The Nature of a Pirate

by A. M. Dellamonica

  His eyes were very wide, but at last he nodded. “Give the order, Tonio.”

  “What about the wood fright? If it tears the ship in half, there’s nothing to salvage,” Bram said.

  “Same plan as before,” Sophie said. “I put on my rig and lead it away from Nightjar. Just, now, I lead it back to the source. It sticks to wood, remember?”

  “Cap’n!” Beal shouted, voice muffled as he pounded down the ladder from the main deck. “The caravel’s coming! Sawtooth.”

  “Is she near?”

  “Immolator’s going to get to us first. Assumin’ that’s what you’re asking.”

  They passed around a grim look. “Right,” Sophie said. “Sinking the ship. Temporarily.”

  “For the record, I hate this plan.” Bram said.

  “It’s your plan,” Sophie said, and left him to execute it, while she ran up the ladder, yet again, to get her wetsuit on.

  CHAPTER 26

  Sinking a ship in twenty minutes was as much work as trying to save it.

  With the locks open, Nightjar took water quickly. The crew brought down and reefed the sails and then lowered the rest of the lifeboats, evacuating as the bow sank and the stern rose. Arranging themselves five to a boat, they rowed madly in the direction of Sawtooth.

  Cly’s caravel had every sail unfurled, every cannoneer on deck. She was too far away, and the fiery ship, preceded by a sulfur smell, continued to close the distance between them.

  The last of the lifeboats held the cannoneer, Krezzo, and the cook. The two of them were turning loose floating smudge pots filled with combustible powder and some kind of moss, filling the air with a pall of thick, white smoke.

  “Looks desperate,” Sophie observed.

  “We are desperate,” Garland said. “We’re sinking the ship.”

  “Temporarily,” she insisted. He nodded without conviction.

  There were just seven of them still aboard: she and Garland, Bram and Verena, and Kev, Daimon, and Selwig.

  “You next,” Sophie said to her brother and half sister, ushering them to the cabin they’d been sharing. The tilt of the ship was severe here; the fore cabins would be underwater in another ten minutes at most.

  Verena unfastened Gale’s heavy clock—it was about the size of a breadbox—from the wall, stopped its gears, and wrapped it in a heavy rug. Reaching inside, she wrapped it in a heavy rug.

  “How do you plan to get aboard the immolator with a homicidal wood fright chasing you?” Bram asked.

  “Garland says he’s got an idea.”

  “He didn’t share?”

  “Maybe we’re hoping to get lucky.”

  “Sofe,” he said.

  “Bram, go. I will lose what’s left of my mind if you end up in pirate hands again. Anyway, you and Verena need to be home if you’re to find out who Coine’s Erstwhile accomplice is.”

  “She’s right. Come on, Bram.”

  Sophie stepped back; Verena took Bram’s hand. She heard two distinct sets of clockworks—the ticking of Verena’s clock, about ten feet away, and the one in Beatrice’s house, in San Francisco.

  “How do you keep them straight?” Sophie asked.

  “I concentrate,” Verena said, but she didn’t sound unduly stressed.

  Sophie’s vision swam. Her eyes flooded and she blinked fiercely. Verena and Bram were gone.

  The residue of ticking remained, little plinks, as if there was one more clock, far away and barely audible.

  “We have to go,” Garland said.

  She took a last look around the cabin. “Where’s my camera?” She’d left her electronics in a bag on her bunk.

  “Someone must have packed it.”

  There was no time to search it out. Swallowing once, she marched back up to the stern, using the rail to keep from slipping on the ever-steeper incline.

  Garland had packed one last wooden lifeboat with one of the flattened inflatable rafts Verena had brought. Now he turned it upside down and lowered it into the water. “The lifeboat will drift, as if it were a spare that came off the ship,” he said. “Kev, Daimon, and Selwig can shelter under it until we’ve taken care of the fright.”

  “That’s the plan?” Kev demanded. “Pretend to be wreckage?”

  Before Garland could answer, Nightjar’s stern lurched upward, fast enough that Sophie’s stomach did an elevator-lunge, and they swiftly found themselves fifteen feet higher than they had been a moment before. The fore cabins sank underwater. Air bubbled madly from the open obsidian portals.

  Garland put a hand on Nightjar’s deck.

  “She’ll be submerged before they’re close enough to burn her,” Sophie said. “She won’t burn, you hear me?”

  “What matters now is keeping everyone alive.”

  That, and retaining custody of Kev. And getting him pacified. And protecting him from torture.…

  “We’ll raise Nightjar.”

  “Let’s see if we can turn that fright on the immolator,” he said.

  “Garland, we’ll raise her.”

  His smile was a bit forced, but at least it was a smile. “One thing at a time.”

  They slid the overturned lifeboat into the water, hiding it from view by keeping Nightjar’s upturned stern between themselves and the immolator. Selwig arranged himself in the bow, treading water. Gesturing to Kev, he produced a length of white ribbon, lettered with a single line of glowing silver spellscrip, and bound Kev’s hands together.

  “Um…” she said.

  “It’s symbolic,” Selwig said. “A leash. Shows he’s yours. Not an escapee, and therefore not subject to immediate execution.”

  “Fine,” she said, though it was far from it.

  “Why not shackle me right to Nightjar’s anchor?” Kev said. “That would solve the problem, won’t it?”

  “Why are you mad at me all of a sudden?” Sophie said. “I’m not the one who infiltrated your cell and betrayed your friends.”

  “No,” he said, flinching as Selwig tugged the knot, testing. “That wasn’t you.…”

  It’s ribbon, it’s ribbon. It’s not hurting him.

  “The boat won’t pass for wreckage if we turn it into the amphitheater for a shouting match,” Selwig said.

  “Selwig’s right,” Daimon said. He had tied his curly red hair back and skinned down to a peasant shirt and short breeches. “If we don’t row together now, we’re sunk. There is still a chance, Lidman. You must trust—”

  Whatever he had meant to say was interrupted as Garland surfaced in their midst, making the space even more crowded.

  “You three, kick gently for Sawtooth,” he said. “Selwig has a compass, I believe? Excellent. Here’s your bearing. They should close the distance soon. Sophie, it’s time to go.”

  “Go?” Kev yelped. “You’re leaving me?”

  She ignored him. “How are we getting aboard the pirate ship?”

  “You worry about leading the wood fright.” To her surprise, Garland grinned. “Remember, it’ll tear its way through anything to get to you. And it will bind with wood, wood fibers, anything from a forest.”

  “Are you okay?”

  Garland’s eyes brimmed, and his expression became almost as cold as Cly’s. “Sophie, this will be a real clash, with a sincerely violent enemy.”

  “Commit,” she murmured. “Commit, commit.”

  With that, she kissed him, hard. Then, taking a few deep breaths, she put her mouthpiece in and her mask on, dropping below the surface.

  Nightjar’s stern was just dropping below the waterline. Streaming bubbles from every portal, she glided in slow motion, setting a slow course for the bottom of the ocean.

  They’d had the ship cleaned at the ice city, Ylle, but the spell had created fresh layers of contamination, weird fusions of mammalian reproductive tissue and forest floor: chips of wood, beetles burrowing in moss studded with oxygen-rich, bloody bubbles, dirt, humus. Earthworms twisted in agony as their bodies met the salt water. Lichens turned black and dropped int
o the deeps.

  Sophie descended slowly, looking for sharks, shining her light ahead of her, and taking as little depth as she could. She wouldn’t have time for a safety stop, and she didn’t want to get close to the fright, in any case. As she descended, looking over the filth-encrusted starboard side of the ship, she suddenly saw a jagged-edged hole the size of a department store mannequin.

  It’s already inside, she thought.

  Now what? She couldn’t enter the ship from outside and hope to outmaneuver the fright—it would just start ripping the ship to pieces.

  So lure it out. She shined the light on the hole and began clinking a metal clip against her air tank—plink, plink, plink—in time with the ticking rhythm still echoing at the back of her mind.

  Was that movement within the chamber?

  She took another second to get her bearings, shining her light back at the upturned lifeboat, barely making out the chaotic whirl of Kev’s, Daimon’s, and Selwig’s legs as they kicked frantically, blind and vulnerable, making negligible progress, caught in a streamer of the ship’s blood.

  Teeth, guys! Row together.

  Over at her three o’clock, Garland’s part of the plan had made itself obvious. He had swum for the surface and tangled himself into a net. Floating, he probably looked as though he’d gone down with Nightjar, lost consciousness, and surfaced. Now he lay faceup, just waiting for a pickup. The net spooled in the water beneath him.

  Handy and ready for the grabbing, she guessed. Will they want him?

  Who wouldn’t want him?

  The bandit ship was getting closer. Its boards, below the surface of the water, cast an intermittent orange glow, flickering like banked coals in a campfire. Nightjar had sunk well beneath her, though; she was safe.

  When did sunk become the new safe?

  Movement inside Nightjar. Maybe the fright could hear her. She kept flashing the light and clinking the clip against the tank.

  Yes—there it was: a human-shaped shadow moving inside the hold.

  Clink. Clink.

  What about my voice? She let a low tone burr through her throat, articulating around the mouthpiece. “Rr-r-r.”

  The fright burst back through the hole it had already made in Nightjar’s hull, enlarging it.

  Holy crap! It was an inhuman thing, entirely bent on killing her, equal parts repulsive and fascinating. It was, after all, a naked, animated mannequin with her own face. Sophie began to swim for that strip of net dangling below Garland. She moved slowly, until she was sure the wood fright had seen her, then kicked for all she was worth.

  It wasn’t clumsy in the water. Why would it be? That must be what I look like swimming. Skinny-dipping.

  Garland blew a few bubbles, then gestured with one hand, opening the fingers then closing them, repeatedly.

  Shut off the light? She doused it, kicking blindly in sudden blackness, hoping for the best.

  There was a splash. A pirate, diving down to secure a rope to Garland?

  Did you think they’d just use a robo-magnet to grab him? Which movie was that from? The Matrix?

  She reached the bottom edge of the net.

  How long before the wood fright caught up to her? She kept one hand twisted in the net; with the other, she checked to make sure her air tanks and hoses were clear.

  She didn’t climb—she didn’t want whoever was stringing up Garland to feel her scrambling around down here.

  If, if, if.

  If they took him aboard without killing him first.

  If they lifted her up without noticing.

  If the fright didn’t catch up with her before they boarded.

  She felt a little convulsion in the net, above, a thrashing that stopped abruptly. Then they were moving, drawn upward and toward the immolator.

  The urge to turn her light back on was all but irresistible.

  She kicked gently, raising herself at the speed of whatever winch was hauling them.

  Weighing you down, weighing you down like an anvil. Got your ship sunk, got Gale killed. Can’t imagine what you see in me, Garland.

  Magic, she thought glumly. Charming-pretty-smart-persuasive-fertile, remember?

  And lucky.

  She needed to be lucky now.

  She was ten feet below the surface, close enough to see Garland dangling above her, streaming the length of the fishing net beneath him, and the murk of the sea below. Where was the fright?

  Come on. Don’t you even want to kill me anymore?

  She started handing herself down the net, staying below, letting it pay out, looking, looking.

  There. And, oh—it was close!

  She reversed direction, climbing fast. As the net broke the surface, taking her weight, it stretched downward.

  A shout. Someone on Hawkwasp had spotted her.

  Her feet, in flippers, couldn’t get purchase within the net, so she paused, pulling one off. The fright was close; she didn’t dare do the other. Instead, she climbed up toward Garland, using arm strength and her left toes to grip the net.

  Calm descended, as it so often did in an emergency. Lifting one hand at a time, spinning, she looked around. The fright was doing the same thing, a sight that raised the hairs on her neck. It scanned past her, up to the net, to Garland, to the pirates hauling them up.

  Don’t kill him, don’t kill him. Sophie sent a desperate thought upward.

  The fright gave her an eager, hungry smile. Then it turned its gaze on Cly’s caravel, Sawtooth, bearing on their position but out of cannon range.

  It didn’t so much as glance at the turned-turtle lifeboat sheltering Kev, Selwig, and Daimon.

  Why would it? All this thing wanted was her.

  Having worked out to its satisfaction that there was nobody close enough to save her, her doppelganger began to climb in earnest.

  Sophie skinned off the second flipper, tossing it into the sea and ascending higher, toward Garland and Hawkwasp. The fright was strong, but it kept growing roots that bound themselves into the net’s strands, forcing it to jerk itself free of the threads each time it tried to lift itself higher.

  What’s your plan, Garland? They haul you aboard and I get up there unseen and the fright follows? No chance. They’ve already seen me.

  She imagined herself scrambling around the lower decks, chased by a deck-shredding wood fright.

  And the pirates doing nothing? Again, not likely.

  At least we got Bram to minimum safe distance.

  As the Hawkwasp crew pulled him the last few yards to their rail, Garland burst into motion, swinging out of their reach, leaping to grab the rope, and bounding aboard. Sophie felt the increased lift of the net dragging upward as his weight came off it, jerking her upward a foot, or even two.

  The fright froze.

  Little roots and suckers started running up and down the net, extending toward the hull—where they smoked heavily, even as they penetrated the boards.

  She changed direction, crawling down toward the fright. The net was thickening up, its weight dragging it against the side of the ship as the fright kept growing.

  She shifted, reaching down for a loose frill of net and flinging its edge around and down, catching the thing on the elbow. More tendrils grew, tangling the fright’s arm.

  Its hand met the side of the hull with a snap and grew into the wood. It tore itself free with a splintering crack.

  Now Garland was leaping over the side, trailing a rope and rappelling down toward her.

  “Sophie!” He reached out, caught her hand, and swung her away from the net, running against the deck, supported by the rope.

  “It didn’t work, I take it? Whatever it was?” she said.

  “No.”

  The fright had both hands pressed to the hull now, sticking like Spider-Man. Its pose put her in mind of a small lizard, an anole or chameleon. Humps of moss and little plant runners were spreading out from it, and when it crabbed closer, in single-minded pursuit of Sophie, it had to rip its hands free, sending a
rain of wood chips down to the water. They sizzled when they hit.

  Garland said, “They aren’t going to let us dangle here for long.”

  She glanced east, past the Nightjar crew in their lifeboats. Sawtooth was almost in the game now, closing to cannon range.

  “The fright’ll stick to Hawkwasp’s hull—let’s rush her. A good push and she’ll do some real damage when she busts free.”

  He nodded. “Ready?”

  She pressed her feet against the ship. “Go!”

  They swung back, forward, then back again. The fright paused, evaluating, thoughtfully moving its hands and feet to avoid getting too tightly bound into the deck.

  “She’s so like me,” Sophie said.

  Garland looked at the fright, coughed, and nodded.

  Oh, teeth. She’s naked. “I meant she thinks like me.”

  “Oh. Yes. That follows.”

  They swung forward, and Garland got a hand on the fright’s bicep, looping the line of rope around its arm and thereby binding them to her. Roots obligingly burst out of its elbow, entangling it, but it only had eyes for Sophie. It grabbed for her throat.

  Sophie caught it with both hands, wrestling the wooden version of herself, trying to brace her feet against the roots growing outward from the thing’s body as she worked to force its elbow against the outer hull of the ship.

  It was much stronger than she was.

  “Commit, commit,” she grunted. “Commit!”

  The elbow bounced off the hull, stuck, and made a small dent as the fright jerked free, once again reaching for Sophie’s throat. Simultaneously, it kicked out at Garland, almost catching him in the hip. The roots in its other foot were making serious inroads on Hawkwasp’s hull. Boards lumped and separated, like a sidewalk breaking under the onslaught of underground oak roots.

  Hawkwasp was buckling, cracking. The fright would make a big hole, albeit one above the immolator’s waterline.

  Maybe I can get past it and run inside, Sophie thought, finding the strength to heave, once, and drive the wooden elbow back against the dented hull. Lure it amidships and—

  And then everything changed.

  The figure shocked in her grip, then turned into boards. These fell, silently, even as Sophie and Garland, disconnected from rope and the fright’s tangle of roots, dropped off the side of the immolator.