Septimus Heap, Book One_ Magyk - Angie Sage [123]
42
THE STORM
Get them! I want them caught!” DomDaniel’s bellows of rage echoed through the mist.
Jenna and Boy 412 paddled Muriel Two as hard as they could toward the Deppen Ditch, and Nicko, who would not be parted from the Hunter’s canoe, followed them.
Another yell from DomDaniel caught their attention: “Send the swimmers out. Now!”
There was a lull in the sounds emanating from the Vengeance while the only two sailors on board who could swim were pursued around the deck and caught. Two loud splashes followed as they were thrown overboard to give chase.
The occupants of the canoes ignored the gasps coming from the water and pressed on toward the safety of the Marram Marshes. Far behind them the two swimmers, who had been knocked half unconscious by the huge drop, swam around in circles in a state of shock, realizing that what the old seafarers had told them was true: it was indeed unlucky for a sailor to know how to swim.
On the deck of the Vengeance, DomDaniel retreated to his throne. The deckhands had shrunk away after being made to throw two of their shipmates overboard, and DomDaniel had the deck to himself. A deep chill surrounded him as he sat on his throne and immersed himself in his Darke Magyk, chanting and wailing his way through a long and complicated Reverse Incantation.
DomDaniel was Summoning up the tides.
The incoming tide obeyed him. It gathered itself up from the sea and poured in, tumbling and churning past the Port, funneling itself up into the river, dragging with it dolphins and jellyfish, turtles and seals as they were all swept along with the irresistible current. The water rose. Higher and higher it climbed while the canoes struggled slowly across the surging river. As the canoes reached the mouth of the Deppen Ditch, it became even more difficult to control them in the tide race that was quickly filling up the Ditch.
“It’s too rough,” yelled Jenna over the rush of the water, fighting with her paddle against yet another eddy as Muriel Two pitched from side to side in the swirling waters. The flood tide carried the canoes along with it, taking them into the Ditch at breakneck speed, twisting and turning helplessly in the wild surge. As they were thrown along like so much flotsam and jetsam, Nicko could see that already the water was brimming to the top of the Ditch. He had never known anything like it before.
“Something’s wrong,” he yelled back at Jenna. “It shouldn’t be like this!”
“It’s him!” shouted Boy 412, waving his paddle in the direction of DomDaniel and immediately wishing he hadn’t as Muriel Two lurched sickeningly to one side. “Listen!”
As the Vengeance had begun to rise high in the water and tug on her anchor chain, DomDaniel had changed his Commands and was shouting above the roar of the tide. “Blow! Blow! Blow!” he screamed. “Blow! Blow! Blow!”
The wind gathered and did what it was Commanded to do. It came in fast with a wild howl, throwing the surface of the water into waves and pitching the canoes violently from side to side. It blew away the mist and, perched high up in the water at the top of Deppen Ditch, Jenna, Nicko and Boy 412 could now see the Vengeance clearly.
The Vengeance could also see them.
On the prow of the ship DomDaniel took out his eyeglass and searched until he saw what he was looking for.
Canoes.
And as he studied the occupants his worst fears were realized. There was no mistaking the long dark hair and the golden circlet of the girl in the front of the strange green canoe. It was the Queenling. The Queenling had been on board his ship. She had been running around, under his very nose, and he had let her escape.
DomDaniel became strangely quiet as he gathered his energies and Summoned the most powerful Storm he could muster.
The Darke Magyk turned the howl of the wind into an earsplitting shriek. Black storm clouds came sweeping in and piled high over the bleak expanse of the Marram Marshes. The late afternoon light grew dim, and dark cold waves