“Take what you want, woman. My crew have suffered enough,” said the captain, in his late thirties, blood showing on his shirt from a number of cuts. At least here was a captain who would fight with his crew, unlike many they had recently come across. “We will put up no more fight.”
“Thank you, Captain. I do appreciate it,” said Gilstrap. “However, I am faced with a quandary. You have a ship full of goods bound for Kingshold. I want said goods. The only problem is my ship is full. You see, we are very good at our work. So how can we, as they say in Trima, have our cake and eat it, too?”
The Edland captain looked visibly troubled but refused to answer.
“Yes. I think you know the answer. Captain Ba, you are hereby relieved of your vessel. And so, you and your crew suddenly find yourselves without jobs, or a home, in the middle of the North Sea. But never let it be said Captain Nini Gilstrap is not one to help fellow sailors in a time of need. You can join us if you like, on probationary terms, of course.”
Captain Ba spat at her feet. Kolsen admired his balls, if not his good sense. “Never. Edlanders don’t make pirates. You can all rot in hell!”
“I was afraid you might say that.” Gilstrap nodded and the pirate minders of each crew member drew knives and set to work. She turned away from the carnage and shook her head. “Mister Talbot!”
“Yes, Captain,” called her first mate.
“You are captain of The Dolphin’s Prize,” she said, gripping his hand and shaking it. “See it to Cloudscar. This has proven to be quite the profitable season. Choose your crew, clean up, and then be on your way!”
Talbot took a crew of twenty-five aboard The Dolphin’s Prize, and he named Kolsen as his first mate. Mareth and Karr came along, too. He wasn’t sure whether Talbot had chosen the two of them because the new captain assumed Kolsen had a connection to them or if he just wanted to keep an eye on the other new guys.
It didn’t matter to Kolsen. He certainly wasn’t going to feel responsible for them. The only thing that did matter was that he was first mate, even if only for the week it would take to sail to port. Opportunity presented itself again.
Mareth looked increasingly out of sorts. He’d had a haunted look in his eyes in the days since the old Dolphin’s Prize crew had been disposed of, and Kolsen had noticed him keeping to himself. Kolsen had approached him the night before with a cup of rum, only to find him two cups in and looking surly. Well, it wasn’t his fault if Mareth couldn’t handle it.
Karr, meanwhile, had been adopted by all the crew as a lucky token. It had been his shot with the crossbow that had taken out one of the ballista crew and allowed enough time for others to respond. Apparently, the wiry little streak of snot had been something of a crack shot hunter working with his da, more at home in the trees of the forest than out on the sea.
As the sun set that night, Kolsen was enjoying his dinner, sitting on the deck with Talbot and a few others. The new captain preferring the company of the crew instead of the former captain’s quarters of the Edland ship. Kolsen saw Mareth approach from the corner of his eye. The bard touched Kolsen’s shoulder and bade him to follow to a quiet spot away from listening ears.
“What is it, Mareth?” asked Kolsen.
“I need to get off the ship. I can’t do this,” said Mareth, his eyes darting from side to side, a twitch appearing at the corner of his mouth. “How can you stay here? You saw what happened to those people.”
“Mareth, I didn’t want to tell you before,” said Kolsen, resting his hands on the bard’s shoulders and looking him in the eyes. “I made my decision for this life a long time ago. Before we met.”
“You were a pirate before? Is that why you were in jail?”
“No. I told you the real reason I was there. But I was a pirate before, just as I am now. And I’m a good one. It’s business. People get hurt in mines, or in wars, even minding cattle. Piracy is a risk of working at sea. It’s always been that way. There’s nothing personal in it.”
“Nothing personal?” Mareth tried not to shout, his voice coming out as an angry whisper. “Did you see those corpses after they’d all been stabbed a dozen times? I need to get off, and I need you to be able to do it. You owe me. I’ve saved your life twice now. Once back there when you lost your ear, and you and the boy wouldn’t have made it in that rowboat if it wasn’t for me. You owe me two.”
“I got you off The Scythe,” hissed Kolsen. “You’d be hanging from a Pienzan gibbet.”
“Ok. That’s one. So, you still owe me one, Kolsen.”
Kolsen looked down at his feet. He hated to admit it, but Mareth was right. Now the question was, did he have to do anything about it?
“What are you thinking?” Kolsen asked reluctantly.
“We make off in a longboat again. It’s a week to Cloudscar, but less to land if we head south. We can be prepared with food and water and a sail. But I need you to sail us.”
“How would we get away? Are we going to shout ‘look over there’ and then make a run for it?”
“I have a plan. Tomorrow night, when everyone is drinking, I will put them to sleep.” Mareth paused when he saw Kolsen’s face. “You remember how I stopped us all from getting hungry on the boat. Well, I can put people to sleep with a song, too. Especially if they’ve been drinking. Not much call for it normally, wanting your punters to go to sleep. But I can do it. You believe me, right?”
“I believe you,” said Kolsen, his mind racing, considering the alternatives. “OK, we can do it. Tomorrow night. You get the supplies ready and I’ll get everyone in one place.”
“Thanks, Kolsen, I mean it. You will save my soul.”
“Don’t thank me yet. Still a bloody crazy plan.”
Kolsen walked back to the group assembled around Captain Talbot, once more entering the ring of laughter and bawdy humor.
“What’s up with your mate, lad?” asked Talbot. “He’s had a bit of a sulk on him. Is he missing someone from The Icicle?”
“No, nothing like that, Captain,” said Kolsen. “He’s an artistic type. A fully trained bard, and he misses performing. He’d like to sing for everyone tomorrow night.”
“Well, of course he can. It’s about time we had a proper celebration for capturing this beauty,” he said, gesturing at the ship. “We can afford to take it easy for one night. We’re well ahead of Captain Gilstrap, what with her damaged mast. Tell him we’ll have a proper party, and he can be the center of attention.”
“Aye, aye, Captain,” said Kolsen, a smile spreading across his face as he snapped a salute.
The sun had set, the sails had been taken in, and a barrel of ale and a cask of rum had been brought up from below decks. Cups were full, and a freshly slaughtered goat provided a rich stew better than anything eaten in weeks. Dice were rolled, arms were wrestled, and so began a pirate party.
Kolsen stood on a crate midships and called for attention. Eventually, Talbot banging on the floor with a stout stick did the trick.
“Good evening, ladies and gentlemen,” he called, and laughter followed at the honorific. “Captain Talbot promised you a piss-up and a piss-up you shall have. And so, to entertain you this fair evening, I bring you, all the way from the Bard’s college in Longford: Mareth!”
Mareth walked out from the aft castle, dressed in the previous captain’s finery and carrying a lute found somewhere, its owner no longer of the ship. He had washed and shaved, his hair tied loosely at the nape of his neck, and he looked to Kolsen more alive than at any time since they had met those many weeks past. Mareth sauntered over to take Kolsen’s place on the makeshift stage. He bowed once and strummed a chord.
The bard launched into an old sea shanty which got the feet stomping. Someone sitting next to Talbot tried to join the chorus with his cracked voice, but the captain clouted him with his stick and he quickly stopped to let Mareth sing. Song followed song, drink followed drink, and Kolsen smiled, not knowing if it was from the drink or Mareth’s voice. He saw the same joy in the fa
ces of his comrades, and people soon got to their feet to dance.
A full moon rose in the deep blue night sky, filled with twinkling stars. Mareth paused only to take an occasional sip from a cup of ale. Kolsen danced, too, though he was tiring and wanted to stop. Eventually, he was exhausted and flopped onto a coil of rope to take a breath.
What was he doing? he thought. Mareth had told him to put wax in his ears and he had forgotten to do so. He pulled two pieces of candle wax from a pouch, warmed them in his hands until the material became malleable and pushed them into his ears, which instantly dulled the noises of the celebration and allowed him to hear the sound of the sea in his head.
All around Kolsen, the other pirates were collapsing onto makeshift seats or the bare deck to rest. Mareth stepped from his stage, and though the sound was now muted, Kolsen could sense the tempo change in the bard’s singing. A feeling of warmth and contentment nagged at the edge of his weary muscles. Kolsen took to pinching himself on the arm to maintain his focus, as one by one the pirates fell asleep.
Mareth stopped singing and gently put down the lute, leaning it against the mast. Kolsen could see Mareth’s mouth move, but he couldn’t hear anything over the rushing of the waves in his head or through the veil of fog that had descended over him. Kolsen breathed deeply until the veil lifted enough for him to realize he needed to pull the wax from his ears.
“They’re all out,” said Mareth. “Let’s go.”
“How do you do that?” asked Kolsen as he struggled to his feet, his left leg tingly and half-asleep.
“No time for chit-chat. I’ll get the supplies, you get the boat ready.” Mareth disappeared down the steps to below deck while Kolsen stood waiting. He was in two minds about his plan. He owed Mareth, but there was an opportunity here. His indecision took root and held him in place.
“What are you still doing here?” asked Mareth once he returned a few minutes later to find Kolsen rooted to the spot.
“Mareth, I—”
A cough came from behind them. They both turned to see Talbot getting to his feet. “Gotta piss,” he slurred. The captain looked around at the sleeping pirates before seeing Mareth and Kolsen. “Bloody lightweights!” And without waiting for an answer, he stumbled up the stairs to the aft castle, already trying to untie his trousers.
“Shit,” exclaimed Mareth, “look we’ve got to g—”
Kolsen sucker punched him in the jaw. The bard’s eyes rolled back in his head as he melted to the floor. Kolsen dragged him over to lean against another slumbering corsair and made a passing attempt at making him comfortable.
“I’m sorry, Mareth,” said Kolsen, though the bard was unconscious. “I will not pass this up. Let’s say I owe you two now.”
Captain Talbot leaned against the railing, sighing as a hot stream of piss sailed out through the night sky and into the sea at the rear of The Dolphin’s Prize. Ever since he’d been stuck by a pointy little rapier in a particularly nasty scrap, he’d had a problem of needing to piss every couple of hours, even during the night. He had cursed it to any who would listen, and Kolsen should have remembered.
That was the thought occupying Kolsen’s still foggy mind as he willed his tired limbs to creep as silently as possible behind his captain, holding a wrung staff claimed from the carpenter’s supplies. That was the thought that occupied his mind and made Kolsen’s reactions a second too late.
Talbot had finished relieving himself, unaware of the threat creeping up behind him. He leaned over to pick up his trousers from around his ankles at the precise moment the length of stout wood whizzed over where his head had been seconds previously.
Kolsen, expecting Talbot’s head to do the job for him, was not braced to stop his swing. He spun with the momentum, allowing Talbot’s danger-experienced subconscious to take over. The captain let go of his trousers and made a grab for Kolsen. He dropped the staff, and turning, punched the older man in the stomach. The wind left Talbot in a rush, but flinging up an elbow, he caught Kolsen in the side of his head, where his ear once was, the wound still raw.
It hurt like hell. Kolsen’s stitches had busted. One hand foolishly went up to defend his non-ear from further attack, opening himself up to Talbot’s rising knee, which drove into his balls. Kolsen revised his opinion. That hurt like hell.
And then the world lurched. Kolsen felt one hand on his groin and another on the shirt about his neck as he was lifted bodily into the air, above the captain’s head. With a grunt, Kolsen was jettisoned from the ship.
The pain in his head and his bollocks felt unconstrained by the physical world, existing only in a bubble of himself sailing through the air. He hit the surface of the water hard, the shock of the impact twisting his neck. Kolsen sank below the waves as Captain Talbot collapsed onto his bare behind, breathing hard and wondering what the hell was going on.
Kolsen plunged into the dark water, his eyes open but his arms and legs not responding to his brain’s desperate pleas to claw his way to the surface. The pain in his groin had disappeared, along with any other sensation below his neck.
This is how it ends, he thought, though he continued to hold his breath as if there was still a way he could propel himself to the surface to gulp more sweet fresh air.
He noticed shapes darting around him; sleek grey blurs, moving fast. Sharks. What would be a better way to go? Drown or be ripped apart? But as he saw the creatures more closely, he saw their smooth, vaguely canine faces. Seals.
Seals were always considered to be lucky by the common seafarer, so much so he’d seen many a seafarer wearing a sealskin cloak, although how that was lucky for the seal he’d never understood.
The mammals swam around him, and then one came straight toward him, and though he knew he was slowly sinking, it stayed with him.
As Kolsen gazed into the eyes of the seal, the face flickered to reveal a beautiful woman with dark hair waving around her head like a halo. She was clothed in a robe that sparkled like starlight, the ends of the fabric floating like tendrils sensing the deep. Her hands and feet gently moved, swimming, as Kolsen so desperately wanted to be able to do, webbing visible between her fingers and toes.
“Greetings, Vin Kolsen,” said the selkie. “You have returned to us too soon. Why are you here?”
Kolsen didn’t know what to do. He found himself compelled to respond, and though his chest burned, he didn't want to release his breath, and he couldn’t gesture when his arms wouldn’t move.
“You can speak,” she whispered. “Nothing more can happen to you now.”
“How?” Was all he dared try at first, but no water rushed into his lungs. Confused, he continued. “How is this possible?”
“Because I willed it. Here at your end, you remember your heritage.”
“I will die then?” he asked, shocked at the confirmation, though he already knew it was true.
“You are already dead,” said the selkie. “You failed. You had so much opportunity, but it has been wasted.”
“What did you say about my heritage?”
“You are of the selkie. Your mother was my half-sister, did you not ever wonder about your feet?”
“I wondered. Children said I was cursed. My ma always said it was because I would be a famous seaman. Can I change shape like you?”
“Ha, you are funny, Kolsen.” She tilted her head as she looked him, her brow furrowed and the barest upturn of her lips made him think of his mother, when he was a child and she would try to reassure him that everything would be ok. “No, you cannot. I had hoped to meet you one day, to point you in the direction that would please me and your family. But it looks like I was too late.”
“What would you have had me do?”
“Sow chaos on the seas. At a greater scale than you have done before. These humans grow too quickly, they poison our seas and steal our fish. They club our kin and wear their hides as trophies. I know you cannot wipe them out, though I would like it if you did, but you could have made a mark.”
&nbs
p; “Yes,” said Kolsen, suddenly understanding what had been driving him all of his life. “Yes. Let me do this for you.”
The selkie tilted her head to look at him. “You are dead; though I could fix that.” She considered him. “You need to command this ship. You must move faster. I am tired of waiting.”
“That’s what I was doing. The bloody bard made me too sleepy. I can take care of Talbot, but the ship’s not mine then. It will be sold when we reach port. The crew will never let me steal it.”
“If you need the yellow metal, then I can give it to you. To the south, there is a bay with trees all around and four rocks which step out to sea. The bay is deep, and a ship of southerners is there, full of shiny metal. They are repairing their ship after getting caught in a storm. They have come from the west. Take them and get what you need.”
“It must be a Pyrfew ship,” Kolsen said to himself. Plans bubbled up again, like his never-ending last breath rising to the surface. “I shall do it. Thank you. Tell me, what is your name?”
“I am Xataniel. Go.” Kolsen’s aunt grabbed him by the face and pulled his lips toward hers. Powerless to resist, he thought a kiss on the lips a strange goodbye, but it was no kiss. She sucked the air from his lungs with one deep breath until everything went black.
Kolsen stood on the deck of The Dolphin’s Prize. The staff in his hands, and Captain Talbot sat in front of him on his bare buttocks, breathing the deep-contented breaths of someone dreaming.
Kolsen held the staff high above his head and brought it down with a crack.
Mareth stood on the docks of Cloudscar and waved goodbye to the departing, newly renamed, Juniper. He couldn’t see if Captain Kolsen waved back, but he doubted it. Bastard.
Mareth had awoken on board The Dolphin’s Prize, the crew desperately looking for Captain Talbot. No one found him.
Tales of Kingshold Page 10