A queue quickly formed. Lina took her place behind the young boy Paine, shifting Runt to her shoulders as she did so. “There, there,” she soothed her scryn. “There, there. We’ll be home in just a moment.”
Her pet chirped miserably, wobbling as she tried to coil herself into her usual position. She was too round to easily find balance, though, and slipped off continuously. Lina put up a hand to help, holding her pet in place by the smooth, drum-tight skin of her belly. Runt rolled into place more easily, and Lina smiled. Then she felt something twitch beneath the skin of her pet.
She stared at Runt in shock and amazement. Was that a kick?
“Stone!” snapped Natasha from the back of the line. “Get a move on! That thing could be coming back!”
Lina started. She looked up to see the rope ladder dangling ahead of her. Paine had scrabbled on up, and now Allen, Michael, and the captain herself were waiting on her. Her soldier started to smile at her but froze as Runt let out a growl. “Aye, Captain.” she replied. “It’s...it’s just amazing. I felt Runt’s babies—”
“Now,” snarled Natasha.
Her excitement shriveled at the look on her captain’s face. Lina sprinted to the rope ladder and climbed awkwardly, using only one hand. The other she kept up to hold her miserable scryn in place.
The ascent seemed to take forever. But it was important that she go slow, even though the village inched past and the others groused at her from below. Why didn’t any of them understand? There was a new mother on her shoulders!
At last the old, familiar gunwales appeared above her, along with Etarin reaching out to help her aboard. She took his hand and swung carefully over. Runt abruptly lifted her head and hissed, spraying poisonous spittle at the older Salomcani man. He cursed and fell back while Lina put boots back upon the deck with a sigh. Then she pushed past him, making for an out-of-the-way place toward the middle of the deck.
Her airship home looked...ragged. The damage from the earlier fighting had compounded the wear and tear of their long voyage before coming back to port. Now the vessel looked like something from an old sailor’s ghost story. All the others milled about as they came aboard, seeing the ship with fresh eyes as well. Lina swore she heard faint groans echoing up from somewhere beneath the deck.
Oh. Right. The Revenants. Lina wrinkled her nose. This is no place to bring newborns into the world, with the lot of those things shambling around below.
“You!” snarled Natasha.
Lina glanced back to see Captain Blackheart come up over the gunwales. She shoved past Allen and Michael Hockton, knocking them both to the deck, and charged straight for Omari. The Yulani aetherite was just climbing down from the ratlines leading up to the gas bag, her clothing disheveled and torn. She flinched at the shout and looked frantically about.
Too late. Natasha was there, slamming a fist into the aetherite’s gut and doubling her over. Runt gave a low moan as most of the crew flinched sympathetically.
“I told you to raise the damned ladder!” she snarled.
“I—”
Natasha kicked her legs out from under her, dropping Omari to the deck. “When I give an order, you obey!”
Runt made a weird trill and started to writhe on Lina’s shoulders.
“I forgot!” gasped Omari. “That monster started roaring out there, and I climbed up to get a better look!”
“At least tell me you saw where the damned Castaways went!”
Omari looked up at the furious captain from between her shielding arms. “Wh-who? I saw some men run into the clearing, chased by the monster...”
Runt chirred, waving her head back and forth oddly.
“Never mind that! I’ve about had it with you, woman. First you stow away on my ship, then you raise Revenants, and then disobey when I was clear—”
“Well, I wouldn’t have,” Omari snapped back, “if that damned great ape hadn’t insisted on playing cards! I tried to get away six times! It was only when that mechanical monster chased those men down below that it lost interest and let me go!”
“Um, everyone?” asked Lina.
“Hey,” said Paine. “That’s blood on the deck.”
“Yes, lad,” said Reaver Jane. “We were in a battle, you know.”
“No, it’s fresh blood, I think. Near the forward hatch.”
“Everyone!” shouted Lina. “Hey! Runt’s giving birth!”
Her crewmates fell completely silent.
“Not...not right now?” asked Allen, tentatively. The cold glare from earlier had been replaced by his more normal look of uncertain worry.
Lina quickly worked the writhing scryn down off her shoulders. Runt was hissing and curling and uncoiling her manta-like wings. Her belly pulsed soft red bioluminescent light. And her lower regions were positively swollen.
“Yes, right now!” she snapped. “Get over here and help!”
Everyone stared at her. Etarin and Farouk appeared horrified. Young Paine was wide-eyed. Natasha had her sword out, and utter revulsion was etched across her face. Omari scrabbled away from Natasha’s feet, taking the opportunity of the distraction to escape. Reaver Jane looked pale beneath her tan. Michael Hockton seemed conflicted, and Allen chewed on his lip. Rastalak watched curiously from the ratlines that lead up to the gasbag, having scampered up when no one was looking. Even Andrea Holt and Ryan Gae, her friends since the beginning, were at the far end of the deck, grimacing and trying not to be noticed.
“Michael? Allen? Both of you get over here right damned now, or by the Goddess Above, I’m going to dangle you from the ship by your stones and make you sing patter songs!” The tremor in her voice surprised her.
Both young men shared a sickly look. Then, as one, they inched their way forward, like two men condemned to the grave. The rest of the crew watched them go, horrified, but making no move of their own to help.
Panic warred with excitement in Lina’s gut, all underscored by a current of dread. What did they need to do? What if something went wrong? She soothed her pet and glared at the two young men, who held the squirming scryn down and were bitten, repeatedly, for their efforts.
Fortunately, Runt seemed to know instinctively what was needed. She moaned and yowled as she gave birth, writhing in pain. But her young emerged into the world.
They didn’t come like Lina had expected, as eggs. It seemed scryn gave live birth. The scrynlings were blind, stubby, and only a little longer than her fingers. They looked like miniature eels, and seven of them writhed in Lina’s cupped palms when the delivery was finished, slick with afterbirth.
A chorus of disgust echoed across the deck. Allen and Michael were white as sheets—where their skin wasn’t rash-red from exposure to poisoned spittle. Lina didn’t care. Her eyes were blurry and her cheeks wet. “Runtie,” she said, bending down with the wriggling scrynlings. “Look. Your children.”
Her pet raised her head wearily. “Chirr,” she said before thumping back down to the deck in exhaustion.
Lina sniffed. She turned to Michael. Holding up the scrynlings as they slithered across her hands, she tried for words, but her throat was too choked with emotion.
Allen and Michael both stood up abruptly, their bodies tight with tension and faces pale as sheets. The apprentice Mechanist abruptly turned and ran for the starboard gunwales. He shoved past the horrified Natasha, then clambered past the wreck of the exhaust pipe to vomit explosively over the side. Michael Hockton just stood there, still as a statue, obviously at war with himself.
“Aren’t they beautiful?” she managed at last.
The scrynlings stopped writhing about. They opened miniature mandibles and began to devour the wet afterbirth still clinging to their hides. Michael Hockton convulsed once, and then he covered his mouth with his hand, turning to flee for gunwales beside Allen.
“That...is...the third worst thing I have ever seen,” said Natasha. The pirate captain’s voice was appalled, and the tip of her cutlass never wavered.
“Oh, Goddess,”
said Paine. “They look like worms covered in sick!”
The scrynlings all paused at his voice. They raised themselves up, shiny black heads waving back and forth.
“Hey,” said Paine. “What’s that? What’re they doing?”
The scrynlings all looked his way. Then they unfurled themselves, revealing tiny wings and pulsing red bellies. They hissed and launched themselves into the air, straight for the unfortunate youth.
He screamed and fled down the end of he deck, a swarm of miniature horrors trailing after him. The crew dove out of the way, swearing and cursing. Lina laughed—they were just like their mother.
“Don’t hurt them!” she called after the shrieking youth. “They just want to play!”
She wiped the mess on her hands absently on her pant legs. Then she froze.
An idea crept over her as she watched the ex-midshipman run in terror from the newborn monsters. The way he ran and yelled. She turned to Natasha, who shifted her cutlass defensively at her approach.
“Take another step, and I’ll kill you, Stone,” she said. “You wash those hands and burn those clothes before you come any closer.”
“I’ve got it!” she said. “I know how we can beat the Perinese!”
Her captain narrowed her eyes. “What?”
“The Stormhammer is broken and useless. There’s still something here, though, a weapon we can use.”
Natasha lowered her cutlass, a little. “Tell me.”
Lina laid out her plan as Runt chirped wearily from where she lay on the deck. Somewhere nearby, the Dray Engine roared.
Chapter Seventeen
“Stand!” screamed Admiral Wintermourn. “Stand firm, you sons of whores!”
The Revenants advanced with rotting claws upraised. They moaned as they came on, hungry for his flesh and thirsty for his blood. Neither musket balls nor the cut of flashing blades stopped them. The alley filled with their stink, just as it resounded with the echo of their infernal moaning, drowning out the battle raging elsewhere. The horrors seemed unstoppable, tearing at the desperate ranks of Bluecoats with abandon, which was the only thing standing between Admiral Wintermourn and a vile end at the hands of those unholy abominations.
Every inch of his skin crawled in revulsion. “The first man to let one pass will spend a year in gaol!” he almost shrieked, gesturing with his saber as if he could drive the monsters back through sheer force of will.
“Sir! Sir, it’s all right. We’ve got them now.”
Wintermourn whirled to face him. The Bluecoat officer, Sergeant Greene, jerked back as Wintermourn whipped his blade about. The man was scuffed and bloodied but otherwise uninjured.
“They’re...not that mean, actually. Sir. They’re tough, but we’ve got ’em licked, for now.”
Wintermourn frowned. He lowered his saber, taking another look at the fight raging in the alley ahead.
It was true. While they clawed and moaned, the Revenants weren’t actually doing much damage. His soldiers worked in tandem, shoving them back with musket strokes before using smallswords to hack off their rotting heads. That seemed to stop the things. A few of the men had fallen back here and there, tending to a worrisome gash, but they recovered quickly enough. Whereas the ranks of the dead were being quickly transmuted to a pile on the boardwalk. The fighting would be over in moments.
Still, Wintermourn held his saber, so hard that his knuckles were white around the grip. “Are...are you certain?” he asked, peering ahead.
“Yes, sir.”
By the Goddess in her Realm Above, I give thanks. Wintermourn took a deep breath, and the air in the alley made him immediately regret it. Slowly he relaxed back into a more normal posture: spine stiff and chin thrust out. His relief proved only temporary, though. Sergeant Greene stood there, watching. Judging him. Seeing him at his weakest. Embarrassed anger washed over Admiral Wintermourn.
“Very good, then,” he snapped. “Finish hacking up these misbegotten corpses, and let us get a move on.”
The sergeant snapped a salute. He turned back to the men, raising his sword and barking out orders. Wintermourn watched him with narrow eyes.
So what if he detested the undead? Not a one of the thousand differing denominations back on Edrus could agree on which way to best please the Goddess. But every single one preached that Revenants were an unholy horror best purged by righteous fire. Even the heathen Salomcani of the Sheikdom understood that much.
Yet an officer couldn’t afford such weaknesses. The Lord High Admiral of the Sea and a member of the Order Gallant, even less so. Only Sergeant Lanters was aware of his horror, and Wintermourn weighed that knowledge against his value every time he saw the man. Fortunately, the sergeant was loyal and dull. Could the same be said of this Greene?
No. No. Best not take the risk. Wintermourn smiled with thin lips. Glory was always in the advance. Soon Greene would take his prying eyes to the grave. Where they’d damned well stay, if they knew what was good for them.
The last three Revenants toppled over. Even then the Bluecoats kept at it, hacking away until they were just another pile of rotting meat. Greene shouted an order, and they stopped, weapons out, waiting and expectant. What was left of the Revenants did not move.
The men let loose a victorious cheer. It wouldn’t have been appropriate to join in, but Wintermourn felt relieved all the same. He sheathed his sword and folded his hands behind his back, waiting for the noise to die down.
Sergeant Greene turned to him, and the rest of the men followed his lead. Wintermourn looked to each in turn, holding their eyes a moment. The rippling pop of musket fire and bomb blasts from the battle in the lagoon echoed down past the ramshackle buildings they stood between.
“So,” he said. “Now you see. Pirates, whores, smugglers. And worse than that.” He curled his lip in a sneer. “Necromancy. Abomination. While you wear that uniform, you are a soldier of our great nation. The church doesn’t enter into it. But if any of you had any doubts...” He gestured at the rotting carcasses in the middle of the street. “This is holy work we’re about.”
Wintermourn snapped his head up to glare at them each in turn. “There’ll be no rest while even an inch of this wretched soil remains unclaimed. If even one perfidious pirate can raise his sword against us, then the price of mercy is too high. Greene!”
The man made his salute. “Sir!”
“Assemble the men and move out. This part of the town will be mine by nightfall.”
The sergeant nodded sharply. He turned to the men and barked orders. The Bluecoats moved wearily but moved all the same. Not a few glared with disgust at the remains lying about the street before falling back into columns for the march.
And march they did. Fear was better, to Admiral Wintermourn’s mind, than inspiration. So long as they followed, though, what did it matter? But whether because of his speech or their own righteous disgust, the column moved with purpose back through the pirate township.
It wasn’t long before another ambush occurred.
The march through the streets went unopposed at first. Doors were kicked in and windows shattered, but no one appeared to fight back. Wintermourn was wondering if the knaves had evacuated completely to the higher terraces when the street widened to a small fish market. It was an impoverished affair, filled with poorly built driftwood stalls and leftover canvas. Crates containing last evening’s catch rotted in the sun, their stink mixing with the gunpowder haze that hung in the sky above. An airship flew past, returning to the battle raging just beyond the city.
What is taking those laggards so long? How hard could it be to mop up that ridiculous pirate force? The lagoon should be positively filled with their own ships by now. Is it the crown prince? Has he come up with some other contrivance of a plan? Or has he just gone haring off again—
“Sir! Look out!”
It was Private Bryant, who slammed into him, tackling him down behind a stall just as the crates atop it exploded into flinders and scraps of fish.
Debris rained down about him as the men shouted cries of alarm. Wintermourn lay in stunned surprise before shoving the marine aside and clambering to his feet. He’d forgotten about the man. Maybe he was of some use, then.
Some of his Bluecoats returned fire blindly, and the pop of their muskets echoed about the market while those more perceptive charged a cart at one end. It had been overturned, spilling rickety crates everywhere. These shifted and shook as someone beneath tried to escape, but it was too late. The marines kicked the detritus aside and hauled out two men, one clutching an ancient and smoking blunderbuss.
Both were thrown roughly up against their cart, seconds away from being skewered by Perinese smallswords. One was a grizzled old man with a peg leg, obviously once a pirate. The other was younger, of fighting age, and Wintermourn wondered why he was here in town until he spied the fellow’s clubfoot.
“Pirate scum!” shouted Sergeant Greene at the top of his voice.
“No!” begged the young man. “Please, we’re just hiding! I didn’t mean for it to go off!”
“Oh aye we did!” belted out the older pirate.
“Sneaking curs,” said Sergeant Greene. “Can’t beat us in a fair fight, so you snipe and skulk.” He turned to the other Bluecoats. “Cut their Goddess-damned throats!”
An angry murmur arose from the assembled soldiers. Wintermourn held up a hand. “Wait,” he snapped.
The marines froze, their bloodlust checked by their training. All eyes turned to him, including those of the pirates. Wintermourn stepped forward, and the men moved aside as he pushed through to face his would-be ambushers.
“Please, sir,” said the younger pirate. He struggled against the Bluecoats holding him to raise his arms in supplication. “I didn’t mean it, really! We were just hiding, and that thing went off!”
“Pity it didn’t take yer head,” snarled the older man. He spat at the marine holding him.
“Oh, I believe you,” said Wintermourn to the younger man.
“You do?” he replied in surprise.
“You do?” said the older pirate.
Beneath a Burning Sky (The Dawnhawk Trilogy Book 3) Page 27