Horsemen's War (The Rebellion Chronicles #3) - Steve McHugh Page 0,3
ever closer. The ship was one of the largest in the world. According to the reports, it could hold more than five thousand passengers. Mordred hoped that there would be considerably fewer people aboard to deal with than five thousand.
“If we’re wrong about this . . . ,” Hel said over the comms.
“Then we’ll grab some cocktails, sit on a sun lounger for a bit,” Mordred said. “Nothing wrong with a lovely day out with friends.”
He heard Remy snort through the comms.
Mordred started to hum the theme tune to Final Fantasy IX’s battles as he checked the reading on the altimeter. He had several thousand feet to go before he needed to pull the cord for his parachute, so he continued to watch his friends beneath him, each of their lives in his hands.
The closer they got to the gigantic ship, it seemed to Mordred, the faster they moved. Another check on the altimeter told him he was only a short distance from needing to pull his chute.
Mordred built up a massive amount of magical air around him, pouring more and more power into it, then used the magic to reach out in front of him like a huge invisible hand. He tapped the comm button on his helmet. “Now,” he said.
Everyone pulled their rip cords at once, but there was not enough distance between them and the ship to ensure a safe landing. Not without Mordred’s magic, anyway. He used the air that he’d pushed out in front of his team like a huge brake, slowing them all down as they descended toward the ship and touched down softly on the deck, close to a huge swimming pool.
Mordred was still a thousand feet above them when the sirens climbed out of the portholes just below where everyone had landed. They clawed their way up and over the railings, moving toward the team, who were themselves heading toward the nearest door to take them into the ship. It looked as though they were unaware of the danger of the approaching enemies, but Mordred knew that wasn’t the case.
Encased in a shield of dense air, Mordred disconnected his own parachute and plummeted to the ship at high speed. He hit the swimming pool with an explosion of air and water, using his water magic to freeze the contents of the pool as it exploded up around him. Thousands of shards of ice drove into the dozen creatures who were all in front of him, waiting to move into the ship. None of them had time to escape the frozen projectiles. Most of the water dropped back harmlessly into the pool, and Mordred walked out completely dry, deactivating his magic.
The door to the ship opened, and Hel stepped out. She looked down at the bodies of the sirens. “Nice work,” she said. “We could have taken them.”
“Not quietly,” Mordred said. “At least one of them would have made a noise or jumped overboard. Couldn’t risk it. Besides, there are plenty more inside you can deal with.”
“Where to first?” Zamek asked, poking one of the sirens with his foot. It had a three-foot spike of ice embedded in its eye and emerging from the back of its skull. Sirens looked human, right up until they were hunting. Then features became almost serpentlike, with long, thin gray-skinned bodies covered in hardened armor across their chests and necks. They were made for killing. Their razor-sharp claws on long bony fingers and their sharklike teeth were more than capable of tearing a human adult to shreds in seconds. “I always thought sirens were female.”
“No one really knows,” Diana said. “They can change their appearance at will. Lots of sailors were men, and these things like humans. To eat. Turns out when attractive women make suggestive comments to large numbers of sailors who have been at sea for months, they become easy prey.”
Mordred and his team unslung their weapons and reentered the ship, moving from the bow through to the main living areas of the guests, who would normally be out and about. It was eerily quiet.
“Nothing good happened here,” Diana said. “It reeks of death.”
“A lot of death,” Remy said.
There were chandeliers in the middle of the main foyer, as well as a stunning staircase that Mordred assumed would normally have a mirror shine but right now was, like everything else in the foyer, drenched in blood.
“This was a massacre,” Hel said. “How many people were on board this ship?”