The Ruling Sea

by Robert V. S. Redick

  The witch had an excited gleam in her eye. She meant the Jistrolloq, Thasha knew: but if they caught sight of her while still trapped in the cove it would be the last thing they ever saw.

  After his first explosive shout the captain had become extraordinarily calm. His voice when he raised it was deafening, but he spoke most of his orders softly to his lieutenants, who relayed them mast by mast along the ship. His face was emotionless; his eyes slid over the crew with an abstracted look. To Thasha, who had seen Rose spitting and furious over a misplaced pen, this subdued Rose was more unsettling than a thousand bellows.

  “Let us have topgallants, Mr. Alyash. But stand by to clew up the moment we clear the rock.”

  Alyash looked at the cove’s western headland. “Oppo, sir. I can hear that wind. Not that it’s doing us any good.”

  “Full parties to the braces nonetheless,” said Rose. “We’re going to have to swing the mains about like a lady’s parasol to scrape out of here.”

  The anchor went by the board: Frix and Fegin, wielding a two-man hawser saw, cut through the tree-thick line in a few dozen strokes. Thasha felt the sudden kick as they floated free, and turned just in time to see the mainsail flash open, like a white castle wall suddenly raised in their midst. The forecourse and spanker-course followed: the odd-numbered mainsails, far enough apart not to fight one another for the meager wind. Thasha raised her eyes even higher and saw men bending topsails. The upper canvas might catch a wind that the lower sails missed, but would all of them together give them speed enough to escape the cove in time? Between the stone cliffs the Chathrand stood nearly becalmed—even as the Jistrolloq raced toward them on the open fetch of the westerlies.

  Suddenly a vast noise erupted to port, followed by the screams of ten thousand birds. All eyes whirled toward Sandplume. From the highest point on the island, a column of scarlet fire was rising heavenward. Taller and taller it grew, until it resembled a great burning tree, while around it the seabirds rose in one contiguous mass of flapping terror. Many of the birds collided or wheeled out of control into the fire itself, where they blazed for an instant and were gone.

  “Silence, fore and aft,” boomed Rose over the cries of the sailors. “Mr. Coote, I want fire hoses ready at the bilge-pumps.”

  Even as he spoke the tree of flame blinked, trembled and was gone. But smoke still rose from the hilltop, and Thasha saw that the flame had set the brittle underbrush alight. She winced. All those blary nests.

  Then Rose’s hand closed on her shoulder. In a growl meant for her ears alone, he asked, “What in the Nine Pits is happening, girl?”

  “I don’t know anything about that flame,” she said, leaning away from him. “But there’s a man on Sandplume—a priest, maybe. He has the scepter that belonged to the old Mzithrini Father. Sathek’s Scepter, it’s called. I don’t know what it’s for.”

  “That’s it?”

  “That’s all I know, Captain.”

  Rose bent even lower, drawing her into a huddle that shut out the deck. In a throaty whisper, he asked, “Which one of them told you?”

  Thasha dared not say a word. Did he know about the ixchel after all? Then Rose glanced surreptitiously down at their feet, and Thasha’s skin went cold. There were other feet beside their own, other men, pressing close as if trying to listen in. Their boots were old and battered and darkly stained. Thasha felt the same whirling disorientation that came to her when she opened the Polylex, the same desire to turn away.

  Rose flashed her a knowing look. “You can tell me,” he said. “Was it Captain Mauloj, with the facial tic? Or old Levirac, with the bad teeth? Or Farsin, maybe—the one with raw meat on his breath?”

  Stiff with amazement, Thasha murmured: “N-no, sir. It was … someone else.”

  “Doesn’t matter. You keep them away from me. Say whatever you like, just order them to keep their distance. Only if Kurlstaf appears, you listen to every word he says and share it with me instantly, do you hear?”

  “But which one is he?” Thasha pleaded.

  “Kurlstaf, Captain Kurlstaf!” said Rose, exasperated. “The pansy with the lipstick and painted nails!” With that he released her and bellowed for Fiffengurt—only to find the quartermaster already at his elbow.

  “That flame was a signal to the Jistrolloq, Captain, or I’m a knave.”

  “Aye, Quartermaster,” said Rose. He turned forward and boomed again: “Tactical team to the quarterdeck. Mr. Alyash, have a look at the gun decks before you join us. Mr. Uskins, I want a report on the doings of the sorcerer: beat on his door until he opens it. And you—” He jabbed a finger at Thasha. “—close the shutters in that private palace of yours, then return to my side.”

  I’m going mad, Thasha told herself, running for the stateroom. My mind’s coming to pieces; I’ve always wondered what it would feel like and now I know.

  She was seeing the dead, seeing ghosts. They had vanished when Rose released her shoulder, without her ever catching a glimpse of their faces. But before she left the topdeck she had looked back at the captain, and there they were, milling about him like flies. They did not look monstrous—or rather, they looked monstrous in the same way Rose did: hard-bitten, brutal, weathered by years at sea. One was dressed like her great-uncle, in the old regalia of the Merchant Service. Two others wore the blue sash and high collar of the old Imperium: a uniform instantly familiar from the portraits that had adorned her father’s study, portraits of naval captains of the First Sea War. A fourth was dressed in brown, like the axe-wielding men who had chased her belowdecks. Yet another wore a frock coat with outlandish tails, and grimaced with muscle spasms.

  Why do they terrify us so? she couldn’t help thinking. But the Polylex had provided one answer. She could still hear Felthrup, reading aloud two nights before: A ghost is one thing by daylight and quite another in the dark. At nightfall would they become the faceless people she had seen in the blanë-sleep? Did that sort of creature visit the captain night after night? It would be enough to drive anyone mad.

  Rose was trying studiously to ignore the spirits, as if they were beggars ready to mob him at the least encouragement. No one else knew they were there. Except for me, she thought. Why me? Was she being punished, or warned perhaps? Is my father dead, and calling me from the land of the dead, and giving me a way to see him? Is he searching for me right now? The thought was like a bone in her throat.

  And still she sensed them around her: a soft tug at her sleeve, a moving shadow that vanished as she turned, a voice murmuring on an empty stair. We have him, it seemed to say, he’s lost to you forever, he’s ours—

  Clenched against the voices, she stepped out of the ladderway onto the upper gun deck and collided with Pazel, who was running in the opposite direction.

  At the sight of Thasha his face lit up. He seized her arms, grinning, whirled her around—and then, just as suddenly, his eyes became guarded and evasive, and he banished the smile from his face.

  “You’re—different,” he said.

  “Oh,” she laughed. “Yes. And so are you.”

  It was her first glimpse of him since the night of the dancing. His gaze slid to the deck. “Made it back alive, anyway,” he said.

  “So Fiffengurt told us,” she said pointedly. “And I suppose it’s good luck that we bumped into each other, since we may not be alive an hour from now.” Her anger with him was already rising to the surface. “Excuse me, I have to close the storm-shutters.”

  “Beat you to it,” he said. “The stateroom’s secured. Neeps is just finishing up.”

  “How is Dri?”

  “Worried. The ixchel girl Felthrup sent has never flown before.”

  Thasha glanced nervously about the passage: they were still alone. “Is it true, what Fiffengurt says?” she asked quietly. “That you saw the scar on Rose’s arm, I mean?”

  He nodded. “It’s true, but that doesn’t mean we can trust him. He’s still the craziest man on this ship, and one of the nastiest. Thasha … what’s
happened to you?”

  She knew he wasn’t talking about her nicks or bruises, or anything as simple as that. But how could she explain when she didn’t understand herself? “I stayed up late, reading the Polylex. What happened to you?”

  “A giant lizard breathed on me.”

  “Oh.”

  “And talked. It was terrible. Thasha, are you in love with Fulbreech?”

  “Maybe,” she said softly, glaring at him. Of course even maybe was an exaggeration; a truer reply would have been, Not yet, but where were you? But Pazel had no right to ask such questions. And Greysan didn’t cringe when they kissed.

  “I think you got older while I was gone,” he said.

  “Only by three days, you blary fool.”

  “They must have been Darkling Days,” said Pazel, making her laugh uncomfortably.*

  He reached for her again. Thasha stood frozen; Pazel made as if to brush her lips with his fingers. But some kind of doubt overcame him, and he ended up idiotically pressing her nose. He snatched back his hand, gaping like one bereft of speech.

  “I drank your blood,” he said at last. “On Simja, I mean. In the milk.”

  Thasha was frustrated almost to despair. “You are absolutely the weirdest boy I’ve ever met,” she said. Turning on her heel, she raced back up the ladderway to the topdeck.

  Thirty sails, and five hundred frightened men at the ropes, and terrible slow turns when the cliffs seemed close enough to touch—but they were gaining speed, and the mouth of the cove was ever nearer. Already the wind was freshening, the jibsails full and the topgallants tight and straining. Thasha looked at the headland, a black basalt cliff falling straight as a curtain into the sea, and half expected to see the Jistrolloq appear from behind it, with all her guns run out, and a horde of soldiers crowding her deck. It could happen at any time: Diadrelu had not been very precise about the distance.

  Rose was pulling every trick of speed a captain could in a desperate quarter hour, backing the topsails, sheeting the jibs to windward and leeward with each tack, even firing cannon from the bow so that the recoil might aid the men’s efforts at the braces. There was no hope of stealth, after all, not with that spy on the hilltop. With such a mismatch in fighting strength, moreover, the Jistrolloq had to know that they would run. But would they even get the chance?

  Pulling herself up the quarterdeck ladder, Thasha found all the senior officers assembled, plus Ott and Chadfallow, and a huge Turach with a broad forehead and cold blue eyes: Drellarek’s replacement, she presumed. She could no longer see any ghosts, although Uskins was pale enough to pass for one.

  “We’ll make it, surely?” he was saying. “We’ll just squeak out?”

  “How d’ye expect us to answer you?” said Elkstem irritably. “We don’t know how close she is. We don’t even know the windspeed out there.”

  “In five minutes we shall,” said Rose.

  The men were all clustered around him, between the binnacle and the rail. The captain was the only man not on his feet: he had sent for a stool and his campaign desk, and had them bolted securely to the deck. The stool was finished with some tawny hide, and swiveled; the desk looked like a large wooden box on legs. Then Rose sprung two latches and raised the lid. Inside was a writing space protected by walls on three sides, and half covered by a wooden canopy. There were small latched drawers, a stack of paper held down by battens, a plotting compass, an abacus and a knife.

  Thasha found the sight of that desk alarming, and she saw that some of the officers did as well. Was Rose about to lose himself in paperwork? Just how crazy was he?

  The captain began whittling a pencil. “Attend me,” he said, as if the group would dream of doing anything else. “This contest may end in minutes, or not for hours, or even days. If it ends swiftly we shall lose. The White Reaper is no idle nickname for the Jistrolloq. Isn’t that so, Mr. Uskins?”

  The first mate nodded. “Beyond a doubt, Captain. She’s a killer and she wants for nothing. An armored bow, she has, and four ship-shattering bow carronades. And a hundred and forty long guns down each flank.”

  “Twice our count,” said Rose, “and a crew drilled constantly in their use. This ship will be matchwood if the Jistrolloq rakes us with a broadside. And at a distance too they can best us. They’ll be better shots, and aiming for a bigger target. They will also be faster, in these waters. Our size is nothing but a hazard, in short, until we find large waves and tearing wind.”

  “Those may be close at hand, sir,” put in Alyash.

  “Don’t interrupt, Bosun!” snapped Fiffengurt. “The captain’s well aware of the conditions.”

  “That I am,” said Rose. “The storm brewing in the east will not be enough, however. Until the wind turns, Bramian herself will tame it. And there are shoals to either side of us, quelling the waves. No, we will not come into our own for two hours at the earliest. Until then we must stay alive. That means fire brigades, and chain-pumps, and any dead removed quickly to the surgical annex, lest the sight of them demoralize the crew. Uskins, you will restrict Byrd and Tanner to strategic fire until further notice: we don’t carry enough shot to waste it in a hopeless spray.

  “And give no face but fury to the crew. Fury, gentlemen: not nerves, not reassurance. Let them see nothing but the mortal danger of displeasing you. That will save them from worrying overmuch about the Jistrolloq. Now then, Ott: will the Black Rags strike us with sorcery?”

  (Obviously, Rose, whispered a voice from nowhere. Only Thasha and the captain raised their heads.)

  “Depend on it,” said Ott. “They have not brought Sathek’s Scepter all the way from Babqri just to send up a signal-flare.”

  “What can they do with the thing? Change the winds?”

  There were anxious hisses at the suggestion. But Ott shook his head. “I haven’t a clue,” he said, “but it was for that scepter that Arunis killed the Babqri Father.”

  “And Kuminzat’s daughter, as it happened,” said Rose. “Have we any other idea of their motives?”

  Alyash cleared his throat. “Captain Rose, the Father never quite believed in the Great Peace. And he had a particular fascination with the Chathrand. We were already in his sights. It may be that he had already shared his suspicions with Kuminzat and the other officers assembled for Treaty Day.”

  Rose pursed his lips, as though he found the remark disappointingly simple. After a moment he said, “Their greatest advantage may be that man on the hilltop. A view to either side of Sandplume could well decide this contest. What has become of your falcon, Mr. Ott?”

  An expression like none Thasha had ever seen on the man came over the spymaster’s face. It took her a moment to recognize it as sorrow. “I dispatched Niriviel the morning we landed on Bramian,” he said, “with orders to return within a day. He flew south into the Nelluroq, looking for sign of the Vortex. I fear he met with some … misfortune.”

  Thasha felt stricken. The bird had almost hated her, but it made no difference. There was something beautiful about his loyalty to Sandor Ott. She hated to imagine him alone over the fabled whirlpool, battling the winds, dropping at last into the depths.

  “Captain Rose,” she said, forcing herself back to the matter at hand.

  “What is it?” he demanded.

  “I don’t think they can change the winds. In fact I don’t think they can use the scepter well at all, if the Father’s dead. Only the most powerful mage-priests can use it safely. But the Father may have used it before he died, to make his sfvantskor stronger, or the ship itself.”

  “How in precious Pitfire could you know such things, girl?” scoffed Alyash.

  Thasha looked at him evenly. “I read a lot.”

  “What Thasaha says stands to reason,” said Chadfallow. “The priest cannot have meant to set the whole hill on fire, when he was standing atop it. He may even have perished in the blaze.”

  Rose turned on his stool. “First Mate, you spoke with Arunis?”

  “Aye, Captain. He’s p
rowling about the jiggermast even now.” Uskins drew a deep breath. “He was … of little help, sir.”

  “No help, you mean?”

  “He speculated that the sfvantskors present at the wedding ceremony had all boarded the Jistrolloq, Captain. And he said that the priest wielding Sathek’s Scepter could not fail to sense the presence of the Nilstone.”

  Rose looked thoughtful. “Lieutenant Khalmet,” he said.

  The blue-eyed soldier nodded. “Sir.”

  “Do you command the Turachs, now that Drellarek is dead?”

  “No, sir. That would be Sergeant Haddismal. The sergeant is inspecting the ranks, and begs your pardon for not attending this meeting himself.”

  “He does not have it,” said Rose. “Tell Haddismal never again to ignore a summons from the captain. And have him redouble the guard on the Shaggat Ness. I don’t want the sorcerer taking advantage of our circumstances to make some attempt to reach his king.”

  “Oppo, Captain. And if I might venture a thought, sir: release the Tholjassan, Hercól Stanapeth, and let him have his bow. We cannot have too many marksmen.”

  “Is that your commander’s advice?”

  “No, sir, merely my own. Sergeant Haddismal has not ventured an opinion.”

  Thasha was stunned by Khalmet’s words. Could he be on our side? A Turach, trained to throw his life away at a word from the Emperor?

  But the captain shook his head. “Stanapeth defied my orders, and sent five of your comrades to the surgery. He is not to be freed unless the sfvantskors themselves come over our rails. Do I make myself clear?”

  “Perfectly, Captain.”

  “Mr. Uskins,” said Rose, “did Arunis have nothing else to say?”

  Uskins hesitated. “Sir, he told me we should drop sail and surrender, before the Reaper cuts us down.”

  A brief silence fell. Thasha saw Rose’s jaw tighten, and his gaze turn inward. He folded the knife, looked down at the blank paper before him, and suddenly began to sketch.

  “Time to change tack,” he said, without looking up.