by Alex Bell
Captain Ajax shrugged. ‘Perhaps fingers ain’t food to a magic egg neither.’
‘Well,’ Shay eventually said. ‘That thing Ethan did with the tiny arrows came in pretty handy, didn’t it? I mean, the polar bean thing was a bit weird, but the arrows were excellent. Maybe we should take him along with us on our next expedition after all. If he can learn to stop moaning all the time, that is.’
‘Seems like he must be pretty good at exploring, if you ask me,’ Captain Ajax put in. ‘I never heard of anyone tangling with a screeching red devil squid and living to tell the tale. Biggest monster that roams the Poison Tentacle Sea, that is. Biggest one I ever saw was a twenty-foot whopper! Snatches sailors straight off the deck of ships when they stand too close to the edge. Once it’s got you in its tentacles that’s that. You’re toast.’ He snapped his fingers.
The sudden sound jerked Ethan awake and he sat up on the couch with a cry: ‘Don’t chop them!’
He lifted his hands up in front of his face and sighed in relief at the sight of his fingers, all still there, all still intact. But then he turned his head to look at the others and the expressions on their faces made him panic all over again.
‘What’s the matter? Why are you staring at me like that? It’s my toes, isn’t it? Oh Gods, they’re all gone! You’ve chopped them off!’
‘Settle down, kid. No one’s chopped nothing,’ Captain Ajax said.
Ethan narrowed his eyes. ‘That’s a double negative,’ he said. ‘So do you mean that you have chopped all my toes off, or do you just have terrible grammar? Because, technically, “no one’s chopped nothing” actually means that everyone has chopped everything. So—’
‘For goodness sake, Ethan, we never even touched the axe!’ Stella said.
Ethan visibly paled at the word. ‘Please,’ he said. ‘Let’s not talk about that axe. Ever again.’
‘We used the moustache wax,’ Stella said. ‘Turns out it cures frostbite. Luckily for you, Beanie had some on him and was the only one of us who listened to the captain.’
‘Just remember your promise,’ Captain Ajax said. ‘Not a word in the Flag Report. Say you found out about the moustache wax by accident. I ain’t never going back to that way of life.’ He shuddered. ‘Wouldn’t have been so bad if I could’ve just transported the thieves, but the Crown wanted me to return all the stolen loot as well. I mean, all of it! Had to travel half way round the world, most times, across every one of the Seventeen Seas. And just you try returning a stolen treasure map to a heat-crazed captain of a pirate galleon. More likely to threaten you with a cutlass than say a nice civilized thank you.’ He frowned at Ethan. ‘But there’s some folk you just can’t do favours for.’
‘Why does my head hurt?’ the magician said, wincing.
‘Oh,’ Stella sighed. ‘We might have dropped you on the table. But it was an accident, a real accident. It definitely wasn’t accidentally on purpose.’
Stella felt she was somehow making it worse because Ethan gave her a suspicious look, but rubbed his head and kept his mouth shut for once.
‘It’s time for you lot to be on your way,’ Captain Ajax said, collecting up their mugs. ‘I said you could stay till the skinny one woke up. Well, now he’s awake – talking and charming us all with his endless gratitude – so that means you gotta go. I can only keep that lot outside in check for so long. They’re not a bad bunch really, but there’s only so much temptation they can resist, and they’ll have the shirts off your backs if you stay much longer.’
The explorers hurriedly stood up and reached for their cloaks. They’d already lost half their provisions – the last thing they needed now was to have the rest of their stuff stolen by a motley crew of bandits and outlaws.
‘So how did you get away from that screeching red devil squid?’ Captain Ajax asked as they walked out.
Ethan stiffened. ‘How do you know about that?’
‘I’ve got eyes, haven’t I? We can see the scars.’
Ethan scowled and yanked his sleeves back down to his wrists. ‘My scars are none of your business.’
‘The way I figure it,’ the captain went on, quite unperturbed, ‘is that to escape a monster like that either you’re the luckiest fella alive, or the most fearsome magician who ever lived. Personally, my money’s on the first one.’
‘If you must know,’ Ethan said in an ice-cold voice, ‘my brother saved my life.’
Stella glanced at the magician, surprised. She’d never heard him mention a brother before.
‘How?’ Captain Ajax asked.
Ethan hesitated for a moment. Then he said, ‘He cut off the squid’s tentacle. Now it hangs in the entrance hall of the Ocean Squid Explorers’ Club.’
Captain Ajax gave a low whistle but didn’t say anything more. They walked back out into the tavern and everyone looked round at them expectantly.
‘Well, what do you know – the moustache wax works after all!’ Skullface said when he spotted Ethan. He glanced at one of his tablemates. ‘Looks like you lost the bet.’
‘The explorers need to get back to their exploring,’ Captain Ajax said. ‘So give them back their goose, and they’ll be on their way.’
‘What goose?’ Skullface said innocently.
Captain Ajax pointed a stern finger at him. ‘The one I can see wriggling around under your coat. Give it back to ’em. Now.’
Skullface sighed and grumbled but he opened his coat and allowed the goose to scramble free. Some of her feathers were a little ruffled but otherwise she looked no worse for wear. Skullface set her down on the floor, and she ran over to Stella, stared up at her and honked to be picked up.
Stella hurriedly scooped her into her arms and they followed Captain Ajax out from the warmth of the Yak and Yeti and into the frozen landscape. It was properly dark now and the moon and stars gave the snow a ghostly blue sheen. It all seemed very inhospitable after the log fires and glowing orange light of the candles they’d just left. Felix had told Stella once that even though exploring was the most fantastic, wonderful thing in the whole entire world, there were still times when you wished you were warm and safe and dry, and back at home in your own bed. Stella supposed this was one of those times.
But there were still adventures to be had. Now that the panic with Ethan was over, Stella went straight up to the frozen rainbow and placed her hand on it. It tingled and fizzed like sherbet beneath her touch. She grinned, delighted. Now she could go home and say that she had actually touched a rainbow, and that it had felt just like fizzy sherbet. Already, the urge to explore was coming back and she suddenly found herself eager to be off and find out what they would discover next.
‘Well then,’ Captain Ajax said. ‘My advice, if you want it, is to head that way.’ He pointed out across the blue snow. ‘My ship – the Snow Queen – is still there, trapped in the ice. It ain’t much: it’s rotting, it smells something fierce, and there are probably rats and all, but it’ll provide shelter for the night.’
Stella wasn’t sure she liked the idea of spending the night on a smelly, rat-infested, doomed ship trapped in the ice, but there was such a thing as ‘any port in a storm’ after all, and the simple fact was that they didn’t have enough tents with them. And after one close shave with the frosties, Stella didn’t fancy the rest of them ending up with frostbite during the night too.
So they said their goodbyes and their thanks to Captain Ajax and piled back into the sled. As they pulled away across the blue snow, beneath the glittering night sky, Captain Ajax suddenly called out after them, ‘Just make sure you don’t wake up the cabbages!’
Stella frowned, thinking she must have heard him wrong. She glanced at Ethan beside her but he just rolled his eyes.
‘Nuts,’ he mouthed. ‘Totally nuts.’
Stella felt rather inclined to agree with him. Useful though he may have been, perhaps, after all, Captain Ajax had had a bit more of One-Eyed Bill’s terrible grog than was really good for him.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
‘Wow,’ Shay said. ‘That is extraordinary.’ He turned to grin at the others. ‘Isn’t being an explorer just the best thing in the whole world, ever?’
Everyone agreed that the ship was magnificent, but the problem was that it wasn’t stuck in the middle of a vast, flat expanse of ice, as they had expected. At first, Stella thought it was perched on the edge of a cliff, but then she saw that this was no cliff – it was a wave that had frozen right at its highest peak. A ladder ran all the way up the ship’s hull but the rungs sparkled with ice, and the whole thing looked a bit precarious.
‘Do you think it’s safe?’ Ethan asked, peering at it suspiciously.
‘The wave is frozen solid,’ Shay replied. ‘It’ll be fine. Besides, it looks like this is our only option.’
They quickly put up their one tent, which was only just large enough to shelter the animals, and then the four explorers took one of the mountain-climbing ropes and tied it around their waists to form a chain. Shay was in the front, then Stella, followed by Ethan and finally Beanie.
‘Beanie, put Aubrey away,’ Stella said, noticing that he had the wooden narwhal clutched in his hand. ‘You can’t climb the ladder if you’re holding that.’
After checking that the knots were all securely tied, they took hold of the frozen rungs and carefully made their way up the side of the ship. It hadn’t seemed so high from the ground but, now that Stella was up there, she thought it seemed very high indeed – dizzyingly high, in fact – and she had to force herself not to look down as she climbed, one hand over the other, and prayed she wouldn’t slip on a frozen rung and break her neck.
After what seemed like forever, Shay reached the top of the ship and scrambled up over the side. She heard a thud as his snow boots hit the deck, and then his hand was reaching over to help her on board. Stella didn’t think she’d ever felt so glad to feel solid ground beneath her feet. Together, she and Shay helped Ethan up over the side.
‘Well, that was a long—’ he began, but that was as far as he got before the rope suddenly went taught as Beanie slipped off the ladder behind him. His weight dragged the magician back into the railings with a thump, and then flipped him backwards right over the edge. The force of their combined weight dragged Shay and Stella across the deck, and they both slammed hard into the railings. Stella braced her boots against them and gritted her teeth against the strain in her arms as she grabbed hold of a rail. Shay did the same and they just about managed to avoid being pulled over the side with the others. Stella could hear Ethan and Beanie both kicking up a tremendous fuss as they swung to and fro at the end of the rope, dangling helplessly above the vast drop spread beneath them.
‘Lord Rupert Randolph Rutledge,’ Beanie gasped, ‘plunged to his death after his teammate cut the rope in order to—’
‘I’ll cut the rope on you if you don’t shut up!’ Ethan snapped, before yelling to the others, ‘For goodness sake, pull us up!’
‘Give us a chance!’ Shay shouted back.
Together, he and Stella carefully got to their feet, gripped the rope and pulled it until Ethan reached the top once again. Shay grabbed his cloak and hauled him over the side before doing the same for Beanie. The four of them gasped for breath as the wooden deck creaked beneath their boots.
Ethan rounded on Beanie at once. ‘What’s the matter with you?’ he snarled. ‘What kind of explorer can’t even climb a ladder?’
‘I’m sorry,’ Beanie said. He had the wooden narwhal clutched tightly in his hand. ‘Aubrey started to slip out of my pocket, so I had to let go of the ladder to—’
‘You’re joking.’ Ethan fixed him with a cold, grey stare. ‘You must be. You’re not seriously telling me that you endangered your life, and mine, over a wooden toy?’
‘He’s not just a toy,’ Beanie protested. ‘He’s—’
But he never got to finish his sentence, because Ethan snatched the narwhal from his hand, and before anyone could stop him, tossed it over the side of the ship. One moment it was there, and the next it had gone, swallowed up by the vast drop below.
There was a moment of total silence. Beanie stared numbly in the direction of the vanished narwhal – then he untied the rope around his waist, turned without a word to anyone, and walked off to the covered bridge, closing the door quietly behind him.
The next moment, Stella flew at Ethan. She simply couldn’t help herself. Using her hands and her feet, she kicked and punched at him mercilessly. The magician tried to fend her off but the rope tying them together made it impossible to get away from her. Finally, Shay grabbed her around the waist and dragged her bodily away.
‘Stella, calm down!’ he said.
‘You’re crazy!’ Ethan gasped. ‘You know that, right? You’re absolutely crazy!’
‘You’re the most horrible person I’ve ever met!’ she yelled.
‘I almost just fell to my death because of your idiot friend and his stupid toy!’ Ethan replied, looking outraged.
‘Beanie’s father made him that narwhal!’ Stella said.
Ethan shrugged. ‘So he can make him another one. Big deal.’
‘His father has been missing for eight years!’ Stella said. ‘He went on an expedition across the Black Ice Bridge and never came back! That narwhal was Beanie’s most precious possession!’
Ethan looked taken aback for a moment. Then he scowled and said, ‘Well, only a complete lunatic would attempt to cross the Black Ice Bridge. Everyone knows that no one ever returns from there. And only a total halfwit would bring their most precious possession with them on an expedition. How was I supposed to know? I’m not—’
‘You’re the worst teammate ever!’ Stella cut him off. ‘You’re selfish and cruel. I bet that’s why your brother didn’t come on this expedition! I bet even he can’t stand to be around you!’
All the colour drained from Ethan’s already pale face, and for a moment Stella thought he wasn’t going to speak at all. But finally he said in a low voice, ‘My brother isn’t here, because he died in the Poison Tentacle Sea.’
Stella couldn’t have felt any worse in that moment than if he had slapped her. Guilt raged all the way through her body, hot and awful. Felix had known about Ethan’s brother, she realised. That was why he’d asked her to be nice to him; that was why he’d talked of battles she knew nothing about. He’d be so ashamed of her if he’d heard what she’d just said. Stella hated herself and wished she could take the words back.
‘Ethan, I didn’t mean—’ she began.
But the magician turned away from her, clutching at his head. ‘Gods, I really do have the most insane headache thanks to you lot!’
‘Are you all right?’ Shay asked quietly.
‘“All right”?’ Ethan repeated in an incredulous voice. He dropped his hands and Stella distinctly saw his nostrils flare. ‘How can I possibly be all right, you utter moron? Didn’t you just hear me say that my brother is dead? Would you be all right if you were in my place? Nothing will ever be all right for me or my family ever again.’
‘I’m sorry—’ Shay began. He reached out a hand as if to grip Ethan’s shoulder but the magician pushed him away.
‘Don’t you dare feel sorry for me!’ His eyes flashed in the cold moonlight. He looked livid. ‘I don’t want your pity! And I don’t want your friendship, either! I just want to live long enough to get through this expedition and return to my own team. That’s it!’
He untied the rope around his waist, turned away and started walking towards the shelter of the bridge. Stella hurried after him. She really felt she needed to say something, to make some effort to soften the harsh words she had spoken before.
‘Ethan, look—’ she began.
‘Will you leave me alone?’ he snapped. ‘You’re right, okay? I am selfish. And it’s cost me more than you can ever imagine.’
He stormed off. There seemed to be nothing more to say, and nothing more to do, other than follow Ethan across the deck to the bridge. Stella glanced at the night sky, which was now thick with falling snowflakes, and knew that fresh snow meant there was practically zero chance of finding Beanie’s narwhal in the morning. It would be buried deep by then, and they’d have no way of knowing where to look for it. Stella knew Ethan was right – Beanie should never have brought such a special thing on the expedition with him – but she still felt terrible for her friend anyway. And she felt terrible for Ethan too.
The magician opened the door to the bridge and the three of them joined Beanie inside. He had settled himself in the corner and was calmly organising a jar of green jellybeans into identical piles. There was a big brass navigational wheel in the centre, which was covered in red flakes of rust, and there were maps on the walls that had almost completely crumbled away. The room had a damp, shut-up smell about it, but at least it was four walls and a roof, and they’d be able to stay dry for the night.
Shay unzipped his bag and handed around blankets, which everyone took in silence. Stella was just about to turn away when Shay held something else out to her. It was a little bird made from dozens of tiny beads and gemstones, shimmering in jade and green.
‘Oh, it’s a hummingbird!’ Stella exclaimed, taking it from Shay.
‘Actually, it’s a dream-snatcher,’ Shay replied. He tapped it once, firmly, on the head, and the little bird suddenly came to life, rapidly flapping its wings and flitting around Stella. Lowering his voice so that only Stella could hear, he said, ‘I thought it might help with that nightmare of yours.’
Stella thought about denying she’d ever had a nightmare, but she could tell from the expression on Shay’s face that there would be no point.