Garth Nix - Drowned Wednesday

Sunscorch hesitated, then picked up Arthur in a bear hug and tottered to the starboard rail, crashing into it with considerable force.

“Sorry, lad,” he said as he lifted Arthur up and prepared to heave him into the waiting sea. “We need the doctor.”

“No!” screamed Arthur. Then, as Sunscorch continued to lift him up, “I’m a friend of the Mariner! Captain Tom Shelvocke!”

Sunscorch lowered Arthur to the deck.

“Prove it,” he said coldly. “If you’re lying, I’ll carve you a set of gills before I throw you over.”

Arthur reached with a shivering hand into his pyjama top and pulled out his makeshift floss-chain. For a dreadful moment he thought the disc was gone, then it slid free and hung on his chest.

“What are you waiting for, Sunscorch?” yelled Dr Scamandros angrily. “Throw him overboard!”

Sunscorch looked closely at the disc, flipped it with his finger and looked at the other side. Then he sighed and let go of Arthur. Just then, the ship rolled to port and back again, almost sending Arthur over the side anyway.

“Do as the doctor says, Mister Sunscorch!” called Catapillow. “We must have a course to get away!”

“I can’t, Captain!” shouted Sunscorch. “The boy has the mark of the Mariner. If he asks for aid, as sailors we must give it.”

“I am asking,” said Arthur hastily. “I don’t want to be thrown overboard. I only want to send a message to the Lower House. Or the Far Reaches.”

“He has the what? The who?” asked Catapillow.

Sunscorch sighed again and helped Arthur along the sloping deck to the group gathered around the wheel. Dr Scamandros still had his hand under his arm. He scowled at Arthur.

“No seaman will go against the Mariner,” said Sunscorch. “The boy has the Mariner’s medal, so you’ll have to figure something else out, Doc. He ain’t going over the side.”

“The Mariner,” said Scamandros. “A figure of reverence for the nautically inclined. One of the Old One’s sons, I believe?”

“Yes,” said Arthur, though the question hadn’t been asked of him. “And the Architect’s.”

“Perhaps I was a little hasty,” Scamandros continued. “I thought perhaps you had something in your pocket we wouldn’t want aboard. But any friend of the Mariner … please do accept my apology.”

“Sure,” said Arthur. “No problem.”

“Well, ah, welcome aboard,” said the Captain. “We’re delighted to have you here. Though I fear that our voyage is, um, about to be cut short.”

Everyone looked back over the stern. The Shiver had closed in and was now less than a mile away.

“She’ll be firing her bowchasers soon,” said Sunscorch. “If they’ve any powder. They’ve the weather gauge too. We’ll have to fight it out.”

“Oh,” said Concort. He swallowed and frowned at the same time. “That doesn’t sound very good.”

“Can you get us a better wind, Doctor?” asked Sunscorch. “Untie one of your knots?”

“No,” replied Scamandros. “Feverfew is already working the wind and his workings are stronger. There is no escape within the Border Sea.”

“And is there, er, no plausible course out to the Realms?” Catapillow pulled his sword partly out of its scabbard as he spoke, and almost cut his nervous fingers on the exposed blade.

“There is one possibility that I may have overlooked due to extreme pain in my hand,” said Scamandros. “I cannot cast the haruspices because of magical interference. But the young have natural ability, so this boy may be able to. Can you read portents of the future in the strewn intestines of animals, young sir?”

“No,” said Arthur with a grimace of revulsion. “That sounds disgusting!”

“They don’t use actual intestines any more,” whispered Ichabod. “Just magical jigsaw puzzles of intestines.”

“Indeed, the art has grown more orderly and less troublesome for the laundry,” said Scamandros, who clearly had very superior hearing. “Though personally I believe it is best to be trained the old way, before coming to the puzzles. So you are not a haruspex or seer?”

“No…”

“Then you shall cast the pieces and I will read them.” Scamandros took a large box out from under his coat—bigger than the one he’d put away before—and handed it to Arthur. There was a picture of an ox on the box, the back half cross-sectioned to show its innards. “Quickly now. Take the box and empty the pieces into your hands.”

As Arthur opened the box, something shrieked overhead. It sounded like a cross between a train whistle and a terrified parrot. Sunscorch looked up, then muttered, “They’ve got powder! That’s a ranging shot!” and started to shout more commands to the helmsman and crew. The Moth lumbered and rolled to port as the wheel spun and the crew hauled on lines to trim the yards, the horizontal spars on the mast that the sails were attached to.

Arthur knelt down on the deck and put his hands in the box. Though all he could see were pieces of coloured cardboard, he recoiled as he touched them.

“Ugh! They feel like raw mince or … or worse!”

“Ignore that!” instructed Scamandros. “Pick them up and cast them on the deck! Quickly now!”

Arthur shuddered and hesitated. Then he heard the whistling again and a huge plume of water exploded just behind the Moth , showering them all with freezing water.

“Over and under,” said Sunscorch grimly. “They’ll have the range inside a minute.”

Arthur took a deep breath and plunged his hands into the box. Picking up the pieces was like picking up handfuls of dead worms. But he got them all, raised them up and threw them at Scamandros’s feet.

As before, the jigsaw came together as it fell. But this time all the pieces joined to make a perfect rectangle. The colours ran and shimmered like spilled paint, then formed into lines and patterns. In a few seconds, a picture appeared. A picture of a rocky island, a mound of tumbled yellow stones, surrounded by a sea of curious colour, more violet than blue.

Scamandros looked at the picture, muttering to himself, then he rolled up the chart at his feet and immediately unrolled it again, revealing a completely different map.

“Forlorn Island, Sea of Yazer, on the planet we call Gerain,” said Scamandros. “That’ll do!”

“Err, Mister Concort…” said Catapillow.

“Ah, Mister Sunscorch…” said Concort.

“Prepare to Cross the Line!” roared Sunscorch. “Idlers take a hold!”

Catapillow and Concort rushed to the rail and gripped it. Sunscorch joined the two Denizens on the wheel. Scamandros picked up the jigsaw, which didn’t fall apart, and stood by them.

“Grab hold of a rope or the rail,” Ichabod instructed Arthur. “When the doctor shouts, look down and close your eyes. And whatever you do, don’t let go!”

Arthur did as he was told, taking a firm grip on the portside rail. He looked back at Dr Scamandros, who was holding the jigsaw and muttering to himself, with occasional instructions to Sunscorch.

“Port five, steady,” he said. “Starboard ten and back again amidships, hold her as she goes, port five, port five, starboard ten…”

The Moth rolled and tilted first to one side and then the other, but didn’t seem to change its actual direction very much for all the turning of the wheel this way and that.

But Dr Scamandros kept ordering small changes of direction.

Arthur heard a muffled bang come from behind them and looked astern, just in time to see the flash of the Shiver ’s bowchasers, followed by that same whistling screech. This time, it didn’t end in a waterspout or a pass overhead. Just as Dr Scamandros shouted something unintelligible and threw the jigsaw in the air, Arthur heard a terrible splintering, crashing noise that momentarily blotted out all other sounds.