Garth Nix - Drowned Wednesday

But he didn’t look. He closed his eyes and bent down as instructed, hoping that whatever the cannonball had hit wasn’t going to fall down on his head.

There was a moment of silence after the terrible sound of some major part of the ship breaking, immediately followed by a flash so bright Arthur’s eyes were filled with white light, even through shut eyelids. That flash was accompanied by a crash of thunder that shook the whole ship and stirred a vibration so strong it made Arthur’s limbs and stomach ache.

Arthur knew what was happening at once. His hand went to the invitation card in his pocket and he hunkered down as low as he could, still clutching his pocket.

They were about to pass through the Line of Storms again!

The thunder was so deafening that its echoes lingered in Arthur’s ears and head, so even when it ceased it took him awhile before he stopped trembling and his hearing started to return. The after-image of the lightning remained in patches, and dark spots danced around his eyes.

Arthur opened his eyes to a scene of destruction and wonder. One of the huge horizontal spars from the Moth ’s mainmast had been struck by the cannonball and broken off. Half of it was sprawled over the deck and half was in the water, a tangled mass of timber, ropes and canvas.

Arthur only glanced at that. His attention was drawn ahead of the ship. There, extending upward from the sea into the sky, was a huge gilt picture frame, easily four hundred feet long and three hundred feet high. It bordered an enormous, brightly glowing version of the jigsaw picture Arthur had made, with the yellow stone island and the violet sea. But this didn’t look like a picture. The sea was in motion, there were purple-tinged clouds drifting above the island, and birds or birdlike things were flying around. Arthur could still see the jigsaw piece outlines—much narrower and more wriggly pieces than in a normal jigsaw—but the lines were very faint.

“Starboard Watch! Cut away that yard! Quickly now!”

The Moth rolled as Sunscorch spoke, sending its sails flapping, to make a sound like sarcastic applause.

“Helm! Hold her steady!” shouted Sunscorch.

The Moth was trying to sail straight for the framed image, Arthur saw. He understood it was not an image. It was a doorway to another world, out in the Secondary Realms.

“Did we lose ’em?” asked Sunscorch to the doctor.

Scamandros looked astern, lowering his smoked glasses over his eyes to stare at the now surprisingly distant Line of Storms.

“I’m not … no!”

Arthur looked back, too, blinking at the still-bright flashes of lightning, though they were now several miles away. At first he couldn’t spot anything, then he saw the silhouette of the Shiver ’s dark sails. She had dropped back but would soon catch up again, particularly with the Moth slowed by the broken spar over the side, which acted like a large and clumsy sea anchor.

“They’ll try and follow us through the portal,” said Sunscorch.

“Um, is there anything … some manoeuvre or other?” asked Catapillow anxiously.

“Get that spar cut away!” roared Sunscorch. Arthur winced. Clearly Sunscorch got louder the more anxious he was.

Dr Scamandros looked ahead at the vast gilt-framed doorway to the violet-hued sea. It was several hundred yards away. He looked back at the pursuing ship, took out a pencil and made some calculations on the cuff of his big yellow coat.

“At our current speed Feverfew will board us short of the portal,” he said. “Even if they don’t take down a mast or hole us below the waterline.”

“He won’t fire again,” said Sunscorch. “Don’t need to, does he? We’re slow enough now. Anything more might damage the loot.”

This confident assessment was immediately undermined by the report of a cannon astern, resulting in another plume of water, this time well short.

“Then again, he might sink us for sport,” added Sunscorch. He looked down at the main deck where the Denizens were hacking ineffectually with axes at the fallen yard. “Cut away! Don’t slap at it! Cut! Doctor, if there’s anything you can do, do it. No seamanship can save us now! I’m for an axe!”

“Carry on!” Catapillow called out as Sunscorch leapt down the companionway to the waist of the ship.

Arthur looked at the rapidly gaining pirate vessel, then at the living picture in its vast gilt frame. Even without calculating anything, it was clear the Shiver would catch them before they could get to the transfer portal. It was too far away…

Arthur suddenly had an idea.

“I don’t know any sorcery or anything,” Arthur said. “But that big painting is like a transfer plate you step on, isn’t it?”

Scamandros nodded distractedly.

“So if we can’t get to it in time, can it somehow be moved to us?”

Scamandros frowned, then cocked his head as if struck by Arthur’s suggestion. Arthur noticed that all the small tattoos on the doctor’s face were showing scenes of trouble. Storms at sea. Sunken ships. Exploding suns. Imploding planets.

Just as the doctor opened his mouth to speak, the Shiver fired again.

“Interesting. Yes, it is theoretically possible to—”

Whatever Scamandros was going to say was lost as a cannonball struck the Moth ’s side just behind and below the wheel, smashing the heavy timber into a spray of deadly foot-long splinters that went whistling across the quarterdeck.

The next thing Arthur knew, he was lying on the deck, right up against the rail, with his good leg hanging overboard. He could hear screaming all around him, and shouting. For a moment he thought he’d suffered a sudden asthma attack and had passed out from lack of air. But his breathing was fine, or so his mind reported before it suddenly switched back to the current situation. The splinters flying through the air—

Arthur pulled his leg in, sat up and stared around him. He was vaguely aware that his broken leg hurt, but that was nothing new. There was blood on his dressing gown, but it was bright blue. A pain in his left hand made him lift it up. There was blood there too—red blood, but not much of it. Arthur focused on his middle finger, and pulled out a needle-shaped splinter that had sliced across a knuckle and was still hanging there.

“Will you look at that?! Ruined!” said a voice next to Arthur. The boy slowly turned to look. There was a large hole on the far side of the deck. The planking was gouged all around and there was blue blood splattered all over the place, amid shattered wood and splinters.

Ichabod was pointing at his waistcoat. A splinter as long as Arthur’s forearm was sticking out of the Denizen’s stomach. Blue blood was trickling out of the wound and into his waistcoat pocket.

“Doesn’t it hurt?” asked Arthur. He was in shock and part of his mind was telling him to check himself over again. He knew the Denizens could recover even from a beheading, but that didn’t help. It also didn’t apply to him. A wound like Ichabod’s would kill him for sure.

“It certainly does hurt,” replied Ichabod with a grimace. “But just look at my favourite waistcoat!”

Arthur looked along his own arms and legs. They were fine. He gingerly felt his stomach and head. They seemed fine too. Only his finger had been touched.

The Denizens around the wheel had not been so lucky. Arthur could hardly bear to look at them, they were so pierced by splinters. At least the blue blood didn’t look so serious as real human blood would. And they were still standing and complaining about their bad luck.