Scimitar War

by Chris A. Jackson

  Norris looked up, and Donnely was startled to see tears running unchecked down the man’s cheeks. The captain swallowed his ire, realizing the man’s loss. He reined in his temper and considered his next remark carefully.

  “Milord,” he addressed the count formally, “I apologize for my outburst. I’m sorry that we were unable to save the lady. You have my condolences.”

  But Norris smiled up at him. “She’s alive, Captain. The cannibals were about to sacrifice her when your valiant attack stayed their hands, but I believe they may have poisoned her with some foul concoction. She’s alive, but very sick, and remains senseless.”

  Donnely was about to protest that he knew a corpse when he saw one, when he noted the lady’s chest rise ever so slightly, then fall again.

  “So I see.” He wiped his cutlass on a kerchief and snapped it into his scabbard, surprise, relief and anger all playing havoc with his practiced military poise. “I’ll assign a detail to carry the lady down to the beach where the healer can look at her.” He waved forward four brawny marines carrying one of the litters they had prepared before the battle.

  “Thank you, Captain,” the count said as he rose from the mire of blood and filth and let the marines move Camilla onto the litter. The count’s son gripped his father’s shoulder, and they shared a weary smile, then trailed after the litter.

  Donnely glanced at the unconscious woman as they carried her past. Her face was pale as death, and he remembered the boat boy’s claim. He smiled wryly, chalking up the wild story to pre-battle jitters. Lady Camilla didn’t look fit to eat soup, much less a person.

  Chapter 15

  Fires in the Night

  Eight bells sounded on the stroke of midnight, and Captain Pendergast stepped onto the deck of Iron Drake. Men scurried past one another as the watch changed, the topmen ascending and descending the ratlines in the age-old ballet of maritime tradition. The crew seemed particularly subdued tonight; only quiet mutters floated on the still night air instead of the usual jovial exchanges, but that was to be expected. Seamen were a superstitious lot, and sailing into the Sea of Lost Ships had them on edge.

  Pendergast clicked his golden pocket watch closed and mounted the stair to the quarterdeck, saluting the officer of the watch when his boots touched the top step.

  “Good evening, Mister Jundis. All’s well, I trust.”

  “Well enough, sir, but the wind’s going light and variable. I’ve bent every sail we’ve got, sir, and even rigged spritsails, but we’re still making only five knots.”

  “Very good, Lieutenant. We’ll probably have to go to sweeps by morning, but we’ll let her ghost along for now. We’re coming into the doldrums sooner than I expected.”

  “Yes, sir.” Jundis gestured forward, indicating the dim glow of the forward deck lanterns. “There’s a light mist on the water. Visibility is probably less than a mile, though it’s hard to tell. I’ve posted additional lookouts. Nothing else to report, sir.”

  “Nothing is just what I expected. Not many ships venture south of the Fathomless Reaches, and according to Captain Brelak’s information, we won’t sight Akrotia for another week. Very well. My watch, Lieutenant. Get some rack time.”

  “Thank you, sir.” Jundis saluted. “I stand relieved. Goodnight, sir.”

  “Goodnight, Mister Jundis.” Pendergast walked a slow circuit of the entire deck, as was his habit at the beginning of a watch. His walk brought no surprises. Everything was shipshape.

  As a naval ship ought to be, he thought, knotting his fingers behind his back and allowing himself a satisfied smile.

  Pendergast returned to the quarterdeck and pulled his viewing glass from its case at his belt. Squinting into the eyepiece, he turned a slow circle to scan the horizon. His observations yielded even less information than his circuit of the deck, since sky and sea blended seamlessly. Dim stars twinkled overhead, but faded at the horizon, their light rendered wan by the mist. Pendergast usually enjoyed the night watch—cool air, peace and quiet, and the lovely sparkles of phosphorescence in the water—and tried to instill the same enthusiasm in his young ensigns. Often, he would summon the entire cadre up from their bunks to conduct contests of who could name the most stars. But tonight for some reason he was discomforted; with no land in sight, few stars and no horizon, it felt as if the ship was sailing in limbo.

  He sighed, stowed his glass and sent word for his steward to send up blackbrew; he would need the drink’s stimulation to keep him alert for the next four hours. While he waited, he checked the ship’s heading, sail trim, and speed. He even plotted a dead-reckoned position and calculated the set of the current from their last known fix. Everything was normal, but still, he was restless, unable to settle into his usual routine.

  “Here ye are, Captain, sir,” his steward said, climbing the stairs to the quarterdeck with the silver blackbrew service balanced in his hands. “Yer blackbrew, and I put biscuits and butter on the plate for ye.”

  “Very good. Thank you, Billings.” He poured a cup, added sugar and buttered a biscuit. The butter was near liquid, and the biscuit as hard as granite, but he gnawed off a corner and chased it with a steaming sip from his cup. “Go on, Billings, get some rest.”

  “Aye, sir.”

  Pendergast strode the quarterdeck, sipping his blackbrew and gnawing his biscuit. He thought he saw a dim light moving in the misty darkness, and he peered intently. Nothing. Wonderful! he chided himself. Now I’m hallucinating.

  He contemplated the bleak night, his bleak assignment and his bleak career. Cape Storm had been sent to hunt cannibals, and Bright Star and Ice Drake were off to rout out pirates. Iron Drake, meanwhile, was tasked with sailing to the middle of nowhere to look at a floating city. “Observe but do not engage” had been the admiral’s words. It seemed as if every mission he was sent on was to observe but not engage, which gave him little opportunity to show his qualities as a naval officer. There had been no war for more than a decade, and thus no means for a young officer to distinguish himself in battle. He had a good record, but unless he wanted to retire still ranked as a junior captain, he needed to distinguish himself. And now these damned mists, waning wind and nothing to look forward to but days of rowing.

  The captain sighed and looked out into the darkness. He took another bite of his biscuit and detected the bitterness of a weevil. Grimacing, he raised his arm to cast the offensive biscuit over the taffrail, when something caught his eye. A flash of golden light in the darkness; he had not imagined this one.

  “Lookout there! Eyes aft! What’s that light?”

  “Aye, sir. Looks like a ruddy great firefly ta me, sir.” The voice of the lookout sounded a little sheepish. “I seen it a few times now, but I di’n’t think much of it.”

  Pendergast opened his mouth to rebuke the man—fireflies out here?—but then thought better of it. He’d thought he’d seen a light only moments before, and had dismissed it as illusory. Besides, he’d seen stranger things than fireflies out on the open ocean. Still, this was strange enough to be alarming, especially since they were searching for a floating city enchanted by a firemage. Pendergast didn’t believe in coincidence.

  “All hands! Keep a sharp lookout for lights of any type! Sing out if you—”

  “There!” the foremast topman called. “To starboard. It’s like a faerie light!”

  Pendergast looked and saw it, a streak of yellow in the mist. It passed outside the mizzen mast shrouds, then turned and flew right at him. The captain started to duck, but the light stopped a mere three feet away, and his mouth dropped open in surprise. It was a woman! A tiny naked woman with skin like burnished copper and wings like smoldering gossamer. And her hair was aflame, a real blazing fire. The flames of her hair danced in the breeze, and Pendergast realized what would happen if her fire touched the tarred-hemp ratlines, or, gods forbid, a sail.

 
He gripped his sword and slowly drew the weapon from its sheath, trying not to startle the inquisitive creature. If he was quick enough, he could end the threat with one stroke. But the little beauty just wagged a finger at him, blew him a kiss and flew away, her mischievous giggle floating on the wind.

  “All hands on deck!” he called as he sheathed his sword. “Fire crews to your stations! Buckets and pots, anything that will hold water! All topmen aloft! Launch the boats and trail them in a line.” The alarm bell rang out, and men scrambled around the deck filling buckets and pots, bowls and barrels. The off-watch poured up from belowdecks, and a moment later, Jundis and the junior officers thundered up the stairs onto the quarterdeck, tucking in shirttails and tying back their hair as they came.

  “Mister Jundis, organize the archers. There’s some kind of flaming creature flitting about. Shoot it down before it sets the ship afire.”

  “Aye, sir!” Jundis had a cool head, and within moments he had the junior officers stationed about the ship with squads of crack marine archers.

  Overhead, the lookouts and topmen called out whenever they spotted the fiery little creature. Arrows shot into the night, missing their mark, and some nearly hitting topmen, who screamed down vicious oaths. On deck, sailors swung at the fiery thing with belaying pins and boathooks, then swore when their mates on the fire crews mistakenly doused them with buckets of seawater in their attempts to wet down the planks and lines. Pendergast stood on the quarterdeck, trying to see everything at once, calling out orders with a calm authority intended to keep his officers and crew focused and prevent the uproar from becoming a disorganized tumult. Though they had not yet hit the creature, Pendergast felt sure that it was only a matter of time until a lucky archer hit the mark. His blood chilled when he heard a solitary cry ring out.

  “Fire! Fire in the port main studdingsail!”

  “Cut away the boom!” the captain cried to the topmen, who hastened to comply. If the fire spread, they were in serious trouble. A moment later, the boom crashed into the sea beside the ship, trailing lines and tatters of burning canvas. Pendergast could not even sigh in relief before another cry rang out from above.

  “The fore-t’gallant! Fire in the fore-top!”

  The captain’s gaze shot aloft. The glow of the burning sail illuminated the entire rig. The fire crews were trying to get buckets of water hauled up to douse it, but that was slow business.

  “Cut it away!” he shouted, then immediately ordered, “Topmen, furl all but the mains and tops’ls!”

  Even as the men spread out along the yards and pulled in the vast expanse of canvas, punching it into tight wads and lashing it down, a stiff breeze piped up from dead astern, cracking the sails and urging Iron Drake forward. By the time the burning fore-topgallant flew away to forward in a shower of sparks, the ship was ripping through the sea at an easy ten knots.

  “Where in the Nine Hells did this breeze come from?” Pendergast muttered as he watched the last glittering embers of the fore-topgallant blown before them. The wind was tearing the mists apart, clearing the air, and the floating sparks seemed to hover before the ship in a cloud. He squinted, trying to focus on the lights, which now seemed to be farther away. Something wasn’t right about this.

  “Lookout!” he bellowed. “Ware away forward! What are those lights?”

  “Dunno, sir. Looks like a bunch of sparks. Maybe a whole swarm of them flamin’ critters!”

  The wind stiffened, urging them forward even faster, and Pendergast’s gut filled with irrepressible dread. Considering the havoc a single one of those things had wreaked, a swarm of them, with this sudden wind to feed the flames, did not bode well. Snatching up his viewing glass, he stared ahead, praying the lookout was wrong. Then he realized that it wasn’t a swarm of fiery little women. It was much, much worse.

  Akrotia was upon them.

  ≈

  The flames of a dozen bonfires threw sparks into the night sky. It was a beautiful sight, and the natives of Vulture Isle and Captain Donnely’s crew were enjoying themselves heartily as they celebrated their victory. Huffington sat beyond the bright firelight, sipping an herbal concoction to ease a headache which pounded to the rhythmic beat of the natives’ chanting song. Donnely’s surgeon had shaved around his head wound, scrubbed out the nasty gash with an evil-smelling liquid that burned like the Nine Hells, and stitched it up, pronouncing him “fit for duty.” Personally, Huffington didn’t agree with that assessment. He was walking, albeit shakily, and counted himself lucky to be alive, but his true wound was deeper; he had failed his master.

  Count Norris sat nearby, Tim at his side, also in no mood to partake in the celebration. Camilla lay before them on a litter, alive, though her breathing was shallow and her color deathly pale. The native healer had examined her, and Tawah had translated the diagnosis, though all he said was that Camilla was “hurt inside,” before hurrying off to treat those more gravely wounded. His magic was limited, and had to be used to tend the life-threatening injuries first. The count clutched Camilla’s hand, worry etched deeply on his face.

  “I don’t know why she won’t wake,” Norris said for what must have been the tenth time that hour. “She’s breathing much better, and her heart is beating easy, but she remains comatose. I simply don’t understand it.”

  “She’ll wake, Father,” Tim said. There was new confidence in the boy’s manner. Indeed, Huffington resolved to stop thinking of Tim as a boy, and instead as an adept young man. By all accounts, Tim had handled himself admirably in the battle.

  Better than I did, Huffington thought as he gingerly felt his wound. Tawah had told of seeing Tim guarding his father’s back as they charged through the melee, on more than one occasion saving the count from a fate similar to that of his secretary. No longer did anyone dispute the cutlass that Tim wore at his hip, not even Captain Donnely.

  “Patience, milord,” Huffington counseled, rubbing his temples in an attempt to scour away the pain in his head. “The lady’s been through a lot, and there might be a bit of my concoction in her yet that keeps her sleeping.”

  “You think she may have taken in some of the poison?” There was new worry in Norris’ voice, and Huffington chided himself for mentioning it.

  “It’s possible, milord, but she’s alive, which means she didn’t get much of a dose.” That was a true statement if ever he had spoken one. Huffington had used four different substances in the brew for the arrows, not knowing what would or wouldn’t affect the demon. But he knew how they would affect a human, and if Camilla had taken in much at all, she would be dead. “Time and care’ll bring her around.”

  “We should tell the healer, don’t you think? Perhaps he can counteract the poisons.”

  “He knows, milord,” Huffington assured his master. “Best leave her be, and let her come around on her own.”

  “But perhaps if he could—”

  “Father,” Tim interrupted, placing a hand on Norris’ arm, his eyes fixed on the approaching Captain Donnely. The captain was flanked by two of his officers and four marines.

  Now there will be all Nine Hells to pay, Huffington thought warily.

  “Ah, Milord Count. I see that you are jealously guarding your prize from the battle.” Donnely stopped and tucked his thumbs in his belt, smiling broadly. “How is the lady?”

  “Alive, but still unconscious, Captain,” Norris answered, his tone carefully neutral. He remained seated, and maintained his grasp on Camilla’s hand. “Though I would not account her as my prize.”

  “I meant no disparagement, milord,” the captain assured him with a short bow. “In fact, I came over to offer you my thanks. The assault could not have gone better, and I give much of that credit to our native allies. The alliance you brokered served us very well.”

  “I’m glad that you are pleased, Captain,” said Norris, though to Huffingto
n, the count’s expression suggested that he would rather the officer simply go away.

  “Yes, well, we’ll be off at first light for Vulture Isle. Some of the natives wish to stay here for a while to hunt down those who escaped us, which is fine by me. They’re a rather bloodthirsty lot when they’re riled, you know. Even the women.” He shrugged and glanced over his shoulder at the throng of celebrating natives and sailors. “It gives one pause.”

  “No doubt,” Norris said, then looked pointedly back down at Camilla.

  “I’ll have a detail transfer the injured, including Lady Camilla, aboard Cape Storm in the morning. I suggest you take some rest, Milord Count. You’ve had a busy evening.”

  The captain turned and strode back to the bonfires, trailed by his men.

  “Pompous twit,” Huffington muttered.

  Tim failed to stifle a snort of laughter, and even the count smiled.

  “The world is full of pompous twits, my friend,” Norris said wearily. One-handed, he tried to bundle a blanket for a pillow without letting go of Camilla, fumbling until Tim did it for him. With a grateful smile, the count leaned back. “But you must admit; this particular twit has been very useful.”

  Huffington stifled a chuckle, but only because his head hurt.

  ≈

  Hydra lay coiled in a ball of hate and agony. It took all its remaining strength, which wasn’t much, to maintain its hold on the woman’s mind. Camilla struggled to wake, but the demon suppressed her. It was too weak to control her; it needed blood to regain strength, and the woman had none to spare. It had taken all it dared to combat the poison, and if it took any more now, she would die. Then the demon would be forced back into the prison beneath the keep, and there would be no more blood.

  It clung to the damaged physical shell and waited. Eventually, the body would generate more blood, and then it could feed. Once it regained sufficient strength, it would wake her and take this man whose hand clutched Camilla’s. It could feel the pulse in his fingers, warm against her skin, could almost taste his blood, it was so close. It longed to wake her and take what it needed, but it was still too weak; if it woke her too soon, it would lose control of her mind.