Witchbreaker (Dragon Apocalypse) (20 page)

“Let’s hope there are no rich people among these half-seeds,” Sorrow said as she watched the
Seahorse
draw to within a hundred feet. “We’re about to be overrun.”

“I can assure you that we aren’t,” said Sage, pointing toward the stern of the
Seahorse
.

Mako was climbing the massive rudder. He was biting through the heavy iron bands that held the beams together. The
Seahorse
lurched as her rudder suddenly tore loose. Even from a hundred feet away, Sorrow heard Captain Stallion curse, “What the devil?”

A dozen pirates ran to the stern and peered over. Mako reached up and flung the closest few into the waves, then leapt to the stern rail and shouted, “Fight for your lives, you scurvy dogs! I take no prisoners!”

Cinnamon ran past Sorrow on her way toward her mother. She grabbed Gale by the shoulders. The older woman’s face contorted, her nose wrinkling, and she suddenly sat up, spitting.

“Sorry,” Cinnamon said. “I had to wake you fast. You should be tasting mint now.”

Gale wiped her mouth on her sleeve. “That’s much better.” She looked around. “What’s going on?”

Sage shouted down the current battle status as Cinnamon moved to revive Rigger.

Sorrow wondered what had happened to Poppy and Slate, and moved to the rail to see if she could spot them. She found the big man climbing the anchor chain with the now conscious Poppy clinging to his shoulders.

“Are you both okay?” she shouted.

“I’m fine!” Poppy cried.

“I’m eager to hit someone,” said Slate. “Where’s the boy?”

“He went into the water,” said Sage. “For some reason, I can’t see him. But if you need a little violence, we have a whole ship at the ready.”

“You can’t touch Stallion,” Gale cried. “He’s mine!”

“I’m not sure that got explained to Mako,” said Sage.

“Jetsam and Brand are awake!” Cinnamon shouted.

“Where’s Bigs—the princess?” Brand asked groggily.

Bigsby stumbled past, his wig in his hand, the kohl around his eyes running down his cheeks. “She’s going below to find a bottle of rum,” he said softly as he unclasped his breastplate, which clattered to the deck.

Gale paid the dwarf no mind as she readied her twin cutlasses and jumped to the railing.

“Ready, Rigger?” she asked.

“Bring the wind, Captain,” the young man answered as he took the wheel.

On the
Seahorse
, chaos had broken loose. A half-dozen pirates now flailed in the waves behind the ship. Mako had liberated a cutlass from one of the cutthroats and was busily cutting throats. Sorrow couldn’t guess how many dead bodies lay around him. Suddenly, a short, shirtless pirate covered with quills broke from the pack and flicked his arms toward Mako, unleashing a hail of barbed darts. Mako flinched as the tiny missiles turned his face into a pincushion. His eyes scrunched shut from the pain. Blinded, he dropped his cutlass and dove back into the sea.

The
Circus
turned toward the
Seahorse
and was closing fast. Brand intercepted Bigsby before he went below deck.

“Don’t take off your armor just yet, Princess,” Brand advised. “There’s about to be a big fight. Time to bring a little Brightmoon justice to these pirates!”

“I’m not a princess,” Bigsby said with a sigh. “I’m a fishmonger. You know that.”

Brand raised an eyebrow. “I’m just happy to hear that you know it!”

“Happy? Now that my secret’s out, I’m ruined,” Bigsby moaned. “It’s hard enough being a dwarf among the ruffians of Commonground. Now that everyone knows about my... other wardrobe... I’m doomed.”

Sorrow’s attention turned to a discarded element of Bigsby’s wardrobe. She slithered over and picked up the gleaming breastplate from the deck. The front and back halves of the armor clanged together on their leather straps as she lifted them, taking a closer look to see if they’d work for the plan she had in mind. Despite the smallness of his limbs, Bigsby’s torso was as large as most men. “If you don’t need this any more, I’ve got a use for it.”

“Take it,” Bigsby said, shaking his head. “I can’t fight. I’m nothing but a coward.”

“I don’t believe that,” said Brand. “I watched you charge at a dragon without batting an eye. If Princess Innocent was brave, you’re brave.”

Sorrow had no time to listen to Brand’s attempt to cheer his despondent brother. She snaked around and headed for Slate, who stood at the rail with his fists clenched as the space narrowed between the two ships.

She held Bigsby’s mace toward him. “I’m sure you can bang some heads together with your bare hands, but you might do more damage with this.”

“Aye,” he said, taking it from her.

“I thought you might also benefit from a little armor,” she said, presenting him the breast plate.

“It’s too small,” he said.

“I can adapt it,” she said, lining the iron plate up to his chest. “Hold still.”

She bent the edges of the plate outward, stretching them to fit over Slate’s impressive musculature. She spun him around and worked on the back, molding and sculpting the metal to his form. She tightened the leather straps, then spun him back around. She glanced toward Bigsby’s discarded helmet. She flicked it with the end of her tail, sending it bouncing across the deck toward her, then caught it and plopped it onto Slate’s head. Satisfied that it fit without any further adjustment, she ran her hands along Slate’s chest to smooth out her handiwork. Slate stared at her intently as she worked.

A little too intently.

She suddenly felt awkward. Was she really trying to perfect his armor? Or were her fingers lingering on his muscles for reasons she was unwilling to admit?

“That should be good enough,” she said.

“Your eyes,” he whispered. “I... remember them.”

“We see each other every day. You’ve not had a chance to forget them,” she said.

“No...” His face sagged as he shook his head. “It’s... it’s like a memory from... long ago. Of you outfitting me for battle. But now... it’s gone.”

Sorrow pressed her lips tightly together. Was he merely remembering when she’d fitted him with his glass armor?

But there was no more time to ponder such things, because the
Circus
was now within grappling range of the pirate vessel.

Captain Romer leapt beside Slate and Sorrow. “The three of us lead the charge,” she said. “Mako’s already in the water and Jetsam’s heading down. Knock everyone you can into the drink. My sons will make swift work of them.”

Cinnamon ran up, with Sorrow’s swords in her grasp. “I figured you might need these.”

Sorrow grabbed the blades. She looked across the narrow gap to the assembled pirates. Despite Mako’s attack, there were still at least three dozen. Among the pirate ranks she spotted a half-bear, a half-boar, and a long-jawed monstrosity that might have been half-crocodile. This wasn’t going to be an easy fight.

Gale cried, “Poppy! Clear a path!”

She stepped aside as a barrel shot past her, splintering against the horns of a goat-man at the rail of the
Seahorse
and knocking him backwards. Gale raised both her cutlasses and leapt across the six-foot gap dividing the ships, shouting, “The moment you chose to be pirates is the moment you chose to die!” She landed where the goat-man had stood and severed the head of a dog-faced boy who’d had the misfortune of standing too close.

Slate followed Gale’s lead, easily crossing the gap between the rolling ships despite his new burden of armor. He plowed into the crowd, swinging his mace in wide arcs that sent pirates flying.

Sorrow stretched across the gap. She had the misfortune of facing off with the half-bear, who slapped away the blade she drove toward his left shoulder and swatted her face with his massive right hand, full of claws. Her helmet spared her any cuts as the man-bear’s nails slid along the glass, but the impact left her seeing stars.

He opened jaws full of ugly teeth and made a thrust for her neck. The pirate’s charge was halted by Slate’s mace, which drove his snout-like nose back into his brains.

She had no time to thank him. Her serpent half had now slithered fully on board and was being attacked by a dozen swords at once. Her scales proved impervious to the combined assault. As if it had a mind of its own, her muscular tail whipped back and forth, knocking pirates overboard.

Sorrow turned to face the alligator-man as Gale flew past, swinging over the battle on a rope, to land on the upper deck where Captain Stallion watched the fight unfolding in the company of the porcupine half-seed. The quill-covered creature bristled as it readied an attack on Gale, but with a flash of steel its head tumbled from its shoulders.

Stallion turned, looking at first as if he might be getting ready to flee, but instead he kicked with his back hooves, catching Gale in the chest. She went flying, falling to the lower deck, where a mob of pirates jostled for the chance to finish her off.

None reached her. Instead, the rigging unknotted and snaked to life, catching the pirates attacking Gale by their necks. All were jerked from their feet by impromptu nooses. Sorrow glanced over her shoulder to find that Rigger had come aboard and was standing on the rail, his hand upon a line leading up to the main mast.

A few of the remaining pirates on the deck turned pale as they looked at their brethren kicking overhead. They had no need to fear death by hanging, however, as Slate plowed through their ranks, bashing skulls and breaking limbs.

Gale bounced back to her feet and again leapt for Captain Stallion. The half-horse cursed as hurricane winds whipped his hair and carried Gale toward him. However, fast as Gale moved, she was no match for his equine legs. He chose flight over fight, making a magnificent leap over the railing. He hung in the air with a look of defiance, before dropping, legs kicking, arms flailing, toward the shark-infested water.

Sorrow lingered for half a second as she tossed a pig-man into the drink, studying the water below. She never saw Stallion surface. The waves were crimson with blood and countless shark fins churned the water. Mako was climbing up the anchor chain and Jetsam had jumped into the air and was swimming up to the level of the deck.

Sorrow turned back toward the action, only to find there was none. The only two animal men still alive were rather pathetic. A half-rabbit was curled into a fetal ball by the mainmast, tugging his ears.

“I-I-I-I s-s-surrender!” he shrieked.

“We both surrender,” a turtle man said in a thick, slurred voice as he slowly raised his fat, wrinkled hands.

“The b-b-boy made us d-do it!” the rabbit man cried. “I n-never wanted to be a p-p-pirate!”

Mako advanced on the cowering figure, drawing his bloodied lips wide as he growled, “I said we would take no prisoners!”

Gale placed her hand on Mako’s shoulder. “Hold! I gave no such command.”

“We dare not show mercy!” Mako screamed as he spun to face his mother. “These crud aren’t even fully human!”

Jetsam laughed. “That just seems funny when you’ve still got bits of pirate stuck between your teeth.”

Mako frowned as he glared at his brother. He ran his fingers between his lips and dug around, producing an earring, and what once might have been an ear.

“There’s no need to hurt us,” the turtle man said. “Hopper is right. We were kidnapped by the others, but the only dirty work we ever did was swab the deck.”

Mako shook his head. “If you’ve eaten their food, you’ve shared in the spoils of their plunder. Honest men would have fought their captors!”

“They w-would have k-killed us!” said Hopper.

“Better to die an honest man than to be moved by fear to wallow in a life of sin,” said Slate.

“Let’s just put them out of their misery,” said Mako.

Gale shook her head. “We gain nothing by killing these two. If they give us no trouble, we’ll spare them.”

Mako crossed his arms and slunk away, sulking.

“I suppose you’re not going to let us keep any of the good stuff we find, either?” Jetsam asked as he crouched over the body of a dead cat-man who had a beautifully crafted rapier in his now limp grasp.

“A Wanderer must never kill in order to enrich himself,” said Gale. “But we did initially attempt to avoid this fight. They brought this battle upon themselves. We may claim the spoils of a justly fought war.”

She made a hand gesture toward Sage, still back in the crows nest of the
Circus
. The girl pressed her eye to her spyglass. Sorrow guessed she was searching the ship for any lurking dangers.

“Will we take possession of the
Seahorse
?” asked Rigger.

“I don’t see the wisdom of laying claim to the only ship on the ocean more hunted than the
Freewind
was,” said Gale.

“W-will you g-give us s-safe passage?” asked Hopper.

“No,” said Gale.

“But the two of us aren’t enough to sail this ship,” said the turtle man.

“You couldn’t steer if we’d left all the crew alive, what with your rudder torn to splinters,” said Gale. “You’re at the mercy of Abyss now. Perhaps his currents will guide you to land before you run out of food and water.”