The Seven Signs: Three Book Collection

by D. W. Hawkins

  Bethany looked down. “Well, I didn’t know, exactly, but it wasn’t hard to see what was happening. I didn’t want to hurt him, but he was going to hurt us.”

  “Exactly,” Dormael said, lifting the girl’s chin. “It’s never a good thing to hurt people, but sometimes it’s necessary. But the way you know that you’re not evil, that you’re not cold, is that you think about it a lot afterward. Maybe you feel bad, even. If you were evil, little one, you wouldn’t stop to pay it attention. Do you understand?”

  “I think so.”

  “Does it make you feel bad?”

  Bethany nodded, and snuggled in closer beside him. Dormael put his arm around her, and tousled her hair again.

  “That’s how you know, then,” he said. “There’s nothing cold about you.”

  “Alright.”

  “And don’t get too twisted up about what other people think,” he said.

  “Yeah,” Bethany replied. “Let them be fat, stupid, and scared.”

  Dormael laughed, and spent the rest of the evening telling the girl stories about witches and pirates in the bogs. She was especially interested in the pirates, but Dormael noticed the odd glance from one of the crewmen in response to her enthusiasm. He ignored them. After all, they had no idea that the Pirate-Queen of the Seas was on board their ship. Let them quail in terror.

  The next two days passed in much the same fashion as the first, though a downpour on the third afternoon made Dormael wish he could use magic. It left the air with a biting chill, and Dormael spent most of the evening huddled under a blanket. He watched Bethany playing her games with the crew, and smiled when she showed him her eleven marks. The girl was collecting quite a purse of coins.

  On the fourth morning, Dormael awoke to a deck shrouded in mist. He pushed the blanket aside and saw D’Jenn standing over him, scowling over the railing. Dormael pushed himself to his feet and looked around, noting the wet halos the lanterns cast in the still, predawn air. The Midwife slid through the water in silence, and it gave the scene an eerie cast.

  “You know what this means,” D’Jenn said.

  “We’ve made it to Farra-Jerra,” Dormael replied. “We’re in the bogs.”

  ***

  The air was as still as warm soup.

  Fog choked the sunlight for most of the day, leaving the landscape to float by in hazy, gray outlines. The loudest noises were the offhand curses of crewmembers, or the cawing of a distant birds. Sounds echoed through the brume like calls through a deathly veil.

  The Midwife hosted an oar-deck below, but could push no more than ten oars at a time. A ship her size was made to sail, and she was tough to maneuver in the dead wind of the Farra-Jerran swamps. The oars were barely adequate to slide her along at a crawling pace, leaving long, quiet waves slipping toward the broken shoreline. The captain had an entire watch keeping their eyes on the river, looking for mud banks and other submerged hazards. He ensured Dormael that he knew both routes through the deepest part of the bogs, and that his crew had been this way before.

  The pace, though, put Dormael on edge.

  The sun slid across the sky as a distant, cold beacon, and dusk was no more than a darkening of the mists. The night was more lively than the day had been, with the chittering calls of uncountable insects buzzing through the gloom. Binnael kept lanterns burning at bow and stern, though they did little to push the haze back. The darkness crouched like a waiting predator.

  He sent Bethany below after she brought him another bowl of food. She protested, but did as she was bidden. Dormael hunched beside the railing while he ate, watching the mists with apprehension. His weapons were within easy reach, and he’d made his bow ready before the sun had been an hour in the sky.

  He nodded to the crewman on watch beside him, and rose to take his bowl back to the galley. There was a fluttering noise, and something whacked against his bowl, cutting a sharp pain over the back of his hand. The wooden dinnerware clattered to the deck, leaving Dormael stunned. He felt warm blood run down his forearm, and he spun back to the crewman, who crouched beneath the fore lantern.

  “Kill the light!” Dormael hissed.

  The sailor reached up to do as he’d asked, and something thwacked into his neck. Blood sprayed into Dormael’s face, and the man tumbled to his knees, hand still stretched for the lantern. A third arrow sailed past Dormael’s face, tickling the hot blood on his cheeks with its passage.

  “To arms!” he roared. “We’re under attack!”

  Cries issued up from other points on deck, and more fluttering noises pierced the night. Curses rang out as men ran for cover, and a bell began to toll with silvery urgency. Arrows sliced through the murk, and Dormael went for the fore lantern.

  The Midwife had been bobbing through the water at a snail’s pace, shining her presence for all to see. The pirates were attacking from the shadows, and as long as the lanterns were lit, everyone on deck was a target. Dormael managed to reach the fore lantern and yank it down, putting his back to the railing at the bow. He twisted it closed and plunged the foredeck into darkness.

  Dormael closed his eyes and pulled his Kai open, letting the world sing into his senses. D’Jenn had forbade the use of magic, but as long as he didn’t gather any power, his song wouldn’t play through the ether. He reached to the side and grabbed his bow, pulling a few arrows from the quiver.

  He felt the men in the longboats, sliding toward the prow like ghosts over the water. There were three boats, and in each of them a man crouched with a drawn bow, loosing arrows over the railing. The absence of light had done little to stop to the archers—they just loosed in the ship’s general direction, betting that they’d hit something.

  Dormael rose to a knee and drew, back muscles tensing. It had been a while since he’d drawn a bow, though all Sevenlander children were taught to use them. He could feel the boats coming over the water, moving as much for silence as for speed. He let his Kai guide his hands, and loosed at the top of his breath.

  His arrow leapt through the mist, and took the first archer in the shoulder. The man cursed and tumbled over the side of his longboat, to the great surprise of his companions. They tried to keep rowing, but the man had somehow managed to keep a hand on the side of the boat, and he fouled their attempt.

  Dormael loosed at the second archer, sinking an arrow into the man’s torso. The pirate let out a surprised grunt as he went down, though the other two began to row faster after he fell. The third archer loosed before Dormael could nock his next arrow, and he was forced to duck under the railing. Dormael rose, drew, and loosed all in the same motion, but he was out of practice, and his arrow flew wide. He cursed as another arrow sliced through the air, and he was forced to take cover.

  When he rose for the third time, Dormael had to stand in order to draw on the pirates. Their boats were rushing toward the Midwife’s hull, but Dormael judged his shot and took the last archer right through the throat. The three longboats thumped against the hull, and Dormael could hear the same sound echoing from all sides of the ship.

  He took the opportunity to rise and loose three arrows in quick succession, aiming for the men whose boat had been fouled on the approach. Two pirates struggled to help a third onto the fouled boat, and they were sitting still on the water. It took Dormael three shots, but he crippled their ability to fight. Grappling hooks tumbled onto the deck, pulling hard against the rail. Grimacing, Dormael abandoned his bow.

  He whipped a dagger from his boot, and shied away from a grappler that landed near his right side. He seized it by the rope when the hook began to pull away, and had to plant his foot against the hull to keep hold of it. He sawed through the rope with desperate motions, and heard a curse from below as it snapped. With the pressure released, Dormael plopped to his back.

  A second hook landed on deck, and was pulled tight while he took care of the other one. Dormael let out a breath and rose to his feet, rushing to the second hook. A face appeared over the edge of the hull, grimacing in fearful determ
ination. Dormael locked eyes with the man, and as he drew close enough, made a wild slash at his eyes. The pirate was still holding the rope, and wasn’t able to get a hand up in time to block. Dormael’s dagger left a long gash across the man’s face, and he fell screaming to the water below. Once the pirate was out of the way, Dormael went to work on a third rope that landed amidst the chaos.

  His focus on the grappling hook almost killed him.

  Out of the corner of his eye, he saw one of the men below pull the discarded bow from his compatriot, and draw. Dormael ducked at the last instant, abandoning his attempt to cut through the rope, and barely avoided taking an arrow through the neck. Thumping feet pounded the outside of the hull as another pirate mounted the rope, and Dormael shoved his dagger back into his boot. With an irritated growl, he reached for his spear.

  When the pirate appeared at the top of the railing, he stabbed the man right in the throat. The pirate let out a gurgling scream, and fell back into the water. Dormael reset himself, and waited for the next man. When no boots thumped against the side of the Midwife, he chanced a look over the fore of the old cog, and saw the remaining men in the longboats rowing for the port side of the ship.

  Following their intended line of travel, he saw Shawna facing three pirates on her own. She danced back and forth, keeping their angles of attack crossing with each other—a tactic she’d taught him during their sparring matches. Watching Shawna fight was like watching a master give an impromptu lesson. She tangled her hilt with that of one of the men, who had tried to come at her with wide, circular swipes of his curved saber. Stepping to the side, she sliced open his stomach and left him to bleed out. The two remaining pirates tried to surround her, but Shawna was too skilled for such elementary tactics. She killed the man in front of her before the one behind could react, and took the second with a contemptuous swipe across the throat.

  Even as she finished those, others crawled onto the deck.

  An arrow blossomed from one of their necks, dropping him from the side like a limp sack of meal. Shawna took the one who came up in his wake, stabbing downward into the pirate’s collarbone as he tried to pull himself up. When he fell away, she cut the grappling rope with a casual flick of her sword, and sprinted toward the aft of the ship, where another hook had taken hold.

  Dormael noticed arrows flying from the crow’s nest, and looked up to see his brother loosing shots in rapid succcession. Allen’s shafts were deadly accurate, even when he was loosing into the chaos of the fight. He worked to save Binnael’s crewmen where they were outmatched, and supported Shawna when he could.

  Dormael hefted his spear and rushed into the fight. All around him crewmen were chopping into grappling ropes, and firing crossbows at screaming attackers. Dormael stabbed one pirate in the side while he was trying to kill a sailor, and another after a tense exchange with his blade. Chaos reigned on deck, and the night was full of the noise of battle.

  He spotted D’Jenn laying about with his mace, knocking a man from the side of the ship. His weapon disadvantaged him against the quick, slicing blades of the pirates, though, and without his magic to aid him, he was hard-pressed to defend himself. Dormael rushed to his side, and engaged two of the men who’d tried to flank his cousin. Together they killed four more pirates, the last expiring to a sickening blow from D’Jenn’s morningstar.

  A lull in the action caused them both to pause. Dormael shot his eyes around deck, making sure that their side wasn’t defeated. To his surprise, they appeared to have won the exchange.

  “Is that all of them?” D’Jenn asked in an incredulous tone. “That can’t be all of them.”

  Suddenly a roar issued up from the murky darkness, the sound of a hundred voices rising in challenge. Everyone on deck froze, and looked around at the fog-choked night. Flames blossomed from somewhere in the haze, as if someone had set the very river on fire. They burned a filmy orange line across part of the river, blocking the Midwife’s advance. It took Dormael a beat to realize that a series of derelicts had been tied across one of the channels, and set to burn.

  “Port!” Binnael’s voice rang out against the battle cries. “Turn her to port, gods-damn you! Row! Row for your fucking lives!”

  Sailors began shouting as they leapt to obey, but Dormael had an urge to belay the captain’s call, even if he had no authority. Something about it set his teeth on edge, even if his mind couldn’t conjure the immediate reason. Drums began to sound from the darkness, beating an ominous rhythm that made the crewmen shoot nervous glances to one another. More flames sprang up on the water, this time from a multitude of torches carried on the decks of a small fleet of longships. The burning points of light wobbled as men shook the torches at them in challenge, and screamed their intentions across the water.

  “Row!” Binnael shouted. “Get me a watch at the prow, keep an eye on the water! Every man with a weapon, stand ready!”

  Dormael shared a concerned look with D’Jenn, then moved to the foredeck to have a look over the water. The Midwife heaved forward with a teeth-grinding lack of speed. Reaching the bow, Dormael leaned over the water and gazed at the burning line of debris in the distance, trying to pierce the murk with his sight.

  When a shadowed landmass moved between the Midwife and the burning ships, Dormael realized what had happened.

  “They’ve pushed us into a fucking trap,” he muttered, eliciting a concerned look from a crewman beside him. Binnael had said that there were only two channels deep enough to allow the Midwife to pass. The pirates had blocked one of them with their makeshift barricade, and now Binnael was headed straight down the other—right where the pirates had herded them. Turning his eyes back to the pirate fleet, he saw the longships keeping their distance, taunting the Midwife as they took up a half-hearted chase. Dormael turned to warn Binnael of the ambush, but a voice brought him up short.

  “D’Jenn! Dormael!” Allen called from the crow’s nest. “You’d better get up here!”

  ***

  “Of all the bloody things,” D’Jenn growled, “it had to be this.”

  Dormael stared over the mist, which was thinner from his perch atop the mast. He stood on the yardarm for the mainsail, and gripped tight to a hand-line to keep himself from falling. D’Jenn occupied the bucket with Allen, and stared ahead with ice in his eyes.

  Poking from the water was a ship’s mast, like a lonely monolith in the fog. It perched at an odd angle—the result of the ship having been scuttled in the middle of the channel. Dormael couldn’t tell much from the mast alone, but its length told him that the ship beneath it was large enough to scuttle them. The Midwife would be caught on the wreckage, and forced to stand and fight the fleet of longships approaching from the stern.

  “They laid a neat little ambush for us,” Dormael said. “Their tactics are sound.”

  “Don’t sound so happy about it,” Allen muttered.

  “There’s no way we could defend the ship from that many pirates,” D’Jenn said. “Not without exposing ourselves to the crew.”

  “Not to be cavalier about it,” Allen said, “but how much does that matter against getting cut down by some stinking bog-dweller? Expose yourselves, for the gods’ sakes. Go down there naked and start tossing around fire—at least we’ll all be alive come the morning.”

  D’Jenn regarded Allen with a flat look.

  “You got us into this,” he said. “Easy run, indeed.”

  “Tomorrow, when we’re still breathing, let’s all have a big cry about it,” Allen said. “Until then, let’s choose to live, why don’t we?”

  “We have to do something,” Dormael said.

  “Do you think you can lift that thing out of the water?” D’Jenn asked.

  “What—the ship?” Dormael said, pausing to make sure he’d heard his cousin correctly.

  “No, the buried treasure in the muck beneath,” D’Jenn said. “Aye, the bloody ship.”

  Dormael looked back toward the approaching mast in the distance, and tried to imagi
ne lifting that much weight. The ship itself would be massive, not to mention the amount of force needed to break it loose from the river bottom. Lifting the ship would be unwieldy, and as soon as it started clearing the water, it would grow more ponderous by degrees.

  “I don’t know, coz,” Dormael said. “That thing’s enormous. I’ve never attempted anything like that.”

  “Gird your loins, then,” D’Jenn replied. “You’re trying tonight.”

  Dormael took a deep breath, and nodded. “Alright. I’ll give it a go.”

  “Allen and I will keep the pirates occupied while you work,” D’Jenn said. “We need to pull it out of the water as fast as possible, and get this ship moving before we’re all peppered with arrows.”

  “What do we tell the captain when he finds out we’re Blessed?” Dormael asked.

  “Let me deal with him,” Allen said, giving him a wicked smile. “I can’t wait to shove something like that in his face.”

  “Alright,” D’Jenn said, “let’s get moving. Another few minutes and we’ll be right on top of that thing.”

  Allen leaned over the side of the bucket, and called down to the captain.

  “Binnael!” he shouted. “You’ve got to slow her down!”

  “What?” the captain called back. “Don’t be a bloody fool!”

  “The channel is blocked! Slow her down!”

  “The channel is what?” Binnael shouted back.

  “To the Six Hells with this,” D’Jenn sighed. He gave Dormael and Allen a wink, climbed outside the crow’s nest, and looked down to judge his distance from the deck. Dormael felt his cousin’s Kai open, and the familiar crawling sensation tickled his limbs as D’Jenn began using his power. To the great astonishment of all who were watching, D’Jenn stepped out into open air.

  Instead of falling, though, he floated toward the deck, and landed amidst a group of gasping sailors.

  Dormael smiled, opened his own Kai, and followed D’Jenn’s example. Astonished whispers broke out on deck, and the crewmen all regarded them with wide-eyed expressions. Dormael gave D’Jenn one last nod, and headed back toward the forecastle. He heard his cousin say something to the captain as he went, but he didn’t care to stick around and listen to the interplay.