Hunt for the Panther 3 (9781101610923) (21 page)

First, to the Inkslingers: Tanya Kyi, Kallie George, Christy Goerzen, Maryn Quarless, and Lori Sherritt-Fleming. I hope that every author, at some point, has a crazy-talented group of colleagues and friends they can count on for apt feedback, moral support, and quality baked goods. Thank you all so much.

Thanks to Pamela Bobowicz for her patience and wise words as well as the entire team at Grosset & Dunlap. Thanks to my agent, Marie Campbell, for tirelessly championing the Lost Souls, and to the talented Gerald Guerlais for the wonderful cover art.

And, always, to Louise Delaney, who continues to perform incredible feats in the name of her daughter’s writing career, most recently enduring severe frostbite in the dead of winter in Russia. I am one lucky, lucky girl.

Rachelle Delaney lives in Vancouver, Canada, where she works as a writer, editor, and creative writing teacher. In 2010 she was named the top emerging writer in Canada by the Canadian Author’s Association.

Relive the adventure from the beginning!

“You there! Get away from that!”

Scarlet McCray had known the crime could land her in deep trouble. For an instant, she’d even considered not going through with it. But then, she’d never been one to let consequences stop her from wreaking havoc, even if the consequences included having one’s limbs lopped off. So why, she’d reasoned, start now?

This time, however, after the deed was done and she found herself staring into a merchant’s bloodshot eyes of rage, it occurred to her that she might have gone too far.

“Why you… you’ll pay for that!”

Not that she regretted it. Not one bit. No, this just meant she’d have to run faster.

“Blasted little scalawag. I’ll tear you limb from—”

Scarlet didn’t stick around to hear the plan. With an innocent shrug and a tip of her cap, she took off sprinting through the streets of Port Aberhard. A hand reached out to stop her, but she twisted and slipped to the left. A King’s Man moved to block her path, but she ducked out of his reach and ran on, dodging a pack of pirates and hurdling a barrel of rum, pumping her arms as the thud of her heart began to drown out the voices of her pursuers. She knew this routine well and was content to let the port town blur into shapes and smells, light and shadows. She liked it better that way.

Scarlet McCray could find her way around Port Aberhard bound and blindfolded. She knew it as well as she knew her own worn boots, her crew, and the ship they called home. Port Aberhard looked the same, smelled the same, and felt the same as all the other port towns on all the other islands. Its red dirt roads teemed with ruddy merchants reeking of pipe smoke, loudmouthed pirates drawn to the tavern like compass needles to magnetic north, and King’s Men sweltering under blue wool coats, their brass buttons winking under a tropical sun. Smells of fried conch, sweet seaweed, and sour rum clung to the humid air, mingling with the scent of spices from inland forests.

The port towns even sounded the same—grumbling pirates, clipped orders from King’s Men, and gleeful cries from cabin boys on leave from the ships they worked on.

But most important was the feeling a person got walking through the ports all over the islands. It was an unnatural feeling. A downright unsettling feeling. The pirates blamed it on the spirits of the Islanders, a people killed by the King’s Men in their hunt for treasure. The King’s Men declared it to be the feeling of untamed wilderness. Others called it dark magic. Voodoo. No one could agree on exactly what caused this feeling, but neither could they deny its existence. And some islands had it worse than others. Much, much worse.

Scarlet herself had long ago stopped trying to find an explanation for the chill that made her toes curl and her ears tingle every time her crew docked in port. But it never left her—especially not when she was running for her life.

She’d just glanced over her shoulder to see how far she’d outrun the merchant when a sudden wind swept in from the docks and lifted the cap off her head, sending her tangled black hair tumbling down her back. “Scurvy!” Scarlet cried, flailing her arms in an attempt to catch her cap. But it rolled over her shoulder and along the road. “Not now!” She did an about-face, ducked low to snatch it up, and kept running. Leaving the cap behind wasn’t an option, for where would she be without her disguise? In a boatload of trouble, that’s where.

Soon she came upon a suitably dank and shadowy alley and dove inside. She found a decent hiding spot behind a mound of old crates and crouched there, hugging her knees, hoping the merchant and his helpers hadn’t closed in when she’d nearly blown her cover. If they found her, they’d turn her in to the King’s Men for punishment. And supposing they discovered that the skinny, dark-eyed boy in ragged trousers and an old gray coat was actually a twelve-year-old girl? That would absolutely scuttle.

Anyway, hers had been a valiant crime as far as crimes went. She’d do it again in an instant, no hesitation. Just fifteen minutes ago she’d been slinking along between the docks, looking for a shiny, green lime or a stray doubloon to pocket, when she spotted a merchant with a great big cage full of birds. Having always been partial to winged things, she approached and instantly felt her stomach turn when she realized what kind of birds the merchant was selling. Only
one island creature had such beautiful, ruby-red feathers, marked by a single band of blue and green on each wing.

The Islanders had called them “aras.” They’d nearly been killed off completely a few decades ago when the King’s Men first invaded the islands to harvest exotic wood and spices and send them back to greedy King Aberhard. The birds’ beauty had been their undoing. As soon as the King’s Men arrived, they began to blast them out of the sky, then ship their red feathers back to the Old World in overstuffed canvas sacks. Rumor had it that every night, King Aberhard rested his big, greasy head on a pillow stuffed with ara feathers. The thought made Scarlet’s blood simmer.

But that wasn’t even the worst of it. Old Worlders of all kinds, from spice merchants and wood cutters to plantation owners and pirates, soon descended on the islands as well, hoping to get in on the pillaging and plundering, especially if it unearthed a bounty of precious jewels. The native Islanders, who’d lived in leafy huts and tended garden plots on the islands for hundreds of years, watched with increasing alarm as these pale, brisk men invaded their homelands and spread Old World diseases among them. Islander numbers fell as hard and as fast as the trees around them, and one particularly deadly plague, known as the Island Fever, was rumored to have killed them off completely.

Scarlet hated that story. It made her stomach ache just as badly as the story of the aras. For perhaps
the thousandth time, she wished she could have done something to save them.

And so, when she saw the merchant’s cage nearly overflowing with the rare red birds, Scarlet wasted no time in committing her crime of passion. She marched right up, grasped the doors of the cage with both hands, and yanked them wide open.

The aras needed no instructions. Out the doors they flew, a long, red ribbon streaking across the sky toward the jungle and hopefully home.

Home. Scarlet bit her lip as she watched them, and for a moment she forgot that she was a criminal, being sized up by a seething merchant with bloodshot eyes and bared teeth…

“Stop the boy!”

Tucked away in her hiding spot, Scarlet heard the merchant and a few other men run past, boots crunching on gravel. She let her breath out in a whoosh, then grinned. She’d saved some powerless creatures and made life a little more difficult for the gluttonous, overdressed Old Worlders. Wishing every day could feel so productive, she stood up and dusted off her grimy trousers. Now she’d just sneak out, find her crew, and regale them with the tale of her daring adventure. Maybe it would inspire them in their own mission. They were, after all, in dire need of inspiration.

She stepped out of the alley, blinked in the sunlight, and headed back toward the docks, pulling her cap down low over her eyes, just in case.

A new ship had docked in port—a great big schooner
with Old World flags quivering in the silver afternoon sky. Passengers stumbled from its deck to the dock, looking stunned and grateful to have both feet on firm ground. Most were King’s Men, smoothing the wrinkles in their coats and trousers. But two of the travelers, neither one in uniform, stood out against the crowd. One—middle-aged and fat with a shiny scalp—studied a compass. But it was his companion who drew Scarlet’s attention: a smallish boy around her age, staring slack-jawed at the busy port before him.

She knew right away what had brought them there. These days, sailors lay anchor in the islands for one reason alone: to search for treasure. Around the time the Island Fever had begun to rage—some seven or eight years ago—one of King Aberhard’s underlings began to speak of a treasure he’d come upon. Unfortunately, the man—Admiral Something-or-Other—perished of the fever himself before he got around to explaining exactly what the treasure entailed. But he had captured the curiosity of the king, who promised a hefty reward to whoever found the mysterious thing. Even now, years later, boatloads of pirates, merchants, and King’s Men flocked to the tropics, practically drooling at the notion of unearthing the treasure. Most even enjoyed the mystery surrounding it—at first, anyway.