by Ree Soesbee
The prisoners were attached to a long strand of rope and then paraded out of the prison and through the town of Port Stalwart. Cobiah counted ten guards in all, including the two still nursing their wounds back at the watch commander’s headquarters. Eleven, if you counted Pierandra. Taking a moment to size up the watch commander’s graceful step and thickly muscled arms, Cobiah decided to round the number up to twelve.
Twelve. There were almost as many prisoners—if Isaye and her crew were willing to take the risk . . . Cobiah glanced toward the tall woman, admiring how her dark hair shone with a soft reddish undertone in the morning light.
Blinking, he snapped his head down again. Twelve guards. Their numbers were close enough. The guards were carrying weapons. They had armor, and their hands were free. The prisoners, on the other hand . . . What we have, Cobiah thought, is . . . is . . .
Two exhausted magic-users and a very annoyed charr.
Cobiah sighed under his breath. “We’re doomed.”
A rough gallows had been erected at the end of the dock closest to the guardhouse. A dozen tall beams stood like scarecrows at the edge of the jetty, each bearing a short crossbar from which hung a length of rope. A man stood at the gallows, tying the ropes into thirteen-coiled hoop knots that sailors called the devil’s window. Several locals gathered on the docks: fishermen and laborers, fellow sailors and local farmhands, all eager to see the show. Henst spat on them from his place in line, returning their jeers with taunts of his own. The rest of the prisoners marched quietly and kept their thoughts to themselves.
A knot caught in Cobiah’s throat as they marched ever closer. He scanned the vessels in the harbor as they walked past each one, but the Pride was not among them. She must have been still waiting, hidden in their false cove near the harbor mouth. Good, Cobiah thought. My crew won’t have to see this. More, they won’t be fools and risk their lives trying to save us before we hang.
One by one, the prisoners were detached and moved to the individual gallows. Cobiah took his turn among them without complaint. Isaye was placed beside him, the noose sliding over her head and tucked beneath the thick mane of her hair.
She caught him looking and scowled. “If you hadn’t gotten in our way—”
“In your way? We were there first.”
“Your plan was stupid. Ours was better.”
“So we should have just left? Excuse me, but I had a knife at my throat. I wasn’t thinking about ‘ladies first.’ Especially not for one engaged in committing piracy.”
“Successful piracy.” She stressed the word. “I had a plan. We’d worked everything out, every detail. We had enough sailors to man the sails and an elementalist to create wind enough to blow us ahead of any pursuit. And you—what were you doing? Jumping and hoping there’d be a net to catch you?”
Stung, Cobiah protested, “It’s always worked in the past.”
“You are so shortsighted. How did you ever get to be a captain?” Isaye grumbled.
“By being shortsighted, of course,” Cobiah retorted. The guard checking the knots hushed them as he moved past, but Cobiah ignored it. This might be his last few moments on Tyria, and Cobiah’d be damned if he’d let this woman go out with the last word. “I’ve sailed from here to Cantha. I know every cove from Rata Sum to the Splintered Coast, every shipping route from Port Stalwart to Port Noble. I—”
“All that,” Isaye said, shifting grumpily in her noose, “and you didn’t take into account that the tide won’t help you if you don’t have the wind on your side as well? If we hadn’t been there, you three would never have been able to get the sails down in time. I may not know your secret coves, but I know how to tell the exact minute the tide will turn. After Lion’s Arch fell, I studied the new currents in the Sea of Sorrows until I knew them by heart.”
This woman was absolutely infuriating! “We only needed the tide for a few minutes. Our ship was waiting at the harbor mouth to tow us out to sea. We had a chance . . . until the djinn came,” Cobiah said mournfully.
“Yeah.” Isaye’s hazel eyes softened. “Until the djinn came.” They shared a long moment, silently cursing luck, timing, and Istani djinn.
Watch Commander Pierandra blew a long, somber note on a hunting horn. The chilly sound echoed over the gray cove as the morning mist thickened. As the note faded away, Cobiah’s sharp ears caught the sound of waves lapping against ships’ hulls, splashing on rocks, and rolling up the shore. In half an hour, the sun would rise and burn away the fog. The town would rouse from slumber. Sailors would report to their ships and dock-hands would begin the day’s labor. Just a morning, like every other. Just another day.
Goose bumps rose on Cobiah’s arms as he realized it would be a day he’d never see. Guards stepped up from behind them, tightening the nooses. “The prisoners are ready, Commander!” one yelled.
Watch Commander Pierandra marched solemnly along the row, gazing at each prisoner in turn. Verahd muttered something under his breath as she passed, and the watch commander snarled. “If you have a problem with your situation, pirate,” she said, goading him, “all you have to do is jump. Maybe you can swim away.”
Frowning, Verahd twisted his hands in the ropes and did not reply.
Reaching the end, the watch commander turned to face her prisoners. With a nod to the hangman, she prepared to blow a third and final note. When it sounded, the guards would push the prisoners from the edge of the dock, and it would all be over.
“Cobiah!” Sykox shouted in desperation. Twisting his head to the side, he could see the valiant charr being forced toward the water by three stalwart-looking guardsmen with spears. “I don’t want to drown! I’d rather die fighting!” The charr roared again, slashing at his enemies with manacled hands and hobbled feet, but he was little match for the long reach of their spears. Tears welled in Cobiah’s eyes as he fought helplessly against his bonds.
“You really care about that charr, don’t you?” Isaye murmured softly.
“Of course I care about him.” Cobiah bit back something sharper. “He’s in my crew. Would you feel any different if they were going to drown Henst?”
Isaye bit her lip and shook her head in silent understanding.
At the shore end of the dock, Watch Commander Pierandra raised the hunting horn, and Cobiah felt the sword against his side press in more deeply. Sykox’s snarls and the clank of his chains filled the morning air, but Cobiah couldn’t watch. He felt frozen, without breath, every muscle tensed as if for battle.
But the sound that pierced the slowly dissolving mist wasn’t a hunting horn. Nor was it the massive splash that Cobiah expected to hear at any moment from the end of the pier where Sykox was being pushed farther and farther toward the sea. Instead, Cobiah heard the sound of a mighty naval bell echoing across the water as a galleon burst out of the fog. Cobiah’s heart leapt into his throat. He imagined the Pride coming to their rescue, or one of Macha’s illusions, fooling their captors into giving them an opening for escape. But what he saw coming through the fog was none of those things.
Instead, the mist was shredded by a rotted black prow.
The ship was massive. Her gunwale rose eighteen feet above the water, and her keel was sleek and sharp. Three huge masts, broken and splintered along their length, nevertheless rose like bristling wires from the center of a barnacle-covered deck. Magic held them aloft as wind caught in her festering sails. The galleon wallowed in the water, but her heading was true, and as she tilted to bring her broadside about, Cobiah could see the sickly green-gold of a brass figurehead guiding her over the murky waves.
Six arms rose from a woman’s torso, two reaching up to the sky, two spread back against the ship in mute protection, and the lowest pair curling down at her sides. The smile on the figurehead’s face may once have been lovely, but beneath the green tarnish and the blackened cracks in the brass, it had become the visage of a demon.
The ship in the fog was the Indomitable.
“Dead Ship!” one of the guards
on the dock screamed. He fell back, dropping his sword with a clatter onto the planking. “Dead Ship ahoy!”
The first bloody red rays of morning crept through the mist, and Cobiah could see a second keel, then a third, then more bursting out of the fog: frigates and bilanders, scows and carracks, with the mighty galleon at the fore. It was a nightmare armada. The ships were ruined, their hulls cracked and weathered, yet still they sailed on. The sailors on their riggings were blue with water, flesh sloughing away from still-moving bone. Hideous creatures swept past on spectral wings, tattered skin flapping in a twisted imitation of seabirds—but far more massive in scale.
The undead armada bombarded the docked ships of Port Stalwart with ferocious enthusiasm. The galleon’s broadside pealed out like thunder. Heavy black cannonballs launched through thick tufts of smoke obscuring her open portholes. Cobiah had little time to react, and even if he’d had the presence of mind to yell, the sound of whistling flight would have drowned out any orders he’d have given.
The shot roared into thunder as it struck, shredding holes in the moored ships, the wharves, and the long dock on which they stood. Some went farther, crashing into buildings by the shore and tearing into the city. Where the heavy iron struck wood, it exploded, casting chunks of timber and broken brick in every direction. The dock tilted to the side as several of the pylons holding it above water shattered out from under its boards. Cobiah heard the guards at the end of the wharf scream as creatures with tattered wings and fetid claws swooped down and snatched them away. Several of the guards broke and ran, dropping their weapons in a panic to reach the shore before the dock capsized into the sea.
“Isaye!” Cobiah called. “The sword by your foot. Kick it to me!”
She looked down and discovered the weapon. Without hesitation, Isaye tucked the toe of her boot beneath it, flipping the sword into his hands.
Cobiah turned and let the weapon slap against his back, trapping it with his tied arms as it slid down his body. “Back up against me. Cut your hands loose on the blade,” he said in a rush. “Hurry. It’ll take them nineteen seconds to reload.” She spun, bending as far forward as her noose would allow so that she could reach back with her tied hands. There was a sharp exclamation as Isaye blindly found the sword’s edge. Drawing the ropes across the blade, she was free.
Isaye wrenched the noose from her neck. “How do you know how long it takes that galleon to reload? Every ship’s timing is different,” she gasped, reaching to help Cobiah get free.
“I know that ship,” Cobiah said grimly.
Isaye cut him free, and as she did, a second peal of gunfire sounded from the galleon. This time, there were echoing booms from several of the smaller ships in the harbor. The sailors of Port Stalwart were beginning to fight back. Still, looking at the size and number of their enemy, they wouldn’t be fighting for long.
The dock trembled warningly beneath his feet. Through the screams of people fleeing the collapsing wharf and the war cries of sailors on ships being attacked, Cobiah heard a charr’s enraged bellow of pain.
“Get Macha,” Cobiah said determinedly. “Take her to the shore with your crew.”
“The asura?” Isaye asked, baffled. “But—”
Cobiah cut her off, pushing the sword into Isaye’s hands. “Take this. Tell Macha that I’m giving her an order to go with you. Take your men and get out of here, Isaye. Sykox and I will meet you afterward.”
“Meet—do you even have a plan?” Isaye snorted. “Of course not. You’re Cobiah Marriner. Shortsighted as hell—and too damn brave for your own good.” She started to say something else, but instead impulsively leaned in and kissed his cheek. “Don’t worry about us. Just rescue your Six-cursed charr and get out of here.” With that, Isaye turned and ran toward the other gallows, cutting captives free one by one as the guards fled toward the shore.
The sound of clanking chains and another terrible howl broke through the chaos, dragging Cobiah’s attention away from the dark-haired woman. “Sykox!” he gasped. With alacrity, Cobiah spun toward the end of the pier and raced toward his engineer.
The guards were scattering, fleeing from the collapsing dock as rotted sailors dropped from the fleet into the sea, making their way toward the town. Some swam above the water; others walked below the waves, leaving a thickening trail of mold and decaying flesh. They carried all manner of weapons, from knives and cutlasses to long shards of broken bone and clubs of shattered coral. Cobiah saw the last guard pulled down into the waves by undead swimming beneath the collapsing boards of the dock. There were battles up and down the shore, undead shuffling on the sand toward those living beings who stayed to fight. If Isaye didn’t move it and get to the shoreline soon, they’d be trapped on the docks.
He didn’t have time to worry about the others. Sykox, still chained, stood with his back to one of the pylons, staring in horror as revenants with pasteboard skin clambered up the shattered planks. Cobiah reached him just as the Indomitable released her third volley. Two of the ships in the harbor, their crews trying desperately to get them under sail, were destroyed by the battering of the Dead Ship’s broadside.
Tugging at the manacles that bound his friend, Cobiah struggled to find some way to get them to open. They were solid steel, heavy and sealed with a lock, and the chains that bound them to the set on Sykox’s feet were equally stalwart. “Don’t panic,” Cobiah said, cursing. “I can get a knife, jimmy this lock—” Even as he said it, an explosion rocked one of the ships in the dock nearby. Their powder room must have caught fire, and the concussion shuddered the dock’s already-weak foundation.
In a voice far too soft for their surroundings, Sykox whispered, “There’s a spear . . . one of the guards dropped it when the flying creatures took him. Use it to kill me.”
“No, Sykox. I can get through these locks.”
“Not before the undead get up here. Then what? We outrun those things up there and swim the Sea of Sorrows to get away?” The charr shook his head dejectedly, his rusty mane shagging over broad shoulders. “You might make it, but me? But you can give me a better death than to be torn apart with my hands bound.”
“You didn’t give up on me when you fished me half-dead out of the ocean. Don’t give up on me now.” Stung, Cobiah tugged at the manacles, trying to find any weakness in the steel. Bony hands scrabbled at the dock as the zombies pulled themselves up, gathering their footing as they hissed through barnacle-encrusted cheeks. Cobiah’s stomach turned at the sight of them, and he focused on Sykox’s bonds, hoping desperately that he wouldn’t see anyone he knew . . . or had known.
“What in the Four Legions are you good for, then, human?” Sykox roared back. “Help me die like a charr, don’t let me go out like some kind of . . . uh . . . flopping . . . wet . . . fish! Toughen up! You’re nothing but a spineless pudding!”
“A pudding? Really? That’s the best insult you’ve got?”
“I’m under pressure here!” Sykox snapped.
Out of nowhere came the crack of a pistol and the sharp whiz of shot flying past. Cobiah spun, grabbing for the spear, while Sykox roared and instinctively raised his claws. Both stared, awestruck, as the manacles fell away from his wrists. There was a second shot, the ringing of metal on metal, and the shackles on his feet sprang open.
“Magic?” Sykox said, mystified.
“Accuracy, you idiot.” Standing back at the gallows with Isaye, Macha raised a stolen flintlock pistol to her lips and blew a puff of smoke from the barrels. “Have you ever known me to obey an order?” she asked with a self-satisfied purr of scorn. “Anyway, the shore’s covered with zombies. We can’t go that way.” Aggrieved and annoyed, Macha stuck out her tongue at them both.
Cobiah threw up his hands in exasperation, but there was no time to argue.
The undead were upon them.
“The dock’s disintegrating! If we don’t stay together, the zombies will tear us into chum!” Isaye yelled to the gathered sailors, trying to herd them into a smaller g
roup at the end of the dock.
Hideous wights scrabbled across the undersides of the boards. They crawled through broken planking to swing at them with vicious, eager swipes. Cobiah blocked with the broken haft of the spear, kicking one undead creature in the belly hard enough to send it tumbling back into the sea. Already, the way back to the shore was blocked by zombies. There was nowhere else to go. “Follow Isaye!” he called to the others. “Gather at the end of the dock!”
Isaye began their retreat, hacking at withered arms reaching up through the boards to foul their feet. Two of the guards who had been cut down at the shore end of the dock shuffled and rose, given hideous unlife by the power of Orr. As Cobiah watched in horror, they turned upon the still-living soldiers in their group—men and women who had been friends and shield mates only a moment before—and tore out their throats. They, too, were limp for only a few minutes before rising to shamble hungrily with the others. Every person killed by the Dead Ships or their minions became another soldier for their cause. There was no winning this battle. As the number of living grew smaller, the undead force grew larger and larger still.
Cobiah saw townsfolk fighting on the sand, screaming in terror as the undead slouched out of the sea in seemingly never-ending numbers. The survivors rallied, only to be devastated by a fresh volley of cannon fire. As the undead climbed up the sides of the moored ships or lumbered onto the white-sand beach, the rotting ships fired round after round of detonations. The harbor’s mist had been replaced by the acrid smoke of black powder, and the waves were covered with sludge, tar, and wooden shrapnel from sinking ships. Villagers ran through the streets of Port Stalwart, some fighting, others grabbing what they could and fleeing for their lives into the Krytan hills.
