Guild Wars: Sea of Sorrows

by Ree Soesbee

  After that, all hell would break loose.

  What are you waiting for? A whisper, high-pitched and snarky, resounded magically in Cobiah’s ear. Startled, he blinked and looked around. Macha stood on the Havoc’s railing, across the divide between the ships. She glowered at him, activating her vocal illusion again. Turn the gun and fire!

  Cobiah reached down and cranked the handle that turned the bombard. Rolling it in its tight circle, he swung the barrel away from the charr ship and rocked it sharply to the right. A piece of tarred wood rested in a metal bucket beside the bombard, sparks popping and flames flickering along its end. One touch of that flame, and the cannon would fire. He planned to clear the Disenmaedel’s deck, point the weapon into the open waters of Lion’s Arch’s bay. Perhaps he would have—if the path of the barrel hadn’t crossed over the brigantine’s deck.

  Staring out over the battle, Cobiah took stock of it. The charr captain had fallen. He lay unmoving on the Disenmaedel’s scarlet-washed deck, surrounded by his conquered foes. Fassur was still fighting despite his terrible wound. If anything, the dark-furred charr’s energy had been renewed with the fall of his centurion. Roaring in grief and anger, he lashed out at anything that came too close. Beyond him, a small knot of bloodied humans readied themselves for an assault. They might have been planning to murder the charr and take their ship, or simply drive the enemy from their decks and push back the Havoc’s prow; they might have been planning to die in battle, throwing themselves on their foe until one or both were eradicated. And suddenly, with a fire that rivaled the Havoc’s massive furnace, Cobiah realized he was angry.

  The charr were killing his countrymen.

  The humans were killing his crew.

  With a wave of possessiveness, Cobiah realized that he had to protect them. All of them.

  He hadn’t foreseen his next actions; he didn’t plan them. Some slight shift in thinking altered his course, changing his intentions as fluidly as the wind altered the canvas of a ship’s sail. With the bombard pointed at the center of the Disenmaedel’s deck, Cobiah raised his voice and bellowed.

  “No more killing!” Cobiah shouted the words so loudly that the hair on the back of his arms stood up. Even Sykox, guarding the stairwell between the main deck and the foredeck, bristled and stood still. Even with that, the two crews probably wouldn’t have stopped fighting if they hadn’t suddenly realized they were staring down the muzzle of a bombast cannon. As it was, the freeze crept over the ship like a winter frost whispering along the shoreline. Both charr and human alike turned to stare up at the youth angling the cannon’s mouth directly into the belly of the Disenmaedel. Yet again, Cobiah was leaping into action without thinking of the consequences, just as he had with Tosh—but this time, there was a lot more on the line than just pride.

  “Wake up, you fools! Look at what you’re doing!” Cobiah roared. “You’re killing each other for no reason. Why? For glory? For gold? For the legions? Out of loyalty to a king who might not even exist anymore? Or because that’s what the charr and the humans have always done?” With a snarl worthy of a charr, Cobiah roared, “To Grenth’s realms of torment with the past! The past is dead! Ten thousand gallons of ocean just wiped it from the shoreline, along with the greatest city in Kryta—and all you want to do is kill each other?” Cobiah felt his face grow hot, his eyes filling with acrid tears in the wake of his anger. “Put your weapons down!”

  Across the Disenmaedel, realization dawned over the combatants. The huge cannon was pointed down at them, primed and ready to fire. None of them—charr or human—could reach Cobiah before he could ignite the weapon. Uncertain and unwilling to let go of their weapons, the warring crews nevertheless stepped back from one another in slow realization of their situation. The brigantine was badly damaged, her hull pierced by the nose of the charr galleon. The Havoc was also in danger; despite the efforts of the human sailors, its nose remained firmly lodged. If the Disenmaedel sank into the waves, she would take her charr suitor as well.

  “You have three minutes to abandon this ship and get on board the Havoc,” Cobiah yelled. “We’re bound for Port Stalwart. The charr won’t hurt you—they’ve lost enough sailors in the storm, and this fight, that they can’t even crew their own ship anymore.”

  “What?” Fassur yelled. “Take these pirates on board?”

  “We’re not pirates,” one of the human sailors shouted resoundingly. “We were two days out of Lion’s Arch when the wave threw us back and crashed us against the cliffs. We fixed ’er as best we could and were trying to guard the wreckage—to look for survivors. When we saw your vessel, we thought you’d come to attack. That maybe the wave was caused by charr weaponry . . .” His voice faltered in a chorus of muttered agreement from the sailors of the Disenmaedel. The charr crewmen snarled disapprovingly, but none raised a challenge in the face of Cobiah’s bombast.

  “None of us are responsible for the wave,” Cobiah said. “I can promise you that. It came from Orr. I can tell you this wasn’t some new charr weapon. It also wasn’t an accident, or a storm, or a natural disaster. I was there . . . when it happened.” Cobiah struggled with his memories as he spoke, trying to force the jumbled recollection into something resembling a sane account of the images he’d seen. “I saw beyond the wave. I saw land in the middle of the Sea of Sorrows. A drowned city, erupting from the waves. Not just buildings, but mountains, shorelines, plains of rock and coral, they’d all been ripped up from the depths. I saw Orr rise—and I saw the thing that did it.”

  Cobiah gripped the cannon with white-knuckled hands as both crews stared at him, aghast. “I don’t know what kind of creature it was, but it was big. Bigger than any ship—like a mountain of rotted flesh and shattered bone. When that thing out there raised its wings, the very earth trembled and rose beneath it. The sea parted, and the wave of its awakening swept over us.” Cobiah paused to wipe the tears from his eyes.

  “Now, you listen, and listen good. We are going to work together. We’re going to sail together, and we’re going to survive together. Otherwise, we’re all going to die.” He took a deep breath and growled down at them, as fierce as one of the charr. “Neither of these ships will make it on their own, so we’re going to do it as one crew, like it or not. Everyone get aboard the Havoc. We’re headed for Port Stalwart. Once there, you can stay or go as you like, and may Dwayna keep your sorry hides.” Both crews looked back and forth at one another, swords still drawn and pistols ready, only a breath away from falling back into the fight.

  “Are you sure about this?” Sykox muttered up at him. He crouched on the stairs, ears back, arms wide, and claws extended in a ferocious pose.

  “Don’t look at me.” Cobiah gave him a thin-lipped smile. “This was your idea.”

  “Mine?” The charr glared.

  “You started this when you saved me.” Cobiah gripped the torch over the cannon’s back so that everyone could see it. “Now I’ve got to save them.” A thin veneer of fire trickled over the tip, illuminating the dark tar there with eager, hungry flame. Holding it a few inches above the vent at the cannon’s breech, Cobiah fixed them all with a cold stare.

  “You’re killing each other because this is the enemy you know,” Cobiah bellowed. “But the enemy you don’t know just wiped out the city of Lion’s Arch without even trying! It raised an entire city from the ocean floor, and that’s just for starters! Are you going to waste your time tearing each other apart just for old times’ sake?”

  “Why should we believe you?” asked the helmsman of the Havoc, his black fur tinged with blood.

  Uncompromising, Cobiah met Fassur’s skeptical stare. “Believe me or not, but something made that wave. Whatever it was, it destroyed the charr harbor to the south and killed all your friends there as well as the humans in Lion’s Arch.” Cobiah faced the human sailors with the same defiance. “Clearly, it doesn’t care if you’re charr, or human, or asura, or anything else. Do you think you can fight it alone? Do you?”

  The two
crews stared at him in shock. Cobiah continued. “Now, I don’t know what that creature was, but I’m going to give you the same choice it did.” Cobiah positioned the torch within an inch of the bombard’s fuse vent.

  “Work together,” Cobiah said, challenging them, “or die together.”

  The ocean lapped hungrily against the ship’s side, echoing in the silence that followed Cobiah’s speech. He watched many sets of eyes flicker toward the line of dark storm clouds hovering on the distant southern horizon. Even the brash Fassur quietly lowered his sword.

  “I’m glad you understand me. Now get moving.” Slowly, Cobiah moved the flame toward the bombast’s wick. “You’ve got three seconds.”

  Roused to motion, the sailors of both ships scattered, racing from the deck of the Disenmaedel. Fassur and Sykox snapped orders to human and charr alike, commanding them to grab anything that could be scavenged from the failing brigantine. Cobiah smiled, one hand slipping to touch the rag doll at his belt. “I’m going to save them, Bivy,” he whispered. “All of them.”

  Bold move. The asura’s illusory words hummed in Cobiah’s ear, startling him. But what makes you think any of them will listen once the bombard’s gone?

  “It’s six days to Port Stalwart, if the Havoc can weather it. She’s damaged, and she needs a full crew. This is the only way for any of them to survive.” Cobiah wasn’t sure Macha’s spell let her hear as well as speak, but it didn’t matter. “I’ll make them listen. I won’t let anything happen to these sailors. Not while they’re under my watch.

  “Trust me.” Cobiah smiled, and lit the fuse.

  ACT TWO

  1229 AE

  (AFTER THE EXODUS OF THE GODS)

  Open sea, and we’re homeward bound

  Fair or foul the weather, O

  The cap’n swears we’ll make our port

  Though the sun’s burned to an ember

  If the Dead Ships come and the darkness falls

  Then we’ll all go down together, O.

  —“Weather the Storm”

  Captain Cobiah Marriner trod the boards of the main deck, hands clasped behind the back of his long dark green coat. Defying convention, he wore a common sailor’s shirt instead of a formal blouse, and a gold-striped kerchief tied in a knot about his throat. He kept his blond hair tied in a ponytail at the nape of his neck nowadays, but his bright eyes were as blue and clear as the day he first set to sea. If time had tempered the reckless boy, it had also granted him confidence. Cobiah strode across the deck with the certainty of a man who’d been through fire—and beyond.

  “Avast, there, you at the stay tackles!” he called to one of the newer sailors. “Belay that lift. Mister Fassur, keep an eye on what your men are doing.”

  “Aye, sir!” the dark-furred charr rumbled. A long white scar marked the old wound across his chest, but his yellow eyes had lost none of their spark. He turned on the errant sailor with a roar. “Aft, I said, you shiftless layabouts! Get that netting to the aft bay, or I’ll tan your hides before you can say, ‘I’m sorry, First Mate’!” The sailors scrambled to obey the command, though the older hands aboard the ship smiled in confidence at the youths’ terror. In a wink, Fassur rounded on the others. “What are you looking at, you bilge rats?” he roared. “You’re not paid to be ballast, you’re paid to work! Put your backs into it!”

  “Aye, sir!” The sailors—human, charr, and asura alike—scrambled to comply.

  Cobiah smiled. Although Fassur Steamreaver seemed ill-tempered, he had proven to be fair handed and, beneath Marriner’s command, a good officer. “Keep a grin on your muzzle, mate,” Cobiah said, winking at him as he passed. “We’ll be in harbor soon, and maybe that minx you fancy will still be in port. We wouldn’t want her seeing that scowl of yours. Might scare her off.”

  “She’s Blood Legion, sir. If I’m not scowling, she won’t think I’m interested!” Fassur grinned ferociously.

  In the years since the destruction of Lion’s Arch, Cobiah had won more bets than he’d lost. Many of the crew of the Havoc remained under his command, along with more than a few from the Disenmaedel, as well as a handful of asura willing to exchange labor for a chance to test experiments out at sea. The crew had made their name sailing the Krytan coast, living the life of a for-hire mercenary trade ship or privateer—or in lean years, a brigand on the open seas. They were unorthodox at best, a mix of races, but they respected the captain’s courage and daring. He was the key that kept them together when old habits might have driven them apart—Cobiah, and the gold they made sailing under his command. The companionship and camaraderie that had sprung up between them gave the ship her strength, but it had also made them more than a few enemies. Still, there were plenty of merchants in Tyria looking for sea passage with an experienced captain and a crew that would ask no questions.

  The Krytan military considered the Pride a threat simply by virtue of its strange makeup. In the new capital city of Divinity’s Reach, some of King Baede’s advisers called Cobiah a traitor to his country. After the fall of Lion’s Arch, Cobiah no longer considered himself a resident of Kryta. He was a citizen of the open sea, as free as the wind itself.

  Their ship was the Pride, a lightweight pinnace best suited for shipping and smuggling. Although she had plenty of cargo space, she was thinner than the larger galleons. Though she had only two masts, she was quick in the waves and easy to pilot with just a small crew. She wasn’t the prettiest ship at sea, but she was stalwart: a rough, rugged-looking thing with many varieties of wood patched into her smooth hull. The portholes had no covers, and water splashed in when the waves were high. Worn brass fittings and rows of mismatched guns dotted her side. Designed to sail but rigged to fight, the Pride was more than one might take her for at first glance.

  The foremast carried a conventional square course and topsail, but her mainmast was lateen rigged, carrying a massive triangular sail set on a long yardarm mounted at an angle from the mast. Converting the triangular sail rig typically seen on smaller fishing vessels to a larger pinnace had been Macha’s idea, and it was one of two things that set the Pride apart. Her other advantage was even more unusual, and the crew of the Pride did their best to keep it a well-guarded secret. Beneath her cobbled-together exterior and patchwork sails, the Pride had the brave, beating heart of a lion. The Havoc’s engine had been redesigned to be smaller and more efficient than the original. Although the ship couldn’t carry enough fuel to run it nonstop, the engine got them through the doldrums and was a massive advantage in a fight.

  With engine roaring and sails to the wind, no pirate could catch her at sea; the Pride could outmaneuver any brigantine. She could turn on a gold coin, with or without the wind, and bring her broadside armaments to strike a blow wherever she chose. Though she wasn’t much to look at, her decks were scrubbed sparkling from quarterdeck to forecastle with the diligence of a dedicated crew, and the eager glint in each sailor’s eye spoke of a deeper devotion—both to the ship and to her master.

  The Pride had made good time plunging across the high tides of the southern sea. She carried a legal cargo—as she did on occasion—from the asuran docks in lower Maguuma bound for Kryta via Port Stalwart. Like all ships these days, she stayed close to the coast, giving a wide berth to the storm that hovered, always present, past the distant curl of Malchor’s Fingers. The Orrian Veil, it was called: dark and deep in shadow even when the sun rose to its zenith. A few brave souls had tried to sail into the waters beyond Malchor’s Fingers in the years just after the great wave, but none had returned. Not the sailors, not the ships, not even a whisper. Most recently, there’d been legends of phantoms: “Dead Ships” with rotting sails, silhouettes glimpsed past the veil. Others claimed they’d seen witch lights in the fog, colored like the stained glass windows of cathedral towers. Unlike other captains, Cobiah never dismissed the tales.

  The sea breeze picked up as the Pride sailed closer to Port Stalwart’s docks. Cobiah heard the sailors shout greetings to old friends as the
port’s tugboats pushed against their ship’s sides. Sailors, both charr and human, threw lines down to the workers on the smaller boats and those walking out on the jetties. Slowly, the port’s workers pulled on the lines, helping to guide the pinnace into her moorings.

  “Engineer!” Cobiah leaned over the gunwale of the Pride, his voice echoing through the portholes below. “Sykox! Come up on deck. We’re docking!”

  “He can’t hear you.” Macha rocked back and forth on her heels, the hem of her brilliant blue robe tossing in the wind. “He’s wrapped up in that new ‘cog’s breath’ he’s been inventing. Some kind of doodad that’ll take pressure off the rudder . . . I don’t know anymore.” She twirled her brightly colored braids through quick fingers, tumbling two loose feathers from her hair. “He hasn’t slept in three nights, and he’s been drinking for four.”

  “Slacker. He should be up here.” Cobiah laughed. “He’s missing a hell of a view!”

  Port Stalwart shone like a pale jewel above the glistening turquoise lagoon. Built on a hillside that rose sharply above the water, the little village had swelled in the last ten years. The clean white masonry of new buildings rose like gulls’ wings, hovering above the tidy rows of small houses that dotted the crisp, snowy beaches. Two waterfalls poured out of the forest, one above the other, leaping down from threaded boulders through heavy greenery, and pouring at last with a burbling roar into the bay. After the great tidal wave hit the Krytan shore and devastated Lion’s Arch, Port Stalwart’s harbor had swelled well beyond its banks. Now it was home to bustling docks, a massive wharf, and the most active trade community on the coast. The asura traded through Stalwart; on occasion a norn or charr vessel would dock there, risking the ire of the humans in the name of profit. While not welcomed, exactly, such vessels had little choice if they wanted to berth after a storm.