Jake returned his attention to the arena floor. As he watched, holding his breath, the golden tip of the black obelisk was struck by the first rays of the new day. It burst into radiance.
The crowd in the stands surged to their feet.
A handful of figures stumbled through a gate into the open sand.
A distant bugle sounded.
With that cue, Horus bellowed from his post at the rudder, “Drop her beak! Let her dive!”
“Hold tight!” Djer warned.
Jake and Nefertiti obeyed as the prow of the ship tilted at a precarious angle. The constant roar of the balloon’s furnace died. A silence spread across the ship—then the windrider dropped earthward again, diving like a hunting hawk.
Wind ripped across the decks. A barrel, poorly tied, broke free, rolled across the middeck, and crashed into splinters. Horus manned the rudder with one arm, pushing hard to turn their plummet into a circling dive.
Jake held tight to a strut of the railing as his ears popped and wind screamed in his ears. He should have thought to grab his earplugs from his backpack; but the pack was strapped behind him, and he wasn’t about to let go.
Their only hope was the element of surprise. And for that to work, the attack had to be lightning fast. Jake twisted to see a squad of five men hunched to either side of the middeck. Secured to their backs were folded sets of wings.
Skyriders.
Jake continued to hold his breath. It seemed as if they were dropping forever when it was likely less than a minute. At any moment he expected to crash into the ground and shatter as surely as that loose barrel had.
Then Horus shouted, his voice full of wind and verve, “On my mark! Steady the keel, boys! Now!”
With a great creaking, the ship’s prow lifted. Jake felt his stomach crash into his boots. The wings to either side shuddered, shaking the entire ship. Then the furnace blasted with fire, stabbing deeply into the balloon. The black rubber skin glowed a dark ruby. Jake expected it to burst into flames.
But it held.
The Breath of Shu steadied into an even spiral.
Jake risked poking his head between the struts of the railing. The windrider glided five stories above the arena. People had flattened to the ground in terror at the unexpected arrival. Cries and shouts echoed up to the ship.
Then horns blared from outside the stadium, coming from the west.
Jake pictured Grymhorst’s force attacking the guards, all to buy them enough time to snatch the prisoners off the sand.
Jake stood up and leaned over the rail. Marika, Pindor, and Bach’uuk were running across the sand. They carried cudgels and spears. Kady, armed with her sword, helped a limping Shaduf flee in the opposite direction.
Jake searched the sand, trying to see what frightened them. But the field was empty. Had the ship’s arrival scared them, too? Jake leaned farther out. But none of his friends were even staring up. Instead they were staring down.
As Jake watched, a large fin crested out of the sand.
“Sand shark,” Nefertiti exclaimed. “With skin like stone, it’s almost impossible to kill.”
Jake spotted two more fins circling the obelisk.
“We’ll get your friends,” Djer said, and signaled to Horus.
A piercing whistle followed. The skyriders leaped over the railing and dove toward the arena. They plummeted for a breath, then the wings snapped wide and flames burst from their packs, turning hang gliders into one-man jets.
Each skyrider dove toward one of the prisoners.
But would they get there in time?
The dorsal fin of the shark disappeared under the sand as the creature neared the fleeing trio. His friends, sensing the attack, split apart and fled in different directions just as the sand opened up into a maw of teeth. The shark shot up, exposing most of its snakelike body, then dropped back again and slithered underground.
Still, Jake got a good look. The monster was a cross between a snake and some reptilian fish. It was also eyeless—just teeth, muscle, and armored skin: the perfect desert hunter.
One of skyriders dove and grabbed Pindor by his shoulders, pulling him off his feet and up in the air. Another managed to snatch Bach’uuk by an arm. The pair of riders shot straight up with their prizes.
A third raced low across the sand toward Marika; but before he could reach her, another shark burst out of the sand, drawn perhaps by the heat of the rider’s flame. The flyer tried to get out of the way, but teeth snapped onto one wing. The skyrider crashed to the sand and tumbled end over end in a wash of flame and broken struts. He hit the stony wall of the arena hard and lay still.
Jake clutched, white knuckled, to the rail.
Marika continued to flee, clearly trying to make it to Kady and Shaduf; but they were on the opposite side of the arena. A pair of skyriders missed their first pass at Kady and Shaduf, who leaped away when two sharks came at them from opposite sides.
The sand exploded as the two hungry predators collided and began to fight.
Kady and Shaduf crawled across the sand, trying to escape.
Then a new problem arose.
Guards sprouted all around the arena, positioned on the lower stands.
Bows were raised.
The archers fired at the ship, at the skyriders. One bolt struck Shaduf in the leg, pinning him to the sand. Scenting fresh blood, the pair of fighting sharks turned toward the old man.
A skyrider dove through a volley of arrows and grabbed Kady by the collar of her shirt and hauled her up.
“Let me go!” she screamed, twisting, plainly wanting to help Shaduf.
She got her wish. An arrow struck the skyrider’s jet pack. It burst into flames, blasting them both back to the sand. The skyrider quickly shed his wings, patting flames from the seat of his pants.
Kady scrabbled for her fallen sword, grabbed it, and ran for Shaduf.
The rider went to follow her, but the ground opened beneath him. With a scream, he was yanked underground by a shark.
The entire plan was falling to pieces. Even the skyriders with Pindor and Bach’uuk could not reach the ship because of the volley of arrows.
“Bring us lower!” Horus cried out from the stern, where he manned the ship’s rudder. “Drop lines over the sides!”
The roar of the bellows died, and the great ship’s shadow fell over the arena as it sank until its lower keel scraped the tip of the obelisk.
Sailors tossed ropes while others fired at the archers, using everything on hand, including the fire gourds that exploded amid the bowmen. By now, everyone had fled the stadium, trampling in a mad rush to escape the fiery battle. Several archers fell onto the sand, thrashing amid a wash of flames.
Jake spotted Kady directly below him. She had Shaduf up again, but sharks circled them, spooked by the fire and chaos. The pair could not reach the ship.