The Pirates of Fainting Goat Island

by Teresa McCullough

  “One ship was called the Rockfall and a second was called Rock Mountain, at least according to the men who were coming up to the Lodge. Merko’s men never mentioned the name of the third ship in my presence and it was too dark, and they were too far away for me to read their names myself, but I’m almost certain the ships I destroyed were the Rocky Coast Pirates.” Vlid could read? Until an hour ago, I didn’t even think he could talk.

  “Our cousin told me about them,” Milea admitted. Our cousin? Who was that and how was it they both had the same cousin?

  “They give pirates a bad name.” Vlid’s voice was bitter. “Merko is ruthless, but practical. He doesn’t kill for fun, just for profit. If a ship surrenders to him or even fights just a little, he leaves them with enough supplies to get to land. But if a ship resists too much, he’ll take the ship and leave the sailors in small boats with enough supplies, so they will usually be able to reach land and tell the tale.”

  “Except when he is challenged,” Milea said.

  “Yes,” Vlid said. “The captain of Bat Bell thought they were invulnerable. The ship was built to be safe from pirates. It was slow, but hard to board. Merko took it as a challenge.”

  “How did they capture it?” I asked.

  “At night in a port. Merko came up when most of the crew was in town and climbed in. The ship was captured, with the token crew thrown over the sides. Most of them made it to shore, but Merko was out of the harbor before any of them could raise an alarm.”

  “Bat Bell is such an odd name,” I said.

  “FAT EEL is also an odd name, but that’s what they called her. It didn’t take much paint to change the F in fat to a B and the first E in eel to a B. Adding an L at the end was also easy.”

  Milea picked up a small pack, saying, “I should go back. It’s safer for us to return.”

  “I’ll row you across,” Vlid said. He turned to me. “There’s food and water here. One of us will come for you eventually.”

  He shook the child awake. When he saw Vlid, he said, “Big Vlid,” with a big smile.

  “Little Vlid,” Vlid responded. They hugged each other. The three of them left.

  In a short time, I had to completely reevaluate Vlid. I thought of him as a lone, crazy man, who was incapable of speech. None of what I thought I knew about him was true.

  Did Little Vlid look like Big Vlid? I didn’t get a good look, but he had the same curly hair, although not as dark and without the white lock. Milea’s hair was curly also. I realized I couldn’t really recognize Vlid. His wild hair and beard covered so much that I didn’t know his features. I recognized his posture, which was slightly stooped. But he didn’t stoop or limp after jumping over the fire.

  I was too cold to stay still. A quick search of the cottage showed me nothing that I could wear while my clothing dried except the goatskins in the bed. I reached for them and a flea jumped out, so I jumped back. There was a small hearth, but the only fuel was dried goat dung, which I had no desire to use. There was box full of books, which I wasn’t cold enough to burn. I moved the door, which Vlid replaced, to get more light in, and saw they were children’s books. For Little Vlid?

  I pulled a slate out of the box. The name Whelia was written in childish letters at the top. It was repeated in less polished letters again and again. Was someone named Whelia learning to write?

  The sun streaming into the cottage made me realize it was warmer outside. I left the cottage and spiraled around it, never leaving it out of sight, but giving me a feel for the land. It was better than sitting in the cottage, and I needed to walk to keep warm. Eventually, I found a spot in the sun on a hill that overlooked the cottage. I sat down, taking off my shoes and socks in hopes of getting them dry. Three goats were grazing nearby. They were larger than the fainting goats and had prominent udders.

  I wondered about Vlid and Milea. I could understand them disguising what they were, but what were they, really? I couldn’t figure it out.

  Vlid returned and entered the cottage, coming out immediately afterward. I waved to him from the hill. He responded to my wave but ducked in the cottage and came out with some containers of food. He replaced the door and when he reached me, he said, “You have to leave the door closed or the goats will get in.” He was soaking wet. I wondered if he swam across.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “It doesn’t matter. Put on your shoes; we’re going.”

  “Where?” I pulled on my socks.

  “To hide. The wind blew most of the fog off, and there appears to be a battle of some kind. The wave put out the fire Merko lit, and his men are battling the other pirates on the stairs. Some have come ashore on both islands, but they’re on the other end of this one. I wanted to destroy the invading ships, but the volcano isn’t ready for another eruption and they were too spread out. I think I destroyed one ship and damaged a second one.”

  “You’re supporting Merko?”

  “I would prefer not supporting either group. Merko will probably kill both of us if he wins, and the other pirates would probably kill anyone who worked with Merko. I would like them to kill each other off, but it seems more likely that one side will be the winner.”

  “Why support Merko then?”

  “He’s not going to massacre the islanders,” Vlid said bleakly.

  He might kill Vlid and me for defying him. My clothes weren’t completely dry, but I warmed up a bit as we climbed uphill. “What did you do, down by the harbor?”

  “I called up a volcano,” Vlid said. “Haven’t you wondered what magic our goddess gave us?”

  “I thought the gods gave their people magic to help them. I can’t understand how making a volcano erupt would help,” I said.

  “Our goddess Goa is one of the most minor ones. Only the people on these two islands worship her. These islands came from a volcano many years ago, and there is a problem. It is going to erupt, now and then, and unless we make small eruptions, there will be a huge one someday, destroying everyone who lives here. Also, we can do earthquakes, because if we don’t do small ones, there will be large ones. Goa gave some of us this magic to save us.”

  Earthquakes and volcanoes. People wondered that enhancers could both do motion and heat, which seemed unrelated. I didn’t know how earthquakes related to volcanoes, but presumably the gods did. “How many of you have this magic?” I asked.

  He just shook his head.

  “Don’t you go silent on me. I’ve had enough of that. Why did Milea think it was safer for little Vlid to be on the other island?”

  “We saw her praying. We have safety magic from our mother, and if we pray for about a quarter of an hour to the god Sliferio, we can tell which course of action is safest. It’s only a yes-no situation. She was praying to see what to do with her son.”

  Our mother. They were brother and sister. “And Sliferio said her son was safer on the other island?”

  “Yes.”

  He led me to a place that was sheltered by some rocks. He pointed out some cottages a distance away and told me to stay hidden, but he would be back. He walked quickly to the cottages, looking all around him as he went. He came back, carrying a bundle. We walked another hour, and he showed me a small cave. As we ate the food, he rolled out two goat-hair blankets.

  “Stay here,” he said. “I have something I must do. I won’t be long.”

  He left, but I could hear his voice from the mouth of the cave.

  Curious, I came out of the cave a bit and saw him on his knees, talking softly to himself. I couldn’t understand every word, but I thought I heard Sliferio a number of times. Once, I thought I heard my name. He rose abruptly and saw me scurry back into the cave.

  “You’re safe here, at least for a day. Don’t leave the cave. I’ll come and get you after I find out what’s going on.”

  He left. I wondered what would happen if he didn’t come and get me. I had nothing to do but think, and I wasn’t happy about it. Should I trust Vlid? I thought so, but his returning Merko’s
sword was odd.

  I realized Vlid wore homespun goat-hair garments. It suddenly occurred to me that either Vlid or someone else patched his clothing, indicating either he was cared for or at least could sew. Milea? A wife? Or did he do it himself?

  He returned the following afternoon. By then, my clothing was dry, but I was dirty and tired. Blankets over dirt were no substitute for a comfortable bed. “It’s no longer safe here,” he said. “We have to move quickly, but quietly.”

  I wondered if he used safety magic to know this.

  We left and headed downhill. We turned a corner of the trail and Vlid stopped. I saw what he was looking at. There were bodies of a man and a woman with arrows in their backs. There was a trail in the dirt where the man crawled to the woman. He lay half on her as if he wanted to die with her in his arms. Vlid walked over and checked them, saying, “Artdon and Whelia. Husband and wife. They took care of Little Vlid. Both dead. Merko’s men wouldn’t have done this.” He spoke in a whisper, but his anger came through clearly.

  “Whelia was the name on the slate,” I said. “There was a slate in the cottage with the name written over and over again.”

  “Little Vlid was teaching her to read and write,” Vlid said. “Milea or I would come and give him a lesson whenever we could. Whelia wanted to learn, and Little Vlid helped her using his books. I brought him a couple of new books when I came just before Merko conquered the island.”

  “You came? You don’t live on the island?”

  “I do now. Unfortunately. I was born here, but I hadn’t been back in years. I came for a visit and was going to be here for two months. It’s now two years.”

  He started to go on, and I said, “Shouldn’t we bury them?”

  “Not at the risk of our lives.” He kept moving and I followed him.

  A few minutes later, he suddenly pulled me down behind some rocks. There were two groups of men below us. I recognized Merko’s men, even from a distance, partly because of Kalten, whose size, bright red hair and beard made him easy to identify. They were pinned down behind some rocks while the other group shot arrows at whoever stuck anything out.

  “Is it time to take sides?” I asked.

  “Can you do anything?” he asked.

  “Yes.”

  “If you help the new pirates, I’ll have to stop you,” he said sadly, “Much as I dislike Merko, the others are worse.”

  “I’ll help Merko’s men,” I said.

  The other pirates split up. They only had three archers, but one archer and half the men moved to flank Merko’s men. I tripped three of them, not being gentle. The archer stopped where he was and shot an arrow. I concentrated on enhancing it, adding to its momentum, and it went completely wide. The archer was puzzled but reached for another arrow. As he pulled it out of his quiver, I made his arm move so quickly that I injured his arm, although I didn’t know how serious the injury was. I repeated this process with a second archer.

  “Move,” I said quietly to Vlid.

  “What?”

  “Move around. I can enhance motion, not stillness. They are being still. I need something to enhance. I can put the motion over there.”

  He rhythmically moved an arm. I picked a random person in the attacking pirates and made his arm move. Since I added a great deal of motion to Vlid’s arm motion, it was an uncomfortable jerk. I eventually got lucky and one of the men hit another man.

  One of them said in a voice loud enough for me to hear, “It’s an enhancer. Look for her.” He not only knew about enhancers, he knew only women could be enhancers.

  They started moving around and looking. One of them spotted us and they started toward me. I concentrated first on the archers, because the others weren’t an immediate threat. Although one arrow skittered behind us, I hurt them enough, they weren’t accurate. In their eagerness to get to me, they forgot the faster they ran, the easier it was for me to hurt them. They also forgot Merko’s men behind them.

  The two parties of pirates were about the same size, perhaps a dozen men each. By the time Merko’s men reached them, more than half of the other pirates were injured. The fight was short and brutal. I helped where I could. I wasn’t happy about it, but I believed the devil I knew was the better choice. Since I could still enhance, Ezant agreed with me.

  CHAPTER 9

  Merko’s men took us across to Fainting Goat Island. They had a couple of boats and they separated Vlid and me when we crossed. One ship was visible out of the entrance to the harbor, but the three other ships were gone. The harbor was filled with debris and floating dead fish.

  There were charred remains of the fire at the base of the stairs, but the water appeared to have washed away the wood. I was tired enough to find the walk up to the Lodge difficult, but I wished it were longer because I dreaded meeting Merko. Many of the men were at The Lodge, including Jerot. Lina and Amapola were sitting together near the kitchen. Roddy was sitting next to Lina. The other women, including Milea, weren’t there. “Where’s the Red Lion?” I asked.

  “Anchored outside the harbor with a small crew on her,” Jerot said. “Merko says there are no storms nearby. We’ll probably bring her in as soon as we clean the debris out of the harbor.”

  “Enough chitchat,” Merko said to Jerot. He turned to me. “I understand you saved my men.”

  “Yes,” I said. His men were generous. They could have pretended my help was minor or nonexistent.

  “Why? You wouldn’t protect us when they first came into the harbor.”

  “I didn’t know they were pirates,” I said. There were a few murmurs, so I added, “I do know you are pirates.” A few of them laughed.

  “Merko’s Courtly Corsairs, at your service,” Jerot said, giving an exaggerated bow. His bow wasn’t aimed at me, but at Merko. A few men arose and repeated his bow.

  Merko ignored them, asking, “How did you know they were pirates?”

  “There was a woman on Goat Island who said Vlid’s cousin told her about them.”

  “Vlid’s cousin? Who’s that?”

  “I have no idea,” I said. “The pirates had a name, something with Rocky in it.”

  “Rocky Coast Pirates,” Merko said. “It’s pretty easy to spot them, because all their ships are named with something to do with rocks. We’re trying to salvage the Rockfall. We’ll rename her.” I decided they would paint over the name, rather than try to create one from the word.

  “How did you get across to Goat Island?”

  “Vlid took me. I got wet and it was cold.”

  “You know how to swim?” He thought I swam across? I suspected Vlid didn’t want the existence of the boat known, so I went along with Merko’s misunderstanding.

  “Yes. Swimming in clothes is no fun.” My father not only taught me how to swim, he insisted I practice in clothes sometimes, in case I fell in the harbor.

  “You can walk across all but about ten feet,” Merko said. “Vlid would know. Well, if he knows anything.” He looked at Vlid, who didn’t appear to be paying attention. “I suppose Vlid was the perfect gentleman.”

  “No,” I said deliberately. “A gentleman would be a better conversationalist.”

  There was some laughter at that.

  “But in the sense I believe you mean, yes, he was a gentleman,” I added.

  “I always knew he was an idiot,” Merko said. His audience responded with some chuckles. “I suppose he didn’t say anything?” His voice was mocking, but there was a seriousness behind it that suggested that he had suspicions.

  Guessing Merko suspected that Vlid wasn’t what he seemed, I decided to go with a partial truth. “He got down on his knees and said a prayer. I heard a few words in it that weren’t his usual muttering. I didn’t really listen, but it was a long prayer.”

  “He can talk?” Merko said.

  “He can say some words.”

  Suddenly, Jerot started singing in a surprisingly good tenor voice, “How did I come to pick this life/That’s filled with theft and death and
strife./The tale I’ll tell is long and true…”

  At that point, several others started singing with him. Merko seemed annoyed at first but joined in after a few lines. I’m not certain how long the song was, but it became increasingly ribald and gory, with a chorus of six lines that was repeated frequently. One man stepped out of the room, returning with a lute, which he strummed to accompany the song. When the song stopped, someone sang another verse, which the others hadn’t heard. They made him repeat it a couple of times, and then they all sang it. The lute player started strumming a different tune, but Merko held up a hand and turned to Jerot, saying, “Your point was?”

  “He might have learned a prayer as a child, before he was injured.” When Merko didn’t respond, Jerot said, “The white lock of hair suggests a head injury.”

  “I suppose so,” Merko said.

  “I have some questions for you,” I said, wanting to turn the attention away from Vlid. “Would you have thrown me that rope?”

  “Yes,” Merko said, “And instructed you how to tie it to yourself so I could pull you up. What else do you want to know?”

  “What were the Rocky Coast Pirates doing here? There must be easier targets.”

  “This is a good refuge. We can relax here with only a few guards when we’re here. What’s good for us would be good for them,” Merko explained. Apparently, it wasn’t important for Merko to guard the local people when he wasn’t here. “Any other questions?”

  “Can I leave?” I deliberately phrased it, so it wasn’t a command, since I didn’t want to test my Controlling. He might just let me leave without a command and I wasn’t certain what would happen if I barely Controlled him. Would he say yes and change his mind? He might be angry with me if that happened. “I didn’t know what I was getting into when I came here and would prefer to go somewhere else. Will you take me to a major port? I’m no threat to you, because I don’t have the slightest idea of how to find Fainting Goat Island. I would prefer to leave with my possessions, including what you paid me, but I would accept being put ashore with the clothes on my back.”