“Take their weapons and set them in longboats. See that they have fresh water and a bit of food. If they run out, they can damn well eat each other. You other men, put out that fire over there before we lose our prize,” the Captain ordered upon seeing a pile of tar-cured rope burning near the mast, a victim of one of Azerick’s spells.
Captain Zeb approached their young savior as the sailors ran about following his orders. A few others paused long enough to give Azerick a clap on the back, but most gave him a wide berth.
“That was quite a bit of work you did there, son. You have any other secrets I should know about?”
“None I think you need to know of, Captain. Nothing like this to be sure,” the exhausted young sorcerer replied.
“I never would have taken the son of Captain Giles as a wizard. Is there anything you need, lad?”
“Sorcerer, and yes, a nap. I am completely spent. Oh, and food. I am starving. Casting spells works up a mean appetite.”
“I’ll take your word for it, lad. Go lay yourself out in my cabin. I’ll have the cook make you something and have it brought to you.”
“Thank you, Captain.”
“It’s us who owes you thanks, lad. We owe you our lives.”
Azerick did not reply to the praise as he shuffled off to the Captain’s bed, so weary that even the gentle swaying of the ship threatened to knock him from his feet. He let out a sigh of relief when his back sunk into the surprisingly soft and comfortable bed.
The noise of someone entering the room stirred him to full alertness from a semi-slumber after an indeterminate amount of time. Captain Zeb brought in a tray laden with a slab of roast beef, mushroom gravy, warm bread, steamed carrots, and a mug of ale. Azerick sat up straight as his nose caught the scent of the delicious food.
“Here you are, lad. Cook went all out on this. I hope you enjoy it, you earned it,” Captain Zeb said as he set the tray down on a table bolted to the floor in the center of the room.
“How is the crew doing?” Azerick asked as he pulled up a seat and dug into the proffered meal.
“We lost four men, nine more were wounded, but only three will be staying below decks for more than a couple days. It’s not just the injuries you are thinking of though, is it?”
“No, sir. I’m glad to know we didn’t lose more, but how are they taking everything else—what I did?”
“Most everyone knows you saved their hides. There are always a few who are a bit more ignorant and superstitious than others, and they’re apt to say stupid things. But I wouldn’t worry myself. The others stamped out any negative words anyone felt they needed to say about you, and I told everyone that if they didn’t like sailing with you then I could drop em off with the pirates in their longboats. There was only a couple hardheads, and I put them on the boat we salvaged.”
“So the other ship is still seaworthy then? That’s good.”
“I got men repairing the rigging, and we’ll be back underway in a couple hours. You know your father was going to make me captain of the Storm Runner before everything happened. I never thought his boy would be the one to end up giving me my own ship,” Zeb said and smiled.
“You sailed with my father. Were you with him the day they took him?”
Aye, that I was. I was his first mate on the Storm Runner on that last voyage. We had left Lazuul and were headed back for Southport when we pirates waylaid us. Your father had us dump a few barrels of demon fire over the side. As soon as the pirate ship ran into the slick, we set it alight and burned it to cinders.”
“Like father like son,” Azerick commented under his breath.
“Your father’s quick thinking saved us all that day. I owe him my life, as does every man who sailed with him on that voyage. He was a good man and a damn fine ship’s captain. None of us knew he had been taken until they started hauling in the rest of us. He never told us anything about taking on any other cargo neither. I thought he had rushed home to you and your mother. It was all he talked about the entire trip back. He said he wanted to spend some time, a couple years maybe, with his family, have another child, and offered me the helm of Storm Runner.”
Captain Zeb paused and took a deep breath before continuing. “The rest of us were brought in about a week after we arrived in port. It was then we found out they had hauled in your father and killed him in his cell a few days later. The Duke’s men managed to round up most of the crew. Only a few had caught a berth on another ship before they ran the rest of us down while we enjoyed our shore leave.
“They started askin’ about your father and artifacts. I told them what I knew, that your father was a good, honest, loyal man and I didn’t know anything about any artifacts or illegal goods on the ship. I guess that wasn’t the answer they wanted to hear, so they asked us a bit more firmly if you know what I mean. For weeks they whipped us, beat us, broke bones, cut our flesh, kept us awake, and starved us. A couple men died in that prison, but they eventually let us go when it became obvious that none of us knew anything.”
Captain Zeb took another deep, shuddering breath. “When they let us go, we all caught the first ships out of Southport. Me and most of the boys got on ships going to North Haven and signed on with a shipping merchant up there. It’s a bit colder, but the work is good. When we make a run to Southport those of us who were questioned try not to even get off the boat, and when we do, we never leave the docks. I should have thought about you and your mother, but we were all so scared we ran as far and fast as we could. I’m sorry I wasn’t there to help you, son, but you’re here now and going to North Haven. You have a friend up there, and I’ll do anything I can to help you. You are more than welcome to sail on any ship I’m in charge of. You make one hell of a pirate weapon, but something tells me being a sailor isn’t in your plans.”
Azerick shook his head as he looked past Zeb’s shoulder, not focusing on anything in the room. “No, Captain, I appreciate the offer, and I will certainly take you up on your hospitality, at least until I get myself settled, but I have a different path to follow.”
“I figured as much. Well, let me leave you to your supper and rest.”
Zeb left him alone and headed deckside. Azerick finished his supper and immediately fell asleep for what seemed like days. When he woke, there was a platter of bread, cheese, and smoked meat on the table as well as a pitcher of water with a good shot of sterilizing rum. He quickly finished the simple meal and headed up on deck, eager to stretch his legs and get some fresh air. Several of the sailors greeted him warmly and knuckled a salute as he passed. He returned their greetings, glad that none seemed too upset or nervous over his display of spell craft.
“Hey, Azerick,” Balor called out to him, “nice to see you back up with us working folk!”
“You know me, always sleeping on the job.” He found the Captain at the wheel and approached him. “How long have I been asleep?”
“About fourteen hours. It’s midmorning right now, and we’ve been under full sail for about eight hours,” Zeb replied.
“How’s the sailing been while I’ve been out?”
“It’s been real smooth. We have a good wind at our backs and a clear sky over our heads.”
“I guess I better get back to work then and return your cabin to you. Thanks for the soft bed. I needed it.”
“It’s the least I could do. I want you well-rested in case we run into any more pirates!” Zeb said with a good belly laugh.
Azerick put himself back to work scrubbing decks, mending sails, tarring cracks in the hull, and just about any other task better suited to the greenest crewmembers. Whatever Azerick’s part was in saving them all from the pirates, ship’s rules and duties trumped just about everything, even the heroics of young sorcerer’s.
The skies remained clear and winds favorable for next several days. Azerick was up in the rigging tightening a few lines when dark clouds rolled in far faster than could possibly be natural. He quickly shinnied down the lines and ran across the deck to the whe
elhouse.
“Captain, those clouds coming in…,” he started to say.
“I see em, lad, and I don’t like the looks of em one bit,” the Captain remarked.
“It’s not just the looks, Captain. I don’t like the way they feel.”
“Feel—like in a wizard kind of way?” Zeb asked, the color draining from his face.
“Yeah, I don’t think they are natural at all.”
“I’m inclined to agree with you, boy, but real or not we’re going to have to ride em out unless you got a trick up your sleeve to deal with a storm.”
Azerick shook his head and went back to the main deck. The wind intensified, and the ocean’s swells began undulating up and down in huge, rolling waves. The relatively smooth, blue sea became a roiling mass of menacing grey swells almost without warning.
“Lower the mainsails! This is going to be a hard blow, boys!” the Captain ordered.
Azerick and the crew raced to lower the mainsails, batten down the cargo and crew hatches, and secure any loose items on the deck. The men in the crow’s nest zipped down the lines and reached the deck nearly as fast as a man falling. Sailors took shelter below decks or tied themselves in so the waves now breaking over the gunwale did not sweep them out to sea. The wind raged with a fierceness Azerick had never experienced before. Fat, heavy rain began pouring from the black sky onto the deck with a force that stung as if he were being pelted with gravel.
Massive swells slammed into the side of the ship until Captain Zeb was able to point the bow into them and ride up and over the aqueous hills. Shifting swells still hammered the ship as they crashed over the gunwale and bow. Breaking waves swept men from their feet and washed them across the deck. The force of the water and winds swept the unlucky ones clean over the side who then had to be hauled back up by their safety line.
Zeb ordered all but a few essential hands below decks. Azerick rode out the storm down in the hold with the majority of the crew until it was his turn to switch out with the men topside to give them a much-needed rest from fighting the massive waves and wind.
Azerick could not believe his eyes when he climbed out onto the deck and clipped on his safety line. Waves and swells five times the height of the deck rolled under and around them. The ship creaked ominously every time it was forced to climb over one the gigantic swells or was bashed in the side by a large wave. He was certain they were all going to die and that the merciless ocean in all its vast power would smash their tiny and fragile ship to splinters.
All afternoon and night and late into the next day, waves swamped and battered their ship. The wind howled through the rigging and tore the small, lateen sails to shreds where they whipped in the wind like a soldier signaling his surrender. Men below decks kept a wary eye out for damage to the hull from the inside. They erected several braces to keep the power of the waves and the twisting of the ship from breaching its wooden walls. They made patches with thick tar and canvas fibers to try to stop, or at least slow, the leaks that sprang between the abused planking of the ship’s hull. Several sailors took turns cranking the arms of the bilge pumps to force out the water that unerringly found its way into the ship.
Through his exhaustion, Azerick thought he finally felt a slowing in the rhythm of the huge swells. He concentrated on the rolling of the ship and the sound of the wind above and could detect a definite easing in both. Over the next hour, the storm above blew out, and the ship slowly began to settle into the gentler rolling gait to which he was more accustomed.
He and the rest of the crew climbed out of the hold for a much-needed breath of fresh air. A storm as powerful as that could upset the stomach of even the most hardened veteran sailor. The clouds were breaking up, and Azerick could see patches of blue between the fluffy, floating mists. The sea had calmed considerably, and men started to take up their work without prompting. One sailor climbed up to the crow’s nest as others began repairing lines and hauling out the heavy, canvas mainsails. Azerick looked around, but he was unable to see the captured ship anywhere. He hoped they had been able to ride out the massive storm as his ship had, but he knew there was little hope for the smaller vessel.
He started repairing lines and securing any items that had come loose during the storm. Azerick heard the captain shouting orders as he worked to help set the ship aright.
“Balor, take a few men below and report back to me with an assessment of the damage,” Captain Zeb ordered before going to his cabin to consult his maps in an attempt to determine where the storm had blown them. “Azerick, follow me if you please.”
Azerick followed the Captain into his quarters. Zeb pulled a large map from a rack of deep pigeonholes, rolled it out on his table, and weighted down the corners to keep it flat.
“Do you know where we are, Captain?” Azerick asked.
“There’s no way to know precisely. I can only make an approximation by knowing what direction we were blown and estimating our rate of travel. It’s not that we’re lost. I can turn the ship due east and run into Valeria’s shoreline. I just don’t know how far north it blew us. If we see floating ice, then we went too far. Now tell me about that storm.”
“There is not much I can tell you, sir. It was definitely formed by magic though. I could detect the emanations holding it together like wards used to trap doors and things. It would take someone far more powerful than me to conjure up and create a storm; especially one that size.”
“If someone purposely made it, I have to wonder if it was meant for us, or did we just get caught in someone else’s trap?” Zeb asked rhetorically.
“Ship off the starboard bow!” the lookout called from the crow’s nest.
“That may be our answer right there, Captain,” Azerick answered.
Both men went up on deck to find out what was happening now.
“Is it our sister ship? What kind of sails is she flying?” Zeb asked.
“It’s not flying any sails, but it’s moving toward us at a fast clip! I think it has oars, Captain!”
“Oars? You can’t use oars alone this far out at sea!” Zeb exclaimed.
“It’s definitely oars, Captain, and it’s moving fast—really fast!” the lookout called down.
“Every man to the arms room! Boy, I hope you’re well rested, because whoever that is I’ll bet my right leg they’re the ones who set that storm on us.”
Sailors ran and armed themselves, readied the heavy weapons, and took shelter behind the deck railing. The new ship flew neither sails nor flag to identify its origins, but at least fifty oars sprouted from the sides of it like the legs of a centipede. The deck sported no heavy weapons like their ballista or catapult, but at least a dozen huge creatures crowded against the rails.
They were massively muscled, humanoid in appearance in that they stood on two legs and had a pair of arms, but their heads looked like that of a bull. Huge horns topped the bovine head and fur covered their bodies. In their huge hands, they wielded massive battle-axes and swords that would take a normal man two hands to swing.
“Minotaurs! Damn those creatures!” Zeb cursed.
“Do you think they sent the storm?” Azerick asked.
“Minotaurs despise magic, so I doubt it. They must be working with someone; as if they weren’t dangerous enough!”
“Are they pirates then?”
“Worse, they’re slavers. They’ll board our ship, take as many of us alive as they can, and use us or sell us as slaves. Look alive, lad, because here they come.”
With their sails torn to shreds, the Sea Star was a sitting duck. Azerick heard the twanging and loud crack of the sailors firing their crossbows and scorpios followed by the heavy whoosh and thwack of the catapult. The huge minotaurs aboard the oncoming ship simply ducked behind the rail of their ship and raised large, wood and iron shields over their heads. Stones and quarrels rained down with little effect. The brute strength of the massive, shaggy creatures was enough to ward off even the fist-sized stones flung from the catapult. Such an impac
t would have broken the arm of a normal man.
The minotaur ship continued to bear down on the Sea Star with such velocity that Azerick was sure they were going to ram them. Azerick let loose a stream of arcane missiles at the oncoming ship as it came near. One minotaur took all three bolts in the chest, but it appeared largely unfazed by the magical assault other than brandishing a sneer of contempt.
Azerick sent a blast of lightning into several of the beasts crowding the bow of the enemy ship. The bolt hurled two of the huge creatures back while the one that had taken the three magical bolts let out a bellow and crumpled to the deck, his sharp-toothed sneer wiped permanently from his muzzle.
The swift, oncoming ship reversed its oars in a rapid back-paddle, swinging its stern around to slam into the side of the Sea Star. The shaggy minotaurs threw grapnels over to lock the two ships together while men and beast met at the rails to do battle. The crew of the Sea Star outnumbered the fighters so far on the deck of the minotaur ship, but those odds would quickly turn if the rowers swarmed up from below.
Even at the current odds, the brute strength of the minotaurs was more than a match for the human sailors, and Azerick knew at once that it would be up to him to swing the battle in their favor again. He leapt onto the rail and straddled his legs across both ships, letting loose another blast of lightning along the length of the battling, bull-like creatures. His bolt caught half a dozen of the beasts in its path and started a fire near the stern of the minotaur ship.
Azerick thought if he could set the minotaur ship aflame, the men could chop at the ropes and separate the two vessels lashed together and give them a chance. He was readying a fire burst when he spotted a horrific figure stroll onto the deck of the minotaur ship. It was nearly seven feet tall but extremely thin. Its head was a grey, bulbous mass looking like a large brain with no skull beneath the clammy skin to protect it. Its thin, lipless mouth was set between large mandibles that sprouted out of its cheeks.
The Sorcerer's Path Box Set: Book 1-4 Page 36