"Apparently," I said, scarcely daring to believe it. "Let's get out of here before they change their minds."
After our escape, we learned that the majority of the diversionary force had survived their mission. Port Llast still had a functional garrison, if only barely so. Hylas spent another three days in town, long enough to make sure the jellyfish was truly gone. On the morning of his departure, we conferred in his study, attending to a few final pieces of business.
"It's strange," he said when we'd finished. "Now that it's time to go, a part of me wishes to linger. But you no longer need me." He grinned. "If you ever did."
I grinned back. "No common man-at-arms would ever admit to needing an officer, but you did come in handy once or twice."
"Thank you," he said, becoming serious. "For everything." We shook hands, then went out to review the men. He had a jest or a word of praise for each of them, and they gave him three cheers as he rode away.
Afterward I wondered when the Lords' Alliance would appoint a permanent First Captain, and what sort of master he'd prove to be. Finally a messenger brought the answer. Hylas had praised me to his superiors, and in consequence, they'd promoted me.
Forged in Fire
Clayton Emery
22 Kythorn, the Year of the Gauntlet
"Have at 'em, me hearties! Sweep 'em into the sea, me brave ones!"
Screaming, swinging cutlasses and scimitars, pirates boiled over the side. Bounding from the deck of their dromond onto the merchantmen's cog, bare feet slapping the deck, the pirates rushed the quarterdeck.
Clustered on the quarterdeck were a captain and first mate who shouted encouragement at a dozen sailors. Simple merchantmen, they looked reluctant to fight.
Clambering carefully over the foaming, gnashing space between the ships, came the corpulent pirate chief who urged on his cutthroats with a cyclone of words. Heart of a Lion no longer fought toe-to-toe with enemies, but kept to the rear to supervise. Someone had to watch the two ships lest they ran aground, after all.
"Take 'em, me fearsome children!" he hollered. "A swift attack brings a short battle!"
Howling, thirty pirates split into two packs like wolves and surged up the short companionways to the quarterdeck. With luck, terror would make the merchantmen drop their arms and surrender. Heart of a Lion noticed the merchant captain, a skinny black-bearded man, had been born with a scowl, and the first mate's face was tattooed like a desert nomad's. Too, the other companionway was guarded by a lean woman in bright pinks and yellows, and such people were always trouble.
Sure as taxes, he saw, the ship's officers offered the pirates straight-thrust steel.
A pirate swung his cutlass to bat the first mate's scimitar aside, but an arm like oak simply riposted. The pirate yelped and jumped, pinked in the thigh. Hampered by the narrow stairs, another pirate sliced his cutlass at the mate's ribs, but that blow too was deflected, and the mate drew blood from a forearm. Below, in the waist, Heart of a Lion hollered useless instructions. Why would his crew never listen at sword practice? The chief was glad to see a tall pirate finally reach past his fellows and ram hard with a boarding spear. The first mate dodged, but banged into his captain alongside. The spear split his throat. Gargling blood and spraying his enemies red, the first mate dropped.
Pirates hollered in triumph, and pushed across the red-slick deck after the rangy captain. He bore a worn scimitar and a small round shield with a nasty spike. He swiped viciously to fend two pirates back, then lunged at a third. A fast chop cut a pirate's wrist to the bone. As blood fountained and the pirate screamed, a shipmate behind rammed him with a shoulder. The wounded pirate blundered into the merchant captain, tangling him. A boarding pike hooked the captain's leg. Tripped up, the captain crashed on his back. Quick as cats, two female pirates jammed blades in his belly and throat. With their officers dead, already the sailors were throwing down their rusty scimitars while the pirates hooted.
"Excellent! Your captain is proud!" yelled Heart of a Lion.
He swiftly marked the progress of the two ships. The pirate's dromond, a long, lean, lateen-rigged, many-oared vessel named Shark's Fang, was bound to the merchant's cog by stout ropes tipped with chains and iron grapnels. Locked, the two ships pitched and yawed in the lee of a big island to the south. Tharsult of the Shining Sea had many rocky clefts deep-shadowed by dawn, an excellent spot for ambushing the sea lanes. Waves burst into spray against a shore covered in seaweed. With a full day of bright sun burgeoning, the pirate chief exulted. They could loot this vessel's cargo and be hidden again by sundown.
Heart of a Lion carried no weapon, only a hollow tube of brass that he waved while exhorting his crew. "Press on, sons and daughters of seven devils! Conquer like kings! Drive-eh? Curse me for a camel boy!"
In a heartbeat, the second pack of pirates had run into a tigress.
Blocking the starboard companionway was the lean woman in pinks and yellows-the colors of the Nallo-jal, the Navy of the Caleph of Calimshan. Her white cork helmet, wrapped with a purple turban and sporting a brass bill, identified her as a lieutenant of the Imperial Marines. She hefted a straight sword like some northerner, and fire flashed from her eyes as she hollered, "Glory to the Caleph!"
Down in the waist, Heart of a Lion groaned. He may need his brass tube, despite the danger of burning the ship to the waterline. Didn't anyone simply surrender anymore?
Charging the lieutenant came a huge pirate named Tasyn, famed for his brawling and swordplay. He leered as he feinted with his cutlass, relying on a trick to distract her. While the swordsman feinted, the lieutenant struck. Cruel as- a dragon's claw, her straight-bladed sword skimmed his knuckles and chunked into a knee carelessly put forward. Tasyn's leg crumpled. As the big pirate tilted to the wounded side, the lieutenant slammed the side of his neck. Blood pinwheeled into the sky and striped the lieutenant's blouse and vest.
Another pirate, a woman, attacked as the lieutenant dispatched her first victim. The pirate squatted so low her hams brushed the deck, then she stabbed upward to spear the marine's groin. Fast as thought, the lieutenant's blade spanked the pirate's cutlass so hard the tip bit the deck, then the straight blade bounced back up. The female pirate saw the sword tip fly for her face like an arrow, then the point pierced her eye and brain.
Ducking herself, using the dropped bodies as a barrier, the lieutenant flicked her sword tip at pirates who suddenly hung back. She taunted, "Come closer, jackals. Taste the iron tongue of the Imperial Marines!"
"Ilmater made me to suffer," sighed Heart of a Lion. His pirates' attack had stalled, and might even fail if the sailors rallied around that devilish lieutenant. "But Sharess finds favor for those who love life."
Raising the brass tube in his hand, Heart of a Lion sighted down its hollow length at the ducking, weaving lieutenant, then stroked his fingers down the tube, invoking, "As'tal rifa!"
Like a wyrm's belch, from the tube billowed flame that coalesced into a sphere and sizzled through the air. Big as a fistful of flaming pitch, the fireball bounced off the lieutenant's turbaned helmet. Purple silk scorched and ignited, as did hanks of short blonde hair below her cork helmet. Panicked, the lieutenant flipped off her burning helmet, and was in turn slammed alongside the head by a cutlass blade. She dropped, face down in blood.
Yet Heart of a Lion's attack had worked too well. The fireball ricocheted from the sturdy cork helmet and lodged amidst tarred ropes and deadeyes in the standing rigging. Tar sputtered and flared like kindling. Paint on woodwork blistered and peeled, smoked and curled, and burst into flame. Within seconds the fire streaked up the rigging and set ablaze the mizzen sail.
"Fire aloft!" hollered a pirate.
Instantly seamen chopped at stays to bring the sail down. The merchant sailors joined in, a tacit surrender, because everyone afloat feared fire at sea. Slipping in blood, they loosed belaying pins to free the running rigging. Let go, pushed by the wind, the flapping, flaming sail flopped over the taffrail and hissed to extinction in the pitching waves. Pirates and sailors alike lowered buckets on ropes and sloshed the quarterdeck to douse stray sparks. Blood swirled with seawater and ran out the scuppers.