Jim Morgan and the Pirates of the Black Skull (33 page)

Jim found himself beneath the branches of a great tree planted beside the river. A fine coat of spring flowers dressed the branches, red and white and bursting into bloom. The mist that had been crawling on the forest floor, grabbing at his ankles, was gone, replaced by a soft bed of grass. In that grass beside him sat George Ratt, and Jim realized it had been George calling for him to wake.

“You’re awake,” George said. He was a bit pale in the moonlight and let out a long, slow breath, as though he had been holding it for a very long time. “Are you alright? Is your…is your arm alright?

“My arm?” Jim asked. The cobwebs of the nightmare were still clearing from his mind, but it struck him suddenly. The pain, that gnawing agony that had been clawing at his arm from the inside ever since he’d pricked his thumb, was gone. The ice-cold chills that had wracked his body had disappeared as well. The evening air felt warm once again. Even the whispering voice at the back of his mind and the song of Philus Philonius’s flute were silent. In fact, the only sensation
Jim felt on his hand was a gentle scratching, for his arm up to his elbow was wrapped in bandages.

Jim took another deep breath. He felt alive and refreshed, like waking up after a long sleep or climbing out of bed the first morning after a fever has broken. But it took only another moment for Jim to remember what he had lost. He had said things – awful things to his friends. He had cut them to the bone with his words. He could still see Lacey reaching for him from beneath the shadow of great wings, her mouth open in a silent scream.

“Oh, George! Oh, George, they’re gone! It’s all my fault…it’s all my fault. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” A great knot tied itself in the center of Jim’s throat and his chin quivered uncontrollably. “Those things I said to you. If I were you I would have let those owls take me instead of your brothers.”

“It wasn’t you, Jim,” George said softly. “It was that poison inside of you talkin’, not the real you. I know that.”

“I think some of it was me, George,” Jim whispered. “Maybe the poison just let that part out. You should have just left me there, George. You should have left me for those owls.” George said nothing for a moment, as though thinking very hard about whether or not he wanted to say anything or not. Then he cleared his throat and told Jim something he’d never told him before.

“I really did know my father, Jim.” George stared into the grass beneath them without blinking. “I don’t remember much of ‘im, you know, just one memory, really. I guess I’m actually more like a couple of years older than Peter and Paul, not just one – ‘cause I remember standin’ there, on the steps of St. Anne’s. Peter and Paul were sittin’ there at me feet, and they was cryin’ and everythin’ cause it was cold. And there was me da’ and me ma’. Me ma’ didn’t say nothin’, but me da’ patted me on the shoulder and he said to me, he said: “George, you’re the oldest, so take care of yer little brothers until me and your ma’ get back. But we’ll be back, he said. We’ll be back. But they never came back. They lied.

“So I took care of me brothers the best I could. Was always makin’ up stories about things our father had said and things he’d done, just to make ‘em laugh. Then, one day, you come along.” Finally George looked at Jim. His eyes glistened in the gray light. “At first I had to look out fer ya, just like me brothers. You was an awful thief at first, Jim, if you remember the incident with the apples and all.” George snorted a snuffly laugh.

“But then all the sudden you got good, as good as me and Lacey. And we was stuck, stuck in that cabin with Dread Steele. I though then, just like me da’, that’d be the last time I ever saw you. But you come back, didn’t you? That’s when I knew…that’s when I knew you was more than me friend. You was me brother, too.”

Jim stared at George, his eyes and his nose and his throat all stinging and thick. Jim could hardly think of one thing to say, not one that was worth what his best friend had just told him. All he could say was: “You shouldn’t give credit to your father for all those things you say, George. They’re good sayings. They’re your sayings and they’re good all on their own.”

Jim and George threw their arms over each other’s shoulders, slapping each other hard on the back. After that, they coughed and sniffed and slapped at their faces as though they had never even thought of shedding a tear in the first place.

“I’m going to go back for them, George,” Jim said hoarsely. “Not really sure I can explain how I know they’re still alive, but I do. I’m going to go back and make it right. Even if I have to turn to stone to do it. I promise.”

“You don’t have to explain how you know, Jim. ‘ Cause the person who told me they was all still alive is probably the same person who told you.” George looked over Jim’s shoulder. When Jim turned from the river, he had to shield his eyes with his arm. A great, gold light nearly blinded him. The golden glow spilled onto the grass and glittered on the river, warmer than a summer morning. Floating at the light’s heart, at its very source, was a young girl. When Jim dared to meet the girl’s eyes, they glimmered with wisdom as ancient as
the gypsy witch’s who had once cursed Jim’s box. Dragonfly wings hummed behind her shoulders. Her hair, yellow as the sun, fluttered behind her, held in place by a silver circlet that must have been her crown.

“Who are you?” Jim finally managed.

“I am Tanaquill,” said the glowing girl. “Queen of the Faeries.”

“It was your voice,” Jim said, feeling the need to bow his head to the Queen. “It was your voice I heard in my dream. You saved us from the owls. You saved me from the poison.”

“It was my voice that you heard,” Tanaquill replied. “And indeed, it was my magic that pulled you back from the brink, and not a moment too soon! The poison had nearly reached your heart. Then you would have been lost forever. But it was not I who saved you from the owls.” Tanaquill’s eyes flitted past Jim to George. “Your friend carried you to me in his arms, some miles from where you fell. His strength was all but gone when I found him. I first thought his efforts in vain, for the poison within your blood ran deep.” Tanaquill’s light illuminated the blossoms drifting from the tree like tumbling stars to where Jim and George sat in the grass. “It was for the love your friend showed you, Jim Morgan, that I entered into your dream. Such love should never go unrewarded. But there are greater reasons I chose to save you. The first is that you now have a promise to keep.” Tanaquill reached her finger to Jim’s hand. Without touching, she unspooled the white bandages from his arm and sent them floating off beyond the tree like a swirling ribbon into the night.

From Jim’s thumb, where he’d first drawn his own blood on the cursed thorn, a scar like a white leaf curled onto his palm. It unfolded there into the perfect image of a rose in bloom, the stem and leaves trailing down his arm. Jim knew without looking that the scar ran all the way up his shoulder and onto his chest, where the black poison had once twisted like a dreadful vine. Jim let his hand sink back down into his lap and his chin settled on his chest.

“Do not lose hope, Jim Morgan,” Tanaquill said. She floated down to where Jim sat in the grass and lifted his chin with her finger, which
was warm and kind as the dawn. “There is more to you than your scars, Son of Earth and Son of Sea. There is goodness in your heart.” At that moment, another, golden light hovered over Tanaquill’s shoulder. At first Jim thought it was another fairy. But it was only a firefly. The firefly bobbed once before Jim’s face, and Jim knew then that it was the very firefly he’d freed from the spider’s web. “To take pity on the smallest and most insignificant creatures is the sign of a great heart indeed.”

“Your friends yet live. You are charged with saving them, as I saved you. The owls were summoned by the dark pirate, Splitbeard, who is no stranger to evil magic. Even now the Cromiers have them and draw near to the cave beneath the mountain. But Jim Morgan, there is one more task you must accomplish. There is one more reason I spared you from the poison in your veins.” The faery queen’s face grew solemn. She suddenly seemed thousands of years older than her child-like face belied. “You must not allow the Treasure of the Ocean to fall into Count Cromier’s hands. The Treasure’s power is as old as the faeries. It is the power of the seas and the winds and the clouds themselves. Only a Son of Earth and Son of Sea may harness this power. But of these rare children, there are only two. One is the son of Lindsay Morgan.”

“The other is Bartholomew,” Jim said. He was not sure how he knew, but somehow he was certain.

“Yes,” Tanaquill said. “His heart has been blackened by his father.”

“Can you help us?” Jim pleaded. “Can you use your magic against Splitbeard? Against the Cromiers?”

The Faerie Queen shook her head no.

“My power and the power of my people extend only as far as the edge of this field, to the river behind you. But there is a secret passage that leads to the Painted Cave beneath the mountain. It lies beyond a door lined in green and guarded by two white-blossomed trees. The passage may take you to the Hidden Chamber there within, masked behind a door of fangs, before the Cromiers and Splitbeard reach it. My people will take you there, but little time will you have to return before
the fate of stone seals your doom. This you must do, Jim Morgan. Are you ready?”

“I suppose I have to be,” Jim said. “Tanaquill, please take George back to the beach. If I’m able to free my friends, and if there’s time, will you then take them all back to the Devil’s Horns as well?”

“No, Jim!” said George. He jumped to his feet and crossed his arms over his chest. His eyes flashed with a passion that would have done Lacey proud. “You’re not goin’ into that cave alone. Not without me. Besides, if we are goin’ to turn to stone, I’ve been savin’ a special face to make at you when we go, just so everyone will know what a git you’ve been today!” A small smile flickered to life on Jim’s face and George returned it.

“I suppose that will be two of us then,” Jim said, standing up beside his friend.

“I have no further gift to give you, Jim Morgan, for I have already given you much. But take these at least from the river. Use them to right your wrong.” Tanaquill pointed to the flowing waters behind Jim and George and two flames burst from the river and floated through the air toward Jim. Jim knew what they were. He reached out to take Lacey’s book of stars and the compass. The Queen of the Faeries offered Jim a smile that brightened even the glow of her aura. She leaned forward in the air and kissed Jim gently on the forehead. From that place, warmth drifted down into Jim’s fingers and toes.

“Take heart, Jim. There are few joys in the world greater than a broken bridge mended.”

“Thank you, Tanaquill. Thank you for everything.”

Tanaquill raised her hands and called out into the night with words that Jim would never learn. Bursts of light streaked into the night air from the long grass on the hill and flew into the darkened sky. They burned in nearly every color imaginable. In auras of blue and green and gold, they twirled and wound through the air. Embers of light trailed down behind them like sparks from a torch.

“That lizard,” said George, his eyes staring through the display of light and color before him. “ That blasted lizard, Twisttail, lied to
us. He sent us away from this Field of Lights where the faeries woulda helped us. He said they were evil spirits! Almost got us killed! Why?”

“I don’t know why, George. Maybe just for sport.”

“He lied to us,” George said again. A darkness fell over his face then, a darkness Jim had last seen when the King of Thieves had betrayed the Ratts in London.

“Do not give into anger, George Ratt,” said Tanaquill, hovering before George. “Even in the face of great pain you have the gift of joy in times of hurt. That is a gift greater than any I could give you.”

“Could you…” George began to ask. He swiped his hat from his head and twisted it in his hands, blushing fiercely. “Could you at least give me a kiss like Jim?” he asked, looking down at his feet. Tanaquill laughed, a laugh full of lightness and joy like chimes in the wind.

“You may have two kisses, George Ratt, and you deserve them both!” With that the Queen of the Faeries kissed George once on each cheek. Jim thought for a moment that his friend’s feet were about to leave the ground and he would begin floating above the grass along with the faeries.

“Thank you, ma’am,” George replied, slapping his hat back on his head all but staggering over beside Jim.

“Pull yourself together, mate,” Jim whispered with a smile, elbowing his friend in the ribs.

“Now you must go, for there is little time.” Tanaquill called again to her people. The glowing lights on the hill swirled together into a great river of light. They wound their way through the air toward Jim and George. The two of them were swept up in the tide, rolled over by a wave of light. The grass blurred beneath Jim like a rushing green carpet as the faeries whisked him and George over the fields and rolling hills toward the mountain. All the while the nighttime sky slowly turned from black to gray. The stars that Lacey so loved winked out one by one. Jim’s friends were in terrible danger, and morning was coming. It loomed just over the horizon, and with it, a prison of stone.

TWELVE