Hunt for the Panther 3 (9781101610923) (23 page)

When Scarlet was five years old, the Island Fever had struck her village, and her Islander mother had fallen ill. She’d begged her husband, a former admiral for the King’s Men, to take Scarlet off the island and keep her healthy. Scarlet never saw her mother again.

Her father, John McCray, had returned to the King’s Men, leaving Scarlet with a governess named Mary Lewis (aka Scary Mary), who’d made every attempt to erase Scarlet’s memories of her old life. She’d even forced her to do awful things like curl her hair and wear petticoats and learn English.

Not that the English lessons themselves were awful. It was being forced to forget her language that truly scuttled. Now, with no other Islanders around, Scarlet doubted it would ever come back to her.

She studied the tree branches above her until she spotted a sparkle of red. Then she concentrated hard. The aras’ distress was gone.

“Figures.”

Scarlet grasped a low branch and swung herself up
into the nearest tree. She could climb it blindfolded by now. High above the ground, she settled into her usual spot on a sturdy branch and looked around. To her left she could see the clearing where the Lost Souls were camped. To her right stood another tree and another beyond it. And in those trees sat dozens of birds’ nests—a rookery, the Old Worlders called it. And in those birds’ nests sat dozens of sleepy scarlet-red birds with bands of green and blue on their wings. The aras. They didn’t look a bit distressed.

“Well?” she said. “What was all that fuss about? Hummingbirds? Rotten fruit? Come on, I came all this way for
nothing
?”

A few aras eyed her drowsily, fluffed up their feathers, and went back to sleep.

“Honestly.” Another problem, as she’d recently discovered, was that while she could understand what the animals were feeling, she had no way to communicate with them. No matter how much time Scarlet spent with them, the aras never seemed to understand a word she said.

A beam of sunlight sneaked through the tree canopy, illuminating specks of red in each nest, and despite her annoyance Scarlet couldn’t help but smile. All these years, the King’s Men and the pirates had been scouring the islands for treasure, as well as wood and spices, but they’d rarely come across a single jewel. Perhaps because the aras hid them so well. The birds simply scraped the ground with their beaks, nabbed the rubies here and there, and tucked them into the walls of their nests for safekeeping.

The King’s Men, meanwhile, continued hunting the aras to near extinction for their gorgeous red feathers, not realizing that the birds were the key to the treasure they so desperately searched for.

Scarlet leaned back against the tree trunk and sighed. It was a funny situation, but not laugh-out-loud funny. The kind of funny that made you want to spit.

She turned away from the birds to look down on the Lost Souls’ camp. It wasn’t the place she’d originally called home; she had yet to find the spot where the Islanders’ village once stood, although she guessed it was about an hour’s journey from here. This clearing, with its long, soft grass and glistening freshwater pool, was a special place the Islanders used to visit a few times a year to relax, chat with neighbors, and harvest food and spices. It had a safe and peaceful feeling about it, which lingered even now, years after the last Islanders had been here. Scarlet was fairly certain they were still here in spirit, though. Island X was rumored to be one of
those
islands, filled with spirits and spooks that kept the pirates and King’s Men far from its shores. Scarlet believed it was just the Islanders continuing to protect their home.

If she concentrated hard enough, she could picture the clearing as it had looked years ago—with children playing tag around the pool while their parents talked and filled baskets with seeds to grind into spices. If she focused even harder, she could picture her mother among them, tall and graceful and beautiful. And if she was very lucky, she could make out her father. Strong and relaxed and happy.

In a way, she’d not only lost her mother when the Island Fever hit, but her father, too. At least the father she knew and loved.

Once they’d left Island X, he rarely even paid her and Scary Mary a visit at the house where they lived in Jamestown. When he did, he was stern and stony. He refused to talk about the past and their life in the village or to call his daughter by her true name, Ara, which meant both a fiery shade of red and the brilliant bird of the same color.

Scarlet hadn’t seen her father in nearly three years now, not since he’d announced that he was sending her to live with his family in the Old World. While Scarlet had been thrilled at the thought of escaping Scary Mary, she’d had no intention of spending the rest of her life in Old World ribbons and petticoats. So one afternoon, she’d up and run away. And it was a good thing, too, because if she hadn’t, she’d never have met up with the Lost Souls or joined their jolly ship
or
been named their captain.

She squinted at the clearing. She could make out a few of the figures below: Liam and Ronagh Flannigan were playing catch with an enormous mushroom while Tim Sanders, the quartermaster of the
Margaret’s Hop
, sat cross-legged near the pool, reading a thick book he’d lugged up from the ship. Other Lost Souls played Smelly Wild Pig in the Middle on the grass, and still more swung upside down in a nearby tree, screeching like monkeys.

From afar, Scarlet thought, they looked like normal Lost Souls. But she knew better. Her crew had been
acting a little off since she’d made the “new mission” announcement a few weeks back. She felt their uncertainty as clearly as she’d felt the aras’ anxiety or the monkey’s outrage over his stolen breakfast.

It wasn’t that the Lost Souls didn’t want to protect Island X. But leaving the
Hop
to guard a treasure on land wasn’t exactly the kind of mission they were used to. They’d grown accustomed to life at sea, dressing up like ghouls in black cloaks and raiding the ships of pirates and King’s Men. And they probably could have carried on like that forever (or at least until they were grown up) if Jem Fitzgerald and his uncle Finn hadn’t gotten themselves kidnapped by pirates. The Lost Souls had staged a rescue, and it turned out that Jem was in possession of a map to the storied treasure everyone was looking for. (Although no one knew quite what it was.) When he got separated from Uncle Finn, he joined the Lost Souls in a hunt for both the treasure and his uncle. A few jungle treks, bouts of treason on board the
Hop
, and battles with bloodthirsty pirates later, here they were, the guardians of Island X and all its treasures.

Scarlet only wished the Lost Souls could share her enthusiasm for the new mission. Maybe if she taught them more about the island, she mused, they’d feel more connected to it. But then, that would require her to remember all the details she’d forgotten in the past seven years. And at the rate she was remembering these days, that would take a while. She sighed again. It was all rather complicated.

“But don’t you worry,” she said, turning back to the aras, not caring if they understood English or not. “We’ll protect the treasure from anyone who dares trespass. And not just the rubies. We’re here to protect
all
of Island X.”

She knew the Islanders would have appreciated that; it was this special, untouched place they’d valued, not some shiny red rocks. If the treasure hunters were to discover Island X’s riches, they’d take not only every jewel on it, but also every tree and animal they pleased—just as they had on all the other islands.

“Don’t you worry,” Scarlet repeated, sounding far braver than she felt. “We’ve got a plan.” She began to climb back down the tree to call the crew together to make that plan.

Scarlet had barely set foot in the clearing when she ran into eleven-year-old Jem Fitzgerald and his uncle Finn, who was supposedly a famous botanist on the other side of the world. Scarlet still thought that Finnaeus Bliss, with his very bald head and sweaty, egg-shaped body, looked nothing like a famous person should. But then, from what she’d heard, things were a little backward in the Old World.

“It’s really the
Bediotropicanus onicus
that we’re after,” Uncle Finn was telling Jem, who seemed to be trying hard to stay awake. Uncle Finn tended to go on at length about plants. “It’s one of the most riveting
Bedio
s I’ve heard of, and that’s saying something! The structure of its anthers, you see—”

Scarlet decided that this was a fine time to interject and stepped toward them. “Are you off then, Uncle Finn?” He wasn’t
her
uncle, of course, but all the Lost Souls had taken to calling him “Uncle Finn.” They might never have admitted to missing their own parents, whom they’d either abandoned to join the Lost Souls or who’d abandoned them, but they were happy to take on a surrogate uncle.

Jem looked relieved at the interruption. Uncle Finn mopped his forehead with his handkerchief. “I am, indeed, Captain. Off on the trail of a plant that could change our lives.”

Scarlet studied the sweaty scientist. Uncle Finn could be a little dramatic when it came to plants, but this sounded interesting. “Really? What is it?”

“A bromeliad.”

“Oh.” Scarlet herself wouldn’t have known a bromeliad to see one, but she knew better than to admit that to Uncle Finn.

“A bromeliad that will”—he paused for effect—“cure the world of androgenetic alopecia.”

Scarlet’s eyes widened. “Really?”

Jem raised an eyebrow at her. “Do you know what that is?”

She shook her head. “Not a clue. But it sounds terrible.”

“It is,” Uncle Finn said solemnly.

“It’s baldness,” Jem said, blowing a lock of hair out of his eyes. “Hair loss.”

“Oh.” Scarlet looked from Jem to his uncle. “A bromeliad can cure that?”

Uncle Finn nodded. “I believe so. It’ll take some
searching, though. And some intense experimentation. Fortunately, I’ve acquired a research assistant,” he said, just as a monstrous man in tattered trousers came running toward them.

“Finn! Finn, I’m ready!” the man shouted. A cutlass hanging from his belt slapped his tree-trunk leg as he ran.

“Thomas?” Scarlet looked at Jem, who grinned.

The giant Thomas skidded to a stop in front of them, gasping for breath. “Thought… thought ye’d left without me. I was worried there.”

Uncle Finn reached up to pat Thomas’s shoulder. “I wouldn’t leave without you, Thomas. I was just saying a few words to Jem before we go.”

“Right. Course. I was… I was just worried.”

Scarlet, Jem, and Uncle Finn all smiled at him. It was hard to believe that just a month ago Thomas had actually helped the treasure-hungry pirates kidnap Jem and Uncle Finn. It hadn’t been his idea, of course—he’d worked on the
Dark Ranger
, a pirate ship captained by a nasty, rodentlike man with a very long name that Scarlet could never remember. But Thomas had proven himself a hero twice: first when he’d smuggled Uncle Finn off the ship and later when Captain What’s-his-name had gotten his hands on the treasure map and intercepted the Lost Souls and Uncle Finn on Island X. There, beside the island’s steamy Boiling Lake, Thomas had denied his captain’s orders to do away with the children and taken their side instead.

Scarlet sighed happily at the memory. Thomas was a jolly pirate. She’d miss him while he was off on this new
adventure, but she could tell he was happy as a clam to be a real research assistant.

“Now, Jem, Scarlet.” Uncle Finn stuffed his handkerchief in his pocket. “We’ll be gone a few days. And I wouldn’t be a good uncle if I didn’t say this.”

“Uncle Finn, we—” Jem began to protest.

“Quiet, boy. We’ve seen many dangers on this island—”

“But—” Scarlet interjected, ready to assure him that she was well aware of all the dangers. Uncle Finn stopped her with a wave of his hand.

“
But
we’ve been here a month, and all seems well. Plus, I know the Lost Souls are capable of taking care of themselves. Lord knows if you can sail a ship and raid schooners without getting caught, you can camp alone on an island.
However
, you mustn’t forget the dangers. Yes, the animals might be on your side. Yes, the spirits seem to be looking out for you. But the Dread Pirate Captain Wallace Hammerstein-Jones—”

“
That’s
his name!” Scarlet exclaimed, and received a glare from Uncle Finn. “Sorry. I just… it’s a long name,” she murmured.

Finn cleared his throat. “You mustn’t forget about Captain Wallace. He has our old map, and he’ll be back. So promise me you’ll be careful.”

Scarlet and Jem mumbled their promises.

“Good. And if you need me, I won’t be far away. In fact…” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a funny little pipe about the size of Scarlet’s pinkie finger. “I’ll leave this with you. It looks harmless, but believe me,
it will shatter the nearest eardrum. If you need me”—he tossed Jem the pipe—“just call.”

“All right.” Jem tucked it in his pocket.

“Well then. Thomas, if you’re ready.”

Thomas straightened and saluted. “At yer service, Cap’n Finn.”

Uncle Finn shook his head. “Just Finn, Thomas. We’re off then. Take care, you two.”