by Rj Barker
“I do not know,” he said. “And it is not my blood. Jennil was there one moment and then gone the next.” He glanced down at his boot and spur upon the slate. And something else: a darkness worming its way across the deck, a single line of movement between Solemn Muffaz and Yerffoeg, and the story his father had told came flooding back. He knew what had happened here, knew the terrible danger they were all in. Those on the deck of Keyshanpike and those back on Tide Child. The black line moved, whip-fast. A tentacle that curled up and around Yerffoeg and before he had time to scream it pulled him from the deck. As it happened, Joron gave sound to the horror. Shouting out a warning the top of his voice.
“Toothreach!” he screamed. “It’s a toothreach!” And he didn’t know what to do. Was frozen in that moment by the terror his father had imparted in him. The toothreach: the great eye of the sea, the snatching tentacles that ate you slow and alive, always hungry just as the sea was always hungry, and death to ship and crew alike.
“Form a circle,” shouted Solemn Muffaz and all jumped to his order. “Weapons!” Curnows came out and were brandished at the encroaching mist and it all came rushing back, his father’s voice: “Clear air, Joron my boy, for them to watch for prey, then mist to hunt in. They watch and wait and plan; a malign intelligence they are.”
“So you must run?”
“No, boy, for that is what they want.”
“Then how do I escape one, father?”
“If I knew that, boy, I’d be shipwife of a boneship not a fisher in a flukeboat.”
And his father’s laughter floated away, vanishing into the mist for there was no laughter here.
“We need to get to Tide Child, run for it” shouted Gavith.
“Hold!” shouted Joron, grabbing Gavith by the arm before he moved. “The beast wants us to run.”
“Hag’s breath,” said Mastir, one of the seaguard. “It’s a beast, it is not clever.” And he broke from the circle of weapons, running for the gangplank and this time Joron saw it, the black whip in the mist. One second Mastir was there and the next he was gone. But the creature must have known it was seen now, and Mastir did not die silently like Jennil and Yerffoeg, his screaming carried through the mist. Joron and his small circle stood breathing hard and hot, weapons extended.
“Never seen nothing so fast,” said Oast.
“Ey, the deckkeeper’ll get us out though,” said another voice.
“No beast’ll put down Meas’s boy,” said a third voice and Joron felt a tremendous weight on his shoulders, as though he coasted through the ocean and all the water in the world pressed down on him.
“Toward the ship’s gallowbows,” he whispered, his heart beating within his breast, breath coming fast. “They are untrussed and primed, step as I call it.” Then he raised his voice. “Toothreach, Farys!” he shouted. “All aboard Tide Child be wary!”
“Deckkeeper!” came the call from Tide Child, “are you hurt?”
“No, Farys, but we have lost Jennil, Yerffoeg and Mastir. Defend yourselves and watch well, for this beast is quicker than the Hag when she’s hungry. Get the gullaime to blow this mist away. If we can see it, we can loose on it.”
“As you say, Deckkeeper,” then he heard her voice again, as she spoke to the rest of the crew. “Bows out, keyshanpikes too, form into groups, protect each other. Shut all our bowpeeks!” And he smiled to himself despite the fear that filled him, and his sword leapt left and right, looking for a target that could move so quickly he would be lucky to see it.
“Seaward or landward, D’keeper?” said Gavith. “Where do you think the Hag-cursed thing is?” Joron did not know, could not know. He only knew it was out there.
“We should get to Keyshanpike’s for’ard seaward bow,” said Solemn Muffaz, “has the largest arc of target of all the bows, best chance for us. And had bolts stacked by it.”
“Mastir died to seaward of us,” added Cwell, “I’d put coin on it.”
“But is it furthest from Tide Child,” said a voice behind him. Vud? Or Yancy? One of them, he thought.
“Stow that panicky talk,” said Solemn Muffaz. “’Tis nothing worse than waiting for another ship to loose is all. You listen to the d’keeper, we have Meas’s luck with us.”
“Step,” shouted Joron and they took a step across the deck, heard a scream, from Tide Child. “And step,” he said and they moved. A scream and Vud was gone from behind Joron, nothing but mist there until the circle closed. Terror now, of a different kind to that in battle. He heard it in his crew’s breathing. Knew this was becoming close to too much for them, that after so long running this may be what broke them. Then he felt the pressure on his ears that told him the gullaime worked, and a cold wind blew across him, picking up the mist and shifting it.
“Run for that bow!” he shouted, for now was the time for running. That part of him that understood command knowing that his party needed to act.
They ran.
Pell-mell across the deck, fast as they could for the for’ard seaward bow. As they ran Joron was sure he could feel the air being split by tentacles, hear the crack as they cut the thinning mist apart. At the same time he heard the twang and hiss of crossbows and bows loosing arrows. Then he was at the gallowbow and that part of his mind that was fleet took over. He forgot to be afraid. Forgot anything but duty and the rote words that would arm the weapon in front of him.
“Solemn Muffaz, load it. Gavith, loose it, Chirot and Alsa, on the spinner. Oast and Cwell organise the rest to protect us.”
A chorus of “Ey, D’keeper,” as familiar routine overtook them. This was better. Better than standing in fear, this was doing something, getting ready to strike back.
“Mist is thinning further, D’keeper!” shouted Chirot as she worked the spinner.
“Good, Spin the bow!”
“No!” screamed from behind him. He turned, and another of the seaguard vanished. But the mist was truly clearing now, Tide Child was visible as a black mass and he could see the rumpspine of Keyshanpike.
“Ready, D’keeper!” shouted Solemn Muffaz and Joron turned back.
“Load!” As the gullaime’s wind took hold more mist was blown away. Solemn Muffaz handled the heavy bolt into the weapon and for the first time Joron saw the creature that attacked them.
“Hag’s breath,” he said. He had heard tales of the toothreach, met some who said they had come across them, but each description of the beast was wildly different, and now he knew that each was wildly wrong. A mass of writhing flesh rose from the sea about four shiplengths out from them, difficult to judge how far with the remains of the mist still confusing his sense of distance. The creature had no real form, was only a churning knot of ever-moving blue-black tentacles and within it was a single yellow eye, with a black pupil that twitched and moved from side to side, seemingly without focus – though Joron had no doubt the creature knew they were there, had seen the evidence of it. “Aim,” he said, his voice quiet, but no one responded, all of them staring at the creature.” Joron took a deep breath. Was it his imagination or did the air stink? “Aim!” he shouted again, and the bow was pushed around. No need for him to help, his deckchilder were well trained. “Loose as you will! Pay that thing back for those it has taken!” They cheered as Gavith pulled the cord and the bow let out its terrible bark and the bolt shot across the distance between the ship and the beast, vanishing into its twisting body. The toothreach let out a scream, a painful wail as if from a hundred mouths. A great roar went up from those around the gallowbow.
“Hold!” shouted Joron. “Spin again!” And as they tensioned the bow he watched the toothreach. If their loosing had damaged the creature it showed no sign of it. The tentacles still writhed, the eye still jerked and twitched. It let out that high pitched, teeth-grating scream again, and spraying from its sides came thick clouds of mist.
“The mist,” said Gavith, “the creature makes the mist.”
“Don’t be foolish, boy,” grunted Solemn Muffaz as he lifted the
bolt into the gallowbow. “Too much mist here for that.” Then, as if it heard Solemn Muffaz, the creature screamed again and the water at the beak of Keyshanpike erupted.
“Another one!” shouted Gavith, as a wave of stink, worse than the smell of Tide Child’s bilges, washed over the deck, a choking, retching miasma. “Another one, Deckkeeper!” screamed Gavith. “There’s another one!”
“I see it, pull the bow round,” shouted Joron. “We’ll put a bolt in the near one’s eye!” They swung the gallowbow around just as tentacles shot out from this new toothreach and it let out that vile scream. Black ropey tentacles from the beast wrapped around the spines and the rails of the ship. One of the seaguard stepped forward and brought his sword down, hard, on a tentacle wrapped around the rail as the ship groaned and began to list. The curnow cut through the tentacle and it fell to the deck. Laid there, still writhing, and Joron saw that along the inner edge of the black rope of flesh were twin rows of tiny round mouths, sharp triangular teeth still working as if the last thought going through the dying flesh was one of hunger.
“Loose!” Joron shouted, though he could not take his eyes from the pulsing mouths, even as he fought against gravity to keep his balance on the rapidly tilting deck. With a cough the bolt was loosed and he saw it flash past, down the ship and into the toothreach, and whether this one was quicker than its sibling or had watched and learned from beneath the freezing water he did not know. He only saw that it caught the bolt in a mass of black tentacles, then tossed it away. As it did, Gavith pointed, shouting something, and a tentacle shot out, wrapping around his arm, pulling him forward. His head crashed against the arms of the gallowbow and he went limp. Only the quick reactions of Solemn Muffaz saved him; the big man grabbed his body, holding it tight and the toothreach pulled, Gavith and the deckmother falling to the deck. Solemn Muffaz jamming one foot on the rail, one on the gallowbow’s base.
“Hag’s sake,” he screamed, “cut the tentacle!”
“I cannot reach!” shouted Chirot, and just as she finished speaking tentacle wrapped around her and pulled her screaming from the deck. Joron looked down, saw Solemn Muffaz struggling not to let go of the unconscious man, saw Gavith’s arm stretched across the bonerail and knew there was only one thing he could do, or both Gavith and Solemn Muffaz would be dragged off the ship. He brought his sword down on Gavith’s upper arm. The sharp blade cutting through flesh but not right through, white bone showed in the second before blood started flooding from the wound. Joron raised his sword once more and struck again, screaming as he brought the blade down as hard as he could on the arm. Once, twice, three times until he severed it completely and the lower arm was whipped away, the tentacle claiming it and the boy’s unconscious body fell back onto Solemn Muffaz.
“Bind the wound if you can, Deckmother,” he shouted, then turned, pointing his blade at the toothreach as it pulled once more on the ship, dragging it down with a jerk that unseated them all and pulled the beak of the ship beneath the water. Joron fell to the deck and luckily so, for he saw a tentacle shoot over his head and then withdraw.
“Loose!”
He heard Barlay’s voice, loud and clear, and a rain of burning arrows shot out from Tide Child, landing on the toothreach, but if it noticed or cared he could not tell.
“Deckkeeper!” Farys’s voice shouting from Tide Child. “Get back here! We’ll put fire to Keyshanpike!” It was a good plan, Joron knew it. More tentacles, waving across the deck above Joron’s head. Grasping whatever they could, the ship, the spars. With a screech of aching bone the top spars of Keyshanpike were wrenched away.
“Do it, Farys! Burn it!” he shouted, looking around, only four of them remained – him, Oast, Solemn Muffaz and Gavith, who was in no state to help. “We will never make it back!”
Did she reply? Did she scream out “No, Deckkeeper”? Did she fear for him? Did she fear for her crewmates? Joron did not know, would never know. For the words that rang out next seemed miraculous, and strange and yet utterly inevitable, as inevitable as the visions of moving through the depths that haunted Joron’s dreams.
“Keyshan rising!”
19
The Leviathan Returns
He had not called it up. Had not brought it to them. Had not gathered the Gullaime’s song around him like a cloak. Had not wished it nor considered it in his fear and panic. Yet knew he should have expected it. The dreams had been getting stronger ever since they had sighted a keyshan. The dreams of soaring through the deeps, of incredible pressure on his shoulders, of the blue light, filtered through an uncountable watery distance.
Dreams of hunger.
It came, of its own bidding and to feed its own desires and he knew that even before he saw it. Felt the water cut apart by the sharp beak, felt it run along the vast body, felt it beaten into swirls by flippers as big as boneships. The toothreach must have sensed it too, the black tentacles slipped from the spines and rails of Keyshanpike and the ship began to right itself.
“Grab Gavith!” shouted Joron. “Back to Tide Child!” Solemn Muffaz scooped up Gavith and flung the boy over his shoulder and Cwell helped Joron up. As they turned they saw the rapidly advancing hill of water in the distance that marked the keyshan’s approach. Glancing back to see the toothreach behind them, venting mist, the air filling with a new sound, an unpleasant basso hum, and then they were running across the slate. The plank between Keyshanpike and Tide Child lost, ropes were flung, hands outstretched, and still the hill of water came upon them, and Tide Child rose and rose, Keyshanpike following it, the sudden tilting of the deck scattering Joron and the deckchilder before they made it to their own ship. A deckchild fell from low in Tide Child’s rigging, hit the deck of Keyshanpike and tumbled past Joron as the deck tilted further and further. He reached out, hand grabbing at cloth, a momentary wrench on his shoulder, the deckchilder swinging round. The face of the bonewright Colwulf staring up at him, her mouth open in an “O”, and then he could no longer hold on and Colwulf tumbled away down the crazily tilted deck, body smashing into the bonerail, bouncing over it before it fell into the water.
Below them passed the vast body of the keyshan: long beak, fiery white eyes, ice-blue body in the ice-blue water, almost a part of it. As it passed beneath the two ships the hill of water pushed before the sea dragon passed and the two ships fell into the trough, screaming and moaning as hulls were forced together, the sound of smashing varisk and gion as the spines entangled, rigging and spars falling from above in a heavy lethal rain, cracking the slate; and yet Joron did not raise a hand to try and protect himself, he was mesmerised by that body passing beneath and by the huge tail propelling the arakeesian through the water.
It dived. A twist so quick it made the thing seem small, a turning of its body as it went into the depths. The toothreach let out their mournful basso call.
“D’keeper, we must get to Tide Child,” said Solemn Muffaz, once more picking up the limp body of Gavith.
“Ey,” he said, stumbling for the rail, touching his temple and finding his fingers bloody. Tide Child’s deck’s was havoc, the for’ard rail ripped away and hanging from the hooked and serrated hull of Keyshanpike. Rope hanging from above like vines in the gion forest in full growth, deckchilder gathering up fallen spars under the eye of Farys.
“Don’t throw it over, you fools, we have little enough stores as is!” she shouted. Broken material piling against the base of the spines. Then Joron, Solemn Muffaz, Cwell and Gavith, still unconscious and held by the deckmother, were being shouted at to cross the gap between the two ships, to time their leaps for the moments when the two ships were closest, the ocean seeming to breathe in and out as if recovering from the passage of the great beast that had vanished into its depths and distracted the toothreach.
“D’keeper, jump!” Hands held out to him as the ships came together, some missing fingers, some gnarled with the Hag’s Kiss, some brown some white or of the many colours in between and all beckoning him on to their safety. He threw
himself across, grabbed by many, pulled onto the deck. Turning as the ships once more parted. Leaving behind Cwell, and Solemn Muffaz with the limp body of Gavith over his shoulder. Behind them the sea. Rising once more and within in it a writhing black shape, a bilious yellow eye. A toothreach. Tentacles wrapping round Keyshanpike once more.
And the keyshan returned.
The ocean a flowering bud, splitting apart around the rotten fruit of the toothreach, the beak of the keyshan as a white stamen, the water as petals. The ear-splittingly loud sounding of the keyshan as it rose beneath the toothreach, burning white eyes closed against whipping tentacles. The hoooom of the toothreach taken within the jaws. More tentacles, ripping through the air, wrapping tightly around Keyshanpike, pulling the ship away from Tide Child.
“Catch!” shouted Solemn Muffaz. “Catch the boy!” And with a great heave he threw Gavith across the widening gap, limp body flopping through the air like a dead fish, crashing down among the throng waiting on Tide Child’s deck as Keyshanpike was pulled away by the water. Bones groaned and complained as the tangled spines and spars of the two ships pulled apart and crashed back together. Once, twice, three times. He saw Gavith taken below. Deckchilder staggering down the deck tossed about by the sudden violent movement of the sea between the ships in the moment before they slammed back together again.
Like his father’s body ground between the hulls.
“Cut those spines loose!”
Beak open, rising and rising, pulling on the ships. The terrible grinding of bone on bone.
“Cut us loose, Hag curse you!”
Deckchilder running up the rigging with axes and curnows. On Keyshanpike Solemn Muffaz stood, ready to meet his fate when the boneship was ripped away from the black ship. Behind him the Keyshan started to fall back into the water, shaking its massive head as black tentacles crawled over its body, ripping away clouds of its thick feathery coating that fell around them like snow.