Clash of the Sky Galleons Read Online Free Page A

souls!’ Wind Jackal roared up at the sky ship as another of the creatures swooped and snarled above his head.
    It glided round, its eyes wide and staring, and closed in for the kill. Then suddenly, as Quint was beginning to fear the worst, a bright arc of light shot through the air and straight through the papery wings of first one, then another of the vast flapping creatures. For a moment they seemed to hover in mid air, before bursting - like great paper lanterns - into brilliant flame and hurtling down into the blackness. With a screech of alarm, the third creature broke off its attack and fled back to the safety of the void.
    Moments later, Steg and Tem were hauling Quint and his father on board, looks of shock on their faces as they saw the blood-spattered state of their faces and clothes.
    ‘Edge wraiths,’ said Filbus Queep the quartermaster, shaking his head. ‘Foul creatures of the void …’
    ‘But what happened to them?’ Quint asked, clambering out of his harness with the help of Tem.
    ‘Harpoon dipped in flaming sumpwood tar,’ said Steg proudly.
    Quint looked up to see Maris smiling down at him, trying hard to conceal the look of fear and concern on her face.
    ‘It was Mistress Maris’s idea, and it worked a treat,’ Steg continued. ‘Now, with your permission, Captain, perhaps we can get out of this accursed place.’
    But Wind Jackal wasn’t listening. He was standing at the balustrade, gazing down into the bottomless void, his eyes glittering from beneath a mask of dried tilder blood.
    ‘This isn’t over,’ he muttered through clenched teeth. ‘In fact, this is just the beginning…!’

• CHAPTER TWO •
GLAVIEL GLYNTE
    As he approached the heavy, studded leadwood door, the young sky pirate captain paused, raked his fingers through his unruly thatch of thick fair hair and set a bicorne hat of polished leather on his head at a jaunty angle. Adjusting his neckerchief and smoothing his ornate frock coat, he glanced up at the tavern sign creaking rhythmically as it swung back and forth in the cold northerly wind. The sign, like the tavern itself, had clearly seen better days.
    The ornate ironwork was rusty, the hinges warped, while the painting itself - an image of a glistening green vine writhing over a pile of cracked skulls and bleached bones - was faded and flaked. Despite all this, the menace in the picture was unmistakable.
    The tarry vine was a parasite. It lived in symbiosis with the fearful bloodoak in the darkness of the Deepwoods, its roots sunk deep into the blistered bark of the tree. Attracted to warm-blooded creatures, it would lasso prey, drag it to its host and deposit it into thebloodoak’s great mandibled maw. Then, as the tree crushed the life out of its victim, the vine would gorge itself on the hapless creature’s blood.
    The Tarry Vine tavern had been aptly named, the sky pirate thought ruefully as he stepped inside the huge slab of a building, with its rows of dimly glowing windows and shuttered roof garrets. For here, in the bustling backstreets of Undertown, the twinkling lights of those windows and roof garrets, and the heady aroma of woodhops escaping from the gently smoking brew-chimneys above, snared unsuspecting passers-by and dragged them inside with a grip as tight and unyielding as any Deepwoods tarry vine. Once inside, as the young sky pirate knew only too well, the tavern’s very own version of the bloodoak awaited …
    ‘Well, well, well, if it isn’t my old friend, Thaw Daggerslash!’ came a gruff voice.
    A portly gnokgoblin in a high-collared jerkin lounged on a large, ornately carved throne beside a heavy tapestry curtain. A tallow lamp above his head cast a feeble yellow light over the narrow chamber.
    ‘Evening, Jaggs,’ said Thaw Daggerslash coolly, unbuckling his sword and handing it over.
    The gnokgoblin scratched his belly and looked the sky pirate slyly up and down.
    ‘Covered in Mire mud, I see,’ he leered. ‘Been trying your luck