CHAPTER SEVEN: THE KRAKEN.
Mist swirls. Out of the mist emerges a golden octopus with tentacles curling underneath it. The mist starts to clear and attached to the octopus pendant by a chain is a golden key with an elegant scrolled design on it. The mist clears some more and an elegant white hand is holding the key. The mist rolls back completely; a head with a peacock hat is looking down at it. It advances towards a wall, which has golden octopuses, their tentacles curling over it in an elaborate design with a curling sea. The key advances towards the wall, closer and closer, and where the shrieking beak of one of the octopuses is on the wall, a keyhole can be seen. The white hand puts the key in the hole and turns it, it clicks.. Nothing happens for a moment, but then an outline can be seen on the wall, a curving shape within the pattern of the octopus and the waves. The shape is about the size of a man. Mist begins to swirl again around the image. The hand takes the key out of the keyhole and suddenly jerks, dropping the key. The mist closes in, the last thing that can be seen is the key falling, falling through the mist, falling through a gap in the floor below the door.
Violet awakes with the image of a golden octopus in her mind, tentacles squirming. She feels like she must have had a nightmare, but the dream didn’t seem scary, but she can’t shift the impression of sudden fear, she feels damp with sweat. She opens her eyes and realises it was not from the dream that the feeling of foreboding and the dampness came from, but what had happened before she had the dream. She looks around her and sees she is on a cold stone floor, on one side of it is a stonewall with a stout stone door set in it. The rest of the walls are curved and of glass, behind which is the ocean, dark green at this depth, with straggling seaweed brushing the edges of the prison, dark shapes half-glimpsed in the water, some coming closer and moving quickly past with a flash of fins, unamused smiles and bulbous eyes. She sits up rubbing her waist, and feeling the tentacles which had caught hold of her so quickly, before she even realised she had been caught and moved so quickly with her that all the breathe was knocked out of her before she could react.
She looks around the room, Captain Brandon and the rest of the crew were also laid on the floor, just starting to become conscious and aware of their surroundings.
“Are you alright, my lady,” asks the Captain with concern, coming over to her and helping her to her feet.
“I’m fine thank you,” she replies in a voice which was a false brightness. “How is everyone else, no one got hurt did they?”
“Rrr, it take more than a rubbery sea creature to upset my lads.”
“Cowardly amphibians,” grumbled one of the crew.
“Just coz we bested them, they had to send the Kraken in.”
“Yeah, bloody kraken.” The crew continued in their disparaging comments about the sea creatures.
Violet discreetly looks underneath her shirt around her waist and saw she had large sore red circles standing out on her skin from the tentacle that had grabbed her. She didn’t say anything as the other pirates were so blarzay about the experience and seemed to count it as a normal hazard of sailing the oceans, like the weather.
“Where are we?” she asks the Captain quietly.
“Rrr, I forget you not been here before. This be the underwater city of the amphibian creatures, worshippers of the Kraken.”
“The Kraken would be the tentacle thing?”
“Aye.”
“So what’s going to happen to us? What are they going to do?”
“They not like the surface dwellers, as they call us. So they probably feed us to the Kraken.”
“Hmm, so why did they imprison us? Why not just let the Kraken eat us then and there, does he had set meal times or something?”
The Captain roared with laughter. “I knew I’d like you girly, when I first saw you. No the amphibians like to taunt you and let you know how superior their ways be and how misguided be yours before they be feeding you to the sharks.”
“I thought we were going to be fed to the Kraken?”
“Sharks or Kraken, whoever be the hungriest.”
“So how are we going to escape?”
“That my girl be a very good question and one I be giving much consideration to.”
“So what are we going to do?”
“Well, my lady,” said the Captain with a smile and a wink. “I have absolutely no idea.”
“What, your plan is just to sit here and become fish food?”
“Well, yes, until something else turns up, like a plan or an opportunity.”
“I am not going to be fish food, I absolutely refuse to be held captive here.”
“Don’t worry, something will come up, it usually does. We have got out of some scrapes, haven’t we lads?” The crew cheered their captain. “We not ended up as fish food yet.”
“Well not the important parts any way,” shout one of the crew waving his hook hand in the air.” The Captain and crew all laugh.
Violet wants to join them in their optimism that something we happen to get them out of this fishbowl of a prison. She looks at the pirates; they all seem to see the imprisonment as more of an inconvenience and a job risk than anything else. She’s never been imprisoned before and she’s not enjoying the novelty of it. She feels like she should be doing something, but what. She thinks of Ayden, is he trapped in a prison similar to this one, she wonders what he’s thinking of. She hasn’t been trapped for long at all and is already feeling insufferably frustrated with the situation. She tries to think of stories she’s read where people have been imprisoned and how they escaped.
“What about when the guards come in to give us food and water?” she turns to the pirates and suggests an escape plan. “If some of us are hidden behind the door and then we jump them and escape.”
The pirates look at each other giving it some consideration. “Well it did work before,” says Captain Brandon. “What d’ya say lads, can it work this time?”
The pirates all look at each other and nod agreement. “Yep always worth a try. Lets hope they be giving us food and water.”
The pirates pass the time in lazily playing games with cards and dice and telling stories which Violet didn’t believe the half of them. Violet noticed that the pirates had a respect for her, almost saw her as one of them, nearly, and invited her to join in some of their dice and card games. But Violet found she couldn’t settle to anything and spent most of the time pacing up and down and gazing out of the bubble they were imprisoned in, into the depths beyond the glass. Violet was sure that around her she could discern in the gloom other glass spheres, of differing size, sometimes she was sure she could see movement within them, but not clear enough to see if they were human or amphibian, as well as dim greenish lights.
At last a grumbling and a rattling could be heard behind the prison door. At a sign from the Captain two of the stoutest pirates took positions behind the door and the rest mingled about the cell, making it difficult for the scaly head which peered through the tiny window in the door to make out how many were in view. As the amphibian came through the door spear first, closely followed by two more, a tattooed muscled arm shot out from behind the door and grabbed the spear shaft, wrestling it from the startled amphibian. He was quickly despatched by a blow to the head. The other two raised the alarm and attempted to retreat out of the room pulling the door to, but all the pirates rushed to the door, the other pirate behind it holding the door open.
Despite being unarmed the pirates managed to wrestle the spears away from the other two amphibians and knock them to the ground. Their cries of alarm had brought another four amphibian soldiers rushing to the cell. Violet decided to keep in the background in this fight, she felt the pirates, had carefully engineered themselves in front of her, and even though she knew that they knew she could look after herself, she felt their manly pride had received a dent with her heroics and they needed to prove themselves to her that they didn’t actually need any help. So she left them to it, they seemed to have things well in hand, especially they now
had some weapons, and seemed to be brandishing them with relish and they seemed to be disconcerting the amphibians with their blood curling cries and faces. Although she considered that trying to do things a little bit quieter might be a better idea in terms of attracting less attention that they were escaping. Although how they were going to get back to the surface and then to the ship, was beyond her. She had a horrible feeling looking out of the glass bubble at the gloom beyond that they were probably too deep to have any hope of swimming back to the surface and would probably suffer horribly from the bends if they did, if the pressure of the water didn’t kill them instantly as soon as they got out. She hoped the Captain had some sort of plan, then thought back to their previous conversations in the bubble and decided it was probably very unlikely. She crossed her fingers as the pirates despatched the last of the amphibians.
Captain Brandon led the way out of the cells. They came across another small group of amphibians just outside the cells and these were also speedily dealt with. Their bodies were shoved back inside the cells. Everything now appeared quiet in the dark cave-like passageway outside the cells, the Captain looked left and right.
“Do you know how to get out of here?” Violet asked hopefully.
“No idea,” replied the Captain jovially. “But I’m sure we’ll find it eventually, you got to trust that something will suggest itself.” He winked at her with a wry smile.
She gave a half smile back, not feeling at all hopefully or trusting.
“Lets be trying this way,” the Captain pointed his spear towards the passageway that seemed to climb up slightly. The pirates followed quickly if cautiously, Violet found she was in the middle, but at least they were going quietly. The passageway climbed more steeply upwards, which she thought was hopeful, if nothing else. The passageway branched off occasionally, but still continued steadily upwards and the group managed to sneak past other amphibians. Violet was impressed with how quiet and sneaky they could be, for all their usual brashness and noise especially in a fight. The passageway as it reached higher up began to widen and the walls from being tunnel like and fairly rough hewn began to look more elegant and polished, with occasional decorations on them, they passed a mural of a dolphin painted on one wall and something tugged at Violet’s memory as she glimpsed it as they hurried past. Something in the style of the painting nagged at her memory, where had she seen it before. They took another turning into a wider passageway and hurried along it. A long mural was painted on one wall of the passageway, Violet glanced at it and stopped so suddenly that the pirate behind her crashed into her and nearly knocked her over. But she didn’t regard it and stared at the mural transfixed. The pirates behind the one that had nearly bumped into her, nearly crashed into him and there was some muttering, which attracted the attention of the ones in front of her, who came rushing back expecting trouble and asking what was going on in rather urgent voices. But Violet was still staring at the wall transfixed.
It was a mural of golden octopuses, their tentacles curling over the wall with the curling waves of the sea below them. Her dream of the previous night came back to her, it was exactly the same, she had such a strong feeling of déjà vu. She looked down at her hand half expecting to see a golden key with a golden octopus attached to it, but her hand was empty. Captain Brandon came up to her. In the passageway from which they had just come a distant muffled regular thumping could be heard, accompanied by shouts, and it was getting louder, and closer. The pirates all looked in the direction of the pursuing sounds
“What’s the delay, it just be a picture,” he said to her, taking her elbow to hurry her along. “Lets be getting out of here before anymore fish friends turn up.” But Violet shook off his arm and ignored him. She kept looking at her hand, she needed a key, where was it. Then she remembered the end of her dream, the key had been dropped, she looked down and then sunk to her knees. There was a thin crack just below the mural, she peered into it and was sure she could see a gleam of gold. The crack was too thin for her to reach into with her fingers she needed something thin. She felt her pockets, nothing, then felt for the butterfly clip in her hair. Pulling it out she bent it to form a hook.
“This not be the time for doing your hair, my girl, lets be going.” She felt the Captain’s hand on her arm a bit firmer now. She jabbed him in the ribs with her elbow and he doubled over winded.
The sounds of pursuit started to get louder and closer.
“Let's be leaving the crazy lady,” grumbled one of the pirates, helping Captain Brandon straighten up. The other pirates started moving around Violet and starting off up the passageway, the Captain was still trying to get his breath back. Violet was on her knees fishing for the gleam of gold in the crack, and just as the Caption got his breathe back, he lost it again in amazement at what Violet had pulled out of the crack. Her improvised hook had caught on a gleaming golden curling octopus, attached to a chain, and on the other end of the chain was a golden key. The pirates at the first gleam of gold had all crowded back round again, their eyes gleaming as much as the golden key. Gold being an important part of a pirate’s life. One of the pirates caught up the golden chain and examined it closely, the others gathering around, he bit it carefully.
“That be solid gold, that be, this surely be treasure.” The pirates then began looking into the gap and trying to see if anymore booty was down there. Violet had lost interest in the key now and was closely examining the wall again, the Captain watched her suspiciously. They could hear the sounds of pursuit getting closer; they would be on them soon if they didn’t start moving now.
“Forget the treasure, let’s go,” muttered one of the pirates regretfully.
The pursuing noises of amphibian shouting and cursing, the heavy slap, slap of webbed feet on stone, seemed to echo, and be coming from the passageway in front of them as well as behind them. The pirates all froze listening
“We be surrounded,” muttered one of the pirates, readying his spear and looking up both directions trying to work out which group of amphibians was the furthest away. Violet, ignoring all else, her nose inches away from the wall was looking into all the beaks of the octopuses. Until finally the smiled and held out her hand for the key, taking it from the pirate that held it just before they all started to rush ahead up the passageway, the pursuing amphibians behind them sounding as if they were just around the nearest corner and almost on them. Violet placed the key in the keyhole within the beak of the octopus and turned it, it clicked and Violet could see the outline of a door within the design of the mural. The Captain had seen what she was doing and quickly helped her pull the door open, he called quietly to the other pirates, who turned back and stared in surprise at the door suddenly appearing in the wall. The door swung open from the wall, and Violet and the pirates dived quickly through it with relief, the heavy slap slap of webbed feet on stone and the banging of spears on shields clearly heard from both directions of the passageway. The door swung closed behind them, just as a squad of amphibians marched around the corner of the passageway, cursing the land dwellers. Violet and the pirates huddled behind the door hardly daring to breathe as the amphibians marched past the door inches from them. They heard them march on and meet the other group coming in the opposite direction. They could hear much murderous muttering from the two groups, and then they continued away from their hiding place.
“See I told you something always turns up,” stated one of the older pirates confidently.
Captain Brandon took a box of matches out of his pocket and struck one, illuminating the jubilious faces of the pirates, and the somewhat stunned one of Violet’s. He looked at her first with a thoughtful expression on his face and then at their surroundings. They appeared to be in a tunnel, hewn from the rock, but it did appear to go upwards steeply, with steps cut into the floor in places. There were also a couple of torches attached to the wall on either side of the door. The Captain lit these and Violet and the pirates followed the tunnel, not knowing where it would lead, but as al
ways hoping for the best. Violet followed the pirates silently, many thoughts chasing each other through her head, but predominantly a woman with peacock feathers in her hat, who was she and why was she in her dreams, giving her important information just as she needed it? Captain Brandon followed Violet, bringing up the rear, and he looked at her, also with many thoughts chasing each other through his head.
They climbed up the tunnel in silence, occasionally hearing sounds of running webbed feet slapping against stone floors, watery amphibian shouts and calls, the clash of arms as the tunnel walls neared corridors, the pursuit and search for them was underway. All were hoping the tunnel led to freedom and not an army of amphibians bristling with sharp spears. Eventually the sounds of angry amphibians grew fainter and they came to a door in the tunnel ahead. The Captain stood at the door with as many of the pirates huddled around him as could fit. He listened at the door but could hear nothing, all was quiet. The door was heavy looking and no ray of light filtered through the tight seal around the door, it was shut with bars attached to a small wheel. The Captain began to twist the stiff wheel as slowly and quietly as possible. Violet and the pirates held their breath. The Captain opened the door a crack and peered behind it, he then opened the door wide and stepped through it. They all trooped after him quickly.
They were in another round bubble-like room, under the sea, but this one was light. It was lit by the sunlight filtering through from the surface. The waves could be seen above them, and the whole room was awash with pale green lights dancing over the surface as they glinted off the waves above them. But the best thing about this room was the round hole in the floor with water lapping gently at the edges. They had found their escape, they were just within swimming distance of the surface. The pirates gave quiet cheers and thumped each other heartily on the back. They had found an escape from the amphibians, they really were the luckiest crew of pirates that sailed the seas. Captain Brandon beamed round at them all, but avoiding Violet’s eye, until she turned away, then gave her a thoughtful look. The Captain had a good look outside the bubble to check for any amphibians or sharks in the water and then they all quickly one after the other took a deep breathe and dived through the watery hole in the floor. Violet took the plunge into the pool, the cold water closed around her, nearly making her exhale the breathe she was holding firmly in her chest, the water thundered in her ears, she was glad she was a reasonable swimmer. She looked around her half expecting to see a creeping tentacle appear from the depth below, then looking upwards she could see the sky and the sun above her, she kicked her legs and struck out with her arms, her whole focus on the sunshine above her, trying to imagine the warmth on her head when she broke the surface of the water. She could see the pirates around her swimming upward, but none of them had broken the surface yet, it seemed further away than she’d first thought it was. She kept kicking strongly as her lungs longed to take another breathe, her heart thumping in her ears. The muscles in her arms and legs burning and surrounded by the bubbles coming from her nose and mouth Violet eventually broke the surface of the water, gasping for air, and nearly blinded by the sunshine which did feel warm on her face. She looked around her, there was no sign of any tentacles or amphibians, just cheering pirates bobbing on the surface of the sea, and not too far away a ship flying the Jolly Roger. She laughed in relief that they had escaped the underwater jail. Captain Brandon, still wearing his tri-corner hat, had surfaced just behind her, joined in her laughter.
“Come on lads, lets be getting out of here.” He smiled at Violet and led the way towards his ship. Violet and the pirates swam towards the ship, no tentacles grabbing her ankles, and climbed aboard. The Captain and his crew quickly got the ship under sail as a brisk wind sprang up, and they were soon a good distance from their unfortunate encounter with the amphibians, with no mist in sight.