Explorer of the Endless Sea

by Jack Campbell

  Lars hesitated, thinking. “As long as the crew stays out of sight. We haven’t changed any parts of her, and we keep a neat ship.”

  Hachi smiled. “There may be a way to capture that Imperial ship without a sea fight. Without any fight at all.”

  “What’re you thinking, trickster?” Erin asked.

  “I am thinking that if we can get a dozen or so sailors into that captured legionary armor, we might be able to fool that Imperial sloop’s officers and crew into doing just what we want.” Hachi paused, pursing his lips in thought. “It would require me to expose myself as a pirate, but I wasn’t really planning on going back to my job in the Imperial bureaucracy anyway.”

  Jules turned to search the surrounding area, spotting one of her sailors. “Marta! Get Shin! He’s over that way! I need him to get into that dead centurion’s armor! And get a dozen more good men and women into armor as well! We need a force of fake legionaries and we need them fast.”

  * * *

  The light of the rising sun shone on the sails of the Imperial sloop as it glided up to the pier on the other side from the Star Seeker, lines going across to those waiting on the shore. Laborers from the town, told by Jules that they were volunteering to help and interspersed with pirates to keep them quiet, caught the lines and tied up the sloop.

  Jules, watching from a building just off the waterfront that offered good cover, watched the sloop’s crew furling their sails. Their movements were those of tired sailors with no trace of worry or alarm in their actions. “Go,” she told Shin.

  Shin gave her a proper legionary salute. With one hand casually resting on his breastplate in a way that covered the hole in it made by the Mechanic revolver, Shin led his group of disguised pirates out onto the waterfront.

  Jules winced as she watched how sloppily the pirates marched, but hopefully the sloop’s officers wouldn’t notice.

  Shin halted his group with a barked command, then walked to the foot of the brow, which the sloop’s crew had just set onto the pier. “I have orders for the captain,” he said, his voice carrying just the right note of authority.

  An Imperial officer appeared, her dark red uniform bearing signs it had been worn all night. “What is it, Centurion?”

  “Colonel Dar’n wishes to see the captain immediately.”

  Even from a distance, Jules could see resignation in the slump of the captain’s shoulders. She’d be expecting to get chewed out for not capturing the ship carrying Jules. But instead of immediately coming down the brow, the captain frowned at Shin. “I haven’t seen you before, Centurion.”

  “No, Captain,” Shin said without hesitating. “I came with the reinforcements on the Raptor’s Strike.”

  The captain looked over at the Storm Runner where it rode peacefully at anchor. “Why was the Raptor’s Strike sent here?”

  Shin shook his head. “I don’t know the reasons, Captain. The captain of the Raptor’s Strike is with Colonel Dar’n.”

  “Of course you wouldn’t know the reasons,” the captain grumbled, only the otherwise quiet of the waterfront letting her voice carry far enough for Jules to hear. “We thought we heard noises earlier from this direction, Centurion, while we were out waiting for the off-shore breeze to subside. Like the sound of Mechanic weapons. Did Mechanics come on that other ship anchored out there?”

  “No Mechanics came on that ship, Captain. What you heard was thunder,” Shin said, calmly reciting the explanation that Jules had suggested if the sound of the Mechanic weapons had carried.

  “From a clear sky?”

  “Yes, Captain. The weather is odd out here, I think.” As the captain frowned, Shin spoke in deferential tones. “Colonel Dar’n expressed his wish that you come right away.”

  The captain turned to another officer to give some orders, then walked down the brow and past Shin. Shin barked some more commands and led his “legionaries” in her wake, staying close behind the captain.

  Jules sized the captain up as she walked closer. Imperial dagger at her belt, of course, as well as a regulation straight Imperial officer’s sword. Nothing that couldn’t be handled.

  Fading back down the street as the captain and Shin’s escort approached, Jules stepped into an empty doorway past the point where the captain could be seen from the ship. She watched the captain stride past, eyes forward, looking tired but determined.

  Stepping out directly behind the captain, Jules placed the edge of her dagger across the captain’s throat. “Don’t—”

  Tired and surprised though she was, the captain reacted with impressive speed, dropping limply through Jules’ grasp and drawing her own dagger.

  Jules slashed at the captain, but her blow only cut a line down the side of the Imperial officer’s face.

  As the captain opened her mouth to shout a warning to her ship, Shin stepped behind her and swung the hilt of his legionary sword against the back of her head. Jules, her dagger aimed at the captain’s heart this time, shifted her blow as the captain dropped, instead stabbing her in one arm.

  “She’s a tough one,” Marta commented from where she stood among the rank of false legionaries.

  “Did anyone on the ship notice?” Jules asked Shin.

  Shin, looking back that way, shook his head. “I don’t see any signs of alarm.”

  “Good. Let’s get her gagged and bound.” Jules stepped back as her sailors did what sailors did well, knotting and tying ropes.

  As the task was completed, Captain Hachi strode up, wearing the suit of an Imperial bureaucrat. Jules raised her eyebrows at him as she took in the suit. Imperial rules dictated the garb worn by different levels of officials. She’d only occasionally glimpsed, from a distance, a suit like this one. “You didn’t tell us you were that high ranking an official,” she said to Hachi.

  He smiled. “I didn’t think you’d be all that impressed. I rose high enough in the ranks of the Imperial bureaucracy to be able to see that the path ahead would just be a more refined, politer, version of the cut-throat competition at lower levels. Being tired of that, I thought I’d try piracy as a more civilized alternative.”

  “You won’t be able to go back to that Imperial job once the crew of that sloop sees you,” Jules said.

  Hachi shrugged. “It’s not as if I liked the job. And in any event, I’d already decided I like this life better. You are Shin?” he asked.

  Shin nodded respectfully. “Yes, Captain.”

  “Excellency,” Hachi said. “I’m His Excellency again.”

  “Of course, Your Excellency,” Shin said.

  “We’ll wait a short time longer, long enough for the captain…where is the captain?”

  “We shoved her in there,” Gord said, pointing to the partly completed building next to them.

  “She can’t get loose?”

  “Blazes, no. Them knots are tight, and so’s the gag on her mouth. Even if she wakes up soon, all she’ll be able to do is think curses at us.”

  “Good.” Hachi looked over the fake legionaries. “You all look impressively dangerous. If we do this right, there shouldn’t be any fighting. Shin, you understand your role?”

  “I do, Your Excellency.”

  “I’ll be watching,” Jules said. “Erin and Lars are ready with a big force of pirates, out of sight of the pier but close.”

  “Then we are ready. Follow me,” Hachi said to Shin, and began walking with exaggerated dignity toward the pier.

  Shin led his fake legionaries behind Hachi, Jules following as well until she had to stop in concealment as the others marched on toward the Imperial sloop.

  As the group approached the sloop, the ship’s centurion met them. “How many I assist Your Excellency?”

  “Are you in charge?” Hachi asked, his voice having taken on the air of someone who knew his own status was superior to anyone else in the area.

  “No, Your Excellency. Captain Kathrin is ashore to meet with—”

  “I know that. Who is in charge in her absence?” Hachi said, s
ounding peeved at having to ask again.

  The Imperial officer who the captain had spoken with before leaving the ship walked quickly onto the pier. “I’m the second in command, sir. Lieutenant Martine.”

  “Lieutenant Martine.” Hachi looked him over skeptically. “All right. I have orders for you.”

  “From Colonel Dar’n?”

  “From the Emperor.” Hachi gave the nervous lieutenant a little time to absorb that information before he pointed toward the Storm Runner. “Do you see that ship? It brought me. Why do suppose someone of my rank was sent here?”

  “I…I do not know, Your Excellency.”

  Hachi sighed loudly, as if explaining was both tedious and annoying. “There is a spy among your crew.”

  “A…a spy?” the increasingly rattled lieutenant asked as the ship’s centurion stared in shock.

  “A spy for the Mechanics. Reporting to them what the Emperor’s loyal servants are doing. You were unaware of this,” Hachi added, making the simple statement sound menacing.

  The lieutenant looked at the ship’s centurion, who had taken on the look of someone who no longer wanted to be noticed and only shook his head at his officer. “We had no idea, Your Excellency. Of course not.”

  “You had no idea.” Hachi shook his head, his entire bearing that of someone carrying out a grim task. “Perhaps that can be overlooked, if the spy is captured quickly and smoothly enough. Get your entire crew onto the pier. I want them all here, lined up. Ensure none of them have weapons, not even those odd knives that sailors carry. And no armor. Your centurion will have to remove his, and you can leave your sword and dagger on the ship while telling your crew to get lined up here.”

  “The entire crew, your Excellency? Regulations say we have to leave a small watch team aboard at all times.”

  Hachi paused. “What was that? I was expecting to hear yes, Your Excellency, at once, Your Excellency, but instead there was something else. Must I repeat myself? Get your entire crew on the pier now, lined up for my inspection. No weapons, no armor. Your ship won’t go anywhere while you’re all standing right here, will it?”

  “No, Your Excellency,” the lieutenant said. “I mean, yes, Your Excellency. At once.” He turned to the ship’s centurion. “Pass the orders. Get the entire crew lined up without delay.”

  “Yes, Lieutenant Martine!”

  The lieutenant and the centurion ran onto the Imperial sloop, calling out orders.

  Hachi waited on the pier with outward signs of growing impatience of the sort only a real Imperial official would display as unarmed sailors and legionaries came tumbling off the sloop, hastily forming into three lines facing him.

  Lieutenant Martine came running down the brow again, his sword scabbard and dagger sheath empty. The centurion, having just finished a head count, saluted.

  “This is the entire crew, your Excellency,” Martine said. “Except for the captain, of course.”

  Hachi looked over the lines of sailors and legionaries with a cold glance that caused every member of the crew to stiffen with worry, then turned and gestured to Shin. “Centurion, take your detachment and search the ship. Ensure that no one is hiding.”

  Lieutenant Martine jerked with surprise. “But, Your Excellency—”

  “Are you questioning the Emperor’s orders? Again?”

  “No, sir!”

  Shin led his force of fake legionaries around the ranks of the crew. Jules saw the ship’s centurion take note of the sloppy marching, frowning in disapproval, but cowed by Hachi’s persona he said nothing.

  Once at the brow, instead of leading the fake legionaries aboard, Shin lined them up to block access to the ship, shields ready, facing the backs of the ranks of the crew.

  “What are they doing, Your Excellency?” Lieutenant Martine asked Hachi, bewildered.

  “You ask a lot of questions,” Hachi said.

  As the lieutenant quailed at the tone of Hachi’s voice, Captain Erin’s call echoed across the waterfront. “Forward!”

  Jules walked out of concealment and toward the pier as pirates erupted from nearby buildings and streets, their weapons gleaming. She joined them as they faced off against the shocked crew of the Imperial sloop. “Thank you,” Jules said to Hachi. “Your Excellency,” she added.

  “What…what…?” Lieutenant Martine asked, staring at the pirates and Hachi.

  “Surrender your crew and none will be harmed, on my word,” Jules told him.

  “I can’t—” Martine’s denial choked off as he realized what had happened, his unarmed crew blocked from getting back on the ship, and faced with large numbers of pirates brandishing weapons. His gaze went to the town as if expecting help to appear from there.

  “We’ve already defeated the Imperial soldiers here,” Captain Lars said. “They’re dead or prisoners.”

  “You and your crew can be dead,” Captain Erin said, “or prisoners. Your choice.”

  “Captain Kathrin—” Lieutenant Martine began to say.

  “Is already our prisoner,” Jules said.

  Lieutenant Martine stared at her, his eyes changing in an instant that told her what he’d do. Like Colonel Dar’n, he knew the price that would be paid for such a failure.

  An instant later, Martine hurled himself at her.

  Jules, having had that instant to prepare herself, twisted aside rather than meet the lieutenant’s charge head on. Her dagger caught his near arm, digging in and forcing it away, while Jules swung the guard of her cutlass against the side of Martine’s head. The crunch of the side of his skull breaking sounded unusually loud across the otherwise quiet waterfront, the blow knocking the lieutenant aside to fall limply onto the wooden planks of the pier. “Not this time,” Jules whispered.

  But Lieutenant Martine’s attack had bought a few moments for the rest of the Imperial crew to think, and now the ship’s centurion raised his voice. “You all know the price we’d pay at home if we surrender our ship without a fight or even a scratch on us! Follow me and die with honor!”

  With a roar mingling defiance and despair, most of the unarmed sailors and legionaries from the sloop followed their centurion in a charge back toward their ship. Shin’s false legionaries locked shields to meet the impact, holding the mass of bodies long enough for the pirates facing the ship to themselves charge the crew.

  But one large group from the sloop, perhaps following the lead of their lieutenant, charged toward Jules and the pirates around her.

  Jules knew what bare hands could do in a fight, especially when they belonged to desperate men and women. She brought her cutlass and dagger up, catching the first Imperial woman sailor to reach her on the blade and twisting it to force her aside. She yanked the dagger free as a second sailor pushed close enough to grab Jules’ arm holding the cutlass. She took a step back, stabbing with the dagger and plunging it into his side, but the sailor hung on and punched her with his free hand.

  Jules slashed the dagger at the man’s eyes, causing him to flinch back, following up with another stab into his chest.

  The press of bodies forced her back another step as another Imperial sailor lunged at her, but a moment later the group of attackers was swamped by pirates hitting them from both sides.

  Jules pulled herself away from the struggle, looking across the pier. A normal fight was marked by the loud clanging of blade on blade and the thuds of impacts against armor. Not this fight, though. The unarmed Imperials fought only with their hands, so the noise of the struggle was marked by the screams and cries of those fighting and injured, and over all that the sickening crunching sound as bones broke under the merciless blows of the pirates.

  The ship’s centurion went down under Shin’s blade as he strove to break the shield wall blocking access to the ship. Around him, the rest of the frantic Imperials fell like wheat before a harvest scythe as the pirates pressed in from all sides.

  Pressed together too tightly to fight, those of the Imperial crew that were still standing fell one by one as the p
irates continued to rain blows on them.

  “That’s enough!” Captain Lars bellowed. “They’re done! Stop this!”

  “Aye!” Captain Erin shouted. “It’s over! Break it off, you louts!”

  Jules, wondering why she hadn’t shouted the same command, watched the surviving Imperials give up as their desperation gave way to hopelessness. Something finally clicked inside of her, though, as she took in the dead and wounded Imperials lying on the pier. “They’d have a healer on that ship. See if their healer is still alive! Someone get the healers from the ships, and you, Kyle, find the town healer and get her here.”

  “Blazes, that was ugly,” Erin muttered as she came up to Jules. “Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine,” Jules said, not feeling anything inside as she stooped to wipe blood off of her dagger and cutlass.

  She straightened to find Captain Hachi, his suit somehow still unmarked, looking soberly at the remnants of the fight. “My plan wasn’t as successful as I hoped,” he said. “See how little I still know of people, even after all these years of learning how to manipulate them.”

  “You know why they fought,” Jules said. “It couldn’t be helped. And we might’ve lost a lot of our own trying to fight them any other way.”

  “Pirates have their virtues,” Hachi said. “But they’re not soldiers. If you mean for towns like this to stand on their own, they’ll need soldiers to defend them and fight their battles.”

  “Then we’ll get soldiers,” Jules said, willing coldness to fill her as she gazed at the dead and injured. She’d known that the path she’d set for herself would likely take her through such things, but seeing the reality in the light of the morning sun still tore at her.

  “We?” Erin asked as she walked up. “Are you thinking the rest of us will be at your beck and call? I’m a pirate. If I wanted to fight wars, I’d have joined the legions and gotten myself a shiny set of armor.”

  “No one’s expecting you to serve my dreams,” Jules said. Not wanting to discuss it any longer, she turned to face toward the town. “We need to have a talk with the captain of this ship.”

  “I’ll get Lars,” Erin said.