by J. C. Hendee
The dark rughìr still glared up at him, though that one’s expression slowly flattened to a disturbing calm, all but those hard eyes. The guardian of the honored dead let go.
Karras stared blankly down.
The old one’s gaze never left him, as the horrid visage of the hassäg’kreig sank from sight, and then…
Karras broke the surface and gasped for air. His back hit the side of the ship while he still clung to the struggling prince.
12. Catch of the Night
“Faster!” Fiáh’our commanded.
Gän’gehtin heaved on the rope with Fiáh’our right behind and two others behind him. The whole effort was worsened by the increasing wind that whipped his grayed locks across his face. At a sudden thump against the ship’s hull, everyone halted in their efforts.
Fiáh’our pushed around Gän’gehtin to the rail, as did Uinseil, Karras’s father. With the lantern slung over the edge, they spotted Karras.
The young one floundered and coughed and gasped as he clung to the belt of the thrashing prince. In all honesty, Fiáh’our was a bit astounded that tossing the kitten into the brine had actually worked.
“Get another line!” Uinseil called out.
Quick enough, one deckhand rushed in with a rope ladder instead. Once it was lowered, Karras took hold, got one boot on the lowest rung, and they hauled him up with the prince finally gone limp in the young one’s grip. In the end, they awkwardly pulled both over the edge to flop on the deck with a wet smack like a couple of big fish.
“Blankets, tarps, anything dry—now,” Uinseil ordered, and one deckhand rushed off toward forecastle.
Gän’gehtin immediately descended upon Prince Freädherich.
Indeed, Fiáh’our was concerned as well, but since the shirvêsh tended the prince, he crouched over Karras, who was still wheezing. Before he could heave the young one up to a sitting position, Uinseil did so.
“Son, are you all right?” the father asked.
Karras’s eyes were blank as he looked about. When his gaze turned toward the near rail, he flinched away from it.
“Dark… down there…” Karras sputtered. “That one… he was… was waiting… trying to take us… take me!”
Fiáh’our scowled in puzzlement at more of the young one’s babbling.
“Bäynæ’s mercy!”
At Gän’gehtin’s sharp whisper, Fiáh’our who flinched and looked. The shirvêsh was on his knees beside the prince, who was now curled beneath a wool blanket that had been brought. Fiáh’our could not see the prince’s face, but he saw Gän’gehtin’s clearly enough.
The shirvêsh’s mouth gaped like his eyes in a face filled with shock as he stared down upon the man. Stranger still, his hands were up against his chest, as if he had snatched them back. Fiáh’our started to rise.
“You!”
He turned back to find the young one glaring at him amid shivers.
“You… you…,” Karras stuttered in a hiss where he leaned against his crouched father. “You… you used me like… like fish bait!”
He lunged, grabbing for the closest grip, which was Fiáh’our’s beard.
Fiáh’our quickly leaned away, wobbling in his crouch as Uinseil restrained his son, but Karras was far from done. Fiáh’our frowned wryly, raising both bushy eyebrows as Karras tore into him with a long string of curses.
That the young one could do so meant he was fine, and in being so close to shore, he had never been in any real danger. That he ranted on in Numanese instead of his own tongue, well, that was another sign of how much he had drifted from his people’s proper ways.
“Fiáh’our, you have more explaining to do,” Uinseil warned, as he tried to wrap an offered blanket around his son without letting the young one break free.
“Later,” Fiáh’our returned. “We need to get under way by what I have already told you.”
Uinseil glanced toward the prince and added, “Not much later, mind you.”
Fiáh’our rose and headed off to crouch at Gän’gehtin’s side. The shirvêsh now held Prince Freädherich’s head in his hands, gently turning it as he tilted his own. He peered at the prince’s face in frightful astonishment. In worry, Fiáh’our looked upon prince as well.
He saw only what he had earlier, when they had first come aboard. Prince Freädherich’s features were slack, and those strangely colored eyes were blank and listless, barely open, as if the young man saw nothing before him.
“What is it?” Fiáh’our whispered.
Gän’gehtin did not answer. Instead, he peered about at all of the others on the deck. When his attention returned to the prince, he shook his head sharply, just once.
Fiáh’our looked about as well. Perhaps there were too many eyes watching and ears listening for his young friend to speak. He rose as Uinseil began shouting orders to his sparse crew to prepare the vessel, and a father ushered off his still fuming son.
As Karras passed, he cast a vicious glare Fiáh’our’s way.
Much as Fiáh’our had intended a far less eventful first night in pushing the young one onto a proper path, it could not be helped now. He assisted Gän’gehtin in settling the prince in an outward cabin below the aftcastle with direct access to the deck. They lashed the door handle from the outside at the shirvêsh’s insistence. While the crew and Uinseil were busy, and Karras had not yet returned, Fiáh’our pulled Gän’gehtin to the rail under the growing wind.
“All right, out with it,” he whispered.
Gän’gehtin looked away over the ship’s side in griping the rail tightly with both hands.
“It was only an instant,” he said. “And it is so dark… perhaps I was mistaken.”
Fiáh’our huffed a sigh. “You said those of your temple served Malourné royals on their visits to our seatt. Was it something you have seen in the prince before?”
“No,” Gän’gehtin answered with a slow shake of his head. “He was always reluctant to leave whatever vessel brought them… always quiet… withdrawn. If not for his wife, I wondered if he would have come at all with the king or queen, but…”
Gän’gehtin fell silent, and Fiáh’our waited. As a shirvêsh, his friend might have led a reclusive life at the temple but was not given to easy nonsense.
“What did you see when you went to the prince,” Fiáh’our insisted. “Tell me. I will believe you, as always.”
Gän’gehtin stared out over the water, doubt plain on his face as faltered out, “Prince Freädherich’s eyes, for an instant, looked… too dark… blackly glassy like… like those of a fish.”
13. It was a Dark and Stormy Night
As Karras stood upon the aftcastle, gripping its forward rail in front of the pilot’s wheel, the wind had whipped up to nearly a squall. The ship rolled in its course toward the point below his people’s mountain and the way into the great bay. He had had few words with his father before they left port, for there had not been time for much.
Whatever the old blusterer had told Father, while Karras had been sinking in the port, it had been enough to make his father put aside all else. Likely, the cargo could still be delivered on time. After that, Karras knew he would be “dealt with” most certainly by his parents.
All he learned was that Mother had been up late, once it was discovered that he was still out. Father, of course, was roused as well by her pacing. When Karras did not return, Mother had stayed behind, waiting for the rest of the family to rise. Father, unable to sleep, had decided to go down early to the ship. He had heard the drums before arriving in port, though he had not known all that those signals had meant. Not until he found Fiáh’our on his ship.
Karras did not dare look back and face his father’s ire. Instead, he peered down across the deck.
Gän’gehtin was nowhere to be seen, perhaps gone off to once more check on the prince. Fiáh’our was alone amid the scrambling, scant crew. The ship rolled again, and the deck slanted sharply. The old boar teetered, white-faced as he gripped the right side rai
l.
All Karras did was merely shift weight in a steady stance.
“You are in my world now, you braggart,” he whispered. “Let us see how you like that… and maybe a good sinking of your own, as well.”
“Give extra way at the point,” his father shouted over the wind. “But be mindful as we veer out of the charted lane.”
“Yes, sire,” answered the pilot.
Karras looked up into the rigging. Three of the crew, far fewer than was best, still worked at shortening some sails. The wind was driving the ship toward the peninsula on the bay’s northward point. They dared not veer too far into the lane for outbound vessels, even at night when few would set sail.
“I will go up as well,” he called out.
Though his father never replied, Karras shifted along the aftcastle’s forward rail toward the steep ladder steps to the deck. All they need do was make it around the point, and they did not have far to go.
Once into the bay’s mouth, the mountain of his people would cut the shoreward wind by half. They could return to full sail for the approach to Calm Seatt. But as he reached the deck, the ship rolled again, and even he had to grab the ladder rungs to keep from slipping.
He did not exactly see what had happened, but he spotted the old thänæ in the last of it.
Fiáh’our went tumbling and sliding down the deck’s slant. In a clatter of armor that rose over the wind’s howl, the old man slammed up against the ship’s other rail wall. The force drove him halfway to his feet where he teetered against the edge.
For that one instant, spite gave way to concern.
Karras lunged out to grab the rail wall, hurrying toward the blustering bane of his life. The ship’s roll ended, and as it began to rock sharply the other way, Fiáh’our snatched the railing. Karras pulled himself along, and the fright in the old braggart’s eyes was too much not to rouse some glee.
“Get to the other side and out of the way,” he shouted into the thänæ’s face. “And tie yourself off… with your hair, if you have to!”
They had to avoid running aground in the dark, and the last thing anyone needed was this old fool getting in the way, especially if someone had to watch the shoreward side.
Fiáh’our’s paled feature’s twisted in a snarl. Whatever foul growl might have come out was lost as the deck leveled and the old thänæ grew pale. His eyes nearly popped out of his wrinkled face as he slapped a hand over his mouth.
Karras lurched away. He was not about to get spewed with ale from the night’s telling, but it never came to that.
Before the vessel swayed again, Fiáh’our stumbled off toward the ship’s other side
With a grumbling sigh, Karras made for the nearest anchored line to the rigging and barely grabbed hold when his father called out.
“More light! Open the bow lamps!”
Karras turned quickly in looking to the aftcastle. His father had fully opened the largest of lanterns hung above the aft. When he glanced toward the bow, one of the crew had done the same there. Lanterns did little to help anyone see ahead along a course at night. No, they were used to be seen. Before he could make for the bow, the ship teetered again, and he grabbed a rigging anchor pin.
“Straight on! It is coming!”
At that shout from the forecastle, Karras tried to lunge, but boots slid on the deck’s slant. He held on until the ship leveled again and then dashed for the far rail, peering ahead around the ship’s side.
“What is happening?” Fiáh’our demanded.
Karras ignored him, for what he saw out in the dark made him freeze in uncertainty.
Two lights out there were too bright and close for those of Calm Seatt’s distant port. A bell clanged frantically out in the dark. Almost immediately, Karras’s ears rang with the answering bell on his family’s ship. He shouted out in the same instant as his father.
“Ship dead on! Hard shoreward!”
There was another vessel out there closing too fast.
14. Flight of the Duchess
Fiáh’our clung to the rail, clenching his teeth against the swell of oak ale in his belly at the ship’s sudden swerve. Well, mostly the swerve, since that made his guts roll even worse amid the ship’s sways. And when Karras had shouted, his stomach felt like it had filled with stones.
“What is happening?” he shouted, and only then did the young one look back from up the rail.
“To the mast, you old fool,” Karras shouted, pulling himself along the rail. “Get off this side!”
Fiáh’our would do no such thing. He was in no state to go sliding across the deck again.
“Another ship is out there,” Karras shouted as he closed and tried to wrench Fiáh’our’s grip from the rail. “We’re too far out, and it is coming in too close toward the point!”
Then came Uinseil’s cry: “Brace! All hands brace for impact!”
Fiáh’our stared at the sight of an approaching lantern’s light. It appeared to float high over the water, rushing toward him at an angle off the bow.
The prow of a taller vessel loomed out of the dark right below that light.
“Oh, mothers of the Bäynæ,” he moaned.
“Let go!” Karras shouted.
And he did a bit too late.
Fiáh’our barely glimpsed a crest painted on the other vessel’s prow and then it hit. The ship lurched under his feet, the deck began to tilt, and the impact’s force nearly threw him back into the rail. For an instant, he saw the other taller vessel grind along the ship’s side.
The splinting and shattering of the rail appeared to race toward him. And then he was jerked back from the rail by his left arm.
Fiáh’our toppled heavily on his back, only spotting the young one clinging to his forearm as he slid yet again. They both slid amid pieces of railing tumbling around them. His right shoulder’s pauldron suddenly struck something hard and unmoving.
The armor took most of the force but he cursed from the pain as his heavy body twisted in a half spin across the dampened deck boards. His long hair suddenly snagged on the base of the ship’s biggest mast, and he threw one arm around it.
The hold on his other arm broke.
Fiáh’our blindly grasped outward, trying to grab Karras. The young one snatched his right boot to keep from tumbling down to the ship’s other side. Fiáh’our looked up along the deck’s incline, fearing the ship might crack in half. The shriek of a woman’s voice pulled his gaze even higher.
“Reine, no!”
He saw no one at the other vessel’s higher rail and then someone vaulted up at a run.
One small booted foot stepped once upon the railing’s top in a leap.
Fiáh’our sucked a breath that stuck in his chest, as that lone, small figure arched through the dark. He glimpsed three others rushing far high rail of that other vessel. One appeared to be a tall woman with long hair swirling in the wind like her greenish-blue cloak. Then his gaze was only for that one above him in the night.
Fiáh’our barely made out dark hair around that one’s roundish face: a human woman smaller than usual. In pants and high boots, her cloak whipped frantically as a sheathed blade twisted and turned at her hip. Then she was falling toward the slanted deck, and he quickly looked down over his chest.
Karras still clung to his boot, but the young one stared up at the flying woman in blank shock.
“Grab her,” Fiáh’our shouted, “when she lands… before she slams against the far side!”
He heard the little human hit the deck before he could look.
Karras tucked under one knee to half-rise as Fiáh’our tightened his hold on the mast. Then he spotted the woman tumbling, not sliding. Karras reached out to snatch her by her tiny left wrist. She jerked to a stop with a yelp that rose over the sound of grinding ships’ hulls. And there she dangled along the deck's in the young one’s grip.
All Fiáh’our could do was hold onto the mast until the grinding of ship hulls abated. The deck shuddered beneath him as it rocke
d level, though Karras let go of his boot. Fiáh’our struggled to sit up, finding the young one and the little woman already on their feet.
“Where is he?” she shouted, holding one arm against her chest.
Her plain-featured face was filled with a manic fear beneath a wind-tangled mess of chestnut hair. She looked familiar, though there and then, Fiáh’our was uncertain why.
Her dark wool pullover ended across her slightly broad hips, and she might have been barely taller than Karras. A short but front-split skirt hung down around her pants, which were tucked into polished riding boots that rose up her narrow calves.
Karras stared at her in shock and confusion. For an instant, Fiáh’our thought she might draw the saber on her hip. Instead, she grabbed the young one by his canvas pullover and shouted into his face.
“Where is my husband?”
Fiáh’our pulled himself up the mast. About to intervene, someone else called out.
“Here,” Gän’gehtin answered, clinging to the frame of the cabin’s opened door. “He is in here, Highness.”
Only then did Fiáh’our recognize the woman, though she was already off in a stumbling run across the deck.
Duchess Reine Faunier-reskynna vanished into the cabin under the stunned stare of Karras. It took the young one another three breaths and blinks before he rushed off toward where the ships had collided.
Out beyond the ship’s rear, Fiáh’our spotted the likely royal vessel of the reskynna drifting off into the dark amid many shouts and calls carrying over the water. But as neither ship appeared to be sinking, he groaned with a sickened stomach.
“Oh, bothersome Bäynæ, you are too hard on old Fiáh’our. Why try to drop a little human woman on his head… even a royal one, at that?”