“Up the gangways!” Damrick ordered. The pirates and brigands on the decks of Ryland’s ships now rose, risking exposure to turn their weapons on the three narrow gangways. Hale took the lead and began ascending the Destiny under heavy fire. He stopped, pinned down from above, and took cover behind the bodies of those pirates shot and hacked while attempting to flee from the docks.
Then the cannon fire began. Hale was not one to shrink from any attack, but he froze now. He heard cannon shot shatter wood. He looked to his right, saw the source, saw more flashes from a dark ship not a hundred yards away. “Back down! Back to the docks!” he shouted behind him. And as the Gatemen retreated, two explosions rocked the Ayes of Destiny.
Fire from above dwindled.
“We just hold still, them pirates on that ship’ll kill off their own kind!” Hale marveled.
More cannon fire rocked the Destiny. Now panic swept the decks of Ryland’s ships as brigands raced to the far port rails and waved their arms, shouting for their allies to cease fire. For their trouble, they were picked off like so many pigeons on a fence. Cannon shot hit the Lion’s Pride, and then the Blue Horizon. Debris and splinters leapt from all three ships, and the entire dock shuddered.
The chaos on board gave the Gatemen sharpshooters on the rooftops every advantage. Within two minutes, the small arms fire declined. Inside one more, it stopped altogether. Shortly after, the cannons ceased to roar. Acrid smoke drifted across the entire scene. Surviving Gatemen stormed up the gangways, finding the dead everywhere, assuring that the wounded joined them.
“Fire into the air, boys!” Hale called out. “Those pirates expect a pirate’s celebration!”
Several of the Gatemen whooped and fired off their pistols. Many more would not waste the ammunition or the energy, just to fool a shipful of enemies. But the meager effort did the trick. The pirates out in the harbor joined the celebration. Pistol fire answered back, and an echoing roar rose from that distant deck. The pirates put up their guns.
Hale Starpus, dripping sweat and blood and nursing a badly cut shoulder, stood at the prow of the Destiny, and waved at them. “Our thanks, until we meet again…” he said softly, through a smile, “…and we shoot ever’ last condemned man of ye dead between the eyes.”
“That may be sooner than you think,” Damrick told him. He was watching a ship’s boat being lowered from the davits of the pirate vessel. “Let’s go change the outcome of this fight. Now.”
“Yer sure this is the right thing—”
“You have your orders! Get that armband off.” Damrick handed him a fat wad of braided leather lashes. “We don’t have much time.”
“Aye, sir.”
“And find Lye. He left our pair of prize prisoners alone, and we need them gone.”
Hale looked down at the docks. “Looks like he’s already doin’ it.”
A battle-weary Lye Mogene was headed back into the Harbormaster’s ofice, two men with him.
“All right, you two. Get up and let’s go!” Ryland and Motley were lying on their sides trussed like hogs, hands tied behind them, feet bound together, hands lashed to feet by a short length of rope. They were gagged.
The two Gatemen with Lye, one young and stocky, one weathered and thin with a drooping, clouded eye, cut loose the men’s feet and stood them up.
“Take a look out there,” Lye said, pointing out a broken window at the docks, which were now littered with the dead. “What happens when ye go up against Gatemen. Got a good look?”
Ryland nodded, his gag tied tight and deep. Motley narrowed his eyes with hatred.
“Let’s have them sacks.” Lye pointed to burlap bags behind the counter. He put one over each man’s head. “We’re takin’ you two out the back way.”
The jolly boat sent from the pirate’s ship docked just in front of the prow of the Ayes of Destiny. Two sailors climbed up onto the dock and began picking their way through the dead. One of them was a big man with dark teeth and a lumpy skull, clearly visible under a thin stubble of hair. He held an enormous pistol in his right hand. The other was a woman, dark, wearing black forester’s leathers. The woman’s pistol was in her left hand. She held a sword, a fine and polished rapier, in her right.
Damrick and Hale Starpus watched them from the rail of the Destiny.
“Who’s the woman?” Hale asked. “She looks foreign.”
“She’s Drammune. I’ve heard of her. She sails with Scatter Wilkins.”
Hale’s mouth opened. He spun to look at the pirate ship anchored in the harbor. “That’s the Lantern Liege?” Her markings were still not visible at this distance, in this light. She was silhouetted against the rising sun.
“I’d say so.”
Hale looked back to the dock. The big man kicked the shoulder of a lifeless body, his toe at the leather armband tied above the bicep. “That’s Scatter hisself, then?”
Damrick shook his head. “Not unless Captain Wilkins is taking orders from a woman.” The woman pointed with her sword at the gangway, and the big man walked toward it. Then she looked up at the rail, caught Damrick’s eye. Even at this distance he felt a chill, as though he were prey measured by a predator.
“You really think we can make ’em believe we’re the pirates?” Hale asked.
“We’d better, if we want to get to the Conch.”
The woman moved like a cat up the gangway, her eyes constantly scanning. When she reached the deck she glanced calmly around at the faces that watched her, and then she walked straight to Damrick. Without any hints or help, signs of office or insignia, with little more than a sideways glance from a Gateman or two, she had determined that Damrick was in charge. He felt the chill grow as she approached. This woman was not only cunning, but clearly in her element, energized by the bloodshed and the danger around her.
“Where is your captain?” she asked. Her accent was thick, with heavy rolling R’s. Her dark hair was braided tight against her head at one ear. A heavy scar ran down a cheek.
“Who wants to know?”
“I am Talon. Captain Scatter Wilkins wants to know.” She held her sword at an angle to the deck. Her pistol was pointed downward as well.
“Then your captain can talk to me.”
“I will talk to you.” Her sword twitched, but did not come up. Still, it struck Damrick as a warning.
“This ship is mine now,” Damrick said flatly. “We thank you for your help, but we didn’t need it. Me and my men, we’re claiming Conch Imbry’s reward. So you can tell that to Scatter Wilkins.”
She looked Damrick up and down, her eyes pausing on the bloodstains, the spatter. Then she looked around at Damrick’s men, seeming none too impressed. She scanned the bodies along the decks, most of them wearing leather armbands. “Where is Damrick Fellows?” Now her eyes came back to him.
He felt she was probing him, and had the sense that she knew he was concealing something. “No idea. Maybe one of these dead. Then again, maybe he ran.”
“And who are you?”
“I’m the man who’s through answering your questions.” He drew his pistol. But before he could bring the barrel up, well before it was aimed in her direction, the tip of her sword moved, and his weapon dropped to the floorboards. A gash along the back of his right hand began bleeding. He covered the wound with his left hand as more than fifty weapons came up, and dozens of hammers cocked back all across the deck.
“Move that sword again, woman, and there’ll be two more dead on this deck.”
“Put it up, ye stupid witch,” the big man hissed at her. “Get us both killed fer nothin’.” He showed brown teeth and a bad disposition. To Damrick, he said, “I’m Jonas Deal, Cap’n Wilkins’s first mate. He didn’t send us to fight,” he glanced at Talon with contempt. “Just to see what’s what. Cap’n Wilkins ain’t after no reward. He wants to know the Gatemen are dead, is all.”
Damrick nodded, but didn’t take his eyes from Talon. He looked her in the eye for a moment longer, then said. “You’ve seen.
Now go.”
“How many escaped?” Talon asked, apparently oblivious to the threat, or to any other part of the conversation of the last few moments. Jonas Deal rolled his eyes.
“Not many,” Damrick answered.
“What is your name?” she asked. There was accusation in her tone, somehow made more ominous by the thick accent.
Damrick studied her but didn’t answer.
The big man spoke instead. “We’re headed to Skaelington, is why she asks. Cap’n Wilkins, he’ll tell the Conch about ye, make sure it’s you gets the reward.”
“I’ll tell the Conch myself.” He leaned down and picked up his pistol, keeping an eye on Talon’s sword. Then he stared hard at the woman. “Maybe I didn’t make it plain enough. You aren’t welcome here anymore.”
“You have something to hide,” she told him. And her eyes flashed. “I would dearly love to make you reveal it.”
“A charming proposal. But no.”
She smirked. Then she sheathed her sword, looked around at the men on deck. They did not lower their weapons. She turned as if to leave, but instead walked up to Hale Starpus. “You fought the Gatemen?” she asked him, looking at the blood on his shoulder.
His jaw was set, his pistol aimed at her heart, but looking into her cold, piercing eyes, he felt off his guard. “Aye.” His chin came up in defiance.
“A hard morning’s work. This wound will heal.” She reached up with her right hand, as if to touch the gash on his right shoulder. But instead she grasped his pistol hand, a movement so quick and agile that it did not seem threatening until she had already twisted his thumb up and away from the pistol grip, causing a sharp, popping pain that levered the gun from his hand. It fell harmlessly to the deck. Gatemen surrounding her gripped weapons more tightly as a murmur rose and faded. But Damrick just shook his head. The moment of danger had already come and gone. She did not raise her weapon. They all watched, riveted.
Without acknowledging any enemy, without a change of expression, as though she and Hale were the only two people in the world, Talon cocked her head, let her eyes fall on Hale’s good shoulder. She moved her pistol barrel to his left upper arm, pushed it at the cloth there. “But what would cause a ring of sweat, right here…I wonder?”
Hale recoiled, then looked down at the obvious sweat line, the wrinkled cloth, evidence of the armband that had been there during his exertions. He looked back up at her, his mind reeling. She had caught them; she had figured it out. She’d disarmed him without any effort, and now she could see right through him. She could see through all of them. He could think of nothing to say, and there was nothing he could do. His eyes reached out to Damrick, pleading for help.
“He was one of our infiltrators,” Damrick said easily. “You and Scatter Wilkins might attack the Gatemen head on, and beat them. But we’re not that good. We needed men on the inside.”
She scanned the deck again, looking for similar signs. “You had many infiltrators.” Then she locked onto Damrick once more. “My proposal stands.”
“I’ll try to remember.”
They all watched as Talon descended the gangway.
Jonas Deal hung back.
“Is she always like that?” Damrick asked him.
“No. Sometimes she’s worse. She suspects everyone of everythin’. But don’t worry, I’ll give the Captain a good report.”
“Thank you.”
Damrick watched as he followed down the gangway, caught up with Talon.
“That was good thinkin’, that about me bein’ a spy.”
Damrick didn’t respond. He watched Talon and Deal pick their way through the dead. Finally, they climbed back into their jolly boat.
“Let’s get these ships ready,” he sighed. “Seal off the docks again—no one in or out. When the Sheriff arrives, bring him straight to me.” He raised his voice, making sure all his men heard it. “You’re mercenaries and bounty men now. Spread the word that all the Gatemen are either dead or joined up and turned pirate. And if anyone asks, tell them Damrick ran again.”
“I don’t know, Damrick,” Hale said, when only his boss could hear. “Seems like a real bad idea. We won’t get recruits again, they think we all got kilt.”
“We don’t need recruits.”
“You’ll get a reputation won’t help us.”
“I don’t care about reputations. I care about killing pirates.”
“Seems like we just let two bad ones go. And there’s a whole ship full of ’em about to sail off.”
“Yes. I would have liked to have killed Talon. But I have to get to the Conch while I have this chance. After that, we can kill all the Scatters and Talons and Jonas Deals we want.”
“You don’t need to tie me,” Ryland tried again. It came out a muffled mess, much like all his previous attempts.
The rough sack was now off his head, but his hands were bound behind him, pressed hard against the wooden seat of the carriage. His gag had not been removed, and he faced an insistent pistol barrel. The bumps and jolts of the ride caused Lye Mogene’s weapon to rise and fall and swing to and fro like some bizarre churchman’s blessing.
Beside Lye sat the droop-eyed Gateman, pistol in hand, though his was pointed at the bound and gagged Motley. Next to Ryland on the other side was another Gateman, the solid young man.
“Oo hoh hee hoo hi hee,” Ryland told Lye once again.
“All right,” Lye said with a sigh, admitting defeat. “Get the gag off ’im. I’m tired of all this hummin’ and mumblin’.”
“Thank you.” Runsford said when he could, wiping spittle from his cheek onto his shoulder. “All I was saying is, you don’t need to tie me. I’m not dangerous.”
“Yeah, well,” Lye answered.
“I’m no threat to you,” Ryland insisted, hoping to make his point clearer.
“Unh hi hee, hoo!” Motley raged.
“Yer both stayin’ trussed,” Lye told them. Then to the goon, “And yer mouth’s stayin’ stuffed, so might just as well shut it.”
Ryland took a deep breath. Unlike Motley and himself, the three Gatemen in the coach were stained and spattered and smelled of drying sweat and blood. Little about his current situation appealed to him. “Where are you taking me?” Ryland asked.
Lye said nothing.
Ryland tried the stern young man at his elbow. “Where are you taking us? Can’t you give me the least idea?”
Nothing.
He looked at the Gateman across the carriage, seated next to Lye—haggard, scraggly, with protruding eye misted over with cataract. Runsford opened his mouth to ask him the same question, but he hissed. He actually made a sound like an angry cat, revealing as he did a gold tooth and several gaps where teeth should be.
“Unpleasant fellow,” Ryland murmured.
“I wouldn’t cross ol’ Murk-Eye,” Lye counseled.
“I’ll take it under advisement.”
Murk-Eye glared from his one good eye, and hissed again.
Ryland focused back on Lye Mogene. “I want to speak to Damrick Fellows.”
“Hee hoo!” Motley demanded through the gag.
“Shut up, Motley,” Ryland told him.
“I need to see Damrick.”
“Oh, you’ll see him all right. I wouldn’t be so anxious, though, I was you.”
It was all the information Ryland needed. He was content to remain silent the rest of the trip, as they stopped in the middle of a dense wood, and walked through a narrow path past a rotting cabin and toward an inlet that might have been a lake. While Motley kept up a stream of muffled curses and required rough treatment to keep him moving, certain that he would be shot at any moment, Ryland did not suspect Lye Mogene’s comment was anything but sincere, nor did he suspect the Gateman was misinformed.
The party found a rowboat moored to a pine at the water’s edge. Lye gestured for the prisoners to get in. But Motley pulled back, and refused to move further.
“Oo hahn uh hoo huh, hoo huh hee.”
“Jus’ shut up and get in the boat.” Lye smacked Motley in the back of the head with his fist, then poked the pistol hard into his back.
But Motley planted his feet. He shook his head. “Oo hahn uh hoo huh, hoo huh hee.”
“What’s a’ matter with him?” Lye asked Runsford.
“Remove the gag, and I’m sure he’ll tell you.”
Lye nodded toward the solid young man, the one they called Stock, who belted his pistol and untied the rag.
“You wanna shoot us, shoot us here!” Motley repeated, glaring his defiance.
Ryland sighed. “He speaks for himself only,” he informed his captors, then stepped awkwardly into the rowboat. It rocked back and forth like a hobbyhorse until he managed to position himself in the stern seat.
Lye climbed in and sat beside Runsford. “Comin’ alive, or stayin’ dead?” he asked Motley. “You choose, but make it quicklike. Murk’s itchin’ to shoot ye.” The red-haired goon frowned at Murk, pursed his lips tightly, eyed Ryland suspiciously, and then stepped into the prow.
When they rounded a small finger of land, Ryland saw his own sloop, Success, anchored about twenty yards from shore. Standing on the deck was Damrick Fellows.
“Hello, Mr. Fellows,” Ryland called out as they drew close. “I hope you’ve made yourself comfortable.”
Damrick didn’t answer.
When the prow of the rowboat banged into the hull of Success, Damrick spoke softly. “Mr. Ryland goes below. Tie the other one to the mast.” And he disappeared from the rail.
Murk and Stock took care of securing Motley while Lye kept a firm grip on Ryland’s elbow, maneuvering him toward the tight stairway that led below deck.
“I’ll take him,” Damrick said.
Seeing he was dismissed, Lye nodded, and let Damrick steer the prisoner below.
Runsford Ryland found a familiar face waiting for him in the saloon. “Hello, Mr. Ryland,” the old gentleman said. “Prisoner on your own ship, are you?” Windall Frost stood and put out a hand.
“Quite true, Mr. Frost,” Ryland answered dutifully. “But for that fact, I’d shake your hand.” Damrick, standing behind Ryland, pulled his knife and sliced the bonds. Ryland rubbed his wrists briefly, then shook hands with Frost.
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