The Tides of Avarice (49 page)

And Rasco. I miss the little nutcase so much. I hope he's safe.

Nearby, a whip struck skin and a pirate yelped in pain or outrage or both.

Sylvester put his head down and kept walking.

✿ ✿ ✿ ✿ ✿.

When they reached it, perhaps half an hour later, the Larder proved to be far more spacious than Sylvester had expected. When Kabalore had talked about “comfortable accommodations,” Sylvester had assumed the worst: somewhere dark, cramped and cold, its walls dripping with foul water, its shadows filled with small creatures with large, venomous bites. Instead, the captives were ushered into a wide cavern with a sandy floor. There were niches in the walls where the guards could lodge their torches, lighting up the space warmly. The walls were also fitted out with metal rings and ropes, and briskly, with the ease of long practice, the Vendrosians secured their captives. Sylvester found he could walk perhaps three paces to one side or the other, but not much farther. Certainly the rope, tied from a ring about a yard above his head to the binding that fastened his forepaws behind his back, didn't have enough slack in it for him to be able to turn himself right around. He and the others were going to have to learn to sleep standing up. What they were going to do about other bodily functions he didn't know; he hoped he wasn't going to be the first of the captives to find out.

It was some consolation that Viola was the next prisoner along the wall. At least they hadn't been separated. On his other side was Cheesefang and that was heartening as well. Sylvester didn't know that he liked the disreputable, temperamental sea rat, but at least he'd grown accustomed to him. The other pirates Sylvester knew only from having seen them on occasion around the deck of the Shadeblaze. He had no idea what any of them were called.

Once the Vendrosian guards were satisfied none of the prisoners could escape their bonds, Kabalore ambled into the Larder carrying a bulging wineskin and bearing a broad complacent grin.

He bowed sarcastically to the tethered pirates, then raised the wineskin to his lips. A long stream of the potent green grog jetted into his mouth, and he drank with loud satisfaction.

“That's better,” he said at last, lowering the skin and wiping the back of his paw appreciatively across his mouth. He laughed. “I do hope you folks won't regard us as terribly ill-mannered if we leave our guests on their own for a while, will you? As you know, my friends and I have some concentrated feasting to get done, and there's no time like the present to get started on that sort of job.”

He and the guards cackled loud and long at this display of humor.

To make sure the prisoners knew their place, a couple of the guards lashed out with their whips, the savage blows drawing blood wherever they fell. Sylvester cringed, certain he or Viola was going to be next, but fortunately they were spared. At last, with Kabalore in the lead, the islanders left the pirates to their own devices.

“Now, there's a stroke o' luck,” said Cheesefang as soon as the cannibals were gone.

“What is?” said Sylvester.

“Them bastards done left us with their torches.”

“So?”

“Flame burns through rope, dunnit?”

“It also burns through flesh,” Sylvester pointed out. “Besides, the cannibals have obviously thought of that. Our ropes aren't long enough for any of us to get anywhere near one of the torches.”

“See these?” said Cheesefang, opening his mouth wide.

Sylvester turned his head and found himself staring in sick fascination at what looked like a stone wall a moment after a herd of buffalo has stampeded through it.

“Them's teeth,” said Cheesefang, making the wall wobble nauseatingly.

“Er, yes,” replied Sylvester. “I'd guessed that bit.”

“And we was given toothypegs,” the sea rat continued, “for a purpose, which purpose is chewing. And ropes is made for getting chewed through, see?”

Sylvester doubted Cheesefang's teeth were good for chewing through anything tougher than porridge – and only porridge that hadn't been cooked by Bladderbulge, at that. He mumbled something tactful to this effect.

“I know that,” countered Cheesefang, his voice full of exasperation. “Them's good pirate toothypegs, which is to say there's a lot o' them missin' and the ones has survived is a bit on the bluntish side. Same for me as it is for me mates 'ere, see?” He rotated his head to indicate the other pirates. All were listening intently to the conversation. “That's prob'ly wot them cannibal bumheads was counting on when they thought it was safe to leave us alone. But wot they didn't notice is that you, Sylvester,” Cheesefang continued, “you an' Little Miss Droppydrawers there—”

“How dare you call her Little Miss—”

Cheesefang ignored the protest. “You two ain't got pirate teeth yet. Yer toothypegs ain't matured into the well developed pirate standard. An' yer rodents. Yer whole lives is built aroun' chewin' stuff. You gettin' me?”

“I think so,” said Sylvester, hackles still ruffled, “but however sharp our teeth are, they're not going to help us. The rope's behind me and Kabalore and his crew didn't leave me enough leeway to turn myself round to get at it.”

“Don't have to.” Cheesefang looked and sounded incredulous. “You tryin' to tell me that you an' Little Miss Droppydrawers 'aven't ever 'ad to escape from a prison cell?”

“Um, no. We haven't. We're law-abiding citizens.”

Cheesefang spat. “Lemmings! Clueless. I tol' Cap'n Rustbane, the triple-breasted goddess bless his soul, I told 'im gettin' involved with lemmings was a big mistake, but did 'e listen?”

“No,” said one of the other pirates, a beaver with two hooks in place of forepaws.

“I want your help I'll ask for it, Pimplebrains,” snarled Cheesefang.

Pimplebrains? thought Sylvester in bewilderment. Is that a name or an insult?

Cheesefang was taking deep breaths, as if trying to get his sanity under control. “Then I s'pose,” he said heavily to Sylvester, “yer ol' Uncle Cheesefang's goin' to 'ave to talk you through this one.”

“How to, er, turn ourselves around when the rope's too tight to let us?” said Viola, sounding as puzzled as Sylvester felt.

“Yes. No. Sort of. Good to find ye've not fallen asleep, Miss Droppydrawers. See, wot ye've—”

“Cheesefang?”

“—got to … Yes?”

“You call me ‘Miss Droppydrawers' one more time and you're going to find your ugly head jammed firmly up the aperture your drawers would ordinarily cover. Got that?”

Cheesefang looked suddenly nervous. A gleam came into his eye that Sylvester had seen before. It was that gleam of mingled awe and admiration that tended to be in the sea rat's eyes when Daphne Pickleberry was around. Now, clearly, Cheesefang had discovered that her daughter deserved something of the same.

“What ye have to do,” continued the rat, a tone of unaccustomed politeness entering his voice, “is back yerselves up against the wall as hard and as far as ye can possibly manage, see? Watch me.”

Cheesefang shuffled back and back on the sands until, standing upright, he was nearly flat against the wall almost directly under the metal ring to which he was tethered.

Sylvester saw at once the point of the maneuver. The rope from the metal ring dangled right alongside Cheesefang's face. All the old pirate had to do was turn his head and, with a certain amount of juggling, manipulate the rope with his mouth until it was between his teeth.

“Gotcha!” said Sylvester in admiration.

Lemmings aren't the same shape as rats, they're somewhat, well, pudgier, to be forthright about it, and it proved a lot more difficult for Sylvester and Viola to accomplish what Cheesefang had demonstrated, but at last, they succeeded.

“Ye ready?” said Cheesefang.

“Uh-huh,” grunted the two lemmings.

“Then get chewin' as quick as yers can! No knowin' when those cannibal swine be gettin' back.”

Sylvester didn't need the urging.

The rope was made from some type of local vines, twisted tightly together, and it tasted like a bar of old soap that had been left on the side of the bath to dry and crack for a year. Or, at least, that's what Sylvester thought. He tried eating soap exactly once when he was very young and going through what his mother had euphemized as his “experimental stage” (his father had used franker terms for it, the only repeatable one being “nuisance”), and strangely enough, he could remember how it tasted, despite the span of years.

Disgusting.

And here he was on a cannibal island facing the same prospect but this time with reluctance. Not only did the rope taste disgusting, it was tough. Out of the corner of his eye, Sylvester could see the back of Viola's head and could tell she was finding the rope as resistant to her teeth as he was. Both of them began to gasp from the effort and the pain.

At last, Sylvester found that only one strand of the rope in his mouth was left intact. He chomped down hard on it and felt the fibers beginning to disintegrate. Unwilling to have the rope on his tongue anymore, he danced away from the wall, jerking with his wrists as hard as he could.

The rope resisted for a moment, then snapped.

Sylvester went sprawling flat on his face in the cool sand.

A few moments later, Viola did exactly the same. They lay there, their heads a few yards apart, grinning at each other with the satisfaction of a difficult task achieved, the sound of their breath echoing all around the cave.

There was a curious muffled drumming noise. Lazily, Sylvester turned to see the pirates, unable to clap the hands that were tied behind their backs, were stamping their feet to applaud the two lemmings.

“Thanks, folks,” said Sylvester smugly.

“Ahem,” Cheesefang said a minute or two later, once the pirates had quietened again. “Yer still not done, you two.”

“What?” said Viola.

“One o' yer's got to gnash through the rope at the other one's wrists, ain't yer?”

“I don't suppose the islanders left any swords or daggers lying around, did they?” said Sylvester with implausible optimism. “Even a pair of scissors would do.”

The cave filled with the pirates' derisive laughter.

“Kabalore may be stupid, but 'e's not stupid,” said Cheesefang.

Sylvester sniffed. “Just wondering.” He glanced across the floor to where Viola was wriggling to her feet. “I'll do it,” he told her. “Once your arms are free, you can untie me.”

She looked as if she might be about to object, then he saw her change her mind.

Gnawing through the ropes at Viola's wrists was somehow not as bad. Sylvester guessed it must be that this was fresher rope than the one that was hanging from the wall. Or maybe it was the proximity of Viola, her familiar warmth, that made him feel more cheerful. Whatever, it didn't seem long at all until she was rubbing her forepaws together to get the blood circulating in them once more, and a minute or two later she was picking with her sharp, nimble claws at the knots that bound him.

In less than half an hour everyone was free. The two lemmings were the heroes of the day. No one even thought of calling them hamsters.

Cheesefang sidled over to the cave entrance and peered outside.

“Garn,” he pronounced, his face twisting into a scowl as he turned back to face the others. “Now, there's a rotten stroke of Lady Fate if ever I did see one. Them 'orrible cannonballs 'as posting a posse of guards not an 'undred yards from ‘ere. They's feastin' and boozin' away like they got a grudge against their guts, but they's armed up to the eyeballs with spears and cudgels and longbows and swords. Most o' the blades they're carrying be ourn, by jingo! Ain't no way to escape this direction, there ain't.”

Viola looked downcast. “This calls for a curse,” she said.

The pirates gasped.

“Bottom!” she exclaimed, putting a lot of feeling into the word.

There was a moment's silence, then the pirates started sniggering.

Sylvester put his arm around Viola's waist comfortingly. “I don't think they regard that as much of a curse,” he said.

“When you've all finished being idiots,” said the beaver called Pimplebrains coldly from the rear of the cave, “there's something important I'd like to show yers.”

All eyes turned toward him.

“There's another way out of this cave,” he said, pointing with one of his metal hooks. “Look.”

Now that the beaver had drawn their attention to it, it was obvious. Sylvester couldn't understand why none of them except Pimplebrains had noticed before. Maybe the flickering of the wall-mounted brands had deceived their eyes into thinking it was just another shadow. Or maybe it was because they were all focusing so intently on ridding themselves of their hated bonds.

Partly concealed by a vertical fold in the rocky wall of the cave there was a pitch-black cleft.

“Could be just 'arf a yard deep,” observed Cheesefang cynically.

“It ain't,” Pimplebrains retorted. “While you lot was putting on yer variety show about bottoms” – the sneer almost dripped – “I was exploratizing back ‘ere. I reckon this crevice goes a long, long way into the hill. I couldn't go too far, because I was running out of light and, unlike Jeopord and his kind, I can't see in the dark. But I got far enough to smell the breath of the sea and the open sky, somewhere way in the distance.”

“Blimey,” said one of the pirates, a one-armed weasel. “I'm game for this.” He leaped to the wall and snatched down the torch from the niche. “The rest of you comin' with me and Pimplebrains?”

The beaver held up a hook in caution. “Could be it's a dead end. We could get stuck in there an' not be able ter find a way back.”

“It's worth the risk,” cried the weasel.