The Sail Weaver (32 page)

Turning his eyes from the deck, Tristan glanced out at the heavy cruiser they were heading towards. He ran his eyes over the ship, trying to gauge a weakness to bring the
Victory
in when he saw something that made his heart skip a beat. The dark sails had something covering them. In that moment, the helplessness and pain washed over him, he nearly collapsed but forced himself up.

“Thom!” Tristan shouted before the order to fire could be made. “The masts! Look at the masts! The dragons!” Tristan pointed to the Vermin masts and the graceful creatures tied to them. On the upper mainmast he could see black, silver and pearly white. “Fenfyr and the others, they’re tied to the masts!”

“What?” All the color drained from Thom’s face as he looked across the distance separating them from the ship. “We need to take down those masts!”

A sharp pain suddenly ripped through Tristan, he was caught by the arm and dragged away from the Interface before he could grab his gun. He kicked out at the creature, trying to look away from the horror of its face. The thing lifted his leg slowly up towards its gaping mouth and bit down. Tristan felt his ankle shatter as he struggled to get away. Another one was approaching when the one holding Tristan evaporated in a blast from the small cannon on the
taffrail
of the quarterdeck. Then Muher was there, hacking at the other one before it could get to him. Tristan started crawling back towards the Interface, Riggan helped him up and held him as he settled his hand on the controls again, blocking out the pain from his injured leg.

“Can you get us in close enough to target the masts, then get us out of there before they can hit us too hard?” Thom asked.

Tristan nodded. He would do anything he could to rescue the dragons held prisoner on the ship. He had no idea what would happen once the masts were free. “Chris!” he called to Muher. “Do we have a line to Darius?”

“Yes, channel four,” the man replied as he shot another Vermin attempting to get onto the quarterdeck.

Punching the
comm
channel on the Interface, Tristan hoped the dragon would answer. “Darius, this is Tristan Weaver.”

“I hear you,” the dragon answered immediately.

“The dragons they are taking—they’re tied to the masts on the
big ship. We’re going to try to break the masts free.”

“We will come in and take care of our wounded, Tristan Weaver, you get them free.”

“We will,” Tristan said, breaking the connection. He glanced out—at the edge of the Navy line he could see a mass of dragons already gathering, waiting for the word to move. “I’m ready, Thom.”

“Okay, we need to get as close as possible. Deck guns, load with chain, we are taking out those masts! We need them down in two rounds, do you understand?”

The men on deck shouted affirmatives even as they fought the Vermin trying to take the big guns away. Tristan watched as they loaded the guns with the special rounds designed to clear the decks of personnel and hopefully break the masts free.

“You take us in, I’ll handle the thrusters.” Thom said. “Ship to the Weaver!”

“Ship to the Weaver!” Shearer answered immediately.

Tristan focused, Weaving the sails as tightly as he could, strengthening them even more for what he knew was coming. Taking a slow breath in, he felt his way through the sails, then found the spot in the Winds he needed, the rigging started to hum with the deep baritone note he knew meant it was moving fast, on a perfect keel. They were heading towards the Vermin ship, the distance closing in seconds.

The Vermin started firing, the shot slamming into the sails and raining down on the deck. Several huge rounds hit the lower hull, shaking the ship. Tristan let it go and kept his focus on the sails. Something burned in his arm. He was yanked away from the Elemental Interface for a moment, a Vermin boarder suddenly dead in front of him. Pushing past the body, he got back to the Interface. They were almost on top of the Vermin ship. He backed off the sails as Thom used the thrusters to move the ship into position.

“Fire!” Thom called.

The first volley screamed across space, cutting down Vermin on the deck, but leaving the masts untouched. Thom swore. “Fire!” The second volley did little more than the first, the shot destroying the crew, but not damaging the masts. “What is going on down there?
Raiden
! Get those guns firing. Take out those masts!”

“Sir! I have an idea, permissi
on to fire at will!” Jacob
Raide
n
called.

“Permission granted!” Thom said, trying to keep the ship close enough to the Vermin vessel to make the shots count. Tristan could see his struggles and moved the willowisps in the sails so they were fluttering in place, holding the ship motionless. They were sparking red and orange as they hung above his head. He looked up, silently thanking them.

A volley from the guns pulled his attention from the sails. Shot flew through space and hit the masts right at the deck level, before the sound of the first shot had died out, a second one came, and a third. Tristan could see the masts now, a small fire burning at their base, the white of bone showing in the flames, slowly turning to char.

“Fire the chain!” Thom cried. The deck guns spoke and this time the masts started to break free. “Again!” Thom ordered and for a breathless moment it seemed like nothing was going to happen, then the masts all began to break away. As they did, the dragons moved in, flying in at high speed to pull the masts away from the ship. Tristan had a glimpse of Fenfyr still bound to the crosstrees of the mainmast, then the dragons were gone.

“That’s it, let’s break this thing!” Thom said. “Ship to the Weaver! Bring us around so we can hit her with our port guns.”

Tristan shifted the sails, the ship wheeled around, and at Thom’s command, the full broadside of the
Winged Victory
hit the Vermin ship. They reloaded quickly and hit them again. The other Vermin heavy cruiser had come up behind them, trying to hit them hard. Tristan was struggling to bring the ship around when two small vessels, their sails sparkling in the dark came up beside them.
Surprise
and the
Noble Lady
fired on the cruiser as they brought the
Victory’s
guns to bear. Between the three of them, the ship was beaten down and the
Victory
turned back to the ship that had held the dragons. It was already moving away, heading into space.

“They aren’t getting away!” Tristan growled, swinging the sails around, making the
Winged Victory
race after the huge ship.

It was easy to catch, without sails the Vermin ship it was moving under power and no match for the
Victory’s
speed. By the time they were up beside it. Thom had the guns ready. Tristan whispered the spell of release as Thom ordered volley after volley emptied into the ship. Tristan knew the moment they managed to kill
the enslaved dragon. It let go with a sigh of relief and thanks, and slipped away into death.

“Finish it!” Tristan said.

Thom nodded. “Fire!”

A huge fireball left the
Victory
and slammed into the Vermin ship, consuming it with white-hot flame, leaving nothing of the ship. In a way it was beautiful, the flames slowly moving up the length of the ship until it was a small shining sun in the center of the battle. Tristan held his breath as the flames reached the engines and the former ship blasted apart, the small bits sparkling for a moment like willowisps.

“It’s gone!” Thom cried triumphantly.

Tristan smiled and shifted the sails, turning back towards the Naval fleet. He could still see the bright flash of guns in the distance, but the tide of the battle had changed. The Navy was pursuing the fleeing Vermin ships. Blinking, he tried to focus on what was happening. There were still Vermin on the deck, fighting hand to hand with the crew. The
Winged Victory
was heading back towards the fleet, as she approached, the last of the Vermin vessels—a small gunboat—poured on the speed and disappeared from the battle line.

It was over.

Tristan glanced up at Thom, the man was splattered in blood, one arm hanging limply at his side. Muher was finishing off the last of the Vermin on deck. He turned to look for Riggan and realized that world was wavering.

He thought he heard someone shout his name, but he fell into darkness.

XXXII

The darkness eased. There was heat, a confusion of sound and light, pain and voices screaming. Tristan tried to make sense of the maelstrom, but he couldn’t. He knew that some of it was focused around him. There were dull
thumps
of explosions, and closer, the sharp crack of small arms fire. Someone was bending over him, urging him to hang on, a desperate male voice, a warm hand clasping his. Then, some moments—or hours—later a matter-of-fact female voice was there, snapping orders, and Tristan felt himself lifted. Then the darkness closed over him again.

The sharp scent of antiseptics crept into his awareness and Tristan opened his eyes on a small white room. There were the lines of IVs in his arms and the soft comfortable chirping of medical monitors. He was fuzzy from drugs, he could feel the sluggishness in his system and knew he wouldn’t be able to stay awake for long. The only thing that had let him push this far into consciousness was his need to know about his friends—had they survived? Was Fenfyr…? Before the thought could form completely, he let the drugs pull him away, not ready to face that possibility yet. 

When he fought his way through the haze again, it was because there was an argument going on outside his door. “You don’t understand, Dr. Webber, he doesn’t get to die. He saved the whole damn fleet, so you save him!” Thom’s voice was angry and urgent.
Tristan wondered who they were talking about.

“We’re doing everything we can. I’ve had the Healers in. Vermin bites are usually fatal.”

“This one had better not be,” Thom snapped. A moment later, Thom’s voice was much closer, a warm weight fell on Tristan’s arm. “Hear that? Not fatal.” Thom sighed. “You hear me?”

Tristan struggled to answer, but the drugs wouldn’t let him fight free. He could also sense the “lightnes
s” that a Healing spell brought;
he remembered it from the days right after the bombing when he’d hovered between life and death. Was that what was happening now? At least Thom was safe. He wanted to ask about Fenfyr, that pain was beating against his heart every time he was aware enough to think about it. Before he could find the strength to ask, the darkness caught him again.

“Sir, I don’t mean to disturb you, mind you,” Riggan was saying as Tristan floated towards the surface again. “And you know I don’t spread idle gossip, sir, but I thought maybe no one had told you there is a guest waiting for you in your cabin. He is most distressed that they won’t let him into sickbay. He is lying in the cabin, all drooping, refusing to even move.”

Relief flooded Tristan’s body in a rush of warmth. He heard a medical alarm go off, but it didn’t matter. There was sudden activity and he heard people rushing in the room and Riggan’s indignant voice defending himself. The words meant nothing. All that mattered at that moment was what had come before. Fenfyr was alive.

The soft chiming of the bells woke Tristan, it was seven bells, although he had no idea of what watch it w
as. He could
hear the
sounds of the medical monitors, and an IV was still pinching in one arm. Trying to get more comfortable, he sighed.

“Tristan?” Thom asked from somewhere beside him, his voice harsh with concern.

“What?” he answered automatically, opening his eyes, squinting in the bright light.

“Welcome back!” Thom was sitting in the chair beside the bed. He had dark circles under his eyes and a fresh scar along his hairline. His left arm was in a sling. Tristan wondered about that, slings weren’t used very often, what with the various bone and dermal
knitting devices. Thom followed his glance and smiled sheepishly. “I was doing too much with it, so the doctor insisted I wear this.”

“Good job,” Tristan said, surprised at how weak his voice sounded. There was a dull ache in his ankle and a throbbing that had been a wound in his shoulder. “How are we?”

“The ship is getting repaired, the fleet is slowly gathering itself together, the Vermin have headed back to their space for the time being,” Thom said. “Our Master Weaver lived.”

“That’s comforting,” Tristan said with a smile.

“Yeah,” Thom agreed, his eyes bright.

“Did we lose many?”

“Not as many as we could have, thanks to you. That goes for the whole fleet, by the way, not only this ship, Tristan.”

“I just fought the sails.”

“Just, he says.” Thom laughed.

“Thom, is Fenfyr…?” Tristan remembered Riggan’s words, but he had to know.

“Currently sleeping in your cabin, making a nuisance of himself since the doctor wouldn’t move you down there until you’d regained consciousness and the doctor doesn’t think sickbay is a place for a dragon. He tried to sneak in.” Thom stopped and grinned. “Fenfyr, a dragon the size of a
shuttlecar
, tried to
sneak
into sickbay. He managed to get his nose in, then realized that wouldn’t work, so then tried to get his tail in, back to this room.”

Tristan smiled. “She should have let him in.”

“I know, Tristan, I did tell her.”

“He’s okay?”

“He was wounded, the dragons cared for him until the battle was over, but he was here as soon as he could fly on his own. He’s been in your cabin since. Riggan has been spoiling him outrageously and telling him wild tales of his life as a pirate, of which a tenth are true. Riggan’s also been here once an hour to make sure Fenfyr is kept abreast of your condition.”

“Can I leave?” Tristan asked, sitting up.

“You just woke up, I’m not sure…” Thom stopped. “I’ll see what I can do.” He got up and disappeared.

Tristan closed his eyes, taking several deep breaths. He wa
s surprised he was alive at all. H
is body hadn’t had the chance to
recover from the moment they left the
Noble Lady
until the end of the battle. So it wasn’t really a shock that there was still actual pain in his body, even though he could feel the lingering effects of the Healing spells, the drugs and whatever surgery that had been performed. Without thinking about it, his mind ran over the words of the repair spell for the Weaving and strengthening of the sails. Oddly, he sensed the sails and felt a shift in his body.

“I don’t like it,” Rose Webber said, coming into the room.

“He can be monitored in his cabin, and you won’t have to deal with dragons anymore,” Thom said from behind her.

“Or Riggan or Chris. They’ve been
driving me crazy with their questions, and I really want to avoid another call from the Weaver Guild Master and Guild Dragon Elder regarding the Master Weaver,” she said, checking the monitors. She frowned and poked at one of them. “What did you do?”

“What?” Tristan asked.

“You did something. Your recovery is… Huh.” She eyed him curiously. “I won’t try and figure it out right now, but you can go to your cabin where you will
rest.
You
will not
under
any circumstances
repair the damage to the sails yet. There isn’t much, it can wait.
Do you understand?
”
She looked at him, her purple eyes snapping.

“Yes, ma’am,” Tristan said meekly.

“If I catch you on deck, it’s right back here to this room.”

“Yes, Dr. Webber,” Tristan said obediently. “May I please go now?”

“Yes, get out, and I don’t want to see you back here for a long time!” she said, smiling at him.

“Thanks.” He waited while she unhooked him from the machines and slid the IV out of his arm. Once she was gone, he sat all the way up and swung his legs off the bed. “I don’t suppose there are any real clothes here?”

Thom opened a closet and handed Tristan a set of soft civilian trousers and a t-shirt. “Riggan brought these by yesterday.”

“Good.” Tristan dressed as quickly as he could. He was stiff from the time he’d been in bed and the injuries he’d sustained. He still didn’t know how extensive they were—he wasn’t sure he wanted to know. He could remember the voices at one point saying Vermin bites were fatal. He looked down at his ankle and saw a purple scar
there. Cautiously putting his feet on the floor, he shifted weight onto that leg. It felt weak, but it held. He breathed a sigh of relief. Looking up at Thom’s concerned face, he grinned. “At least it’s on the leg I already limped on,” he said with a laugh.

Thom smiled—a little wanly. “I guess that’s a plus.”

“Can we go?” Tristan took a step and felt the ankle give a little.

“Sure,” Thom said, stepping beside him and pulling his arm over his shoulder. “If you fall down on the way out of sickbay, I doubt the doctor will let you leave.”

“Good thinking,” Tristan replied, grateful for Thom’s support by the time they reached the officer’s lift. He was sweating from the exertion and his leg was aching. “How bad are the sails?” he asked, trying to distract himself.

“Not bad, whatever you did to them kept them intact. We took one hit after you collapsed, from a Vermin ship that had been lurking behind some debris, and that was the one that did the damage. It’s not much and it’s only on the mainsail.”

“I should be able to fix it in a day or two,” Tristan assured him.

“Not until you are strong enough. I’m not risking losing you—we came too damn close this time,” Thom snapped. “Sorry.”

The lift doors slid open and they stepped out. The door to Tristan’s cabin was partially open, he could see in, Fenfyr was lying in the middle of the cabin, his eyes trained on the door. Tristan walked as fast as he could, dragging Thom along with him and pushed it open.

“Tristan!” The dragon’s voice was loud enough to shake the glassware on the sideboard.

“Fenfyr,” Tristan said, pulling away from Thom and stumbling towards the dragon. His leg gave out as he reached him, but Fenfyr caught him and pulled him close, wrapping him in his feathers and a protective claw. Tristan couldn’t swallow through the lump in his throat, and when the tears broke free and started down his cheeks he didn’t care. He could hear the soft hitching of
Fenfyr’s
tears as well. They stayed motionless for a long time, taking comfort in the fact
that
the other was actually okay and alive. Finally, Tristan pulled back. “How bad
were you hurt
?” he asked softly.

“Nothing that won’t heal, and better now
you’re here
,” Fenfyr said. “And you?”

“I didn’t even ask,” Tristan admitted with a laugh.

“They wouldn’t let me in, I tried to come, to let you know I was here,” the dragon said, distressed. “It was bad enough I couldn’t protect you during the battle, then they wouldn’t let me see you.”

“I know, Thom and Riggan told me.”

“You need to sit, Tristan,” Thom said, pushing a chair over.

“Thank you,” Tristan replied, sitting in the chair.

“My watch starts in a few minutes, I’ll be down to check on you in an hour, though. Sleep if you need to, I’m sure Riggan will be here…now,” Thom said with a laugh as the man appeared. “Take good care of them, Riggan.”

“I will, sir, I was just getting some grapefruit for Master Fenfyr. I guessed he’d be eating now that Master Tristan was back in the room.”

Tristan digested that comment and reached out so his hand was resting on
Fenfyr’s
head. Between the space of one breath and another he was asleep.

It was another two days before Tristan could do more than be up for an hour or so, eat a little and sleep again. He spent as much time as he could in the main cabin, finding he slept better in the presence of Fenfyr. When he was alone in his bedchamber, his dreams were filled with the memories of Fenfyr being hooked and the Vermin crawling over the deck of the
Winged Victory.
He still wasn’t strong enough to fix the sails, but he did get up and wander into his office and open the communications to Guild headquarters.

“Tristan!” Brian Rhoads boomed the moment the connection was made. “By the First Spell, it’s good to hear your voice! We thought we’d really lost you this time,” he said, his voice soft with worry.

“I’ve heard that,” Tristan replied with a laugh. “I still haven’t asked exactly what they mean, I don’t think I want to know.”

“How are you doing now?”

“Better, Brian. I’m only waiting to get strong enough to repair a small hole in the sails so we can head back into the inner system.”

“It will be good to see you, there’s a lot we need to talk about! Chris Muher and Alden were both talking about what you did to the sails, and we need to see if that’s something you can teach, or if it’s
only you.”

“I’m sure anyone can learn it.” Tristan felt the blush creep up his cheeks.

“We’ll see about that, and Muher has some idea about training commandos that can use that small personal sail you created. You’ve caused quite a stir.”