The aide said the Konyan wizards had determined that The Sarzana and his allies were lurking in the Alastors, an island chain about three weeks to the south, where they seemed to have found a base for their battlefleet. Trahern 'suggested' we continue scouting as we had been, and correct our course so we remained directly in front of his ships. That was all - the aide had no instructions about asking for our observations or ideas.
It was amusing to see Cholla Yi fume and fuss at being treated in such a 'shameful' way. Perhaps I shouldn't have, but I couldn't resist quiedy mentioning that Trahern's behaviour was most discourteous, and he should've patterned his style after Cholla Yi's, particularly the way the admiral had treated us when we set forth from Lycanth. All my sarcasm accomplished was to make him angrier.
Xia was even hotter, snarling she'd been betrayed, and this was no way to treat nobility. It was afternoon, in a sleepy midwatch, and all I could hear outside our cabin was the creak of the ship and the bootheels of the watch on deck above us as he walked to and fro. I was sprawled on the bed, and she sat beside me, legs curled under her. I told her she was right, but that was the way of the world, both here and in Orissa. Men appeared to be men wherever I went. Perhaps, I said, she might become Queen one day, and begin a new way of thinking that'd end the silliness. She looked at me oddly. After a moment she frowned, and started to say something further. But I had other thoughts, feeling the warmth in my bones looking at her as she sat in the dim glow from the deadlight. She caught my look and gave a knowing laugh - then all her anger melted in our embrace.
I hadn't gone into a rage of my own because I knew in advance that Trahern had no intention of treating us as equals, and had therefore planned how - and when - I'd deal with it. As long as we weren't in contact with the enemy, I could accept the situation as it was. I concentrated my energies on daily drills to make sure everyone in our small fleet understood the new way I proposed we would fight. The change was great, as great as chalk to cheese.
The greatest change was in attitude. Instead of thinking of ourselves as infantry that happened to be aboard ship instead of on land, we were going to think like cavalry. There's no greater sin a horsewoman can make than to be unhorsed to become one with the common swine she tramples under her hooves. In our case, our horses were our ships. We were only to 'dismount', in other words to board, when we were sure we'd crippled our opponent, just as a cavalrywoman only leaves her horse to administer the final mercy to a fallen enemy.
We were trying to destroy our enemy utterly, not just take the ground he was fighting from, which in a naval fight meant his ship. Burn him, ram him, drive him on the rocks, destroy his sails or oars and he would be out of the battle.
Naturally, Cholla Yi's captains set up a clamour, again moaning that meant they'd take no prizes. I told them I understood, secretly cursing and wishing I had seamen under me who fought for the love of their city rather than for gold. But what I had, I had, and so I told them if they obeyed my orders, they might not take a prize at that moment, but when the battle was won, there'd be more than enough drifting hulks to claim. Wouldn't it be easier, I asked, to seize such a ship from its demoralized, surrendering crew than have to take it by force of arms? Also, if they didn't close and board a ship unless they had the distinct advantage, their own craft would be less likely to be damaged or sunk. I reminded them these huge galleys of The Sarzana we'd be facing would no doubt have derrick-hung stones that could be dropped straight down from their decks when we tried to grapple them, and send us straight to the bottom without further ado. They didn't like to admit there could be something new on the sea, let alone ideas produced by greenlings who also were women. So we went over the theory again and again, until little by little it sank in. Any time one of them said something that mirrored one of our thoughts I complimented him and told him we'd incorporate that into our thinking.
Eventually, it appeared to them they'd had as much to do with this new strategy as we had, and then, with the general idea accepted we could begin endlessly drilling the specific tactics. Sailors learned how to work their galleys handily in close quarters, practising one against another, backing, filling, darting in and out like hounds worrying a boar, never holding still long enough for the tusks to slash them down.
We learned how to fight in two- or three-ship elements, striking always for the flanks and where blood showed. We would give no mercy, not expecting any ourselves, nor would we fight a 'fair' battle, whatever that means. We had more than enough time to lower sails and turn aside from our course, since our galleys had three or four times as much speed as the hulking Konyan ships behind us.
There was also new weaponry to mount and train on, weapons I'd had built secretly in a small yard and moved onto our galleys under cover of night. They were special catapults, with double troughs set at slightly divergent angles. Somebody had seen one as we loaded it and asked if we planned on shooting two arrows at once. I just said yes, and didn't explain, assuming The Sarzana had spies thoroughly covering Konya, or else might be observing magically. I'd worried, but Gamelan had reassured me: 'Just because someone may be able to look at something doesn't mean he can tell what it is, or what it's intended for, now does it?'
Polillo had been detailed off to train sailors how, and more importandy when, to fire these catapults, which were intended for use deep in the battle.
She'd snarled she had more than enough to do making sure her women were ready, plus keeping herself in shape so that Precious, her axe, would drink deep in the fight. Someone else could worry about those damned sea dogs of Cholla Yi.
Corais laughed, and said she was being innocent. She herself would never turn down a chance to teach a man something in his own supposed area of expertise. 'It'd be almost as good as showing one of these leap-on, leap-off, drop-a-coin-and-gone oafs how to really pleasure a lass.'
Polillo had grinned wickedly, then said, dreamily, 'Now, there is a thought. Perhaps, if I'm nice enough, one of them might introduce me to his sister.'
'Careful,' Corais warned. 'Sailors don't have sisters. They only mate with porgies and lighthouse keepers.'
I paid little attention to their chatter, deep in my conjectures as to how the Archon had managed to send fire spitting across the waters, and while I'd not been able to come up with a spell that would let me do the same, I thought I might have devised an incantation that could prove a stronger counter than what Gamelan had been able to produce on the instant.
Gamelan was another problem. As much as he tried not to be a burden, and not always to be the spectre at the feast, he was hardly the picture of cheerfulness. I heard Sergeant Bodilon refer to him once as Evocator Darkness, and took her aside and asked sharply if she herself would bear up handily should she lose both her arms. Bodilon said if that happened, she'd And the nearest cliff and leap rather than wander about glooming to her once-fellows.
I retorted, Then, it's evident who's got the greater courage, isn't it, since Gamelan soldiers on without giving up.' She started at what I said, then bowed her head, apologized and said I was right.
Maybe I was, but something had to be done about our Evocator. I began to worry that he might, indeed, take Bodilon's way out, and considered warning the two women who were his caretakers.
Then another thought came. I ran it back and forth, and it seemed to have a bit of merit. Or, at any rate, to be something that'd not make matters worse.
The next day was clear and sharp, spray coming off the bow as we made full sail towards where The Sarzana would be waiting. There was a slight haze in the air, just enough to blur the horizon and make it a glow. Gamelan was in his usual daytime post in the bows staring forward as if he could see. I jerked my head for his two companions to leave us, and greeted him.
'How goes the planning, Rali?' he said, his voice dull and lifeless.
I was surprised at his tone. It had been days since I'd had time to think about him, and I realized just how much his morale had plunged - like a soldier whose wounds refuse
to heal. We talked a bit, and I led the conversation to the predictions of Admiral Trahern's sorcerers that The Sarzana was close.
'I think they're most likely right,' he said. 'Not because I can feel even a hint of my powers, but out of pure logic from all the years I've lived.'
'Go on,' I said.
'The Sarzana, or at least so he told us, had his first triumph when he destroyed the fleet the Konyan King sent against him. Wouldn't he want to repeat his triumph?'
'Of course,' I said. 'That's a trap every soldier must be wary of. If it worked once, it'll work again and again until one day you walk into an ambush and are slaughtered by an enemy who learned your habits better than you did his.'
'Even more to the point,' Gamelan went on, 'it's in The Sarzana's best interests to break the Council of Purity as rapidly as possible. His bloody ways won't be peaceably accepted for long, if there's an alternative. But if he can shatter the only rule the Konyans know, then they'll most likely accept him rather than risk complete chaos.' Gamelan sighed. 'So we'll meet them soon I'm sure.
'Unfortunately, I'm also sure we'll be lured onto ground of The Sarzana's ... and The Archon's ... choosing. Perhaps I'm being vain, but none of the wizards I've spoken to in Konya impressed me as having half the powers of The Sarzana, let alone the Archon ... Gods,' and his voice turned fierce, 'this is the battle that'll settle Konya and perhaps the fate of Orissa as well, and I might as well be put at the gate with a bowl to beg! Rali, if you knew how many ways I've prayed and thought and wished for even a touch of my powers to come back!'
'I know,' I said. I let the silence hang, then said, as quietly as I knew, 'A thought came to me last night, Gamelan, that might be of some help, and perhaps—'
Before I could continue he'd spun and had me by the arms. His face thrust forward, as if he could will sight, could somehow look into my eyes. 'Anything, my friend. Anything, please. I cannot continue as I am much longer.'
I waited until he calmed, then began. 'I don't know very much about wizardry,' I said, 'in spite of your teachings. By that, I mean I don't know how the Talent comes on you.'
'It comes as it went,' he said. 'Without bidding or whether you wish it. Now I wish it had never cursed me, but left me as a fisherman on the banks of our river.'
'That's what I thought,' I said, paying no mind to his bitterness. 'And I know it's cheaper in lives if a soldier can figure a way around a defended position, or else take it from the rear than to shout battle-cries and make a frontal charge.'
'Which is what I've been doing, trying to force my powers to come back,' Gamelan said. 'So what is the way around, my cunning friend?'
'You were a fisherman once,' I said. 'You said that's when people started realizing you had the call to be an Evocator.'
'It was.'
'Return to that time, or anyway, that manner of thinking. There are hooks and lines here. Maybe you could start fishing. Let your fingers remind you of your thoughts all those years ago, when you always came back with a rich catch.'
Gamelan nodded excitedly, and then he smiled, and I realized it was the first time I'd seen him smile for weeks.
He said, 'Yes. Yes. You can always tie a knot or splice once your muscles learn how it's done, even though if you try to remember how the line twists you'll end with a tangle. Maybe ... maybe ...' He stopped, and I thought I saw wetness in the corners of his eyes, then he turned away from me.
I motioned for one of the soldiers who companioned him, and told her to get fishing lines and bait and anything else he might need. And when I told Gamelan I must be about my duties, he nodded, barely hearing, his lips moving as they led him into the past.
When I went below that night he and the two Guardswomen were still up, silhouetted in the bows. I remembered the love of his life, Riana - the woman denied him. I thought of what I'd heard whispered of sex magic, and how strong a spell that could create. For the briefest instant I wished one of my women, perhaps one of his companions, was of a nature attracted to men, then shook my head. It was foolish. And I'd done the best I could.
It was after evening mess, and I was on deck, helping some of my archers make arrows. I was carefully cutting peacock feathers to the precise angle, and trimming the quill exactly to the instructions of the corporal with the gluepot. Corais was nearby, lapping a bowstring with silk thread. About the time my taskmaster decided we'd made enough arrows to riddle a regiment, Corais finished her own job. I went to the rail with her to enjoy the sunset, one part of seagoing I never tired of.
Corais still had her bow, and as we talked of this and that, she rubbed it up and down, letting the oil from her palm work into the fine yew. I realized she'd had the bow since we were raw recruits, and never knew where she'd got it. I asked if it was a family treasure, and she shook her head, then looked surprised as she realized of all the secrets we'd shared this was something I knew nothing of.
'I made this bow myself,' she said. 'It took me five years, and I started when I was only ten. There was this man in our village who fascinated me.'
'A man fascinated you,' I joked. 'And weren't you the eager young stripling with desires beyond your years? No doubt you were perverted from your true nature not much later, just as so many priests and men would have it.'
She wrinkled her nose at me. 'As you know, as I've told you time and again, my village was created boring. Beyond midsummer festival, harvest home, and the winter solstice, the most exciting thing was to watch the turnips grow. All we had were farmers, the priest, a cheating shopman, and... this fellow. His name was Sollertiana, and he was a bowsmith.'
'Now I understand your fascination.'
'Not quite,' Corais said. 'Certainly there were the gleaming lengths of wood in his shop that slowly became singers of death, and the long rows of grey-goose-feathered shafts. But Sollertiana himself held me, not just for the stories he'd tell, nor for the customers that'd ride long distances from the city just to order one of his bows that would require a year or more's wait. I'd just begun to realize I wasn't like the other girls, and playing their little games of squeal and be chased and maybe let a boy put his little pigtail in me and wiggle it. Somehow I knew Sollertiana was different, too. When I was fifteen, after the bow was finished, I knew I'd been right, seeing him look out the scraped-skin window over his bench when a young lad strode past, recognizing the same longing I felt for one or two of the village maids.
'But where I had been able to find a little happiness, even though one claimed she'd been asleep and the other she'd been drunk, Sollertiana knew better than to indulge his passion. Our priest would've raised a mob to burn him and his home if there'd been any suspicion.'
She snorted. 'Of course that same priest also gave scant comfort when a woman was beaten by her husband, or even when a man thought he had the right to take all the women of his household, adult or babes, to wife. Priests!' Corais spat overside, then went on.
'Once a year Sollertiana went to Orissa to buy silk and peacock feathers, and I hope he found a measure of comfort there. I always wondered why, since he was what he was, he didn't move to the city. I asked him once, and he just said that he couldn't breathe when he couldn't see the sun's journey from dawn to dark, and in the city the buildings strangled him.' Corais shrugged. 'I see I've gone astray from my story. But that was why I felt a kinship with Sollertiana. Not only that he was different in his desires as was I, but he also showed me the way I must take. I knew I couldn't remain in that village and either be an old maid, or pretend passion for a man and have to spend my life under his sweaty grunts.
'This bow came from a bunch of three heavy, old red yew trunks that grew close enough to the sacred grove that they'd been permitted to reach great age, yet not close enough so that cutting them was sacrilege. When I told Sollertiana I wanted a bow, he looked at me for a long time. I expected him to just say "go away, child, I've got work to do", like most of the adults did. Instead, he nodded, and paid me no more mind. A week later, he took me to this grove and pointed out the
yew trunk. He cut it down with a handsaw, taking over an hour at the task. He sawed the log carefully in two, and kept the half that had grown on the inside of the clump. It had no twigs or pins or knots to it. He took this cutting high in the hills, where a stream ran clear, and he tied the plank securely in the water.
'It sat there for three months, until some of the sap had been washed from it. Then he put it in a damp, dark shed, keeping it in the rafters above the ground for over a year. I wonder if he thought I'd forget about the wood, but I never did. Every day, I visited what would be "my" bow, and thought I could see it change and dry. I even dreamed once I could see a bow's sleekness hiding there. Little by little, Sollertiana moved it to drier places. The last year before we shaped it spent in the open wind and air under the eaves of his workshop.
'All the time it was drying Sollertiana was working with it, tapering it bit by bit after he'd gently peeled off the drying bark. Then he used a succession of rasps, broken glass, pumice stone and then powder to shape it. As it took form, he trusted me more and more to do the work. Finally, I held what almost looked like a bow in my hands. Then came the most dangerous part. He cut the wood into two billets, and I almost died, sure he'd ruined all our work. But he cleverly shaped, fitted and then glued the pieces together, and ... it was a bow!
'He waxed and varnished the wood, and fitted these tips I'd carved from the horn of a stag I'd stalked and killed in the heart of the winter with another bow. Then it was mine.' Corais regarded the bow lovingly. 'It was the first thing I'd really ever owned, besides a couple of dolls my mother had given me that had been hers as a child.
'Not long after that, Sollertiana died, and I left for Orissa. And that was when we met.'
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