Death by Airship by Arthur Slade

Author:Arthur Slade
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781459818729
Publisher: Orca Book Publishers
Published: 2018-10-31T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Eight

“It’s Mom!” I shouted. “It’s Queen Athena!”

“We be doomed,” Bonnie whispered. For she knew as well as I and the rest of the crew that my mom, Athena, has the second-biggest and baddest ship in the whole pirate kingdom (Dad’s ship Goliath is first). And her crew was firing all guns at once. Heavy-metal thunder was coming toward us.

“Incoming cannon fire!” I shouted. A ball tore through the sails. Another knocked our rowboat out of its moorings. And the third punched another hole in the deck. Fortunately, none had hit the giant bladder of hydrogen above us, or we’d have been diving earthward.

I just like saying the word bladder.

Anyway, I had some barking to do. “Evasive maneuvers!” I shouted, which translated to Odin putting more coal in the fire. I grabbed the steering wheel, turning us this way and that, watching cannonballs fly over us, fore, aft, port and starboard.

The Vengeance is much, much bigger than Cindy. She has about a hundred more guns. And with two giant steam engines, an air paddle and sails made of non-rip silk, she can travel a lot faster. We were doomed. Doomed. Doomed!

But we continued to dodge most of the cannonballs. The crow’s nest was knocked askew and stood at an angle. Our spotter was barely hanging on. “I be fine!” he shouted.

“She be gaining on us,” Bonnie said. “And she be looking steaming!”

I glanced back. The Vengeance was now directly behind us, not falling for any of my maneuvers, and Mom, dear sweet Mom, was clearly aiming right at me.

I’d never seen her this mad. Even when I scribbled on her favorite treasure map. Which, um, meant she never found that treasure again.

I saw her raise a bullhorn to her lips. “Stop your boat!” she shouted. “That is an order from your Queen. And prepare for boarding, you traitorous killer scum.”

“Should we be stopping?” Bonnie asked.

“No! She looks too mad,” I shouted, continuing to turn Cindy this way and that. “But maybe, maybe I can talk her down. I’m good at that.” Actually, I’m not, but I didn’t want to admit to the crew that I had no other plan.

“And prepare for a summary execution,” my mom added.

Gulp. Even though summary made me think of schoolwork and essays, I knew she meant the deadly way. The off-with-his-head way.

Me. Her ninth child, her baby boy. Cute little Conn.

Mom never messed around when it came to executions.

“Stop the ship or you will all soon be dead!” she shouted.

“I be thinking she means it,” Bonnie said. “What be your orders?”

“I am not sure I can talk sense into her. She’s super mad at me for something,” I said. “Do you remember me doing anything wrong?”

“I be not remembering that. You be not sending a birthday card. Maybe that be it.”

“That doesn’t deserve an execution! Or being tagged as a traitor!”

“You have ten seconds to stop the ship!” Mom began to count, lightning fast. “Ten, nine, eight, seven, six…”

“What be your orders, sir?” Bonnie shouted. “Orders!”

I couldn’t think of any.

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