Act of Will wh-1

by Andrew James Hartley

  I watched him get on board and was suddenly struck by the sense of being on the threshold of a life-changing decision. I had stuck with them this long because I needed them to get me out of Cresdon and because they were useful allies in an unfamiliar and hostile world in which I knew nobody. But get on that boat, and everything would change, even if it didn’t sink as soon as we hit open sea. This was the point of no return.

  I turned and looked across the dockyard into the gaze of an Empire trooper, one whom I had seen in a local tavern three nights before. He was with another soldier and they were both looking at me and muttering to each other.

  They couldn’t have recognized me. Surely. Not now. I dropped my eyes to my bag and tried to look busy, fumbling with panic.

  The boat was ready to go, but a glance told me that the guards were still watching. By the time I picked up my bag and turned to the ship, they were coming over, slowly, uncertainly, each seeming to follow the other.

  “Garnet!” I called, trying to sound unconcerned. He paused in the midst of passing a crate up onto the ship and peered from me to the two soldiers, who had picked up their pace significantly. He called to Renthrette and then stooped to pick something up: a bow. I turned to the soldiers quickly.

  “Everything all right, Officer?” I said, smiling blandly.

  “I saw you the other night,” said one of them. “I thought you looked familiar.”

  “Really?” I said, my heart fluttering. “Just one of those faces, I suppose.”

  “No,” said the other, taking a step towards me. “I know you. I recognized you when I saw you the other night, but I couldn’t place you.”

  I smiled and shrugged. “Oh?”

  “Yeah,” he said. “Till two months ago, I was stationed in Cresdon.”

  Oh, hell.

  For a moment I could think of nothing to say.

  “You’re Rufus Ramsbottom, aren’t you,” he said, thrusting his hand into mine. “The actor.”

  He was smiling, his eyes bright, his cheeks flushed.

  I blinked.

  “Yes,” I said, taking his hand and shaking it. “Yes, I am.”

  I scribbled my name-or, rather, Rufus’s-on whatever they put in front of me and then sort of glided over to the Cormorant to find Renthrette and Garnet warily unstringing their bows, their eyes fixed on me. I wasn’t sure whom they would have shot first, the soldiers or me.

  I watched the soldiers from the rail, my heart still thumping. Any minute I expected them to realize that I was not the actor-and I use that term in its loosest and most degraded sense-Rufus Ramsbottom, but the actor, rebel, and fugitive for whom new torturous means of execution were being devised, Will Hawthorne. We were out of port before I relaxed enough to realize that if this had indeed been the point of no return, I had just made a career choice.

  The captain had his eye on Renthrette from the outset. I saw the drunken half-wit leering at her as she watched Stavis fall behind us, and knew then that there would be trouble.

  I passed my time fencing with Orgos on what little area of free deck there was. It wasn’t easy, and I spent as much time dodging spars and deck fittings as I did his sword. Still, it kept my body moving and my mind off the amount of water under our ancient keel.

  The gulls swooped infuriatingly at us for miles, convinced we were trawling. At first I felt ill, but it was more trepidation than actual seasickness, and it passed, mercifully, within a couple of hours. Oddly enough, it was Garnet who suffered most. He was greenish before the dock was out of sight and, as we cleared the sandbars that flanked the port, he began hanging over the rail with a desolate look on his face. I couldn’t help feeling sorry for the poor swine.

  We slept in hammocks, two to a berth, and it wasn’t exactly idyllic, but the rocking of the ship actually helped me doze off. Orgos lay large and completely silent beside me. I don’t think Mithos closed his eyes much, since Garnet, his berthmate, spent half the night running up to the deck to throw up. Mithos’s sleeplessness turned out to be for the best when he caught one of the ratty, toothless crew pawing through our belongings. From then on, one of us kept watch.

  On the morning of the second day we saw dolphins leaping off the starboard bow, apparently racing us. They flashed silver-grey into the foam of our wake like curving arrows. The sky was cloudless and we were making good time, but if there had been more to occupy the captain, things would probably have worked out better.

  He was a big clumsy man with a black beard, a mouthful of gold teeth, a natty little scarlet jacket, and a penchant for heavy earrings. His voice was permanently slurred, even when he wasn’t on the rum, and his tongue clicked and gurgled when he spoke. He didn’t have an accent as such; you just couldn’t tell what he was saying. I would just nod, laugh loudly, and say “Yes mate, exactly” a few times, until he left me alone. He spat through his beard as he talked and his eyes wandered around sparkling mischievously, so that more than once I wondered with a start of panic what it was I was agreeing to. Garnet said he looked like he had been a pirate once, and I could see his point. His face was red and leathery from the sun and salt wind, and his arms were tattooed with voluptuous women coiled around snakes and daggers. He would sidle up to you and make crude, unintelligible jokes and then slap you on the back and laugh to himself while you wondered what the hell he was going on about. He wore a short, heavy-looking cutlass with a bowl-shaped hand guard. Maybe he still was a pirate.

  Renthrette was on deck waiting for the sun to go down when he made his move. I don’t suppose she understood most of what he suggested, but she got enough idea to detach herself from him and head for the cabins. He’d had a skinful, however, and wasn’t to be dealt with so easily. He caught her from behind, but she shrugged him off and slapped his hands away. Since Renthrette was angry but controlled, things might have been left at that had I not decided to “rescue” her.

  For a moment there, it was close to perfect. I took two quick steps and caught him off balance with a punch to the jaw. He never saw it coming, and though it wasn’t really much more than a slap, he slumped to the ground. Feeling pleased with myself, I turned to minister to Renthrette, who was staring at me in disbelief. I was just realizing that what I had assumed was admiration was actually outrage when I heard the captain stagger to his feet behind me, scraping his cutlass out of its rusty scabbard.

  His eyes were small and full of malice, and he started to advance on me, spitting meaningless curses. I had no weapon to hand, but he was in no mood to be sporting. Renthrette closed as if to part us, making conciliatory noises, but he swung the sword at her like a club and she stepped back, giving a single unhurried shout for Orgos. The first mate appeared, ushering her out of the way, then stood there laughing. I was beginning to regret a lot of things.

  On the deck, discarded from our last training session, was a blunted épée. I seized it and turned back to face the captain, who was drooling and laying about himself pointlessly with the squat and murderous-looking cutlass, his eyes locked on me.

  “Perhaps we could discuss this. ” I ventured. He swashed wildly at me with his sword.

  I instinctively raised my blunted “blade,” and it almost kicked out of my hand as he made contact. He came at me again and I parried wildly, following up with a crazed lunge that didn’t come close. I knew that I just had to keep him at bay until help arrived, but I couldn’t manage that kind of composure. I swung like a berserker and fled from his hacking attacks, leaping rope coils and clambering over the huge racks of bound timber. He came lumbering after me, barking wordless insults and bellowing like a rabid bear. I poked at him with my (now bent) épée and hopped away again.

  Orgos took him from behind, catching his sword arm and raising a dagger to his throat until he became still. As the crew roared with laughter, I scrambled to my feet and looked for somewhere to hide my embarrassment.

  “My hero,” said Renthrette dryly.

  I tried to think of a crushing riposte that would salvage some dignity from
the moment. But nothing came to mind, so I just started shouting, as one is wont to do in such situations. “Look, I was trying to help you out, right? You might show a little gratitude, for God’s sake!”

  “Gratitude?” she sneered. “For what? For starting, and almost losing, an unnecessary fight? Let me fight my own battles, Will.”

  “Right, I will,” I spluttered, “And next time-”

  I was interrupted by Orgos calling me from the foot of the mainmast. Lisha was with him and they looked thoroughly disenchanted.

  “Oh bugger,” I muttered, and went over to them, staring at the decking all the way. When I stood before them I could barely look them in the face.

  “Sorry,” I said in a small voice. “I just. ”

  “I know,” said Orgos. His tone was soft but not without reprimand. “Renthrette can look after herself, Will. And did you forget everything we have learned together? You looked drunker than him.”

  “It’s different when you’re fighting someone with a real sword who wants to hurt you,” I replied bitterly.

  “In a real fight you have to be even more composed than when you fence, because the hits are more crucial.”

  “Don’t lecture me, all right?” I said. “I’m not a child.”

  “Will,” said Lisha quietly.

  “What?”

  “There won’t always be someone on hand to pull you out of trouble when you get in over your head. If only for that reason, be more cautious.”

  They left me to myself, and I stared over the side at the water for a while, feeling the slight sting of the salt spray on my arms and face.

  SCENE XVI Consequences

  You’ve got guts, Will, I’ll give you that,” said Garnet obliquely as we sat down to a supper of dry biscuits and steamed mussels. He gave me a half-smile of encouragement, and then moved to where the smell of the food didn’t remind him of how awful he felt. Renthrette behaved as if the matter simply hadn’t happened, which was actually a pleasant surprise. She even passed me the salt as we ate. As if we didn’t have enough salt.

  I saw the captain lurching around the galley in the evening and sort of smiled at him. He muttered something spiteful and gestured with his fist. I was not the Cormorant’s most popular person.

  That night it transpired that there were two meetings. The party meeting consisted of Lisha reminding us that we should “keep our heads” (directed at me) and that when we docked tomorrow we should conduct ourselves with caution and dignity (also directed at me). Mithos sat out of the lamplight, almost lost in shadow. Once he nodded solemnly, but he said nothing. Garnet ground the bit of his ax, tracing small perfect circles with a flat stone. Renthrette was rebinding her sword hilt in the same tortuous manner. Her eyes would flash from Lisha back to the weapon in her hand as she wound the thin leather thong round and round the handle, spiraling slowly and immaculately up to the pommel.

  The second meeting was held in the captain’s quarters, but we didn’t learn of that one until the morning.

  Southern Shale was in sight shortly after dawn. Though it was a lengthy stretch of coastline, there was only one convenient harbor close by, and we steered towards it under the same prevailing wind that had made our trip so swift and easy. Trouble, however, has many guises. In this case, it had a scarlet jacket and a black beard full of muffled curses.

  “The captain is up to something,” said Lisha as we finished breakfast. “He looks furtive.”

  “He always looks furtive,” I said.

  “But he also looks pleased with himself, and I fear he is planning to revenge himself on us for yesterday’s incident.”

  I tried not to look guilty, but Renthrette met my eyes mercilessly. Then Garnet looked up and whispered, “Did you feel that? We’re changing course. He’s steering us out to sea.”

  He was right. A long, anxious pause followed.

  “I wouldn’t put it past the captain to just take us where the sharks can get us,” said Mithos darkly, “and toss us overboard. Or find somewhere he could sell us.”

  “We’ll give him a fight,” added Orgos, feeling the edge of his shaving dagger.

  “Could we not just grab the lifeboat and go?” Garnet suggested.

  “We’re too far from shore,” Mithos sighed. “He could bring the ship about and plow us under.”

  “Then we must take the wheel,” said Orgos, “and steer it in ourselves.”

  “There are twenty-five crewmen,” said Garnet, “we couldn’t hold them all off.”

  “Not if they were organized, we couldn’t,” agreed Lisha, “but we might be able to if we could somehow keep them in pockets of five or six.”

  She fell silently thoughtful for a moment, and then carefully, pausing between sentences, laid out a course of action.

  I had crawled my way to the lifeboat unseen. The crew were still wandering around, but while they had been listless before, they were now cautious and alert. On the deck where I had “fought” the captain, two burly men, bronzed by the sun, stood with shouldered pikes, looking about them. In the stern of the ship, rising like a pulpit above the racks of bound cargo, was the castle, and in it, the helmsman. Two floors below the castle were the captain’s quarters. He now shared them with five armed men, two covering the steps down to the door from the deck. I loaded my crossbow and kept as still as I could, the heat prickling on my salt-dried arms and sunburnt neck.

  Lisha emerged from our cabins and fell heavily on the wet stairs. The crew watched, unimpressed. Garnet helped her to her feet, and then she ducked back inside the cabin and emerged with her spear. With this she supported herself conspicuously and hobbled out onto deck, Garnet at her side. He was wearing a dark green cloak over his tunic, and I knew what it concealed. Slowly they edged around the ship until they neared the castle.

  The crew were armed with clubs, boathooks, and whatever else they could lay their hands on, but their demeanor suggested that they thought we hadn’t spotted the change in course.

  So much the better.

  I caught a glimpse of Orgos shinning up the castle ladder only because I was watching for him. He emerged, black against the sky, his swords spinning in his hands. He dodged an advancing guard, who fell heavily onto the massive bundles of timber below, and parried the cutlass of another, turning him promptly out of the wooden turret and down onto the deck.

  A cry went up immediately and the crewmen started to move at random, shielding their eyes from the sun as they looked up to where Orgos was bringing the vessel groaning back towards the coast. Lisha twirled the spear in her hands and threw off the false injury like a cloak. In a second, she stood at the foot of the castle ladder with Garnet at her side, his ax drawn and ready. As they braced themselves for the inevitable assault, Orgos started down the ladder towards them.

  Through the portholes of his cabin I could see the captain shouting as he felt the Cormorant speeding towards mainland Shale.

  Orgos took a position between Lisha and Garnet, his swords whirling about his wrists. The crew hesitated and then began to close in on them. I thought I noticed the deep green of Garnet’s eyes as he flashed a look of concern from Lisha to the growing semicircle of armed men that edged closer to them, but Lisha, spreading her feet apart a little, just raised her dark spear purposefully and nodded to Orgos. As Lisha and Garnet lowered their eyes, he raised his sword, the one in his right hand, the one with the amber stone in the pommel, and there was a flash of light.

  Actually, it was more than a flash. It was as if something had been dropped into a still pool, the ripples coursing out from the pommel of Orgos’s sword, yellow-orange, like tongues of flame. They radiated out in a single pulse that lasted less than a second and traveled no more than a few yards from where they stood, but the crew touched by the light faltered, lowered their weapons as if stunned or unsure what they were doing. And in that second, Garnet and Lisha struck.

  What the hell?.

  Three of the enemy fell bleeding to the deck before they knew what was happening.
Then Orgos was among them, his swords spinning, and two more collapsed screaming.

  While I was trying to get my brain around what had just happened, Renthrette appeared from our cabin, armed with her broadsword and shield. She stalked unnoticed by the men who continued to close around the castle until she reached the captain’s quarters. Mithos followed and took up a position behind the cabin door as Renthrette opened it. I sat up, crossbow at the ready, and my heart pounding fast.

  Three guards exploded out of the cabin. She stepped back quickly and I had a clear shot. I followed the first one unsteadily with the bow for a split second before pulling the trigger. The weapon bucked slightly in my hands as the bolt left it. It wasn’t a good shot, but it would do. My target crashed to the decking, clutching his hip. Renthrette raised sword and shield to meet the next, and Mithos engaged the third.

  Renthrette’s assailant crashed into her, hewing madly at her raised shield. She stood her ground, then lunged with her broadsword under the rim of her shield. The steel tip of her sword pierced his chest and, with a short-lived scream that turned every head on the ship, he crumpled at her feet. She looked absolutely controlled, even calm.

  Then Mithos’s man went down and he was in, flinging the captain back against the wall.

  I scrambled to my feet. There was a sudden churning sensation in the pit of my stomach, and my hands were shaking like poplars in a high wind. In a few strides I was almost with Renthrette, drawing my rapier as Mithos hissed, “Call them off or you’re a dead man!”

  He bundled the wild-eyed captain onto the deck. I grabbed his cutlass and held on to it as the crew moved to see what was going on. Mithos showed them.