The Mousehunter (8 page)

“Hold tight yourself, sir!” he said, doing his best to make Drewshank safe. He then walked to the main mast and shouted up to the crow’s nest.

“Get yourself down, Emiline! No place for you in a storm!”

Emiline heard his cry and waved back in response. But as she tried to pick up Chervil, the boat tilted onto its side. She realized the waters ahead had switched direction, and the course of the ship was shifting. It was being drawn slowly onward against its will, and against the direction of the wind.

Drewshank called out more orders. Emiline picked up Chervil and made for the edge of the crow’s nest to climb down. In the darkness, the descent looked much farther than it had previously. She lifted her legs over the side and caught a foothold. Chervil let out an angry meow and his movements stopped dead — his eyes staring out to the sea.

Emiline looked cautiously over her shoulder, and gradually it became clear: the frothing, swirling water was vanishing into a deepening twisting circle. This was much more than a freak storm. She threw herself and Chervil back into the crow’s nest, stretched out to grab the bell, and rang with all her might.

“Captain Drewshank!” she shouted as loud as she could. “Whirlpool dead ahead!”

On deck, Drewshank heard her words and then saw it for himself. The whirlpool, emerging from the darkness, was at least double the length of the ship and growing, sucking them ever closer with its overwhelming power.

“Get the sails set! We need the wind!” ordered Drewshank sharply. He threw his rope to the ground and ran to the rigging. Mr. Fenwick beat a course to the wheel and aided the helmsman. Now all the sailors had seen the whirlpool, and were calling orders down the line. The clatter of trapdoors signaled the arrival of the rest of the crew from below deck.

“We need those sails, men!” Drewshank shouted once more.

The rigging was soon awash with sailors and mice. They worked frantically, knowing their time was short.

“Hard to starboard!” shouted Drewshank, his voice almost breaking. The ship lurched in the water as the helmsman turned the wheel forcefully with the help of Fenwick. Sailors grabbed hold of anything secured to the deck as it rose sideways. Emiline tumbled in the crow’s nest, her heart pounding hard in her throat; Chervil fell down on top of her; Portly scratched his way urgently into her jacket. There was no way she could safely climb down now. The rain battered her face as the wind blew it whichever way it pleased.

Emiline hurriedly searched for a rope and eventually found a piece wrapped around the crow’s nest that was secured to the rigging. She was scared, but she calmly tied the rope to her waist and fitted it around Chervil’s belly. She could feel herself tilting over and clutched the crow’s nest as tightly as she could. The sailors on the rigging struggled to keep hold, grabbing the ropes for dear life as the mast neared horizontal with the sea. Waves crashed onto the deck. The
Flying Fox
fought against the whirlpool and eventually righted in the water, but the circular waves were stronger, pulling the ship closer.

Drewshank gripped the side of the ship and looked hard into the whirlpool. The black heart of its pull looked closer to hell than anything he’d ever seen. His fingers dug in, and he twisted his leg three times around a guide rope. The noise was terrific, whooshing and gushing with such force that he struggled to think straight. He thought desperately about what to do.

And then he saw a sharp streak of silver bolt through the darkness. He rubbed his eyes, unsure of what he’d seen. An immense roar tore through the air, and the swirling water blasted upward into columns of jet black before cascading down onto the
Flying Fox.
A huge silver-bodied serpent reared up like an angry cobra from the whirlpool. Its pointed, skeletal head roared ferociously before scything downward and cutting the sea in two. Two jets of pure white steam blasted from its nostrils as it twisted back into the air, its pulsating scaly body thrashing around violently. It was too dark to see the monster’s full extent as it rose high in the air above the ship, but there was no missing the glistening tentacles jutting out from its mouth and its burning, bright red eyes.

Everyone onboard froze. The sea monster was the mythical Grak, and that meant one thing: certain death for them all.

The Elephant Mouse

THE ELEPHANT MOUSE IS THE LARGEST MOUSE DEEMED SUITABLE FOR
keeping in a collection by the International Mousehunting Federation. This thick-limbed, big-eared, and long-nosed rodent can grow to a meter in height and is often house-trained like a dog. Elephant Mice are generally docile creatures and make suitable family pets — unlike some of the more fancy collectible mice — but they have difficulty climbing stairs, so this should be taken into account when getting one for your home.

MOUSING NOTES

Elephant Mice have few specialist requirements, and as long as they have a nice warm bed made of straw, they can make wonderful pets in any home.

The Giant’s Reach

“R
EADY THOSE CANNONS!” SCREAMED DREWSHANK AS
the Grak’s head lowered and eyed its prey. Drewshank thrived in times of danger, his blood raging through his body, and he waited impatiently for his sailors to take their positions.

The whirlpool subsided as the Grak circled menacingly in the air, but the waves were growing by the second. “Hold firm!” shouted Drewshank, and the monster’s mighty, ugly head shot down and drove straight into the hull, knocking the ship sideways. Sailors went flying about the deck. The ship groaned as it keeled over, but it was a tough vessel. It rode the tumbling waves and righted jerkily. Drewshank took a breath, and watched as the Grak twisted below into the circling waves. He caught glimpses of its silver scaly body, but he waited. And waited. And then, the water broke.

“Fire!” he bellowed, his veins almost exploding from his neck.

The starboard cannons unleashed their fury. The Grak pulled up, its serpentine body twisting like a tornado in the air, and the shots vanished into darkness, consumed by the tempestuous sea.

“Fire!” he shouted again. Once more the cannons fired, sending clouds of smoke into the air. This time some of the shots hit the target. The monster let out a deafening scream and careered back into the water, vanishing from sight. The sailors cheered loudly. If anything, though, the sea became even more ferocious. The waves rose up again like an impenetrable black wall around the ship.

“Ready the cannons!” ordered Drewshank, wiping his drenched hair out of his eyes. He stood firm, but all he could hear was the raging water smashing at the ship’s hull. With a screeching wail, the Grak burst out of the sea once more.

“Fire!”

The monster cried out as the cannonballs struck with deadly accuracy, but it powered forward with such force it hit the side of the vessel and lifted it clear of the sea. Drewshank crashed to the floor.

The
Flying Fox
was truly flying for the first time as it sped awkwardly through the air. The sailors hung on with all their might, but some lost their grip, tumbling into the deafening roar of the sea.

The ship smashed back onto the water and twisted into a huge wave, its bow slicing keenly through into the pitch black of the sea. Ice-cold water flew over the deck and the
Flying Fox
was sucked into the deep. Towers of bubbles rose up around the hull and shot off in trails behind the ship. Every sailor’s lungs soon reached bursting point, but they held on, and the sea started to lift them. The ship was being forced up and up by the air trapped in the hull, the pressure becoming almost unbearable until finally it was catapulted clear into the air.

The
Flying Fox
landed back on the sea like a skimming stone, skipping twice before coming to rest on calmer waters. Drewshank gasped for air, just as every other sailor did. He found his footing and stood up uneasily. He surveyed the black waters ahead but could see no sign of the Grak or the whirlpool.

“Water’s breakin’ in below!” shouted Fenwick, who was drenched to the core.

Drewshank looked around at the wreck that had become his ship. Water sloshed back and forth over the deck, and crates and splintered wood lay strewn everywhere. Torn sails snapped in the wind.

“Fix the leaks, men,” ordered Drewshank. “Assess the damage and get the cannons ready again.”

He looked into the distance and his heart dropped. The Grak was spiraling out of the sea once more and it was coming at them.

“That monster’s not done yet!” he shouted.

The crew braced themselves for another onslaught. Screaming loudly, the monster dropped and shot straight at them like a torpedo, sending water and snorts of steam blasting out into the air. The cannons fired out, but the Grak’s huge form lifted into the air and continued to rise until its scaly body was directly above them.

But it didn’t attack. The air was immediately filled with more ear-piercing cries. Drewshank turned to follow its course and witnessed a second awesome Grak rise out of the sea a few hundred meters behind them.

“Of all the luck in the world . . . ,” gasped the captain. “We’re done for!”

The two monsters veered upward to where they clashed high above the masts. Their jaws crunched into each other’s skulls, and they twisted away together, tumbling downward just clear of the ship, until they punched into the water in a writhing mess.

As the two Graks submerged, a wave swelled, caught hold of the
Flying Fox,
and drove it high up and far out across the sea. Drewshank’s sailor’s legs were trusty, and had served him well in the past, but that was the last straw. His chest convulsed and he was sick on the floor.

Drewshank righted himself and wiped his mouth sheepishly.

“Find some sails!” he shouted queasily to what remained of his crew. “There must be something left hanging from those masts! Get us out of here!”

Tired sailors unhooked themselves from their posts and surveyed the damage.

“Captain!”

Drewshank heard a shout. It was Scratcher, his face blackened with soot and tears. He was holding a taut thin rope over the side of the ship — it was the remainder of the rigging from a broken mast, and something was attached to its end, dragging in the water.

Drewshank and Fenwick ran over. During the battle they’d forgotten entirely about Emiline. They looked desperately to the dark sea and saw the battered remains of the crow’s nest floating along at the end of Scratcher’s rope. Fenwick took hold of it, and the two of them pulled as hard as they could against the waves. As the crow’s nest neared, they could just make out a body drifting behind. Emiline’s small mouse was sitting on her chest, and Chervil was paddling frantically behind.

Lord Battersby watched the storm from his apartment window. Standing stock upright in his light-gray navy uniform, he rubbed his hands against one another with worry. The port of Hamlyn was taking a battering.

In charge of the Old Town Guard’s navy, Battersby was a man of great power. He was tall and broad, and had a strikingly strong and imposing chin.

“I wouldn’t wish to be out in this,” he said darkly, watching the ships rise and fall in the docks, ten-foot waves crashing at their hulls. “It could ruin our plans if the
Flying Fox
fails to arrive.”

Lady Pettifogger approached Battersby, her diminutive size making him look like a giant. She was beautiful — she knew it too. She held a scarf loosely in her hands, and she played with it casually as lightning cracked outside and lit up the port.

“Drewshank has a solid ship. He’ll make it through,” she said confidently. “Don’t worry yourself.”

Lord Battersby looked pensively at her. “There’s a lot riding on that trumped-up privateer — too much if you ask me, Beatrice. We should never have agreed to all this so willingly. There must have been an easier way?”

Lady Pettifogger shook her head slowly, gave a sultry smile, and placed her hand on Battersby’s solid back.

“Lovelock knows what he’s doing, Alexander. Besides, Mousebeard never runs from a fight, and I’m sure he knows there’s a ship on his tail by now.”