Path of the Crushed Heart: Book Four of the Serpent Catch Series (14 page)

Chapter 24: A Storm of Birds

Phylomon studied the sky on the rolling deck of the ship, studying clouds of birds. For a hundred miles across the island, the skies were dark gray, as if the storm of the century were on the rise.

In his head he quickly calculated—estimated that there were not merely millions of the strange gray birds, but hundreds of millions, more than mankind on Anee could ever hope to fight or evade.

“Have Darrissea idle the engines,” Phylomon told Fava. “I want all of you to stay inside the cabin, in case the birds attack.”

Fava rushed below deck into the cabin, but Tull remained beside Phylomon for the moment.

“Maybe we should shut off the engines,” Tull said.

“Why?” Phylomon gave him a sidelong look.

“I hear serpents speaking in the water,” Tull answered, “strange serpents. They will be looking for our boat.”

Phylomon knew that the sea serpent was Tull’s animal guide, but the big Tcho-Pwi looked worried. “Why should we fear these serpents?”

Tull shook his head. “These are not like the serpents at Smilodon Bay. These are … strangers, new ones. Cruel.” Tull thought for a long moment and concluded. “They will hunt the boat.”

Phylomon exhaled a long sigh. He knew that the Creators had wiped out all of the serpents last year, but hadn’t imagined that they might supplant the creatures. Of course, that had been their plan. They’d upgraded the serpents, created a breed that saw humans as prey, boats as a threat.

“Can you guide us past them, get me to the island?”

Tull nodded, “Perhaps,” then he went down into the cabin.

Phylomon watched him leave. Tull hung his head, and his shoulders were rounded by fatigue. The boy was still weak and had been up for hours. Phylomon worried for him.

Darrissea came topside, took Phylomon’s hand, just held it, and asked, “What are you going to do?”

Tull reversed the engines, turned the boat away, and headed east of the island, back farther out to sea.

“We’ll see if we can reach the island, and then decide,” Phylomon answered. The young girl looked up at him from dark eyes.

“Can I come with you?”

“I don’t believe that will be possible,” Phylomon answered, but he did not move his hand away. “It’s too dangerous.”

Tull kept the boat on course for several hours, then circled up north of the island and cut the engines. By then, he was sweating and breathing shallowly, and Phylomon had to urge him to go to bed.

“Just let the wind blow us toward the island in the dark,” Tull whispered in pain. “Don’t move around or speak. I’ve tried to commune with the serpents, and they’ve begun to accept me, but I can’t vouch for your safety. I think that they won’t attack if we remain silent.”

Phylomon agreed, and as the sun set behind the island, he stood on the fore deck and let the boat drift. Tull came out with him, and stood gazing down into the water.

A stiff breeze battered the boat so that waves slapped the hull with a ringing sound. Phylomon watched Tull.

“Let’s go back farther out,” Tull whispered once. Phylomon moved to go start the engine, but Tull said, “No, wait—they’re too close!”

He began muttering, looking to the south and repeating the mantra of, “We are brothers.…We are brothers.”

He clutched the rail and stared into the water, as if he were in a trance.

He carefully walked into the cabin, stood at the throttle, and closed his eyes, sweating.

For several minutes he stood, then shouted, “They’ve found us!”

He gunned the engines, spun the boat. Phylomon held on, looked back. A dozen young serpents surfaced at once, only yards from where they had waited—small serpents, in the fifty-foot range—but still longer than the boat.

Tull kept the boat at full throttle, leaping over the waves, and the serpents followed in their wake, gaining.

Suddenly, directly behind the boat, a great serpent rose, a huge male with a dorsal fin that was longer than the boat. He roared and flashed his head in the sunlight, displaying teeth longer than a man’s arm.

He came down and grasped a smaller serpent in his jaws, then disappeared underwater, trailing blood.

Phylomon glanced at Tull’s pale face. The big Tcho-Pwi kept his hands on the wheel, kept running. Behind them, a serpent roared again, and Phylomon saw the great one rolling in the water while the others attacked, biting him in several places.

The big male threw them off, killed four, but the water around him teemed with foes.

Tull held the boat on course for an hour, then headed south, shut off the engines, and slumped at the controls.

Evening was coming, and the wind had died. They sat quietly, and Tull looked far off.

“Is your serpent dead?” Darrissea asked.

Tull nodded, gazing out to sea. “He couldn’t have killed them all. There were too many to fight.”

Fava nodded, put her arm around Tull.

“The wind is calmer now,” Phylomon said. “We shouldn’t have that trouble again.”

He did not bother to say that if the serpents attacked again, they wouldn’t make it away from the island alive. “Once the boat gets close to shore, I may have to jump out and ask you to run for it.”

The others merely nodded, and he added, “If we can get ashore safely, I’m not sure it would be wise for you to stay. There may be more blood eaters on the island.”

Fava shivered, and Phylomon thought a bit, then said, “In fact, if you can make it out, I’d prefer if you leave. Give me two weeks, and then come back for me.”

Darrissea said, “What if there are more eels here, like the blue eel the Creators sent to attack you in Smilodon Bay?”

“Then I will have to deal with them,” Phylomon answered.

By midnight, the others had all fallen asleep down below. Phylomon sat with Darrissea above decks for awhile, holding her hand as the moons did their nightly waltz.

The girl was beautiful in her way, with that innocence and purity that could only be found in the young and naïve, and Phylomon realized he would miss her.

He suspected that he was going to his death. The fuel-air bomb he’d hidden in his arm was powerful—too powerful for Phylomon to use at close range, and on the island, it would most likely incinerate him.

Perhaps if he had a pyroderm for his symbiote, like the one Tantos had stolen from his brother, he might survive, but Phylomon’s symbiote wouldn’t be able to withstand such heat, and Phylomon knew he could not count on the harmonic resonators alone to kill the Creators.

He might shake down their mountains, bury them for awhile, but they would just dig their way out. No, he needed to use the incendiary bomb first. If he survived, he could try the rods after he’d done as much damage as possible.

Phylomon kissed Darrissea’s cheek as she slept. “Find someone good to love,” he whispered in her ear. He doubted that her subconscious mind would register the words, but he hoped. He stroked her face, then got up to leave.

He watched the boat washing ever close to shore. There were rocks on shore, rocks enough to tear apart the small boat. The waves battering them were white with foam that flashed in the moonlight.

Tull, Fava and Darrissea apparently did not suspect that the boat was in danger. Being from the Rough, they’d never sailed in a metal boat, and they must have believed the metal shell gave their vehicle more protection than it did.

Let them sleep,
Phylomon thought.
Let them imagine themselves invincible.

Phylomon had a name for those without symbiotes; he called them “temporaries,” for their lives came and went like leaves passing in the wind. At times he found them amusing. Sleeping like babies when the boat was about to be dashed apart on the rocks.

He stayed at the wheel, ready to start the engines if necessary and back away from shore.

But he actually got lucky, and the wind drove them up on a steep but sandy beach.

Thor was up, and under the green and ginger light of the massive gas giant, Phylomon could see that the shore was black with sleeping birds.

The blue man packed his weapons into one sack, then slipped out the door of the boat, locked it behind him, and covered the windows with a tarpaulin. The birds would probably not recognize the boat as man-made, but he would not want them to be able to see into the cabin.

Phylomon tied the boat to a large boulder, and then slipped off through the darkness, walking softly among the birds.

They were larger than gulls, the size of large eagles with sharp beaks.

They often readjusted their wings and pecked at one another in their sleep, and Phylomon found them so numerous that he frequently had to move one aside with his toes so he could place his foot.

Yet the birds were unnaturally silent. Gulls or terns or nearly any other type of bird would have emitted cooing noises or an occasional cry, but these creatures were absolutely silent, and from time to time one would flip its neck in its sleep and try to slice Phylomon’s impenetrable hide.

He headed for a dark line of trees where the brush was thick, and took nearly an hour to cross three hundred yards of open beach and reach the trees.

The ground under the trees was littered with white bird guano and small animal bones piled many inches deep. It made squishy cracking noises as he walked through, and as he passed over the miles, he remained constantly amazed to find that it never got any thinner.

Always, above him, the birds sat thick in the trees, so that even under the light of an ample waning moon, he felt as if he were passing under the darkest jungle canopy.

He almost felt as if he had already entered the caves that would lead to the lair of the Creators.

***

Chapter 25: Dragons

At dawn, Darrissea woke to the sound of hundreds of clawed feet scrabbling atop the steel boat.

She rose and found the windows covered with leather tarps, and walked uneasily about the cabin. She relieved herself in the latrine, and then ate a small meal.

The fresh water was low, so she drank little. She sat in the shadows, munching thick moist rye crackers from Bashevgo. She tried not to think about the birds on the roof.

She recalled the eel that had come out of the gray bird back in Smilodon Bay, and in her mind’s eye she watched it wriggle in the fire, filled with bullets, yet unable to die. She could not help but wonder if the birds above her might carry such creatures in their stomachs, and if the cabin had any holes to the outside that would allow them access.

She tried to peer outside, hoping to see through a crack in the tarpaulin.

When Tull rose, Darrissea whispered, “Do you think any blood eaters are out there?”

“If they were close,” Tull answered, “I think Phylomon would have come back to warn us, or pulled the boat under cover to hide it.”

Darrissea nodded, little reassured.

For the rest of the morning they spoke seldom. Darrissea’s muscles began cramping, and she often stretched or rubbed herself. Her neck and head ached particularly, and by watching others, she saw that the stress was affecting them, too.

Several times during the day, they heard sea serpents roar out in the waters, a deep bellowing that had been familiar in Smilodon Bay. Back then, the sound had been comforting, but now it filled her with fear.

That evening, the whole boat rocked as some huge creature pounced on the deck.

Fava grabbed a handrail and righted herself. None of them moved for nearly twenty minutes as they listened to snuffling outside. The beast brushed past a window.

A hooked claw ripped the tarpaulin, and they saw a massive black shape, part of a wing.

“Dragon,” Tull whispered, but it was not like the little tyrant birds that protected the forests and hills from pterodactyls back home.

This was bigger even than the great horned dragons that rode the thermals out at sea, and Darrissea knew instinctively that it had been engineered by the Creators to hunt humans, that it was sniffing at the doors for them.

A few moments later, after circling the deck, the dragon returned to the cabin door and sat, snuffling and licking at the door, tasting their scent on its tongue.

None of them moved or spoke for nearly an hour, simply hoping the predator would leave, but Darrissea sweated a storm, and realized she was only making it worse, filling the cabin with the taste of her fear.

Finally the dragon roared and leapt into the sky. She waited for several moments for it to return, and when it did not, Darrissea heaved a sigh of relief.

“
Adja.
I fear we can’t stay here,” Fava whispered. “This place has evil kwea.”

“I don’t think we can leave right now,” Tull replied. “I hear serpents patrolling the coast.”

“I can’t hear them,” Darrissea said.

“They talk very deep. You can almost feel the sound trembling through your bones rather than hear it with your ears.”

Darrissea listened, shook her head. “I can’t hear anything.”

“I hear it,” Fava answered after a few seconds.

“You Pwi and your strong ears,” Darrissea said. “If they become silent, can we leave?”

“If they become silent,” Tull said, “it means only that they’ve quit talking.”

Darrissea asked, “Couldn’t we outrun them?”

Tull considered. “They can call to one another for miles, and they hunt in packs, driving their prey. I’d rather try to sneak away.”

The serpents that they had seen were juveniles, and Darrissea wondered if the metal hull could protect them against such small beasts if a serpent coiled around the boat.

Fava stared through the small tear in the tarpaulin. “I see more dragons outside, floating on the wind.” She exhaled a deep breath. Above they heard the soft scrabbling of bird claws, the scrape of beaks as gray birds settled on the boat again.

They crept down into a storage room below and locked themselves in.

For hours they waited, and Fava pulled off the bandages from Tull’s chest to store them.

The wound had finally stopped seeping, though the strange blue scar seemed to have grown wider. It was nearly two inches wide and a foot long, and she said, “The scar seems bigger than the wound was. How does it feel?”

“It’s getting better,” he said.

He put his tunic back on, furtively, almost as if he felt guilty, then he let Fava lay her head on his chest and softly sing. In the muted light, Darrissea could see little.

For some reason that she couldn’t fathom, she could not help but feel jealous. Loneliness stings.

Darrissea wished Phylomon were near so that she could lay her own head in his lap, feel safe in his arms. Darrissea could not help but think about how Phylomon had kissed her last night, when he thought she slept. “Find someone good to love.” They were not the words of someone who was dead to love.

Yet she feared he was dead to the world.

For the past several days, she’d been thinking about it. If the Creators’ symbiotes were so much stronger than Phylomon’s, he would need a powerful weapon to kill them.

She suspected that his weapon would kill him, too.

“You know, you once told me that you admired my courage, because I always speak the truth,” Darrissea said to Tull. “And I’ve admired yours, because you are not afraid to live.”

Tull grunted in answer.

Darrissea continued, “I feel like we are both cowards now. We came to fight the Creators, but
we’re
not fighting. We’re letting Phylomon do it. And in Bashevgo, what did we accomplish? Back in Smilodon Bay we promised to destroy the slavers, but we’ve run from them.”

“The slaves don’t want to be freed,” Fava countered. “You saw how they turned against Phylomon and the Hukm.”

Darrissea apologized in the Blade Kin’s behalf, “They were only afraid of the Hukm.”

Tull said, “You’re right, we made a vow, but who do we kill? The Slave Lords? I saw them in Denai—beautiful people who were more interested in parties than in ruling slaves. Most of them don’t
run
anything. They’re just merchants, buying and selling goods to one another.

“So shall we kill the Blade Kin? They’re apes, beating their chests to seek one another’s admiration. You should have seen Mahkawn’s eyes as he thrust the sword into me. He called me his ‘friend,’ and he was being as compassionate as he knew how.

“So shall we kill the Thralls who continue to serve the Slave Lords and the Blade Kin? Shall we be reduced to eliminating the greatest victims of the state?” Tull asked. “In Smilodon Bay the answer seemed easy. Perhaps the Creators are right, and it is time to tear the whole thing down, destroy mankind and start over.”

“You don’t believe that, do you?” Fava said.

“I don’t know what to believe.”

“In Bashevgo,” Fava said, “Wertha had begun to think that you are the Okansharai, that you could free Bashevgo. He was praying for you.”

Tull laughed. “He shouldn’t have wasted his breath.”

“We made a covenant,” Darrissea said. “You promised to help me.”

“I’ll do what I can, everything that I can” Tull said. “Once I learn the art of Spirit Walking, we should be able to help some slaves escape from Craal and Bashevgo. But think of it: For every slave we free, a dozen more will be born. In time we could build a nation of free men, but we would never be a match for Craal.” Darrissea began to speak, but Tull stopped her with a motion of his hand. “Listen—”

Darrissea heard moaning. She’d have thought it the creaking of timbers in the boat, but this metal ship made no such sounds.

“The serpents are leaving,” Tull whispered. “They’re angry about something.”

He gently moved Fava aside, got up, opened the door and ran up into the cabin, then stood hunched, looking out the slit in the tarpaulin. It was far darker than Darrissea had expected, and she realized that her time below had gone fast. Night had fallen.

“I see a ship!” Tull said. “Tantos has come to battle the Creators. He is firing laser cannons.”

Darrissea and Fava rushed up, looked out the slit. Several miles out to sea, a huge metal ship lit the night with cannon fire.

A great battle was raging. The Creators’ dragons had besieged the ship from above, while the great serpents did the same from beneath, yet Tantos had brought the same armored behemoth he’d used to transport slaves from the Rough, and against that ship the Creators’ beasts appeared ineffectual.

The conventional cannons began roaring from the decks, belching white plumes of smoke and spitting fire, while portable laser cannons sliced the air above. The gray birds didn’t join the attack, did not even seem aware of the roaring cannons in the distance.

“They’re getting closer,” Darrissea said. “Could they spot us?”

“Not if we leave now,” Fava answered.

Before Darrissea had time to react, Fava opened the cabin door and stepped outside. For several minutes she made no noise, then the tarp over the front windows was pulled away.

Darrissea went to the window. The shore was black with sleeping birds, as was the deck of the boat.

She watched as Fava tied the tarp at the top, and then crept slowly to the bow of the ship, tiptoeing between the sleeping birds.

Sometimes, birds would turn and slash her ankles with their beaks as they slept, and Fava bit her lip and tried not to cry out. She untied the rope that held the boat to shore, and stood up, wobbling.

She staggered back to the door, heedless of birds nipping at her ankles. As she stepped in, she was panting, sweating, and she fell to the floor.

Tull grabbed her and hugged her. “You shouldn’t have done that.”

“Wash my feet!” Fava cried, near hysterics. “They are like ice. I can’t feel them!”

Tull ran down to the galley, got some water, and Darrissea held Fava.

“I … I’m sorry,” Fava said. “I think I’ve been poisoned. I had to do it. I had to unmoor the boat, before my courage failed.”

Tull rushed back up to pour water over Fava’s wounds. “They’re bleeding well. Any poison should come out,” he said hopefully, and Darrissea studied the wounds. They were bleeding more than well. They were a mess, slashed half a dozen times each, and Darrissea felt amazed that the birds could have done so much damage so casually.

Outside, the booming cannons drew nearer. Fava looked up at Tull, panting. “Get the boat out of here,” she told him. “There’s nothing more that you can do for me.”

Her constricted breathing filled the silence of the cabin, and sweat gleamed on her forehead in the failing light. Darrissea took the stick to the ship, fired the engine, and tried to back the boat away from shore.

It wouldn’t budge.

“We’re too high on the sand,” she yelled at Tull. “We need to push off.” She looked down at Fava’s feet. The girl had not been wearing boots.

Darrissea grabbed some cloth, tied it around her own boots, reinforcing the supple leather. The Blade Kin had taken her armor when they captured her, so she had no other protection.

She threw on a heavy tunic, grabbed a long-bladed knife. Tull was still on the floor, washing Fava’s feet.

“Good luck,” Darrissea said, and she rushed up to the cabin door, went out on deck.

She walked slowly in the moonlight, and still the birds ripped at her feet when she tried to nudge them aside.

She used the knife to parry, and made her way to the sand. She leapt down, pushed the boat off.

It moved out into the water more easily than she had thought it would, and soon the boat was bobbing in the waves.

Tull appeared at the window, and waved, urgently motioning for her to jump in the water, wade out to the boat.

Instead, Darrissea waved goodbye, whispering, “Good luck.”

She pulled her cloak tight, then slowly made her way up the beach toward the tangled woods, following Phylomon’s tracks in the sand.

Tull waited several minutes, then fired the engines. Abruptly the boat turned and sped north.

***