Call of Kerberos: Twilight of Kerberos, The - Jonathan Oliver Page 0,33
surrounded by slowly rolling thunderheads, skeins of mist and great valleys and peaks that constantly shifted and changed.
A shadow passed him and he saw that there were other travellers in the storm.
He noted the look of serenity on the faces of those that fell past, arms outstretched, before they faded from view. Others rode the columns of cloud that boiled up from the depths below. He recognised one man, rocketing towards him, as Pandrick, the owner of The Necromancer's Barge. Windmilling his arms, he managed to get out of the way before Pandrick collided with him. He shouted a greeting to the publican, but any response that he may have called was eaten by the howling winds.
He only had a moment to consider what lay below him, on the other side of the clouds, before he was through and he saw for himself.
Silus was thrown out of sleep, across the deck and into the side of a locker as the Llothriall came to a sudden halt.
He struggled to regain his breath as, with a clatter of footsteps, the crew rushed up from below.
"I though that you said nothing could stop this ship." Jacquinto shouted.
"Yes, well I wasn't counting on running into the tip of a bloody great spire out on the open seas now was I?" Dunsany snapped.
Nursing the large bruise that was beginning to blossom on the small of his back, Silus got to his feet and joined them at the prow of the ship.
There, rising above the masts, was a tapering column of stone. Looking over the side of the ship Silus could see a ragged hole where they had collided with it.
"Bail! Now!" He shouted, starting to move. But Kelos put a hand out to stop him.
"No Silus. The Llothriall will provide for herself. Look."
Silus followed the direction of Kelos's pointed finger and saw a membrane forming over the hole. With a wet pop it quickly closed up, re-sealing the ship.
"In time she'll even grow a new skin of wood. Now, what do we have here?" Kelos said, the excitement of discovery evident in his voice.
Silus began to relax as he realised that they weren't about to sink and he took in the strange vista before them.
The structure that they had run into was just one of a ring of six towers, rising from the waves. Gulls called to each other as they swooped around the delicate spires or nested in niches in the columns of brightly marbled stone. None of the towers rose any taller than the one which had stopped the Llothriall, though several were grander in design. Intricate carvings had been wrought into three of them. From where Silus stood it was difficult to make out many details, but on one he thought that he could see the design of a figure riding a whale, surrounded by smaller creatures that may have been mermaids.
"Gods, what is it?" Katya said, joining them.
Silus slipped a hand into hers and with the other he shielded his eyes against the glare of the sun.
"It looks like the towers of a cathedral or castle." He said. "But who would have built such a thing out here?"
"Not the Chadassa?" Katya said, her grip on Silus's hand tightening.
"I don't think so," Dunsany said. "If it was I'd expect them to be swarming all over us by now."
There were starting to drift away from the towers and Dunsany signalled to Jacquinto to secure the ship. He scurried up the foremast with a rope, Ignacio in his wake, while Ioannis shouted guidance from below. With a dexterity and grace that Silus would not have expected of such weathered brutes they managed to loop the rope over the stone column before pulling the ship in close.
"Well I told you that we'd discover something soon enough didn't I?" Kelos said. "Ah, Emuel, you're awake. What do you make of this?"
The ship's eunuch emerged from below deck, looking so pale that he positively glowed, the tattoos that marked his face and hands standing out starkly against his flesh. He looked at the circle of gull-covered stone, his hands idly toying with the hem of his robe.
"The towers of a cathedral perhaps?" He said.
"Which means that there must be more to see below." Dunsany said.
"Emuel are you okay?" Katya said, noticing the perspiration that beaded the eunuch's forehead.
"Oh, don't worry about him," Ignacio said. "He always looks like that. He'll be pining for the Faith."