Fate of the Free Lands

by Jack Campbell

  He didn’t hesitate. “Yes, Captain. What about these others?”

  “The guards are mine. The prisoners are really prisoners, though.”

  Aravind came striding up, looking perplexed. “What’s going on?” Daki grabbed his arm, whispering to him. Turning a shocked look on Jules, Aravind took one step closer to peer at her. “It is you. Yes. Get aboard.”

  Jules beckoned to Nico. “Bring them up.”

  As the prisoners and fake guards came aboard, Jules smiled at Aravind. “When are you leaving port?”

  “I was planning to do that tomorrow on the evening tide,” Aravind said. “We were waiting on one more shipment. But I think maybe we should take tonight’s tide out.”

  “Yeah, I think so, too.”

  Jules stood aside, trying not to be recognized by anyone else, as the last of the prisoners came up the plank and Daki told the grumbling sailors of the Prosper that they’d be getting underway right now instead of enjoying one more night in the taverns of Landfall.

  Artem came up to her with a grin, rendering a passable salute. “At your service, Captain. All of us from the Evening Star. You gave us life and freedom when we thought both were lost forever.”

  “We’re not out of Landfall yet,” Jules told him, watching nervously as the Prosper’s crew started taking in lines and going up into the rigging to unfurl the sails. “Where are the prisoners?”

  “Daki told us to take them below so they’d be out of the way,” Artem said. “Nico and the rest of ours are still watching them. They’re going to have a big surprise before long, eh?”

  “Yes, they are,” Jules said, smiling.

  The smile faded as she looked toward the head of the pier. More legionaries had come into view. Probably just a shift change, but still worrisome.

  Captain Aravind had noticed as well. “Move it! Take in all lines and the boarding plank!”

  The last lines came off the pier, a couple of sailors scrambling aboard just before the plank was pulled in. Sails unfurled and spars were shifted, catching the breeze beginning to come from the land as the sun sank behind the clouds.

  The Prosper swung out into the harbor.

  Jules watched the legionaries at the head of the pier look toward the Prosper, but none of them moved as the ship drew away from the pier. Lights were springing to life around the harbor as night fell and lanterns were lit ashore and on ships, and the big beacon on the harbor’s headland flamed to life to guide ships.

  On the best pier in the harbor, she saw bright, steady lights flare against the darkness. Two of the Mechanic metal ships. The Mechanics only had four of those monster ships. Why were two here? Did it have anything to do with her?

  It wasn’t until the Prosper cleared the harbor that Jules finally felt herself relaxing. She walked up the ladder to the quarterdeck, nodding to Captain Aravind as she finally pulled off the leather helm and ran her hand through her hair. “Where are we bound, Captain?”

  Aravind shrugged. “I thought you’d tell me. Officially, Imperial records show we’re supposed to be headed for Sandurin, but I was planning to go to Dor’s.”

  “I’d love to go to Dor’s,” Jules said. “Thank you.”

  “No need to thank me. You owe this to a certain pirate who instead of taking my last copper coin instead gave me and this ship a new chance.” Aravind looked her over. “No disrespect intended, but you look like you’ve been dragged under the keel a few times.”

  “I feel like I’ve done just that,” Jules said.

  “My cabin is yours. Get some sleep. I’ll have some food sent in.”

  “Thanks. My companions, the ones wearing guard outfits like this. They’re mostly pirates, off the Evening Star. They’re taking orders from me.”

  “All right. We’ll see them fed, too. And the prisoners?”

  “They’re real prisoners,” Jules said. “Tomorrow they’ll find out their fates have changed for the better.”

  Afterwards, she vaguely recalled making it down the ladder and into the cabin before passing out.

  * * *

  She woke to a day that seemed far along. Food was set on the table, so she ate and drank, grateful for the reassuring feel of the ship as it rolled across the waves.

  Stripping off the prisoner guard clothing with a sigh of relief, Jules got her own clothes out of the bag she’d been carrying since the wagon was burned. Her clothes weren’t exactly in great shape after her confinement on the Hawk’s Mantle, the battle that destroyed that ship, her escape and subsequent travels from and back to Landfall, but they were hers.

  She paused before dressing, looking at the strange fern-like scar running down one side of her body, her legacy from a Mage lightning bolt that hadn’t killed her, and thinking it was lucky that scar didn’t extend to her face. That was something even a passing glance would have spotted.

  Walking out on deck, Jules felt her heart leap as she breathed the salt air.

  “Good, um, afternoon, Captain,” First Officer Daki said, nodding to her.

  “I slept that long? What are we doing?” Jules asked, squinting up at the sails. She saw the other members of Prosper’s crew eyeing her with awe or respect, the first of which bothered her but the second of which felt good.

  “Tacking west toward Dor’s.” Daki pointed to the ladder below decks. “Can we get them out of their chains now? It’s been hard to see it.”

  “Yes, let’s do that,” Jules said.

  The pirates she’d brought aboard had only their prisoner guard outfits to wear as they came on deck, smiling and waving at Jules. “At your service, Captain Jules,” Artem said. “I was told it was all right to say that now.”

  “When did you figure it out?” Jules asked.

  “On the road. It was Mad recognized you first, and when she spoke to me I saw it. And it all made sense. Who else could’ve got us out of there but the woman who fought a Mage dragon and has killed Mages?”

  “You got yourselves out of there,” Jules said. “I just helped. Are the prisoners free?”

  “Not yet. Mad’s bringing them up. We figured it was better to take their chains off on deck where no one could get too excited and cause trouble, you know?”

  The thirty prisoners were brought up the ladder, looking beaten down and forlorn. They sat still as their chains were unlocked, looking about as if fearing a trick.

  When all were free, Captain Aravind stood before them. “I’m the captain of this ship. You are no longer prisoners, though you will be required to follow my orders as long as you’re aboard this ship. We’re on our way to Dor’s, a western settlement, where you’ll be set ashore, and where you’ll all be free to live your lives.”

  “You can’t do that,” one of the prisoners said, his voice quavering. “Don’t lie to us. Only the Emperor can pardon us.”

  “The Emperor doesn’t rule here,” Jules said. All eyes went to her. “You’re free because the west is free. It’ll stay free if we all fight to keep it that way.”

  “Who are you to say such things?”

  Artem laughed. “Don’t you know her? That’s Jules, you clods! Captain Jules of Landfall. The woman of the prophecy. She’s the empress of the sea, she is! Not all the Emperor’s horses and legions and ships, nor all the Mages in the world, can keep her in chains. And someday a daughter of her line will free this world of the Great Guilds forever!”

  Jules saw hope come into the eyes of the prisoners, hope and unlooked-for joy in faces that had expected nothing but suffering, and she thought that maybe it made all of her fear and struggles worth it. Because no one had ever come for her when she was an orphan, but she could come for people like this, and give them hope and freedom.

  But two of the former prisoners stared at her with rigid faces.

  Jules walked over to them, past men and women babbling with joy to each other while the sailors of the Prosper looked on and grinned.

  “I didn’t kill Colonel Dar’n,” Jules told Ian’s mother and sister. “He sacrificed him
self so the Emperor wouldn’t fault him for the loss of Western Port.”

  Ian’s sister glared at her. “Lies. To think our family has been brought down by a gutter rat like you.”

  “You’re free,” Jules said, shrugging off the insult despite an urge to slap the young woman. “You can make any life you want outside of the Empire. I don’t expect you to thank me. I owed it to Ian to free you if I could.”

  “When Ian finds you again—!”

  “He’s alive?” Fears that had been riding her since the Mage attack on the Imperial sloop suddenly shattered, leaving relief and happiness in their wake. The intensity of her feelings surprised her, but she put that down to the stress of recent events still weighing on her.

  Ian’s sister got the look of someone who’d inadvertently revealed something important and wished she could take it back. “No! He’s…his ghost. I meant when his ghost finds you.”

  Jules smiled slightly, relieved at the news even while aggravated at Ian’s sister. “You’re worse at lying than Ian is.”

  Whatever else might have been said was interrupted by a hail from the lookout high on the maintop. “Sail three points off the starboard bow! Looks to be heading for us!”

  Jules looked in that direction. With the winds as they were, the other ship had the weather gage and could run down the Prosper. If it was an Imperial warship, a fight was inevitable.

  As if sensing her thoughts, Ian’s mother smiled. “You haven’t escaped the hand of the Emperor. Whatever happens to us, we’ll still have the satisfaction of seeing you hauled back to the Emperor in chains.”

  Chapter Five

  Jules started to head for the shrouds and ratlines to climb up to the maintop, but paused to look at Ian’s mother. “The last time the Empire tried that, they lost a warship. Stay out of my way. Try anything to harm this ship and you’ll be the worse for it.”

  “You can’t give us orders,” Ian’s sister snarled. “Fatherless, motherless—”

  “Shut up.” The ice in Jules’ voice stopped the flow of insults and fear came into the girl’s eyes. Jules couldn’t help herself. “Ian was adopted, wasn’t he? There’s no way the blood of your family runs in him.”

  She left without waiting for a response, but swung by where Nico was standing gazing past the starboard bow. “Those two,” she said, indicating Ian’s mother and sister. “They need to be chained again before we encounter that ship. They’ll betray us if it’s an Imperial ship of war.”

  “I’ll take care of it,” Nico said, grateful to have something to do since he knew as little of sailing as the pirates had known of horses.

  Jules hoisted herself into the rigging, climbing rapidly until she reached the maintop. The sailor there was one she vaguely recalled from when the Sun Queen had first encountered the Prosper. “Over there,” the sailor said, pointing.

  Narrowing her eyes and shading them with a flat hand, Jules gazed at the masts and sails coming into view over the horizon. “That’s not a war galley.”

  “No. Maybe a sloop, though.”

  “Maybe.”

  “Can you tell what he is?” Captain Aravind called up from the quarterdeck.

  “Not yet,” Jules called back. She raised herself a little more, trying to spot any more details on the oncoming ship. “He’s seen us for certain. He is coming for us.” The Prosper rolled over the top of a swell, for a moment raising the maintop a little higher. “There’s a third mast. Do you see it?”

  “Yes,” the lockout said.

  “He’s not a galley or a sloop of war,” Jules called down to Captain Aravind. “He’s got three masts.”

  “That’d mean a merchant ship,” the lookout said. “But the way he’s coming to meet us isn’t reassuring.”

  “Maybe a pirate,” Jules agreed. Would she be able to identify the Sun Queen from this distance? But something didn’t feel quite right, making her think that ship wasn’t the Queen. “Artem! Come up here!”

  He scrambled up the rigging, coming up onto the now-crowded maintop. “Aye, Captain?”

  “Can you tell who that is?” Jules asked, pointing toward the other ship. With the Prosper still holding her course, the two ships were closing fairly quickly.

  Artem raised himself up, staring toward the other ship for a long moment. “I think it’s the Bright Morning,” he finally said. “See that missing yard on the foremast? That was the Bright Morning last I saw her.”

  “The Bright Morning?” Jules felt her expression hardening. “That ship has a bad reputation.”

  “Aye,” Artem agreed. “There are pirates, and then there are pirates. Last I saw of the Bright Morning she was running off, leaving us alone to fight that Imperial warship. If the Morning had stuck by us we might’ve had a chance, but they ran.”

  “Tora’s the captain of the Bright Morning, right?”

  “Aye. He and Captain Orin talked the morning before the Imperial warship showed up. Like Mad said after that, Tora looked like a fine enough man until he opened his mouth and spoiled it.”

  Jules nodded. “Let’s go down. Get our people in their armor, swords at ready.”

  She and Artem went back down the rigging to the deck, Jules heading for the quarterdeck and Artem to gather the pirates from the Evening Star.

  “He’s a pirate ship,” Jules said. “The Bright Morning.”

  Aravind looked relieved. “He’ll leave us alone, then, once he knows we’re your ship.”

  “Not necessarily,” Jules said. “Captain Tora of the Bright Morning has a bad reputation. If he doesn’t know I’m aboard, he might ignore your claim to be working with me.”

  “Then why not tell him you’re aboard?”

  “Because he might want to collect that Imperial reward for me, and kill any witnesses to his treachery,” Jules said. “I’ll only expose myself if he doesn’t accept your warn-off. We can handle him if he tries anything. We’ve got ten pirates with leather armor and swords to help defend this ship, plus your crew, and any of the freed prisoners who want to fight to ensure they don’t get sold back to the Imperials by the Bright Morning.”

  Aravind gazed unhappily toward the approaching ship, whose sails were now visible from the quarterdeck. “I don’t favor fighting, but it seems we’ll have no choice if he won’t be warned off. And we also have you. If anything will stiffen the spines of our defenders, it’s having you lead them.”

  “You’re captain of the Prosper,” Jules said.

  “And I thank you for deferring to me in that,” Aravind said. “But when it comes to fighting pirates, you should be calling the shots, I think.”

  Jules grinned. “Let’s try to do this the easy way. But if he wants a fight, he’ll find himself in trouble.”

  By the time the Bright Morning came about to match the course of the Prosper, Jules had her defenders ready but still hidden. Once settled on the same tack, the other ship veered close. The pirates on the Bright Morning crowded the railing facing the Prosper, waving their weapons to intimidate the crew of the other ship. “Heave to for boarding!” Captain Tora yelled across the gap between the ships. Tora wasn’t a large man, and perhaps to compensate for that he wore an outsized hat adorned with feathers that fluttered in the wind.

  Captain Aravind called a reply from his quarterdeck. “This is the Prosper, a ship working for Captain Jules of the Sun Queen. Our cargo and profits are shared with the Sun Queen.”

  Tora didn’t hesitate in his response. “Jules is either dead or in the Emperor’s bed! Even if she was here, she doesn’t give us orders! We’ll take our share of your cargo! If you fight, it’ll be the worse for you and your crew!”

  She’d been standing on deck, but now Jules climbed up onto the rail facing the Bright Morning. Tora hadn’t left her any choice. “Jules is here, you sorry excuse for a sailor! And I’m telling you to break off! This ship isn’t yours to take from!” Jules had to admit to feeling some satisfaction at seeing the reaction of the Bright Morning’s crew to her appearance.

&nb
sp; Captain Tora was obviously surprised as well. Instead of another quick reply, Jules saw him talking to a woman who was probably the Bright Morning’s first officer.

  Finally, Tora called back to her in a voice whose friendliness was too exaggerated to feel sincere. “Jules! It’s wonderful to see you well! I’ve been wanting to meet with you. Will you let my ship come alongside so we can speak and share a drink?”

  “He’s lying,” Artem said. “He means to come alongside and attack us by surprise. He’s done that more than once to other ships.”

  “I’ve heard,” Jules said. “He’s one of those captains who thinks no one’s going to expect him to do the same thing he’s always done. Daki, Artem, line up our armed pirates beneath the rail here, the other armed sailors beside and right behind them. Keep them all low. Then line up as many of the former prisoners as we can behind them, where they’ll look like more ranks of armed defenders. When I give the word, I want them all to stand up.”

  She waited as those on the Prosper followed her directions. The crew of the Bright Morning would notice some of the preparations, but not all of them, and wouldn’t expect nearly that many defenders on the Prosper.

  When all was ready, Jules called over the gap between the ships. “All right. Come alongside for a meeting.”

  As the Bright Morning put her helm over and slid across the gap to come alongside the Prosper, Jules raised the short sword she’d taken off a dead prisoner guard. “On your feet and look ready to fight!” she called to those on deck.

  The pirates from the Evening Star, the crew of the Prosper, and most of the freed prisoners stood up. In the center of the defenders stood the pirates and Nico wearing the armor of prisoner guards. The great majority of the freed prisoners in the back had no weapons except marlinspikes, but that couldn’t be seen from the Bright Morning. What they could see was that the size of the defending force easily exceeded the number of pirates on the deck of the Bright Morning.