“Is that your business, pirate?”
“I don’t guess it is—”
He hissed. “You wish to mate with Mirian?”
“I … I just wanted to be her friend. Maybe buy her a drink.” He looked off at the lightning.
“If not for my sister’s sister,” Jekka told him, “I would have left you bleeding in the dirt. Spare me your words. We are not friends. We are not clan.”
“Sail ho!” the bosun shouted.
“Where away?” Ensara called aloft.
The answer was swift in coming. “One point off starboard!”
There was a thump, the sound of footfalls, and the cabin door swung open. Mirian emerged onto the deck. “What ship?”
“Looked like a three-master, Captain,” the bosun cried.
“On this heading,” Ensara said, “it’s got to be Rajana. On my ship.”
“You may be right,” Mirian said, and her eyes swept up to consider the masts. “Gombe! I want all reefed sails drawing full! I thought I made that clear!”
The second mate came running from somewhere aft.
“Yes, Captain. I was afraid we’d part a shroud—”
“We’re not at gale strength,” Mirian said. “The Daughter’s masts will hold. Shake the reefs! Full sail!”
“Aye, Cap’n. You heard her, lads! Slow and steady, though. One hand for yourself, one for the ship!”
The crew scrambled into the ratlines.
“She’s a good ship, Captain,” Ensara ventured. “I like how she handles.”
“Who’s left to manage your old ship, Ensara?” Mirian asked.
“The third mate. He’s only fair, but my sailmaster’s got a good head on his shoulders. They might be a little shorthanded, unless they picked up some more crew.”
“Probably not,” Mirian guessed. “They’re in as much of a hurry as we are. You think there’s any chance of us catching her?”
“We might,” Ensara said. “She’s overdue for careening. But her holds are empty. And she can fly a lot more canvas than the Daughter. Not to mention Rajana might throw spells to keep her moving.”
“I don’t think Rajana’s that sort of wizard. Although you never know.”
They followed the ship through the long hours, at first only seeing the Marvel as lightning slashed down, but then the squall blew out and the stars peeped out from behind the curtain of clouds, and they could see the Marvel’s outline as they slowly gained.
In the sky behind them still loomed a mass of dark clouds.
Finally, in the predawn light, the lookout reported sight of the reef chain known as the Lizard Kings. In ancient times, Jekka’s forebears had carved huge images of lizardfolk into the towering rocks. Time and tide had worn them down and dulled the details, but the brooding heads still rose above the sea, and the coming dawn outlined their frilled silhouettes. So sharp were the rocks around them that ships usually gave them a wide berth. Not Ensara’s vessel, though. It veered two points to port and headed straight on.
“They’re going to tear out their keel, aren’t they?” Ensara asked him.
Jekka hissed. He hoped they would. And yet, as he held the lizardfolk compass he saw that the Marvel’s heading was dead-on.
If the ship crashed, it meant there was no gate and everything had been for naught. And as much as he wanted to find the gate, Jekka felt a strange sense of relief at the thought it might be closed. He couldn’t explain why, even to himself.
Just as he thought the Marvel was done for, a blue-gray mist formed between two of the great stone images. Bright red lights blossomed in the cavities of their eye sockets.
“I’ll be damned,” Ensara breathed. “There’s nothing back of that but sharp rocks.”
“No,” Jekka told him. “That is the Veil, raised by the sight of the old kings, who have given their return gaze to the ship. That is the gate in the sea, to the island of my people.” He looked down to the compass, now glowing from within. “Mirian, they will reach there first.”
“Sail ho!”
This time the call came from Caligan, upon the stern. As one, Ensara and Mirian called: “Where away?”
“Aft, two points to starboard,” came the answer.
Mirian faced the man at the wheel, her voice low. “I’ll thank you, Ensara, to let me answer the lookout aboard my ship.”
“Apologies, Captain. Old habits.” He tried a smile.
Jekka saw Mirian hurry aft, but he couldn’t tear his eyes from the Marvel as its prow struck that line of blue mist. He fully expected to hear the gut-wrenching din of the ship smashing on the rocks that lay just beyond, and to see its stern swing and twist dizzily as it struck, but then the vessel passed beyond, as through a curtain.
And into another world. The world of his people.
27
INTO THE MIST
MIRIAN
She raised her spyglass and discovered a high three-master bearing down on them fast.
“How,” she asked long-limbed Caligan, the sailmaster, “did you miss her? She had to be coming up on us for hours!”
“She came out of the squall behind us, Captain!”
Mirian steadied her arm with her other hand as she searched the deck. She didn’t recognize the ship—it looked like a typical south-seas rig with Sargavan lines, but …
There, along the rail, stood a native warrior, his own glass winking at the dawn.
Mirian cursed. “It’s the damned Mzali. He must have a sea witch!” She frowned. They might have to recruit one of their own from now on. Jeneta was a healer, not an elemental magic worker.
She studied the pursuer, then twisted round the spyglass to consider the lizard statues. The Marvel was gone, and the veil that had lifted between the two largest statues had vanished with it. Now there were only the great carved rocks and the reef that lay beyond them, jagged as shark’s teeth in the dawn. And less than a quarter hour away, at their speed. The question was whether they’d arrive before their enemy caught them.
“Jekka.” She stepped to her brother. “How long an opening do we have?”
“I don’t understand.”
“You told me we could only cross at dawn. How long is ‘dawn’?”
“Until the sun stands a hand’s height above the water.”
That wasn’t an especially precise guideline. It depended upon the size of the hand, not to mention the length of the arm. Mirian looked to Ensara. “You think we can reach those reefs before that?”
“Aye, just. If that other ship doesn’t catch us. But if we’re going in full speed, and the eyes don’t work, we won’t be able to turn. We’ll break into kindling.”
He was right. “I’d planned to ease in, but the best laid plans … Can you keep a steady hand?”
“Aye.”
“I can’t have you turning off—”
“I’m in till the end with you, Captain. I at least owe you that.”
“Damned right you do,” she said, though she regretted it a little. His did seem a steady hand, steadier at least than that of Gombe, who always preferred working aloft to the helm.
Ensara swung them a point to starboard. Just as Mirian opened her mouth to correct him, he steadied his hands on the wheel. He had an instinctive feel for the ship and its limitations.
For all that, she would still rather have had Rendak there.
“Cap’n,” Caligan called from the stern, “those bastards are closing, fast!”
The sun had climbed halfway up over the distant spread of the Sargavan coast, a crescent of blinding crimson and gold.
The great statues of the Lizard Kings loomed like malevolent spectres, more than a dozen of them, their mouths wide as if they longed for a banquet of broken timber. Jekka stared once more at the compass, pointing unerringly between the two largest. She saw the spray on the rocks just beyond them.
There was no longer need for a spyglass, for their pursuer loomed huge only a few ship-lengths back. If the newcomer had ballistae, the Daughter was done for.
But then Mirian realized the ship probably had no intention of sinking them. It probably meant to close and ride through on their tail. How else could it get through without eyes on its prow?
“Ivrian!” she called, and soon the slim, well-dressed lord stood beside her. He still looked haggard and pale. “Take the wand and make things difficult for them. Aim for the waterline.”
He grinned. “Aye, Cap’n.”
She hoped the pursuers wouldn’t be throwing any spells of their own. Hopefully their sea witch was busy keeping wind in the sails. Hopefully Telamba couldn’t throw a flaming net several ship-lengths. But then, if they meant to ride through after them, they wouldn’t be trying to sink the ship.
She hurried back to Ensara. He and the crew in the rigging stared as one at the great Lizard Kings and the reefs beyond them. “Steady as she goes, Ensara!”
“How close do I get before their eyes catch fire?” he asked Jekka.
The lizard man was so intent on his compass that he didn’t hear him.
“Close as you have to,” Mirian answered.
She looked back to the stern rail where Ivrian was leveling his wand. He fired once, twice. Emerald bolts struck their pursuer’s planks above the foaming bow wake.
Then he changed his aim and blew a hole through the mainsail.
This provoked immediate shouting, for the fist-sized bolt of acid instantly ate a widening hole. The sail tore and sailors rushed to fight the flapping canvas. The ship fell back.
“Archers!” a voice screamed from the other ship, and a line of men converged upon the larger ship’s foredeck. Mirian rushed back to consult with Ivrian, watching as the archers drew back on their bows.
Ivrian’s eyes were wide. “Damn.”
“Shoot first!” Mirian cried. There wasn’t time to explain that archers were unlikely to aim well. Not only did they have to shoot around their own bowsprit, their ship and their target were constantly moving.
“Captain!” It was Ensara. “It’s not working!”
One of the archers dropped, screaming, as Ivrian’s shot went home. The archers looked more like mercenaries than natives. They scattered as Ivrian fired a second time. Telamba screamed at them to hold position.
Mirian might have grinned, except when she reached the wheel she saw Ensara was right. The Daughter’s prow slid closer and closer to the gap between the central statues. They were a ship-length out now. What if Jekka, in his eagerness, was wrong? What if they’d missed their window and the gateway wouldn’t open because the sun was too high, or what if only one ship could pass through each day? They’d be smashed against the rocks.
Ensara gripped the wheel with white knuckles. Jekka stood stiff beside him.
“Maybe the eyes on our ship weren’t placed right,” Ensara said. “Did you polish them? Maybe they were out of magic.”
“Shut up,” Mirian snapped. “Steady as she goes.”
There was no longer room to turn. The waves crashed against the titanic statues. Were they real giant lizards, they might have reached down to smash the ship.
“My sister,” Jekka began.
And then the eyes in the great statues bloomed with scarlet light and a vast curtain of glowing blue mist spread before them.
A moment later, the bowsprit touched the Veil and passed through. Gombe and the front half of the ship vanished within. Mirian’s jaw clenched as she suddenly knew an altogether different kind of fear. Suppose that it wasn’t really a proper gate at all, but just a death trap?
“Are you ready, my sister?” Jekka asked her.
Mirian looked to Jekka just as the mist struck them. “I’m ready, my brother.”
And they passed through.
28
ROUGH PASSAGE
MIRIAN
Shifting mist surrounded them on every side, alive with tendrils of glowing light so thick Mirian could barely see past the ship’s rails. She shouted for sails to be reefed and men scrambled up the lines to ease the sails and drop their speed. “Gombe, drop a line and give me depth!”
“Captain,” Ensara said, “the ship’s sluggish.”
“Explain,” she snapped.
“It just doesn’t feel right,” he answered. “The wheel has too much play.”
“Best figure it out, Ensara,” Mirian said. “Jekka, did those books say anything about this mist?”
“It said a sea of mists lay beyond the Veil.”
That’s what he’d said earlier. Only now was she realizing she had assumed she knew what that meant.
She couldn’t see Gombe, but there was no missing the worry in his voice as he called to her from the prow. “I don’t think there’s water down there, Captain! My line’s not hitting anything—not water, not land beneath! We’re sailing on the mist!”
Ensara’s shocked look would have been comical if she hadn’t felt the same way.
A pinnacle of rock rose along the port beam.
“Our first landmark,” Jekka said. “Prepare to bear to port.”
“How do I do that if we’re floating on mist?” Ensara asked. “No wonder she feels weird!”
“Give it a shake and see how much play you have,” Mirian suggested.
Ensara spun the wheel and the ship shifted slightly. So whatever was keeping them afloat at least responded a little like water. Another worry came to her. If that ship was right behind them, could it have made it through before the Veil closed?
“Ivrian,” Mirian called back. “Did our pursuers come through with us?”
“I can’t see them,” the answer floated back. But then, he wouldn’t be able to see far.
“Bear to port three degrees,” Jekka said, and Mirian shouted for the crew to adjust the sails accordingly.
“Port, aye.” Ensara turned the wheel and the ship heeled.
“Easy, easy,” Mirian said.
“Sorry. Overcompensated for the extra play.”
“Look to starboard,” Jekka said.
An immense, round object the size of the Daughter materialized in the mist, resolving itself into a great lizardfolk head carved from green marble and studded with emeralds. The sailors marveled with one another.
“Eyes forward!” Mirian shouted.
“Another nears,” Jekka said.
They came upon a second head, just as large, this one with open maw. It had been decorated with gold and glittering bits of stone that sparkled like glass. The slitted eyes of the thing were immense rubies.
They drifted past. One ship-length, two—
“Starboard five points,” Jekka ordered. His voice was level, controlled, as if he had done this a hundred times. Mirian called to the crew to adjust sails once more.
“Starboard five points, aye,” Ensara answered, and spun the wheel. The ship creaked, heeled, turned. “We’re definitely not on waves. I’m not meeting much resistance at all.”
“Just as long as we keep floating.
“Be warned,” Jekka said. “We’re about to hit the first of the three currents.”
“All hands clap on!” Mirian shouted, and just in time, for the Daughter shuddered. The ship pitched forward, borne by unseen energies.
She heard Jekka counting quietly, methodically beside her, as though he had no care in the world. At eight he said, “Port twenty degrees!”
Ensara echoed the command, shifting the Daughter, and they blew past a reef that reached, clawlike, from starboard. A moment later they heard a rending crash, and a host of screams from somewhere aft.
“Ivrian?” Mirian called. Whatever that was sounded too far away for the Daughter.
“I think that was Telamba’s ship,” Ivrian called back.
Mirian found a tight-lipped smile on her face. The screams continued, as did the sound of smashing timbers.
The current seemed to have slowed. Nothing was visible but tendrils of mist glowing with green and blue energies. About them all was quiet save for a rising wind, like the wail of forgotten souls.
The ship lurched h
eavily to starboard. Mirian grabbed Jekka’s arm to steady herself.
The ship rocked, battered by a surge from port.
“We are halfway,” Jekka said to her questioning glance. “Ensara, ten points to starboard. We are approaching the inner circle and the last current.”
Once again the pirate captain repeated Jekka’s order. “Standing by.”
“Gods preserve us!” Ivrian’s plea mixed with colorful curses and even a series of male screams as the shattered hulk of a ship tumbled end over end in the mist directly aft, borne by some errant current in the swirling mist.
“Starboard!” Mirian cried.
Ensara scrambled with the wheel. What Mirian had taken for a ship was but the front third of one, shattered, trailing broken timber and bits of line. Incredibly, living men clung to the wreckage.
“Straighten us out,” Jekka cried. “We can’t miss the next current—”
“If I straighten us, we’ll hit them!” Ensara objected.
“If we don’t, we’ll sail off course!”
“You heard him, man!” Mirian ordered
Ensara groaned, swung the wheel as the hulk tumbled past their port side. “I think we might just ma—”
The ship shivered as the wreck brushed their port rail. The Daughter lurched further to starboard.
A figure leapt from the heaving deck before it was swept away. He landed in a crouch beside the rail and immediately stood. He was tall, muscular, and dressed in an emerald loincloth, his dark face painted with the white lines of a skull. He raised his gloved hand. From Ivrian’s description, she knew him immediately for Telamba.
Mirian ripped her cutlass free and charged him.
Her blade caught in Telamba’s gauntlet before the red glow in its center spread. Her strike broke the spell but didn’t cut the glove or even the warrior, though it forced him back. He snarled into her face.
“We’re clear!” Gombe shouted from the prow, and suddenly they burst into bright daylight. The ship’s deck heeled dangerously. Mirian couldn’t help lurching away from Telamba, who steadied himself at the rail.
“No,” Jekka cried. “Port, Ensara! Port!”
Pathfinder Tales--Through the Gate in the Sea Page 24
