Dragons on the Sea of Night Read Free Page B

ship sent the man arcing over the side rail.
    With a shriek, he disappeared, and Moichi was dragged several heart-stopping feet after him across the deck. He fetched up against the side with a rib-jolting blow. Half-dazed he held on, gritting his teeth with the effort, his muscles bulging, veins popping in lightning streaks.
    He peered over the side, his face filled with seafoam and rain. He saw the mate’s mouth twisted in terror, his eyes staring wildly. Blood ran off him like pink rain.
    â€˜Hold on! I have you now!’ Moichi shouted into the storm as he gathered his strength to bring the mate up onto the deck. But just then, the Tsubasa lurched sickeningly, sending the side they were on plummeting downward into the thrashing sea. My God, Moichi thought, it’s dark down here. Like the underside of the world.
    And with just an indifferent flick of its bulk the ocean took his mate from him, tearing his hand from Moichi’s. The man’s mouth opened in a silent shriek as the water in great black swirls lifted him into its embrace, up, up, and then, quite suddenly, sucking him into itself, down and away.
    There had been absolutely no sensation of him slipping away, no intimation of what was to come. One moment Moichi had him firmly in tow, the next instant there was nothing to hold on to, just the chill wetness all around, moaning and pitching as if in agony.
    God of my father, Moichi thought, I have never seen the sea like this.
    His head came up and he squinted through the typhoon, thinking, No! By the Oruboros, this is too much!
    But in truth his ears had not deceived him. They were picking up a vibration rather than a true sound – a horrid, bone-chilling rumbling that reverberated through his body and buzzed evilly in his brain.
    With a bellow of rage, Moichi stormed the high poop deck and, shouting mingled instructions and encouragements to the young, petrified tillerman, brought his own brawny weight to bear on the protesting steering mechanism. It would not budge.
    He raced to the railing, leaped down onto the mid-deck, gesticulating as he picked himself up and ran for the mainmast. ‘Raise the mains’l!’ he cried. ‘Raise the mains’l!’
    No one reacted. The best of them knew only to trim all sail, batten down all hatches and tackle in order to ride out a storm. Raising sail in the face of foul weather was unthinkable. What their captain was asking of them was sheer madness.
    â€˜Move,’ Moichi shouted, ‘or we’ll all be dead men, lying at the bottom of the sea and food for the big fish!’
    As if to underscore his words all light left the world. In the unnatural blackness the men turned aft. There came a shriek among them; or perhaps it was the infernal typhoon itself, laughing at its height, at the puny creatures who dared ride its coruscating back.
    No matter. They all saw it at once: the tsunami . The towering wavefront, black and purple, had risen up behind them, traveling at a fast rate, growing and curling with every split second until it had formed a massive fortress wall threatening to engulf them. The pressure drop was palpable, a great rushing in their ears, a pounding in the heads. The crew stood paralyzed, staring helplessly at the advent of their doom.
    Only Moichi was in motion, striding among them, screaming in their ears, shoving them this way and that. And still the building tsunami transfixed them. Then one among them came to life, moving to the mainmast, hauling with all his slight weight, his dark almond eyes sliding from Moichi’s face to the rapidly unfurling sheet. It was the lone Bujun among them, a man who had kept to himself so completely throughout the voyage that Moichi could not even recall his name.
    â€˜The Oruboros curse you!’ Moichi shouted as he and the Bujun struggled with the mainsail. ‘You’ll do as I say or die!’
    Perhaps they felt the proximity of their deaths or perhaps it was the example