Drome stayed low to avoid getting a crossbow bolt through his tender anatomy and half crawled, half scuttled over to the nearest mast. A profusion of ropes ran down the mast itself, vanishing through holes in the deck. More ropes hung in loops from the cross members - yards he remembered they were called - that the sails were attached to.
He tugged frantically at any rope which looked like it might be attached to the sails. Unfortunately, this meant he had to stand up, and he danced around like a lunatic, hoping to stop himself from becoming the target of the next bolt.
So intent was he on his task, he didn't notice that what he'd mistaken for a pile of wet rags at the base of the mast, had sprouted pale yellow limbs and sat up. A thin arm shot out and grabbed his ankle as he danced past.
He fell, knocking his breath from him. Before he could move, the yellow creature jumped onto his chest and put its hands around his throat.
"Thief of ships!" yelled the creature. "Stealer of boats! Die!"
Drome caught a glimpse of the creature's tiny eyeless head before its voluminous, wet clothing flapped across his face and blocked his vision. Its hands tightened, squeezing with a deadly strength that choked off his breath. He thrashed about, eyes bulging, trying to throw off the creature, twisting his head from side to side and wrenching at the hard, bony wrists.
It was no use. His chest heaved uselessly.
His vision dimmed, his head swam. He flailed with his fists, hoping to land a blow hard enough to dislodge his assailant, but his fists merely sank into the creature's damp clothing. It was like punching a damp sponge.
Suddenly the pressure on his throat vanished.
Spluttering and gasping, he gulped air into his tortured lungs.
The creature lay on the deck next to him, arms and legs twitching. But it wasn't Drome's fist that had knocked down his would-be killer. A crossbow bolt was buried up to its flights in the small, yellow bump that served as the creature's head.
The sight of the bolt sent Drome ducking again. He crawled over to the gunwale and looked carefully through a sluice gap.
The guards were climbing into a small sailboat, forcefully requisitioned judging by the shouting and arm-waving from the boat's only non-guard occupant, a stubby limbed, long-necked individual with a face like a constipated turtle. The two crossbowmen were still on the quay reloading their weapons.
"Will you stop messing around and get those bloody sails down!" shouted Nev.
He came clattering down the stairs from the poop deck, leaving the wheel to its own devices.
"We haven't got all day!" he said. "It won't take long for those damned guards to get in that bloody boat! They'll be boarding us while you're still fiddling about."
"I wasn't fiddling! I was attacked by that..."
Drome lowered the hand pointing at the spot which - until recently - had been occupied by the corpse of the yellow creature. All that was there now was the crossbow bolt lying in a small puddle of copper-coloured blood.
"What?" said Nev.
"It's gone," said Drome. "The bloody thing's gone! It was there! I swear!"
"Oh, for the gods' sake!"
Nev spun around and stalked over to the mast. He yanked at two or three ropes and cursed when nothing happened. "Why won't the sails come down?"
"I think you've got to climb up there and undo them," said Drome, pointing vaguely at the lowest untidily reefed sail.
YOU ARE READING
Flight of the Gazebo
FantasyDrome isn't paranoid. The entire world really is out to get him. And that world isn't even Earth. It's a weird hollow world that his whole village ends up in through a thaumaturgic accident. And to make matters worse, as soon as they arrive he's tak...
