"I wish I were on land. I wish I could swim." Peregrine joked, but her voice shivered. "We don't see waves like these in the Sukurvia."
"Nor the jungle," added Jedit. He told the frightened lieutenant, "You'll gain shore safely, if not dryshod. I promise."
Despite the damp and cold, Adira's temper flickered like a coal. Dare Jedit allude to taking command after she'd blistered his hide earlier? Then she let it go, too busy to be petty.
With a heave ho, the riggers hauled up the yard on wobbly blocks. Adira's Circle gave a hoarse cheer at a small victory. Their captain turned away, a lump in her throat.
Prowling the ship, Adira Strongheart watched sky and shore, gauging their chances. Clawing seaward might let them ride out a squall, but a sustained storm would drive them on the rocks. Adira ordered Murdoch, who was handy, to help the ship's carpenter and sailing master fashion a sea anchor from a broken spar and spare sail. Glumsy on the slippery deck, they managed to shove it overside. As the hoop of canvas sank and bellied, it dragged like a wagon brake to slow Conch's speed. Virgil and Peregrine muscled and hoisted spars. Jedit carried lines as he climbed like a spider. Heath and Wilemina, with clever hands, wove new rigging from dangling ropes.
Indeed, everyone was so busy only Adira saw the monster strike.
As sudden as winter lightning, alongside the ship reared a green-black scaly head and neck high as the mainyard. The skull was elongated like a pike's, the neck sinuous as a snake's, and the mouth lined with white daggers. Fast as Adira could blink, the sea serpent hooked its impossible neck at a man slaving to hold the tiller. The helmsman barely shrieked. Adira was reminded of a bird pecking a worm as the serpent bobbed and bit. Its horny muzzle rapped the deck as razor teeth engulfed the man, snapping so hard one foot sheared off to bounce on pine planks. The serpent flicked its chin high, gnashing and crushing, then gulped and swallowed the broken man whole.
Consternation swept the ship. Howls and screams rang even over the ear-piercing wind.
In the tiny pause while the serpent devoured its victim, the Conch raced on. The fearful beast was left a cable's length behind. Yet the ship lost headway as the remaining tillerman deserted her post. Rudderless, pushed by the wind, with sails haphazardly trimmed, the bow came around, so the stern broached the half-gale. Immediately the ship's quivering roll degenerated into a slamming gait like a crippled horse. Men and women slid along wet decks to bang painfully into masts and rails and furniture. From long years of practice, Adira's pirates gripped something, but Jasmine, Peregrine, and Murdoch tumbled headlong until seasoned sailors nabbed them. Instinctively all scuttled toward their captain. Jedit Ojanen hunched as if ready to spring, snuffling the salt air with black nostrils.
Virgil fumbled his axe from his belt and held it up helplessly. "How do we fight that beastie?"
"Don't they coil around ships and crush 'em?" asked Murdoch, totally out of his element.
"Hush! Heath, Wil, nock your bows!"
Adira's keen mind sifted standard defenses but came up short. She'd barely believed sea serpents existed. Squinting into eye-stinging rain, she said, "If we batten the lubbers below-"
"It's back!" screamed Sister Wilemina and loosed a wild arrow into the sky.
Unexpectedly, the sea serpent flung its head above the port side, having swum or slithered under the ship like an eel. Water sluiced from its long green head in buckets. The mouth, a full six feet long, cracked to reveal rows of needle teeth. This time Adira saw the comb of tall spines that jutted from its head and stippled its spine. Shaking its head, perhaps to fling water from its eyes, the creature stabbed at the largest target-Adira's Circle of Seven.
"Back!" Adira slapped one arm wide to brush her crew out of harm's way. In her other fist sprouted her cutlass, though she didn't remember drawing it. Lurching against the unfamiliar lunging of the ship, she stabbed upward as the serpent drove down. A scaly head big as a coffin banged Adira's thigh as her cutlass pierced the thing's chin from underneath. The pirate queen felt the blade split skin like thin leather, then the point jammed in springy fish bone. The serpent waggled its head at the pinprick, ripping the cutlass from Adira's hand and almost breaking her fingers.
In that instant, Jedit Ojanen struck.
Unlike humans, the "ship's cat" kept his footing on careening wet deck by digging claws into pine planks. As the tiger's comrades spilled and skidded and dived to avoid the onrushing serpent, Jedit was free to act. Slinging a long arm behind, he swiped a huge circle. Black claws struck the serpent's head. Four long weals of skin were peeled from the monster's muzzle to hang in shreds flapping in the wind. Surprised and hurt, the serpent whipped its head back and paused, so it was left behind as the Conch of Corn's raced on directly for surf-drenched rocks a half-mile distant.
"Bastards!" cursed Adira Strongheart at no one in particular. Her ample breasts heaved as she panted. "Damnation and hellfire! Jedit, Heath, the rest, fight that thing! Simone, Virgil, come! We've got to claw off the rocks!"
Used to obeying blindly in crises, pirates fell to. Murdoch, Jasmine, and Peregrine crabbed to a mast and unlashed eight-foot boarding pikes. Heath and Wilemina nocked their favored weapons, bumped rump to rump, and tried to watch all sides at once.
Following Adira, Simone the Siren and Virgil pulled handover-hand across a sloped deck and up to the quarterdeck. It was deserted, the officers having fled below. The tiller snapped back and forth like a dragon's tail, making the ship veer sickeningly. Virgil jumped on the long wooden arm, taking a painful rap in the ribs. Simone dived in, and together they steadied the vessel.
Virgil called to his mate, "What if that fish-beast attacks while we steer?"
"We die!" yelled Simone.
"Can't we just lash the tiller hard over?"
"No. There may be rocks! Belt up and bear down! Uh oh!"
Up the short ladder staggered Master Edsen and three officers. All carried cutlasses and murder in their eyes.
The master shouted, "Strongheart! You've been a jinx since you first stepped aboard! I'm taking command, and I'll kill-"
Far overhead, Whistledove Kithkin keened like a tern. Her tiny finger pointed astern.
The serpent struck where it had found good hunting earlier. Virgil and Simone sprawled on their butts but never let go the tiller. Edsen's officers dived back down the short ladder, leaving the two captains gaping in the open. Adira acted. Heedless of how she landed, she vaulted the low railing overlooking the waist. As she soared, she snagged Edsen's tunic to drag him along to safety. Half-turned, Edsen failed to see the fearsome head swooping. As Adira yanked on his tunic, the serpent sank fangs into Edsen's shoulder. The master howled as cruel teeth sheared muscle and bone. Pulled between Adira and the monster, the captain split apart. Dragged from Adira's fist, what remained fell and flopped like a fish. Blood spurted in a surf-washed cascade across the quarterdeck. Edsen died as the sea serpent tossed its chin and gulped down the master's arm.
An errant gust shoved Conch onward as the beast slipped below the waves.
Adira Strongheart earned her name again by hooking her boot toes in the quarterdeck railing. Shouting orders, she seemed to move the ship by her voice alone.
"Simone, Virgil, on your feet! You three, get forward and let slip the capstan! It's shallow enough to drag anchor! Seveners, stand fast to fight the monster! The rest of you ignore it and get aloft to tack! No, I'm not mad! We save the ship or die on the rocks!"
Forward, a woman shrieked as the sea serpent reared again. Jedit, Wilemina, Heath, Jasmine, and Peregrine rushed that way as Sergeant Murdoch slipped and crashed on a coil of rope. Dusk had descended, and footing was tricky in semi-darkness. Rain stung faces. Jedit Ojanen slit his eyes and tiptoed on thorny claws to the bow, then waited, watching both ways.