Captain Nemo_ The Fantastic History of a Dark Genius - Kevin J Anderson [57]
He heard the crack of a flintlock pistol, and a ball shattered with a white starburst against the stone a yard to his left. Four more pirates charging toward him from the opposite side of the slope. He hadn’t even noticed them coming.
Nemo ducked as one of the men jerked a pistol from his belt and fired a wild shot, which drew the attention of the first party of seven. He ran as both groups charged toward him from opposite directions. He could never fight them all.
Three more pistol shots rang out, though the balls each missed him by an arm’s-length. Nemo took heart from the wasted shots, since the pursuing pirates would have no time for the tedious muzzle-reloading process. And Nemo didn’t intend to let them get close enough to use cutlasses. The pirates might have been murderous, but they were not smart.
Unfortunately, the gunfire might rally the other brigands on the island, and Nemo could find himself trapped before long. But he knew exactly where to run. It wasn’t far.
Nemo had survived by his wits for years, and he wouldn’t give up now. He scrambled down a slope, threading his way through a labyrinth of rocks. As he neared the thermal areas, the ground felt hot through the soles of his seal-hide moccasins.
Soon he reached the most perilous part of his flight: a stony clearing where sulfurous steam hissed from fumaroles in the ground. He had very little cover, and if the pirates had kept any of their pistols loaded, a lead ball could catch him in the back.
Hearing the pursuers behind him, he put on a burst of speed, wishing he could fight them face to face, one at a time. But before he could go far, the ground bucked and shook with a heavy tremor that jarred the mountainside in the most powerful earthquake Nemo had yet experienced. He stumbled and sprawled on his face, cutting palms, arms, and chin on the sharp lava rock. The raiders shouted, terrified by what was happening.
Then with a tearing sound and a rumble from deep beneath the surface, part of the steep hillside caved in. The crust of the mountain dropped away and rocks sloughed aside, leaving a yawning black door -- the entrance to a cave that had been sealed until the quake shattered it open. Humid, swampy smells came from the new cave, as if an entire subterranean world were hidden within the mountain. A pallid glow of eerie phosphorescence leaked out of the dark hole.
Nemo scrambled backward as he heard something deep in the cavern: footsteps like mallets pounding against rock, an explosive exhalation of breath, a loud and hungry snort.
The pirates, however, had no interest in the phenomenon. Their only concern was killing him. Intent on their victim, the men passed the broad cave mouth. Their shadows fell across the sunlit opening.
The noises from within grew louder . . . hungrier.
Nemo staggered to a halt as he saw a reptilian shape emerge from the cave. The pirates backed up and shrieked as the enormous beast lumbered out. Its hide was covered with scales, and it had huge, muscular back legs, a lashing tail, and a head barely large enough to contain its yawning rack of jaws. Scarlet, glittering eyes fastened on its prey.
When reading the science magazines Verne had shared in Nantes, Nemo had become familiar with paleontology debates, the remarkable discoveries of the French naturalist Baron Cuvier Georges and the meticulous restorations of the American paleontologist Othniel Charles Marsh. He had seen sketches of enormous skeletons on display in museums, as well as artists’ renderings of how the beasts might have looked before some catastrophe had made them extinct.
Dinosaurs, they had been called.
“It’s a dragon!” one of the pirates screamed.
Nemo sprinted across the sulfurous clearing toward the distant rocks. As the marauding party scrambled for cover, the predatory