Voidhawk - Lost Soul

by Halstead, Jason

  “Aye, Captain,” she said. She smiled at him, ready to show her prowess. Dexter noticed the bruises were fading and the cuts were healing. Jenna still didn’t trust Celia but his wife was too embarrassed by her temper tantrum to say anything bad about the young woman.

  Dexter hurried up to the deck, stopping only to grab his sword he’d taken years ago from the elf that had tried to capture Jenna the last time they’d been to Port Freedom. He girded it about his waist and marveled at how the void seemed to be getting smaller.

  Dexter reached the bow deck and joined Tasha, Xander, and Jenna. Tasha looked resplendent in her gleaming golden plate mail. “Think I’m still the admiral?” Dexter mused aloud to let them know he’d walked up behind them.

  “Do I look like a butterfly?” Jenna quipped.

  “Captain, their weapons are loaded and manned,” Tasha said, pointing to the ballista on the bow of each scout ship.

  “That’s not very friendly,” he muttered. He turned and glanced back at the ‘Hawk. Celia had been working on improving their sails and other features of the ship, trying to give it some extra speed. Ballista would be useless against the ‘Hawk. On the outside it looked normal enough but Dexter had called in some favors with the elders. Of course a hardened hull wouldn’t do him any good if they tore up the sails that captured the solar winds. “I don’t see any hailing flags either.”

  “Sir, we’re almost in range.”

  “Ain’t no gravity or air but what the ‘Hawk brings with us the void,” Dexter reminded the Golden Lady. He stepped over to the weapon the elders had outfitted the Voidhawk with and patted it appreciatively. It resembled a ballista in that it fired a steel tipped bolt, but there the similarity ended. The weapon used magic, not mechanical arms, to propel the tree trunk size bolt. “We’re always in range. We don’t have the crew to reload the Lumberjack, so we wait until they shoot first. Then we wait some more to make sure we don’t miss. Then we turn and hit them with the other one.”

  They sailed on in silence, closing the distance with the three elven vessels. Dexter began to think his fears were unfounded, they were less than a minute from merging atmospheres with the lead ship and still nothing untoward had occurred. Almost as if his relaxing shoulders were a signal, there was movement aboard the three ships.

  “Captain, they’ve fired on us!” Jenna shouted.

  “Some gratitude,” Dexter muttered. “Bring our bow up!”

  Dexter snapped orders to the crew. Keshira, Trilliana, and Sayara scrambled to work the sails to help Celia raise the ship’s pitch. A few seconds later Dexter felt the first thud of a ballista bolt striking the hull of his ship. A second vibration gave proof to the impact of a second bolt, but the third shot wide to the starboard.

  “That’ll do, bring us down and line her up with the lead ship.”

  The bow dropped, bringing their opponents back into view. Figures lined the railings of each ship, pistols drawn and pointed at the Voidhawk. Normally it wouldn’t be a concern, the power of a ship’s helm and the magical bubble of air and gravity that surrounded it swept small objects aside. A catapult, ballista, or shot from a bombard might break through the repelling field but an arrow or bullet would not. Unless the battling ships were within each other’s bubbles.

  “Captain, we’ve merged air!” Tasha cried out. Jenna continued to give orders, bringing the ship around to line up for the shot.

  Dexter nodded. Now things were going to get interesting. He waited for the perfect moment. “Fire!”

  Tasha spoke the magical command word for the ballista. The bolt, twice as long as a man and as wide around as Dexter’s thigh, burst out of the tube so fast wind buffeted the four of them. The bolt streaked through the void and hit the elven ship on its port bow, a few feet beneath the deck. It punched through the hull and smashed through the wooden bones of the ship. The main mast, which held a triangular sail, canted to the side. The ship listed badly, supplies from within the hold spilled out of the gaping hole in the hull.

  Xander pumped his fist in the air and cheered at the direct hit. “Sir, she’s breaking up!” Tasha cried out.

  “Bookworm, learn anything useful in the last six years?”

  Xander pulled his sleeves back. He reached into a pocket and pulled out a small lead ball. “Think you can hit their mainsail?”

  Dexter scoffed at the wizard. He drew his pistol and fired it at one of the ships, then hurried to pour fresh fire powder into the barrel and pack it tightly. By the time he was ready Xander held the bullet suspended in the air between his hands. Dexter noted the faint bluish glow the lead gave off.

  The first enemy pistol shots struck against the ship, one coming so close between the two men that Xander ducked back and nearly lost his concentration. Dexter stepped closer to the wizard, holding the pistol in place so Xander could place the ball in the end of the barrel.

  Dexter wasted no time in ramming it down the pipe, then he turned and pulled the hammer back. He paused, staring in surprise at his pistol. He could feel the cold seeping out of it and into his hand.

  “Hurry!” Xander warned. “It grows colder with each passing second!”

  Dexter aimed and fired, then dropped his pistol to the deck and grabbed his aching hand. Dexter stared at the wizard, uncertain if he should thank the man or punch him. His fingers were tingling as warmth began to return to them. He followed the wizard’s gaze and saw the enemy ship’s mainsail hanging stiffly from the ropes.

  “Shoot it again!” Xander cried.

  Dexter searched for his pistol on the deck and reached for it, but by the time he’d picked it up another shot rang out. Jenna watched, smoke rising from the end of her pistol. A moment later the elven mainsail shattered and fell to the deck in broken chunks. Xander wooped in delight.

  “One left,” Dexter said, reloading his pistol. He looked back up in time to see something bright and yellow slam into him. He grunted, all the wind knocked out of him, and slammed into the deck.

  When Dexter’s head stopped ringing he sat up and looked around, trying to make sense of it. “What in the void…”

  Tasha lay several feet away, one leg hanging over the edge of the forecastle towards the main deck. She looked up at him and grunted, then pulled herself to her knees and then her feet. “Are you all right, Captain?”

  Dexter shook his head and stood up. His hip and back hurt, but other than that he seemed to be okay. “What happened?”

  “The other elven ship reloaded,” Jenna said. “If you’re done lazing around, I mean to turn our tail to them.”

  Dexter nodded. “Aye, let’s do it.” He turned and started walking towards the stairs to the main deck but his hip protested. “You do it, I’ll keep an eye on the bow.”

  “Captain, I—”

  “You done good,” Dexter stopped Tasha. “Get back there and gut that ship!”

  Jenna, Tasha, and Xander made their best speed for the stern castle while the crew worked furiously to turn the ship about. Dexter ducked low when the two ships were briefly broadside to each other, avoiding the sporadic pistol fire that struck the deck and hull. He heard a yelp from behind him, a cry of pain that meant someone had been hurt. Dexter fired back, but he only had time to reload and shoot a second round before the Voidhawk pulled away.

  Remembering that he’d heard Trilliana cry out, Dexter risked the exposure to take a look. He saw saw she’d been grazed by a bullet. She was working again, ignoring the blood that ran down her side and stained the scarves wrapped around her belly and hips that she pretended were clothing. He turned back and alternated staring off the bow and looking behind them to try and see what was going on.

  The ‘Hawk had barely completed her about face when Jenna cried out for Tasha to loose the stern ballista. Dexter leaned against the railing, trying to see over the aft of his ship. Tasha and Xander cried out, giving him hope. Even a glancing blow against an elven scout ship with one of the massive bolts would be enough to knock it out of commission.

 
; Dexter saw the broken bolt that Tasha had shielded him from lying next to the Lumberjack. He limped over and picked it up, amazed that she hadn’t been skewered. Even plate armor shouldn’t have been able to stop a steel tipped three foot long bolt thicker than his thumb. He shook his head and held onto it. Tasha deserved a trophy for surviving, let alone saving him.

  Jenna and the others made their back to the deck, Jenna ordering the ship to come about again. As it swung around Dexter saw only wreckage from the enemy vessel. Sailors clung to the scattered remains, though with the magic of the ships helm undone they were bobbing in the Voidhawk’s gravity plane and being slowly pushed out of the bubble of atmosphere.

  “Here,” Dexter said, holding out the bolt to Tasha. “Again, thank you.”

  She grinned and glanced at Jenna, then back to Dexter. “Doing my job, sir. There’s not a time I can’t remember you risking your life to save someone that needed it.”

  “A smarter person would learn from my mistakes,” he gave her a wink then turned away from her. He noted Jenna’s raised eyebrow but he calmed it with another wink sent her way.

  With the ship now sailing back towards the disabled vessel, Dexter had a chance to take in the damage done by Xander’s magic. His eyes widened. The mast had broken off as well and the ship showed signs of crumbling. A few bodies littered the deck and others were bobbing in the gravity plane trying to swim through air in an attempt to get away from the doomed vessel.

  “Xander?”

  “Oh!” Xander said, his eyes wide. “I tapped into the ether that the void fills, using it as a portal of sorts to drain the energy from the lead into the ether. It should close itself after a few minutes.”

  “It’s been a few minutes,” Dexter pointed out.

  “So it has. We should probably be somewhere else,” Xander suggested.

  Dexter studied the scout and winced when a loud crack resounded across the space between them. A large section of the deck fell inward, the impact sending visible fissures along the outer hull. A moment later it shifted and began to fall apart. “Aye! Jenna, get us out of here!”

  “What about the survivors?” Xander asked.

  Dexter turned to the men slowly being pushed back towards the frozen ship. The sailors on the other ships were already lost to the void. He shook his head. “They came with death on their minds, let them find it.”

  Chapter 7

  “Can’t believe elves would attack us,” Jenna protested.

  Dexter leaned over the table on the bridge, studying the star charts. They were a week away from Port Freedom, but only a day and a half from the border between the elves and the Federation. “You forget there’s a couple different kinds of elves,” he said. “There’s the kind you dealt with and there’s the kind that want the old ways back.”

  “But how would they know where to find us?”

  Dexter glanced at Celia on the helm. She turned her head slowly and stared back at him. Her eyes were unfocused but she offered a faint smile. Dexter smiled back before turning away. Jenna’s eyes narrowed as she saw the exchange.

  “We’ve got one wizard on this boat,” he stalled her arguments.

  “Two. Trilliana.”

  Dexter waved his hand, “Fine, two, but Xander says she’s not very good. Point is we got nobody on the ‘Hawk that can tell anyone where we are. More likely they know where we’re going.”

  “Port Freedom?”

  “Aye.”

  “So there’s more to it than just Rolxoth wanting Port Freedom and thinking we can help,” Jenna deduced.

  Dexter nodded. “Seems like it, and there ain’t a thing about it that’s pretty.”

  “So what do we do?”

  “We got no choice, we keep going.” Dexter turned away from the chart. “Could use some old friends, though.”

  Jenna bit her lip and nodded. “Never thought I’d want Rosh back.”

  Dexter smirked. “Don’t reckon he’s an option. I was thinking of Bekka, Logan, and Bailynn. I got a feeling that a healer will come in mighty handy.”

  “I don’t know how I could face Bailynn,” Jenna admitted. She glanced at Celia and lowered her voice, “Not after what I done to Celia.”

  “You told me you and ‘Lynn had a talk about that sort of thing a while back, long before them three took off,” Dexter reminded her. “And there’s not a one of us on the boat that don’t understand what happened. Maybe it wasn’t the best, but even Celia says she earned a beating.”

  “Nobody deserves what I did,” Jenna whispered. “It’s what my father would have done. No—it’s what he would have ordered done, he wouldn’t have bloodied his hands.”

  “Does that make you a bad person, or does it mean you understand how it was they came to be the way they was?”

  Jenna’s head jerked around to look at him. Her eyes were narrowed at first but they widened as his words sank in. “You’re a rare man,” she said.

  “Good thing too, if there were too many of me running around I’d get mighty tired of myself!”

  Jenna shook her head. “The void might be a better place with a few more of you.”

  Dexter resisted the urge to reflect on the mistakes he’d made in life. He’d once told Rosh that he imagined just about every son of a bitch had earned some admiration at one point or another. He shrugged her compliment off and decided it was time to get back to work. “We got another day until we hit the border. Keep your eyes and wits sharp. I’m off to see if Xander’s got any finger wiggling he can do to help keep us out of a jam. Why don’t you go let Tasha know it’s her turn on deck.”

  “You’ve been leaning heavy on Tasha,” Jenna observed, her voice dangerously neutral.

  Dexter nodded. “She’s been trying to impress me for years now, ‘spect it’s time I gave her credit for it.”

  Jenna frowned, which prompted a laugh from Dexter. “What’s that for?” She grumbled.

  “You got nothing to worry about, Empress,” Jenna opened her mouth to protest but Dexter put a finger to her lips to silence her. “You’ll always be my Queen,” he winked at her.

  Jenna blushed and started to look away. She changed her mind and hugged him tightly before pressing her lips to his. She broke away enough to ask, “So what about Tasha?”

  “First Keshira wants to pleasure us and now you want to include Tasha? We’re going to need a bigger cabin!”

  Jenna slapped him on the shoulder.

  Dexter grinned through the temporary pain. “Do as you’re told, First Mate. Tasha’s the number three sailor on this boat. We could use a few more deckhands, they’re near exhausted from the long shifts even with Keshira able to handle more than a sailors got a right to.”

  Jenna nodded. “She’s a good choice, I think.” She gave him another peck on the lips then stepped away. “I’ll send her up.”

  Dexter watched her walk out of the bridge, her hips swaying. Tasha was sitting at Jia’s bedside. Jenna’s good spirits would fall quickly when she saw their daughter’s body lying nearly lifeless on her bed. After the door shut he walked over to Celia and waited until the girl noticed him.

  “Captain?”

  “You hear all that?”

  She nodded.

  That was good enough for him. If she’d heard what Jenna said then she knew how Jenna felt. The rest she could figure out on her own. “Life on the ‘Hawk’s not quite like racing between moons, is it?”

  She grinned, accepting the topic change without fuss.

  Dexter nodded. “Good job.” He turned and left the bridge, heading to the former stateroom Xander had been given.

  * * * *

  “Captain, we’re coming up on the border of the empire and Federation.”

  Dexter looked up from the table to Tasha. The meal they’d prepared was a mix of dried meats and fruits, as well as the standby of elven bread and cheese. It was dry, tasteless, and about as exciting as chewing on the table.

  “Not unless the Feds expanded, we should be outside any claim to t
he void they got.”

  Tasha frowned. “I thought our course took us through Federation void?”

  Dexter shook his head. “Charts we got are old, from before the elves took Port Freedom. Still, even then Port Freedom wasn’t part of the Federation, it hasn’t been for over a hundred years. That’s what made Port Freedom a good place for smugglers and thieves, next to both realms but outside of both.”

  “Why was it allowed to exist for so long?” Tasha voiced her confusion.

  “I used to wonder that,” Dexter admitted. “Then somebody slapped me across the face with a title. Turns out even the biggest nations can use a place like Port Freedom when something needs done that best not be public knowledge.”

  She nodded, a tilt of her head showing she was considering his words carefully. “Whatever the border is, we’re near to it.”

  “Aye, just as well. A decent meal would do us all good.” He tossed a wrinkled apple slice back on his plate. “Another week of this then.”

  “We need a cook,” Xander moaned.

  Dexter nodded. “They’ve got big shoes to fill.”

  Xander lowered a piece of cheese he’d been about to bite into. He cocked his head and frowned. His brow smoothed as a smile slipped onto his face. “I get it, that’s a joke! Jodyne had small shoes, she was a dwarf, but she did a fine job.”

  Dexter sighed. “Think maybe you shoved your head in one too many books.”

  Xander chuckled. “Perhaps. We need more crew in general, Trilliana does little good on the deck. Her true talent lies in the arcane.”

  “We’re needy bastards,” Dexter agreed. “Might be you noticed our luck’s not been too good on trusting people lately?”

  The wizard grimaced, then hid it behind a drink of his water. Tasha spared the wizard any further embarrassment by asking, “Should I wake up Jenna, Celia, and Trilliana?”

  “Why? You planning on tipping off the border patrols?”

  Tasha’s mouth gaped open for a moment, then she clamped it shut. “No Captain, of course not.”