Scimitar's Heir (25 page)

“I don’t doubt you, Cyn.” Feldrin gave her wrist a squeeze and let go. “Just remember, there’s gonna be some of us air-breathers with you when we crack this thing open, and I don’t swim so good anymore.” He tapped his peg leg and gave her a wry smile.

“Don’t worry, Feldrin. The water’s the least of my worries.” Cynthia focused her eyes on her map, banishing the image in her mind of her son in the hands of the mer. “Okay, so we reduce the parties in the upper sections to six, form up new parties for below, work toward the center and down, and have Edan deal with any nests of hukkol we find.” She looked up and into the two men’s faces. “Agreed?”

“Works fer me,” Feldrin said with a nod.

“I think that is our best strategy, yes,” Ghelfan agreed. “I will retire now to work on the inscriptions that Hadley’s group found today.” He nodded to Cynthia and Feldrin and rose.

“And I gotta check the watch schedule.” Feldrin stood, wobbling only slightly on his peg leg. Cynthia kept her eyes on her map. “You gonna work on that all night, or can you spare an hour fer dinner with me.”

“I’ll eat here, Feldrin.” She let her eyes rise, and met his, her heart aching with her own words. She wanted to throw herself into his arms and forget about everything, if even for a while, but the guilt would not let her take even that small solace. “I’m sorry, I just—”

“Don’t apologize, lass,” he said, his huge hand resting on her shoulder for a moment. “Just remember to eat somethin’. You’re the key to this, and yer not gonna be fit ta do what needs doin’ if you don’t get some rest and food in ya.”

Without waiting for her answer, he turned and left the galley.

Cynthia rubbed her eyes until she saw bright spots, then turned back to the map. She reached for her cup and downed its tepid contents, promising herself silently that she would follow Feldrin’s advice. He was right, of course; she was the key to this, and if she had any hope of getting her son back alive, she would have to be ready.

≈

Tepid seawater cascaded over Sam’s head as she tilted the bucket, washing away the crusted salt and sweat of her turn at the oars. She scrubbed gingerly at the salt-raw spots on her chest and buttocks, then dried herself with her sweat-stained shirt. A seawater rinse for her clothes, then she wrung them out and pinned them to a line to dry in the scorching sun. She left her leather belt with the obsidian dagger looped over the tiller, grateful that the stone knife didn’t rust with its constant exposure to salt water; her cutlass was showing some corrosion, so she kept it below, oiled and wrapped in a clean cloth.

Making sure her hands were dry and free of salt, she recovered the navigational instruments she had taken from the seamage’s keep and took a quick sighting of the sun’s position. It was still well before noon, an hour at least, so she took her instruments and her viewing glass forward and settled down on the starboard bow to wait to take her noon sighting. She lacked an accurate chronometer, and had to reset her sole timepiece, a gold pocket watch she’d found in the seamage’s desk drawer, to exact noon every day. She’d calculated its inaccuracy well enough to supply a reasonable fix, but without charts of the area, it was hard to maintain a good course line. If her numbers were right, they were making a steady four knots using only the four sweeps and the faint breeze, a remarkable pace under the circumstances.

Manta’s
shallow hulls slipped right over the mats of weed that choked the surface, and the light breeze filled the loosely sheeted sails just enough to aid their progress and cool her damp hair. She swept the horizon with her glass, then took another sighting of the sun, jotting down the angle. She tilted her face toward the sun and closed her eyes; she had another forty minutes to wait for her noon fix. The breeze on her wet skin was cool, and the sun’s warmth felt good, like a blanket…or a warm body. A flash of memory; Edan’s warm skin against her, his mouth on hers, his tongue like a flame…

Edan
, she thought, losing herself in the sweet fantasy. With him, she had felt safe. With Edan, she could be
Samantha
…

Sam jerked awake from her half-doze when the steady cadence of the oars suddenly stopped.

A quick glance over her shoulder, and she knew she was in trouble; her six crew stood on the deck behind her, weapons in hand, the slack oars trailing in the water.

Mutiny
…

She was cornered on the bow, her dagger in the cockpit and her sword belowdecks. But at six against one, her weapons were not likely to make much difference. She wore only her scanties, as her other clothes were still drying, and had only her telescope and navigational instruments by her side. A chill ran up her spine that had nothing to do with temperature, but she fixed her face in a scowl and glared.

She stood and faced them. “What is this, Uag?”

“We go home,” the big boatswain said, his cutlass held easy in his hand. The others fanned out, blocking her from moving aft. “This sea no good. No wind. We die here.”

“No,” Sam said, keeping her tone even. She smiled a shark smile, her empty hands at her sides, her feet easy on the deck.

“We kill you if you say no, Capt’n Sam,” he said, but she heard reluctance in his voice; the others had talked him into this. Well, now it was her turn.

“Tell them this, Uag: If you kill me, you will all die out here.” She paused, but he just stared at her wide eyed. “Tell them!”

He relayed the message to the other five, and she caught a few of their incredulous comments. She waited for his reply, wondering if her ploy would work.

“They ask how we die. We can sail
Manta
home without you.”

“Can you?” She grinned again, then carefully stooped to pick up her sextant and watch. “You can’t use these, Uag. You can’t find your way home without me. Tell them.”

Without consulting with the rest he said, “We come south to here, we go north to home.”

“No, Uag,” she said, shaking her head. “We
point
south, but currents move us east or west. I know where we are, but you do not. If you go north, you will not find your home.”

He turned and spoke at length to the others. She hoped he believed her, or that the others believed him. In fact, they had not deviated much from their southerly course, but they didn’t know that, and she saw worry and confusion on their faces. They knew nothing of navigation, nor of any geography beyond the Shattered Isles, and she wasn’t about to tell them that they would eventually reach land if they simply sailed slightly east of north. Their ignorance was her only weapon.

The muttering continued, and Sam could tell that most of the arguments were coming from Prak, one of the two women on the crew. Sam waited until the argument escalated, with raised voices and even some meaningful gestures with naked blades, then stepped forward.

“Enough!” Sam’s shout silenced them in an instant. She could see that they were still divided. Prak and one of the men stood side by side; the rest of the crew sidled closer to Uag. Prak’s face was a mask of anger, fear and mistrust. Sam considered grabbing Uag’s sword and ending the problem with one quick thrust, but didn’t know how the others would react. Also, she needed them all. “We are wasting time. Uag, put them back to the oars. We have far to go.”

Sam turned her back on the group, picked up her sextant and sighted the sun twice in quick succession. It was difficult trying to hold the tiny reflection of the sun steady on the horizon with her hands shaking. If they were gong to kill her, it would happen now, but she refused to pay the slightest attention. She heard mumbles, a few curt comments, and the shuffle of feet. She took another sighting; the sun was still rising, but barely. She picked up the golden watch, set it to exactly noon just as the sun peaked, wound it carefully, then sat down to jot down the angle of the sun from the instrument’s dial. The sounds behind had faded, and she turned back just as the four oars dipped into the water.
Manta
was moving again. On her way to the cockpit, Prak glared at her, but Sam just walked past. The cadence of the oars continued, and Sam sat down in the shade of the cockpit and breathed a sigh of relief.

She was still alive.

≈

A crisp new Tsing flag flapped from
Flothrindel’s
mainsail leech as she sailed into Scimitar Bay under the watchful eyes of several hundred armed sailors and marines. The boat’s arrival created quite a stir, and one of the drake-class warships had been deployed to intercept them well north of the armada. Tipos had shouted back and forth with the drake’s first mate under the glaring eyes of a dozen ballistae crews. Finally, an escort of armed launches had been deployed to shadow the small boat into the bay. There, two more drakes were anchored and the frigate,
Cape Storm
, lay docked at the stone pier. But the fleet of warships was not what hit the
Flothrindel’s
crew the hardest.

“Bloody hells, de shipyard’s
gone
!” Keyloo exclaimed, pointing at the blackened ruin of the lofting shed.

“Everyt’ings gone,” Tipos said, his voice as cold as stone. The tidy rows of huts were little more than ash, and along the cliff face stood a grim row of headstones, each carved with Odea’s crescent.

“De basta’ds killed
everyone
!” Tawah growled, glaring at the boats full of imperial troops. They actually knew from Count Norris’ account of the pirate attack what had happened here, but they had agreed to act as if they knew nothing. Their delivery of the count and Tim to Middle Cay had to remain a secret. There would be all Nine Hells to pay later, but that was later, after they had rescued Miss Camilla. Though he knew they were not surprised, it appeared so to Huffington—he saw that their distress was not an act; their homes had been here, their families.

“What has happened here, Lieutenant?” Huffington called out to the nearest boat.

“Dock at the pier, if you please, sir!” the officer shouted. “Captain Donnely will explain everything to you presently.”

Huffington nodded and tipped his hat, then said in a low tone, “At least they’re polite.”

Tipos steered
Flothrindel
toward the pier. As they came alongside, Tawah and Keyloo silently furled sails while Tipos put out fenders to protect the smack’s delicately carved gunwale from the unforgiving stone. Their actions were automatic, their faces set as if carved in granite. Huffington’s heart felt heavy in his chest as he scrambled up the rope ladder lowered from the pier.

He and the crew of the
Flothrindel
were met by an armed detail of marines and the crisply uniformed captain of the
Cape Storm
. The captain’s eyes swept them in silent scrutiny before he gave a begrudging tip of his hat to Huffington.

“Mister Huffington. I remember you from the meeting on
Indomitable
in Rockport. You made remarkably good time in getting to Tsing and back in less than a fortnight.”

“We did, Captain Donnely,” he said. Huffington acknowledged Tipos with a nod. “Thanks to Tipos, here, who had been dispatched to Tsing from Plume Isle with messages from my master, Count Norris.” He looked around at the decimated beach and the ruined shipyard. He hoped his feigned surprise was convincing; his dismay was real. “But what has happened here, sir? Where is Count Norris? Surely Admiral Joslan did not order this…this destruction.”

“Your master is safe, Mister Huffington, and this was
not
done by his majesty’s forces,” the captain said, his words clipped. “We found this place in a much sorrier state than you see. It seems that there was a pirate attack prior to our arrival.”

“Pirates?” Huffington exclaimed, eyes wide.

“Yes, pirates. And a sizable force of…natives from another island. We found—”

“Tipos!”

The men turned to the shout. Paska ran down the pier, little Koybur bouncing on her hip. Tipos and his crew dashed to meet her, and all four spoke rapidly in their own language. Huffington turned back to the captain.

“Perhaps you should direct me to Admiral Joslan, Captain.” He patted his satchel. “I have sealed orders from the emperor’s own hand.”

“This way, Mister Huffington,” the captain said grudgingly, none too happy to be relegated to escorting a diplomatic secretary.

Donnley strode up the pier, ignoring the tight group of natives, and Huffington followed, exchanging a quick nod with Tipos in passing. They had agreed that each would gather as much information as they could, then share it. The only information that Huffington had not shared, even with Count Norris, was his set of private orders from the emperor regarding the seamage and the pyromage; those he would share with no one, save Master Upton.

The interior of the keep, he discovered, had fared little better than the shipyard. A few natives sifted through the remnants of the pirates’ looting, still looking stunned. Broken furniture, porcelain, bent and ruined bronze and brassware, torn table linens, and even some shredded clothing littered the floor. Though he had been little acquainted with the people who had lived here, the anguish in their eyes showed how deeply the destruction of their home affected them. He fixed his eyes on Captain Donnely’s shoulders, studiously ignoring the vacant, pleading stares.

The doors to the great hall, where he had feasted with Norris and the lovely Miss Camilla what seemed like an age ago, were guarded by four stoic marines. One of them nodded to the captain and pushed open the portal, ushering the two men inside. Admiral Joslan looked up from the long dining table, its surface littered with papers and a silver blackbrew service. The table was the only intact piece of furniture Huffington had seen thus far, though it had been damaged by the chandelier that had fallen from the ceiling. The heavy wrought-iron frame had been heaved off into a corner, its once-graceful lines bent and spattered with wax.

“Admiral,” the captain said with a stiff salute. “Forgive my intrusion, but Mister Huffington has arrived from Tsing bearing messages from the emperor.” He indicated his charge with a sweeping hand, and Huffington stepped forward.

“Ah, Mister Huffington,” the admiral said, leaning back in his chair. His eyes raked his visitor from head to foot and back up while he sipped from a porcelain cup, his round face expressionless. He returned the cup to its saucer, and the dutiful steward at his elbow refilled it from the silver pot as Huffington endured the scrutiny.

Huffington knew better than to speak until he was told to; he did not enjoy the scrutiny of powerful men, but it seemed he was destined to tolerate it. After several long minutes, the admiral finally spoke.

“You made good time.” Joslan’s eyes returned to the documents before him, and he lifted a pen. “You may leave the emperor’s messages and go. I’ll see to them directly.”

“Certainly, Admiral,” Huffington said, retrieving the single scroll case intended for the admiral. He stepped forward and placed it carefully on the table, just out of the admiral’s easy reach. “And may I ask where Count Norris and Master Upton might be, sir? I have messages for them, as well.”

The admiral leveled a glare that would have hulled a warship and said, “Your count is aboard the
Lady Gwen
, on his way back to Tsing where he belongs. And the last I saw of Master Upton, he was aboard
Indomitable
. Now please leave, I have many details to—”

A ruckus at the door interrupted the admiral, and an irritated marine entered. Irate shouts could be heard from the hall, and Huffington was hard pressed to suppress a smile. The voices of Tipos and Paska rose high above those of the marine contingent who held them at bay.

“Sorry, Admiral, but that woman insists on seeing you again, and she’s got another fellow with her, too. Says he’s come from the emperor himself.”

“I expected this, corporal. You may let them in, but under guard.”

The admiral stood, and Huffington stepped back. He was used to fading into the background—a secretary is often an overlooked and disregarded presence—and closely watched the encounter. Four marines, hands on their weapons, flanked Tipos and Paska, but the pair approached the admiral undaunted.

“Admiral Joslan, you cannot be takin’ de
Flothrindel
away from us!” Paska raved, the babe on her hip adding his own shrill cry. “Dat boat belongs to Masta Ghelfan, not you!”