“No army?” asked Smimf. “Then who were all those armed men outside?”
At that moment, a head poked out from an alcove in the back of the room—a bald head, with pale, almost bluish skin and teeth that had been filed into sharp triangles. This human barracuda briefly locked eyes with Smimf and began pounding a nearby gong. A horde of Darian soldiers rushed into the throne room, swords and spears at the ready. Smimf gasped when he saw them and zipped off instantly. The warriors froze in their tracks, baffled by the messenger’s disappearance.
Queen Apricotta looked back toward the nightmarish-looking bald man and asked, “Are you Darren?”
Frustrated, the man waved off the other Darians and ducked back inside his hideaway—a dusty old storage area filled with empty shelves. A sign above the alcove read A PLACE FOR THINGS WE FORGET TO PUT AWAY.
In the darkness, the pale Darian lifted a glowing crystal orb. He rubbed it, and the swirling green mists within the glass parted, revealing the face of his master.
“What is it, Falco?” Lord Rundark asked.
The mute Darian made a series of rapid hand gestures, and Rundark nodded in understanding. (Yes, Falco could not speak—but that had not stopped the Warlord from positioning him as the puppet controller of Sylvaria, a kingdom where he rightly figured that any odd behavior would go unnoticed.) “Continue as you were told, Falco,” Rundark replied. “Worry not. Our forces are in place. And the princes are en route to their final destination.”
Fig. 15
VISION ORB
Falco put away the orb and checked on the royal family. The twins were shuffling around the room, feeling the air with outstretched hands, hoping to find the messenger, whom they assumed to be invisible. Their mother had gone back to dotting cartoon eyes onto lemons. All was back to normal.
But one kingdom over, in a barely lit basement chamber, Lord Rundark was troubled. He turned away from the king-size crystal orb that sat on a chest-high pedestal constructed of human bones. “I should kill the princes now and be done with it,” he said into the shadows.
“Patience,” a thin voice replied. “It’ll be much better this way. Unforgettable.”
“I don’t care,” Rundark said.
“You will soon have everything you want,” the voice said. It sounded irritated. “Now it’s my turn. And remember that without me, you couldn’t have any of this—not without years of war and hardship. Who showed you how to split the Gem? Who amplified its power? Who gave you the orbs?”
“Enough,” Rundark said. “I will hold to our bargain.” He sauntered over to a large map that was nailed to the wall below two drippy, wax-caked candle sconces. It was a map of the Thirteen Kingdoms, not that you could easily tell, thanks to all the thick red Xs scratched across it. “After all, you are right: This bargain of ours has given me the world.”
19
AN OUTLAW BOATS TO THE ROCK
It was a little awkward when Gustav first attempted to “talk” to Jerica. His icebreaker was “Hey, Pirate Lady! So what’s up with this seafaring stuff?”
To which Jerica responded, “I would appreciate it if you call me Captain. Or, at the very least, call me Jerica.”
To which Gustav responded, “I’m gonna call you Pirate Lady.”
To which Jerica responded by calling him Goldilocks.
To which Gustav responded by kicking a barrel overboard.
To which Mr. Flint responded by yelling, “Hey, those were my parrot treats!”
But things went much smoother the second time around. And in the ensuing weeks at sea, the two spent most of their days together (Gustav and Jerica, that is—not Mr. Flint). They told crude jokes and tall tales, they dueled, they went shark fishing. They had mast-climbing contests, barrel-chucking contests, and even eating contests (the Dreadwind, to Gustav’s relief, had a full stock of fruits, grains, and dried meats). They played pranks on each other (it took Gustav days to get the squid ink out of his hair) and took every possible opportunity to make fun of Liam together.
“He’s certainly having a good time,” Frederic said to Liam one afternoon as they watched Gustav and Jerica guffawing up in the crow’s nest.
“I wish I could say the same,” Liam replied sourly, pulling a DUNK ME sign off his back.
“Believe me, fun is the furthest thing from my mind,” Frederic said. “I worry about Rapunzel and Ella and Snow every day. Not to mention that this ship does not have so much as a single bar of soap on it. Or a pair of tweezers. And have you seen what the salt air is doing to my skin? Look at my hands! It’s like I have mummified iguanas sticking out of my sleeves! But, um, mostly I’m concerned about the ladies. And I know that Gustav is, too. But in the midst of all this hardship and horror, he’s managed to find a little oasis of happiness. And seeing him smile has been the only thing that’s made my time on this ship tolerable.”
Liam nodded. “No, you’re right. It is heartening so see any light in this time of darkness.” And then, with a thump and a squirt, a rotten grapefruit splattered on his head, while yards above, Gustav and Jerica high-fived.
And on they sailed, through calm seas and rough, through blinding sun and pelting rain, through days of solemn silence and nights of raucous singing. All the while, First Mate Key stayed at the wheel, guiding the ship southward and doing his best to handle Duncan’s constant onslaught of questions.
“What’s a mizzenmast?” Duncan lay on the deck, staring up at him.
“It’s the one toward the rear,” Key replied, keeping his eyes on the sea ahead.
“How’d you get the scar on your face?”
“Shaving accident.”
“Oh, not a duel?”
Key smirked. “I don’t get hurt in duels. The other guy does.”
“Touché,” said Duncan. He was now swinging from a beam overhead. “Why don’t you talk like a pirate?”
“I do talk like a pirate.”
“You don’t talk like Cap’n Gabberman.”
“Gabberman talks like an idiot.”
“Who would win: a pirate or a ninja?”
“You’ve got a lot of energy, don’t you? You know, the foredecks are great for running laps, if you need to burn some of it off.”
Duncan balanced on a barrel. “What’s that shiny thing out in the water?”
“I think that’s enough questions for today.”
“No, really, what’s that—”
“Enough!”
Duncan yelped and dashed off.
Gustav, meanwhile, prepared a surprise for Jerica. He planned to get her back for the squid ink trick by ambushing her with a barrage of hardtack. His arms loaded, he tiptoed up to the captain’s cabin, flung open the door, and began hurling flavorless biscuits. Jerica was not amused.
“Get out!” she barked, quickly stashing a glassy, shimmering something under her desk. Gustav immediately stopped tossing hardtack and gave an innocent shrug.
“What did I—”
“There was one place!” Jerica screamed as she jumped up, knocking over her chair. “One place I said not to go! Now, get out!”
She slammed the door in his dumbstruck face.
“But . . .” He dropped the rest of his bread-bombs and shuffled off. In earlier days, when Gustav was upset, he would often climb into a tree and sit there until he felt like talking to human beings again. Stuck on a ship, he did the next best thing.
Jerica found him ten minutes later, sitting on the topmost crossbeam of the ship’s mainmast. “You look pathetic,” she said as she hauled herself up and scooted out to sit next to him. He offered her nothing but a sullen frown.
“I though Liam was the mopey one,” she tried.
Gustav let out a tiny snuffle of a chuckle. “I should toss you in the ocean just for making a comparison like that,” he said.
“I’d like to see you try,” Jerica replied, and waited a second to see if he actually would. “Look, we’ve had some good times together on this voyage, I’ll admit. But that doesn’t mean you ca
n barge into my private quarters like that. I gave you an order, and you disobeyed it. Am I not supposed to get angry about that?”
“I thought we were—”
“We were nothing,” she said. “We are nothing—other than shipmates who’ve had a few laughs together.”
Gustav looked her in the eye. “That’s not true,” he said, with more conviction than he expected. “It’s different, and you know it.”
“All right, fine. Yes, it is different. Because you were my prisoner. And I’m not exactly known for getting along swimmingly with my captives. But, hey, for whatever reason, you and I hit it off. And that’s exactly why this needs to stop. You’re getting too close, and we can’t have that. I’m a sea captain; you’re allergic to fish. It would never work.”
Gustav grumbled. “I shoulda known better than to trust a girl.”
“I’m a woman,” Jerica said.
“Yeah, first woman I ever had fun with,” he muttered. “Fine, Pirate Lady. Just tell me one thing. What were you messing around with when I busted in on you? It looked kinda like a—”
Jerica leaned forward and kissed him. Gustav’s eyes went wide. “What . . .” he stammered. “What was . . . for . . . that for . . . what . . . ?”
Jerica was about to answer when there was a thunderous thud, and the entire ship rocked violently from side to side. Gustav lost his balance and slipped from the beam, but Jerica caught his hand as he fell. The big prince was twice her weight, and she struggled to hold on to him as, below them, the whole crew began to scramble.
“Sea dragon!” shouted Mr. Key.
“The shiny thing in the water! That’s what I was trying to tell you,” Duncan said, popping up from behind a crate of empty crab shells.
The serpentine beast raised its head up from the waves and snorted hot, briny mist onto the scattering pirates. It was covered everywhere in glinting silver-white scales, save for one dark, bruised circle on its left cheek.
“Well, I’ll be pickled in prawn juice,” Key said, straining to hold the wheel steady. “It’s the same beastie that sank your old ship. He must’ve been tracking us for weeks. Cannons, men! The only thing worse than a sea dragon is a vengeful sea dragon!”
The Dreadwind was too large for the monster to wrap itself around as it had done with the Wet Walnut, but the creature was fully capable of bashing a hole through the massive galleon’s side planks—and that is exactly what it tried to do. The hissing dragon rammed its crested skull against the ship’s starboard side, each blow sending those on board for a painful tumble across the deck. One particularly powerful jolt sent Frederic flipping through the air, heading straight for the rail. Tauro, the crew’s musclebound bruiser, caught the prince in his arms like a baby.
“We’ve got to stop meeting like this,” the big pirate quipped. He set Frederic down and rushed to a nearby cannon. Tauro reached into a slatted crate for ammunition. But before he could retrieve any, the dragon’s tail—thick as an elephant—crashed through the rail and smacked him unconscious. Frederic yelped and ducked behind a cask of grog.
Where are all the cannon blasts? Frederic thought. He looked around; the dragon was thrashing with maniacal fury, and the Dreadwind was in complete chaos. Sails were torn, and the mizzenmast was cracked in two. Several people had gone overboard. Of the three cannons on deck, one was now lying on its side, and a second was missing entirely, having vanished through a section of splintered rail. And the stairwell to the cannons belowdecks was blocked—jammed by a huge section of fallen mast. That left only the gun right in front of Frederic.
“I suppose it can’t be too difficult to use,” he said. “Put the cannonball in the cannon, light the fuse—boom. Yes, I can do that.” He reached down and attempted to lift a cannonball. It was the heaviest thing he’d ever tried to pick up. It might as well have been glued to the deck. “Well, that’s just ridiculous,” he said, flopping onto his rear. “Where is Gustav when I need him?”
And then he looked up. Sixty feet above, Gustav was flapping like laundry on a clothesline, while Jerica lay flattened out on the mast’s crossbeam, holding on to his arm as tightly as she could. Had Frederic been able to hear them, he would have heard Gustav say, “Just drop me into the thing’s mouth. We all know I’m the reason it came after us. It got a taste of me before, and now it wants more. I’m delicious.”
And then he would have heard Jerica reply, “Shut up, Goldilocks.”
But instead, all Frederic heard was “Why do they get to swing on the masts while we have to fight the dragon?”
“Duncan!” Frederic cried. “Where’d you come from?”
Liam stumbled up behind him. “We were trapped by a fallen Two-Clubs,” he panted. “Took a while to get out from under him.”
“We need to—” Frederic was cut off by another booming crash that nearly knocked them all off their feet.
“—stop that dragon,” Liam finished.
“We should use the shooty-thingy,” Duncan said, very proud of the idea.
“Indeed,” Frederic replied, bracing himself on the teetering deck. “But I need a little help loading it.”
“I’ve got it,” Liam said. He squatted and, with a pained grunt, hoisted one of the cannonballs a few inches off the floor. “Holy cow. Why do they make these things so heavy?”
Frederic gasped. The dragon had stopped thrashing, but it now had its eyes set on Gustav, who was wriggling like a worm before its eyes.
“Teamwork, people!” Liam shouted. “Lift! Lift!” Frederic and Duncan crouched down with him, and together the trio lugged the weighty iron ball to the end of the cannon barrel and shoved it inside.
“Duncan, give me a match,” Liam said urgently.
“What makes you think I’ve got a match?” Duncan asked.
“Because you’re you.”
Duncan felt inside his pocket and pulled out a match. Liam took it and lit the cannon’s fuse. “Everybody get back!” he yelled. They darted away from the powerful weapon and its dwindling fuse, gathering behind a supply bin to watch from a safe distance.
“I have a question,” Duncan said.
“Not now,” Liam said.
“That’s just what the scar-faced pirate said when I tried to tell him about the dragon,” Duncan said. “I think people need to stop asking me to stop asking things.”
“Fine, Duncan,” Liam said. “What?”
“Shouldn’t we have aimed the shooty-thingy at the dragon?”
“Oh, crud.” The cannon was about to fire its load at nothing but seawater. And the sea serpent was flicking its forked tongue at Gustav’s dangling toes.
Fig. 16
SEA DRAGON, vengeful
“Make a lot of noise!” Liam shouted. He, Frederic, and Duncan ran back out into the open. They jumped and shouted and waved their arms like crazy.
“Hey, Cecil!” Duncan cried. “Over here, Cecil!”
The sea dragon’s head darted in their direction. It opened its jaws wide enough to swallow all three of them in one gulp, and lunged. Liam dove back, pulling the others away with him, and the dragon’s teeth chomped down into the deck. The beast bit off a huge hunk of ship—deck, rail, and cannon included.
The princes huddled as the sinewy creature raised itself up above them once more, baring its rapier-like fangs in what seemed like a smile. And then they heard the muffled boom of the cannon going off deep inside the dragon’s gut. The beast went cross-eyed as black smoke leaked from between its teeth, and it slowly sank to the bottom of the sea.
Mr. Key, who’d been straining at the wheel the entire time, let out a long victory hoot. “Not the most orthodox use of a cannon I’ve ever seen,” he said. “But it got the job done.”
Up on the mainmast, Jerica was relieved that the ship had finally stopped swaying. She took a deep breath and hauled Gustav back up. He lay there on the beam and looked at her. Her sleeves were torn, her hair in tangles. She was a sweaty, disheveled, red-faced mess. She’s magnificent, he thought.
“Hey, Pirate Lady,” he began to say, but she quickly cut him off.
“Not now, Goldilocks,” she said. She was staring off at the southern horizon. “There’s the island.”
20
AN OUTLAW FORGETS TO PACK A CHANGE OF CLOTHES
The island loomed on the horizon, a squat, brown lump of earth marring the sleek beauty of a sea that was as blue as the clear sky above it. Honestly, to call it an “island” was generous. It was more like a floating dirt pile. Other than a few runty, gray bushes and one jutting, rocky hill, it appeared completely flat. And empty. From several miles away, on the bow of the Dreadwind, the princes took turns peering at it through a spyglass.
“You sure that’s where you dropped Briar?” Liam asked skeptically. “Because it looks to me like nobody’s home.”
“There isn’t another island for miles in any direction,” said Jerica, while her crewmen lowered the ship’s anchor. “That little hill you see has a cave in it. She’s probably inside. Unless you think she was stupid enough to try to swim for it.”
“Briar swim?” Liam said, half chuckling. “No, if that’s where you put her, I’m sure she’s still there.”
“Well, this is it then,” Jerica said. “You guys should probably get going.” She began to walk away.
“Whoa, Pirate Lady,” Gustav said, catching her arm. “Aren’t you coming?”
“No,” she said. She looked him in the eye, but only for a second before she turned away again. “In case you didn’t notice, your scaly friend did a number on my ship. I’ve got repairs to oversee.”
“What’s-his-name can do it,” Gustav said. “And the other guy.”
“I’m captain of this ship. I have responsibilities,” she said. “Deal with it.” And she marched over to some pirates who were hammering away at a broken rail.
“What’s up with her?” Gustav wondered aloud.
“The captain is always going to do what’s right by her crew,” said Mr. Key. He paused and took a deep breath. “Even if it means abandoning the fellows who just saved her ship.”