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Sabine could have er stor as she could Jack’s plan ht be undone by a true downpour
From within his shirt he withdrew a sth of fuse He pried up the edge of the barrel’s lid with his knife, then slid the fuse down inside,sure it was firmly in place He wondered if the h, but this was no time for hesitation or doubt He hoisted the barrel and--with one final glance around--ran lightly out across the foredeck The wheelhouse loomed behind him, but there were no shouts or sounds of alarht There will be no shout All he would hear would be the click click of claws on ry breath, and--
He shook the thought away
Jack took a closer look at the forward cargo hatch It was iron, the heavy frame bolted to the deck, intended to prevent any hope of escape by prisoners the Charon ht take, hu, too sh even with the bars cut away Despite the thickness of the hatch and its heavy bolts, the savage strength of the wolves was so great that they ht well have been able to break out if they could have put any pressure on it from below But the hold was at least twenty feet deep, so it would be i Jack!" a familiar voice said from down in the hold Ghost knew his scent, and Jack was pleased at the captain’s evident surprise
"Hush," Jack whispered, wondering if the guards had heard Ghost speak Not that it h to wake the dead
He laid the barrel atop the hinges on one side of the hatch, then dug into his pocket for the tin box of lucifers he’d stolen from the Larsen The ht with a hiss
Jack looked down through the grate and saw Louis staring upward Hope flickered within hiht be a beast, aJack had to a friend in Ghost’s crew
Vukovich, Tree, and Maurilio were down there as well, bloody and bedraggled but alive Strangely, he felt a pang of regret that Demetrius had not survived The fat sailor had seemed fairly even-keeled
"What are you up to, Jack?" Louis whispered
"Stand back and cover your ears," Jack replied, and he took his own advice, racing toward the bow and throwing himself facedown upon the deck He clapped his hands over his ears
The explosion shook the entire ship, roaring at the sky as if the sea had replied with thunder of its own, and thu wailed like a creature in pain Metal rupturing, Jack thought, and he wondered whether the gunpowder load had been too much When he looked into the hatch, would he see Ghost and the others pulverized down there? Crushed, spattered, taken apart by the blast?
The cargo hatch was now a s hole in the deck Shouts rose froed open farther aft, and the two drunken pirates stumbled out
Jack scrambled across to the ruined hatch Ghost and histo their feet as they recovered from the explosion, shaken but otherwise unhar open and two guards rushed in, halfway through their agonized lupine transfor and skin stretching as fur sprouted all across his flesh He leaped at the guards, and he tore out the nearest beast’s throat even before the rest of his sea wolves had finished their metamorphosis
Jack turned away then, loath to witness any et out?" one of the drunken sailors barked, pointing at him He looked at his companion "Wait Have we seen this one before?"
Jack hesitated They thought he was a olf! He wondered how he could use this
Bleary-eyed, arrogant, and exuding cruelty, the sailors approached hi his measure One of the his eyes, "this little bastard is hu and sharpening to points as fur sprouted from his skin "Beautiful"
Jack drew his knife, wishing it were silver He bent slightly, taking slow breaths, using thehis time in the Yukon He could not only sense the presence of animals but channel their essence within himself and join it with his own innate wildness There were fish nearby, of course, and if he extended his spirit far enough, he ht find a seabird or two But the true beasts were those standing before hi their prier on the outside
The rainstorthened, and Jack silently thanked Sabine
The drunken olves closed in, going around the ragged hole blown in the deck They ignored the sounds of slaughter froe, lupine bodies by the rain, they growled in hunger as they flanked hi his teeth Knife in hand, he tapped directly into the essence of the olves, ery to theirs so completely that for ain the sense of power and freedoer than ever before, and if only he could harness this power and take control, release himself to the animal and beco ember of his humanity remained within And it alould "Coiant wolf that had been Kurt lunged toward hied aside and kicked the olf’s leg with such force that it snapped, spilling the monster to the deck As it thrashed and tried to stand, he stos and sla past bone to ih iant wolf screa back to a form that was part beast, part man The wound would not kill him, but Kurt would stay down for a while
The other olf howled in rage and launched itself at Jack, who leaped over Kurt’s bloody for He had no real options--his only avenues of escape were over the side into the ocean or a twenty-foot drop into the cargo hold with Ghost and his ravenous crew
In a limpse of movement behind the olf A dark streak of fur erupted fronashing and claws dragging furrows in flesh Blood led with rain as the tolves clashed on the deck, tu, and it cracked but did not give way
The dark-furred wolf clawed the other’s face, flaying its jaw open to the bone and taking out an eye The booze-soaked hined and staggered back; its reed for his knife but dared not try to retrieve it fro the blade out of his heart
The deck came alive olves as Ghost and his crew--spattered with their guards’ blood--leaped out of the hold The olves steaer for flesh and vengeance Counting the dark-furred one who had just half blinded the eneainst two drunken, injured beasts Death’s wolves had no chance Ghost and what remained of his pack tore thehter and crossed to the starboard railing If Ghost decided to kill hi he could do to stop it, and he preferred not to watch the sea wolves taking their grisly meal
The scrape of claws on the deck forced hiray wolf that Ghost became when he revealed his true self, but instead the monster that approached was the dark-furred olf that had aided hi that threat The olf began to change, its bones shifting and popping as it stood up, now half man and half beast It threw back its head and howled, and bared its fangs in a olden tooth
"Hello, Louis," Jack said
It brayed like a hyena and then transfor as it resumed the illusion of humanity Louis stood naked on the Charon’s deck
"Jack," he said, "you are one crazy fool, but I’m happy to see you alive"