“For now—I don’t know for how much longer. We need to get down before that storm catches us!” They had to shout to be heard over the wind. He glanced over his shoulder at Black Moclips. “We have to do something to help Little Red. She’s game, but as good as she is, she can’t go it alone.”
Spanner Frew’s black-bearded face swung about momentarily, then straightened forward again. “If we could get a line to her, we could tow her.”
“Not in this weather—not with all those airships chasing us. We’d be slowed down, even using her parse tubes to help.”
The big man nodded. “Better get her off there, then! When that storm catches up, chances are pretty good she won’t be able to stay aloft. If she starts to go down then, we won’t be able to help her.”
Redden Alt Mer had already come to that conclusion. He wasn’t even sure he could manage to keep the Jerle Shannara flying. He toyed briefly with the prospect of changing over to Black Moclips and sailing her instead, since she was in better condition. But the Jerle Shannara was the faster, more maneuverable vessel, and he didn’t want to give her up when it was speed and maneuverability that were likely to make the difference in a confrontation with their pursuers. The matter was moot in any case because there wasn’t any real chance that he could get everyone off his ship and onto Little Red’s with the weather this bad.
He pursed his lips. Rue was going to be furious if he told her to give up her prize. She might not do it, even knowing how much trouble she was in.
He looked back again at Black Moclips and beyond to the enemy airships, black dots against the roiling darkness of the storm.
“How do they keep finding us?” he snapped at Spanner Frew, suddenly angry at how impossible things had gotten.
The shipwright shook his head and didn’t answer. A new level of frustration crept through Big Red. It was bad enough that they had lost Walker and all those who had gone inland to the ruins. It was bad enough that they had nothing to show for having come all this way and might well return home empty-handed—if they were able to get home at all. But it was intolerable that these phantom airships continued to harass them like hunting dogs would a fleeing, wounded animal, finding their tracks or their scent where there should be no trace of their passing at all.
There was nothing he could do about it just now. But he could do something about Little Red. She was not yet recovered from her wounds and couldn’t have had much more sleep than they had. She must be near exhaustion from flying Black Moclips alone, trying to manage everything from the pilot box, the wind howling past her like a demon set loose to tear her from the skies. She was a good pilot, almost as good as he was—and a better navigator. But it wouldn’t be enough to save her from this.
“I’m taking her off, Black Beard!” he yelled over to the shipwright. “Drop our speed one quarter and hold steady toward that split in the peaks ahead.”
“You want to take her off in a grapple?” Spanner Frew yelled back.
Redden Alt Mer shook his head. “It would take too long. She has to come to us. I’ll send one of the Wing Riders in.”
He jumped down to the main deck, shouting orders at the crew, telling them to find their places at the working parse tubes, to monitor the draws while he ran aft. At the railing, he dug through a wooden box and found the emerald pennant that meant he needed one of them to fly to him.
Of course, the signal wouldn’t work if no one was looking. And in a bad storm like this one, they might not be.
He fastened the pennant’s clips to a line and ran the piece of cloth up into the wind, where it snapped and cracked like ice breaking free in the Squirm. Facing back, he watched Black Moclips lurch and buck. Several of her draws had broken loose, and one of her sails was in tatters. She was flying on her pilot’s skill and sheer luck.