CHAPTER 20
When Blade came up onto the flagship's deck after breakfast, he found the same scene that had greeted him every morning for the past week. To seaward a flat, glazed blue sea stretched to meet a glowing blue sky, the sea broken only by the sails of the patrol ships and the sky by a few puffs of white cloud.
Toward the land, the first thing he always saw was Charger, tied up alongside the flagship like a kitten snuggling up to its mother. Men were moving on her decks-the guards, leaning wearily against the masts and railings in postures that reeked of boredom, and her own crew, washing down the decks and airing hammocks under Brora's supervision. On either side of the flagship a line of merchant vessels stretched off for miles into the distance, their sails furled and decks bare except for morning working parties and officers taking the air like Blade. These were the deep-draft transports, which drew too much water to anchor closer in or run up on the beach.
Farther in toward the land a line of galleys and smaller merchant vessels tugged at their anchors. Beyond them still another line of masts rose into the air, marking the galleys actually drawn up on the beach. Amid those masts rose the thin curls of blue smoke marking the cooking fires of the camps on shore.
Then the land climbed into swelling green hills, marching away and blurring into the faint haze that shrouded the landward horizon. The nearest hill was surmounted by a scar of black-the ruins of a small fishing village. The ruins had been smoldering as late as two days before, long after the flames and screams that rose into the night as the pirates sacked the village had died away.
It had taken the pirates two days to sail north to their chosen landing point and another day to put ashore their landing force, fortify the camp, and anchor or beach their ships. Cayla's fear of a trap had had some effect; the pirate fleet was less vulnerable to a seaward attack than Blade had hoped it would be. But it would most certainly be short-handed. On the fourth day the landing force had marched off into the hills, more than thirty thousand men in four great columns. Occasional faint spots of fire in the night and distant pillars of smoke by day showed where they were spreading out across the countryside in search of the gold horde of Royth. Otherwise, they might as well have all marched off the edge of the world-or into a sealed trap laid by the army of Royth. Blade hoped it was the latter.
The flagship was coming awake around him now. Smoke curled up into the almost windless air from the galley smokestack as the cooks prepared breakfast. All the fresh provisions were long gone; breakfast would probably be another unappetizing mush of pounded biscuit and minced salt meat. Amidships, the officer of the watch was looking importantly around him, taking bearings on the neighboring ships to make sure the flagship had not dragged her anchors during the night. Forward, one of the anchor windlasses creaked as a working party hauled buckets of seawater for washing the decks thirty feet straight up from the sea. One of the armorers squatted on the deck with a large pot of paint, carefully dipping the tips of catapult bolts into it.
The faint brrrum-brrrum-brrrurn of an oarmaster's drum beating out a cruising stroke came over the water to Blade. Turning, he saw Sea Witch gliding past, Cayla for once sitting rather than standing by the tiller, her unhelmeted blonde head gleaming bright in the sun. She raised an arm in mocking salute as Witch cut across the flagship's stern, heading out to take up her patrol station. Blade was glad when the other ship passed out of his field of view. Seeing Witch and Cayla reminded him always of her murmured words about the allies she had, to deal with Blade in case of treachery.
Yet somehow on such a day, all stillness and color and sunlight, it was hard to believe in the slithering submarine monstrosities that Blade's imagination conjured up out of his memories and his fears. He had seen no signs of them during the voyage north or the week of waiting. Perhaps they could not survive so far from the haunted waters of Mardha where they laired.
But he had also seen no signs of the royal fleet of Royth. That was much less welcome. How long would the fleet wait in its northern lair before bursting out and taking the pirates in the rear? They were less than a day's sail north of the pirate anchorage. Had Pelthros' admirals developed cold feet? The trap had to close on both the pirate fleet and the pirate army to make the victory complete. If only their army was destroyed or driven away, the whole thing might have to be done over again in a few years, regardless of what he had said in the Council. Blade found himself sweating with more than the rising heat of the sun and pacing the deck like a caged animal, until he caught himself and forced himself to sit down and at least look calm.
Breakfast arrived-what he had expected. He pulled out a wooden spoon and sat down on a canvas stool to eat. The shrieks of squabbling seabirds floated up from aft as the cooks emptied the garbage over the side.
Then all at once Blade saw smoke gush into the air at the far northern end of the line of merchant vessels. Some seconds later a dull thud floated down the line to his ears. He saw eyes swivel to follow his own gaze and took a closer look.
Oily gray-brown smoke was pouring up from a ship anchored close in the lee of the little peninsula marking the northern end of the bay. Even as Blade watched, another ship spouted smoke and this time flame, and splashes went up beside a third one. Somebody up on the peninsula was doing remarkably good shooting with a siege engine firing-what? Pots of burning oil, most likely.
Blade didn't wait to wonder who was attacking or why at this time. Only one force could be striking at the pirates here and now. Why the royal fleet was attacking its superior opponent in broad daylight was something to consider later. Right now there was not a split second to spare for either him or Charger if they wanted to get clear of the pirate armada safely.
He had only his eating dagger; the first thing to get was a weapon. The guard assigned to him was too busy looking north to notice anything else until he found himself jerked off his feet and over the railing by two colossal arms. Blade barely had a chance to get a good grip on his new sword when two other guards ran at him, pikes leveled. He launched a kick at one that took him down with a smashed kneecap and opened the throat of the other with a backslash. Then he dashed forward, toward the galley smokestack, snatching up the stunned armorer's paint pot on the run.
He whipped his arm up in an underarm swing, and the paint pot arched through the air like a cricket ball and dropped out of sight down the smoking galley stack. Blade was already backing away, dueling furiously with three sailors, when the galley stack spewed black smoke and orange flames. Screams floated up from below as the galley fires erupted all over the cooks. Smoke was already beginning to billow up through the hatches as Blade ran lightly up the ladder to the foc'sle, locked both arms around the windlass rope, and slid down it to the sea.