'This map is no fake,' Cornelius assured them, and Sebastian wondered how he could be so confident. 'Of course, there's no guarantee that somebody hasn't been there before us. It might be a safer bet to take a standard wage for the trip. Otherwise you risk coming back empty-handed.'
Jenna smiled. 'It's a risk I'm prepared to take,' she said, 'because I could come back rich beyond my wildest dreams. Which is frankly too good a prospect to ignore.'
'She's got a point,' said Max, and hiccuped loudly.
Cornelius gave him an irritated look. 'Stay out of this,' he said.
'What? I was only shaying! There's no need to look at me like I'm a bad muffalope . . . I mean, a mad buffalope!' He lifted his head and stared towards the bar. 'Landlord! Another belping of heer, if you please! I'm starting to get a taste for this stuff!'
Sebastian grimaced. That was all they needed right now. A drunk Max.
'Well, gentlemen, you're not saying much, are you?' observed Jenna. 'Do we have a deal or not?'
'Well, for a start,' interrupted Max, 'you've got your figursh wrong, young lady. It would be a one quarter share of the treasure, because there are four of us, not three!'
Jenna looked at him for a moment and then turned to Sebastian. 'You're not seriously giving a share to him?' she cried.
Sebastian winced. 'Well, we've never formally discussed it,' he admitted, 'but—'
'Thersh no need for discussion,' insisted Max. 'We are partners. We share everything. So it's a one-quarter share, or you can go and take a junning rump into the ocean, young lady.'
'But . . . what would a buffalope do with treasure?' Jenna wanted to know.
'I would give some to my mistress and . . . the rest I would shpend on pommers to eat and beer to drink.' Max became aware of Sebastian glaring at him and blew him a fruity raspberry. 'Oh, loosen up!' he said. 'Landlord, what are you doing with that ale, screwing it from bratch? I mean, brewing it from scratch?'
Jenna shrugged. She turned back to the table. 'Very well,' she said. 'It sounds like madness to me, but a one-quarter share for me and my crew.' She looked from Sebastian to Cornelius and back again. 'You may as well accept my terms, gentlemen, because let me assure you, if you choose to go with another captain, you'll have the Sea Witch on your tail the moment you leave the quayside. And then we'd be rivals, not allies.'
'And you wouldn't want us as rivals,' Lemuel assured them. 'Oh no, you would most definitely not want that.'
Another bucket of ale arrived and Max set to with a vengeance, his loud slurps rudely breaking the silence.
Sebastian and Cornelius exchanged worried glances. Clearly Jenna Swift was as sharp as a cut-throat razor. Finally Cornelius sighed and spread his hands in a gesture of defeat.
'Very well. I suppose there's nothing else we can do. But listen well to these words. I don't want this matter to go any further. If any of your friends or relatives start following us to our destination, all deals are off. And you'll answer to my sword.'
Jenna grinned, as though she liked the sound of this. 'So, you're a swordsman as well as an arm wrestler! I'm no mean fighter myself,' she told him. 'Perhaps we can put it to the test some day.' There was a short silence while the two of them appraised each other. 'But yes,' continued Jenna, 'I agree that total secrecy should be the order of the day. Don't worry, I've no wish to share my cut of the spoils with anyone else. Or do you perhaps have a pet boobah hiding in the woodwork who wants to claim his share?'
'Very funny,' said Sebastian.
Jenna bowed slightly. 'I'll take that as a compliment from a professional joke-teller,' she said.
'I already told you, I'm not in that line of work any more,' he said.
'Oh, that's right,' she said, her eyes mocking him. 'You're a pirate-killer now. I'd quite forgotten.' She shrugged. 'Well, I hope it's no idle boast, Mr Darke. The waters we'll be sailing are infested with pirates – there's every chance we might see some action.'
Cornelius grinned. 'We're not afraid of a bit of action,' he assured her. 'You might say it's what we're used to.' He raised his tankard in a toast. 'So,' he said. 'To a successful trip.'
'To success,' said Jenna; and she and Lemuel raised their own tankards and drank deeply.
And then Max started singing. Well, not singing so much as bellowing.
'Out on the wild and rolling plain, I met a buffalope!
His eyes were filled with tears of woe, it seemed he'd lost all hope.
When suddenly he heard a sound, a voice that called his name
And from that day that buffalope would never be the same!
'The voice of Colin, Colin, a buffalope so true . . .
Colin, Colin, he's calling out to you!
Colin, Colin, the king of all the beasts
Colin, Colin, he calls you to the feast!'
Heads appeared in the doorway from the other room. Some of the drinkers appeared to like the song, and were raising their tankards to the performer, but the landlord with the shell teeth didn't seem quite as impressed.
'Who owns that great noisy brute?' he bellowed.
'Time's moving on,' said Cornelius hastily. 'I think we should leave.'
'Er . . . yes,' said Sebastian. 'I'm feeling pretty tired too.'
They finished their drinks as quickly as they could and virtually ran from the room, telling Jenna that they would see her the following morning. Once outside, they ran round the side of the building and did their best to drag Max away from the window, but having found an appreciative audience, he was somewhat reluctant to pack it in.
Eventually they managed to prise him away. As they moved off, Sebastian glanced through the open window and saw Jenna watching the incident with some amusement, her dark eyes flashing with mischief.
He waved to her, and then he and Cornelius led a very unsteady buffalope away in search of somewhere to spend the night.
CHAPTER 12
EVE OF DEPARTURE
After finally locating the only stable in Ramalat that was prepared to put up with the raucous din made by a singing buffalope, Sebastian and Cornelius trudged back to the Spyglass Inn and took a room for the night on the top floor.
Through the open window they had a magnificent view of the moonlit rooftops of Ramalat, sloping steeply down the hillside to meet the restless ocean, which rushed to and fro beneath the mantle of myriad glittering stars.
Sebastian stood looking out across the water with a strange mixture of feelings within him. There was excitement, yes, because this trip across water would be a totally new experience for him. But there was apprehension too. He remembered how Cornelius had said that the ocean was deep enough to cover the peaks of the highest mountains and the thought of going down into those terrible depths filled him with an unspeakable dread. There was one other thing. Try as he might, he couldn't rid himself of the image of Leonora's face.
Cornelius sat at a rough-hewn table, counting up his remaining coins. 'We should be all right,' he said. 'In a way, Jenna's decision will work in our favour. If she'd asked for a straight fee, we'd have had trouble scraping it together.'
'I suppose we could go to a moneylender,' said Sebastian.
Cornelius scowled. 'I wouldn't give those grasping scum the business,' he said. 'They'd only add on huge amounts of interest, and besides, we'd have to tell them what we wanted the money for. Even if we were vague about where we were actually going, they'd soon put two and two together, and before you know it, everybody in Ramalat would find out what we were up to.' He placed his last coin on the small pile. 'We can't even afford to replace all the equipment we lost in the fire,' he said. 'We'll just have to make do with very little until we find the treasure.'
'And if there is no treasure?'
'We'll cross that bridge if and when we get to it,' he said. 'Jenna has agreed to a cut of whatever we find. If we find nothing, she gets a cut of nothing. That's the way it works. But as for me, I trust the man who sold me that map.'
Sebastian turned back from the window in sur
prise. 'What?' he cried. 'I thought . . . I thought you said you were given it. Somebody at the hospital in Keladon, you said. A man on his deathbed!'
'Well . . . he was dying, yes, but he . . . he didn't exactly give me the map. He sold it to me.'
Sebastian could hardly believe his ears. 'But why would anyone do that? I mean, what use was money to him if he was dying?'
'He had nothing left in the world,' explained Cornelius. 'The money was to pay for a decent burial. What's your problem?'
Sebastian shrugged. 'Well . . . call me stupid if you like, but I don't feel inclined to trust a man whose last act on leaving this world is to get a few more croats in his pocket.'
'More like five gold crowns,' said Cornelius quietly.
'Good grief.' Sebastian thought for a moment. 'He must have been buried in real style for that, with a fine coffin and a site in the poshest graveyard in Keladon. Still . . . I suppose you took the money back once he was dead,' he ventured.
'Absolutely not! I do have some principles, you know.'
'Well, it's good to see that somebody does.' Sebastian turned back to look out of the window. 'So, we're five crowns down before we even start.'
'No, I'm five crowns down. I'm the one who paid the money, remember. And it's not as if—' Cornelius broke off. 'Why are you gazing out of the window like that?'
'Hmm? Oh, I was just wondering . . . do you suppose Leonora will be able to follow us across water?'
'Shadlog's beard, what are you blathering about?'
'Leonora. I was just wondering if I would ever see her again.'
Cornelius stared at him for a moment. 'You are a hopeless case, do you know that? Don't you realize that woman wants nothing more than to see us both die a horrible death?'
'I suppose . . . and yet, I can't stop myself from worrying about her.'
'That's rich. The only worries she has about you are that you might go on living a bit longer. For my part, I hope we never lay eyes on her again, but something tells me that we won't be that lucky. And you'd better watch out, my lad. As if things aren't complicated enough, I'd say you have a new admirer.'
'Really? Who would that be?'
'Jenna Swift, of course! She has her beady eyes on you.'
'Me?' Sebastian stared at him. 'Oh, I don't think so.'
'Believe it! I know when a woman is making moon eyes at a fellow, and she was certainly doing that this evening.'
Sebastian frowned. 'Hmm, well, if that's really true, she needs to understand that there's only one woman in the world for me.'
'Ah yes, of course. Queen Kerin. Still carrying a torch for her, eh?'
Sebastian looked at him blankly. 'Who?' he said.
Cornelius slammed a hand down on the tabletop with a force that caused the piles of coins to go flying in all directions. 'I don't believe it!' he cried. 'You are the absolute end!'
'What have I done now?' cried Sebastian.
'You've only gone and forgotten the name of the woman who you claimed you'd love till the end of time!'
'Did I say that?'
'Yes, you did. And then you wandered about saying that your heart was broken and that there would never be another woman who could measure up to your beloved Queen Kerin . . .'
'Well, yes, but—'
'And then, practically the next day, you set eyes upon that hideous scheming witch, Leonora—'
'I've warned you, don't call her that!'
'And suddenly you're completely besotted with her, a woman who would happily slice your head from your shoulders if she could only get within striking distance. A fine sweetheart she makes!'
'I appreciate she's not perfect, but—'
'And finally, to cap it all, you've got what must be the only female captain in Ramalat going all weak at the knees over you. I suppose it's only a matter of time before you fall for her charms!'
'That's nonsense. Me and Jenna Swift? I can't think of a more unlikely partnership. I mean, she wears men's clothes, for goodness' sake! All right, she's quite good looking, I suppose . . .'
Cornelius shook his head and buried his face in his hands. 'We are most definitely in trouble,' he concluded. 'If you've noticed that much about her, the rest is sure to follow.'
'No, I assure you, the only woman who occupies my mind is Leonora.'
Cornelius groaned. 'Perfect,' he said. 'The one who wants you dead is the one you'd give your heart to. Sebastian, you are the absolute limit!'
'Oh, now, don't be like that.' Sebastian left his place at the window and came to sit at the table opposite his friend. 'Come on, Cornelius, you must have been through similar times yourself.'
'You are joking. When it comes to matters of the heart, nobody in the world has had similar times to you. You're a . . . serial romancer!'
'I'll take that as a compliment. But . . . there must have been young ladies in Golmira when you were a young man. Little ladies. You're not telling me you didn't fall for any of them?'
Cornelius sat up straight in his seat and smiled wistfully. 'There were plenty of young ladies in Golmira. It's famed for the beauty of its women. But there was only one who I ever really cared about.'
'Ah-ha!' Sebastian clapped his hands triumphantly. 'And what happened to her?'
Cornelius's smile faded. 'She married somebody else. A rich merchant, if you must know. So I enlisted in the army and since then I haven't so much as looked at another woman. And do you know what, Sebastian? I've been happy. Romance is an unnecessary complication. You're better off without it.'
Sebastian thought about that for a moment. 'Perhaps you're right,' he said. 'But what can I do? I'm under an enchantment. And until I find a way to shrug it off, I must accept what my heart tells me is true.'
Cornelius gave a loud tut of annoyance and went back to counting his coins. 'You're a hopeless case,' he said.
'Maybe,' admitted Sebastian. He got up and walked back to the window, where he stood gazing out over the great restless sweep of the ocean, shimmering like a carpet of precious jewels in the moonlight. Amidst the other points of light, two glittering jewels seemed to stand out from the rest, burning with a powerful tawny glow.
PART TWO
CHAPTER 13
THE SEA WITCH
Sebastian and Cornelius were at the quayside as the first light of morning began to colour the eastern horizon. They were leading a very sorry-looking Max, who had quite clearly endured a restless night.
'My poor head!' he groaned. 'Which one of you insisted on me drinking that second bucket of ale?'
'Neither of us,' said Sebastian, not without a certain sense of satisfaction. 'That was all your idea.'
'I'm nauseous, I tell you! I've spent the entire night groaning in my stall. And that ostler wasn't very sympathetic either. Kept telling me to belt up!'
Cornelius gave Max a suspicious look. 'I hope you didn't tell him anything you shouldn't have,' he growled.
'Of course not! I was too sick to form actual words. Fine friends you two turned out to be, allowing me to get into such a state!'
'You're an adult,' Sebastian reminded him. 'It's up to you to exercise control. You've never drunk ale before and do you take it easy? Oh no. You drink two bucketfuls!' He glanced at Cornelius. 'I suppose we should have warned him that Ramalatian ale is the most powerful gut-rot known to man.'
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