The Trophy Chase Saga

by George Bryan Polivka

  “I’ll try.”

  By the time Panna had said goodbye and started up the street, she had already worked out exactly what she would need to carry in her knapsack and what she must leave behind. If she could get back into the house and out again without waking her father, she would be gone within the hour.

  The knocking grew more insistent. Talon turned her head toward it, looked back at Packer with disgust, then reluctantly lowered her sword. “I will kill you,” she promised. She sheathed her blade and left the lantern behind as she walked around the packing crates.

  Captain Wilkins closed the small wooden window in the adjoining room, the peephole built so that he could view the questioning of prisoners unnoticed. The room was located just behind the packing crates, which were not actually crates at all, but walls.

  “You said he was mine!” Talon hissed at the Captain as she entered.

  “You were going to kill him. You haven’t even questioned him.”

  She narrowed her eyes. “I brought him back from the dead. His life is mine to take as I please.”

  He waved her off. “Don’t try me with your witchcraft. He said he can find the Firefish!”

  Talon was furious, wishing she could shake some sense into him. He didn’t understand. It was exactly this story about Firefish that would make the Captain believe, want to believe, everything the boy said. Who could come up with such a perfect path to Scat’s confidence but the Traitor?

  “Nothing this boy says will be what it seems, whether he lies or not. He carries the poison, and the plans, of Senslar Zendoda. He could spy against us, sabotage us a thousand ways, all of which would require the trust of the Captain, not his death.”

  “Nonsense.” It all seemed absurdly conspiratorial. “I will trust a man until he proves himself untrustworthy.” He shrugged. “Then I’ll kill him.”

  Talon was unmoved. “That is beyond foolish.”

  Scatter Wilkins rubbed his temples. Foolish? He would have laughed at her, had he not known how furious it would make her. “It’s easily tested. We go where he says there are Firefish. If he lies, he dies.”

  “It will be a trap.”

  “Who wants to trap us? We have a deal with the King of Nearing Vast. Your own emperor, the Hezzan, expects shipments. There are no pirates left but me. Where are our enemies? Who are they?”

  She clamped her jaw. “You make your money from enemies who hate one another. Is that not enough reason to hate you?”

  “But the Swordmaster of Nearing Vast? What does he care?”

  Talon bit her tongue. He couldn’t see it. Five years ago, even two years ago, the boy would have been dead already and the Captain would be thanking her. But Scat had changed. He had grown so soft that now he thought he had no enemies simply because he couldn’t name them. She had met the king. She knew the Hezzan. The two were a knife’s edge away from war, and each had a hundred reasons to plot, to use a venture that traded in the dark gray markets between them. But Scat saw no shades of gray. He saw only shades of gold. “You have charged me with the security of this ship. And I tell you he is dangerous, and should die.”

  “And I am the Captain of this ship, and I say not yet,” Scat replied evenly.

  She trembled with rage. She opened her mouth to speak, but her teeth remained clenched. Her right hand moved almost of its own accord toward her sword hilt.

  The Captain’s visage grew dark, and one eyebrow rose. “Talon.”

  She caught herself, lowered her eyes.

  Scat laughed now, low and rumbling. “Woman, do you know what I think? I think you need to kill somebody. It’s just been too long.” He studied her. Then he spoke words of command, softly, but in a tone she knew better than to challenge. “Here’s what you’re going to do. You’re going to find the innkeeper who sold you the ale, and question him. Follow your theory wherever it takes you. Take your pleasure of vengeance on shore. It’ll do you good.”

  “When we return to shore, I will do as you command.” She stared hard at him, but the Captain was shaking his head.

  “You’ll do as I command now.”

  Talon was stunned. He was sending her away? Putting her off the ship?

  “Take whatever boat you want. Take whatever supplies you need. Take your two animals with you. You’ll find them confined to quarters, nursing wounds from Mr. Deal’s lash.”

  Her eyes flashed. Ox and Monkey had been whipped? She had not been told they were to be disciplined. She said nothing, but her insides wound into a knot. Flogging her subordinates was Scat’s way of telling her she deserved punishment herself. Well, she had offered her head. He had refused it. He would never have that chance again.

  The old times were gone, never to return. Suddenly, she wanted off this ship immediately.

  Scatter Wilkins continued. “We’ll let the boy soften in chains a while, see what he tells us about the big Fish. In thirty days we’ll make port at Split Rock. By then he’ll have outlived his usefulness. You’ll rejoin us then.”

  “You will keep him in chains?” she asked darkly.

  He nodded, but did not meet her eye.

  She did not back away. “His spirit has been among the dead,” she said in a hoarse whisper. “Trust him at your gravest peril.” Then she bowed, a shade excessively, he thought, and left.

  Talon walked straight back to Packer Throme, grasped his hair and slung his head back into the wall, banging it painfully. He looked at her from the corner of his eye, wary but listless. She held his head tight in her grip, and spat in his face.

  Then she spoke to him again in a hiss, not wanting the Captain to hear her words. It was barely more than a whisper, and all venom. “Know this, Packer Throme. I will find the one who has schooled you, the one who sent you, and those who have harbored you. I will return to the innkeeper. I will find this girl, your Panna, whom neither you nor anyone shall ever marry.”

  Now Packer eyed her fearfully. She smiled. “Yes, you did not tell me everything. But you told me enough. I will find them. I will kill them all. I will not rest until you, and all whom you love, are dead. This I swear to you.”

  She banged his head once more into the wooden wall, and left. He closed his eyes and waited, numb. He did not pray. He could not. Though he had believed she could do him no more harm, her words now crushed him further. Master Zendoda, and Cap Hillis. Panna Seline. His heart, all that was in him, emptied like a burst wineskin, leaving a hollow shell, emptier and more useless than he had ever dreamed possible. There was nothing he could do about any of it. Not even death promised rest now.

  Scatter Wilkins took a deep breath. He couldn’t tell what she had said to the boy, but he assumed it was devastating. She could do that to a man, more quickly and more thoroughly than he could comprehend. He hoped she hadn’t broken him completely. He hoped she’d left enough so he could get one more bit of information out of him.

  He sighed. This was her witchcraft, this ability to destroy a man from within. It had protected him well while buccaneering. But neither her wiles nor her sword seemed necessary now. She didn’t have any appreciation for what was at stake; instead she and her enchantments were always getting in the way. Perhaps it was time to part ways with her permanently. He wasn’t sure how to do that, how to rid himself of her and keep his own head on his shoulders. Well, getting her ashore was a good first step.

  The Captain looked again at Packer, whose head was hung down now, his body still quivering with each breath. He was crying. A mere boy. Yet he’d beaten the Captain at arms, survived Jonas Deal’s justice, and now had lived through Talon’s torture. Scat closed the peephole door. The boy was turning the ship upside down. Well, so what? If he could find Firefish, it was well worth it. Had anyone ever, in all of history, Scat wondered for the thousandth time, hoarded a million gold coins?

  A million in gold. It was an inconceivable sum, but Scat Wilkins now believed it was possible. Piracy hadn’t brought in more than a thousand a month, perhaps a little more in a very good month. And t
here had always been the risk of capture or death. But the Firefish, now…this was a realm of riches beyond reckoning, uncharted glory. This was the land of legend. And the only risk was death, effectively cutting the possibility of ill fate in half.

  Last year Scat’s enterprise had earned nearly two hundred thousand gold coins in one season, and they had done it by sailing the seas, for all intents and purposes, aimlessly. Their only methodology was to head for deep water and hope a Fish would take their bait. But this idea of knowing where the Firefish fed…of feeding waters…

  Scatter Wilkins would investigate. And Talon could sink into hell if she didn’t like it.

  All hands were on deck or in the rigging as the small boat was lowered over the side, into the black darkness of the shadow cast by the ship as it sailed under the light of a pale moon. Talon was all but invisible, wrapped in a dark cloak against the chill night air. She sat in the stern of the shallop, manning the tiller. The boat settled into the water with a gentle slap, and Ox and Monkey unhooked the lowering blocks. “Good voyage!” one of the sailors above them called as others rewound the windlass, pulling the heavy lines back up.

  “Yeah, it’ll be great,” Ox answered sullenly, grabbing an oar. Pain shot through the torn flesh of his back with the sudden movement.

  Talon was silent. This promised to be a long, arduous row back to shore, with no means of propulsion beyond human muscle and sinew. Talon faced the stern and watched the Trophy Chase and her two escorts, the Camadan and the Marchessa, recede. She did not pay attention to the two men as they made ready the oars, as they struggled in pain. She felt no trace of pity for them.

  By her feet was her duffel, heavy with clothing, provisions, and weapons. For this trip, it was imperative that the boat be small enough to hide, and so she had chosen the shallop rather than the sail-equipped jolly. She would have preferred the longboat of the huntsmen, but two men, let alone two idiots like these, could not handle such a craft.

  Her two henchmen glowered at the back of their dark mistress’s head. She didn’t care about the task ahead of them, they knew, didn’t care about the lash wounds that ripped at their backs in the salt spray. She had not offered them salve—none of the healing arts they knew she possessed. She had done nothing to even acknowledge their pain.

  She, of course, had received no punishment for allowing the stowaway onboard. And she, of course, was solely responsible. It was their task only to negotiate, buy, and haul goods. It was hers to protect the ship.

  “I say we’ll be gone half a day with a good wind,” Monkey said softly to his mate. “We’ll row twice, maybe three times that long getting back to shore.” And with little rest, he didn’t need to add. The boat was wide enough that neither man could row it by himself, and there was little chance Talon would volunteer a turn.

  “Aye,” Ox answered hoarsely, “but only if we make a straight line of it. Row otherwise and we row ourselves to Hades.”

  Talon turned toward the two men. With the moon behind her, she was a dark form, hardly more than a shadow. “You have more pressing business, perhaps?” Her voice was cold enough to damp a fire.

  Ox just glared at her.

  Monkey panicked; he never spoke to Talon. That was Ox’s job. But Ox wasn’t speaking. “Barring a storm, this is just a fine way to spend the hours.” His voice cracked, went falsetto. He attempted a smile that caused her to roll her eyes. Did he think her as stupid as he was himself?

  “I’d welcome a storm,” she said, and turned away from them.

  The two men glanced at one another. Even a minor squall would swamp their boat. Something had happened aboard the Chase. She’d had it out with the Captain, certainly, over the stowaway. And now she didn’t care whether they lived or died.

  But Talon knew what they didn’t. The Chase’s course had been a zigzag as the Captain swept the seas for Firefish. The row back would be less than a day. Anyone who understood sailing would have known it. But she was in no mood to lighten the load of men too ignorant or too lazy to have learned the basic navigation of their own ship.

  These two feared a storm! If they had been paying any attention to the ship’s mission during the past two seasons, they would fear something much harder to predict…and impossible to survive. In her duffel was a Firefish lure she dearly hoped she wouldn’t have to use. And if she did need to use it, she dearly hoped it worked.

  “It’ll kill us before it dies,” the huntsman said, dropping the large brass box that was a Firefish lure onto the wooden table of the engineer’s small cabin. “The fuse is too long.” Stedman Due crossed his arms, daring disagreement.

  Lund Lander forced a smile. Then he took his spectacles from his pocket and placed them carefully on his nose. “How much too long?” He picked up the lure easily, a brass container that weighed almost twenty-five pounds, and set it on end. He first examined a dent that had pushed the plating inward a full inch on one side. Then he looked at the top end, at a small door beside the box’s most outstanding feature, a large brass ring. The little door was covered with a thick wax seal. He took a knife from his desktop and peeled away the seal, opened the door, and peered into it.

  “How much too long?” Lund repeated.

  “I don’t know,” Stedman answered.

  “Guess.”

  “Maybe four or five seconds.”

  “Tell me why you think that,” Lund demanded in his quiet, intense way.

  The huntsman glared. “I just guessed.” Talking to Lund was always like this. They called Lund “the Toymaker,” an ironic nickname that stood in stark contrast to both his calling and his demeanor. “It’s too long,” the huntsman explained again. “The boys are worried. I’m worried. We’ve had some close calls.”

  “You want me to adjust just this one, or all of them?”

  The huntsman shrugged. “All of them,” he said softly.

  Part of the reason Lund was intimidating was physical. The Toymaker was a big man, six-feet-four, lanky, strong, a sailor who could get drunk and get in fights and win more than he lost, even when paired against the huntsmen. But most of the intimidation came from the way Lund made Stedman feel. Like there was always something he knew that others didn’t.

  Now Lund looked across the table, one eyebrow raised. It wasn’t that he disliked the man before him or didn’t appreciate his role. Lund respected the difficulty and danger of the huntsmen’s job. But what respect he did manage, the huntsmen always seemed more than eager to undermine. And this particular huntsman, the experienced, respected Stedman Due, was their leader. He should know better.

  “Has there been even one incident in which the fuse was actually too long?” Lund knew the answer.

  Stedman shrugged again.

  The Toymaker nodded his understanding. “Each fuse,” he explained patiently, for what seemed like the hundredth time, “has been calibrated based on what we’ve learned from all the encounters with Firefish that you and your men have ever had. Every time you use a lure, we recalculate the average time to strike.” Stedman glanced around the room, trying not to show his irritation. Lund noticed it, but pressed on. “That’s why an engineer accompanies every longboat. Some lures have detonated too early, as you know,” Lund shot Stedman a sharp look. Early detonations had cost thirteen lives to date, but Lund didn’t need to say it. The tally was universally known, a baker’s dozen who ended as quarry, in the bellies of their prey. Three were Lund’s own men, who had died with their timepieces in their hands and pages of notes in their laps.

  Lund let the silence speak for him. Then he continued. “We adjusted the calibration. They don’t detonate too early any more. And so far, none have detonated too late. So tell me. Should I go by our calculations, by what we know about Firefish strikes, or should I go by…something else?”

  The huntsman stewed. He pulled at his ragged beard. Then he spoke softly, imploring. “Listen, Lund. The boys are concerned you went too far the other direction, that’s all. You don’t know these monsters like we do.
”

  Lund’s eyebrow shot up again.

  “Oh, you know all the numbers. I grant you that. But these things…” he swallowed, trying hard not to show any fear. “You can’t predict what they’ll do.”

  Lund waited.

  “They…they change.”

  Lund was unimpressed. Stedman saw he was getting nowhere. Anger crept into his tone. “I’m telling you, Lund. We’re the ones out there baiting those killers, trusting your fuses and your explosives and your fool calculations. But while we’re studying them, they’re out there studying us.”

  Lund stared harder. Could Stedman Due be losing his nerve? These were beasts, forces of nature, certainly intelligent as far as animals went, but their patterns were unmistakable. Lund Lander and his team had reduced the hunt to simple calculations. Human fear on the part of the huntsmen was, of course, part of the equation—expected. Complete loss of nerve, however, would make the hunters unpredictable, not the beasts. The Captain needed to be aware of this. “Very well, then. I think I understand your concern. I’ll look into it,” he said, smiling. “Anything else?”

  Stedman had gone as far as he could. He knew Lund would do nothing. But there was something else—there were problems with getting the fuse to ignite when it got wet. But Stedman didn’t particularly want to answer questions about how and why the fuses were getting wet, because he didn’t know the answer. The Toymaker was extremely proud of his water-resistant fuse. Once it was lit, you could drop it to the ocean floor. But Lund had told them again and again it wouldn’t ignite in the first place if it went past a “saturation point,” or some such malarkey.

  Stedman sighed. He and his men were hunters. They were tracking the most dangerous prey in the world. And they weren’t accustomed to being held captive by calibrations and calculations and saturation points and other mathematical gobbledygook. It hurt morale.