Sinbad and The Eye of the Tiger Read Online Free Page B

could feel no pain!
    The ghoul thrust his blazing timber at Sinbad, who dodged, hacking at it with his sword. The skeletal apparition swung the flaming wood hard, but Sinbad blocked it, throwing his weight behind his sword. Jumping back, Sinbad struck at the fiery lance with all his strength, knocking it from the ghoul’s grasp, sending it flying against the sloping wall of the tent, where it started another smoky fire.
    The other ghouls were closing in upon Hassan and the weak, but game, Aboo-seer. Axe and club were met with skillfully wielded scimitars and in a sudden thrust Hassan severed an arm from a ghoul. His eyes widened as the skeletal figure paid no attention to the loss of the limb. It merely reached down with the remaining arm and tore the thick club from the clasp of the severed hand and swung it again toward Hassan.
    In a corner, obscured by smoke, the hooded woman had moved to stand protectively over the huddled, wounded figure of the youth. Her eyes still blazed, wide with tension, watching the battle with feverish interest.
    “To me!” shouted Sinbad, leaping over a mound of smoking pillows. He kicked aside the discarded drums of the musicians, and in a long vertical slash cut open the side of the tent. Hassan and the weakened Aboo-seer struggled through and joined their captain as he drove back the ghouls with a dazzling display of swordsmanship. The smoke was pouring out through the rent in the felt wall as Sinbad’s two companions hurried out.
    Now all of the inhuman figures were advancing on the lone sailor. Sinbad shot a look over his shoulder. Behind him was a pyramid of sawn timber logs and his two friends were hurrying past it. Aboo-seer was beginning to sag, but kept on gamely.
    Sinbad whirled as a club hissed by his shoulder. His scimitar streaked out, stabbing into the ribs of the ghoul with no effect. He raised a boot and kicked out, staggering the attacker with his blow. The ghouls advanced stiffly, their movements awkward and far from the lithe movements of the human they were attacking. But their apparent invulnerability seemed to spell the doom of the swiftly moving Sinbad. They gave forth a triumphant hissing noise as they moved in for the kill, their weapons raised menacingly.
    Sinbad jumped out through the slit in the tent and the ghouls followed awkwardly, their clubs and axes and wide-bladed cleavers swinging in tireless blows.
    The tall sailor risked another glance over his shoulder. The encampment ended near the projecting quay, a stone pier that jutted into the bay. He could see Hassan and the Mate scrambling into a boat. He dodged another near blow by a sharp-edged cleaver and jumped quickly over a log, running toward the pyramid of timbers.
    The ghouls followed him in a silence broken only by the hissing of burning tents and the rattle of their bony passage. Sinbad quickly moved to the base of the log pile, glancing at the advancing figures, ghostly in the moonlight and still murderous.
    His scimitar glinted in the light of the crescent moon as he slashed through the ropes that held the pile of logs together. The ropes fell away and the logs began to tumble down. The ghouls did not pause in their shambling rush at Sinbad and the turbaned sailor had only time to jump away before the avalanche of logs thundered past him.
    The ghouls froze in their tracks as they realized the danger, but they were too slow in reacting. The logs rumbled over them, snapping brittle, fleshless bones like tinder, burying them under the pile of heavy wood. Here and there a severed leg or arm twitched and tried to move on, but could not.
    With a glance back at the smoking tent Sinbad ran down the quay past piles of cargo and was about to plunge into the water when a figure moved out of the shadows. Covered in a sari and yashmak, it came from between bales of merchandise, but stopped as Sinbad’s sword swung toward it.
    “Captain Sinbad! Wait!”
    Sinbad recognized the voice at once. “Princess Farah!”