by Mel Odom
“So he says. He’s tellin’ big stories over breakfast down in the galley. How the two of ye faced down thirty or forty goblinkin, squared off against a den full of magical wooden snakes, an’ took on an evil wizard.”
Juhg started to interrupt, then decided not to. During the brief interlude between the dregs of the night and dawn, he’d set down the events in his journal. He’d transcribed an accurate accounting of the sortie aboard the goblin ship, which was adventurous enough in its own right, but he’d been with Windchaser’s crew long enough to enjoy a proper whopper of a story. He decided to let Raisho’s tale stand.
“It isn’t something I’d like to repeat in the near future,” Juhg said. “Or any time ever.”
Herby shook his head and sighed as he leaned against the ship’s railing. “I can’t believe ye had to leave all them jewels an’ gold behind.”
“Jewels and gold?”
Nodding, Herby said, “Raisho’s tellin’ everybody about the treasure that ship carried. Why, half the crew’s ready to pick a fight with them goblinkin just to have a chance at all them riches.”
“That,” Juhg said, “would be dangerous.”
“Aye.” Herby’s eyes gleamed with larceny. “An’ a prize worth takin’ the chance for.” He wiped his nose with the back of his hand. “Accordin’ to the cap’n, we may well get that chance, too.”
“What are you talking about?”
“The cap’n’s got his spies out an’ about. Medgar an’ Toryn. Out there spyin’ on the goblinkin. Findin’ out what they can about her business.”
“They could get caught.”
Herby grinned. “Aye, they could. An’ that’s what makes it all excitin’. But they won’t. They’s the best spies what the cap’n has. ’Cept me. But he don’t see it that way.”
“The captain told you this? That we might try to take the goblinkin ship?” Juhg kept his voice low so it wouldn’t carry far across the water.
During the night, the goblins had managed to put the fire out aboard the ship. As it turned out, Raisho and Juhg had only just missed the return of several of the ship’s crew bringing supplies. Under the cover of darkness, Juhg, Raisho, and Captain Attikus had watched the goblin crew extinguish the flames.
The corpses of the three goblins who had served guard duty last night still hung from the ’yards. Pelicans and seagulls warred over their flesh with clacking beaks, raking talons, and flapping wings.
The ship struck by the wizard’s fireball had suffered a similar fate. Unable to save their ship, the crew had abandoned the vessel and left her to a brutal death. The flames had consumed her down to the waterline until they burned out. Precious little cargo was saved, but the captain had put crews in skiffs out to do what they could. Her blackened husk sat out in the harbor while small sailing vessels lashed chains to her so they could drag her from the harbor.
The goblinkin worked hurriedly on their ship, making repairs as best as they were able. But goblins, though seafaring in their own right, had never mastered the true hand of sailors. The ship was patched together right enough that she could sail, but Juhg would have hated to trust her out on the open sea.
“The cap’n,” Herby said, “why, he didn’t tell me, of course. But I heard it just the same.”
“You were listening at his window again.”
Herby lifted his shoulders and dropped them. “I just like to be kept informed, is all. I draw a ship’s pay from ’Chaser same as ever’ other man on this ship.”
Juhg eyed the goblin vessel doubtfully. Windchaser had a seasoned crew aboard her and the promise of riches would draw her sailors’ courage.
For himself, he could scarcely keep his thoughts from the mysterious book. If the book were the prize, would he go willingly to attack a goblin ship? The itch inside him to see the book, to peruse the pages, grew strongly and deeply.
* * *
Despite his fatigue, Juhg labored in the heat of the day. He sat on the ratlines spun like an immense spider’s web along Windchaser’s prow and worked in his book with charcoal. Traveling with Grandmagister Lamplighter had trained him to work with a fine hand in ships while at anchor or at sea, though he hadn’t thought the skill or compulsion would continue long after he’d said his goodbyes at the Vault of All Known Knowledge. As an added benefit, working in charcoal was generous, allowing him to blend smudges into the illustrations he so feverishly drew.
He framed the pages in his journal quickly and neatly, working one after the other while he munched sandwiches of jerked taupig, sliced cucumbers, tangy peppered lemonfrass, and drizzled with sweet apple-mustard. He didn’t try to fill the images he drew with details, just applied enough lines and shading to get the overall image blocked out so he could better render them later. He let his mind roam, picking the memories he intended to capture of the events last night, as well as what he saw going on aboard the goblin ship now.
Three pages held eleven images of the wizard. Juhg drew the man in profile, as well as full frontal and from the back. He added as many of the arcane symbols as he could, feeling that he dared much because one of those icons of power on the wizard’s robes might inadvertently rise from the page and strike him dead for daring such an affront.
Or perhaps one of those symbols might afford the wizard the ability to spy on him through the book. Juhg didn’t know. But he felt certain that if he could remember enough details, Craugh might be able to identify the man from his robes. Despite the fact that the world seemed to teem with humans, only a few of them became wizards, and fewer still of those ever managed power enough to fling fireballs.
A few of the pages showed pictures of the mysterious book as he had seen it. He drew pictures of it by itself, and of the way it was placed in the drawer. A historian oftentimes never knew the true significance of what he chose to record.
He copied the writing he’d seen on the front as best as he could, but he couldn’t be certain how much of it, if any, was correct. Looking back on things now, he wished he’d chosen to study the book better before reaching for it and triggering the magical defenses the wizard had placed on the book. But the book had lain right there, seemingly his for the taking. A quick flight up the ladder and he could have been gone with the book.
Juhg sighed at his own impatience.
In times past, Grandmagister Lamplighter had urged caution before moving too swiftly through a thing. The Grandmagister had tempered his remonstration through examples of his own past ineptness, which was only one of the things that had won Juhg over to him. Besides being the Grandmagister, Edgewick Lamplighter had also been very much a simple dweller. But he hadn’t lived a simple life since the crew of One-Eyed Peggie had shanghaied him all those years ago.
Taking a break for a moment, Juhg finished his last sandwich, then dropped the crusts and crumbs into the water. Fish that had gathered in the shadows on the lee side of Windchaser puckered their lips and took the crumbs with gulping kisses. He glanced up at the goblin ship and watched her crew lower her sails. The wind brought the canvas to full bloom in heartbeats.
The fire aboard the goblin ship had left soot patterns that stained the canvas, but the sails caught and held the wind easily enough.
Rising to his feet, surefooted among the ratlines after all his time at sea and possessing a dweller’s innate sense of balance and movement, Juhg closed his journal and shoved his stick of charcoal into the cloth bag that held his writing instruments. As far away from other ships as they were, there was little chance that any ship’s crew in the harbor could have seen what he was doing.
Slowly, the goblin ship came around in the harbor. She tacked into the wind, maneuvering back and forth until she could properly come about. Once the other ships’ captains had a proper chance to see how badly the goblins handled their craft, a few of the nearer ones moved away, giving the goblin vessel more room to maneuver. Hoarse shouts and curses drifted across the harbor water, and sailors hung out from the rigging to yell imprecations at the goblin crew.
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Coming about to starboard, the goblin ship slid into a merchanter stern hard enough to crack timbers. Still, the goblins kept their vessel turning till she nudged free of the other ship and put her head more properly away from the wind. The merchanter’s crew ran astern to check out any possible damage. Their ensuing curses told Juhg that the goblins had splintered her rudder.
Once the ship was pointed out to sea, the goblin crew turned her sails to catch the wind. The dark patterns of smoke stood out against even the grimy and tattered canvas the ship carried. But she moved.
The ratlines under Juhg’s feet shifted as they took on weight. He glanced over his shoulder and spotted Raisho coming forward to join him.
“The goblin ship’s under way,” Juhg said, feeling the need to say something.
“Aye.” Raisho nodded. “That she is.”
“Does Captain Attikus know?” Juhg caught himself. Of course the captain knew. Captain Attikus was a fine sailing man. “I mean, did he know she was about to set sail?”
“The cap’n knew, right enough. Medgar an’ Toryn brought him word of it. Them goblins, they took on supplies an’ hired out some of the ship’s repairs.” Raisho grinned. “After last night, ’pears her cap’n didn’t have the stomach to stay an’ risk another thief.”
“A thief?”
Raisho shrugged. “That’s the scuttlebutt bein’ told in the harbor. Course, nobody believes a goblin ship would have anythin’ worth stealin’. If’n they did, why, they’d be back on their way to a goblin city port down South where the weather’s better an’ they could spend their ill-gotten gain like proper pirates.”
Quiet concern filled Juhg as he watched the goblin vessel sailing away. “They were here for a reason.”
“Aye, but Medgar an’ Toryn, they didn’t get a glimmer of what that reason were.”
Juhg watched the goblin ship sail through the narrow confines of the harbor mouth. “What about the book?”
“No one knows. Since we got back with the news last night, the cap’n assigned Medgar an’ Toryn to watch over Blowfly—”
“Blowfly?”
Raisho nodded toward the departing ship. “That’s her name. Blowfly. Ye ask me, they done went an’ named her fair an’ proper, ’cause she’s got the stench of a corpse about her.”
“Where’s she bound?”
“Don’t know. Medgar, he figgers the crew don’t know either. Otherwise them goblins would have been talkin’ it up. He was listenin’ to the crew rail an’ rave in the taverns.” Raisho glanced at Juhg. “Wouldn’t be the first time a goblin cap’n kept its crew not knowin’ nothin’ about where they was headin’.”
A forlorn feeling swelled within Juhg. He felt as though he was letting Grandmagister Lamplighter down. “They’re getting away with the book, Raisho.”
“No.” Raisho showed him a white mirthless grin. “Them goblins, why, they ain’t gettin’ away with nothin’, bookworm. Cap’n Attikus, he’s givin’ ’em a lead, is all. Lettin’ ’em build their confidence afore he takes it all away. ’Chaser, she can cleave through the water faster’n that dirty pig ever thought of sailin’.” He glanced up at the sun and squinted. “Won’t be much longer afore we take off after her.”
“We’re going after Blowfly?” The possibility spun crazily in Juhg’s mind. He’d been part of ship-to-ship fighting in the past, seeing decks that ran red with blood and hearing the constant ring of steel against steel and screaming men’s voices, but years had passed since then. It was not an experience he was looking forward to repeating.
“Aye. We are. An’ we’ll catch her, right soon enough.”
“What about the wizard?”
“Wizards ain’t nothin’ but men.” Raisho spat into the water. “Some of ’em take a little more killin’ than others, but they die.” He winked at Juhg. “An’ if’n they wasn’t afeared of dyin’, why, they’d stay in the thick of things instead of hidin’ themselves away in castles an’ big houses an’ caves an’ islands an’ the like. No, them evil wizards don’t live among most folks ’cause they’s afeard of gettin’ a knife ’twixt their shoulder blades when they ain’t lookin’. Keeps ’em honest in town. To an extent.”
Uneasiness bounced in thick, greasy globs in Juhg’s stomach and made him feel sick. He was certain they’d barely escaped with their lives last night, and Raisho’s overly confident manner made him fearful for his friend. Confronting a wizard was never a good thing.
6
Pursuit
Near dusk, when Blowfly was at least half a day out to sea, Captain Attikus called a meeting in his cabin. His quartermaster, a quiet man of middle years named Lucius, and first mate, Navin, who was only a few years older than Raisho and was normally boisterous and outgoing, joined the captain.
Juhg and Raisho also stood in attendance.
The captain’s mood was somber. “We’ll weigh anchor and ride the eventide out to sea in just a bit. Make sure the men are fed proper and bundled up when they’re about the deck. I want them looking sharp as can be.”
“Aye, Cap’n,” Lucius said, and Navin echoed him.
Captain Attikus glanced at his mate. “Navin, you’ll take first shift. Keep the men on short watches. Rotate them so they stay rested and ready.”
“Aye, Cap’n,” Navin replied. His hand fiddled idly with the cutlass he wore at his side. The scars he bore on his face spoke of past battles, but they didn’t say whether he had won them or lost them.
“And remind them that hard tasks, like taking that goblin ship soon, are part of what they signed on to do when they took ship’s articles.”
“I will, Cap’n,” Navin declared. “But I won’t be havin’ to remind them much. This ship, Cap’n? Why, we’ve been bloody before, an’ we know we’ll be bloody again. You look around durin’ a boardin’, you won’t find a man in this crew what’s takin’ a lackluster step.”
“I’ll hold you to that, Navin,” the captain said in a gruff voice. “And tell the men that I’m proud of them.”
Juhg looked at each man in turn, studying them so that he could easily sketch the scene in his journal when time permitted. How can they so easily talk of possibly going to their deaths?
Even after reading treatises and biographies of warcraft and battles, Juhg struggled to comprehend what drove warriors, humans most of all, to seek out violent confrontations. The goblinkin were an easy study. Those foul creatures knew no other way of life, even among their own kind.
“Lucius, you’ll take the men after first watch,” Captain Attikus went on. He reached into a hidden compartment in the wall behind his desk and took out a sealskin container. Reaching into the container, he took out maps of the area. Only sailors who sailed the seas to protect Greydawn Moors and the Vault of All Known Knowledge had maps.
(During his tenure at the Library, Juhg had drawn maps. Grandmagister Lamplighter insisted that every Librarian know cartography well.)
Captain Attikus checked through the maps, then unfurled one across the desk. The paper was thick and limber as cloth, specially prepared down in the bowels of the Vault of All Known Knowledge, and held inks in the same color and same thickness as the day they were applied. The formula for making the paper had come from the books in the Library, one of the first things rescued from the higgledy-piggledy mess left by the armies that had delivered the books by the wagonload and shipload.
Lucius reached for the small lantern and raised it over their heads so the light might better strike the map.
“For now, we’ll assume Blowfly made for south,” Captain Attikus said. “If after two days’ sailing we haven’t caught up with the goblin ship, we’ll turn back north.”
“Ain’t much in the way of north,” Lucius commented. “Just colder an’ more miserable. Can’t see them botherin’ to head up that way.”
“Agreed.” Captain Attikus studied the map. “But we still don’t know what Blowfly and her captain are doing in these waters.”
“Or the wizard.” Only when the o
ther men looked at him did Juhg realize he’d spoken aloud. Embarrassment flamed his cheeks.
“I haven’t forgotten about the wizard, Librarian Juhg,” the captain said, gazing at him levelly. “If getting that book wasn’t impressed as important to me by my standing orders, I wouldn’t hasten to chase a wizard. I don’t much care for magic, and I’ve yet to find a seafaring man who does.”
“This wizard’s weak,” Raisho said. “He only had the one fireball in him last night.”
Captain Attikus shifted his attention to the young sailor and waited a beat before speaking. “Aye, Raisho, but I also see that one fireball was responsible for a lost ship this morning. I don’t mean for my ship to be counted as the next. And you don’t know if a fireball spell is the only thing that wizard is capable of.”
Raisho gave the captain a curt nod.
“I’ve studied the map and I know these waters,” the captain continued, glancing back at the parchment lying across the desk before them. “Goblinkin don’t trust sailing as a general rule and have only learned what they have of it for the plunder they can take.” He traced a finger along the coast of the mainland.
Juhg followed the captain’s directions. Much of the map Juhg already knew from his own journal he’d prepared for his journey back to the mainland.
“The goblinkin will hug the coast, never wanting to be far from it.” Captain Attikus’ finger stopped at a cluster of islands only a short distance from the coastline. “’Chaser’s fast enough to outrun them. We’ll hug the coastline, too, and beat them to the Tattered Islands.”
Juhg’s heart took a dive. He knew about the Tattered Islands and all the evil that was supposed to cling to them.
“The Tattered Islands,” Navin repeated with a small nervous quaver in his voice. “That’s a dangerous place, Cap’n. Full of jagged rocks an’ coral reefs.”
“I know,” Captain Attikus agreed. “Most captains swing out wide of the Tattered Islands, following along them rather than the mainland to avoid those rocks and those reefs. There are plenty of ships that lost their bottoms there and went down. I’m guessing that Blowfly’s captain will do no differently.” He studied the map. “We’re going to sail through the Tattered Islands.”