Zeb Bolt and the Ember Scroll

by Abi Elphinstone

  “You’re our prisoner now, so get below deck; whatever Mrs. Fickletint might say, we need those Stargold Wings. The Kerfuffle is powered by phoenix magic, so it can outpace fire krakens and ogre eels when it reaches full throttle, but with Morg on the loose, we’ll need to keep out of sight until we’re sure it’s safe.”

  The dragon screeched again, and Zeb threw himself over the benches toward Mrs. Fickletint, who was trying, in vain, to yank a trapdoor open. Zeb’s heart skittered. He had been adamant he wanted nothing to do with the girl and the chameleon, but it very much seemed like he was on the brink of a voyage with them.

  Chapter 9

  The Kerfuffle sped on, its golden sail juddering in the wind. Zeb couldn’t see the dragon—only miles and miles of mirror-bright sea—but he could hear it screeching, and the Bother-Ahead Beacon on the prow of the boat was still bright red.

  Mrs. Fickletint hopped up and down. “Gah! The enchanted trapdoor has gone and changed its security lock again! It was LIFT earlier—Laugh Intensely Five Times—but now it’s saying YANK and I can’t for the life of me remember what it stands for!”

  Zeb threw a panicked glance at the trapdoor under the chameleon and the four golden letters spelling YANK on top of it. Then Oonie began frantically nodding her head and blurting out a strange kind of song that started high, then dipped low.

  “Yodel and Nod Knowledgeably!” she cried between outbursts.

  The trapdoor sprang open, and Zeb glimpsed steps leading down into the hull. Mrs. Fickletint scampered to safety, then Oonie disappeared through the trapdoor. With the dragon’s cries ringing in his ears, Zeb hurried down after her.

  It was not dark and cramped inside the hull as Zeb had imagined, and this was because the Kerfuffle was simmering with magic. There couldn’t possibly have been room for a sweeping staircase leading down into a large cabin lit by lanterns, and yet there was. Because magic deals in impossibilities all the time.

  Zeb pulled the trapdoor shut, drowning out the cries of the dragon, then inched down the stairs in disbelief. There was a long wooden table, raised on crab legs in the middle of the room, spread with maps and leather-bound books, and two cubbyholes either side. One contained a stove and numerous pots and pans, the other a little bed in front of a circular window looking out to sea. There were barrels crammed with gold jewels labeled SUNCHATTER and shelves cluttered with glass bottles, spinning globes, ink pots, and silver quills. And, at the far end of the cabin, there was a fire of blue flames blazing in a hearth before two threadbare armchairs.

  Zeb could no longer hear the dragon calling. The boat really did seem to be racing away from danger, as Oonie had said it would. The girl and the chameleon breathed a sigh of relief. As did Zeb. And so incredible was the Kerfuffle’s cabin that Zeb almost forgot about being cross and hard-core.

  “There’s no way all this can fit under the boat…,” he murmured. “It makes no sense.”

  “Magic never makes sense,” Oonie replied curtly as she stepped down into the cabin. “It just settles in and gets on with stuff.”

  From inside a jug on the table, Mrs. Fickletint raised a scaly brow at Zeb. “Oonie and I have been on board the Kerfuffle for six months now, and we’re only just getting to grips with all its quirks—but don’t you go thinking we’ve lost control of things around here. You’re our prisoner—one false move from you, we’ll feed you to the fire krakens.”

  Oonie spun the knife in her hand, and Zeb froze on the stairs. But then a miniature toad popped out from beneath a rug and began burping the alphabet backward. This was followed by a very large turtle—which Zeb had assumed was ornamental—that started scurrying around the cabin, straightening rugs and closing trunk lids.

  Mrs. Fickletint tried to keep her eyes on Zeb, but the turtle was proving a noisy distraction. “I’m all for employing a hurtle to keep the cabin shipshape, Oonie, but this one has no idea how to follow instructions. I distinctly told it that cabin cleaning was tomorrow and ironing was today.” The chameleon narrowed her eyes at the alphabet-burping toad. “And as for you… I swept the place for sea-hoppers after the commotion your lot caused when we stepped on board for the first time, and yet you just won’t leave, will you?”

  “Stop fussing, Mrs. Fickletint.” Oonie hadn’t shifted her gaze from Zeb. She raised her knife in one hand, then thrust out an open palm in Zeb’s direction with the other. “Hand over the Stargold Wings. Or else.”

  Zeb leapt back a step. “The Stargold Wings are going to help me build a new world, but—but I was thinking that when I find the Ember Scroll, I could write a very small continent for Unmappers and”—he motioned toward Mrs. Fickletint—“talking chameleons, if you’d like?”

  Oonie snorted. “That is the most stupid—and selfish—thing I’ve ever heard. Everyone here knows that if you steal the Unmapped magic to build a new world, you lose the Unmapped Kingdoms and the Faraway. You wipe out everyone.”

  Zeb looked at the floor. Surely Oonie didn’t know everything. There must be a way around mass extermination when you had the most powerful magic of all in your hands?

  Oonie was having none of it. “I’m the captain of the Kerfuffle, so as long as you’re on board, you’ll be following my rules. And I’m telling you that once we’ve shaken off Morg, we’ll be using the Stargold Wings to find the Ember Scroll. Because this ship is now on a mission to save the Unmapped Kingdoms and the Faraway.”

  Mrs. Fickletint flounced dramatically over the edge of her jug. “Does nothing I say sink in, Oonie? Must you leap toward risk quite so enthusiastically?”

  Oonie groaned. “This is a voyage we have to make, Mrs. Fickletint. Every day, another boat is drowned by the fire krakens and another Unmapper dies. Every day, a little more of Crackledawn’s magic fades. The water in the Gaping Gulf used to be so turquoise it glowed in the dark, but you’ve said yourself the sea there is black and all the sunchatter on the seabed is cursed. Then there was that Sunraider who said he saw a whole pod of silver whales washed up, dead, on the shore. And maybe Wildhorn has managed to cling on to its waterfalls and golden caves, but Morg and her Midnights are there now too. What do you think that means for our home—my hammock hanging from the snoozeaway tree and all my sea trinkets lining the branches? For your hollow inside the wibblebough sapling beside it and the little armchair Mr. Fickletint carved from enchanted driftwood? For the waterfall we love to swim beneath with your twenty-seven children? There’ll be nothing left. No Unmappers, Lofty Husks, or magical creatures either.”

  Tears stood in Mrs. Fickletint’s eyes now. “No more sipping wibblejuice at the Cheeky Urchin with the family after a day out Sunraiding with you. No more nights watching shooting stars and wishing on them for a phoenix to return.”

  Oonie took a deep breath. “If we don’t write a phoenix into life on the Ember Scroll, there will be nothing to go back to. It’ll be over for the Unmapped Kingdoms and the Faraway forever.”

  Zeb tried to think of the Faraway, and all its disappointments, rather than imagine Oonie’s home and Mrs. Fickletint’s enormous family. “I don’t care what happens to the Faraway. It’s not as if I have friends or a family to go back to,” he muttered.

  But as he said those words, the little pouch around his neck began to glow again.

  Mrs. Fickletint sat bolt upright in her jug and gasped. “The Stargold Wings—they really are inside that pouch, aren’t they? They’re shining!”

  Zeb’s heart quickened and Oonie took a step closer. “If they’re shining, that means there’s still phoenix magic left inside them. They might be able to show us the way to the Ember Scroll.…” Oonie turned to the chameleon. “The Stargold Wings led the Faraway boy to our ship and now they’re glowing. It feels like they know we’ve got a part to play in saving the world. So, what do you say, Mrs. Fickletint? Are you in?”

  The chameleon looked from the pouch to the girl, then with a weary sigh, she said: “Of course I’m in, Oonie. Wherever you go, I go too, especially when it comes to saving Cra
ckledawn. I just—I just wish you’d see that you don’t have anything to prove in all this. That the way you are is absolutely enough.” She paused. “And that if we fail, which we might well do, it won’t be your fault.”

  Zeb sensed there were things about Oonie he didn’t understand, but he realized something about the chameleon then—she was loyal. And quite without warning, Zeb felt a yearning deep inside him for friendship, for someone to say they’d be rooting for him on this voyage. He told himself to get a grip.

  Mrs. Fickletint took a deep breath and jabbed a paw in the direction of the lanterns dangling from the roof. “The Bother-Ahead Beacons down here are no longer red. They’re yellow, which means we’ve outsailed the fire krakens—for now.… But those beasts can sniff out phoenix magic better than most creatures. They’re the ones cursing our sunchatter, after all, and turning the ocean black. So, if they gain ground and catch even a whiff of the Stargold Wings, they’ll be onto us in a flash. Somehow, we need to ask the Stargold Wings where to go for the Ember Scroll. And we need to do it fast.”

  Oonie smiled at the chameleon, then she turned and set a very determined foot on the first stair. “If you hand over the Stargold Wings right this instant, we’ll keep you hidden from Morg and her Midnights for the duration of this voyage. Try anything funny, and we’ll shove you up on deck to be eaten by that fire kraken Mrs. Fickletint mentioned.”

  Zeb wasn’t about to give up on his plan of building a new world for himself, but he didn’t fancy being gobbled up by Morg’s Midnights either. He was starting to realize he needed to work with the girl and the chameleon, for the time being, anyway. So, he lifted the pouch from his neck and thrust it into Oonie’s palm.

  “I have no idea what’s going on with the magic in this place, but I do know one thing: None of us are going to get what we want if Morg is alive. I’m in for this voyage because we both need the Stargold Wings to find the Ember Scroll. You can write the harpy out of existence, and I can use all the Unmapped magic to sort out who’s living where.”

  Mrs. Fickletint winced. “Not quite in the spirit of things, but I suppose it’s a start. What do you think, Oonie?”

  The girl shrugged, and then her face, lit by the glow of the Stargold Wings, broke into a smile. “This,” she whispered, holding up the pouch as she felt her way over the wings inside, “this feels like hope.”

  Oonie made her way carefully down the stairs and placed the pouch on the table.

  “Watch out!” Zeb called, rushing after her. “The wings might fly off?!”

  “You can’t hope in something without trusting it first,” Oonie replied. “It would be like wishing on a star without believing in the night.”

  She opened the pouch, and the Stargold Wings fluttered out. They hovered above the maps on the table, and the cabin fizzed with magic. The multicolored sand in the glass bottles on the shelves swirled, the sunchatter in the barrels whispered, and the pages of the books on the table rustled.

  Then the wings flew over to the blue flames at the end of the cabin. There was no wood paneling boxing the boat in here, just large oval windows looking out into the deep blue sea. The wings hovered before the fire, and even Zeb couldn’t hide his wonder as they scattered gold sparks, which settled in the air as recognizable shapes against the flames.

  “Words,” he breathed. “There are words in the fire!”

  Zeb, Oonie, and Mrs. Fickletint walked closer, spellbound by the magic of the Stargold Wings, until they were all standing before the flames. And so enthralled was Zeb that he didn’t notice Oonie nudge the chameleon and whisper, ever so quietly: “What does it say?”

  Mrs. Fickletint began reading aloud:

  “Sail on south to the Final Curtain.

  Step beyond all you know is certain.

  Seek the cave that has never been found.

  Claim the scroll before the moon is round.”

  The sparks faded, and Zeb shook himself. “Seek a cave that has never been found?”

  “Before the next full moon?” Mrs. Fickletint cried. “It’s a well-known fact that Unmapped magic is at its strongest when the moon is round, but the next full moon is in just four nights’ time!”

  “And what kind of place is the Final Curtain?” Oonie said. “It doesn’t sound like the Ember Scroll is up at the sun.…”

  Zeb stared into the flames, hoping more words might appear. The Stargold Wings slipped soundlessly away from the fire and flew into the pocket of his jeans. He wasn’t used to things sticking around, but something about the wings choosing to settle in his pocket made him feel just a little bit less alone.

  Mrs. Fickletint tilted her head toward Zeb. “You may have given up on the Faraway and all the magic keeping it alive, but I’d say magic clearly hasn’t given up on you.”

  From the tone of the chameleon’s voice, Zeb wondered whether Mrs. Fickletint’s opinion of him might be changing a little. He was a prisoner aboard the Kerfuffle still, but he got the impression that being held captive by Oonie and Mrs. Fickletint might be somewhat different from being trapped by Morg.

  Oonie was back at the table now, rummaging through the maps there. “We’ve no idea what kind of landmark the Final Curtain is, but the message from the Stargold Wings told us to ‘sail on south,’ which means the Blackfangs is the right destination, for now. The only confusing thing is that there’s no mention of anything of note beyond the southern boundary. Nefarious Flood just sketched out a few islands with the words: ‘Not Much Here, but Worth a Visit If You’re Really Bored (and you’ve got the stomach for the Blackfangs).’ ” She sighed. “It’s too risky going up on deck now to write a new destination onto the dragonhide sail, but once we reach the Blackfangs, we’ll need to tell the Kerfuffle to sail on to the Final Curtain, whatever that might be. Then we’ll just have to hope she knows where to go.…”

  Zeb was watching Oonie carefully now. Because the maps spread over the table, he realized, were blank. At a glance, Oonie looked like she was scouring them, but close up Zeb could see she wasn’t using her eyes at all. She was using her hands, feeling her way over the parchment, and in the light cast by the Bother-Ahead Beacons, Zeb could just make out the little bumps that seemed to be guiding her thoughts.

  Then suddenly Mrs. Fickletint’s words earlier made sense. There was something different about the way Oonie had been born.

  “Braille,” Zeb said quietly as he remembered the boy in his class back home who read stories by running his hands over bumps on the page because he couldn’t see. He looked up at Oonie. “You’re blind.”

  Chapter 10

  Mrs. Fickletint flashed green, shot out of her jug, then began a charge across the table toward Zeb. But Oonie knew the ways of the chameleon better than anyone else, so she felt about over the table until she reached the reptile, then she scooped her up into her hands.

  “It’s okay, Mrs. Fickletint,” she whispered. “It’s okay.”

  Oonie looked at Zeb. The same way she had when Zeb stepped aboard the Kerfuffle. Her eyes didn’t meet his exactly, but they fixed on a part of him all the same, as if she had found something in him that even he didn’t know was there. She raised her chin, daring Zeb to make a wrong move.

  Zeb was quiet for a moment. This was, after all, a girl who had a knife in her pocket and most probably wrestled giant squid in her spare time. She looked stronger than all of his class back home, stronger than many of the grown-ups he’d met too. And she seemed so completely in charge on the Kerfuffle, it felt impossible that she couldn’t see.

  Zeb tried to imagine how he would feel without his sight, how frightened he’d be of the dark magic racing after them. But Oonie had an instinct for where things were, and she moved with a calm sort of confidence that made her seem much older than she really was.

  “There was a boy in my class back home who was blind,” Zeb found himself saying nervously. “He scored top grades in every test he took, and he made a speech in Debating Club last term about how he wanted to run for presiden
t one day.”

  Oonie held her head high as if considering this. Then she shrugged. “I would never work in politics. Not nearly enough voyages.”

  She turned back to her maps, but Mrs. Fickletint wasn’t through with Zeb. She wanted to make sure he knew who he was messing with.

  She puffed herself up on Oonie’s shoulder. “Six months ago, Oonie was chosen by the Lofty Husks themselves to become Crackledawn’s youngest Sunraider.”

  “That’s enough, Mrs. Fickletint,” Oonie warned. “We’ve got work to do.”

  The chameleon, who was entering her stride now, dropped down onto the table and wagged a paw at the boy. “Normally, you have to wait until you’re eighteen and you’ve reached the end of your formal lessons to roam the seas for sunchatter, the gold jewels found on the ocean floor that whisper the magical sounds of the sun—”

  Zeb started. “Sunlight makes a noise?”

  “Every sunrise and every sunset you see in your world is, in fact, a symphony,” Mrs. Fickletint explained. “A unique piece of music made up of a thousand sounds hauled up from the bottom of the sea by Sunraiders here in Crackledawn.”

  Zeb wasn’t sure how many more surprises he could handle in one day. There should be some sort of limit, he felt, because all these revelations were making him feel very unsettled. But the idea that sunrises and sunsets might be symphonies was, to him, the most magical thing he’d heard so far.

  Mrs. Fickletint went on. “Sunsmiths on Wildhorn tip the sunchatter into cauldrons and mix it with marvels to form ink. Then they use this ink to write symphonies onto the sun scrolls, which they play once on the organ in Cathedral Cave before sending on to the Faraway.”

  Zeb was struggling to keep up, but as he eyed the barrel of sunchatter beyond the table, he was filled with a sudden desire to hear all those sounds strung together in a melody. He tried to focus on the logistics of this to make sure he wasn’t being taken for a fool. “Marvels,” he said. “What are they?”