01 - The Burning Shore (44 page)

No matter. He’d have fresh specimens soon enough.

He sat back with a contented sigh, and barked an order to one of the skinks
who was operating on the present specimen. With sure, expert moves it cut around
the dwarf’s scalp, peeling back the skin as two of its fellows got ready with a
saw.

Xinthua Tzeqal looked on as the sound of crunching bone filled the clearing
and the top of the dwarf’s skull was removed. The dead brain inside was all very
interesting, but Xinthua decided to wait until he had a live specimen before
drawing any more inferences.

Somehow, the Kislevites had managed to get drunk. They passed around a
shrinking wineskin as they rowed, the splash of their oars becoming increasingly
uneven as the tide sucked, them towards the sea.

The song they were singing collapsed into a chaos of raised voices and harsh
laughter, the sound bringing a disapproving frown to Lorenzo’s face.

“Lucky swine,” he muttered, and jabbed angrily down with the steering pole.

“Foolish swine,” Florin corrected him. “They could have brought more gold
instead of that poison they brewed up. Did you ever taste any?”

Lorenzo nodded.

“Yes, it was revolting. And to think I swapped a treasure map for a measure of
it.”

“A treasure map?”

“It’s a long story.”.

The Kislevites’, dispute resolved itself and another raucous chorus floated
down the string of boats and towards the widening river beyond. In two hours the
current had carried them the same distance downstream that it had taken them two
days to row up. The muddy bottom of the watercourse had already deepened out of
the reach of their steering poles, and its banks had drawn away from them just
as eagerly.

The jungle, it seemed, was as keen to be rid of the men’s intrusion as they
were to be rid of its cloying embrace.

Up ahead, the river curled around in a final oxbow bend and, as the boats
were carried around it, a salty breeze picked up to brush across the sweat of
their brows. After the constant humidity of the jungle it felt almost chill, a
glorious freshness that encouraged the oarsmen to row harder. Their mates,
meanwhile, leaned anxiously forward, eyes fixed on the slowly opening horizon as
they sniffed at the sea breeze.

The banks of the river suddenly peeled away as the boats slipped forward
bobbing up and down on the waves which marked the end of the river and the
beginning of the ocean. It stretched away in front of him, as bright and fresh
as a new dawn after the suffocating confines of the jungle. Sunlight danced and
sparkled on top of the thundering rollers, and the breeze picked up as if in
greeting.

Now even the oarsmen paused, joining the search for the ships that should
have been waiting for them here. All movement stopped as the men scanned the
vast expanse of the distant horizon or peered back towards the tangled
shoreline, their oars held dripping out of the water as the current spat them
farther out to sea.

“They’re not here,” Lorenzo said at last.

“Of course they are!” somebody shouted at him, his face flushed with sudden
anger. “They’ll just be around the corner.”

“Yes, that’s what it is,” his mate agreed and a doubtful chorus of voices rose
in hopeful support of the theory.

Lorenzo laughed bitterly.

“All right then, they are here. Look, right in front of you.”

A couple of the men, still unwilling to give up hope, looked towards the
expanse of empty water that lay beyond. It stretched as far as the eye could
see, the blueness of the ocean misting into that of the sky as it disappeared
over the far horizon.

“No,” Lorenzo said. “They’ve left us. Left us for dead.”

This time there was no disagreement, just a series of vicious curses, and one
low moan.

“All right then,” Florin said, shaking off the despair that threatened them
all. “We’ll set up a camp on the shore for now. Light some signal fires,
perhaps.”

He sighed and took a last look at the empty ocean. For all he knew there was
nothing between him and Bordeleaux but two thousand miles of empty salt water.

Behind him another explosion of harsh Kislevite cries broke out, and he
scowled irritably.

“Ranald’s teeth I wish those damned savages would… would…”

The sentence trailed off as he saw the cause of this latest uproar. This time
there was more behind the Kislevites’ raised voices than vodka, dice and sibling
rivalry.

This time their rage was directed at a real enemy.

The skinks had chosen this moment to strike. A moment before, the little
flotilla had been alone in the muddy expanse of the delta’s mouth, with only the
rolling waves and the seagulls that circled high above for company. But now,
without even a ripple of warning, the sea was thronging with reptilian life.

Shaking beads of water from their crested heads and blinking the salt out of
their eyes, the hunters emerged from the hidden depths below, short spears held
clear of the water as they paddled towards their prey.

And their prey had already been chosen. It was the last boat, the Kislevites’
boat. No matter where each new skink breeched the surface it turned and surged
towards it, its lithe body drawn to the target like an iron filing to a magnet.

As Florin watched, the first Kislevite died, spraying a fountain of blood
over his comrades as he pulled a short-hafted spear from his throat and toppled into the ocean. More spears were thrown, bouncing off
armour or slicing through skin as the skinks closed in on the confusion.

A pair of high-crested heads popped out of the water beside the Bretonnians’
boat. They ignored it completely as, blinking water from the yellow orbs of
their protruding eyes, they made for the Kislevites.

“Looks like it ain’t our fight after all, boss,” Lorenzo said. “Let’s make
for the shoreline.”

“Don’t make such jokes,” Florin snapped, although he’d been turning over
exactly the same unworthy thought. “Get us turned round and headed towards the
Kislevites. Come on, get a damned move on. Do you want to miss all the fun?”

Once more Lorenzo started to call out the oarsmen beat and, turning
reluctantly back into the resistance of the Lustrian current, they rowed towards
the quickening violence.

The sea was boiling around the Kislevites’ boat now, rocking it dangerously
against the swell as scaly claws gripped its gunwales, onyx sparked against
steel and bodies were pushed back and forth.

There was a high-pitched scream, cut off by a terrible gurgling sound, as
another one of the human warriors was slain. This time, the man’s body fell
halfway out of the boat, the dangling arms and torso making a bridge over which
more skinks scampered.

Desperate orders were hurled about as water started to surge into the listing
boat, and half the Kislevites threw themselves against the opposite side in an
attempt to keep it from capsizing. The skinks took advantage of the collapsing
defence and scampered over the gunwale, only to be cut down by the Kislevite
sergeant’s axe. Bloodshot eyes glinting with a berserker rage he lunged at the
skinks, a white froth of spittle flecking the tangle of his beard as he roared a
blasphemous combination of curses and prayers.

Scale and bone slit asunder beneath the northerner’s frenzied attack, and as
Florin’s boat came level the skinks drew back. His men shipped their oars and
hefted their weapons.

For once, the lizards were outnumbered. Bretonnians and Kislevites chopped
downwards in a flurry of steel as their two boats drifted closer together, and
the skinks, their fearlessness matched only by their tactical good sense, fled
from the killing zone. Risking their tails to the vengeful steel of the humans
they dived down, resurfacing to swim in a wide circle around them.

As they fled a wild cheer rose up, echoing from throat to throat as the
skinks swam clear.

Florin cheered too, although he knew that it was only a respite. The skinks
hadn’t retreated, they had merely regrouped. Even now, fresh swarms were
emerging from the depths of the jungle and disappearing into the depths of the
sea, bobbing up to join the survivors of the first attack.

His comrades’ cheering grew louder as Florin licked his lips and studied the
enemy. It seemed a shame to dampen the men’s spirits, but regardless of their
morale it was time to prepare for the next assault.

“Watch out,” Florin warned, raising his voice above the celebrations. “They’re
going to hit us again. Get ready!”

He readied his machete just as a dark, cold shadow fell across his back.
Gritting his teeth he looked back over his shoulder, ready to face whatever
fresh horror the jungle had sent against them.

He gaped stupidly when he saw what it was, and at last he understood what all
the cheering had been for.

Bearing down on them, the sea curling into a sparkling filigree before the
sharp edge of her bows, came the
Destrier.

“There you go, Master Graznikov,” Gorth grinned, slapping the pale-faced
Kislevite on the shoulder. “Told you that you were mistaken.”

“Yes,” the Kislevite nodded unhappily, and ran his fingers nervously through
the satchel of treasure he wore. With an obvious effort he squeezed his cheeks
up into a big smile, although the fear never left his eyes.

“And captain? No to tell the men I said they were dead, yes? Don’t want to
hurt their feelings.”

Gorth’s grin grew wider, until it resembled a shark’s.

“Oh, I don’t know,” he said, watching the sweat bead on Graznikov’s forehead
as the first of the mercenaries tumbled onto the deck of the ship. “They’ll
probably think it a fine old tale to tell back home. Anyway, they’ll want to
reward Costas. If he hadn’t looked back just before we lost sight of the coast,
or if his eyes had been a little less sharp… Well, friend Graznikov, it
doesn’t bear thinking about, does it?”

There was a sudden bang as one of the longboats the sailors were hauling up
hit the hull. Then a sudden pause, the crew’s usual foul-mouthed efficiency
silenced by what they saw glinting in the bottom of the boat.

“Please, captain. It would only upset them. Say I asked you to wait.”

One of the mercenaries, a Bretonnian who Graznikov didn’t recognize, seemed
to recognize him. He turned and tapped one of his mates on the shoulder. Within
minutes even more faces had been turned in his direction.

“Please, captain,” the Kislevite hissed, the false smile melting away like
butter in a frying pan. “Don’t tell them I said they were all dead. I thought
they were.”

Despite the fact that Gorth seemed not to hear him, Graznikov lowered his
voice.

“I’ll pay you.”

There was another series of bumps and booms as the sailors manhandled the
longboat onto, the deck, and then tipped it out. Amongst the bloodied cloth and
blunted weapons a hundred misshapen golden fragments gleamed, twinkling like
fallen stars against the dark woodwork. The sailors lapsed into a reverential
silence at the sight.

Gorth licked his lips, the only movement in a face gone suddenly still.

“Is that real?” He asked quietly.

“Yes, yes. It’s real,” Graznikov told him, desperately trying to ingratiate
himself.

“Well, then. Looks like you don’t have enough to bribe me with. Sorry.”

A look of sheer terror passed across Graznikov’s face as Gorth leapt down
onto the main deck, the better to study the haul.

“Looks like it wasn’t a wasted journey after all,” he told Florin, who was
too busy watching his men gathering up the spilt gold to have seen Graznikov
yet.

“Wasteful enough,” Florin replied. “Van Delft didn’t make it. Neither did a
dozen of my men.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” Gorth said, and it was true. Even so, his eyes
glinted with the pleasure of seeing so much treasure.

On the far side of the ship more sailors stood lined up whilst their mates
recovered the expedition’s boats and men. Armed with a motley collection of
hunting bows and handguns they’d been standing ready to guard against the
strange, reptilian goblins that their arrival had driven back into the shallows.

Gorth roused himself from his appraisal of the loot, and nodded towards the
shoreline where the enemy waited, eyes held above the water like giant frogs despite the occasional shot that churned into the
water between them.

“Who are your friends?”

“No friends of mine,” Florin scowled humourlessly, and glared past the
strangely familiar figure that stood silhouetted on the foredeck and into the
jungle beyond. It seemed to glare back, the great stinking mass of it as
threatening and as alien as the first day he’d seen it.

Yet despite the men he’d lost to it, and the blood, Lustria’s hungry
wilderness no longer filled him with fear. He had faced it, after all, . had
taken every peril and every beating that it could throw at him.

And he’d won.

A wolfish smile appeared on Florin’s gaunt face, and the falling sun caught
the glint of victory within the hollows of his eyes.

“I beat you,” he whispered, the chill ocean breeze carrying his boast into
the steaming jungle beyond. Behind him he heard more gold clinking onto the
deck. His smile grew wider.

Graznikov, who was still huddled against the stern rail, saw the expression
and whimpered with fear.

“Treacherous dog,” he quietly cursed Gorth. He’d seen the captain talking with
that psychotic Bretonnian, and a second later his face had twisted up into that
terrible snarl.

The
Destrier
rolled beneath a wave, and Florin took a step forwards.
That was the final straw for the Kislevite. His world collapsed into a single
calculation, a weighing of the odds of survival in the jungle balanced against
the odds of survival on a ship full of the mercenaries he’d tried to abandon
there.

It was an easy calculation.

With barely a second’s hesitation, Graznikov kicked off his boots and,
holding them in one hand and pinching his nose with the other, vaulted over the
railing and into the sea beyond.