by Paul Stewart
‘Come on, Cade,’ said Gart, clapping him on the shoulder. ‘We need to tell Thorne and the others what we saw.’
The pair of them crossed the under-balcony and climbed the stairs to the first floor of the tree-cabin, where they emerged in a narrow corridor, dimly lit with wall candles. A low babble of voices was coming from behind a polished copperwood door. Gart turned the handle and pushed the door open, and the pair of them went in.
For Cade, entering Blatch Helmstoft’s meeting chamber was like stepping back in time. At first glance, it resembled rooms he had known back in the city of Great Glade.
There were sumptuous satin curtains at the windows and plush rugs on the polished wooden floor, intricate patterns picked out in deep reds, greens and blues; there was a detailed tapestry on one wall showing Maris Verginix and the lost children founding the Free Glades. The furniture was made of varnished darkwood: a couch upholstered with leaf-patterned brocade and strewn with silk cushions; straight-back chairs, armchairs and footstools. And there were other items dotted about the chamber. A tall, three-legged table. A glass cabinet containing crystal vases and delicate wood-amber carvings. A broad blackwood chest, inlaid with hammelhorn ivory depicting Deepwoods creatures . . .
This could be a grand salon in a prosperous merchant’s mansion on the shore of the New Lake district, Cade thought.
On closer inspection, though, the differences were plain. A startling array of goblin weapons on the far wall, Blatch’s magnificent collection of white trog crystal shards on a desk top and an extraordinary splayed skeleton of a rotsucker suspended from the roof beams were all indications of the savage, untamed world of the Deepwoods all about them.
Beneath the skeleton, seated at a black ironwood table, sat a council of war.
Blatch Helmstoft was polishing his wire-rimmed spectacles with a square of blue velvet. In front of him was a parchment notebook, a leadwood pencil lying on an opened page full of diagrams and annotations.
Beside Blatch was Thorne. The fisher goblin was wearing his old military overcoat. Cade saw the patch stitched to the sleeve, the words picked out in embroidered letters, 1st Low Town Regt. Laid out in front of him on the table were five types of phraxmusket bullets. Phineal was sitting next to him, his crest glowing the same anxious green as his webfoot brothers outside as he fidgeted with a copperwood spyglass.
At the end of the table, looming over the others, was the clan chief Cade and Phineal had encount-ered in the Western Woods. His heavy brow tattoos and snowbird-feather cape marked him out as the high chief of the hammerhead nations of the Western Woods. And as Cade and Gart entered, he turned and was about to speak when the door on the opposite side of the room burst open and Celestia hurried in, Rumblix at her side. Tug came lumbering in after them.
‘Cade! Gart!’ Celestia exclaimed, and she strode across the chamber towards them, her arms open wide – only to be knocked aside by Rumblix, who bounded past her and jumped up at Cade.
‘Easy, boy.’ Cade grinned, ruffling the prowlgrin’s sleek grey fur as he tickled his back and neck. ‘I’m pleased to see you too. And you, Celestia. And Tug!’
‘Tug much better now,’ said Tug, a broad smile spreading across his features. He tapped his head with a spatula finger. ‘Tug was sleepy, but now he’s wide awake.’
His friend dwarfed everyone else in the meeting chamber as he stood before Cade, arms outstretched. Cade stepped forward and was enveloped in a hefty embrace.
‘I’m glad you’re feeling better,’ Cade said. ‘But what’s this you’re wearing?’
Tug released Cade and looked down at the apron. It was covered in pockets containing vials, wads of bandages and tightly bundled sacks.
‘Tug is my assistant,’ said Celestia, patting Tug affectionately on the shoulder. ‘I’ve been teaching him how to help me, and he’s a quick learner,’ she said lightly. Then her face grew more serious. ‘Have you brought the supplies, Gart?’ she asked. ‘The homespun for bandages?’
‘It’s down in my phraxlighter,’ he told her. ‘Three bales.’
Celestia frowned. ‘You think that’ll be enough?’
Gart and Cade exchanged a glance.
‘I think we’re going to need all the bandages we can lay our hands on,’ said Gart quietly.
‘And weapons?’ said Thorne, looking up from the bullets on the table in front of him.
Gart nodded. ‘Some,’ he said. ‘Eight phraxmuskets and ammunition.’
‘Come,’ said Celestia, taking Tug by the arm. ‘You’ll help me unload, won’t you, Tug?’
‘Tug help,’ he said happily as he followed Celestia to the door.
Thorne gestured to two chairs opposite the clan chief. ‘This is Baahl,’ he said. ‘I think you three have met before.’
The clan chief nodded. ‘You bring news of the sky-farers?’ he asked, peering at Gart, then Cade, his eyes glinting bright beneath his heavy brow tattoos.
Gart sat down, but Cade did not. Instead, he gripped the back of the second chair and took a moment to compose himself.
‘The mire-pearlers have discovered the Farrow Ridges,’ he said quietly.
For a moment, there was silence. Then Rumblix, sleek and well-groomed, brushed up against him and purred softly.
Cade swallowed. Blatch, Baahl, Phineal and Thorne were looking up at him.
Gart stared down at the table. ‘We were surprised at the sky-platform by a couple of their scouts, but Cade here dealt with them,’ he said without looking up. ‘But then . . .’ He paused and glanced at Cade. ‘You’ve got a way with words – you tell them, Cade. Tell them what we saw.’
‘It was a ship,’ said Cade. ‘Black and shuttered and strung with glowing skulls. As big as a skytavern, but built for war . . . and destruction. We hid below the treeline when we saw it. As we watched, it moored at the sky-platform and then began to open up. Clanking and rattling. Gears grinding. The shutters in the decks slid back and the hatches along the hull rose like a black beetle with a hundred wings. Then the crew came out. Cloddertrogs, flatheads, mobgnomes, fourthlings. All armed with phraxmuskets and pistols, staves and swords . . .’
‘I have a thousand warriors,’ said Baahl, gathering his feathered cape around him. ‘If we strike first . . .’
Cade shook his head. ‘Then the final hatch opened,’ he said. ‘At the centre of the fore-deck. A phraxcannon appeared, on a rotating platform, with four phrax-engineers at the controls. We watched them as they loaded it and trained it on Fifth Lake Village. Then, methodically, they fired it, again and again, and building after building exploded into flaming balls of fire. By the time we crept away, there was nothing left but smoking ruins.’ Cade looked across at Phineal, whose crest was now a mournful blue colour. ‘I’m so sorry, Phineal,’ he said.
The webfoot had his head in his hands.
‘Again,’ he said, bleakly, raising his head and looking around the table at the others. ‘I’ve seen all this before. At the four lakes. They arrive at a town or city in their skyships and make a show of force. To intimidate the inhabitants, to show that resistance is futile. Then they hole up in their ships, hovering over their intended target, carrying out the occasional raid – but all the while they’re plotting. The mire-pearlers eyeing up potential slaves and resources to plunder – and the phrax-engineers working out the best way to harvest them. Then, when they’re good and ready, they strike. It may take weeks, months even, but strike they will. And when they do . . .’ His voice broke. ‘We must prepare ourselves. We must resist . . .’
‘But it won’t be easy. Not if we’re up against a phrax-cannon,’ said Thorne, picking up the bullets in front of him in a bunched fist. ‘We’re going to need weapons of our own – and plenty of them. Enough phraxmuskets and ammunition for a thousand warriors. And even then . . .’
‘And where do you propose we acquire such weapons?’ asked Blatch, tapping the end of his pencil on the opened notebook.
‘Not in Great Glade,’ said Gart thoughtfully. ‘The
place is crawling with mire-pearlers and their like. But maybe Hive?’ He turned to Thorne. ‘You know Hive, don’t you, Thorne?’
The fisher goblin shrugged. ‘Old comrades I served with back in the war,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘They could probably help us find phraxmuskets. But how do we pay for them?’
‘Wait.’
It was Celestia. Cade turned. She was standing by the door, Tug beside her, his arms full of bales of homespun. She crossed the room to a carved bureau and opened an ivory inlaid drawer. She reached inside and took out a stunning necklace of mire pearls, interspersed with glittering green marsh-gems. She laid it down on the table.
‘What’s this worth?’ she said, and Cade heard the catch in her voice.
‘But, Celestia,’ Blatch said softly, ‘your mother gave you that.’
Celestia smiled, her eyes as glittery as the gems as she held back tears. ‘She would have understood,’ she said, then gave a little laugh. ‘Besides, it’s ironic, don’t you think? Using mire pearls to help defeat mire-pearlers?’
Cade noticed Phineal’s brow furrow, and he knew that the webfoot felt uneasy about the pearls from any clam being used.
He caught Cade’s gaze, and nodded. ‘Desperate times demand desperate measures,’ he said.
Blatch reached out and patted his daughter’s hand, his eyes welling up behind his spectacles. ‘She’d be so very proud of you, Celestia, my dear,’ he said.
Gart cleared his throat. ‘May I?’ he asked Celestia, then picked up the necklace and examined it. ‘These pearls are exceptional,’ he said. ‘Should fetch five hundred hivers, I’d say – enough to buy fifty phraxmuskets, with ammunition.’
‘Fifty?’ said Celestia. ‘Is that all?’
Gart shrugged. ‘Phraxmuskets don’t come cheap,’ he said. ‘About eight hivers for an old militia model, rebored barrels and reconditioned phrax-mechanisms. Not the finest weapons, of course, but perfectly serviceable.’
They all looked at each other.
‘Fifty phraxmuskets,’ said Thorne, shaking his head. ‘It just isn’t enough.’
‘I was travelling to Hive when I first came to the Farrow Ridges,’ said Cade, pulling back the chair and sitting down. ‘The fourthling I was working for told me all about high-jumping . . .’
‘Over the central falls, yes,’ said Thorne. ‘Every two weeks. It’s the city’s main sport – but what’s that got to do with anything?’
‘Bets are placed on these races, isn’t that right?’ Cade went on.
‘They certainly are,’ said Thorne. ‘Fortunes have been made and lost in a day at the Hive high-jumping . . .’
‘And how much might one make if, say, one put five hundred hivers on a prowlgrin and rider to win?’ Cade asked.
‘That would depend on the odds,’ Blatch said, scribbling in his notebook. Phineal watched over his shoulder, his crest glowing bright orange. ‘An outsider at, say, twenty to one. That would be—’
‘Ten thousand hivers, plus your original stake,’ Gart broke in.
Cade smiled, his hand trailing over Rumblix’s head as the prowlgrin sat purring at his side. ‘And that would buy how many phraxmuskets?’ he asked.
‘A thousand,’ Gart announced. ‘And more than enough ammunition.’
‘That sounds more like it,’ Cade said, nodding. ‘So all we’d need to do is put our money on the winning prowlgrin. An unknown prowlgrin, so the odds would be high, but a sure-fire winner. A pedigree – possibly a pedigree grey . . .’
Thorne grinned. ‘I don’t suppose,’ he said, looking up as Rumblix nuzzled Cade’s hand, ‘you might know of such a prowlgrin, Cade?’
· CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE ·
A LARGE BIRD with a red breast and purple plumage tipped its wings and swooped down for a closer look at the small angular object flying across the sky beneath it. There was the odour of meat in the air. Maybe there was food to be had.
The phraxlighter caught the early-morning sun as it continued north, rose-coloured rays of light gleaming on the windows of its small flight-cabin, on the rudders at the stern, and on the carved hoverworm adorning its prow. From the under-funnel of its gently humming phraxchamber, a ribbon of pink-edged steam trailed back in a sinuous line, bright against the muted greens and browns of the Deepwoods forest below.
It was two weeks since the Hoverworm had set off from the Farrow Ridges with four on board, plus provisions – as much as the small vessel could carry.
They’d left the tree-cabin in the Western Woods under the cover of darkness, flown through that first day and anchored up at dusk for the night, then resumed their journey at daybreak the following morning. It was a routine they quickly got used to, despite the difficult conditions. They’d been plagued by bad weather; high winds and driving rain, freezing fog banks and sudden buffeting twisters. But at last, on this, the third week of their voyage, the conditions had finally begun to improve.
If everything went well, Gart said, they should make it to Hive in another two days. Three at the most.
Unspoken was the fact that time was of the essence. Every delay, every lost day, was more time away from the Farrow Lake. Sky willing they would make it back – and with weapons – before the mire-pearlers had destroyed their home and enslaved their friends.
Gart Ironside was in the cabin, standing at the wheel. He was wearing his pilot’s leather hood and gloves, and there was a scarf wound tightly round his neck. Every time he turned his head to check their latest position, the yellow-tinted glass of his goggles flashed in the sunlight.
Thorne Lammergyre sat next to him, perched on a built-in wooden bench and thumbing through an old notebook that he’d kept years earlier when he lived in Hive. He had a red-lead pencil in his mouth, which he would remove and use to circle anything he came across that he thought might be useful. The address of an old friend. The headquarters of the Hive Militia. A contact on the Sumpwood Bridge . . .
Outside on the aft deck, Cade Quarter was sitting with his back leaning against the stern. His collar was up and he had one of Blatch’s fur hats pulled down over his head because, although the sun had risen, the cold of the previous night had not yet released its grip. He’d have been colder still, were it not for the fact that the fourth member of the small group heading for Hive – Rumblix – was crouched down between his legs.
Every so often, Cade would dip his fingers into the jar of grease that sat on the deck by his side, then rub it into Rumblix’s joints and feet. Made from a mixture of hammelhorn fat, lakebird oil and woodcamphor, the grease was dark and pungent – but Rumblix loved it, purring so loudly as Cade massaged him that the deck vibrated beneath him.
‘Hey, a feathered visitor!’ Cade exclaimed as a red-breasted bird swooped down out of the sky and landed on the edge of the cabin roof. ‘We should make a wish!’ he said, remembering how skytavern passengers believed that birds from the Deepwoods landing on board brought good luck.
The red-breasted bird cocked its head to one side. Then, as Rumblix watched suspiciously, it flapped its wings and landed on the deck – a little too close to the bucket of offal for the prowlgrin’s liking. The purring stopped.
Grooming, then food. That was the way it was. First his master would oil his toes, file his claws and brush his fur, and then it was time for breakfast – his favourite part of the morning ritual.
A threatening growl started up in the back of Rumblix’s throat as the bird strode jerkily towards the bucket. Cade didn’t notice.
The trouble is, he was thinking, one wish really isn’t enough. We need to win a high-jumping race. We need to buy a thousand phraxmuskets – and as quickly as possible. And we need to defeat the mire-pearlers. Cade was wondering whether a wish for ‘success’ might cover everything, when Rumblix suddenly wriggled free and, with a yelping bark, pounced at the bird.
There was an anguished squawk and much frantic flapping. The bucket went over with a crash, spilling the offal, which swirled round the red and purple feathers now littering the dec
k.
Then everything fell still.
‘Rumblix!’ Cade barked, leaping to his feet.
The prowlgrin half turned, the body of the bird clamped in his mouth. The next moment, with an audible gulp, Rumblix swallowed it whole – then turned his attention to the spilled offal.
‘What’s going on?’ came a voice.
Cade looked up to see Thorne standing by the doorway to the little cabin. ‘Rumblix killed a feathered visitor,’ he said glumly. ‘Seven seasons’ bad luck!’
Thorne shrugged. ‘I’ve never been one for superstitions,’ he said. ‘Hungry, were you, boy?’ He patted Rumblix on the shoulder. ‘You need all the food you can get, don’t you?’ He turned back to Cade, the notebook raised in his hand. ‘There’s a tavern in Hive I thought we’d head for first. The Winesap. Run by an old army friend of mine, Rampton Gleep. He’ll help us out.’
They sailed on across the green vastness of the Deepwoods during the day, making good time through a cloudless sky. And by the time the sun was once again sinking towards the horizon behind them, and they had started the search for somewhere suitable to anchor up for the night, Gart was confident they were no more than a day and a half away from their destination.
‘How about there?’ said Cade, pointing to a glade of lullabee trees. With the fading light, the spectral turquoise glow of the leaves was already illuminating the patch of forest. ‘We won’t have to use the lanterns.’
‘Always best not to attract unwanted attention,’ Thorne agreed.
Gart seized the rudder levers and steered them down. As the Hoverworm broke through the upper canopy, the juicy fragrance of bruised leaves scented the air. Descending further, it came to a hover above a broad branch, its surface a mass of lumps and hollows, the deepest of which were full of rainwater. Thorne and Cade jumped down, and while Gart locked the flight levers, they tethered the phraxlighter, fore and aft.