Shade huddled in on himself again, but said, “Setting the sac on fire is a good idea. We have to stop them, or they’ll just attack Opal Night for more crossbreeds.”
Chime cleared his throat. “I don’t know if Delin has any weapons onboard. But we can look.”
Moon had Lithe, Shade, and Chime go through the other cabins, while the two warriors kept watch. He searched the main cabin and the hold himself, but all he found that might be useful were some knives and other sharp implements, for cooking or for working on the boat. The food and water stores were still good, so at least they would be able to eat and care for the wounded right up until the Fell killed them.
He had finished and was in the main cabin when Chime returned with something he and Lithe had found.
It was a metal projectile weapon, with a long tube attached to a handle, and a lever. Chime pointed to various bits of it. “I think you use the lever to pump air into this part of it, and then when you pull this, that makes the air release and that shoots out the projectile. I found some of these—” He set a box down on the table. It was filled with round little packages wrapped in paper. “I think they’re the projectiles. But I’ve been thinking, Delin never mentioned he had a weapon that would be useful against the Fell. And this was packed up in a cabinet in his sleeping room, and not up in the steering cabin where he could get to it quickly. So maybe it’s not a weapon, it just looks like one?”
Moon picked up one of the projectiles, handling it carefully. It felt soft, like sand wrapped in heavy paper, and it had a wick like a candle. He tried it against the opening in the weapon, and it slid right inside. He took it out again, and sniffed it cautiously. The scent was bitter and acrid, like sulfur. Like something that would be flammable, and it was clearly meant to be lit. “I don’t think it is a weapon. I think you light this on fire, and shoot it into the air with this thing, and it makes a burst of light.” On the Crescent Coast archipelagos, he had seen ships signal each other with various contraptions that made light high in the air.
Chime took the device back, turned it over and examined it again. “It could still be a weapon. If you shot it into a kethel’s chest… It would still hurt.”
“Hurt it, but maybe not kill it. I wonder if it would set something on fire.”
“The sac, like Shade suggested?” Chime’s expression was doubtful. “Some things don’t catch on fire easily. It might need to be covered in oil. But there is oil in the hold. It’s made from some kind of sea plant that the Islanders grow. Delin has it for the ship’s lamps and the metal cooking thing.” He added nervously, “And then there’s the part where the sac collapses on the boat and we burn to death.”
“I’m trying to think of a way to avoid that part,” Moon admitted. It would be better to use this as a means of escape, not a way to die spectacularly and take as many Fell with them as possible. But that depended on what the Fell wanted with them.
A thump on the deck above made them both flinch. The wood creaked with the movement of something heavy. Moon shifted, Chime a beat behind him. Moon started for the door, then turned back to shove the weapon at Chime and motion frantically for him to hide it. Moon might regret that, but he thought if the Fell meant to just come in here and eat them all, they would have done it before now.
Chime scooped up the box of projectiles and turned to the cabinets on the far side of the cabin. Moon stepped out into the passage as Lithe and Shade hurried back from the hold area. Floret and Saffron stood at the bottom of the stairs, their spines flared. Floret whispered, “I think it’s a kethel.”
The creaking above ceased abruptly, and Moon felt rather than heard the change in the air as the creature shifted. Heavy footsteps crossed the deck toward the stairs.
“Get back,” Moon told them. He was thinking that two female warriors more or less wouldn’t matter to the Fell and the kethel might just kill both of them if they were within reach. Both hesitated, and he snarled, “Now.”
They moved away, reluctantly, as a kethel in groundling form stamped down the stairs.
Its body was big and muscular, more than a head taller than Moon and twice as wide. It wore no clothing except for a silver chain around its neck. Its skin was pale like the rulers, but there the resemblance ended. Its face was bony and the dark eyes were deep-set under a heavy brow. It had long yellow fangs, distended enough to make sores in its lower lip. Its gaze went to Moon and its expression went blank. Its mouth fell open, its throat worked, and a deep voice like gravel and broken glass said, “The crossbreed consort will come with me.”
Saffron hissed and Floret twitched. Moon bared his fangs. That was a ruler speaking through the kethel, and probably seeing through its eyes as well. Moon said, “No, he won’t.”
Moon didn’t expect the creature to accept that as an answer. The kethel surged forward, swinging an arm to fling him out of the way. Even in groundling form it was still a kethel, and Moon knew it could crush him if he closed with it. He ducked under its arm and lunged at its throat. Moving faster than he had thought possible, it jerked back and caught him by the shoulder. Moon sunk his claws into its arm and hand, but he could barely penetrate its tough skin.
Then the air changed as Shade shifted behind him. Shade reached over Moon’s shoulder, dug claws into the kethel’s wrist and twisted. The kethel snarled in pain and released Moon, jerked its hand free and fell back a step.
Moon glanced at Shade to make certain he was ready if the creature charged them. Then he did a double-take.
This was the first time he had seen Shade’s shifted form. The shock of it was like a punch to the face.
Shade was big, as big as the kethel’s groundling form, and he looked like a Fell ruler. Shade bared his teeth at the kethel, revealing an impressive array of fangs. He said, “Go away.”
The kethel made a half-hearted growl, but it was clear from its expression that the ruler no longer had control over it, and that the kethel had never seen anything like Shade. Baffled, it backed away, then climbed the stairs.
They heard the thumps of its feet on the deck, then the boat jerked as it shifted and leapt away.
Chapter Seventeen
Moon stared at Shade. It took an effort of will not to step back and growl. The others stared too, except for Saffron, whose spines flicked in embarrassment and Lithe, who just looked frightened. Shade didn’t notice at first, his gaze on the ceiling as he tracked the kethel’s movements until it left the boat. He turned to Moon. “Why did it…” His voice trailed off as he realized what the silence in the cabin meant.
He twitched self-consciously and shifted, his dark armored body flowing into his smaller groundling form. He watched Moon warily, like someone who expected the worst.
Moon recognized that expression because he was pretty certain it had been on his face every time he had been forced to shift in front of someone who had thought he was just another groundling. And the worst was always what had happened. He belatedly shifted too, so Shade wouldn’t think he was going to attack him. He said, “That’s…”
“It’s how I’ve always been.” Shade’s shoulders hunched in misery. “Did the kethel leave because it thought I was a ruler?”
Moon hadn’t had much trouble with Shade’s groundling skin color. Maybe because he was used to seeing so many varieties of groundling, and Shade’s whole demeanor was so unlike a Fell’s, that after the first initial surprise the comparison seemed ridiculous. But this… This he had a problem with. And he needed to get past it, now, before the Fell returned. Because if the kethel had been intimidated by Shade, the other Fell might be too, and that could give them far more of an advantage than a weapon that might or might not be able to start a fire at a distance. “Can you shift again? So I can see?”