by Chris Bunch
She rinsed her mouth, asked, “Did you dream? About these bastards?”
Gareth nodded.
“That wasn’t a dream,” she said. It was not a question.
“No,” Gareth said.
“Did they … their magicians … send it?”
“I don’t know,” Gareth said. He saw Labala coming out of another door. “If they did, why’d they send the last part — the part about their decadence — if they’re trying to frighten us.”
He noticed Labala was shaken.
“You, too, dreamed of these around us?”
“I did,” Labala said. “And more. I saw something, some sort of vision, after I’d seen these people’s slow dying.
“I don’t think it was intended. Maybe I was riding on the spirit of one of these wizards here, like you can launch a canoe through the surf more easily in the backwash of a great wave.
“I hung over this island and saw us sleeping, some of us moaning in our sleep, for many of us were dreaming the dream.
“Then I was outside the city, a day’s travel, beyond any of the buildings. I saw the Linyati in their camp, and two Runners were talking to a man who looked like that Baryatin and another dressed like him.
“Then I woke up.”
Gareth considered. “Not good,” he said. “Assuming you dreamt true, and there’s no reason you didn’t, that means they’re negotiating with the Slavers.
“Their enemies.”
“The enemy of my enemy could be my friend,” Cosyra reminded him.
Gareth nodded. “Maybe they’re thinking they could buy the Slavers off from their raiding by delivering us, all trussed up for the slaughter.”
“I think,” Labala said, “I’d best be preparing some spells, and we had better start packing for a very sudden journey.”
“What about that dinner tonight?” Cosyra said.
“I don’t think we’ll have any choice,” Gareth said. “We’ll just have to go well armed, and hope if they start something we can fight our way back here.”
“And then what?”
“I don’t know,” Gareth said. “We’ll have to find — and seize — the opportunity when it comes.”
“If it comes,” Cosyra corrected.
• • •
Gareth was looking for Iset, and found Knoll N’b’ry, Froln, and Nomios in deep concentration. N’b’ry had drawn some sketches on the rock wall of the barracks with a stone.
It was various views of a ship.
“Now that’ll give these Hertis something to puzzle over once we leave,” Gareth said, amused.
“Here,” N’b’ry said, “just the man we need. I’ve been thinking about the way we go a-pirating, and there’s things wrong with it.”
“No fooling,” Gareth said. “The way we got euchred out of that treasure fleet still rankles.”
“The first thing we’re doing wrong,” N’b’ry went on, “is we’re using the wrong kind of ships.”
“He’s tellin’ us we ought not just grab the first merchantman we see, or, we build one like it, but with guns, like the old Steadfast,“ Froln said. “Look at this.”
The drawing was of a long, slender, two-masted ship, with a bow like a knife-blade. But what caught the eye was the amount of sail it carried — two huge gaffsails on each mast, plus triangular sails between the foremast and the jib boom. Also, small squaresails reached above the angled gaffsails.
“Enough sail there to drive her under,” Gareth said.
“Not with that shape,” N’b’ry said. “She’ll cut through the water, not push her way like a fat-butted marketwoman. Also, see the rake on the masts, to take the strain.”
Gareth considered the design.
“Looks like it ought to sail close to the wind.”
“Just so,” N’b’ry agreed.
“We kin flash our arses in front of any escort,” Nomios said, “run downwind, then tack back, not wearin’ ship, and be on the merchantmen like the wolf.”
He stared out the door, and Gareth knew he was seeing open ocean and clean sky, instead of gray, evil stone.
• • •
The air that day was still and humid, as if waiting for a storm.
A runner came, just before the midday meal, to tell Gareth that Baryatin wished the woman to attend the feast as well as his officers.
“I wonder why the change?” Cosyra wondered.
“The wand-waver wants a little beauty — besides mine, I mean — to liven up the affair,” Tehidy suggested.
Cosyra looked at him and snorted. “I think I’d best go sharpen my dagger.”
Twenty-one
No, Cosyra,” Gareth said slowly. “Sharpen your dagger if you wish, but you’ll not be using it to slice a roast. We’ll not be attending this feast.”
Froln grimaced. “ ‘Twould be a declaration of war, with us trapped on this damned rock.”
“Better that than dividing our forces,” Gareth said. “Kill the officers at the feast, hit this island at the same time — that would make things just too easy.”
He sent for Labala.
“You told us that the Linyati are pursuing one of us in particular, with no idea who, right?”
Labala nodded. “I’ve done other divinations since then, with still nothing to shout about.”
“Try this, though there’s no magic in it,” Gareth said. “First Baryatin won’t deign to give his language spell to a mere woman. Then, half a glass ago, he sends word that Cosyra must attend this feast of his. And Labala had a vision of Baryatin or somebody with a pretty serious case of the tattoos talking to the Linyati.
“I’m just evil-minded enough to think the Slavers have made a deal — give us Cosyra, and we’ll help you kill off the pirates and stop raiding your lands. Baryatin is too arrogant to realize the alliance will last about a minute and a half after they have what they want — then it’ll be back to business as usual.”
“That’s a big jump in logic,” N’b’ry complained.
“Starting,” Cosyra added, “with the fact nobody’s got the slightest idea why they supposedly want me, rather than, say, a chubby brown wizard or this cute devil with a beard.”
“I’m not chubby,” Labala protested. “Just … firmly built.”
“Maybe so, maybe no,” Froln said. “I’m not botherin’ with that, all I need is the truth that we’d be easy to take out if we split up.
“I vote with you, Gareth — and I know damned well so will the men.
“So what do we do?”
“Pack up,” Gareth said. “Try to keep it from being obvious. Ready to move in two hours. And give me ten good swimmers right now.”
Tehidy took a deep breath.
“This is good,” he announced. “Ever since we’ve been in Herti, it’s like the walls are closing in on me.”
“Aw,” N’b’ry said. “Him wants his widdle jungle back.”
“Damned right I do,” Tehidy agreed. “And I want it now.”
He stamped like an infant. Everyone grinned, and started preparations for the march out.
• • •
Gareth waited with the swimmers inside the barracks until the pirates were ready to move. The four cannon were left in position, in the hopes that the men of Herti, even though the Slavers also had guns, still didn’t know what the shiny brass tubes were intended for.
Iset reported the column was ready. “Straight across the causeway in a charge, move two guns with us, set up a bridgehead, and then — ”
“No,” Gareth said. “I’ve got to believe, if Baryatin’s double-dealing us like I think, he’s got to have soldiers — maybe the Linyati, too — in position over there waiting for us to do the obvious.
“That’s why I wanted the swimmers. We’re going out a different way — but as soon as they figure out what I’m intending, that’ll have torn it, and the shooting will start, so be ready.”
He told his officers what he intended, then motioned to the swimmers.
“Let’s go
for a bath.”
Gareth stripped naked except for a long, sheathed knife on a belt. The others did the same.
He took a deep breath, ran out of the barracks, flat-dove into the lake, and swam hard around the islet, toward that floating causeway.
He made the causeway, pulled himself up on it.
A man pulling a small cart across saw him, yelped in alarm, and started running as the other swimmers came out of the water, the cart overturning and bananas scattering in all directions.
“Four of you to the near shore, where that thicket is. Cut eleven straight saplings and strip them for poles. The rest of you, start cutting these rafts apart.”
As the men went to work, Gareth heard shouts, war cries, and saw Herti soldiers running down to the waterfront, toward the unseen solid causeway to the pirates’ barracks.
He thought he spotted the curved metal helmets of the Linyati to one flank, but wasn’t sure.
One of the pirate guns slammed, and the ball crashed through a file of Herti soldiers. They hesitated, and Gareth realized his hope had proven true — as solidly grouped as they were, they had no familiarity with artillery and the tactics it made necessary.
Another round of grape swathed through the ranks. Gareth saw one of the Slavers’ stubby moyens being pushed into view from behind a monolith, powder and shot bearers behind it.
“We’re ready, Cap’n,” a swimmer called, and three rafts floated free. They took poles and began pushing the rafts through the shallow water toward the island.
They rounded the curve just as a mass of Herti soldiers charged across the causeway. Both stationary guns cracked, and swept the causeway clean.
A Linyati moyen went off, and Gareth saw the cannonball bounce across the water and skip across the islet without hitting anyone.
The two mobile guns were aiming at the moyen when another, unseen gun fired. The closest pirate gun was struck, knocked spinning into the lake, its crew shattered by the ricocheting bits of the ball.
Then the two mobile guns fired as one. They hit just behind the moyen, in the powder supply, and it exploded in a gout of black smoke.
The Herti tried another charge, and this time the corsairs let them get within musket range before firing.
Then the rafts were at the islet, and Gareth was shouting orders to get aboard, get the guns on the rafts, move, move, we’re on our way out of here!
A Slaver cannon fired, and its ball cut through a knot of soldiers, gore splattering for yards.
Fire was returned, and the Linyati pulled their gun back into the shelter of a pyramid.
A gunner cleverly aimed at the low, square building next to it, blasted grapeshot. Evidently enough of the small balls ricocheted into the hidden Linyati gunners, for Gareth heard shrieks of agony across the water.
The pirates and the three surviving guns were packed onto the rafts, and the polemen set to, sweating in the bright sun, back the way they’d come.
Herti and Linyati soldiers saw Gareth’s intended landing and poured around the shores of the lake as the Slavers’ cannon were pushed into the open and fired at the rafts.
Now the benefits of Gareth’s sniping were evident, for these gunners, not the first nor the third set who’d carried the guns until shot down, couldn’t seem to strike a moving target.
“Dammit, dammit,” Gareth heard Tehidy mutter as one of the pirate guns fired. “And where are we going to find more gunpowder, dammit, dammit!”
The rafts banged ashore. Iset and his officers shouted orders, Iset stroking his mustache as calmly as if this were a familiar drill. As the Herti ran toward them, the corsair formations counterattacked as they’d been trained.
They slammed into the motley throngs in a wedge. Pistols and muskets cracked, and men screamed as cutlasses slashed, were parried by spears, and knives cut into flesh.
It was quickly apparent that the Herti, as the dream had showed, had had no serious enemies for many years. Here a knot fought bravely until cut down, there half a hundred were charged by ten pirates and screeched into a panicky retreat.
There were Linyati on the field, holding firm, carefully aiming, shooting, loading, but no more than a hundred so far.
“Don’t chase them,” Gareth was bellowing. “Pull back and form up!”
The pirates reluctantly started back, and then thunder rolled across the cloudless sky.
There came a great roar, but no beast showed itself.
Instead, the front line of the corsairs seemed to go mad, throwing away their swords and muskets, pulling at their clothes, then leaping on their fellows, ripping and tearing with clawed hands and teeth, as if they’d become jungle cats.
The skies were filled with maniacal laughter, and Baryatin appeared in front of the Herti soldiery. He spoke, but his voice came from the heavens:
“Now, evil invaders, see that you cannot stand against my magic. Let your greatest wizard try to save these men as they ravage their fellows, then writhe on the ground, dying, as if their guts were snakes, tearing at their bodies.”
And, indeed, the afflicted pirates were on the ground, screaming in utter agony, now tearing at themselves, dying a horrible death.
Once more the laughter rang.
“Very well,” Labala said quietly, and walked out in front of the lines. “Gods, and Dafflemere’s spirit, be with me.”
He lifted something on a chain around his neck, and Gareth saw it was a shark’s tooth.
Labala called out words, but none that Gareth knew, words that hurt his ears.
Now it was the Hertis’ turn to howl in frenzy as something invisible struck at them from the empty air, and blood spurted. One soldier ran toward the pirate lines as if pursued, and then something took him, like a great white shark takes its prey, and tore him in half.
But in a flash, the sharks, if that was what Labala had brought up, were gone, leaving only a dozen or so rent bodies on the dirt.
“You have some power, fat witch,” Baryatin called. “But I broke your spell. I have a creature of my own, needing but one, who thrives on the blood of wizards. Now, see your doom, and the doom of others, for once summoned my demon will not vanish until he’s had his fill of blood.”
Baryatin’s hands moved, and Gareth smelled the reek of a slaughterhouse, the stink of burning bodies.
He began chanting — not words, but primal grunting noises, the summonings of some terrible beast.
Something swirled in the air between the armies, who stood as if paralyzed, waiting, watching.
Something like a cloud appeared, but more solid, with twisting colors of excrement, decay, rottenness; it, whatever it was, shrilled in delight, borning.
There was a sharp crack from behind Gareth.
Baryatin’s incantation stopped, but his mouth stayed wide open. Then blood gouted in a solid stream. The wizard took two stumbling steps, lifted his hands to his throat, but the blood kept pouring.
He twisted and fell.
The apparition between the armies vanished.
Cosyra stepped forward, her still-smoking pistol gripped in two hands.
“Sometimes,” she said, voice shaking, “lead beats magic.”
Then there was chaos in the Herti ranks. Men turned and ran in complete panic, no matter if they were in the first or the last rank, trampling their fellows.
The Linyati held firm for an instant.
“Wake up, you sorry bastards,” Iset shouted. “Volley into the Slavers!”
Muskets cracked, first singly, then in a volley, and the Slavers, too, broke and ran.
“I think,” Cosyra said wearily, “the way is clear now.”
• • •
“I know you won’t let me marry her,” Labala said earnestly to Gareth. “But I’ll accept lifelong slavery for her saving me.”
“Oh stop it,” Cosyra said. “You men were standing around with your fingers in your poop, and somebody had to do something.”
They were outside Herti, marching through overgrown pyramids and
abandoned farms.
“Well,” Thom Tehidy said, “at least we’ve seen the worst of what Kashi can offer us, even if those frigging Slavers are still on our track.”
He made a face. “Anyway, I can only hope we’ve seen the worst.”
Twenty-two
A month later, they’d left the jungle behind and were crossing a high, grassy plain dotted with occasional groves, springs, and pools.
There were less than three hundred of the corsairs left. Both chirurgeons had been killed in Herti, so the casualties either healed with what sorcery and rough medicine Labala and the two assistants he was training could offer, or else died, were buried, and the column marched over the grave, to leave no trace for the still-pursuing Linyati.
Twice Gareth laid an elaborate ambush, but the Slavers now seemed able to sense danger, and turned away before entering the killing zone. At least his rear scouts were still able to snipe a victim now and again, and sometimes waylay an unwary skirmisher. But they were still outnumbered more than two to one.
They’d encountered half a dozen empty monolithic cities before leaving the jungle. They’d sheltered in one against a storm, but the horrible dreams that came made the driving rain welcome, and they’d not chanced entering another.
Gareth wondered whether these cities, which showed signs of fire and battle, had been destroyed by the warriors of Herti or by Slavers.
As they climbed higher, still holding east, still hoping to somehow elude the pursuit and turn back to the coast, they’d found empty villages, and even seen the villagers fleeing in panic with what they could carry.
“In these parts,” Dihr said, “the white man is a slaver, no better.”
Gareth had ordered the villages left alone, but pirates being pirates, four men had slipped away from the night’s camp, looking, their friends said later, for women and drink in the nearby village, ready to pay with either gold or steel.
After midnight, the sentries had jolted to full alert, hearing terrible screams from the village. At dawn, Gareth sent a strong patrol in to look for the fools.
They found nothing but patches of blood on the ground, pools larger than a man’s body should contain. But there was no sign of the four men, and the column marched on, into the grasslands.