by J. C. Hendee
9. Fate and Other Mistakes
Karras, still soaked and shivering, ran up the ramp to his family’s ship. He was too angry to even notice his chill.
The thänæ and shirvêsh crouched beside the prince at the deck’s midpoint. Fiáh’our dismissed the two warriors who had helped carry the man. As that pair turned away, Karras grab Ionlak, the ship’s watchman, by his shirt.
“Why did you lower the ramp for him?” he demanded, pointing at the thänæ. “You take orders from only my father or mother… or one of the family!”
Ionlak’s weathered face went slack as he looked at Fiáh’our and back to Karras.
“But… but…” he sputtered, “with everything happening… and all I saw and… he is thänæ… with a shirvêsh!”
Karras released Ionlak and threw up his hands. “He is a menace is what he is! Now get into the port and wait for my father. Warn him before he comes aboard.”
Ionlak nodded and quickly scurried down the ramp.
Karras was about charge the thänæ when a pounding noise rumbled in the night. The sound of Seattâsh’s great drums rolled down the mountainside, calling out as Fiáh’our had demanded. Everything and everyone bent to the old blusterer’s will, and Karras tromped across the deck.
“You” he shouted at Fiáh’our. “Get off this ship!”
The shirvêsh rose as the thänæ looked over his shoulder with no emotion on his face. Gän’gehtin had a knife in hand, likely prepared to cut the prince free, and he took a deep breath.
“We mean no disrespect to you or your family,” Gän’gehtin said with effort, “but this vessel is the only one available. It is the surest way to return the prince safely. The royal family is out looking for him, even as—”
“Then let them come for him,” Karras cut in. “He is safe here until they do… and I want him gone.” And he turned his ire on Fiáh’our.
“I think not,” the thänæ said, looking away and down at the prince.
Karras could not see the prince with Fiáh’our’s bulk in the way, and he took a step.
“Do not,” Gän’gehtin warned.
“And what will you do,” Fiáh’our added, still facing away, “if more Maksœín come looking for their too-long away comrades?”
Karras halted.
“Whether or not the Witenons know what is happening,” Fiáh’our went on, “or even if they disapprove, the prince is still in danger. He would make a fine bit of favor barter, if stolen back. I will see him to his family.”
“No… you will give the prince to me.”
Karras jumped slightly and turned at that deep gravelly voice. A dark form stood toward the ship’s bow before the squat half-high forecastle. Even Fiáh’our rose as Gän’gehtin spun toward that voice.
“Only I can assure his safety, his well-being,” the newcomer said. “I have the full faith of his family… not you, thänæ.”
Karras tensed, as he looked upon a black-clad rughìr male.
The stranger could have passed unnoticed at night if not for lantern light sparking on the steel tips of his armor’s black leather scales. Two war daggers tucked into his belt, much like Fiáh’our’s, had black sheathes with engraved fixtures to match the armor. His wild hair was black as well, though shot with gray like the thänæ’s.
“Who are you?” Karras demanded. “And what are you doing on my—”
“Hassäg’kreig,” Gän’gehtin whispered.
That one word took the breath out of Karras. He back-stepped once before stopping himself.
The black-clad one fixed emotionless, cold eyes on Gän’gehtin, and the shirvêsh quickly bowed his head, dropping the knife to clatter upon the deck. For an instant, Karras actually feared for the shirvêsh, though he was more afraid for himself.
The Hassäg’kreigi—“Stonewalkers”—came only in the wake of death, or so it was said.
He had never before seen one. No one had that he knew, except his mother’s father. That had been years before his own birth and a scant tale too tall to be believed, but his people often lived well passed a century and a half.
Hassäg’kreigi only came for departed thänæ, and only a few of them at that. Those most honored among the “honored ones” were taken “into stone”… into the underworld of the Hassäg’kreigi to rest forever among the greatest of the Rughìr. It was whispered that even Death bowed to the Hassäg’kreigi, as had the shirvêsh.
How had this one gotten aboard the ship, completely unnoticed?
“Give the prince to me, thänæ,” the dark-clad one said. “You have done all possible for him. No one could ask more than that, and the rest is my service.”
All the while, Fiáh’our had remained silent and unmoving. He still stood above the prince, and Karras could see neither the old man’s face nor the human’s. This whole night kept growing in madness.
Barbarians far from their home shores had captured a prince of Malourné and sought to ransom him, by whatever custom. A Witenon convoy rested off shore in the dark waiting for what on its way to where? No one knew how a prince had ended up in the open ocean well beyond Malourné’s immense bay. The shirvêsh claimed the young man was not ill, and yet what Karras had seen said otherwise. Unlike the thänæ’s insane ways, there was something worse in the prince’s eyes. And now…
Karras stared at a hassäg’kreig, who should have been barely more than the tall tales of the Bäynæ. In that silence, he kept trying to think of something to do or to say.
“No,” Fiáh’our barked at the dark one.
“Fiáh’our!” Gän’gehtin whispered in warning. “Do not interfere with a guardian of our honored dead.”
“I see nothing here for them,” the thänæ rumbled. “The prince is neither rughìr nor thänæ, though neither is his honor in question.”
Karras stiffened, wondering at this, and inched a little closer to peer around Fiáh’our.
Prince Freädherich lay upon the deck, though he looked at no one as he breathed with too much effort. Craning his neck, he rolled his head and stared blankly toward the ship’s far rail wall. That contorted movement exposed those too-perfect triplets of lines along both sides of his upper throat. With his arms already unbound, though not his knees or ankles, the prince curled into a ball and plucked weakly at his remaining leather lashings.
“There are things you do not know, and I cannot tell,” the hassäg’kreig answered in a voice like crushed gravel.
“Then they do not matter to me,” the thänæ shot back.
“It is what his family would want.”
“Fiáh’our, listen to him,” the shirvêsh admonished, barely raising his eyes. “We do not know what this is about.”
“Then the family can deal with you,” Fiáh’our told the dark one, ignoring everyone else. “If the prince so wishes.”
Karras eyed the prince again, and as he looked upon that ill or addle-minded human, he could not help but think…
He had spent the last few years trying to avoid what his parents, family, and clan expected of him. He had seen marriages arranged for his siblings, and what they endured for the sake of maintained honor in such alliances. That would not happen to him, and perhaps it was this that drove him to a sudden strange compassion.
It should not happen to anyone.
There was one person here who should decide his own fate, if he could, though no one had asked him.
Karras rushed in, snatched up the knife, and instantly hooked the blade’s tip under the lashings around the prince’s knees. At the snap of the leather…
“Stop, now!”
Karras flinched at the dark-clad one’s command, but the prince struggled up on his haunches. In the nearest lantern’s light, his eyes glowed aquamarine, and without taking those eyes off Karras, the prince groped at the bindings on his ankles.
“Wait…” Gän’gehtin whispered. “Perhaps we should—”
Karras hooked the knife’s tip into the prince’s last bonds and severed them.
“Get a hold of him!” shouted the hassäg’kreig.
At that one’s sudden charge, the thänæ stepped out to block the way.
“Keep your place!” Fiáh’our warned.
Even then, Karras stared in shock. There was so much sudden relief in the prince's glittering storm-sea eyes. A shallow sigh slipped from the man, like that of someone who had finally been freed from the agony of a deep wound. Even with all that was happening, Karras felt a weight had suddenly lifted as he saw the prince soft smile of relief.
Prince Freädherich rolled to his feet and bolted for the ship’s far rail. Before Karras could even rise, the man threw himself over the side.
Everyone on deck stood dumbfounded, until they heard the splash.
10. Fishing with a Kitten
“Blessed Bäynæ, what is this madness?”
Fiáh’our could not believe his old eyes as he looked to where the prince had leaped from the ship. Gän’gehtin rushed the rail, leaning over and sidling left and right as he looked over the edge. Karras got there just before Fiáh’our, and in the darkness it was hard to make out any lingering ripple rings upon the water.
“What have we done?” Gän’gehtin whispered in shock.
Fiáh’our had no answer and twisted about to look along the deck. The hassäg’kreig was nowhere to be seen, gone as silently as he had appeared. Fiáh’our began to panic as well.
They had stolen back a prince of Malourné from a bunch of Maksœ’ín only to lose him again through the young man’s hidden madness. Signals had been sent to the royal family searching for him, and any ship that bore them might already be headed this way.
“What was… I… he… I did not…,” Karras began babbling.
“Why did you not listen?” Gän’gehtin snarled.
Karras stiffened. “How could I know—”
“You bull-headed fool!” Gän’gehtin cut in, jabbing a finger at Fiáh’our. “I told you we did not understand all that—”
“Enough bawling and wailing,” Fiáh’our shouted back. “That will not make the prince pop up like a bit of cork.”
Looking down upon the water, he saw no sign of the prince resurfacing. Was the young man trying to drown himself or just swimming away beneath the surface? Either way, every passing moment slimmed the chance of his recovery.
“We have to get him back,” Fiáh’our said.
“And how?” Gän’gehtin demanded. “We cannot swim.”
All Karras did was grip the rail and stare over the side.
Fiáh’our cast about, looking for anything that presented an option. His gaze fell upon the iron grappling hook and rope left lying beside the prince’s severed bonds. In a couple of strides, he snatched up the three-pronged hook.
“Oh, yes,” Gän’gehtin grumbled in fright. “Let us wound the prince, as well, in blindly trying to haul him in.”
“Better that than drowned,” Fiáh’our argued.
“Get some sail cloth or something to blunt that hook!”
And at that, another notion came to Fiáh’our.
Indeed, in fishing for a prince, the hook would have little chance in a blind cast. Even if snagged, such a madman might simply pull the hook off. There was a better way to be sure the prince would not be harmed and did not escape.
Fiáh’our eyed Gän’gehtin.
“What now?” the shirvêsh asked warily.
Gän’gehtin was too big for what Fiáh’our had in mind, so he turned his eyes on Karras’s exposed back. Stepping in, he grabbed the back of the young one’s thick belt.
“What are you doing?” Karras demanded, squirming to turn about.
“Be still!” Fiáh’our ordered, and shoved the young one back against the rail. He snagged two prongs of the hook on the back of Karras’s belt.
“You must be joking,” Gän’gehtin moaned.
“If you have a better idea,” Fiáh’our returned, “then out with it or get ready.”
Karras looked over his shoulder in fright, and then at Gän’gehtin. Before he could shove off the rail or fight back, Fiáh’our twisted and swung the young one around across the deck.
“Wait!” Karras shouted.
“No time,” Fiáh’our said. “You are the smallest and easiest for this.”
He spun another turn, building momentum and swinging Karras like a sack of stones.
“If you hit something,” he shouted, “grab it and hold on, no matter what, until we pull you in.”
“No… no, no, no!”
With a final grunt, Fiáh’our heaved the young over the rail, doing his best to aim for a point beyond the fading ripples. At a sudden scream over in the dark over the waters in the dark, Fiáh’our wrinkled his nose with a grumble.
“A’ye, he even wails like a kitten.”
And the young one’s scream cut off with a loud smack.
Fiáh’our and Gän’gehtin shielded their faces as the immense splash spattered droplets of seawater up over the deck. The rope continued feeding out over the rail, and Fiáh’our rushed to the near mast to snatch a lantern off its hook. He hurried back to hold the light over the ship’s side for a better look.
“Well, at least he sinks like a true rughìr,” Fiáh’our muttered, and at Gän’gehtin’s dumbfounded expression, he added, “Grab the rope but let it slide. If it suddenly goes slack or jerks sharply, pull fast and hard!”
The shirvêsh quickly stepped to the rope, but before Fiáh’our could do likewise…
“What is happening here?”
Fiáh’our blinked twice and quickly glanced back.
Across the deck, before a handful of rughìr at the head of the ship’s ramp, stood a tall dwarf with a full beard in a finely oiled canvas jerkin suited to foul sea weather. His dark hair, likely brown, was pulled slickly back, perhaps in a tail. The brass octagon buckle on his belt was the most telling detail of all.
Uinseil, sire of the family Iamílchlagh, eyed the interlopers on his ship. Karras’s father had arrived far too soon for the long ride down the mountain.
“Fiáh’our… what are you doing?” Uinseil demanded.
With a glance at Gän’gehtin, Fiáh’our merely uttered, “Oops.”
The young shirvêsh scrunched his eyes with a groan.
11. Death Comes with a Grasp not a Gasp
Amid a horrified scream, Karras saw the water’s surface at the last instant. He never got out a single obscenity at the old braggart, though not for the lack of such coming to mind. His scream cut off as he hit flat, face first, with arms and legs spread.
For an instant, everything went white before his eyes.
Breath rushed out and cold seawater rushed in before he could shut his gaping mouth. Coughing and gagging, he gained one last gulp of air before he sank like an “Earth-Born” boulder. In the dark and cold below the surface, he struggled to get his feet aimed downward.
Eventually, he would hit the bottom, and that thought replaced much of his shock with fury. It would be a fair walk to the shore, followed by a much quicker one up the dock. He would get that mad thänæ off his family’s ship and out of his life, once and for all.
A dim light grew all around Karras.
It appeared to come from somewhere above the water. It was not much to see by but enough to spot a pair of kicking feet just below and ahead of him. There was only one other person who could be down here.
Karras reached out as he sank; he snatched a narrow ankle before it was too far out of reach. Jerking upon that leg, he tried to claw his way toward the prince’s waist. Before he did so, he got the other foot in his face.
The blow did not even turn his head but angered him all the more. He latched onto the prince’s belt and, if he had to, he would clout the silly, sickly man to get him under control.
The prince’s buoyancy did little to slow Karras’s descent, and he started to panic again. Not for himself but for a human might not survive the walk to the shore. Unless someone pulled in both of them and quickly, it would not matter that he had
landed close enough to catch the man.
Karras thought to tug on the trailing rope, but the prince struggled too much—much too much for a human who should be running out of breath. He wrapped his arms around to still the man’s flailing and looked down, trying to see if the port’s bottom was in sight.
Boulders took shape in the dark below, soon becoming part of a rocky sea floor. He faltered as he looked out, trying to spot where the floor met the shore. It was too far to see for what little light pierced the depths. Wondering if he should simply release the prince before the man drowned, he looked down again to see…
The whites around black rughìr irises peered up from the depths.
Glimmers rose in the dark as weak light touched steel tips on black-scaled armor. The pale face of a dark-haired rughìr took shape around those staring eyes and eagerly watched him sink closer.
Karras looked upon the black-clad hassäg’kreig standing upon the ocean floor. Panic turned to terror. The old one’s bristling hair swayed like dead sea grass in the shifting waters. And that hard gaze of his turned to the struggling prince.
The black armored rughìr reached up with one hand.
What Karras did was born of fear-fed instinct that he would never explain later. He twisted, wrenching the prince upward out of reach, which only made his own legs drop lower.
Fury rose upon the grisly face below him.
The hassäg’kreig latched onto Karras’s ankle instead. That grip closed tight like a band of iron.
Karras shouted in fear, but all that came out was what little air he had left. Amid bubbles exploding over his face and obscuring his sight, he released one hand from the prince’s waist and gripped the rope. With a sharp jerk on that, he kicked down with his other foot toward his own ankle.
The kick jarred against an arm, but the grip on his ankle did not release.
The rope suddenly pulled taut.
All Karras could do was hang onto the prince’s belt and the rope as he lurched upward. Below him, that frightful form followed, still clinging to his leg. No matter how he thrashed and kicked, he could not break the deathly grip. Light grew stronger from above, but when Karras looked down again, something stranger still met his gaze.
