Raiders' Ransom (28 page)

“Hold on to something!” I shout, pushing the tiller. The boat leans so far over, Lexy's practically dangling over the water, her arms tight round the mast. The rigging whistles and clanks as we pick up speed, the sail groans and creaks as the wind tries to pull the tear in the canvas even wider.

“Lilly, the other boats!” shouts Lexy.

But what can I do about them? Cos even with my boat nearly tearing itself to pieces, we've hardly gained anything on Medwin's warship. And I know now that this is it.
Cos we're never going to make it to the English fleet.

I fight to keep the boat sailing as close to the wind as I can without tipping us over. Medwin's warship's just behind us, but he doesn't blow us up with a rocket. And he doesn't overtake us, either. It's like he's playing with us. And I feel colder and colder inside, cos what kind of game would a raider Boss play? The water splashes past frothing greens and grays, every bump and wave bringing a stronger scent of the sea. Finally, we push past the last island. As soon as we're out of the river, out into open sea, the wind picks up, swirling in different directions, chopping up the waves. We start banging through the water, the boat crashing hard into each trough, rising up sharply with every crest. Lexy's face is fixed into stiff fear, and her thin arms braced to hold on. Zeph's hanging on, too, and I can't tell if he's crying cos of all the spray, but he's still staring back at his father's dragonboat.

The rigging creaks and sighs as the wind tries to pull everything apart. Then comes a gust that bangs at the mainsail. The boom snaps suddenly across, leaving the sail slack and flailing. The boat lurches upright, and now we're bobbing and drifting on the waves.

“Eek!” screams Lexy, and she's on her face, lying in the bottom of the boat.

I start grabbing for lines, trying to get the sail back, but the wind's playing with us, swinging the boom about. The lines are like wet snakes, snapping and twisting out of my fingers.

“Hishk!” says Cat, leaping about and trying to catch at the flapping lines. But he's only got paws, and these ain't mouse tails.

There's a loud, cracking snap from above, and the scorched and frayed halyard breaks. The mainsail folds and curls, pulling away from the mast in a great slump of canvas.

“Look out!” I scream, cos there ain't time for much else. Lexy shrieks, the sail falls. With a rushing, slapping sound, like the falling of wet leaves, it crashes down across the boat, half burying us in its gray-white billows.

We're dead stop now; I can't even bear to look behind us.

“Why ain't your father blasted us?” I say to Zeph. He looks back, his face pale and frightened-looking.

“He probably wants to catch me. Make an example …” And he won't say anything more.

So we're sat here, like dead fish, and the raiders are all around us. All we've got to sail with now is the jib sail, which won't get us anywhere fast. I've got to get the halyard mended and the mainsail back up. But the only way is to climb the mast, and I don't fancy making myself such a nice target for the raiders.

“Look!” calls Lexy, pointing ahead. And there, right in front of us, filling up all the sea that ain't filled with red, are the white sails of the English fleet. They're sailing right for us! We're saved!

I hope.

“They're huge,” says Zeph, eyes wide and staring.

The English ships tower over us. Looking up at the nearest one, with its brown-gray hull all patched and stained, it makes me think of them buildings in London, but with stacks of white sails on top.

“… twenty-four, twenty-five,” says Zeph.

It's like a whole street of them buildings just picked themselves up and sailed here.

“There's my daddy!” cries Lexy, pointing at one of the ships. “Daddy! Daddy!” she calls. And there he is, up on the deck of the biggest ship. Like a fat plum in his blue waistcoat. He's holding a telescope, the glass glinting as he points it our way.

I try to pick Andy out of all the men running around on the ships. But there's too much going on: sailors spidering up and down the rigging; cannon shutters banging open; soldiers on deck loading and checking their rifles.

From behind comes shouts and the smacking of oars. Medwin's dragonboat! And the rest of the dragonboats are fanned out behind, filling the mouth of the river. Seems like all I can see is the hulls of boats, all of them bigger than us. Everywhere, ships are turning away from each other, turning toward each other, throwing up great roars of spray, filling the air with shouted commands and the snap of swelling sails. I use the jib sail as best I can to keep us out of harm's way, thinking every moment we're going to be smashed to pieces by some bigger boat.

The two fleets pass into each other, red sails mixing into white, but there's no shots fired. The raiders shout and swear
at the English, and the English soldiers raise their rifles and take aim. But nothing happens. The war doesn't start. It's like everyone's sizing each other up. Just as quick as they went in, the red sails turn and pull back, while the white sails hold their distance. The two fleets stalk each other, passing all around us, and still no shots are fired. Medwin's dragonboat and Randall's flagship match their moves tack for tack, keeping close as they can to our little boat. And we drift in between them like a fly waiting to get squashed.

“Randall!” roars Medwin. “Randall, you low-living English pus-bag! What have you done to my son? Sent a witch to turn him traitor?”

Randall's up on the foredeck of his flagship, leaning over the gunwale and clutching at some rigging to steady himself. Next to him there's a man dressed all in black, Jasper, the Scottish Ambassador.

“You black-hearted terrorist!” shouts Randall. “You kidnapper! What are you doing with my daughter?”

Cat gives a scared, mewling cry. I pick him up and hold him tight to me.

“What's going to happen?” asks Lexy, and I don't want to tell her, cos it's likely something bad. I look at Zeph, but he's lost in his own thoughts, staring back at his pa.

“It'll be all right,” I say, and I pull Lexy down into the bottom of my boat, half under the fallen sail, and try to make us look as small as possible. Cat's squeezed as close to me as he
can get. We bob in the water, helpless, while the two flagships circle us. A mouse between two tigers.

Out in the fleets, the raiders start banging their swords on their shields, a bit like the drumming of their warships, but more menacing. In answer, there's a rippling, crackling noise as all the soldiers on the English ships lift and aim their rifles. There's a loud clattering noise from Medwin's warship. On the deck a gray, metal-looking machine starts to turn slowly. At its center, pointing into the sky, is a sleek black rocket.

Lexy leaps up suddenly.

“Daddy! Help me!” she cries, her voice like a tiny bird.

And Randall's shouting orders. Sailors run, and one of the rowboats dangling from the stern starts rattling down on its ropes toward the water.

There's answering shouts from Medwin's dragonboat. On the deck, two raiders start spinning wheels on the rocket launcher, and the sharp nose of the rocket whirs around. Turning, lowering, till it's pointed right at us.

“Randall!” shouts Medwin, his voice carrying over the water. “You stop that, or I'll blow your little girl out of the water!”

“Father!” cries Zeph, like he can't believe what his father's doing. But Medwin doesn't even look at him.

Up on the English tall ship, there's the
clang, clang, clang
of cannons rolling into their places. They're aimed at the raiders. Could a cannonball reach the raider deck before they had time to launch the rocket? On the dragonboat, Medwin starts laughing.

“You want a fight, Randall?” he roars. “Well, that's what I came here for!”

Zeph keeps staring up at his father, like he's trying to read his mind. Then suddenly he snaps round to face me.

“This is all your fault!”

“You were the one brought us this way,” I say.

“You sailed straight for the English fleet!”

“Because your father was firing rockets at us!”

Me and Zeph are face-to-face, glaring. Another word and we'll be punching each other.

“Stop it!” shouts Lexy. “What are we going to do? We've got to do something!”

The rowboat's stopped lowering from the tall ship. There's a huddle of blue-coated soldiers around Randall and Jasper. On the dragonboat, the red-leathered raiders are still jeering insults out over the water. One of them, tall and thin with red hair, holds up a spear, pulls back his arm, and hurls it. The gleaming metal point sparkles as it flashes through the air.

“Get down!” cries Zeph, and yanks me and Lexy under the fallen sail. I can hardly breathe, hardly see, I'm being pushed flat by the canvas. Something slaps down into the sail, and there's a sudden break of light between me and Zeph. The tip of the spear tears into the canvas next to my head, hurtles through and slams into the wood. About an inch from my foot. A cheer goes up on the dragonboat. And gets cut off by the clatter of three or four rifles firing from the English ship.

“We're going to be killed!” I say.

“My daddy's fighting to save me,” says Lexy.

“And mine'll kill us before he ever gets a chance,” says Zeph.

“Then we've got to stop them fighting,” I say, “cos I don't reckon we'll last two minutes once the battle starts.” And then I have a thought, cos it ain't true what Lexy says, they ain't just fighting over her. Not really.

“It was the Scots started this,” I say. “They sent your pa to raid our village. And they didn't want Lexy, they wanted the jewel-puter. If we could just show everyone what was really going on …” But then I stop, cos I ain't got a clue how to do that. Zeph's face changes, like he's got a glimmer of hope.

“Then my father'll believe Aileen's a spy, coz she was always going on about the jewel. And she was well angry when Father brought home Lexy instead.”

Above us, there's more shouts, and some rifle shots crack out.

“You can make the ghost come out,” says Zeph. “Show it to them.”

“Well I would if I had it!” I snap.

“You do,” says Zeph, looking pleased with himself. And he reaches into his jacket and pulls out the jewel.

“How did you get that?” I say, and he looks even more pleased with himself.

“Just get the ghost out,” he says, and I take the jewel from his hand.

It feels warm and tingly when I touch it, and the head suddenly pops out. 'Cept there's so little room under the sail, the head bumps into the canvas above us, and it bends and spreads out, so one eye is smeared into its hair.

“Primary user identified. Welcome, Lilly Melkun.” It sounds excited. “Are we there yet? Where are the scientists?”

Then it looks around at me, Lexy, Zeph, and Cat huddling under the canvas. “Not again,” it groans. “Why do you have to keep activating me in totally inappropriate settings? Where are we now, in some kind of tent?”

“We're trapped between two war fleets, hiding under a sail, and we're going to get blown to pieces if you don't stop them,” I say.

The head raises one eyebrow. It might be raising the other one, but I can't tell cos it's stretched sideways across the underside of the sail. “Are you
sure
you aren't hackers?” it says.

“I don't even know what a hacker is!” I shout. “But you've got to get out there.”

“Out into a sea battle? Do you realize how vulnerable I am to seawater? “

“Well, you'll have plenty of it if we get hit by a rocket!” I snap. “You say you want to go to Scotland: Randall's got the Scottish Ambassador on his ship. But he'll never even know you're here if we all drown.”

“All right, all right,” says the head. “Really, there's no need to be so dramatic!”

I push my head out, blinking in the bright light reflected from the sea. Everything's roaring and loud after being under the sail. On the boats, there's running around, and orders being shouted. My heart's hammering, waiting for a rifle shot to whine into me, for a spear to come thrumming through the air. I get my hand out, the one holding the jewel, and the head comes floating out with it.

“Go on,” I say. “You said to Aileen you were some super war puter. Do something.”

The head coughs, and looks away. “Ah. Yes. I did, didn't I?”

“What about stopping the rockets and cannons from working. Can you do that?”

“Um, no.”

“Can you make everyone fall asleep so they won't fight?”

“Not really.”

“Can you shoot the rockets out of the air before they hit us?”

“Honestly, you do have extremely high expectations! You can hold my drive unit in your hand, so where exactly do you think I'd be hiding weapons?”

“Well, what
can
you do?” I cry. The head looks around at the tall ships creaking above us and the dragonboats with their jeering warriors.

“I know,” it says. “I can go interactive!”

And the head starts to swell, getting larger and larger, rising up and filling the air above us. It ain't long before it's
bigger than our boat, then bigger than a dragonboat, then it's as big as one of the tall ships. The mouths of the sailors drop open, the ones on the rigging cling to their ropes with fear. Soldiers drop their rifles and back away across the decks.

One of the raiders on a dragonboat starts shouting, “It's the sea spirit, come to take us!”

The head bobs and sways in the air, getting bigger and bigger, sparkling and shimmering, like it's made of seawater. Other heads pop into the air and start growing next to every dragonboat, every English ship. Soon there's so many floating giant heads that any of the sailors or raiders could reach out and touch one, if they dared. When the space between the fleets has filled up with heads, they start spinning slowly, looking at everything. Then all their mouths open at once, and start speaking with just one voice.