Hunt for the Pyxis

by Zoë Ferraris

  Santher and the monkeys worked tirelessly for the next two days. Emma spent most of the time in the cargo hold, pounding nails and sawing wood alongside the monkeys. It improved her mood enormously to see the Markab returning to life. Maybe by the time they got to Cygnus, she and Herbie would be able to take the boat with them instead of leaving it here in pieces. It would mean they could set off to find her parents. This thought did so much to restore her hope that she worked with a new, boundless energy.

  She’d told Herbie what she was doing, and he was delighted that the Markab wouldn’t be lost. He promised to come and see the boat, but because Emma was no longer working in the aerie, Herbie was doing twice as much work.

  Although they ate meals together in the dining hall three times a day, Laika was usually there and Emma didn’t get much chance to talk to Herbie alone. She finally got an opportunity at breakfast one day.

  “You’ve got to come down soon,” she said. “We’ve totally remade the hull with wood!”

  “Okay,” Herbie said a bit smugly. “But I’m learning stuff in the aerie.”

  “Like what—how to pick up poop?” She was so happy that she couldn’t help teasing him. “You’re still crushing on Laika. Oh no…is she your girlfriend now?”

  “No.” He was blushing and fumbling with something in his pocket. Emma noticed that his pocket seemed to be moving.

  “What is that?”

  “Nothing. It’s just…” He drew out the vial with the screech bat inside. The bat was awake now and struggling violently against its confines. The minute it hit the light, it shrank away. “Laika had to stay in the aerie and wait for some of the birds to come back. She asked me to bring Chester down so I could change his water. It’s getting kind of green.”

  “Chester?”

  “Laika named him.”

  “So she’s got you on daddy duty.”

  He looked bored when he said, “She—is—not—my—girlfriend.” The bat had stopped jerking, so Herbie set the vial gently on the table. Slowly, the bat looked around with interest. “There are other cool things about the aerie, you know.”

  “A nice view?” she deadpanned.

  He pursed his lips, looking smug.

  “What?” Emma said.

  “We saw a dragon.”

  “WHAT?” She practically leapt out of her seat.

  Herbie looked around with embarrassment. “Chill OUT,” he said. “It was at night, and we weren’t totally sure it was a dragon.”

  “Wait, wait. You were up there at night?”

  “No! It was just getting dark. Right before dinner.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  He frowned. “Laika thought it was a dragon because she sees them every few weeks, but they like to stay out of sight. They’re really quite stealthy.”

  “Ragnar, you saw a dragon!”

  “Shut. Up.”

  She kicked his chair gleefully and laughed.

  After breakfast, Emma went straight down to the cargo hold. As usual, Santher was already there, and he and the monkeys were in full swing, hammering and sawing and drilling. They woke up at dawn every morning and went straight to the hold, working until late at night. The result was rapid progress. They had almost finished replacing the boat’s hull, and the Markab was sitting upright now, propped on giant beams. The new mast—also made of wood—had been erected the night before, and although it looked very different, the Markab was finally a proper boat again.

  Emma went over to where Santher was working.

  “I’ve been thinking about our deal,” she said. “It seems a little unfair. You’ve done a lot of work…. ”

  “You know,” he said, “when I first saw you, I had this crazy idea—I thought you looked just like Halifax Brightstoke.” He smiled, and she forced herself to smile back. “And then, when I saw that astrolabe around your neck…”

  “You thought it was the Pyxis?” Emma said, trying to sound as if this were the most ridiculous thing she could imagine. “You know that’s crazy.”

  “Not really,” Santher said. “There were all kinds of rumors flying around Porta Amphitrite. And the navy was chasing you like the hounds of hell. It kind of made sense.”

  “Okay,” she said, trying to stay cool. “So you think I look like Halifax Brightstoke.”

  He shrugged. “I always thought she was a hero. She joined the pirates and started a rebellion and stood up to the Queen all those years.”

  Emma wanted more details about Mom standing up to the Queen, but she didn’t want to sound completely ignorant. “So is that why you’re fixing my boat—because you think I look like Halifax Brightstoke?”

  “Well, yeah.”

  “Why do you care about her so much?” Emma asked.

  “You mean, aside from the fact that she’s the galaxy’s most famous pirate?”

  “Okay,” Emma said. “I get that. But this is an awful lot of work.”

  Santher seemed a little embarrassed. “Well, she’s a hero to everyone, really, but being from Lynx, I feel a particular connection to her. You know how they executed her, right? With the lynx?” Emma looked perplexed. “They sewed her inside a canvas sack with one of our cats and threw her over the side of a ship. We believe that lynxes are…well, they’re special. People like to say that this one helped Halifax survive. Maybe he clawed his way out of the bag. Maybe he dragged her to the surface. Anyway, they believe that he was her protector.” His cheeks reddened slightly.

  Emma was overcome with the sickening image of Mom being sewn inside a canvas sack. If the Queen captured her mother, she could easily do the same thing again.

  Santher noticed her discomfort. “Okay, I guess it’s silly to think that Halifax might still be alive, but nobody ever believed she was dead. It’s been this unanswered question for twelve years: did she die? The navy says she did, but ever since that Pyxis transmission happened, everyone has been saying, ‘See, I told you! She’s not really dead! She’s still out there!’ Everyone believes it. It’s not just me.”

  “Yeah.” Emma was relieved that she wasn’t the only one hoping that her mom was alive. “So even though she was a pirate, she was a hero for standing up to the Queen?”

  “Yes,” Santher said. “When she died, the pirate armies fell apart. I mean, it destroyed the rebellion. That was really when the Queen won the war.”

  “And this is why Laika is looking for the rebellion. She’s hoping that Halifax will come back.”

  He hung his head. “Laika’s just…I don’t know. Normally she doesn’t talk about it that much, but yeah, when the Pyxis transmission happened, she started going on about pirates again. She really believes that if they come back, they’ll overthrow the Queen.”

  “You don’t think that will happen?”

  “I wish it would!” he said. “But it’s not going to happen—not without Halifax.”

  Emma was stricken by a sudden thought: if her parents were so heroic, why would they hide out for so long? Surely the rebellion needed them this whole time. The Pyxis must have been more important than anything else. But why?

  She had so many unanswered questions. They had been pounding around her head for days now, and the frustration was only growing.

  Santher had fallen quiet. He kept glancing at the boat and back at Emma. “I’m probably an idiot for thinking you’re Halifax’s daughter,” he said. “It’s just…the Pyxis transmission got everyone excited. Only for a day. We really thought Halifax was going to come back. It’s why Laika started nagging people, and I guess it’s why I thought you were, well, related to her. But obviously it’s not going to happen.”

  Emma hadn’t realized that her mother’s return would mean so much. She knew it was a terrible idea to tell anyone who she was, but Santher had given her hope when she had none, and after all the work he’d done on the Markab, she felt he deserved to know the truth now.

  “If I tell you something, will you promise never to tell anyone else?” she asked.

  He was watching her str
angely. “Ye-e-es,” he said.

  Shaking from nerves, Emma sat down beside him. “My mom is Halifax Brightstoke,” she said. “And my necklace—it really is the Pyxis. So…you were right.”

  Santher regarded her for a long moment. “You’re not joking, are you?”

  “No.”

  “You’re telling me that Halifax Brightstoke is still alive?”

  “I think so,” Emma said. “I didn’t know who she was—I mean, she was just my mom until I saw a notice on Delphinus. She never told me anything about space. Neither did my dad. But then they were kidnapped. And my dad was shot. And I don’t know where they are, but I think they’re still alive…. ” Her voice was too pinched to keep talking, so she paused to take a breath. “I’m going to find them. Once the boat is fixed.”

  Santher’s face was flushed. She couldn’t tell what he was thinking, but he hadn’t moved a muscle since she’d said the words Halifax Brightstoke. Clearly the news was a shock, but she thought she detected a look of disbelief.

  “You think I’m making this up,” she said.

  “No,” he said. “I’m surprised. I think I believe you. Like I said, you look just like her. And you showed up on Delphinus right around the time of the Pyxis transmission. And the navy was chasing you…. ”

  “Are you going to stop working on the boat now that I’ve told you the truth?” she asked.

  “No.” He gave her the hint of a smile. “Don’t worry, we’re going to fix it up. It’s going to be the best boat you’ve ever seen.” He picked up a hammer, but his expression had changed to awe. “You have to admit, this is really big news. People should know—”

  “You promised never to tell anyone,” she put in quickly.

  “I know.” He shook his head in amazement. “I promise. But shoot, this is huge. Halifax Brightstoke is still alive.”

  “I hope so,” Emma said quietly.

  “Why didn’t she tell you anything about space?”

  “I don’t know.” She fingered the Pyxis through her shirt. “Maybe she was afraid I would tell people who she really was?”

  “Can I see it?” Santher asked.

  She looked around to make sure that no monkeys were watching before drawing the Pyxis out of her shirt. He dropped the hammer and took it in his hands, gaping in excitement.

  “No wonder the navy was after you!” he laughed.

  “They chased us all the way from Monkey.” Emma gave a dispirited laugh. “The stupid thing is, I don’t even know what the Pyxis is supposed to do.”

  Santher was stunned. “It’s the key to the Shroud!” he said.

  She gave him a blank look.

  “Your parents really didn’t tell you anything?” He let go of the Pyxis, and she tucked it inside her shirt. “Well, okay…” He looked around, still amazed. “First of all, the pirates went to war with the Queen because she was stealing all their memory water.”

  “I stuck my finger in some memory water on Delphinus,” Emma said. He seemed surprised by this. “But I don’t really know what it is.”

  “Did it make you sick?” he asked.

  “No. I heard some guys singing inside the glass, and then later I could hear the people around me talking.”

  “That’s weird. But it is pretty weird stuff. Nobody actually knows what it is.” He leapt up suddenly and went to his tool chest. After rooting around for a few seconds, he drew out a parchment and brought it back to Emma. Sitting down again, he unscrolled it. Emma leaned closer. It was a very long map. At the top the words Fluvius Eridanus were spelled out in gold letters. The stars of Eridanus sat like bright-yellow wasps on a background of surprising blackness. Connecting the stars were the constellation’s Strands, marked in silver ink.

  “Cool chart,” she whispered.

  Santher ran his finger along the constellation. “All the Strands of Eridanus are called the memory seas,” he said. “They’re the most dangerous waters in the galaxy. They have deadly currents and they’re full of rocks and reefs. They also used to be infested with pirates, but now the navy has blockaded the system, so nobody goes there.

  “They’re called memory seas,” he went on, “because so many ships have gone down in the Strands—thousands of them—and the souls of dead pirates and sailors are trapped in the waters. No one understands why, but people think that the Strands contain the memories of all the people who have passed through here—even the living ones.”

  He looked up at Emma. “But memory water has magical properties. The Queen started using it to make things. Her doctors made medical cures. The navy used it to make scuppers. It’s all over the galaxy now—like in that net we used to bring you guys on board. It’s the stuff inside wing masts that gives them their lift.

  “Anyway, the Queen took it too far. She started making weapons that could destroy whole planets. And she did that a few times. The whole galaxy was terrified of her.

  “When the pirates of Eridanus realized that she was using their water to destroy other planets, they went to war to stop her. But the rebellion wasn’t that strong. The pirates started to realize that they couldn’t win, so they began to drain their own system. They sabotaged the Queen’s pumps, stole their own water, and put it on giant ships. And that’s where the Shroud comes in.” He rolled up the chart, searching for a good way to explain. “The Shroud is a hidden cave at the edges of the galaxy.”

  Emma pursed her lips. “If it’s hidden, then how do you know where it is?”

  He rolled his eyes. “Of course no one knows where it is,” he said. “You need the Pyxis to find it. The Pyxis is the navigational device that Cascabel created to locate the hidden water.”

  “Who’s Cascabel?”

  “He was the pirate leader.”

  “I thought my mom was the pirate leader.”

  “She was his…girlfriend maybe? They used to call her the ‘second-greatest pirate of the seas,’ but that was a joke. She was way more important than him!”

  “What about my dad, Jack Garton? Was he in this too?”

  “He’s your…” Santher smacked his head. “Of course—your name is Emma Garton! I completely missed that. Wow. Yeah, Jack Garton was the first mate on Cascabel’s ship. They used to call him Mad Jack. I heard that he was executed by Cascabel.” Santher looked at her warily.

  “What?” she said.

  “I’m not sure you’ll want to hear this, but they said that Cascabel chopped off his head and placed it on the prow of his ship. But obviously that’s not true.”

  “Why would Cascabel want to kill him?”

  Santher shrugged. “Maybe he knew that Jack was going to run off with your mom.”

  Emma nodded, trying to imagine her parents running away from an evil pirate captain.

  “What happened to Cascabel?” she asked.

  “He’s in exile on Eridanus. Nobody’s seen or heard from him in twelve years.”

  “So doesn’t he know where the Shroud is?”

  “No. See, it’s easy to put things inside—there are doorways all over the galaxy—but no one has ever opened the Shroud and taken things out.”

  “So what—it’s like a black hole?”

  “Yeah, except with the Shroud, there’s supposed to be a way to open it again. That’s what the Pyxis does. Cascabel commissioned the sorcerers of Eridanus to make it. He sailed all these giant ships into the doorways of the Shroud so that the Queen wouldn’t get the memory water.”

  “Did he really drain an entire Strand?” Emma asked.

  “No, he just took so much water that it killed the Strand. If you go to Eridanus today, all that’s left is this mucky green sea. That’s probably the memory water you had on Delphinus. But it’s good that he did that because ever since Cascabel stole the water, the Queen’s power has dropped. She doesn’t have enough good water left to destroy a whole planet.”

  “So my mom was one of the good pirates.”

  “Yeah. But the thing is, if the Queen got her hands on the Pyxis now, it would lead her to t
he hidden memory water and she’d become powerful again. She’d go back to blowing up planets.” He said this with a sudden sadness. “One of those planets she destroyed was mine. It was near the star Elvashak. My parents got me out on a ship just in time.”

  “What happened to your parents?” Emma asked.

  “They died,” he said. “There wasn’t enough room on the ship for us all.”

  This information shocked her. Santher stood up and returned the chart to his tool chest. She watched him, mindlessly fingering the Pyxis and feeling more and more amazed. Her parents had given up their whole lives to protect the Pyxis and keep the Queen from becoming more evil. They had been heroes, and even though it bothered her that they hadn’t told her the truth about space, she was secretly proud that they’d done so much to keep the Pyxis away from the Queen.

  And here she was, carrying the Pyxis around. She had even activated it on Earth! And now the navy was after them. Now the Queen knew that the Pyxis wasn’t lost forever. She realized suddenly that, by her own ignorance, she’d set something horrible in motion, something her parents had spent a very long time trying to prevent. It was why they had hidden on Earth all those years.

  Emma suddenly felt very lost and overwhelmed. She could only think of one thing: she had to get her parents back, and until then, she had to protect the Pyxis like they did.

  “Santher,” she said, “promise me again you won’t tell anyone about the Pyxis.”

  He nodded. “You have my word.”

  Santher worked for the rest of the day. He didn’t even stop to eat. The monkeys worked tirelessly too, but ever since the conversation with Santher, Emma had been feeling restless, so she excused herself and went down to the dining hall for dinner.

  She found Herbie sitting alone at a table.

  “What’s up?” he said.

  “Nothing.”

  “You’re fixing up the Markab. You should be happy.”