The Sword of the South - eARC

by David Weber

  The rest were an inextricable mass. There were humans (including a surly ex-officer from Emperor Soldan’s army who captained the main top), two dozen hradani (who regarded themselves as Brandark’s elite corps, though he was prone to crack heads if they became too vocal about it), a round dozen dwarves (who’d clearly found it expedient to be elsewhere in a hurry and loudly missed their mountain tunnels), and even one elf—Hornos, who served as first officer and never mentioned his past.

  “Ho, Kenhodan!” The lookout’s hail broke into his reverie, shaking him back into the present.

  “Ho, yourself!” he shouted back up at the man perched at the topmast crosstrees as the mastheads traced slow, uneasy circles against the sky.

  “If you must pluck that thing, at least give us a tune!”

  “What would you like to hear?”

  “D’you know ‘Torloss Troubled Heart’?”

  Kenhodan let his hands lie limp on the strings, waiting to see if this was one of the tunes which lurked in the reefs of his memory like ships’ bones on the Fradonian Banks, ready to bob to the surface on a passing current when tickled by their names or hummed melodies. A handful of seconds passed, and then his fingers moved suddenly and a rollicking ditty sprang from the harp, laughing over the decks. After a moment, his voice began the song of the sailor, the barmaid, and Hirahim Lightfoot, the laughing god. He’d just reached the verse in which Torloss discovered that his rival for the maid’s favors was none other than the god of seductions himself, when a hail from above broke his concentration.

  “Sail hooooooo!” the same lookout called. “Three sail—no, four, by the Trident! Two points off the starboard quarter, and closing like the wrath of Phrobus!”

  “What?!” Brandark had joined the crowd enjoying Kenhodan’s song. Now he wheeled, staring astern towards the sails invisible from deck level, and his mobile ears were half-flattened.

  “What’s wrong?” Kenhodan stilled the strings with his hand. Brandark’s alarm clearly stemmed from more than the near number of strangers.

  “Maybe nothing.” Brandark tugged his shortened ear and peered up at the lookout. “But there’s no telling who you’ll meet out here, and I don’t like it that they’re closing—not if they’re under canvas.”

  His fingers flicked at Wave Mistress’ lifeless sails.

  “I see your point.”

  Kenhodan reached for the harp case and began fitting the instrument into it, conscious of the sword that wasn’t at his side at the moment.

  Bahzell scampered up the ratlines with apelike speed, and Brandark propped his fists on his hips and stared upward as the other hradani carefully peered along the line of the lookout’s hand, exchanging observations with the seaman. Then Bahzell gave an emphatic nod, clapped the man on the shoulder, and reached for a state. He wrapped his legs around it and plunged down to thump heavily on deck, then wiped his stinging palms on his breeches and clumped to Brandark’s side.

  “You’ve a good man up there, Brandark,” he said quietly. “I’m thinking he spotted them as they broke the horizon, but they’ll be up to us soon. They’re after coming with the whips of Fiendark behind them, and no mistake. Corsairs. Black sails.”

  “No quarter, then,” Brandark muttered. He stroked his chin with callused fingers. “And they’re moving under sail, not oars?”

  “They are, Captain.” Heads turned as Wencit emerged from the maindeck hatch, eyes flaming. “But not on the winds of this world.”

  “Sorcery!” Brandark spat. “May all the wizards of the world cut each others’ throats! Except yours, of course!” he added hastily.

  “I applaud your sentiments, but we have more pressing problems.”

  “Aye.” Bahzell was thoughtful. “Boarders or sorcery, are you thinking?”

  “Both. There are at least two wizards over there, and there’s something more than a wizard wind with them. It won’t be shadows this time—too much light—but it’s something evil, and strong enough I may be hard-pressed to counter it. And since I can’t use the art if I have to fight at the same time, they’ll send boarders to break my concentration.”

  “My thought, as well,” Brandark said grimly. “I’ve good lads, Wencit—not many you’d take home to your mother, maybe, but good lads in a fight. Unfortunately, I don’t have as many as I’d like against four ships, even with the Axe Brothers.”

  “When you’re surrounded, you’ve more targets,” Bahzell said philosophically. His hard, calculating eyes belied his light tone. “At least they’ll not try to sink or burn us—not if those are after being real corsairs. I’m thinking as they’ve come for your bullion, Brandark, and it won’t buy a pot of poor ale on the seabed.”

  “Well, I don’t have any such compunctions where they’re concerned!” Brandark grunted, and the scholar was buried deep in the elemental hradani. “Black sails, is it? If that’s what they want, I’ll stretch myself to give it to them!” He raised his voice. “Hornos! Captain Forstan!”

  His lieutenant and the imperial commander arrived together. Hornos’ habitual expression of gentle melancholy was unchanged, but his sword was at his side, an extra dagger had materialized on his belt, and he wore a scale mail hauberk. The Axe Brothers’ captain looked more anxious than the elf as he tightened his breastplate over the black and gold tunic of the Empire’s crack heavy infantry. Kenhodan wasn’t surprised; ultimate responsibility for the treasure was his.

  “Those gentlemen mean to relieve us of your cargo, Captain,” Brandark said levelly, “and they may have the strength to do it. I’d be obliged if your men would muster on the starboard side.”

  “At once.”

  Forstan nodded and wheeled away, bellowing orders as boots stamped and armor clanged. Most seamen eschewed armor, for its weight would drag a swimmer swiftly under, but the Axe Brothers were no sailors. They wore plate and carried the double-bitted great axes of the King Emperor’s elite, and Kenhodan smiled grimly at the surprise awaiting the corsairs if their allies hadn’t warned them what to expect.

  “The crew will take the port rail,” Brandark went on, laying out his plans for Hornos. “Clear away and load with banefire—but for Korthrala’s sake, don’t fire the loads before I tell you! The last thing we need is flaming rigging around our ears when we’re outnumbered four-to-one!”

  “Aye, Sir!”

  “Seldwyn,” Brandark turned to his archery captain. “Load the dart throwers, but save them till they close. There’s no way to dance and run with them when they’ve got a wind and we don’t, so wait till they’re right on top of us, then sweep their quarter decks. If there’s a wizard on deck, that’s where he’ll be, and if we put a javelin in his belly, so much the better.”

  “Aye, Sir!” Seldwyn turned away, but Brandark caught his jerkin.

  “Wait a minute. Put the archers on the quarterdeck; they won’t try coming over the bow—their bulwarks are too low and the foredeck’s taper favors us too much—so they’ll run alongside to keep us busy, then try to break into the quarter galleys and come over the stern. Don’t wait there—start hitting them the moment they’re in range.”

  “Aye, Sir!” Seldwyn repeated, and this time Brandark let him go.

  Kenhodan watched the crew come alive with purposeful fury. Outnumbered they might be, and more than a bit unhappy at the odds, yet they appeared to be dominated by anger, not fear. Indeed, they seemed almost to welcome the appearance of enemies they could deal with instead of the bizarre weather they’d been unable to understand…until now. Hornos’ high voice lacked the volume of Brandark’s bellow, but it was clear, cutting through the tumult like a trumpet, and the crew’s bare feet added a pattering urgency to the din, counterpointing the soldiers’ boots and the crash of opening arms chests. He watched a dwarf test an axe edge with grim delight while a brawny topman made a cutlass whistle.

  “Bahzell,” Brandark ignored the rush as he continued to plan his defense, “Captain Forstan can see to the starboard side. I’d like you with me and the cre
w on the other bulwark. Hornos will command the ballistae, and he can lead the artillerists wherever they’re needed once the bastards close with us. Seldwyn will command the archers and the afterguard.”

  “Good enough,” Bahzell replied. “Best I go find my gear, I’m thinking.”

  He nodded sharply to the captain and headed below just as one of Brandark’s younger seaman ran up to him with a daggered axe on a baldric. It wasn’t the traditional great axe of Bahzell’s people, for it had only a single blade, but the back of its head ended in a wicked spike, suitable for piercing armor, and the entire weapon had a lean, lethal book. Brandark took it with a nod of thanks, looped the baldric over his head, and settled the axe on his back.

  “Where do you want me?” Kenhodan demanded.

  “You draw a heavy bow,” Brandark replied. “Join the archers, if you please. But make it your special duty to look after Wencit. He’ll be on deck to counter whatever deviltry’s brewing over there, and you can bet whatever you own they’ll try to mark him down early to stop him.”

  “Fine.”

  Kenhodan darted down the main hatch to his cabin. He had to dodge the last few crewmen as they boiled up, but he made good time despite the obstacles. He took time to stow the precious harp carefully before he buckled his sword belt, settled the sword and Gwynna’s dagger at his side, and slid the quiver over his shoulder. Then he bent the bow stave with a quick motion, seating the resined string in its grooves, and plucked it gently. It hummed as musically as his harp, and he raced for the quarterdeck.

  He was one of the last to arrive, and he scanned the deck carefully, fixing the defenders’ positions in his mind. The corsairs were well above the horizon now, storming across the water at an unbelievable speed, and thirty other bowmen stood with him, watching them sweep closer. Black sails groaned on their yards, hard-bellied with angry wind, but still no breeze stirred over Wave Mistress.

  Kenhodan sneezed on noxious fumes as Hornos bent over the after ballista, speaking quietly to his men. The heavy weapon crouched on its turntable like a vast crossbow, loaded with a long, vaned shaft. Its yard-long, hollow iron head was already loaded with deadly banefire—now Hornos stood ready to ignite the evil mixture of pitch, sulfur, naphtha, turpentine, and quicklime. Bahzell stood well forward, abreast the foremast with one foot on the bulwark, and the sun winked on the crossed sword and mace of his surcoat as he studied the enemy. Two halflings crouched over a dart thrower beside him, laying the five-foot, vaned javelins into the grooved firing tray. The heavy spring steel firing bar would drive all eight shafts at the jerk of a lanyard, and while the weapon was slow firing, at close range its missiles would pierce ten inches of seasoned oak.

  Kenhodan searched for his special charge and saw Wencit leaning against the mainmast. He’d drawn his sword, but his expression was blank with intensity and his multihued eyes gazed sightlessly at nothing as mind and will sought for the telltale tendrils of sorcery directed against the ship.

  Once certain of Wencit’s exact position, Kenhodan turned back to starboard and nocked an arrow. They’d enter longbow range soon, and—

  His thoughts broke off and he blinked, almost staggering as a hammer struck his brain and sudden fury exploded within him. He shook his head drunkenly, fighting the shock of rage. It was the same anger he’d felt in the taproom, only stronger even than it had been then, and it was neither fear nor the zest Bahzell seemed to feel. It was a personal hatred, a loathing, as if the corsairs represented some hideous disease, and it was so much stronger than the hate of Brandark’s crew that his bones burned like ice. It lent him a frightening strength—strength all the more frightening because he didn’t understand it. Yet he saw its danger, as well, for this fury was blind. It could destroy him as easily as any blade…unless he could use it rather than be used by it. Berserkers made deadly foes, but they also expended themselves like unthinking weapons, and the thought of dying in a mad frenzy of butchery was almost as terrifying as it was seductive.

  He knew that, sensed his capacity for destruction and a deep, almost ecstatic need to embrace his own destruction, and saw the maelstrom spinning its vortex of bloodshed and thunder at his very core. Its power appalled him, and he made himself breathe deeply, fighting for control.

  He won—barely. His pulse slowed and the pounding in his temples slipped back towards normal. He took his hands from his bow one at a time and dried his palms carefully on his trousers, and the bloodlust bubbling in his brain had been chained to his purpose. It flickered like fire walled in ice, uneasy, unwilling to yield, yet it was his now, and he was no longer its. He still felt the crawling need to kill or be killed, but he commanded himself once more.

  And just in time.

  His lips drew back in a snarl as the corsairs swept closer. Little more than half Wave Mistress’ length, they were low, lean, and wicked, and spray burst over their raked stems in green and cream as they leaned to the breath of their private tempest. Despite their smaller size, each carried almost as many men as Wave Mistress, even counting Forstan’s Axe Brothers, for their crews greatly outnumbered those of any honest vessel their size, and Kenhodan studied their sleek lines—lines that ruthlessly subordinated cargo space to speed. After all, he thought grimly, pirates sought small bulk, high-value prizes; they could afford the sharp ferocity of those speed-hungry hulls.

  “Ready your bows!” Seldwyn ripped out the words and raised his hand, his feet spread wide for balance while his eyes measured the range, the pitch of the hulls, and the priority he should assign each target.

  “The lead ship!” He shouted harshly. “Gut me those archers!”

  Kenhodan felt the sun’s kiss, distant through the cold air, as his bow rose with the others. Salt, pitch, and hemp hung in his nostrils. One corsair had strayed four full lengths before her consorts, a temerity which marked her as the first target for Wave Mistress’ wrath.

  “Loooooose!”

  Kenhodan sighted, drew, and released. The string whacked his leather arm guard, and his bow lifted as a cloud of arrows snarled up, fletching howling, and hissed above the sea. They sheeted down on the foremost corsair, barbed heads hungry for blood, and Kenhodan grinned fiercely, rage snarling in his brain as he followed their lethal flight. Then black figures tumbled aside under the beat of the arrow storm, and his nerves quivered ecstatically at the sight.

  The return fire was late and short as their bitter points drove into the corsairs’ faces. Dozens of out-ranged shafts plunged into the sea in flashes of white, far short of Wave Mistress’ deck. To rate archer under Brandark Brandarkson, a bowman must be skilled with a longbow, rather than the short bow or crossbow most seamen favored, and his lieutenants were chosen as much for battle skill as sea craft. Seldwyn’s keen eye had gauged the range more accurately than his corsair counterpart’s, and his bowmen fell into the deadly rhythm of the Vonderland archer: twelve aimed shafts in a minute. Arrows slashed across the corsair like spume, sweeping the packed deck, heaping it with dead and writhing bodies and spattering it with blood.

  The corsair archers were no match for that fire. They were cut down before they could reply effectively, but their consorts hastened to their aid. They began to find the range, and arrows whined and licked among the crew. Kenhodan heard them shriek in baffled rage from the Axe Brothers’ armor, but too many sank into flesh with dull, meaty thuds, and gasps and screams erupted as men fell about him. He saw and heard it through the fury in his brain, but it was distant, far away and happening somewhere else as he concentrated on the strength of his arm, the keenness of his eye, and the limber strength of his magnificent, killing Vonderland bow.

  Two corsairs bored straight for the starboard side. A third circled, storming up to port, while the fourth—hull lined with pike-waving pirates—lunged straight for the stern, exactly as Brandark had predicted.

  “Now, Hornos! Now!”

  Brandark’s bellow split his crew’s snarl as they sighted the corsairs’ bare steel. The halfling coxswain’s hands sl
ashed, and the spring engines thudded. Their long, slim missiles howled through shield and pirate alike, and Seldwyn’s remaining archers pivoted, hurling their arrows over the rail into the teeth of the boarding pirates.

  But it was Hornos who unleashed the most devastating blow. Corsair arrows hissed among his men like feeding sharks, but they waited grimly as Hornos and the boatswain pressed torches to the banefire and leapt aside. Fire geysered and the artillery thudded far more loudly than the dart throwers had. The long missiles soared, trailing stinking smoke and flame in a smudgy line above the sea, and the gunners snatched up swords and boarding pikes and formed behind Hornos as their missiles streaked for their foes.

  The boatswain’s shot slammed into the portside pirate’s bulwark. It smashed clean through the thick planking in a shower of splinters and porpoised across the deck, but the head failed to shatter. Liquid fire dribbled from it, but a howling corsair—mad with battle lust or supremely courageous—levered it over the side. The terrible substance ignited his clothing, clinging like death, and his flaming figure hurtled overboard behind the banefire even as his ship lunged across the final few dozen yards to Wave Mistress. His screaming body was crushed between the grinding hulls, yet his sacrifice saved his ship, and his mates surged up the side, pikeheads shining in the smoke.

  And smoke there was, for Hornos’ shot had crashed into the oardeck of the lead ship to starboard, and crewmen scattered wildly as the projectile shattered into fiery fragments. Water was less than useless against the quicklime-charged banefire, and it spread too quickly for sand buckets to quench. Smoke billowed and fire licked up the masts. Sails and tarred rigging burst into towers of flame, and screams told their own tale as the pirate ship bucked out of control, showering the sea with charred flecks of canvas and burning paint.

  The corsair sheared away, wrapped in destruction, and the wizard wind became a two-edged weapon, blowing her to her doom. Wind bellied the untouched sails and fanned the flames to furnace fury. Bitter heat drove the helmsmen from their stations, unable to control their hurtling vessel, and desperate figures flung themselves overboard, only to be smashed back against the hull and battered beneath the waves by their ship’s speed.