Plague Lords (Empire of Xibalba, #1) (24 page)

The new slaves were made to file past High Pile and Daniel Desipio.

As she passed Daniel, Krysty hawked and with a last smidgeon of Gaia power spit square in his face.

The impact made his head snap back.

Harmonica Tom watched as the two fastest pursuit ships continued to close on his stern. He knew he was getting everything there was to get out of
Tempest.
There was no doubt in his mind that in a fair race between the three, he would come in dead last. If he did nothing, the pirates would bracket him in the open water, bring their grappling hooks to bear and swing aboard in droves.

Desperate times called for desperate measures.

Tom cut the helm over to starboard, steering for the mainland shore. He knew the shoals around Padre; he was pretty sure they didn’t. Even if they did, it was the only card he had to play.

Holding course with his left hand, he opened the backpack of C-4. He dumped out a couple of bricks onto the cockpit’s bench seat, then picked out a remote detonator. Leaning against the wheel, working on the cabin top in front of it, he ran a power check on the remote, making sure it lit up. Setting it aside, he rigged four pounds of high explosive in two chunks.

He wasn’t sure yet how he was going to use the plastique. Mebbe he would wait until the pirates got closer and then lob the armed bricks onto the respective decks. Mebbe if things really went downhill, if he got boarded, he’d blow up
Tempest
himself and two pirate ships along with it.

Blasterfire from behind, angling in from both ships, rattled the stays. It forced him to duck momentarily. When he popped back up, he dead-reckoned a line that ran from the northwest tip of Padre with a dip in the bluff along the mainland shore. Then he checked his compass reading in case enemy blasterfire made taking a line of sight a dicey proposition at the last minute.

If he missed the gap in the shoal, if the sandbar had shifted more than ten yards in either direction since the last time he was here, it was going to be all over for him in a big hurry.

If he made it through, he had a fighting chance.

The pursuit continued to gain on him. At the rate they were traveling, they would be side by side with him as he hit the slot.

He had one more trick up his sleeve.

He was still running with engine as well as sails to squeeze the most speed out of his ship. As the shoal came up fast, Tom pulled the motor into neutral.

Tempest
slowed sickeningly.

The pursuit seemed to leap forward.

The pirates were so preoccupied with coming alongside, that they didn’t see the color change rushing up at them. From emerald green to lime green.

The ship on the starboard side hit the sandbar at what had to be fifteen knots. The keel instantly grounded, the bow pointed up at a sixty-degree angle. The vessel stopped so short that the forward momentum cracked off its main mast at the deck. Undoubtedly it had been weakened by his last burst of machine-gun fire. As the mast and its sheets toppled over into the water, Tom let out a whoop and dropped the motor back in gear.

The other ship cut speed, veered in behind him and followed him through the slot. As they shot through the gap, the distance between them was about twenty feet.

Another hump of sand was coming up fast. As Tom tried to bring
Tempest
to port, the ship slowed a little, and the pursuer, keeping a straight course, sped up and joined. For an instant they were pressed hull to hull. Fiberglass squeaking against fiberglass.

Tom watched in astonishment and fury as the pirates waiting in the bow jumped from their boat to his. No grappling hooks. No lines. They just jumped, landing with loud thuds on his foredeck.

Then the pirate ship stopped dead as it, too, ran aground. Men in the cockpit were thrown up into the sheets, into the booms, thrown overboard. The vessel was stuck good, but it didn’t lose its masts.

Tom popped his head up over the cabin roof and saw four men on his foredeck. They were unslinging submachine guns and taking cover in front of the cabin. A glance over his shoulder told him that the two remaining pursuers were following in his wake at a discreet distance. He slipped a loop of line over the wheel to hold course, then drew his handblaster.

Tom rolled out of the portside of the cockpit, and came up against the rail in a shooting crouch. One of the pirates angled around the front corner of the cabin, trying to get a bead on him with his submachine gun. Before he could touch off a round, the big wheelgun barked and bucked.

A hole opened up in the front of the guy’s throat, as chunks of flesh and blood blew out the back. The pirate flopped under the rail, his head hanging down loose at an unnatural angle, like a broken doll. Then as the ship hit a line of chop, the body slipped over the side.

Tom caught another movement at the corner of the cabin and fired again. The pirate ducked back, but not quickly enough.

The .45 slug took off half his head, dreads and all.

Sensing that they were losing their advantage, the remaining two pirates rose in unison and sent autofire streaming his way. Then they charged the starboard rail, still firing, trying to pin him down in the stern. As the ship hit the chop of the Gulf, it porpoised and rolled, making it hard for them to keep their balance and stay on target.

Tom jumped back in cockpit and swung the rudder over hard. The main boom swung in the opposite direction, sweeping across the deck and knocking one of the boarders into the water. The sound the boom made against his head was hollow like hammer hitting a coconut. The impact left a smear of blood on the sail.

The last pirate wasn’t going to give up. He resumed the attack, rushing down the rail while he fired from the hip.

He ran out of ammo amidships.

Tom popped up from behind the cabin and had him flat-footed, dead in the water.

Grinning maniacally, the pirate dropped the empty blaster and reached behind his back for another clip.

Tom cocked back the Smith’s hammer, single action.

The pirate held up the full mag, showing it to Tom, as though he thought the captain wouldn’t blast him. Or maybe he didn’t care.

Instead of shooting him in the heart, the skipper lowered his aimpoint and put a .45 round through his right knee.

The leg gave way at once and the pirate hit the deck, no longer smiling. His leg half blown off, he was screaming like a baby. High and shrill.

“There, there now,” Tom said as he holstered his weapon. “Let me fix that for you.”

He climbed over the cabin and came around behind the pirate. Without a word, he looped a line around the man’s neck, cinched a quick knot, then used a pulley to jerk him up the main mast, hanging him from the yardarm.

The pirate stood on the tiptoe of his good leg, able to keep from strangling only if he maintained his balance.

Tom tied off the line on a cleat, leaving the man to toe dance, then checked the other body for signs of life. Finding none, he dragged the head-shot corpse to the stern.

As he did, he talked to the toe dancer, not giving a good goddamn if he was understood. “You dirty bastards chilled a bunch of friends of mine,” he said. “You chilled them in awful ways.”

Looking back toward the stern, he saw that one of the pursuit ships had stopped to pick up the bodies of the two pirates overboard, the throat-shot one and the boom-busted one. Just like off the beach at Padre, the Matachìn were recovering their dead.

It gave Tom an idea.

The other ship kept coming, and it was gaining fast.

“Know what that gets you?” Tom asked the toe dancer. “Chilling my friends?”

The pirate had no clue. His neck was stretched to its limit, the rope creaking under the suspended weight.

“It gets you fucked by Harmonica Tom.”

With that, the skipper of
Tempest
flipped up the cockpit seat cushion and dug out a pair of bright orange lifejackets. Wrestling the corpse with half a head onto its side, he got the limp arms through the lifejacket holes, then rolled the body onto its back. He laid one of the blocks of C-4 on the chest, then folded over the front panels and cinched the binding straps up extra tight.

Tom returned to the mast, uncleated the end of the line connected to the other pirate and hauled on it hard, yanking the guy off his tippy toes. After a minute or so of letting him dangle, when he stopped kicking his good leg and his face went deep purple, Tom lowered him to the deck.

He put the other lifejacket on the unconscious man. This time he stuffed the brick of C-4 into the back of it, where the pirate couldn’t get at it, then he really bore down on the binding tapes.

After dragging him to the stern, he threw some water in his face to wake him up. When the pirate blinked at him, Tom tipped him over the side. He did the same with the dead guy.

Tempest
sailed on, leaving two men in lifejackets bobbing in its wake.

One of the floaters was conscious enough to wave an arm at the oncoming pursuit ship.

Tom knew the guy wasn’t waving to be picked up; he was trying desperately to wave off his pirate kin.

But they didn’t know that.

The skipper took out his harmonica, and tapping his foot, started up a lively tune, a kick-up-your-heels-and-dance kind of tune.

Sure enough, the ship closing in on him dropped sail and slowed to pick up the wounded and the dead. The fourth ship was coming up on it from behind, trying to reengage the pursuit.

When the lead ship stopped alongside the floating men, Tom put down his harmonica, armed the detonator and, pointing it over the stern, hit the little red button.

With a tremendous flash and boom, a water spout shot into the sky. Along with it went half the ship’s port side. The plume of debris was spectacular.

“Whoo-wee!” Tom exclaimed.

Stuff blown skyward rained down all around the stricken craft, splashing in a wide circle. All of a sudden there were a lot more corpses and parts thereof for the pirates to recover.

As water flooded into the breached side of hull, the ship immediately began to tilt in that direction, the masts angling lower and lower until they touched the water.

The fourth and last ship approached the wreck cautiously, just in case there were more explosives.

The chase had ended.

And ended badly for the Matachìn.

With the pressure off, Tom indulged himself. He laughed and hooted and danced an ungainly jig accompanied by himself on the harmonica.

The moment of triumph passed and the skipper of
Tempest
was left with lingering doubts. Serious doubts. Was what he had just done enough? Did it balance the books? After all, the pirates had murdered a couple hundred people. They had brought down one of the hellscape’s living legends, Ryan Cawdor.

On its face it hardly seemed like tit for tat.

Did there have to be more? If so, how much more? Did the payback have to be times ten, times twenty?

He still had a shitload of C-4 that could be put to use. What good was jack when it had the blood of so many good people on it?

It was something he would have to contemplate.

Tom cut his engine and let the wind take his ship southwest, then scooped a bucket of seawater to sluice the residue of brains and skull off his foredeck.

On the beach below the
Yoko Maru,
the new slaves awaited their masters’ pleasure. Ryan could see again, as could his companions and the islander boy, Garwood. His eye still burned, still teared a little, but he could see, and he was aware of the totality of their predicament. The situation was beyond desperate.

Disarmed.

Chained.

Held at blasterpoint.

Prisoners all, but to what end? He knew nothing about the pirates, except they were triple brutal, didn’t seem to speak English and packed some impressive weaponry. They had slaughtered an entire ville for what? Not for its material wealth. Most of that had burned in the shantytown or was still burning in the grounded freighter. They had made no attempt to put out the fires or to secure the goods that hadn’t been destroyed.

They didn’t seem to give a damn about any of it. About any of the things that the people of the hellscape would’ve gladly chilled for.

It was something that really worried Ryan. As long as their motives were unknown, their future actions couldn’t be anticipated.

He was furious at himself for letting Daniel live. He should have chilled him when they first boarded the freighter. But he’d had no way of knowing he was in league with the Matachìn.

Standing behind the pirate with the tallest pile of dreads, Daniel looked like a pet that was barely tolerated, a creature used to receiving the back of a hand on a whim. Cowed. Cringing. Servile. That’s one reason Ryan figured he was harmless. Despicable but harmless.

Wrong.

The nature of the pirate–Daniel Desipio relationship was as unclear as everything else. What had he been doing on the island? Scouting it out for the attack? That didn’t seem likely. There was no way for him to pass information he had gathered to the pirates. Not without leaving the place. It was too isolated. And if he had left Padre Island to deliver his scouting report, why had he come back? There would have been no reason to do that.

“We almost made it,” Krysty said. “If it hadn’t been for that smarmy little bastard, we would have. We were that close.”

“At least Tom got away,” Ryan said.

“He turned his back on us,” the redhead said. “He ran off with his ship and left us for dead.”

“He didn’t owe us anything,” Ryan countered. “There was nothing he could do. And he had the right to save himself.”

“Would we have left him like that?”

“If the situation was reversed, I’d say yes. In a heartbeat.”

Krysty didn’t like that answer, but she knew it to be true.

A quartet of pirates marched down the slope from the freighter solemnly carrying the body of the man she had killed, evidently some kind of officer. They bore the corpse back to the beach where a funeral pyre had been constructed. The bodies of the Matachìn fallen were laid out in a pyramid on top of stacks of unburned wood scavenged from the ville. With great care they set the corpse among the others.

An explosion rolled over the island, a distant boom from the southwest. The companions couldn’t see what it was, but they recognized the sound. There were smiles all around.

“Guess old Tom found some use for that C-4,” J.B. said. The Armorer was in a bad way. His face was twisted in pain, and it looked pale and drawn. The CS gas hadn’t helped his breathing, and the paroxysms of vomiting hadn’t helped his ribs.

“Our intrepid captain,” Doc said. “I wish him godspeed.”

“Hope he kicked their asses good,” Mildred said.

“Mebbe you’d better wait before you light that pyre,” Ryan told one of the pirates. “From that sound, it’s my guess there’s some more of you bastards in need of ceremonial burning.”

The man said something back, something fast and singsong. From his expression it was a threat.

“What language are they talking?” Krysty said.

“Spanish, kind of,” Mildred said.

“Definitely a variation of the loving tongue,” Doc said. “But not Castillian.”

“You understand it?” Ryan asked them.

“Some of it,” Mildred said.

Doc nodded.

“It would be better not to let them know that,” Ryan said. “We might be able to pick up something useful.”

“¡Silencio, esclavos!”
the pirate snarled.

“Does the last bit mean what I think it means?” Krysty whispered.

“Unpaid labor unto death, I am afraid,” Doc said. “We have joined the ranks of the terminally employed.”

Along with the handful of other survivors from the freighter, the companions and Garwood were forced to climb into the rafts and then row themselves to the waiting tugs. The Matachìn commander rode in the bow of the companions’ dinghy, making notes in pencil in a crumpled little book. Daniel sat at his feet. Two of his underlings guarded the rowers with leveled submachine guns.

The tugs’ engines were silent. As they approached the vessels, long oars in a row dipped lightly into the water, holding position. In the skinny shadow of the awnings, gaunt sunburned faces stared back at them.

Hopeless faces.

As Mildred leaned into her oar she said, “I’m getting a premonition of what our job is going to be.”

When they came alongside the pirate flagship, after the commander and Daniel had debarked, they were forced to board in a clinking, clanking, clumsy conga line, then they were herded together on the stern deck.

Ryan looked closely at the people sitting under the awning: shirtless men and boys, a few women, also shirtless. Their manacles were chained to the oars so they couldn’t let go. There were lash marks on their bare backs and arms.

Some looked to be at death’s door, living skeletons with blistered, peeling skin. They were breathing hard though they weren’t exerting themselves. Their whip wounds were inflamed and leaking green pus.

It occurred to Ryan that the prisoners from Padre Island were replacements. But for those already chilled or the weak?

When the pirates disconnected the newcomers, pulling the length of chain out of the loops of their ankle cuffs, Garwood sprang away like a tiger. In three great hops he was behind Daniel and had flipped his manacles over his head and down over his neck. Crossing the cuffs behind the startled man’s head, the boy twisted his arms, tightening the chain-link garrote.

Daniel’s eyes bulged and his tongue protruded. He tried to shift out of the choke hold, but the teenager wouldn’t allow it.

Before the boy could break his neck or strangle him, one of the pirates drew his machete and whacked him with the flat of it on top of the head. The stunning blow drove the boy to his knees, taking Daniel down with him. Before he could recover his grip, the Fire Talker disengaged himself and moved well out of range.

The Matachìn raised the heavy blade, winding up to use its long edge to take off Garwood’s head at the shoulders. Before he struck the fatal blow, he looked over at his leader.

The commander waved him off impatiently.
“Chico es muy fuerte, necessito no le matar,”
he said.

“I’ll get you!” the boy howled at Daniel as he jumped back up. “I’ll get you, yet. You wait and see…”

The Fire Talker rubbed his throat. The chain links had left angry welts from ear to ear.

“I’m afraid that’s not likely,” the commander said.

Daniel looked from the livid boy to a pirate bent over the stern deck. His expression fell as the man opened an inset hatch about four feet by four feet. A pair of pirates swooped in and grabbed hold of Daniel under the arms. They carried him bodily to the opening and threw him in, feet-first. The hatch slammed shut with a thud. One of the pirates twisted shut the latch, locking him inside.

“So the turncoat is a prisoner, too,” Doc said.

“That’s strange,” Mildred said. “It’s not like he could swim and get away.”

“Don’t like the look of that,” Ryan said, nodding toward the awnings.

The Matachìn were unchaining some of the slaves from the oars and making them shuffle to the stern.

The weakest ones.

Those who could barely stand were separated from the rest. They were so exhausted they couldn’t resist. One by one they were bent over the stern rail and dispatched with single machete blows across the backs of their necks. Their bodies were dumped over the side.

It was a horrible spectacle, barbaric.

Some of the victims shut their eyes tight as the blades whistled down. Others looked off into space. A few looked back to the other slaves. Their expressions said, “Make them pay for this.”

Those who had been spared beheading stood huddled in a corner of the stern while the commander took stock of the new arrivals. He felt their muscles, poked their ribs, examined their backs. When he touched J.B., the Armorer grimaced in pain. It was clear he was not in top shape.

At the commander’s order, one of the pirates pulled up the hem of J.B.’s shirt, exposing the multicolored bruising over his ribs.

He waved J.B. to one side.

The side with the other weaklings.

“Are they going to chill J.B.?” Krysty said.

The pirates quickly moved the fresh slaves forward, forcing them to take the newly emptied places behind the oars. The rowers sat three across on crude wooden platforms, all pulling on the same shaft. The seats were unpadded; there were no backrests to lean against. Ryan watched in silent fury as both his manacles were chained to the oar. Mildred sat on his right, closest to the gunwhale.

Ryan laid his hands on the highly polished shaft. Polished by human skin.

The commander climbed the stairs to the pilothouse deck. From that vantage point, he shouted a curt order.

What he wanted them to do was obvious.

Row.

A pirate on the stern deck started pounding a steel drum with rag-wrapped hammers, setting the stroke rhythm. From behind there were the cracks of whips as the overseers urged the slaves to pull harder, pull faster.

It was difficult to get the timing at first. Everyone on the oar had to pull together, and all the oars on the side of the tug had to pull together, as well.

As Ryan was struggling to make it all work, a lash struck him across the shoulders. It felt like a red-hot wire. It made him sit up straight.

He turned and glared up at the man who had just struck him. Dirty face. Dirty hands. Nasty matted hair. He smelled like a bear pit. The pirate grinned as he coiled his short, braided whip for another blow. He clearly enjoyed this part of his work.

Once they had acquired some momentum, the rowing was a little easier. Ryan and Mildred fell into the rhythm of it.

The tugboats headed south, away from the island, to what had to be a prearranged rendezvous point. Three of the pursuit sailboats were waiting for them offshore. Two of the pirate vessels were damaged, one badly. And one of the ships was missing.

“Tom did good,” Mildred said.

The commander was not at all pleased. After yelling at the sailboat crews, he gave the order to resume rowing.

Under threat of the lash, the slaves leaned on their oars, once again working up momentum. Facing the rear, Ryan had a view of the still-burning freighter. He also saw some of the pirates lounging at the stern rail. They were laughing. Trinkets were on display. Gold trinkets. It looked like they were making bets.

Then they started dividing the weaklings into pairs and standing them side by side. Short and tall. Skinny and skinnier. Old and young. Male and female. This was the source of more laughter and backslapping among the pirates.

Ryan watched as J.B. was forced to stand next to a much bigger man, older, with a mat of gray hair on his chest. All the body fat had been worked off him. His face was haggard and grim.

From the pilothouse deck, the commander gave another order to his crew.

“What did he say?” Ryan asked Mildred.

“Whoever wins, lives.”