The Skeleton Coast Page 7

  They both looked around. They were in that part of Dio where the buildings were as much under the water as above it.

  ‘Not really,’ Cherry said, ‘but I know we need to get out of here as quick as we can.’

  They paddled over to a rickety boardwalk and climbed out. Cherry took his Admiralty jacket off and carried it, but even without the jacket, their Duxan clothes made them both conspicuous.

  ‘How long do you think we’ve got until they realise we’re missing?’ Annalie asked.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Cherry said. ‘Depends on whether we’re lucky or unlucky. We need to find ourselves a ride out of here.’

  They hurried along the boardwalk, listening out for any sounds of pursuit. The path swerved down towards the water; a cluster of dinghies were pulled up above the tideline.

  ‘What’s your position on stealing things?’ Annalie asked.

  ‘Normally I’m against it,’ Cherry said. ‘But in some situations, it’s necessary.’

  He tried the dinghies one by one while Annalie kept a lookout. The first four engines had been disabled and wouldn’t start.

  Annalie noticed someone opposite had stopped and was watching them. ‘Maybe we need to keep moving,’ she said nervously.

  Vrroom! The fifth dinghy started. ‘Let’s go!’ Cherry said.

  They both jumped in. Cherry opened the throttle and drove out into the channel. Behind them, a window was thrown open and somebody shouted furiously, but the voice was quickly lost.

  They motored out, making for open water, Annalie keeping watch behind them while Cherry steered a course.

  ‘Anybody following us?’ he asked.

  ‘Not yet,’ Annalie said, half-expecting that at any moment someone would come shooting out to hunt them down.

  But no, not this time.

  They crossed the debris field and reached the safety of the open ocean. Cherry turned east and they began to put the great sprawl of Dio behind them.

  ‘We made it,’ he said. ‘I can’t believe it.’

  ‘Don’t you do this kind of thing all the time?’ Annalie asked, smiling.

  ‘Not by myself,’ Cherry said. ‘So had you thought about what happens next?’

  ‘I need to get in touch with my friends,’ Annalie said.

  ‘That’s easy,’ Cherry said. ‘I’ll just take us back to my ship and we can contact them for you.’

  ‘That isn’t necessary,’ Annalie said hastily. ‘I really just need to get my hands on a shell, then I can call them and get them to come and pick me up. Maybe if you dropped me somewhere, and lent me some money to get another shell—’

  ‘I don’t have any money,’ Cherry said. ‘Or even any ID. I really think we’d be better off going back to my ship.’

  ‘There’s no time,’ Annalie said desperately. ‘I’ve got to warn my friends not to rendezvous with the pirates before it’s too late.’

  ‘Then we can stop in at the nearest port and I’ll make contact with my ship that way,’ Cherry said reasonably. ‘We’ll make landfall in Gantua—it’s probably safer there. And I can get us both the help we need.’

  Annalie reluctantly nodded her agreement. She was going to need Cherry’s help for just a little longer; once she’d contacted the others, she would simply escape again.

  They puttered on over the quiet sea, moving eastward. Cherry seemed to know which way he was going. ‘You should try to get some rest,’ he suggested at one point. But Annalie didn’t dare. She wanted to make sure she was awake and ready when they finally did reach port.

  The hours passed. The dark bulk of Brundisi slipped by, dotted with only a very few lights. The engine droned on. Then more lights began to appear on the shore, more boats on the water. ‘I think,’ Cherry said at last, ‘we’re in Gantua.’

  Annalie sat up a little straighter. Now for the next part in her escape plan. Not that she actually had a plan of any kind.

  As the sun rose, they came upon a port town. ‘This looks like a good place to stop,’ Cherry said.

  It was not a big town. It sat at the mouth of a river, and Annalie guessed the town was a staging point for goods that arrived by sea and then were sent inland by river. Even so, it had a rather sleepy look to it. She hoped that meant it would be easier for her to slip away unnoticed.

  There were a number of boats anchored in the harbour, none of them Admiralty. Cherry drove past them all and came to a stop directly in front of the harbourmaster’s office, shrugging back into his uniform jacket. Annalie followed him slowly. Should she make a run for it? But no—if she did that, she had no way of contacting the others. Better to stick with Cherry for now and get help.

  ‘Good morning,’ Cherry said to the woman at the front desk. ‘Do you speak Duxish?’

  She stared at him for a moment in surprise, then said, ‘A little.’

  ‘My name is Lieutenant Cherry and I was kidnapped in Dio by pirates. I managed to escape, along with my friend here, and I need help to get back to my ship.’

  The woman blinked at him a moment longer, then got down to business. ‘What is your name please?’

  Annalie stood and listened while Cherry started spouting details: name, rank, number. She was jolted when he named his ship: the Triumph. Annalie’s boarding school, Triumph College, was the battleship’s feeder school. She had been aboard the ship once; it had been an impressive and intimidating experience. Funny to think that she and Cherry might have walked past each other without knowing it.

  But it was not the Triumph that she’d seen in port in Dio. It had been another, smaller ship.

  ‘What was the Triumph doing in Dio?’ she asked, hoping she sounded innocent, while the harbourmaster made a call on her shell.

  ‘It wasn’t,’ Cherry said. ‘I was on secondment to another ship, the Raptor. They wouldn’t send the Triumph to a place like that.’

  Annalie nodded and said nothing more.

  The harbourmaster returned. ‘I have notified the Admiralty,’ she said. ‘They are sending someone straight away.’ She looked at Annalie. ‘Did you wish to make a complaint about what happened to you in Dio? I can contact the police.’

  ‘I really just want to try and call my family,’ Annalie said.

  ‘But you should file a complaint with the authorities,’ the harbourmaster said.

  ‘All I need is access to a shell,’ Annalie said.

  The harbourmaster looked at Cherry. Cherry looked back at her non-committally.

  ‘Please,’ Annalie said.

  The harbourmaster nodded, and placed a shell on the counter.

  Annalie called her own number. It was answered on the first ring.

  ‘Hello?’

  ‘Will, it’s me.’

  ‘Annalie!’ Will shouted. ‘Where are you? What’s going on?’

  ‘Listen to me, you mustn’t go and meet those pirates. I got away from them—I escaped.’

  ‘Seriously? How?’

  ‘Long story,’ Annalie said, aware that Cherry and the harbourmaster were both listening. ‘I need you to come and get me.’

  ‘Where are you?’

  ‘Gantua,’ Annalie said, and named the town.

  ‘Good,’ Will said. ‘I never want to go back to Brundisi as long as I live.’

  ‘When do you think you can get here?’ she asked.

  ‘I’m not exactly sure,’ Will said. ‘But sit tight. We’ll be there as soon as we can. Are you safe?’

  ‘Pretty safe,’ Annalie said. ‘I’m with an Admiralty officer. We escaped together.’

  ‘What?’ squeaked Will. ‘Is that a joke?’

  ‘Nope. And his ship is coming to pick him up too, so it’ll be fun to see who gets here first,’ Annalie said, trying to sound light and cheery.

  ‘Oh, man,’ Will said. ‘Okay. Whose shell is that? Can we call you back on it?’

  ‘Probably not,’ Annalie said, still trying to sound cheerful. ‘I’ll update you if anything changes.’

  ‘Okay,’ Will said. ‘We’re coming.’<
br />
  He hung up.

  ‘They’re coming,’ Annalie said simply, and handed back the shell.

  Courtesy of the harbourmaster, arrangements were made so Cherry could access his creditstream. ‘Come on, I’ll buy you breakfast,’ he said.

  They wandered into town, looking for somewhere to eat. Annalie felt newly awkward with him now. While they’d been locked in the room together, she had been able to see him as just another traveller like herself, a boy discovering the world from the deck of a boat. But now, back on shore, the differences between them reasserted themselves. He was no longer a fellow prisoner; he was about to rejoin the enemy. And she knew that at any moment, someone might take a closer look at an Admiralty watchlist—the harbourmaster, for instance—and realise who she really was.

  They found a café and sat down together, breakfasting Gantuans looking at them curiously. ‘Looks like they don’t see a lot of out-of-towners here,’ she said, wondering whether she should be making herself so conspicuous.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ Cherry said, misunderstanding her. ‘You’re perfectly safe here. Gantua isn’t Brundisi.’

  Their food came quickly, and although it was unfamiliar, it was excellent. After their days in captivity, they were both starving.

  ‘I really am grateful to you,’ Cherry said, when he’d satisfied the worst of his hunger. ‘It wouldn’t have occurred to me to escape like that if you hadn’t pushed me into it.’

  ‘I’m just glad it worked,’ Annalie said.

  ‘I’m serious,’ Cherry said. ‘If I’d been there on my own, I would have just kept on waiting until someone came for me. I don’t know how long I would’ve been stuck there. The Admiralty doesn’t pay ransoms and it doesn’t negotiate with kidnappers, so I don’t know how I expected them to get me out.’

  ‘Send in the marines, all guns blazing?’ Annalie said, jokingly, although she knew it wasn’t really a joke. ‘Anyway, I couldn’t have done it without you either.’

  Cherry looked at her for a moment, as if he was about to say something, but eventually he just smiled. ‘I’ll get the bill.’

  They stepped out into the sunshine with full stomachs. ‘We should probably head back to the harbourmaster’s office,’ Cherry said. ‘There’s just one more place we need to go first. Come with me—I need your help with something.’

  A little reluctantly, she followed him into a shop that sold a jumble of wares of all kinds, including lots of shells, old and new. ‘Which one should I get?’ he asked her, indicating the shells.

  ‘I’m not really an expert,’ Annalie said.

  The shopkeeper came over to give advice on the relative merits of the makes and models. Cherry chose one, and a chip to go with it.

  They stepped out of the shop. ‘Here,’ he said, and handed her the shell, along with a modest handful of Gantuan money.

  ‘What’s this for?’ Annalie asked, surprised.

  ‘Call it a thank-you present.’ He paused. ‘Use the money. Get away from here. Tell your friends to find somewhere else to pick you up, somewhere I don’t know about.’ He paused. ‘I know who you are, Annalie.’

  Annalie felt suddenly dizzy. ‘How long have you known?’ she asked.

  ‘I didn’t really work it out until yesterday,’ Cherry said. ‘But I wondered from the start.’

  ‘Oh,’ Annalie said.

  He looked at her anxiously. ‘You know as soon as I get back to my ship, I’m going to have to tell them about you.’

  ‘Do you really have to?’

  ‘It’s my duty,’ Cherry said. ‘So the less I know about your plans, the better.’

  Annalie felt a surge of gratitude to this surprising young man. He was letting her escape in the best way he knew how. ‘Thank you,’ she said.

  She was about to turn and go when Cherry spoke again. ‘I don’t know what the real story is with you and your father,’ he said, ‘but I think you’d be an asset to the Admiralty if you ever came back.’

  ‘They’d never have me,’ Annalie said incredulously, ‘even if I wanted to. Which I don’t.’

  Cherry frowned, perplexed. ‘I don’t know who you think we are,’ he said, ‘but we’re the good guys. Really.’

  ‘Some of you are,’ Annalie said.

  Cherry shook his head and smiled. ‘You should go.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Annalie said again, and then she turned and hurried away into the crowd.

  Annalie did exactly what Cherry had suggested. She contacted the others, Essie did some research, and they arranged to meet on the far side of Gantua. Annalie would travel there by train.

  Gantuan trains were long and slow-moving, with many classes of carriage strung along their length, from luxury at the front to boxcar at the back. Annalie had chosen somewhere more or less in the middle, which meant she had a seat to sit on, she didn’t have to share her carriage with livestock, and there was no one cooking on the floor, although it was crowded and very noisy.

  She curled up quietly in her seat, hoping not to attract too much attention, still stunned by what had just happened. Cherry had known, or at least suspected who she was from the very beginning, but he hadn’t betrayed her. He’d befriended her, helped her, and then, when he had the chance to capture her—something that would no doubt have given his career an enormous boost—he’d let her go.

  She felt fairly sure he was going to tell his superiors about her; he’d made that clear enough. But he’d done his best to give her a fighting chance to get away. He’d tried to find a solution that would help her while still allowing him to do his duty. She was charmed by the thought that he wanted to do his duty. He seemed the polar opposite of Beckett and his men.

  She remembered a conversation she’d had once with Essie about the Admiralty and what they stood for. Essie had grown up believing the Admiralty were a band of heroes who sailed the world, righting wrongs and protecting the weak, and she’d been very upset when Annalie suggested that perhaps there was another, darker side to the Admiralty’s power. Annalie hadn’t grown up hating the Admiralty, although she had picked up Spinner’s ambivalence about them. Her dislike and mistrust of them had really only begun when she met Beckett. He seemed like the living embodiment of everything that was frightening and hateful about the Admiralty: he was dangerous and manipulative, vindictive and violent, ruthless towards anyone he saw as an enemy. He seemed to have the freedom to sail the oceans of the world, pursuing his vendettas, and there was nothing that anyone could do about it.

  But Cherry was different. Cherry seemed to represent that other Admiralty, the one Essie believed in. He’d joined because he truly believed in their mission, and in his first year at sea, he really seemed to think he was making a difference.

  In a way, she hoped he was right. It would be comforting to believe in his Admiralty.

  But what was the point in her believing in it? She had cut herself off from all that when she ran away. After everything that had happened, there could be no going back, even if she wanted to. She was a traitor’s daughter. There was no way back to her old home, her old life. The best she could hope for now was to be reunited with Spinner and find a new place to hide. It was a slightly depressing thought. Could they build new lives for themselves if they had to stay in the shadows forever, always afraid that Beckett might come after them?

  For she knew that Beckett would never stop. He would never be appeased. Charges of treachery were not something that would simply go away. They would always be hanging over their heads now, forever.

  The train rattled its way across Gantua, stopping many, many, many times. Annalie dozed, woke, watched the landscape slip by. The journey was a long one, but at last the noisy announcement system called out the name of her station, the train eased to the platform, and she stepped out into hot, dusty daylight on the far side of Gantua. From there, it was a long and thirsty walk down to the port, where the Sunfish lay at anchor, waiting for her.

  Will came in the dinghy to fetch her. She threw her arms around his neck
, immensely relieved to see him.

  ‘Good work, getting away,’ he said.

  ‘Same to you,’ Annalie said. ‘You still haven’t told me how you guys got away from the pirates.

  ‘We had help,’ Will said.

  They zoomed back towards the Sunfish. Annalie took the shell Cherry had given her from her pocket and threw it overboard, in case they had some way of tracking it.

  ‘So is everybody all right?’ she shouted, over the motor.

  ‘Yes,’ Will shouted back. ‘There has been one new development though.’

  ‘What’s that?’ Annalie asked.

  They reached the Sunfish. Annalie clambered up, noting it now had a bullet hole in its hull, as Will tied the dinghy up securely.

  The others were waiting for her on deck. Essie ran to throw her arms around her. Annalie hugged her friend, tears of relief springing to her eyes now that she was finally home. She turned to look at Pod—and saw, to her shock, a strange girl standing beside him.

  She was younger than the rest of them, maybe only ten or eleven, with Pod’s thin build and her hair cropped short. She was dressed in Essie’s sparkly jeans and top, and she watched Annalie’s arrival with the wariness of a small wild animal.

  ‘Annalie,’ Pod said, ‘meet my sister Blossom.’

  Blue Water Duchess

  ‘But what does that mean? Your dad will see what he can do?’ Will asked.

  Will, Pod and Essie were anchored in the bay of Doria. Essie had triumphantly shown the boys the message she’d received from her father. Will was less impressed than she’d expected.

  ‘It means he’s going to try and get the money for us. We can save Annalie!’ Essie said. ‘C’mon, give me some credit here!’

  ‘Okay, that is good news,’ Will said grudgingly. ‘But how long is it going to take? You heard those pirates. They’re not going to wait forever.’

  ‘Hello?’ Essie said. ‘It’s a hundred thousand creds. He can’t just fish it out of the back of the couch you know! It’s going to take a bit of time, and if the pirates can’t recognise that, they’re idiots.’

  ‘That’s what you’re going to tell them, is it?’ Will said.