12 - The Phoenix In Flight
The ship's surgeon refused to perform his services on a griffin. Van should have left it to Lady Kirke, but she and the captain were deep in plans for fleeing the Calormenes, who were now racing toward them. Sailors everywhere were dumping cargo overboard, spoils that might slow their pursuers. Van should have been helping, but he was skilled at medicine—no thanks to his heritage—and he couldn't leave the creature like that after it had helped Lady Kirke escape the enemy ships.
Van scrambled through his bunk for herbs and bandages, then rushed back to the deck, where the grumbling creature had stood up. It favored its hind leg as Van approached it. The beast eyed him with obvious distrust. "I'm not here to add to your injuries, Feathers." The griffin snarled something in what Van could only assume was Griffish, because he couldn't understand it. "Just hold still," Van ordered, and deftly applied poultice and wrap to the creature's flank. He finished before Arrow had the chance to respond again, or call him names in his shrieky native tongue. "That's all I have time for. We've got three much bigger problems," Van said, turning away.
"Wait," the griffin called.
Van stopped and looked back.
Arrow tested his weight on his leg, head tilted, then looked back at Van. "What can I do?"
Van smiled. "Be our eyes up top."
Arrow nodded and soared up to the rigging.
And then the real trouble began. Whatever a gun turret was, each of the Calormene ships had one of them. Van discovered fast that he might have been happy not learning of gun turrets his whole life. The things pelted crossbow bolts at them as soon as the Calormenes came within range of The Phoenix. Cannons fired at them too, but the cannonballs burst against the side of The Phoenix as they always did, frosting over and shattering like broken icicles. Not much help if one reached the deck, though. Then the crew found themselves ducking cannonballs and crossbow bolts as they rained down. In the distance, Van saw the Selbarani turn and fly homeward.
The captain swung up into the shrouds. "Run up every sheet we've got! Make for the Gate! Go, go, go!"
The crew scattered to obey. Sails rose skyward and billowed out. Frigid wind, capricious at best with the Calormene sails, filled the sails of The Phoenix and pushed her onward.
Van leaped onto the port rail to watch their speed. "Come on, old girl, come on," he whispered. Crossbow missiles hissed past him. One fluttered at the tail of his hair.
"Look out!" shouted Lady Kirke. She grabbed his hand and jerked him down as a trio of bolts hissed through the air where his head had been an instant before.
He smiled at her. "Thanks for that."
"Welcome. They're going to fire again. I saw them loading cannons."
"How? The cannons would be belowdecks—"
Boom. Van heard a high-pitched whine overhead. He grabbed Lady Kirke around the waist and spun her out of the way as a smaller cannonball smashed to icy pieces on the deck. She and Van tumbled to their knees behind a coil of rope. He peered over the rail and squinted across the diminishing open water toward the Calormenes. "Hand-held cannons?"
"Probably not the last of it," the lady said, then looked up at him. Even in the midst of a firefight, Van found himself transfixed by her smile. "Thanks for that."
He helped her up and steadied her as she stumbled against his body. "Welcome."
When he looked across the deck, the rain of crossbow bolts made his mouth go dry. One snapped the rope holding a sail aloft, and it fluttered back downward. A sailor tried to rescue it, but another projectile cut him down.
The captain rushed onto the deck and took the fallen sailor's place, hauling the sail back up.
Van raced to his aid and pulled the rope from his hands. "Get down, get down!" he yelled. "If you fall, we're done!"
The captain growled something unintelligible, but didn't leave. Together, they hauled the sail back aloft. Lady Kirke joined them in time to thread another rope through the broken one and make it fast.
"Look ahead! They're going to ram us!" called Arrow.
One of the Calormene ships had managed to cut across their path. "Hard starboard!" Van shouted.
The ship leaned almost flat against the waves. Lady Kirke yelped and fell against him. Van's arms went around her automatically, and they slammed back against the forward mast. He let go with one arm to fling it around the mast as his feet slipped free of the deck. Sailors shouted in alarm and grabbed for the shrouds. For one heart-stopping moment, Van thought they'd be swamped. Lady Kirke held onto his waist, her legs swinging wildly. Van's heartbeat pounded as he spied the Calormene interloper's side cannons. The bow of The Phoenix cleared the Calormene ship's nose. "Port with all you've got!" he screamed.
The ship lurched again, and Lady Kirke cried out and slipped from his waist. Van seized her by the wrist. They dangled like earrings as The Phoenix swung over, skidding around the Calormene ship like a horse running too fast around a curve. Van snarled through his teeth, holding on for all he was worth.
The swing to port flung them free of the mast. Van slammed against a capstan and rolled to his feet, already running. Lady Kirke raced with him to the bow, where the captain stood, drenched in seaspray.
Ahead in the middle of the ocean loomed a mountainous shadow, shrouded in mist.
The Fairies' Gate.
And behind them, gaining, were all three Calormene ships. Crossbow bolts whizzed past them. Two bolts drilled into the deck rail beside Van. "We're not going to make it!" he shouted.
"Damned if we're not," the captain said over the boom of cannon fire. His gaze went to the mainsails as if willing them to gulp wind.
Closer, closer, closer. Van saw the enemy sailors' faces now, leering like hounds on the chase. He looked skyward, to the sun. Please, if you ever loved a doomed soul ...
Cool mist caressed his face. Van turned to the Gate in awe, then back to the Calormenes, whose ships were rapidly losing their shape and substance. He beamed at the captain, then hooted loud and long. His voice bounced off the mist. The captain grinned back, and Van turned to Lady Kirke, who stared around them, open-mouthed in wonder, as the mist swallowed them all.
- # -
Lucy gaped. At first, she saw nothing but endless grey. Van and Ed's laughter reached her through the mist, and then she made out Van's face. He grinned ear to ear. Lucy couldn't help smiling back. They'd made it. Somewhere. They were alive.
She looked to Ed, who smiled at her, then turned to look ahead.
She followed his gaze to find thinning mist. Then, it cleared.
Above them on either side rose sheer, mossy slate cliffs whose tops were lost in fog. The Phoenix drifted along a channel that cut through the rock no more than a ship's breadth from the rails on either side. Down the cliffs hung braids of thick vine, woven like endless knots that went all the way down to the water.
Cut into the cliffs were caverns. Lucy spied more moss edging the openings. A solitary bird called out as it launched itself from one vine into the air. No one followed them; behind lay only a wall of fog.
After a time, the drifting ship slowed, and Lucy realized they were turning. The rock seemed to remold itself, and suddenly she saw a bay-like cavern. The Phoenix turned and approached a dock inside.
Too busy staring at the stunning landscape, Lucy hardly noticed when she, Van, and Edmund debarked and headed down a tunnel whose rock walls glimmered like obsidian. "Where are we going?" she murmured. Her voice echoed off the walls with their footsteps.
They emerged into a high-ceilinged cavern of the same gleaming rock. Bowls of some bluish flame lit the room, at the end of which she saw flashes of light coming from a pair of high seats on a platform.
A throne room.
Edmund led their party to the dais, where he paused to bow his head. "Greetings, my hosts, from one humbled by your sanctuary."
From the left-hand seat rose a tall, wispy creature, too graceful to be called human. She (It must be a she, Lucy thought, transfixed by the creature's beauty) approached Edmund. From her back spread a pair of wings as shimmery and transparent as slivers of mica. "As we are to provide it, brave one." She turned her gaze to Lucy, who felt a shiver of wonder that Narnia could hold such a lovely thing. The creature looked briefly back to Edmund, encompassing them both with her endlessly blue gaze, as bright as the flames in the bowls. She held out a long, slender arm, and Ed stood straight again. "You are welcome here, Your Majesties," the creature said in a soft, melodious voice. She turned her attention to Van. "And welcome also to you, Lord Vandelar."
Lucy and Van stared at each other. Each spoke at once.
"Majesties?"
"Lord?"