Time's Demon

by D. B. Jackson

  After a moment, the pinnace veered to port so abruptly, Tobias nearly overbalanced.

  “What is it?” Mara asked.

  “Do you still see the third man in that craft?” Larr asked.

  Mara peered across the water’s surface. “I can’t tell.”

  “I’d wager he’s not there.” She pointed. “They let him off at that isle.”

  Of the two isles that formed the gap through which they’d passed, only one had an accessible shoreline. The other was sheer from water’s edge to the clifftop two hundred hands above. They gained the sloped landing on the first island moments later. Tobias, Mara, and the captain leaped off the pinnace into the shallows and ran up the strand.

  “Track down the others,” she told Ermond. “You can fire at them if you’re close enough. I don’t want them getting away.”

  “Yes, captain.”

  He and the rest of the crew rowed away from the isle.

  “Tracks,” Tobias said, pointing at a single set of footprints in the sand, barely visible in the dying light.

  Larr gestured for him to lead them.

  The isle wasn’t large, but it sloped steeply away from the water to a wooded crown at its center. They climbed in single file, following a path among rocky outcroppings, pistols in hand.

  “Is there another way off?” Tobias asked in a whisper. “Could he have a second boat on the other side?”

  “He might,” Larr said. “I’m not familiar with these inlets.”

  Not the answer Tobias wanted.

  A sound stopped him. He raised a hand, signaling to the others. It had been another muffled cry, but from where exactly? He thought he heard a footfall, ahead and to the left, among the trees.

  He walked on, more slowly now, listening, trying to ignore the steps of his companions.

  When Sofya cried out again, nearby, no longer muffled, Tobias broke into a run.

  The captain called after him, but he didn’t slow.

  Reaching the peak of the crown, he stopped. A man stood before him in a small clearing, visible but dim in the gloaming. He held Sofya with a lean, muscled arm around her belly. A knife glinted in his other hand, the blade held to her throat. The princess sobbed, her face damp with tears.

  “Down!” the man shouted, the word weighted with the accent of Sipar’s Labyrinth. “Weapon down!”

  “Don’t lower your weapon,” the captain said, her voice as calm as ever. She stepped past Tobias, her movements slow. Her gaze didn’t stray from the slaver. “Don’t listen to him.”

  “Down! Down!”

  “He’s not going to hurt her,” she said. “Because if he does, he’s a dead man. He knows that. He wants us to let him go. His freedom for her return.”

  Mara had stopped beside Tobias.

  “Missus Lijar, please keep moving,” Larr said. “Keep yourself between Tobias and me. If we spread out, one of us is bound to get a clear shot.”

  Mara and Tobias shared a glance. She walked on.

  “Gold!” the man said.

  The captain shook her head. “No gold. The girl.”

  The man darted his gaze from face to face. “Weapons down!” he said, giving Sofya a shake and shifting his blade.

  Tobias sucked a breath through his teeth.

  “No,” Larr said, without inflection. “We keep our weapons. You put down the girl.”

  “No! Gold!”

  Larr raised her weapon, gestured with her off hand for Tobias and Mara to do the same. “Put down the girl.”

  The flat crack of a distant weapon echoed among the isles. Two more followed in quick succession. The slaver peered in that direction.

  “Your men are dead,” Larr said, dragging his wide-eyed stare back to her. “You’re the only one left. You shouldn’t have come aboard my ship, and you shouldn’t have stolen this child. You understand what I’m saying. I know you do. Slavers speak a number of languages.”

  “Maybe your men dead. Mine had pistols, too.”

  Another report careened among the rocks and trees.

  “We were six to your two. Your men are dead. Put down the girl, and you’ll live.”

  He considered Mara and then Tobias.

  Tobias feared for Sofya, and wanted desperately to kill this man, but his pistol hand didn’t waver.

  “If you kill her, you die,” Larr said. “If you try to run, you die. If you try to fight us, you die. Put her down and you live.”

  Another tencount passed before he moved the knife from Sofya’s throat and held it up for them to see. Then he bent, lowering her to the ground, his movements cautious, deliberate, his eyes on Captain Larr. Setting her at his feet, he straightened again. Sofya wailed, her arms raised to Tobias.

  “Back away from her,” the captain said.

  The slaver backed away a single step. She waved him back farther with her pistol. He took a second step and a third.

  Larr nodded to Tobias.

  He rushed forward to Sofya and lifted her into his arms. She continued to cry, clutching his shoulder and chest.

  “It’s all right, Nava. You’re all right.”

  “Nava?” the man said. “Sofya.”

  Tobias and the captain exchanged glances.

  “What did you say?” Larr asked the slaver.

  “Girl name. Sofya.”

  “Why do you think that?”

  “He say,” the man answered, pointing at Tobias. “On big boat. He call for her. ‘Sofya, Sofya.’” He looked a question to Tobias. “Yes? You say?”

  Captain Larr’s pistol belched flame, the roar making Tobias jump. Sofya, who had quieted, shrieked again.

  The slaver collapsed to the ground, blood gushing from his shattered brow.

  Gray smoke hung over the clearing. Tobias regarded the captain and she stared back at him, each waiting for the other to speak.

  “That was my fault,” he finally said. “I was… I panicked, and I called her name without thinking.”

  “There’s plenty of blame to go around. I’ve been in these isles before. I know slavers traffic here, yet it never entered my mind as I thought about tonight’s celebration. I’ve never had a child aboard. I should have guessed they might be here today.”

  “It doesn’t matter,” Mara said. “He’s dead, and she’s safe.” She walked to Tobias and kissed Sofya’s forehead. Sofya reached for her and she took her out of Tobias’s arms. “What do we do about the others aboard your ship? They heard her name as well.”

  Larr weighed this for less than a fivecount. “It doesn’t matter. Few will remember, and fewer still will connect the name with the child. If we give them cause to ponder the matter, it becomes something to worry about. If we say nothing, do nothing, I think we’ll be all right.”

  The princess had balled one fist in Mara’s shirt and was sucking the other thumb. Her eyelids drooped. Tobias guessed that she’d be asleep by the time the pinnace came for them.

  “What should we do with him?” he asked, indicating the slaver’s corpse with a lift of his chin.

  “Leave him,” Mara said, ice in her expression. “That’s what he deserves.”

  They picked their way along the darkening path back to the shore. Tobias led, Larr took the rear. Now that Mara wasn’t terrified for Sofya’s life and possessed with their pursuit of the slaver, she noticed things she had missed before. She was barefoot, and this path was rough with broken branches, jutting stones, and shattered seashells. Sofya rested in her arms, awake still, but leaning into her, bone weary from her ordeal. It took every bit of Mara’s concentration to navigate the slope without falling or dropping the girl.

  She still carried her weapon, though she had tried to give it back to the captain.

  “Keep it for now,” Larr said, reloading her own pistol. “We don’t know that the other slavers are dead, or that there aren’t more hiding among these isles who might be drawn by the shot I fired.”

  Well before they reached the bottom of the path, Mara heard the scrape of wood on sand and st
one, splashes in the water, and then voices.

  “Captain!” A man’s voice. “Captain, you there?”

  “Fools,” Larr muttered under her breath. She stepped past Mara and Tobias. After perhaps ten strides, she said in a voice pitched to carry, but lower than that of her crewman, “Yes, Mister Wenn, we’re here.”

  Mara spotted the sailors, pale forms blocking their way.

  “And the wee one?”

  “We have her. She’s fine.”

  “The Two be praised,” Ermond said.

  Those with him murmured thanks as well.

  “The two in the boat?” Larr asked.

  “Dead. Both had blades, which we took. The boat was empty.”

  The captain showed no surprise at this. “All right. Let’s get back to the ship. Well done, all of you.”

  She continued toward the shore, but the sailors waited, greeting Tobias and Mara, and peering at Sofya, seeing for themselves that she had come through the evening unscathed. She shied from them, clutching Mara, but she didn’t cry.

  “Told you we’d get her back,” Ermond said to Tobias, his voice roughening.

  “Thank you.”

  The sailor gripped Tobias’s shoulder, and they followed Captain Larr.

  Their journey back to the Sea Dove took less time than Mara expected. Their pursuit of the slavers felt endless, but really they hadn’t gone far.

  The ship glowed with torchfire, and long before they pulled alongside its hull they heard music, singing, and laughter. Mara smelled boiled shellfish.

  “Most of them won’t know we were gone,” Larr said, so only Tobias and Mara could hear. “None of them will spare a thought for what you called the child.”

  Upon reaching the ship, Mara handed her pistol back to the captain and passed Sofya up to Tobias, who in turn gave her to a sailor on the Dove’s deck. They climbed the rope ladder in turn and were welcomed back by Larr’s crew, who awaited them at the rail.

  Yadreg, a bandage on his brow, didn’t bother to mask his relief.

  “Forgive me,” he whispered to Mara.

  “There’s nothing to forgive, and she’s fine.”

  The old man nodded, eyes bright with torchflame and tears.

  The dancing, eating, and drinking went on for much of the night. Tobias and Mara remained on the deck, but held themselves apart. They stuffed themselves with crab and lobster. After a bell or two Sofya woke and ate her fill as well. The three of them danced and sang along, making up words to songs they didn’t know.

  The princess appeared none the worse for all that had happened. But she made no attempt to climb down from their arms, which was fine, since Tobias gave no indication that he would ever again trust anyone other than Mara to hold her.

  In time, the locals began to leave the ship. The crew continued to eat and drink, but the festivities quieted. Sofya dozed off again. Mara guessed that she would sleep through the night.

  “Come on,” Mara said to Tobias. “It’s time to go below.”

  “Are you as exhausted as I am?”

  Mara kissed him and breathed, “No,” into his ear. She pulled back and smiled. “You didn’t think I was going to forget, did you? It’s still Kheraya Ascendant. You thought I could be put off by the small matter of a kidnapping?”

  His cheeks colored, but he smiled in return. “I didn’t think anything. I haven’t had a clear thought in a while now.”

  “Since she was taken?”

  “No,” he said. “Since our swim.”

  Mara laughed aloud, drawing glances from those nearest to them, and stirring Sofya for an instant. She took his hand and led him to the hatch leading down to the hold. There they paused and caught the captain’s eye. She raised the tankard she held. Mara descended into the hold, pulling Tobias after her.

  Other couples were already down here, but Mara didn’t care. She led him to the shadowed corner they had long since claimed as their own, and set Sofya on the small pallet members of the crew had built for her. After tucking the princess’s blankets around her, Mara faced Tobias and kissed him again, deeply this time, her fingers in his hair.

  “Are we going to make a baby?” he whispered.

  When she was still in Windhome, one of the other girls, who was far more daring and precocious than she, told her of herbs she drank to keep from getting pregnant. Since coming on the ship, Mara had asked some of the crew where to find those herbs, both because she anticipated this night, and because they needed to keep up appearances.

  “No,” she said, “we’re not.”

  They kissed again and as they did she untied the drawstring of his breeches. He pulled back and gently lifted her shirt. She raised her arms, allowed him to pull it off her, and shook her hair free. Then she wriggled out of her breeches.

  They lay down together on their pallet, kissing, touching. Their first time was over too soon. The girl in Windhome had warned Mara about this, as well. But the times after that were far better.

  It was a late night

  CHAPTER 11

  5th Day of Kheraya’s Descent, Year 634

  On the fifth morning after the celebration of the Goddess’s Ascendance, with a warm wind rising from the west, the Sea Dove left the waters of Chayde. They followed a zigzag course, tacking southward, across the open waters of Kheraya’s Ocean.

  Within half a day of unfurling their sails, they could no longer see land in any direction. For all the many leagues they had covered since joining Captain Larr’s crew, Tobias had never felt so removed from his former life. The sky remained clear, but this far out from any isle, the swells grew higher, the waters rougher.

  Mara, he knew, had feared that she might prove susceptible to seasickness. By luck, or by design, the captain kept both of them busy with duties on deck; Mara showed no sign of feeling ill. Sofya toddled from one rail to the other, a doll in one hand some kind of food – bread, dried fruit, hard cheese – in the other. She was as sure-footed as any sailor, and as immune to the pitch and roll.

  Every so often, Tobias spotted a sea bird skimming above the water’s surface, enormous wings held steady, tail twisting with the wind. Pods of dolphins briefly carved through the swells along the ship’s hull. Clouds gathered on the western horizon, piling upon one another, a bank of distant gray in an otherwise sapphire sky. When Tobias pointed to them, Captain Larr shrugged off his concern.

  “By the time they’re here, we’ll be elsewhere,” she said, standing at the helm, feet braced, stance wide. “Be at ease, Mister Lijar, and count your blessings. This is as comfortable as a voyage across open ocean can be. Enjoy it.”

  He tried. The sun setting through the curtain of clouds set the western sky ablaze with reds and yellows, pinks and oranges. Stars emerged above them, burning brighter as the embers of the sunset cooled to darkness. The crescent moon chased the sun toward that same horizon. Its reflected glow danced on the peaks and troughs of the Goddess’s ocean.

  He hadn’t wanted to leave Chayde, but never had he experienced anything like this day.

  Later, below, he and Mara surrendered again to their passion, as they had each night since the solstice. As discreet as these sailors were about such things, a few of them couldn’t help but comment on the sudden ardor of Tobias and Mara’s “marriage.”

  “Been wonderin’ what the two of you was waitin’ for,” Yadreg had said to Tobias the previous morning. “Figured you wasn’t ready to risk another wee one. Glad to see you’re makin’ up for lost time.”

  Tobias blushed to the top of his head, his scalp prickling as he hurried away.

  Yet the deepening of their love and the wonders he found on the open ocean couldn’t erase that night of terror in the waters around Chayde. He barely let Sofya out of his sight. He slept with Mara in his arms, but he dreamed of slavers and pistols and that maze of tiny isles. In all his nightmares he chased Sofya’s cries, calling for her, desperate to get her back. In all of them, her captors eluded him. He woke often in the darkness, heart tripping with pani
c, sweat dampening his hair. Some nights Mara woke as well and murmured to him until he drifted back into uneasy slumber. Other nights he lay alone with his fear.

  Notwithstanding the captain’s assurances, the weather deteriorated steadily. By the third morning after their departure, rain lashed the ship and waves hammered at the hull, sending plumes of water over the rails to soak the crew and slick an already treacherous deck. Captain Larr remained at the wheel, her face pale and streaked with rain, her dark hair plastered to her brow.

  Upon seeing Tobias emerge from the hold, she waved him over with a quick motion before gripping the helm again.

  “I owe you an apology,” she shouted to make herself heard over the wind and rain. “It came up on us faster than I expected.”

  “Are we in danger?”

  She adjusted the wheel. “No. We’ve work to do to clear the storm, but the Dove has survived worse.”

  This put his mind at ease.

  “We do have a choice to make. We’ve turned westward. I’m hoping to run straight through the worst of it and so clear the storm sooner. That will take us close to the Outer Ring, and, therefore, closer to Daerjen.”

  So much for an eased mind. Tobias stared into the rain.

  “It’s possible that the skies will clear before we reach land. If the storm persists, though, I think we should make port in Fanquir.”

  It could have been worse. Fanquir was on the eastern shore of Kantaad, which was separated from Daerjen by Fairisle and the Inward Sea.

  “If you think the risk is too great, I can steer us south again, but that could mean another day or two of this weather.”

  “How long would we remain in Fanquir?”

  “No more than a day, I should think. We’d wait out the storm, perhaps trade for ale and food, and then continue toward the Knot.” She watched the water, steered the ship clear of a huge swell. “I need an answer soon, but not right away.”

  “It’s all right. Make for Kantaad, captain. There’s no reason anyone would search for us there. We’ll be fine.”

  “I agree. Still, we’ll keep you and your family out of sight.” She smirked. “From what I hear, you and your wife shouldn’t mind that too much.”