Читать книгу Spellbreaker: Book 3 of the Spellwright Trilogy - Blake Charlton - Страница 19

The ghost ship listed. A sailor was rowing Nicodemus from the first barge to the smoldering ship, the bay water blue around them.

The pilot of the lead barge had seen a column of smoke as their convoy left the Matrunda River and entered the Bay of Standing Islands. The captain had wanted to avoid any trouble, but Nicodemus ordered him to investigate.

Over the horizon had come a small junk. What was left of her rigging smoldered. Not a stitch of sail remained. Scorch marks raked her bow. No one moved on her deck and not even the loudest of hails raised a soul from belowdecks.

Nicodemus had sent Doria, Sir Claude, and three armed sailors to investigate. When Doria had shouted for him to follow, he knew they had found something important. The swells were minimal, so Nicodemus made it to the ghost ship’s deck without taking an embarrassing dip into the bay.

First Nicodemus noticed the bodies. Four men. Or, Nicodemus corrected himself, very likely four men. Two were burnt beyond recognition of sex. The other two wore drab, bloodstained lungi and were sprawled on deck.

Then Nicodemus noticed the smell. Burnt flesh and … something else … Doria was standing by the mast, frowning at a book in her hands. “There’s a smell like …” he said and paused to sniff. “Maybe like … hot metal maybe … or like sulfur?”

“It smells like vog,” she said without looking up from her book.

“Vog?”

“Pollution from active volcanoes or from lava flows meeting the sea. It can get pretty bad north of the big island and near the active volcanoes on the outer island chain.”

Nicodemus sniffed again. “But there’s no active volcano near here, is there?”

“Not for hundreds of miles.”

“Then why should this boat smell like vog?”

“I’m not sure, but it’s hardly her most pressing mystery.” She held up the book. “According to the captain’s journal, she’s a merchant sailing out of Feather Island, makes a run to Chandralu once every three days or so. Sometimes she takes commissions to ship cargo to the other sea villages. Three days ago she was in Chandralu. The last entry put her in Feather Island yesterday. There’s no entry about departure. The hold has been half emptied. The ballast is off. She’s tilted back.”

Nicodemus looked at the bodies. “You think she had to leave her home port in a hurry?”

Doria clapped the book shut. “I do. Even a half competent crew would have redistributed her cargo. If she was attacked on the water, the pirates would have taken her as prize or sunk her.”

“So what attacked her in the harbor? Never known raiders to burn someone that badly.” He nodded to one of the blackened bodies. “Not in combat at least. A fire neodemon?”

“I’d say lava neodemon, given the scent of vog. But given what’s in the cabin, it’s got to be more than your commonplace lava neodemon.”

“What’s in the cabin?”

Doria took a deep breath. “There are some things in my life I wish I could unsee and unremember. What is in the cabin, it’s one of those things.”

“That bad?”

“That bad.”

Nicodemus raised his eyebrows. Doria wasn’t one to exaggerate. He followed her aft. The moment he set foot in the cabin he regretted it. Three bodies were huddled in the corner, all badly burned, all of them children. The oldest couldn’t have been more than six.

“Seeing how they’re huddled, I’m guessing the crew was trying to get them off the island, away from whatever was attacking,” Doria said beside him. “The children’s burns are bad, but not bad enough to kill. It’s mysterious. Those two however …” she gestured behind Nicodemus.

He turned to find two adult bodies sitting against the wall, their heads lolling at odd angles. Below the neck, each man was painted with blackening blood. In each hand, each man held a curved knife. “Opened each other’s throats?” he asked.

“Too far apart. Slit their own.”

“Madness then. Something drove them mad.”

“Something on Feather Island,” someone said from behind them. Nicodemus looked back to see a pale Rory and a thin-lipped Sir Claude standing in the doorway. Their expressions were tense. Apparently the present situation was enough to quell their feud.

Nicodemus nodded. “Or something that was on Feather Island a few hours ago.”

Doria sighed. “Should we continue on to Chandralu?”

Nicodemus rolled his neck as he thought. His keloid scar was itching again. Distracted, he wondered if he should rewrite the tattooed spells around it. But then he forced himself to focus. Head to the city or investigate? “If we did find trouble on Feather Island, we’d be in river barges, which are hardly ideal for fighting. And except for Doria, none of us is suited for combat afloat.”

Doria shrugged. “Leandra on her catamaran and with her shark god in tow wouldn’t be a bad idea … but, Nico, what if this neodemon gets away?”

“My Lord Warden,” Sir Claude added, “the neodemon who did this must have very, very malicious requisites. Burning his victims, driving them to …”

Nicodemus nodded. “One of the deadliest creatures I have ever faced was the Savanna Walker of Avel. He had been born with the same capabilities that I have, but by distorting his Language Prime and his magical language, he learned how to wound the minds around him, causing insanity.”

Doria made a thoughtful sound. “You never told me the Savanna Walker produced carnage like this.”

Nicodemus shook his head. “It was different. The Savanna Walker could induce blindness, deafness, aphasia, that sort of thing. When he completely corrupted a mind, he made men his homicidal slaves. But he never made men suicidal and he had no power of flame. The lava neodemon that did this may be as dangerous or even more so. Sir Claude, I take your point. We can’t let this monster roam the bay.”

The knight bowed his head.

Nicodemus turned to look at the three children. He tried not to shudder. “It seems I had better figure how much we will have to bribe the captain to change course for Feather Island.”

Whatever trouble Leandra had gotten herself into, she was going to have to manage it alone for a bit longer. And whatever had made Leandra think she might murder her mother … well … he would just have to trust his wife and daughter to find some way to avoid killing each other.