Fox smiled. ‘I think you have the more dangerous task.’
She sauntered towards the guard in a straight line, just as the vixen approached her prey.
Jacob leant over the railing. The figurehead had the body of a Dragon but the head of a man. Dunbar had first noticed how much the gilded face resembled statues of the Witch Slayer during his research for a lecture on the history of the Regal Navy. Jacob still thought it was a rather far-fetched theory, but the figure supposedly came alive whenever the fleet was attacked. The head of a Warlock to protect Albion’s fleet. Some black magic was always useful, even in these modern times. Dunbar claimed that Feirefis’s great-great-grandson had begun the tradition of fitting the flagship’s figurehead with the miraculous head, not knowing that it was that of his wizarding ancestor.
Jacob looked around.
Robert Lewis Dunbar, I hope you’re not wrong about this!
He couldn’t see the guard any more. Where had Fox lured him? Forget about it, Jacob. She’s a grown-up. He took the Rapunzel-hair from the snuff tin where he kept it. The golden hair was one of the few items he hadn’t lost in the Goyl fortress – thanks to Valiant. Jacob rubbed it between his fingers, and the hair grew fibre on fibre until it was stronger than any hemp rope. Jacob tied one end to the railing. The other end he dropped down, and it immediately wrapped itself around the neck of the figurehead. He jumped over the railing and rappelled down the glistening rope until he could clamber on to the Dragon’s back.
Don’t look down, Jacob.
He could stand on any precipice without the slightest reaction from his stomach, but the sight of the water beneath nearly made him vomit all over Guismond’s golden head. The Dragon’s wings, which were pressed against its body, were also covered with golden scales, but its body and neck were made of scarlet-painted wood.
Jacob loosened the Rapunzel-rope from the bulky neck and tied it around his waist. Then he pulled a fishing net from his backpack and wrapped it around the head and neck so that the head, once he cut it off, wouldn’t just drop into the ocean. His fingers were damp from the spray, and the high waves made him slip twice, but the Rapunzel-rope saved him from falling into the water.
The head was attached to the Dragon’s neck with a broad metal band, but the knife Jacob pulled from his belt could even cut through steel. He’d stolen it from the kitchen of Valiant’s castle. There was nothing better than a Dwarf knife, and Valiant owed Jacob much more than a knife, anyway, for the scars he bore on his back.
On the horizon, the first light of morning was eating into the night like mould. Hurry, Jacob. Of course, he expected that Guismond had secured his three bequests with a spell that would allow only his children to touch them without harm. So Jacob pulled on the gloves that had protected him in the tomb before he slipped the knife through the net. It cut through the metal band like fresh bread, and as he touched the head, he felt nothing – the gloves worked. Good. Jacob was halfway through when he heard a sound from above. Fox was standing by the railing. He motioned her to wait up there; the figurehead’s mounting didn’t look strong enough to support them both. Suddenly, the wooden body beneath him bucked. Even though it was only connected by a few inches of metal, the golden head opened its mouth and let out a scream that resounded far across the water.
Jacob heard the engines even before the planes appeared out of the dawn light. A squadron of bi-planes was headed towards them across the black waves. The sailors were so dumbfounded that the planes managed to reach the ships before a single gun was aimed at them. They bore down on the Albian fleet like an eyrie of eagles swooping down on a swarm of defenceless fish. Their red fuselages were painted with the black outline of a salamander – which had replaced the Fairy’s moth on the Goyl crest ever since their King had taken a human wife.
The figurehead flapped its wings, and Guismond’s head screamed through the net that Jacob had pulled over its gilded skin. He held on tight to the Dragon’s neck as the first bombs exploded between the ships. Screams and shots joined the noise of the howling engines. Explosions tore through the wooden hulls, and men dropped from the rigging like birds. Fire rained from the sky, setting even the sea itself aflame. The head, Jacob! Or you’ll soon be as dead as those already being eaten by the fish down there – even if you manage to survive today.
Above him Fox was trying desperately to steady the rope. Jacob clawed his fingers into the net; he ducked just before one of the wings could slice its barbed shoulder through his back. Fox was screaming something at him, but Jacob couldn’t hear her through the noise. And he could hardly see anything, either. His eyes were burning from the biting smoke gathering between the ships. Even the wind reeked of powder and burning wood, but the planes kept up their attacks. The howl of their engines nearly burst Jacob’s eardrums, and the Titania groaned like a wounded animal.
Jacob! The head! He pulled the knife through the last bit of metal, and finally the head dropped into the net. The gilded face stared up at him, its mouth still wide open in mid-scream. He pulled a swindlesack from beneath his wet shirt. It clung to his trembling fingers. Jacob tugged it over his loot and then looked up at the railing. Fox held on to the ship with one hand, steadying the Rapunzel-rope with the other. They could barely see each other through the thickening smoke that was enveloping the ship. The deck was on fire, but he had to get up there. Fox was up there, and maybe not all the lifeboats had been put out on to the water yet.
She started to haul in the rope, though she could barely hold on. The Titania was swaying too wildly, and Jacob was heavy. The flagship was sinking, together with the entire Albian fleet. Drifting among the burning frigates was the iron ship, its armoured flanks torn open and planes swarming over it like scarlet wasps.
Jacob tucked the swindlesack back under his shirt and began to climb, his feet pushing against the hull to make Fox’s work easier. Underneath, the figurehead still flapped its wings like a beheaded chicken. The warning Fox screamed over the railing came too late. Jacob tried to dodge the wings, but their barbs were as sharp as blades. The black magic inside them cut through the Rapunzel-rope barely a hand’s breadth above Jacob’s head – and he dropped like a stone towards the blazing water.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
MAL DE MER
Jacob wasn’t sure whether his ears were filled with his own scream or the calls of the drowning men floating all around him. The sea was frigid, despite the burning ships. He grabbed hold of a drifting plank while he desperately tried to spot Fox on the flagship above. But the smoke was too thick. Jacob hoped she’d jumped, because the big ship was going to take everything with it when it sank. He yelled her name, but he could hardly even hear his own voice. The screams and moans were too loud, as though the waves were suddenly roaring through a thousand human throats. An explosion tore up one of the sinking ships, and the Titania started listing dangerously, yet Jacob kept searching for Fox among the floating bodies and debris.
Where was she?
He yanked the head of every passing corpse out of the water. Their pale faces floated like wax blossoms between the charred sails and the empty powder kegs. He could barely feel his limbs any more in the icy water, and the smoke made every breath an ordeal, but he had to find her.
‘Jacob.’ Wet arms wrapped around his neck. A cold cheek pressed against his. Fox’s red hair, which stuck to her face, was so wet that it looked almost black. Jacob squeezed her tight and could feel her heartbeat through their wet clothes. He didn’t dare let her go, afraid the waves would wash her away again.
‘You have the head?’
‘Yes.’
‘We have to get away from here.’
Away to where? Jacob looked around. What was Dunbar going to think when he opened his paper in the morning? Iron ships, aeroplanes, bombs falling from the skies . . . would he wonder whether they’d drowned with the head? Would he finally begin to fear the new magic of technology as much as he feared that of the Witch Slayer?
‘The coast can’t be far. We were sailing southeast for hours.’
Whatever she said. The planes were gone, but there would definitely not be any rescue mission.
‘Come.’ Fox pulled him with her. She seemed certain in which direction the coast lay.