officers couldn’t rally their men.
It was a deadlock. The marines and officers were better armed, but the crew outnumbered them and pressed their flank so neither could advance. Delik shoved his way to the front line, taking stock of the situation. Elrin followed, though he had considerably more trouble squeezing through the agitated crew. The lad needed to grow a stem; he was too damn polite.
Above them on the quarterdeck, the battle raged on, steel clashed and men cried in a cacophony of agony or victory. Delik had to break the deadlock to weigh the scales in their favour; every moment wasted counted the Jandans an opportunity to regroup.
“Your captain is captured. Stand down!” Delik’s voice demanded attention, commanding an authority that towered above his mere stature.
“Hold the line!” The officer in command screamed, his face stained with blood from a cut above his eye.
“You have one chance for surrender, you are outnumbered. I have fifty armed and trained men advancing from the docks.”
The sailors holding the front line shifted their posture. They were listening now.
“All surrendering troops will be offered clemency. Officers will be interrogated and detained.”
Delik waited.
The sailors shifted again and some of them muttered to each other.
“Deserters will be killed! By lord’s will, hold the line!” The young officer raised a sabre above his head, fury flashing his eyes wide.
That was no way to command. Morale grew in warm soil, not cold steel; those men needed hope and trust, not threats. Delik sucked in a breath for courage and turned his back on the marines to address the ragtag mutineers. It wasn’t as dangerous as it seemed; the mutineers’ faces would tell him if an attack was imminent. “Protect those who surrender, disarm or kill those who resist.”
Two marines from the front line broke ranks, dropping their weapons and running to the mutinous crew. The crew cheered for the defection and Delik let them through.
“Hold the line!” The officer screamed in a futile rage.
“Prepare to advance. Men with weapons to the front.” Delik faced the sailors holding the line, staring down his opponents. The crew behind him rallied their spirits by stomping on the deck in rumbling unison and hollering abuse at the enemy. Delik knew he could not hold them much longer.
Four more soldiers broke the line, filling the mutineer’s ranks. Another cheer went up. The commanding officer shoved men forward to fill the gaps, shouting abuse, frantic as his control slipped away.
Delik led the charge. “Attack!”
The crew launched forward in a bluster of screams, blades and blows. The front line of sailors wavered then collapsed; some dropped their weapons and others fell back to a defended corner of the quarterdeck.
Delik made for the commanding officer, breaking through the ranks, deflecting blades, ducking and weaving, slicing a wedge to the officer’s position. The officer slashed low with his sabre, trying to keep Delik at a distance. Delik parried and Elrin burst into the fray with a clumsy thrust. The officer stepped to the side and countered, slashing at Elrin’s back as he careened off balance. The attack exposed the officer’s flank and Delik took the opportunity to move in, cutting through the Jandan’s hamstring, collapsing him like a trestle. He kicked the officer’s sabre out of reach and advanced on the remaining sailors fighting on the quarterdeck.
Elrin recovered his balance and charged ahead, lucky to fight on with only a scrape across his back. What he lacked in skill, he compensated with daring, pressing an attack on a panicked sailor who slashed a sabre around, trying to swat Elrin away.
The remaining sailors stood at around fifteen men. They were backed against the bulwark without any officer to rally them. Not that an officer would have offered a great advantage to the cornered men; the crew were hungry for the fight, whilst the sailors were just trying to stay alive.
Delik yelled out to the remaining sailors. “Surrender you bastards! I can’t control this crew otherwise.”
Some of the crew were out for blood, despite Delik’s offer of mercy on surrender. Most didn’t want to risk their own lives by going easy on the sailors and hoping they would drop their weapons. Delik couldn’t hold them back from the passions of battle once they took hold.
The sailor fighting Elrin dropped his blade and held his hands forward, begging for mercy. A mutineer came up from behind, raising his sword for the kill, but Elrin knocked it out of his hands before it could come down on the sailor. The mutineer wheeled around and grabbed Elrin, breaking on berserk, wide-eyed and red with rage. Elrin took a fist full of the madman’s hair and brought the hilt of his sword crashing into his crazed skull, knocking him out. The surrendering Jandan fell to his knees, desperate for the melee to be over.
Delik kept an eye on Elrin. He handled himself well enough when the odds were against the enemy, but if the tide of battle were against them, he’d be blood on the deck. Delik pressed on at the front of the fray, Elrin close beside him, disarming vigilante crew intent on killing Jandans who surrendered. The lad might just fit in with his freedom fighters—if he survived long enough.
In the last moments, pressed by mutineers on all sides, there was no opportunity for surrender. The final marine standing was disarmed, only to be struck down from behind by a raging mutineer. Cold blooded murder was all too often cloaked in the heat of battle. Delik’s blood boiled in a fight like any other; many of the uniforms deserved everything they got, but he wished there was more honour in it. The disparity of justice afforded his people fuelled a furnace of enmity he wrestled to dampen.
He bottled it down against every raw impulse to paint their blue uniforms red. “Take their weapons and round them
up on the main deck. Get the rest of the ship secure and separate the officers.”
Delik had expected more resistance; the fight could have been more difficult. He took a breath to survey the decks, tallying the number of blue jackets being rounded up. There were less than he reckoned on and while the rebels had control of Juniper, the true battle had not yet begun.
As planned, his dockers had joined with a unit of rebel elite and pressed in, supporting the mutineers and containing the fight on the frigate. Though they came to battle in motley armour, these men and women fought with formidable precision and discipline. They held the pier and guarded each door and stair on the deck. There was no way past them to escape; now Delik knew they stood a real chance for what was to come. The warrior in charge of the force ran over to update Delik.
The drakkin was a welcome sight.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Signal
Elrin felt soft and vulnerable standing before the burly drakkin warrior. The reptilian was covered in brown and bronze scales with a sinister blade curving from hip level, slung low and dangerous. The weapon was less a sword and more a monstrous cleaver, keen and ready to butcher anyone fool enough to make a challenge. A turtle shell pauldron and a pair of cowry-studded vambraces were the only armour the battle hardy brute required. While displaying a hulking chest with naked pride, the drakkin was civilised enough to keep his dignity covered with loose fitting hemp trousers that also made room for a muscular tail, and were held up by a wide utility belt crowded with pouches and flasks.
Delik showed no apprehension whatsoever, beaming up at the reptilian and grasping his clawed hand in a vigorous shake. “Bloody glad you could make it, Tikis.”
“This job is not done yet. There are many dogs still hiding in the officers’ quarters and great cabin because Min–“ Tikis was interrupted by Minni who snuck up behind the drakkin and slapped his tail. Tikis jumped a little and swung his tail away; the momentum snapped his body around to face her.
“Locked them in.” Minni chuckled. “Beat you to it Tik Tik.”
Tikis leant over, putting his face level with Minni’s. “Tikis wants this job done right, Min Min.” He chuckled; a sound mixed between a frog croaking and a cricket chirping. “These ones are locked in, yes. They say they have ten boltmen aiming at this door. This one and us cannot advance without deaths.”
“Let them wait Tikky Bik. There’s no rush.” Minni went to wrap her arm up in his, but Tikis swatted her away.
“Is rush. Very rush. Lookout man on headland sees sails advance.”
“What! Already?” Delik called down to a thickset man on the main deck. “Coalman! Get me an eyeglass up here.”
Tikis pulled his top lip back exposing hundreds of short sharp teeth to Minni. “These dogs are barking. We and us have not replied. This headland beacon repeats the signal. We and us saw this, yet do not know these flashing light words.”
Minni poked her tongue out at Tikis. “You don’t have to go on about it, Delik doesn’t play favourites.”
“Where’s the codebook, Minni?” Delik let the one-upmanship slide. He took the spyglass from Coalman’s runner and put it to his eye, sweeping it over Rum Hill and the headland protecting the harbour. “We’ve got to reply or we’ll be under fire once those galleons round the headland.”
“It’s in the great cabin,” Minni crossed her arms.
“What?” Delik collapsed the spyglass with a curt snap.
“I would have had it, if you’d let me blow a hole in the ship like we planned. Remember the plan, Delik? I would have been in and out before she sunk. Seems to me your gripe with Pelegrin got in the way.”
Delik ignored her dig. “What about the ship’s signal seal?”
“The first mate didn’t want to let it go, so I had to persuade it from him.” Minni pulled forth an elaborately sculpted ivory dragon carved from a very large tooth. It perched on a brass tube with a crystal seal mounted on the base. “The blood wiped right off, so it should still work fine.”
Elrin had never seen such a magnificent piece. “Is it from a real dragon?” He reached out to touch it.
“Whoa there!” Minni pulled it back and cradled it close to her bosom. “You should ask a lady before you reach for her treasures.”
Elrin blushed.
Minni laughed and Tikis swivelled his head around focussing on Elrin with a movement so swift and smooth it was unsettling. Tikis flicked his tongue out, tasting the air. Elrin was nothing but drakkin food, a soft snack after a quick battle.
“Is this one known?” A clear membrane blinked horizontally across each of his staring eyes. He flicked out his tongue again. “He tastes like—”
Delik cut in with a shrill whistle. “Come on you two! Quit it. We have to get those codes.”
Elrin was glad for Delik’s intervention; Tikis put him on edge. This drakkin warrior had a palpable intensity, a primal, brutal certainty. All of which gave Elrin an idea.
“I know how to get us through the door,” Elrin blurted, his thoughts rushed forward. It would be easy.
“How?” asked Delik.
“Release the ogre.”
“This one jokes,” Tikis bared his teeth and aspirated a choked confusion somewhat resembling laughter.
Elrin readied himself for some jibe from Minni. What was he thinking, saying that out loud? The ogre would raise chaos if he went berserk on deck.
“What then, lad?” Delik asked, in sincere consideration.
“Return his honour,” said Elrin, surprised to be taken seriously. “Ask him to fight the Jandans who enslaved him.”
Tikis erupted in more fits of strange laughter. “This Ogre? Honour?”
“Honour or not,” said Minni. “The beast would be a perfect shield.”
Elrin was shocked. “He isn’t yours to sacrifice. I thought you were here to free slaves. Give him his own shield, why have him sent to slaughter? It’s senseless!”
“Of course, that’s what I meant.” Minni shook her head with a grin. “Listen to this one boys; half a day with the rebels and he’s a zealot.”
He’d been baited. Damn this woman, she was impossible!
Delik called to several of his dockers. “Bring the ogre to us and make it quick.” The men hesitated a moment before heading down through the hatchway below decks as instructed.
Tikis quit laughing once he saw Delik was serious and instructed his men to unhinge the heavy door below the forecastle for a makeshift shield. Some of the crew protested that their quarters would be open to the weather, but once Tikis made his presence felt, their complaints evaporated.
The deck vibrated as the ogre came up from below, his immense form rising through the hatch, shackles rattling with each shambling step. He kept his eyes to the deck as he was brought before them. Elrin wondered if the ogre noticed his captors were no longer in charge of Juniper.
“Ogre, do you want your freedom?” asked Delik
The ogre shifted his weight, but did not raise his head.
“Do you speak?”
The ogre stood still.
“He’s too scared to speak. Or, maybe he doesn’t speak Jandan.” Elrin walked forward, but Delik held him back, out of range of the ogre’s muscular arms.
Elrin called to the ogre. “Speak to us, you are free.”
“Free is not free.” The ogre’s voice was like a storm rumbling, a deep rolling power on the horizon. His lightning blue eyes struck Elrin.
Elrin stood tall, though inside he was a lone leaf clinging to a limb in a storm. “We need your help to break down that door and subdue the Jandans.”
The ogre swung his arms apart with a low grunt. The chains between his iron cuffs snapped taught then broke under the sudden strain. He flexed his huge arms and rotated his shoulders.
Everyone backed away, hands on their weapons, except Elrin. He stood in shock with a leaden stomach, watching the ogre’s hands open and close. He was about to be crushed by keg-sized fists. The young man drew his arm up in a pathe
tic attempt to block the inevitable blow.
It didn’t happen. Elrin dropped his arm, feeling both relieved and foolish.
With a controlled thud, the ogre sat down and grasped the chains on his leg irons. He rolled onto his back and heaved with his arms and pushed with his legs. Thickset muscles bulged and after much grunting and straining, a link in the chain gave way.
The ogre slowly knelt before Elrin and the others. “Hurn Ga Kogh will help now.”
Elrin didn’t know what to say. Why hadn’t the Ogre broken his bonds earlier?
Delik called to Tikis. “Right then, give the big fella that shield and let’s get these bone baggers out of bed.”
Tikis assisted a burly docker to lift the shield made from the door and carried it to the ogre. The ogre took it with ease; sliding his arm through the rope straps and gripping the improvised handle.
“There’s a bunch of Jandans with crossbows in there, Hurn was it? ... Can I call you Hurn?”
The ogre towered over Delik in stony silence.
“Anyway, give that door a tap and keep behind your shield. Just stay put.”
“Tikis, get that foul brew ready.” Delik called to the rest of the rebels. “Spread out, everyone. Let’s take these bastards alive!”
Hurn lifted his foot and crashed it into the door. It shuddered, but held. The second kick knocked the door off its hinges with a splintering crash into the cabin. The ogre ducked behind his makeshift shield as a volley of bolts took flight.
The wall of missiles bit into the shield, and fanned out across the deck. Tikis took cover against the bulkhead beside the open door and uncorked two terracotta flasks, lobbing them into the cabin where they smashed apart, spilling vile smoke. The men trapped inside yelled and spluttered, beginning to choke on the gas. The fumes leached out onto the deck, thick with the smell of putrefied eggs.
Another volley of bolts thudded into Hurn’s shield. He grimaced and gave a snort, but held his position. At such close range the bolts were just breaking through, the sharp tips protruding like the spines of an angry manticore. After the second volley, Minni dashed into the room with her face covered in a strange black mask. Tikis retreated away from the door and signalled Hurn to do the same.
Dragon Choir Page 9
