Justice and Utu (20 page)

The
Rattlesnake
was closing in on the crippled
Rona
swiftly. The crew of the fleeing barque had cut free the remnants of the rearward mast, and were improvising some kind of
steerage, but they were halved in boat-speed and seemingly had little control. Hobson had voiced the fear that they would make a run for shore, but the offshore winds were instead driving them eastwards, straight towards White Island.

Evie sucked in her breath as a flash and dull boom came from the
Rona
. There was a splash forty yards ahead of them, and away to the right.

‘They've got a swivel-gun amidships!' someone shouted from above.

‘A popgun,' the seaman next to Mat muttered derisively.

‘They're nae gunners, Cap'n,' one of the officers commented drily.

‘That's as may be,' Hobson acknowledged. ‘But they've no doubt got a few more tricks to play.' He glanced over his shoulder. ‘Take us across their bows, Master Smythe,' he called to the helmsman. He drew his cutlass. ‘Clear the decks for action!'

‘Does he mean us clearing off?' Damien wanted to know. ‘He better bloody not.'

Wiri hurried towards them. ‘No, it doesn't mean you, but get under cover. I've persuaded Hobson that you're all valuable if this gets messy, but you need to stay out of the way of the sailors while they do what they're best at.'

Damien glanced at Mat. ‘Phew.'

‘You're far too enthusiastic about this sort of thing,' Mat told him.

‘Please be careful, both of you,' Evie said to them.

Damien winked, putting his finger to his lips. ‘We'll be fine, Gypsy-Queen!' His grin was infectious.

The
Rattlesnake
was swinging about the
Rona
now, gliding
towards the crippled barque like a shark. Sergeant Carver's marines, resplendent in red, were priming their muskets. Another shot flew from the
Rona
's swivel-gun, whistling through the foresail and splashing into the waves just behind them. The sail lost air, and Hobson was bawling instructions to lower and replace it. Mat peered through his spyglass, trying to spot Asher Grieve or Sebastian Venn. He quickly found the latter, standing beside a squat, bearded man in a captain's hat, presumably Hayes. The man who had killed Shui.

‘Prime the starboard guns! Chain shot, Master Lane!' Hobson shouted to his gunnery officer. All over the ship, men shouted and cursed and rattled about, activity masking their nerves, although Mat saw one man lean out of a cannon port and vomit into the sea. He felt a bit that way himself, but it was hard to feel as frightened as he'd been when facing men on a battlefield. The
Rattlesnake
lent a feeling of invincibility, with its thick hide and spiky guns.

In the bow, Hotu began a haka, slapping his thighs and stamping his feet, his voice carrying above the tumult as the crew readied the guns. Mat felt his blood begin to simmer, his heart to pound to Hotu's beat.

‘Stand by!' Hobson's voice went up in pitch.

The
Rona
dipped into a trough, almost vanishing from sight. Timing was everything, Mat realized; the pitch and roll of the ship had to be taken into account, and the motion of the target. It was like a slow, deadly dance towards that perfect moment to unleash mayhem. He found himself holding his breath as the
Rattlesnake
righted, and the
Rona
lifted on the next swell.

‘Take aim, 'tween wind and water, boys!'

Hotu continued his solo dance, bellowing his challenge across the waves at the
Rona
. Their quarry came up, her nose piercing a wave with a cascade of spray, her hull rising from the waves then crashing down, leaving the full length of the ship exposed. Mat could see the steersman frantically spinning his wheel, trying to bring her around to port and duck behind
Rattlesnake
's trajectory.

‘Fire!' Hobson screamed.

The
Rattlesnake
convulsed as every gun on the starboard side blasted its load towards the exposed deck of the
Rona
. Mat's hearing went in the concussion of the broadside. The black-powder smoke smothered them, until it was torn away by the winds. His eyes stung, and he wiped at them hurriedly. His hearing returned as deep-throated cheering erupted from the men about him.

Peering forwards, he saw the
Rona
floundering, dragged in a circle by the collapse of her forward mast. Half the rigging was shot away, her deck a shattered mess. He saw bodies rolling, bloodied and broken. Venn and Hayes were clinging to the helm, and Grieve had vanished.

The
Rattlesnake
ploughed on, carried past the
Rona
by her momentum. ‘Bring her about on port, Master Smythe!' Hobson shouted. ‘Port batteries, prepare!'

Mat flung a glance back over his shoulder, and realized with a shock that Whakaari was closer than he'd thought — the
Rattlesnake
's looping course to cut off the
Rona
had taken her much closer to the volcano. But the
Rona
was floundering, barely seaworthy.

‘We mustn't squander the advantage,' Wiri said tersely,
thinking aloud. ‘With cannon and seamanship, we have them. But if we close in too soon, we're facing Asher Grieve and Sebastian Venn.' He hurried towards Hobson, presumably to give him that same thought.

The
Rattlesnake
slowly came about, losing the wind as it did so, out of cannon range again. Mat put his eye to the spyglass, and saw a sight that sent a quiver through him: Asher Grieve was on the foredeck. His hands were raised, as if he were beseeching the heavens, and some kind of dark light crackled about him.

Damien pointed Grieve out to Sergeant Carver. ‘Can you hit him from here?'

The marine commander shook his head. ‘We'd need to be much closer, lad.'

‘What's he doing?' Evie asked.

Mat shook his head. ‘I don't know, but it won't be good.' Even as he spoke, something happened. It was as if the very water about the stricken
Rona
changed. It seemed to take on the consistency of gel, and he could see limbs and faces of human-like creatures, some many times the size of a man, clinging to the hull and propelling it forwards. The faces were beaked and twisted, akin to the kehua goblins perhaps. It was as if a Maori carver had hewn them from melting ice. He looked at Wiri. ‘What are they?' he shouted.

‘Water-spirits!' Wiri replied. ‘He's called up water-manaia! He can't keep it up for long; even Puarata could not do so!' He caught his breath as the other ship began to pick up pace again, the water-manaia boiling about it.

‘Where are they going?' Evie asked.

‘They're making a run for Whakaari! They're too far from
anywhere else!' They all gasped as the
Rona
began to power forward as if propelled by a motor. After the hours of crawling along, it was a shock to see such a burst of speed. ‘Captain, the island!'

Hobson was cursing. ‘Bring her about, Master Smythe. Faster! Run out the port guns! Hard shot. I want them holed!' The helmsman spun the wheel with blurring hands, and the port-side guns aligned.

‘Prepare to fire!' the shout echoed through the ship. A trough, backwash from the island, loomed, plumed in smoke, and Whakaari towered above them now, sheer and bleak. The
Rona
ploughed into the wash, the range lengthening again, but the angles aligning.
Three … two … one!

‘Fire!'

The cannons rattled in a sporadic machine-gun burst. Plumes of water erupted about the
Rona
, but most struck home, bursting jagged holes in the timbers. One splashed through a manaia, and the creature disintegrated into spume and spray. The
Rona
visibly slewed, a massive crack appearing near the stern, right below the ruined steerage. The barque began to come apart, timbers tearing free, the sails tattered and flapping loose, losing the wind entirely.

But still the
Rona
ploughed onward. Held together by Asher Grieve's elementals, without steerage but crashing through the waves, she ran full-tilt at the island, grinding through the rocks to strike the shoreline like a cavalry charge. She grounded upon a small beach and almost rolled over. Mat heard shrieks from the barque's seamen, and more than one was cast overboard, some into the water, others onto the rocks. But through it all Asher rode the stricken ship, keeping
upright as her keel ripped through the rocks. As the
Rona
broke apart, he flew from the wreckage, landing upon a rock like a cat. He spun and faced the
Rattlesnake
, gesticulating and shouting.

As one, the remaining manaia swirled about in a foamy mêlée, and swarmed towards the
Rattlesnake
.

 

Evie fumbled for her rune stones as the wave of elementals flooded towards them. She saw the marines fire into them, but their musket balls splashed harmlessly. Even a cannon was fired, to no avail. Donna Kyle had seized Mat's collar. ‘You must free me!' she was shrieking. ‘I can stop this!'

Evie saw Mat waver.

No, don't free her
. Evie sought a way to make freeing Donna unnecessary among her runestones. She drew
Laguz
: the water stone. It came into her hand reversed — very bad! She had to physically turn it, fighting its resistance, as the flood bore down on them. She could feel Asher Grieve fighting her efforts.

I hold the cards here!

She snarled and threw the rune stone right into the charging manaia. It struck them like an explosion, splashing them apart like a shockwave. Then Mat dived, a smothering rugby tackle that threw her to the deck behind the gunwale, wrapped in his protective arms. A wailing cry arose even as the wall of water and manaia smote the ship, flooding over them. She glimpsed sailors tumbling helplessly over the sides. For three or four seconds she thought the ship would capsize. Then the manaia were gone. It was their furious dismay she'd
heard as the rune stone snatched them away. Only water had hit the
Rattlesnake
in the end, and the frigate rode it out.

I did that,
she thought with grim satisfaction.
I made the manaia go. Take that, Mr Grieve!

The
Rattlesnake
righted with a dizzying reversal that cast her against the gunwale, pressed to Mat, as the water still trapped on deck washed back over them, then poured out the ports. She looked up to see who still remained on deck. Hobson and his officers were clinging to the stern, hats gone, shaken and drenched. Wiri was with them. Donna was clinging to the mainmast, her face desperate.

There was no-one by the wheel.

Damien was gone.
Jack of Diamonds
, she thought immediately, trying to free her hands to find the card. ‘Mat—' she began, when the whole ship shuddered, amidst the sickening sound of breaking timbers. She and Mat were thrown apart, hurled forward and sprawling helplessly.

They, too, had struck the island.

 

Mat crawled along the deck behind the protection of the gunwale. Evie was OK, lying in shelter a few yards away. But he couldn't see Damien. Sporadic shots flew about them, forcing the sailors into cover. Many of the marines had been washed away, so no-one was currently shooting back. The men in the water were mostly alive, it seemed. They were calling out to each other as they clambered to rocks in the lee of the grounded ship. Damien was with them, to Mat's relief. Hotu, also, swimming like a manaia himself.

Meanwhile the crew of the
Rattlesnake
had bigger concerns.
Mat was amazed at their discipline. They were under fire, they were holed and stuck on rocks, with lives lost, yet neither the control of the officers nor the spirits of the sailors faltered. The call from below, ‘We're holed and stuck fast, Cap'n!' was as cheery as a ‘How do you do?'

Hobson was on the seaward rail, calling down to a man hanging from ropes, assessing the damage to the hull. ‘Are we holed below the water-line, Master Briggs?'

‘Mostly, Cap'n, but we can caulk it, and seal it from within. Won't be pretty, but we'll float 'er!'

‘Thank you, Master Briggs.' Will Hobson turned back and surveyed the upturned faces below him. ‘High tide's not until evening, lads. In the meantime, shall we go ashore and have a word to Captain Hayes about this matter?'

If the naval men felt fear, they didn't show it. Instead there was anger, and the desire to get even. Their ship was damaged, and they wanted a fight. ‘Let's go get 'em, Cap'n!' someone yelled fiercely.

‘Let us indeed! Arm the men, Sergeant Carver. Lower the longboat on the seaward side. Get those marines out of the drink, and give them new powder. Master Lane, find us a route through the rocks, and a defensible beachhead. I want the first detachment ashore in ten minutes!'

‘Captain!' Donna Kyle called out in an imploring voice. ‘Free me — let me fight!'

The deck fell silent as every head swivelled to look at her. To these men, new to New Zealand, she was just another woman. But Hobson knew better. The captain's eyes went to Wiri, who shook his head firmly.

‘I am sorry, Miss Kyle.' Hobson bowed formally, then
turned away. Donna gave a shriek of frustration, breathing heavily as though restraining violence. When she looked up at Wiri under lowered brows, her expression was murderous.

Hobson issued a stream of orders. Mat marvelled at the man's ability to keep so many things in mind and at how he made such instant decisions. Whatever the man became in his older years, negotiating the treacherous waters of racial politics in a new colony while battling ill health, on board a ship he was fully at home.

‘He did the right thing,' Evie said to Mat. ‘She's not in control.'

‘Maybe,' Mat said. ‘But keeping her leashed might cost us everything.'