Contents

  Cover

  About the Book

  Title Page

  Maps

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  About the Authors

  Also by Paul Stewart and Chris Riddell

  Copyright

  About the Book

  Quint is in urgent need to money to repair his skyship, the Stormchaser. So when Multinius Gobtrax offers him a job creating a sky chart of the Deepwoods, he eagerly accepts – on the condition that his wife Maris can go with him. But Maris has a secret that she must keep hidden from their superstitious new captain at any cost. After all, it is considered very bad luck to give birth onboard a skyship . . .

  Chapter 1

  The flock of white ravens wheeled round the Loftus Tower, highest of the magnificent buildings that graced the great floating rock of Sanctaphrax, then swooped down towards the Stone Gardens. At their far edge, the glistening thread of silver that was the Edgewater River flowed over the jutting lip of rock and disappeared into the shifting clouds below.

  Further upstream, the factories and foundries of Undertown belched thick acrid smoke that covered the surrounding slums in a filthy haze. Further still, the palaces and mansions of the Leagues glittered in the early morning sunlight. And far above both the blackened chimneys and the brightly tiled turrets, skyships flew through the air – elegant galleons with billowing sails, squat flat-bottomed barges loaded with cargo, skiffs and lighters, and small nimble ferries crowded with passengers – each vessel held aloft by the buoyant flight rock at its centre.

  Already the warren of narrow streets and squalid alleys of the boom docks were filling up with hawkers and traders and high-hatted league merchants, eagerly getting on with the business of the new day. None of them noticed a small figure picking its way between them, head down and keeping to the shadows.

  The figure was slight, and dressed in a long grime-smeared coat and stiff gauntlets, with a tall conical hood that masked the face and was set with two round panels of glass. Heavy boots, out of keeping with the slight build, clomped over the cobbles as the person hurried purposefully past bustling market stalls and timbered lock-ups; now left, now right, over arched bridges that spanned fetid waterways and down tiny cinder tracks.

  At the corner of two rubbish-strewn lanes, where half a dozen shifty-looking goblins were haggling over hammelhorn hides outside a ramshackle warehouse, the hooded individual turned down a broader thoroughfare. Shops lined both sides. Ironmongers with fire-pots and griddle-pans, mire-buckets and rock-spikes that hung from racks outside; fishmongers displaying white oozefish fresh from the river, on ice-filled trays; tailors sewing storm-capes in open-fronted workshops and barbers shaving corpulent goblins over streetside troughs . . .

  The figure paused in front of a tavern at the end of the street. A metal sign bolted to the wall above the door creaked as it swung slowly to and fro in the wind. Below a painting of a curious-looking Deepwoods tree with a broad knobbly trunk and stubby branches, three words were written in angular black letters:

  The Bloodoak Tavern.

  Reaching up with both hands flat, the figure shoved hard at the ironwood door, and entered.

  It was hot and humid inside, and very loud. Despite the earliness of the hour, the place was heaving. Flathead and hammerhead goblins in the tilderleather aprons of boom dockers stood in rowdy groups, regaling one another with stories as they drank from the communal woodale troughs. A circle of sky pirates sat at a large table covered in carved names, their elegant oiled hair and plaited whiskers glinting in the low light as they discussed their latest voyages in low whispers. An ancient oakelf, perched on a stool, was gossiping with a brightly feathered shryke matron behind the bar, while to the right of the tavern, where the winesap barrels were set into the wall, a tiny tavern waif sat on a high carved chair. The waif’s huge ears quivered as he read the thoughts of two cloddertrogs quarrelling beside the roaring fire in the opposite corner.

  No one paid any heed as the newcomer headed towards the flight of stairs at the back of the tavern. At the foot of the rickety staircase, the figure paused then clumped up the stairs two at a time. At the first landing, a walkway led to the roofbeams that spanned the open ceiling, from which hammocks to rent were slung. At the second landing, a shadowy corridor led to private rooms for hire. The person didn’t pause at either landing, but continued instead up the creaking stairs – one at a time now – to the third floor, where half a dozen rooms were set under the sloping roof.

  Grasping the handle of the third door along, the hooded figure tapped lightly with a gauntleted hand, then, without waiting for a reply, strode inside.

  The attic room was large and sparsely furnished. A tilder-oil lamp that hung from the rafters filled the air with acrid smoke, and a flickering yellow light that fell on a long hardwood table, a pair of ornately carved armchairs and a pot-bellied stove, glowing with the heat of the lufwood logs that blazed inside.

  A gigantic insect-like creature was sitting on the floor beside it, the light passing through his transparent glass-like body. Blood pulsed through his veins. The translucent skeleton encasing the insect’s internal organs rippled as he raised a claw in greeting. With another claw, he reached out and poured water from a steaming pan into a tall teapot with a fluted handle and a long curved spout.

  ‘I’ve been expecting you,’ the spindlebug trilled.

  Without saying a word, the figure removed the gauntlets and took off the tall conical hood. A cascade of long red-tinged hair tumbled down, which a slender hand pushed back to reveal the face of a pale, wide-eyed girl.

  ‘The mistress has not spoken a word since her return,’ the spindlebug said glumly, as he poured the golden aromatic tea from the pot into two glass beakers. ‘And as for Captain Quint, well, he won’t even mention it – changes the subject whenever I bring it up. Which means,’ he went on, stirring barkhoney into the tea, then looking up, ‘it is up to you, Maugin . . .’

  The spindlebug’s great eyes swivelled in their transparent sockets, and a tremble passed through his huge glass body.

  ‘. . . to tell me what happened on that last fateful voyage.’

  Maugin took a deep breath, and then began to tell the tale to Tweezel the spindlebug . . .

  Chapter 2

  Things had not gone well for Quint since he stormed out of the Knights Academy. His first voyage as captain of the Stormchaser was meant to set us up with a tidy sum and establish Captain Quint and all of us in his crew as sky pirates to be reckoned with. For myself, I was confident I could handle the flight rock in all weathers, and the rest of the crew were just as capable.

  Tem Barkwater was the best harpooneer in all of Undertown. Stope, Phin and Raffix were from Sanctaphrax and had learned their trade up in the academy with Captain Quint, where they were known as the Winter Knights – but that’s another story.

  Then there was Hubble, our faithful albino banderbear to provide muscle, and Spiker the oakelf who, as lookout, was our eyes and ears up in the caternest at the top of the mast. Mistress Maris was ship’s healer, tending to any injuries. And lastly, Slyvo Spleethe was the quartermaster, in charge of cargo and stores, and who could be trusted to put the Stormchaser’s interests before his own – a rare thing for a sky pirate quartermaster.

  And yet, through no fault of the captain or the crew, the Stormchaser’s first voyage under Quint’s command proved disastrous. Three days out from Undertown, rotbugs infested the hull-sails, eating half of them away and forcing us to turn around. We limped back to a boatyard in the boom docks, where we discovered the rotbugs were the least of our worries.

  Weevils had infested the aft deck, sky barnacles had wrecked the rudder wheel, while the flight weights had been all but eaten away by rust. We might have had the finest crew in all the Edge, but without money, there was just no way that the Stormchaser could be made skyworthy. And without completing a voyage, where was Quint to find that money?

  There was no option but for the crew to split up for the time being and go their separate ways. The ‘Winter Knights’ took up jobs in Sanctaphrax, while Hubble, Spiker and Spleethe found work in the timber yards of the Flight Leagues. And as for me? Well, I was approached by a league captain, one Multinius Gobtrax.

  I remember that day well . . .

  I was hooded up and heading to Quint and Maris’s lodgings when Gobtrax stepped out of a side alley, along with that hulking great cloddertrog bodyguard of his – Kelter. Stupid and mean, he was, but mostly mean. I could tell from the height of his hat that Gobtrax was small-time – a minor league captain, scrapping for whatever morsels fell from the tables of the ‘high hats’.

  Anyway, Gobtrax blocked my path, his pale grey eyes peering at my hood as his pudgy hands reached for his sword. Kelter, cudgel in one hand, reached to grab me with the other. But I ducked round him and kicked away his legs with a blow to the back of the knees. He fell face down in the black mud of Midden Row like a beached oozefish – but not before Gobtrax had drawn his sword and backed me into a doorway with the point of its blade.

  I cursed Sky and Earth for not being more vigilant but, what with the state of the Stormchaser and the crew splitting up, I’d had a lot on my mind. I had no choice but to listen to this low-hatted league captain as he talked at me – especially since Kelter had got up out of the mud by now and was standing, blocking my escape.

  ‘You’re Quintinius Verginix’s s tone pilot if I’m not mistaken,’ Gobtrax said, his moist, fleshy lips flecked with spit as he spoke. ‘From what I hear, you and your captain are in need of a berth.’

  I shrugged, but he wasn’t letting me go that easily.

  ‘It just so happens that I’m in need of a stone pilot. And a competent navigator . . .’

  Gobtrax stopped, and the smirk on his fat lips suddenly disappeared as the tip of a sword plucked the league hat from his head. The three of us turned to see Quint standing there, Mistress Maris on his arm and his sword in hand, the league captain’s gaudy hat skewered on its tip.

  ‘That there is the best stone pilot in Undertown,’ Quint said with a smile, glancing at me, then at Gobtrax’s hat before tossing it back to him. ‘League of Plankers and Beamers, I see,’ he added, nodding at the embroidered patch on Gobtrax’s skycoat. ‘One of the minor leagues.’

  Gobtrax scowled, and I could see it was all he could manage not to set Kelter on him. But then his expression changed. The smirk returned, and he repeated what he had said to me about his need for a crew.

  ‘The Plankers and Beamers might be a minor league right now, but I . . . I mean we,’ he corrected himself, ‘have big plans. And they start with a voyage to the Deepwoods to a very particular series of locations that require careful and accurate skycharting. There could be a sizable amount of money in it for a good navigator,’ he added.

  I saw Quint’s eyes light up, if not at the thought of crewing for this pompous league captain, then at the prospect of the money he might make – money that would enable him to refurbish the Stormchaser, and pursue the life he’d always dreamed of as a sky pirate captain. He turned away, and he and Maris engaged in a short but agitated conversation. Maris kept glancing across at Gobtrax, and I knew that she was trying to persuade Quint to turn down his offer. But then Quint turned back.

  ‘My wife Maris is an accomplished healer,’ he said to Gobtrax. ‘It’s the three of us – or none of us. For one voyage only.’

  Gobtrax looked at Maris, his eyes glinting unpleasantly. ‘The late High Academe of Sanctaphrax’s daughter, a member of my humble crew – who’d have thought it?’ he said with a sneer, then thrust out his hand to shake Quint’s. ‘Quarter profits between the three of you. Do we have a deal?’

  Quint hesitated for a moment, then took the league captain’s hand and shook it firmly. ‘It’s a deal,’ he said.

  ‘We set sail tomorrow,’ Gobtrax announced. ‘At dawn.’

  And so, the following day, concealed inside my stone-pilot’s suit, I accompanied Quint and Maris to the berth of the Reaper of Plenty – which, despite its fancy leagueship name, was a cramped-looking skybarge with an ornate two-storey aftcastle built onto its stern. We arrived at six bells, exactly on time, though Gobtrax was waiting for us impatiently, strumming his fingers on the fancy balustrade.

  Quint greeted him amiably, and the three of us stepped aboard. I was sent to the flight rock to prepare for our departure; Quint went up to the helm to align the flight levers and take the wheel, while Maris was shown to our cabins – which turned out to be little more than sectioned-off corners of the cargo hold. Gobtrax settled himself down in a wing-back chair on the quarter deck, Kelter standing at his side, and called for a tankard of sapwine.

  A small crew, Gobtrax had said. Well, it was small all right. Apart from Gobtrax and Kelter, and the three of us, there was only one other crew member: Timple the cook. Bandy-legged and whey-faced, the old mobgnome looked as though he’d had all the fight knocked out of him under Gobtrax’s command. He came limping up from the galley and handed the league captain a tankard – only to be clipped around the ear for not bringing the bottle. The mobgnome scuttled away under a rain of blows from Kelter as we loosed the tolley ropes and rose up into the sky.

  That first day, we travelled over the glistening white mud of the Mire, the treacherous glow of the Twilight Woods and on far into the Deepwoods, only resting up when the light began to fail. For the next few weeks we sailed over the seemingly endless forest, settling into our various roles.

  Timple was in charge of the galley, preparing three meals a day for the captain and crew. Gobtrax’s meanness made the mobgnome’s task a hard one, but with his expert use of herbs and spices, syrups and salt, he was good at turning even the simplest of ingredients into tasty dishes. And when she wasn’t busy mixing up tinctures and poultices for Gobtrax’s endless array of imaginary ailments, Maris helped him.

  Quint’s job as navigator was to plot our course through the vast Deepwoods, and record our voyage on the sky chart that Gobtrax kept in the small ante-chamber next to his luxurious cabin. In addition to the detailed notes on wind currents and storm fronts, he also marked the chart with the exact length and time of travel which, together with readings from his sky compass, accurately plotted the course of our voyage. Without a well-kept sky chart, no skyship could hope to find its way around the endless Deepwoods. It was painstaking work – which is why Gobtrax wanted no part of it.

  The league captain was a lazy good-for-nothing, content to sit in his wing-back chair all day, drinking sapwine and issuing orders, while at the helm Captain Quint kept the Reaper of Plenty on course with well-set sails and carefully adjusted flight levers. And after mooring at dusk, Quint would work late into the night on the sky chart, with Maris bringing him endless mugs of charlock tea to ward off fatigue.

  As for me, as the stone pilot it was my job to maintain the flight rock; cooling it ready for departure, heating it for landing, and ensuring that it was always carefully tended, to keep the Reaper of Plenty airborne. Not that it was particularly demanding work. The flight rock was small – just large enough to maintain a steady buoyancy – and had none of the liveliness and lift of the magnificent sky galleon rocks I had once tended. Unlike those rocks, with this one I could set the cooling rods and burners at the beginning of a flight and hardly need to adjust them all day. It was dull work, and meant that the Reaper of Plenty was ponderous and unable to exploit the faster air currents higher in the sky. Instead, as I stood on the small flight platform in my hood and gauntlets, we slowly made our way just above the treetops, day after endless day.

  One voyage, Quint had insisted, when we signed up. I now understood the wicked little smile on Gobtrax’s face when he’d agreed – it was proving to be a single voyage with no end in sight.

  After the first few months, Gobtrax’s plan became clear. He was charting the locations of a very particular type of tree. Or rather, he was using Quint to chart them. Growing in dank, marshy areas, in stands of a thousand or more, the great bulbous trunks and emerald foliage weren’t difficult to spot once I’d learned to look out for them.

  For these were sumpwood trees, their wood the most buoyant of all Deepwoods trees. Gobtrax had discovered their existence from a captured shryke, and now was intent on cornering the market in a timber that everyone in Undertown and Sanctaphrax would want to buy. Once he had gathered enough locations, Gobtrax planned to auction the information off in lots and make a fortune. By comparison, our share would be small – though more than enough, on our return, to refit the Stormchaser handsomely and to relaunch Captain Quint’s career.

  Everything would have worked out fine if it hadn’t been for Gobtrax’s greed. Once he appreciated how talented a navigator Quint was turning out to be, how well Maris rationed our stores, and my own skill with the flight rock, he kept extending the voyage, going further and further into the Deepwoods in search of more and more sumpwood stands. And as we sailed on, I noticed a change come over Maris.

  At first, she had seemed radiant and happy, but as the months passed, she grew more pensive. Her face looked drawn and tired, and she began to wear a long black cape that covered her, head to foot. And as Maris became more withdrawn, Quint too seemed to become tense and concerned. Many times I’d enter the cramped quarters in the cargo hold to find the two of them locked together in whispered, urgent conversation, only for them to fall silent when they saw me. On several occasions, I asked them both what was wrong, but neither would tell me.

  Finally, one morning, I found Maris weeping silently in the galley, with Quint trying to comfort her.

 

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