Lintang and the Pirate Queen

by Tamara Moss

  ‘Absolutely.’ Captain Shafira kicked her boot up on the frame of the bed and rolled one of her braids between her fingertips. ‘You belong on the Winda, Lintang. Know how I know?’

  Lintang stroked the warped wood of her sword. She belonged here. She liked the sound of that. ‘How?’

  ‘When the siren pulled you under, the lightning bird dragged you all the way to the surface again.’

  ‘Keelee saved me?’

  ‘Sure did. The lightning bird is your protector now, too.’

  Lintang hesitated. ‘But … it’s a mythie. Aren’t you going to medicate it?’

  An odd expression crossed Captain Shafira’s face, although it was gone too quickly to read.

  ‘Xiang tried to hit it with a dart dipped in Curall. She’s got excellent aim, but it dodged every attempt. It seems it would rather protect us than turn human.’

  Yamini knocked on the door with a platter of food and a flagon of water, halting their conversation. She placed the things on the desk, then stalked out, all but slamming the door behind her.

  Lintang picked at a bowl of unfamiliar berries that must’ve come from Vierz. Despite Yamini’s attitude now, she’d tried to stop Lintang from going to Bayani while he was under the siren’s spell. Did that mean Yamini actually cared about her? Or had she done it for some other purpose?

  ‘I can’t work out whether Yamini likes me or hates me,’ she said at last.

  Captain Shafira unscrewed the cap from the flagon. ‘It’s complicated. She’s upset because I forgave you, whereas she’ll never be anything other than a cabin girl.’

  The first berry was sour, the next was sweet. The two tastes tingled on Lintang’s tongue as a strange feeling of sympathy washed through her. Having Captain Shafira’s disapproval, with no chance of redemption, would’ve been awful.

  ‘You won’t forgive her?’ she said.

  ‘She was offered gems to betray me, just like you were. But she took the offer.’

  Lintang stopped mid-chew. The sympathy disappeared.

  Yamini had betrayed Captain Shafira?

  ‘She grew up differently to you,’ Captain Shafira said, seeing Lintang’s expression. ‘She lived on the streets of Zaiben, forced to steal to eat. Gems mean more to her than they do to you.’

  ‘How could you let her back on the ship?’ Lintang cried. ‘How do you know she won’t turn on you again?’

  ‘When she realised what she’d done, she was very sorry. She begged to come back, even if she had to spend the rest of her life as cabin girl. I accepted.’ Captain Shafira sighed. ‘I think she expects I’ll give her a pardon one day, and she’ll be allowed to be a proper crew member again. That wasn’t the agreement. I’ll have to talk to her.’

  Lintang scowled. To think she’d actually started to feel sorry for Yamini.

  ‘Eat,’ Captain Shafira said, standing. ‘I have to check on things. You can come out when you’ve finished.’

  She left, and Lintang gulped at her food, barely tasting it. She set the plate on the desk, downed the flagon of water and hurried out of the room clutching her broken sword pieces. The salty air was fresh against her skin. It reminded her how much she loved being here, even if she had to live with a traitor like Yamini.

  The first person she saw was Avalon, who was lounging on a chair under the main mast. He was giving instructions to Zazi and Dee as they carried a plank of wood to a splintered piece of the deck. He had a bandage around his head and Twip on his shoulder. Hewan hovered nearby, begging him to go back to bed. He ignored her and lifted a hand when he saw Lintang. Despite his injuries, he looked happier than he’d ever been.

  Zazi nodded to Lintang, then yelled as the plank thunked to the deck. Dee had dropped her side to pull Farah-the-clam-shell from her belt and wave at the same time.

  From the rigging, Mei called a hello between flips.

  Lintang reached the bow and hugged her broken sword to her chest. The ship cut through the waves, as powerful and proud as it had ever been.

  Keelee screeched, circling above.

  ‘Thank you!’ Lintang said to it.

  She lifted her face to the wind. She’d done it. She’d impressed Captain Shafira, just like she said she would. She was allowed to stay.

  Bayani joined her. ‘I’m sorry I snapped your sword.’

  She laughed. ‘To be fair, you also did the impossible and fought a Kanekonese siren’s spell to save me. I think we’re even.’

  He propped his elbows on the railing. ‘I still can’t believe I managed to resist it. The spell worked fine on Avalon.’

  ‘Mmm.’ She glanced at him. ‘Maybe there’s something about you. Something special.’

  ‘Or,’ he said, ‘maybe the people who wrote The Mythie Guidebook need to remember we’re not all like them.’ He eyed her broken sword. ‘Avalon might be able to fix that.’

  ‘No, it’s all right.’ She took one last look at the hilt with its carved three moons in one hand, and the chipped and worn blade in the other, then tossed them both overboard. The wind caught them, letting them fly, before they sank into the white foam. ‘I’ll be getting a real sword next time.’

  ‘Next time?’

  ‘I’ve been invited onto the Winda as a proper crew member.’

  ‘Really?’ Bayani said. ‘That’s great! Congratulations!’

  ‘I’ll be going home for one more season, though, to tell the village all the new stories I have.’

  He nudged her. ‘Good, because I’m not ready to say goodbye to you yet.’

  ‘You could always ask to come with us. I’m sure Captain Shafira won’t mind having someone who can communicate with the Gods on board.’

  He didn’t answer.

  She licked salt from her lips and studied him. ‘How did you know the infection was a second star?’

  ‘Mratzi showed me when I was drowning,’ he said, looking at her in surprise. ‘How did you know?’

  ‘The second star gave me visions of where it had been. Was it really all an accident? The shooting stars, the scattered seeds …?’

  ‘Yes. It was really, truly an accident. The Gods tried to warn us, but they’d never involved themselves with the living world before. We were just crops to them. They didn’t know our languages, or our cultures, or anything.’

  ‘But they can talk to you.’

  A long pause. Then, ‘Yes, they can talk to me.’

  ‘How, Bayani? How are you so special?’

  He gazed out at the ocean for a long, long time. So long, in fact, she wondered whether he’d heard her. Then he said, ‘Mratzi showed me something when I was underwater. Something … impossible. I need time to figure it out.’

  She sighed. ‘I’m never going to get the whole truth from you, am I?’

  ‘You will, I promise. One day.’

  ‘Mmm.’ She wasn’t sure she believed him. But she wasn’t going to let his secrets get in the way of their friendship – she had made that decision already.

  She stared down at the water. It rushed towards them, breaking in two when it hit the prow, taking one path or the other on either side of the ship. It was different looking at it since being a mythie. The ocean had felt comfortable then, like a sort of home.

  ‘What happened to Lanme Vanyan?’ she said after a silence.

  Bayani looked at her. ‘She was you.’

  ‘Yes, but …’ Lintang examined her hands. ‘Where is that body now? Where is the second star?’

  ‘Extinguished,’ Bayani said. ‘The extra seed is gone forever, thanks to the Curall.’

  ‘But I was a giant snake woman with wings. Where did that all go?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Bayani said. ‘Inside you, I guess. She was the mythical version of you. Having that second star just … brought her out.’

  Lintang curled her fingers against her chest. So the extra star had been an enhancement of who she already was, or, perhaps, the adult she would be one day.

  The mother of monsters. The warrior queen. What a thing
to live up to.

  Pelita bounded over to them. ‘What are we talking about?’

  Bayani and Lintang exchanged a hesitant glance. ‘Home,’ Bayani said after a pause.

  Pelita grabbed his arm, then Lintang’s good one. ‘Home is wherever you two are.’

  ‘I like that,’ Bayani said.

  ‘Me too,’ Lintang said. ‘Maybe you could both become crew members with me.’

  ‘Yay!’ Pelita said.

  Lintang turned to face the ship. She took in the wooden deck, the splintered mast, the billowing black sails, the bridge and the people. Captain Shafira was at the helm, staring off into the distance. Xiang, still in her splint, argued with Eire about something while Quahah watched on in amusement.

  Lintang smiled. She would be going home for awhile, and that made her happy. But the Winda was home now, too. Captain Shafira would return to take her at the beginning of the planting season, and after that … well.

  She would make her own legends.

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  I’d like to thank Zoe Walton, Cristina Briones and the rest of the fabulous team at Penguin Random House for their support and enthusiasm. Thank you so much for taking a chance on me. Special thanks to Lindsey Hodder for plucking me from the slush!

  Molly Ker Hawn, my agent, thank you for swooping in and rescuing me in the nick of time, just like a super-hero. Thank you also for your kindness and patience over the years. I’ve appreciated our correspondence more than you will ever know.

  James Brouwer, your illustrations have brought my story to life. It’s been a joy seeing your work. Thank you!

  Emma Burchett, Jennifer Liu, and Helen Pemberton – my cheerleaders – thank you so much for all the positivity over the years. *supertacklehugs*

  My lovely Year Fives of 2016! Thank you so much for listening to early drafts of the book, giving feedback and always asking for the next chapter. Your excitement and support has made this whole process a wonderful dream.

  Thanks to my family and friends for putting up with the lifelong brain strangeness that comes with being a writer. Vivienne Chan, let’s do brunch.

  Thank you to Alastair Stephens, the smartest person I know, for doing an incredible story edit. Your podcasts are the highlight of my day. Everyone should go to pointnorthmedia.com – it’s amazing.

  Marissa Meyer, I owe you so much. You were there for me in my dawning days as a writer, and have continued to be a supportive and positive presence in my life. Your encouraging emails were sometimes the only thing that kept me going. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

  Thanks to my husband for supporting me through some of my toughest times. Thank you also for stepping back and letting me immerse myself in edits. Your patience and support means the world to me. I love you.

  Finally, Marguerite Klup.

  Marguerite. What can I say? How can I possibly express my deep gratitude for being there with me since we were fifteen, for reading every word I’ve ever written, for loving even my worst work with all that you have? How can I thank you for the praise, support, dedication and long hours you’ve put towards my dream? You are the bestest of best friends. I wouldn’t be here without you.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  West Australian author Tamara Moss has been writing seriously for over a decade. After majoring in Asian Studies at the University of Western Australia, Tamara has taught Japanese, interned at indie publisher Twelfth Planet Press, and worked at many different schools. She teaches upper primary on her days off. Lintang and the Pirate Queen is Tamara’s first novel. She is currently working on the second and third books in the series.

  Lintang is back in Desa, but it isn’t the home she remembers. Abandoned by Bayani, who snuck off with the pirate queen, Lintang’s only companion is Pelita, whose return to human life has been … challenging. Worst of all, the planting season has come and gone, and the Winda – bringing Captain Shafira’s promised return – is nowhere in sight.

  Finally, a captain comes for Lintang – but not the one she’s expecting. When Captain Kona offers for Lintang to join his crew in the Vierzan Navy, Lintang uses her only leverage to ensure that Pelita, too, will leave the island that no longer seems to have a place for them.

  But Lintang has a plan, and it’s not long before she and Pelita escape from Captain Kona’s ship and reunite with the Winda and its crew. Together they embark on a journey with terrifying new mythies in a land cut off from the rest of the world – Captain Shafira’s home, the forbidden island of Allay. To clear their captain’s name and stop the Zulttania’s evil counsel from ruling Allay, Lintang and the crew must discover what really happened to the Zulttania all those years ago …

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted by any person or entity, including internet search engines or retailers, in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including printing, photocopying (except under the statutory exceptions provisions of the Australian Copyright Act 1968), recording, scanning or by any information storage and retrieval system without the prior written permission of Penguin Random House Australia. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

  Version 1.0

  Lintang and the Pirate Queen

  ePub ISBN – 9780143783428

  First published by Random House Australia in 2017

  Copyright © Tamara Moss 2017

  The moral right of the author has been asserted.

  A Random House book

  Published by Penguin Random House Australia Pty Ltd

  Level 3, 100 Pacific Highway, North Sydney NSW 2060

  www.penguin.com.au

  Addresses for the Penguin Random House group of companies can be found at global.penguinrandomhouse.com/offices.

  National Library of Australia

  Cataloguing-in-Publication entry

  Author: Moss, Tamara

  Title: Lintang and the pirate queen / Tamara Moss

  ISBN: 9780143783428 (ebook)

  Series: Moss, Tamara. Lintang; 1

  Target Audience: For primary school age

  Subjects: Pirates – Juvenile fiction

  Adventure stories

  Children’s stories

  Sea stories

  Cover and internal illustrations copyright © James Brouwer

  Cover design by Christa Moffitt, Christabella Designs

  Ebook by Firstsource