The Golden Anchor. Cameron Stelzer
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the sound. Ignoring the captives, he began pacing around the foot of the web, deep in thought and muttering to himself, ‘What to do? What to do?’ He looked down at his trousers and frowned. ‘These prison pyjamas will have to go, and as for my poor missing ear, well,’ he touched his beret, ‘perhaps a disguise is in order.’
He scanned the web, eyeing the companions’ outfits with interest. His eyes came to rest on Anna’s baggy coat. ‘Yes, that should suffice.’
‘ERRRGH!’ Whisker gasped, throwing his body forward as if to say, don’t you dare touch her.
The gerbil took a quick step backwards, his entire body stiffening. He locked eyes with Whisker and watched Anna’s protective older brother vibrating helplessly in the web.
‘You’re a feisty one,’ Eddie said coldly. ‘You and your band of ruffians. And that leaves me with a big dilemma. I can’t cut you down and risk you escaping and I don’t trust this web to keep you secure forever.’ He smiled humourlessly and read from the newspaper. ‘WANTED DEAD OR ALIVE. The gov’nor don’t care what state you’re in and, for two and a half thousand gold coins, neither do I.’ He picked up Whisker’s scissor sword. ‘I think we both know how this ends.’
Whisker looked to his sister and then back to the gerbil, his pleading blue eyes conveying an unspoken question.
‘Oh, no,’ Eddie whistled, turning his back on Whisker. ‘I can’t have one of you revealing my identity. No witnesses. No loose ends.’ He plucked a pine needle from the closest branch and tested the sharpness of Whisker’s sword. With barely a touch of the razor-sharp blade, the pine needle split in two.
Whisker felt a shiver run through his tail.
‘Excellent,’ Eddie said, spinning to face the helpless companions, a merciless expression stamped across his face. ‘Now, who’s first?’
The Pie Rats were silent, every eye fixed on the sword.
Then Whisker began to shout. He screamed and hollered and thrashed his entire body hysterically, hoping his companions would follow his lead. If this was the end, it would be a spectacular one and, with enough effort, they might even bring down the web.
Ruby, never one to shy away from displays of aggression, quickly joined him. And then Horace, Anna and Chatterbeak started up a chorus of deep-throated wails and spasmodic body shakes.
Ungagged, Chatterbeak was by far the loudest member of the death-row choir. He had freed his tongue from the tangle of silk threads and let out a shrieking chant of ‘Murda! Murda! Murda in da woods!’
Eddie was momentarily stunned. He stopped in his tracks, peering nervously above him, uncertain which one of the moving targets to strike first.
The chaos continued, a groaning, flailing, cacophony of bodies. But the golden orb-weaver web held strong.
Confidence returning, Eddie stepped towards Horace, his sword raised, his teeth bared.
Whisker watched in terror, straining with all his might in a final desperate attempt to shake the web from its supports.
The gerbil’s eyes glinted in triumph and Whisker knew the web simply wasn’t going to break.
And then, suddenly, unexpectedly, Eddie’s enormous ear twitched violently and the gerbil’s expression changed from triumph to fear. He spun around and stared into the dark forest, his ear twitching madly.
The chaos in the web ceased in an instant, only to be replaced by a foreboding silence.
Without a word, Eddie scooped up his sack and darted into the shadows, leaving four rats and a parrot staring after him in disbelief.
Whisker turned to Anna, relief in his eyes.
And then he heard it, a deep, thrumming sound penetrating the silence. Vroomp, vroomp, vroomp.
It grew louder, drowning the sound of his own pounding heart.
VROOMP, VROOMP, VROOMP.
The sound was unmistakable, a rhythmic beating of wings. It was the same sound Whisker had heard on the river but, on that occasion, it had been through a protective layer of fog. Now, stuck in a web, with nowhere to hide, it brought a whole new kind of terror to Whisker’s ears.
He searched the trees, frantically hoping for a glimpse of the mysterious winged creature. But the sound appeared to be coming from everywhere at once, echoing off the mighty pine trunks as if the trees themselves were alive.
VROOMP, VROOMP, VROOMP.
Suddenly, a bloodcurdling scream rang out and the trees closest to the web began to shake.
Clumps of snow tumbled to the ground. Anna let out a muffled squeal of alarm.
Whisker’s blood chilled. His tail went limp as a monstrous shape appeared through the branches. Cloaked in shadows, it glided towards him like a nightmarish dragon, its enormous wings spread wide. In its strange webbed feet, it clutched the screaming body of Eddie, the contents of his sack raining down like Christmas presents.
Eddie looked up and, seeing the web right in front of him, sank his teeth into the creature’s toes. It released its grip instantly and the gerbil dropped like a stone. Not even his empty sack could slow his descent and he hit the ground hard, bouncing off his ear and knocking himself unconscious.
The huge, winged creature continued its approach, hurtling towards the very edge of the web.
Whisker shut one eye and braced himself for the impact.
There was a rush of air and the creature pulled up short, beating its wings rapidly to remain stationary in mid-air.
Keeping one eye firmly shut, Whisker squinted at the animal hovering inches from his face. It wasn’t a dragon but it was still enormous. White all over with a yellow and black bill and small brown eyes, it was the largest bird Whisker had ever seen. A ray of sunlight illuminated a round disk hanging around its long swan-like neck.
Whisker’s second eye sprang open in surprise.
What in Ratbeard’s name …? he gasped.
His eyes grew wider as he realised what he was looking at. The disk was a gold medal attached to a purple ribbon. Engraved into the face of the medal, above the image of a skull and two crossed torches, were the words 25th Pirate Cup Champion. Curving around the bottom of the medal was the name of its recipient.
Whisker blinked several times as he read the name. He would have scratched his head in puzzlement if his paws weren’t stuck to the web.
It seemed impossible, but there was no denying it. The name engraved on the medal was Whisker.
While the bamboozled apprentice tried to comprehend how and why his Pirate Cup medal was hanging around the neck of a giant swan, the white-feathered animal lowered its bill and let out an ear-piercing HONK, blasting Whisker with chunks of half-chewed bird seed and swan slobber.
Sticky, sopping and in need of a hot bath, Whisker simply stared into the swan’s eyes, wondering what bizarre event was going to happen next. He heard a hearty chuckle from the back of the bird and saw, for the first time, that the swan was carrying a passenger.
‘Don’t ye be concerned ‘bout ol’ Balthazar here,’ the passenger said light-heartedly. ‘Tis his way o’ sayin’ hello.’
Whisker looked up to see a portly old rat wearing a green velvet suit, complete with a waist coat, top hat and a bow tie.
At the sight of the old rat grinning down at him, Whisker’s eyes grew bigger than clock faces. The outfit was a mystery to him, but he recognised the face in an instant.
‘Good mornin’ to ye, li’l capt’n,’ the rat said, tipping his top hat in greeting. ‘It looks like ye could do with some rescuin’.’
From somewhere near the bottom of the web, Whisker heard Horace let out a string of muffled cries, ‘Arherr erh raaherr! Erh arrher eerra arrhha!’
Whisker