The Last of the Sky Pirates (19 page)

‘Particularly after the horrors of the terrible Eastern Roost,’ said Magda drowsily.

‘Just think,’ said Rook. ‘One day, when we’ve completed our studies and set out on our treatise-voyages, we’ll fly over these woods.’

Magda stifled a tired yawn. ‘I’m thinking of looking at the life-cycle of the woodmoth,’ she murmured.

‘Woodmoths?’ said Rook. ‘I’m going to study banderbears.’ The curious yodelling sound repeated, fainter and farther away. ‘I can’t wait …’

‘Go to sleep,’ said Stob.

‘Well said, Master Stob,’ said Hekkle. ‘We’ve got a long day ahead of us.’ He fluffed up his feathers against the rising wind. ‘Good night, brave masters, good night brave mistress,’ he said. ‘And sleep well.’

‘Night-night,’ came Stob’s sleepy voice.

‘Good night, Hekkle,’ said Rook.

Magda, already half-asleep, muttered softly and rolled over.

Six days they travelled – six long, arduous days of hard riding. After the initial thrill of being inside the dark, mysterious forest, even Rook’s enthusiasm was beginning to wane. The going was tough, and when it rained at night, they climbed out of their hammocks the following morning feeling more tired and achy than when they had turned in. But with their destination still far off, they had no choice but to continue, no matter how weary they felt.

Hekkle urged them on as best he could, encouraging and reassuring them, producing delicious food night after night and praising the contributions they were
beginning to make to the forage sack. But the un remitting pressure of the long, difficult journey through the Deepwoods was taking its toll. Stob and Magda bickered constantly, while Rook’s sleep was increasingly troubled.

On that sixth evening, as they tucked into their supper of grubs and fungus, the atmosphere was oppressive. Stob was in a foul mood, Magda was tearful, while Rook – who had drifted off to sleep and fallen from his prowl-grin earlier that day – was nursing a badly bruised knee.

‘Any more for any more?’ said Hekkle, offering round a tray of toasted ironwood bugs. The young librarians all declined. Hekkle looked at them fondly. ‘You are doing so well,’ he said.

Stob snorted.

‘Believe me,’ said Hekkle. ‘I have never guided a more determined and courageous group through the Deepwoods than your good selves. Our progress has been phenomenal.’ He clacked his beak. ‘So much so that you’ll be pleased to know our journey is coming to its end.’

‘It is?’ said Rook eagerly.

Hekkle nodded. ‘We are getting close to the Silver Pastures,’ he confirmed. His face grew serious and the familiar harsh tone to his voice returned. ‘But I must tell you that this is the most perilous part of our expedition.’

Magda sniffed miserably.

‘Naturally,’ muttered Stob sullenly.

‘This area attracts the most dangerous of creatures,’ Hekkle went on. ‘The pastures – and indeed the densely
populated Free Glades beyond – offer rich pickings. From sun-up tomorrow, we must be extra vigilant. But fear not. We shall not fail – not having come so far.’

That night Rook slept worse than ever. Every squawk, every screech, every whispered breath of wind permeated his fitful sleep and turned his dreams to nightmares – to
the
nightmare.

‘Mother! Father!’ he cried out, but his voice was whisked away unheard as the slave-takers carried them both off. The whitecollar wolves snarled and howled. The slavers cackled. Rook turned away, trying to shut out the horrors of what had just taken place, when …

‘No!’ he screamed.

There it was again. Looming out of the darkness; something huge, something terrifying. Reaching towards him. Closer, closer …

‘NO!’ he screamed.

Rook’s eyes snapped open. He sat bolt upright.

‘It’s all right, brave master,’ came Hekkle’s voice. The shryke was perched above the hammock, looking down at the youth sympathetically.

‘H-Hekkle,’ said Rook. ‘Did I wake you?’

‘No, brave master,’ said Hekkle. ‘Stob’s snoring woke me hours ago.’ He smiled kindly. ‘Get up and get ready,’ he said. ‘The end is almost in sight.’

Despite Hekkle’s words, the atmosphere that morning remained tense. They packed up quickly and in silence, and set off before the sun had risen high enough to strike the forest floor. On they travelled, through the morning and into the afternoon without once stopping.

‘What about the forage sack?’ asked Rook.

Hekkle smiled. ‘Tonight you will feast on something grander,’ he said. ‘Hammelhorn, perhaps. Or if you’re lucky oakbuck.’

Rook peered ahead into the shadows and shook his head. ‘It all still looks the same,’ he said. ‘How can you tell that the Silver Pastures are near?’

Hekkle’s eyes narrowed and his head-feathers quivered. ‘I can sense it, Master Rook,’ he said quietly. He shuddered. ‘Believe me, the pastures are not far now.’

As they journeyed further, the prowlgrins began to grow skittish. They snorted; they rolled their eyes. They pawed the ground and tossed their heads. Once, Rook’s prowlgrin bolted, and it was only Hekkle’s speedy re actions that prevented him from being whisked off into the endless forest alone.

‘I thought I saw something out there,’ said Magda a while later. ‘Something watching us …’

Hekkle reined his prowlgrin in, and listened intently. ‘Courage, Mistress Magda,’ he said at last. ‘It’s probably just woodhogs scratching for oaktruffles. But we’d better move on quickly, just in case.’

Magda tried to smile bravely. So did the others. But as dark, purple-edged clouds moved in across the low sun, plunging the forest into shadow, their hearts beat fast.

In a loud hiss and a flash of yellow and green, a hover worm emerged from the undergrowth to their left and sped across their path, causing the prowlgrins to rear up in panic.

‘Steady,’ said Hekkle. ‘Keep your nerve.’

Rook glanced round him constantly, his head jerking this way, that way, as he searched the shadows for whatever it was lurking just out of sight. His eyes focused in on a dark shape sliding off behind a tree. He shivered.

Crack
.

‘What was that?’ gasped Stob.

‘Stay calm, brave master,’ said Hekkle. ‘Fear amplifies the slightest of sounds.’

Crack
.

‘There it was again,’ said Stob. He looked round nervously. ‘From over there.’

Hekkle nodded. ‘Stay close together,’ he whispered. He kicked his prowlgrin’s sides, urging it into a loping canter. The others did the same.

Crack
.

The sound was behind them now, and fainter. ‘I think we lost it,’ said Hekkle, easing up. ‘But just in case, no-one must make another sound until we get to the Silver Pastures—
’

All at once something whistled over their heads. There was a thud and the sound of splintering wood. And there, inches from where Magda sat on her jittery prowlgrin, was a flint-tipped spear, embedded in the trunk of a great lufwood tree.

Magda screamed. Stob held on desperately as his prowlgrin reared up and squealed. A second spear flew past, hitting the forest floor and scattering the iron-wood cones which lay there.

‘Take to the trees!’ Hekkle cried. ‘And try not to get separated!’

But it was no use. All round them the air suddenly pulsed with the sound of low, guttural voices grunting in unison, throwing the prowlgrins into a panic.

‘Urrgh. Aargh. Urrgh. Aargh. Urrgh. Aargh.’

The prowlgrins leaped around in alarm – and there was nothing their riders could do to bring them back under control. A second flurry of spears flew through the air.

‘Urrgh. Aargh. Urrgh. Aargh. Urrgh. Aargh.’

‘Rook! Stob!’ shouted Magda, as her prowlgrin thrashed about, trying its best to dislodge her. ‘It won’t climb! I can’t make it—’ She screamed as the prowlgrin suddenly bolted. ‘Help!’ she cried out.
‘Help!’

‘Hold on!’ Rook called to her.

He yanked the reins and tried to steer his own prowlgrin after her. But the creature had a mind of its own and, before he could do a thing about it, had tossed him off its back and leaped up into the low-slung branches of a huge ironwood tree.

‘Stick together!’ he heard Hekkle shouting.

Rook rolled over and looked round. Magda’s faint voice floated back through from the shadows. Stob and Hekkle were nowhere to be seen.

‘Urrgh. Aargh. Urrgh. Aargh. Urrgh. Aargh.’

Heart pounding, Rook looked up to see his prowlgrin perched on a branch of the ironwood tree above. He
struggled to his feet, and cried out as searing pain shot through his injured knee. He fell to the ground again. ‘Here, boy,’ he whispered. ‘Come here, boy.’

The prowlgrin watched him from the branch, with wide, terrified eyes. Rook gritted his teeth. There was nothing for it. If the prowlgrin wouldn’t come to him, then he would have to go to the prowlgrin.

Head down, he began dragging himself across the forest floor to the foot of the ironwood tree. His knee felt as if there were a knife lodged beneath his kneecap, jarring with every movement he made. Closer. Closer …

‘Urrgh. Aargh. Urrgh. Aargh. Urrgh. Aargh.’

All at once another spear whistled through the air. It struck the prowlgrin in its side. With a low moan, the creature dropped like an ironwood cone, hit the ground with a thud – and fell still.

Rook froze. What now?

‘Urrgh. Aargh. Urrgh. Aargh. Urrgh. Aargh.’

The chanting was louder than ever. It seemed to be coming from every direction. Rook was on his own – wounded and frightened. He couldn’t run. He couldn’t hide. And something huge was coming towards him … With a surge of panic mixed with nausea, Rook suddenly realized that it was as if his nightmare were actually coming true.

Then he saw it. Tall, brutal, half-formed – it looked like a larger, fiercer and much, much uglier version of a cloddertrog. Its huge, blunt face was mottled and scarred. The flat nose sniffed the air, the heavy jutting brow
frowned over deep-set, red eyes that scanned the gloom of the forest floor.

Rook shrank back down into the soft leaf-cover on the ground and held his breath. His only hope was that it did not see him.

‘Urrgh!’
it grunted over its shoulder, and was joined by another trog with jagged, yellow nails and long matted hair.

‘Aargh!’
its companion responded. It pulled a spear from the giant quiver slung across its shoulder and brandished it in the air.
‘Aargh!’

From all round came replies, and out of the shadows emerged more of the hulking great trogs. Rook trembled with terror. Each of the creatures had skulls – whole strings of them – tied on leather thongs around its neck. They rattled as the trogs walked, jaws grinning and empty eye-sockets staring out in all directions.

‘AARGH!’

The first trog had spotted him. Their eyes met.

‘No, no, no,’ Rook muttered as he desperately tried to scuttle away on his backside, dragging himself along with his scrabbling hands.

The creature advanced unhurriedly. It drew back its heavy, muscular arm and threw the spear.

Rook ducked.

It whistled past him, and on into the tangled undergrowth behind. The creature drew another spear and lumbered forwards, the necklace of skulls rattling. Its mouth opened to reveal a set of long, wolf-like teeth.

‘AARGH!’
it roared.

A sharp pain shot up from Rook’s injured knee. He collapsed. It was no good. There was nothing he could do. He could feel the pounding feet vibrating through the ground beneath him, he could smell rancid fat. The facets of the flint spear glinted in the dappled light as the trog raised it, ready to strike.

‘AARGH!’

Rook closed his eyes. So this was how his nightmare ended, he thought bitterly.

Just then, from behind him, there came the sound of furious scratching, followed by a loud whirring noise. The trog cried out.

Rook looked round to see a dense swarm of small, silver-black angular creatures emerging from the undergrowth where the stray spear had landed. Despite the perilousness of his situation, the instincts of a true earth-scholar were awakened in him. With their long, pointed noses and stubby triangular wings, they were clearly related to the ratbirds which had once roosted in the bowels of the great sky ships. Like the ratbirds, they flew in flocks. Unlike their harmless, scavenging cousins, however, these small, vicious creatures seemed to be hunters.