The Caldera

by John Flanagan

  Thorn turned to her, released his grip on the backstay and stood with his arms spread out to the wind in total abandon as the berserker spirit overtook him. He roared with wild laughter.

  “Totally!” he said to her. “This is fantastic! Nobody has ever felt anything like this before!”

  The crew heard his words and shook their heads in wonder. Sometimes they suspected Thorn was a little crazy. At other times—such as this—they were sure of it.

  But Hal was staring ahead.

  Two hundred meters away, the smaller of the two rocky outcrops that formed this entrance to the lagoon was looming toward them. The wave was carrying them at fantastic speed toward it. There was no way he could turn away. If he tried to turn back, the wave would swamp them. But if they continued to rush on like this, they would be driven up onto the rocks. He had to get them off the wave.

  “Hold on!” he yelled. It was an unnecessary order. Apart from Thorn, the Herons were gripping tight for their lives. He shoved the tiller, letting the ship angle down, accelerating down the face of the wave, building the speed. Dimly, above the roar of the wave, he heard Thorn’s exultant yell. Then he heaved back on the tiller, sending the ship soaring upward once more, using the speed and momentum he had gained to keep her going across and up the wave.

  Only this time, he didn’t back off at the top. He used the incredible momentum to shoot out and break clear of the crest of the wave.

  Heron’s bow smashed through the crest, and a welter of foam thundered down onto the crew. She came clear out of the water for half her length. But she was newer than Vulture, and better built. Hal himself had selected the timber for her keel and her frames. He had sweated over every rivet that held her together. She hung in the air for several seconds, then smashed down onto the back of the wave, rolling wildly, plunging her bows deep into the water, so that the yardarm pulled clear of its bracket and cracked in half, sagging down against the restraint of the halyards. Then she righted herself, rocking sluggishly, half full of water, and lay in the calm water behind the terrible wave.

  A secondary wave caught her. But it was barely half the size of the first wave, no more than two meters high. The Heron rose sluggishly to it, half full of water as she was. She rocked and plunged but her watertight central compartments kept her afloat.

  Slowly, the crew gathered themselves, looking at one another in relief as they realized they had survived the caldera’s onslaught. They released their hold on the ropes and fittings they had clung to through the insane ride across the face of the wave. One or two of them shook their heads in wonder, unable to quite believe that they were still alive. Seawater sloshed thigh deep in the rowing wells, slopping backward and forward with the unsteady motion of the ship.

  “Let’s get her bailed out,” Hal said in the sudden calm that followed the roar of the wave. “Ingvar, Stefan, take down that broken yardarm.”

  Moving as if they were in a daze, the Herons set about carrying out his orders. Stig stepped up to the steering platform, where Hal sagged unsteadily against the railing, his knees suddenly weak as the adrenaline drained away.

  “That was amazing!” Stig said. “I didn’t know she could do that.” He slapped the oak rail affectionately, then added, “I didn’t know you could do that.”

  Hal, his hair plastered down on his head with seawater, grinned in return.

  “Neither did I,” he said. “Now let’s get this water out of her before another one of those waves comes along.”

  • • • • •

  It took an hour’s hard work to set the ship to rights. The main task was to bail the water out of her, and the crew set to willingly with buckets and beakers to get it done. Once the massive weight of water was out of her, she rode the water like a seabird once more.

  The yardarm was cracked and unusable. Ingvar, Stefan and Hal cut the bindings that held the sail to it and trimmed the ends of the yard itself, putting the two shortened halves into the rack of spare spars. While at sea, they never threw usable timber away.

  “Shall we put the sail onto a new spar?” Stefan asked.

  Hal shook his head. “Time for that later. For the time being, we’ll sail on a foul tack if need be.”

  A foul tack used the sail on the side from which the wind was blowing. The mast impeded the sail so that it didn’t develop its full power. But it would keep the ship moving, albeit at a reduced pace.

  Hal looked around the ship. Aside from the cracked yardarm, she had sustained little in the way of physical damage.

  “We should go back and look for survivors,” he said, remembering the terrible moment of seeing the other ship crack in two.

  Thorn shook his head. “There won’t be many. Most of them were wearing armor. Not a good idea when you get hit by a monster wave like that.”

  “Let them drown,” said Olaf. “They wouldn’t come looking for us if the shoe was on the other foot.”

  “Which is what makes us different from them,” Stig said firmly.

  Olaf went to reply, then decided against it.

  Hal watched the two of them keenly. “I thought you might want to see if Myrgos survived,” he said to Olaf. “You could take him back to Byzantos to stand trial.”

  That idea appealed to the guard commander. “Good thinking,” he said. “I’d enjoy seeing him on the rack.”

  Hal raised an eyebrow. “Not exactly what I was suggesting.”

  They sailed back to the point where the wave had overwhelmed Vulture. The sea was littered with debris—broken planks, hatch covers, oars, casks, clay jars and sections of spars. The surface of the water was also coated with a thick layer of ash from the heaving, belching cliffs behind them.

  As Thorn had forecast, very few of the pirate crew had survived—partly because many of them had been wearing armor and partly because very few of them could swim.

  They hauled three of them out of the water, more dead than alive, and shoved them roughly into the bow, where Stig and Jesper stood guard over them. But the pirates had no fight left in them. They huddled on the deck, covered in dirty, ash-laden water, and looked down at the planks, not willing to meet their captors’ eyes.

  “That’s about it,” Thorn remarked to Hal.

  The skirl was drawing breath to give sail orders to Ulf and Wulf when Lydia called:

  “Over here! Clinging to that spar!”

  Hal swung the tiller and they rowed toward the spot she was pointing to. Thorn gave a mirthless laugh when he saw the hapless survivor hanging on to a section of broken spar.

  The wild hair and beard were plastered down by seawater, and the features were half obscured by ash and dirt. But the glaring eyes and snarling mouth were unmistakable. It was Myrgos.

  “Up you come, my beauty,” said Ingvar, leaning down to lift the pirate captain bodily onto the ship. He set him down and Myrgos slumped against the rail, his eyes alive with hatred, his ugly features contorted by rage.

  “Did he say thank you?” Thorn asked.

  But then the treacherous Myrgos reached behind his back and drew a long knife from a sheath, slashing at Ingvar.

  He caught the big lad a glancing blow on the left forearm, opening a long, shallow cut. Ingvar reacted instinctively. Before Myrgos could recover from the first wild stroke, Ingvar grabbed a handful of his shirtfront and heaved him up and over the rail once more, pitching him bodily into the sea.

  There was an ugly thud as Myrgos’s head made solid contact with the spar that had so recently saved his life. He let out a short grunt of pain and surprise, then his eyes glazed and he sank back into the water, sliding off the spar and sinking into the dirty, scum-covered water of the caldera.

  “Best place for him,” said Thorn. They waited a few minutes, but the pirate captain never reappeared.

  Finally, Hal put a weary hand on the tiller. “Let’s go home,” he said.

  cha
pterforty

  It was mid-morning when Heron cruised into the Golden Reach under easy sail, heading for the harbor at Byzantos.

  Hal threaded his way skillfully through the bustling traffic on the waterway, realizing after a few minutes that the other craft would come close to him—at times frighteningly close—but would always manage to avoid a collision at the last moment. He grinned to himself. If you didn’t have that attitude on this piece of water, you’d never get anywhere. Once he had learned to trust the other helmsmen, and to copy their practice of close, but not too close, he found it was a lot more comfortable navigating the Reach.

  But then there was one craft that didn’t look as if it would give way or shear off at the last moment. A solidly build ten-oar patrol boat heaved to across their path, and sat broadside on. In the bow, a figure in shining armor stood, hand on the hilt of his sword, and held up his hand for them to stop.

  “You’ve seen him, of course?” Thorn said.

  Hal nodded. “Wonder what would happen if I just sailed straight into him?”

  Thorn grinned. “He’d get that shiny armor all rusty. Don’t think that’d make us too popular.”

  But Hal was already calling orders to Ulf and Wulf. “Let go the sheets. Bring down the sail. Jesper, get in the bow if we need to fend off.”

  As the sail was released and came sliding down to the deck, the way began to fall off Heron. At the last moment, Hal swung her bow to port to avoid contacting the patrol boat and the two craft rode side by side, a few meters separating them, rising and falling on the choppy sea.

  He noted that the crew were also wearing armor. Obviously, this wasn’t a friendly reception welcoming them back to Byzantos. The armored man’s next words confirmed this.

  “You left port without permission,” he called.

  Hal shrugged. There wasn’t much else he could do.

  “Follow us,” the armored one continued, his tone brusque and uncompromising. He pointed across the harbor. “Moor up at the Imperial Wharf.”

  Hal glanced in the direction he had indicated. The Imperial Wharf was easy to recognize. It was large and solidly built, with several official-looking buildings along its length. Two more patrol boats were moored alongside, and there was room behind them for the Heron. Hal waved his compliance and called to Stig.

  “We’ll go under oars, I think. Too hard to keep station if we sail.”

  The crew quickly dropped into the rowing wells and ran out their oars, while Ulf and Wulf stowed the sail. The patrol boat waited until they were ready, then gave way, the armored man turning to make sure they were following. Meekly, they processed across the water behind the patrol boat, like a naughty puppy with its tail between its legs. This time there was no need to weave among the rest of the traffic. The other craft gave the official patrol boat a wide berth. Nobody wanted to tangle with them. They all knew from bitter experience that the Emperor’s fleet had absolute right of way and any collision would inevitably be blamed on the other craft, and a subsequent heavy fine imposed.

  They came alongside the wharf, and the patrol boat sheared off to return to the harbor. The tide was high and the deck was almost level with the wharf. As Hal steered her in, letting the last of her speed die off, Jesper tossed a mooring line to a man on the wharf, who hauled the bow in close to the pilings, creaking and squeaking against the cane fenders that were hung over the edge of the wharf. In the stern, Stig threw another mooring line ashore, and within minutes they were moored securely fore and aft. Hal slipped the retaining rope over the tiller to keep it secure. The rowers ran their oars in and stowed them along the ship’s length.

  They had barely finished this when they heard the tramp of booted feet on the wharf’s planks, and a double file of soldiers—twenty in all—marched along the wharf, coming to a halt opposite the ship and right-turning to face them. Each man was equipped with a shield, spear and helmet, and they all wore short, Toscan-style swords on their right hips. Their commander, a senior officer judging by the amount of gold and silver trim on his armor and cloak fastenings, stepped down from the wharf onto the ship without waiting to be invited.

  Thorn raised an eyebrow. “Nice manners they have in this part of the world,” he said, not too quietly.

  The officer turned an icy glare on him. Then he glanced around the people gathered on the deck and found Olaf. He stepped toward him, his brow furrowed in an angry frown.

  “You’ve got a nerve, Olaf, coming strolling in here calm as you like—”

  “We sailed in, actually,” Thorn pointed out in a friendly tone.

  The officer glared at him. “Shut up, northman.”

  Thorn’s eyebrow, already raised, went a little higher, and his hand dropped to the hilt of his saxe. But the officer didn’t notice. He had turned back to Olaf.

  “You know the Empress has a warrant out for your arrest,” he said. “And she’s discovered that the last time you were in port, you escaped from the town prison. Well, you’re under arrest now, and this time you won’t find it so easy to get away.” He called to the men on the wharf, without taking his gaze from Olaf, whose face was slowly reddening with anger. “Corporal!”

  “Sir!” a craggy-faced corporal in the leading rank of men responded, coming to attention.

  “Take this man’s weapon and place him under arrest.”

  “Sir!” The corporal marched across the wharf and stepped down onto the Heron’s railing, then to her deck. Hal eyed his heavy, nailed boots and the marks they had left on the rail with growing annoyance. He stepped forward, blocking the corporal’s progress and spoke to the officer.

  “You know, I’m getting a little tired of people barging onto my ship without asking permission.”

  “We don’t need your permission. We’re on the Empress’s business and you are all criminals. It remains to be seen whether or not you’ll be arrested with this one.” The officer jerked a dismissive thumb at Olaf. As he did, the corporal sidestepped Hal and strode forward to take Olaf’s sword from its scabbard.

  “And who might decide that?” Thorn asked, belligerently stepping forward to stand beside Hal. On his other side, Stig did the same. Each of them had his hand resting lightly on the hilt of his saxe. The officer noticed this but didn’t look intimidated. He glanced at the nineteen armed men on the wharf, then at the Heron’s crew.

  “Men!” he ordered, and the twenty soldiers came to attention. “Stand by to arrest these criminals if they try to hinder the Empress’s justice.” He turned back to Thorn to answer his earlier question. “Whether we arrest you or not will be up to the Empress herself. At the moment, we have no orders concerning you.” He paused, then added in an ominous tone, “But that can change.”

  “Excuse me, Colonel.” It was a young voice that interrupted him, a high-pitched voice. He turned, annoyance showing in his face, as Constantus stepped up out of the rowing well where he had been watching proceedings. The boy was dressed in clothing contributed by the crew, most of it too big for him and all of it made from common, rough material—nothing like the fine silks and linens he was used to wearing.

  “What is it, boy?” the colonel asked dismissively.

  Constantus drew himself more erect at the tone. “I’m wondering who is this Empress you keep referring to?” he asked.

  The colonel spared him another annoyed glance. “As everyone knows, she is the Empress Justinia, ruler of Byzantos and the eastern empire of Toscana. Now, if you’ll shut up and get out of the way . . .”

  And that was going too far. Constantus went red with fury. When he spoke, his voice was high pitched and on the verge of breaking.

  “I rather fancied that my mother was the Regent, ruling in my name. Not the Empress in her own right,” he spat, his voice sharp as a sword blade.

  The colonel hesitated at his words, peering more closely at the boy. “Your mother?” he said hesitantly.

&n
bsp; “The Regent Justinia,” Constantus said. “Ruling in the name of Emperor Constantus.” He paused for effect, then jabbed a thumb at his own chest. “Me!”

  He spat the last word at the colonel, who now saw past the rough clothes and disheveled appearance to recognize the boy emperor. The man’s mouth worked, but no sound came.

  Constantus shook his head in disgust, then turned to the corporal. “You! Return Commander Olaf’s sword to him.”

  The corporal also gaped and hesitated.

  Constantus’s shrill voice cut like a whip. “Do it now!”

  The corporal stood irresolute for a second or two, then clumsily held out the sword to Olaf, who took it and returned it, ringing, to its scabbard.

  Hal watched in some surprise, wondering where the air of command and the boy’s self-assurance had come from.

  “These men,” Constantus continued, “these men who you call criminals and want to arrest, have just saved me from the pirate Myrgos. Olaf, commander of my personal guard, recruited this band of Skandians to attack the pirate’s stronghold and destroy it. Then they sank his ship and killed Myrgos himself, ridding us of a scourge who has plagued our oceans for years.”

  “Well, we didn’t do it all,” Thorn said genially. “The volcano helped a little.”

  Constantus gave him an angry look. “Be quiet,” he ordered.

  At that moment, Hal realized it wasn’t a natural air of command that gave the boy his self-assurance. It was a matter of upbringing. Constantus had been told since he was a baby that he was superior to other people. Now he was just an arrogant prat with an overblown sense of his own importance.

  Still, his attitude and manner had the desired effect on the colonel, who came to attention and hurried to make amends.