‘The wind,’ Captain Ford cut across him, ‘the one you used to blow that thing off Steven’s neck – can you do that again? I mean right now.’ He pointed at the sails he needed filled.
Gilmour sized up the situation and started incanting the spell, hurrying between the foremast and the main, blowing the sheets full, while Garec and Brexan manned the lines.
The Morning Star took her time coming about.
The captain leaned on the helm, his teeth clenched, and watched the sheets fill, empty and fill again as Gilmour blasted away at them. He listened to the roar of the breakwater just beneath the bow and whispered, ‘Come on, old girl, come on around. You don’t want to bite that mud; you don’t want to leave us out here. Come on, my darling girl…’
The brig-sloop struck, throwing Garec and Brexan to the deck. Gilmour kept his feet, still hurling massive gusts into the sails, determined to bring the Morning Star about…
Captain Ford cursed like a trooper, but never let go of the rudder. ‘Hit it again,’ he begged, ‘aft just a bit, hit it again, my darling, come on, now old girl…’
The Morning Star obliged, hauling her backside around and bouncing and glancing off the mud reef. The water was just deep enough for the little ship’s shallow hull to clear the bottom and make the tack, however bumpy. The captain spared a grin for Garec, for every time he tried to stand, the brig-sloop glanced off the reef, sending him rolling for the starboard rail again and again.
‘Pel, get below, see if we’re taking on water.’ He turned to the sorcerer and said, ‘Give us a few more gusts, if you can, please – I’d like to overtake that fishing trawler before he has a chance to alert the entire Malakasian navy.’
Gilmour interrupted his spell-weaving long enough to reply, ‘Aye, aye, Captain!’
‘And Gilmour, what news of Steven?’
‘He’ll live-’ Gilmour looked nervous, ‘but I’m not certain how long he’ll be out. I’ve drained a great deal of blood, so I imagine he’ll be weak and disoriented for some time when we finally get him back.’
‘Are we still…’
‘Yes, the spell should keep us well hidden, as long as Steven doesn’t die.’
Pel appeared from below and reported, ‘One futtock cracked, sir, in the bow, just above the bilge. Probably caused by the initial impact.’
‘Then forget it,’ Captain Ford said decisively. ‘We need you up here. If we make it to port alive, we’ll patch it when the tide turns, but right now we’re running empty, and I don’t care if we take on some water – it won’t slow us much more than a bit of extra ballast. We’ve nearly flown up here this Moon. Dragging our backsides will make honest sailors out of us again.’
‘Aye, aye, sir.’
‘Now, see to those foresails, on my mark…’
Between then, they got the Morning Star into position and as she caught the northerly wind – the real wind – she glided towards the inlet with ease. Content with both heading and speed, Ford handed the wheel to Pel and turned to Brexan.
‘Time to deal with Marrin,’ he said soberly.
*
Marrin lay unconscious in the captain’s cabin, breathing in shallow gasps. The spider-beetle’s venom had polluted his blood. No one knew when it had burrowed inside his ear canal – it might have been in there for days, ever since the tan-bak killed Sera and Tubbs – but the poison had travelled too far. Gilmour watched the patient and tried to make sure Marrin’s vital systems continued to function, though he had no idea what he would do were one to shut down.
The others searched the ship for more spider-beetles, but if there were more of the insect hunters on board, they were well hidden.
Now Pel, Garec, Brexan and Kellin emerged on deck; no one wanted to miss Ford navigating the Welstar River.
When they passed the trawler, the Malakasian fishermen barely gave the graceful brig-sloop a second glance. Brexan said, ‘It does look like Steven’s cloaking spell is still working.’
‘And it might save our lives.’ Captain Ford agreed. ‘It’s as if they see us but don’t realise they’re seeing us.’
‘Look, that man – the captain maybe – he’s looking straight through us.’
‘Let’s hope it works on the whole city.’
The brig-sloop came around the final point, hugging the shore, towards a rocky, windswept jetty, brushed green with a narrow strip of pine forest. Beyond, the Welstar River spread out before them, at least five times as wide as the Medera River in Orindale and looking more like a great lake.
No one spoke at first; they all worried that the slightest sound would bring the full attention of the Malakasian capital down on their little ship.
‘Well, there it is,’ Captain Ford said at last, ‘a veritable highway of bad news for us.’
‘You can do it,’ Brexan said, full of admiration for his skill that morning.
‘Hold your breath,’ he warned, ‘here we go.’
Gilmour’s estimation of Malakasian strength looked to be quite accurate. They could see several patrol boats, flanked by two heavily armoured schooners that were plying the deeper water between the city and a strip of sand on the east bank near the jetty. Two barges passed off the Morning Star’s bow, one headed north towards a big galleon moored near the main wharf and another tacking south towards the naval schooners and customs boats.
‘Well, that certainly cuts off any escape route upriver,’ Ford murmured.
‘But they don’t seem to see us,’ Brexan said.
‘Or if they do, maybe they’re mistaking us for a fishing boat, one of the locals working the shallows. There was a whole fleet of them down there this morning.’
‘As big as we are?’
‘Steven’s your friend, you tell me: is he strong enough to make us look like a fishing boat? I, for one, hope so.’
‘What about when we get downriver? And look out for those barges!’
‘Brexan, would you just let me steer the ship? I’ve been doing this for a long time; I’m not going to ram a barge.’ He focused his gaze north and, despite all that had happened, stifled a laugh.
Brexan said, ‘It looked like you were heading straight into that one – this is frightening enough without you showing off!’
‘Showing off?’ He scowled. ‘We can’t be more than half an aven from certain death, and you accuse me of showing off?’
‘Well…’
‘Well, what?’
‘Well, how often do you have attractive young women here watching your every move?’ she said teasingly, easing the tension.
‘All the rutting time,’ he shot back, ‘and let me remind you that with your Seron-crooked smile, you may not be the most attractive visitor this quarterdeck has ever seen.’ He altered their heading slightly, bearing away from the schooners.
‘Oh, really? You think so?’
‘Oh, really, yes,’ he grinned, ‘our Tubbs attracted all sorts of fine-looking women, I can assure you!’
‘Tubbs?’ Brexan burst out laughing, then covered her face when she noticed Garec and Kellin, both deadly serious, looking at her. She caught her breath and asked, ‘So what about north of us? Why aren’t there more boats down there?’
‘I don’t-’ He broke off mid-sentence and stared.
‘What is it?’
‘I think it’s the reason our Malakasian friends don’t have additional patrols working the stretch of water from the wharf to the centre of the river.’ He pointed.
‘I don’t see any… Oh.’
The shipmates instinctively moved together as they spotted the three massive frigates emerging like ghost ships over the horizon, dwarfing their escorts, a little fleet of cutters and schooners. There was no mistaking the frigates, which had obviously come through the Northeast Channel and were now making way – with haste, it appeared – towards the Pellia waterfront.
‘That’s him,’ Captain Ford said. ‘The downriver patrols have gone out with the harbourmaster. I’ll bet it’s not every day ships like that come in, let alone three at a time.’
Brexan was beaming. ‘Then we made it. We did it. We’re here ahead of him. Granted, it may only be by a few avens, but we did it.’ She hugged him, briefly but with genuine affection.