The cage, p.15
The Cage, page 15
The Vryka lost more way; grapnels flashed, swung out in looping casts. One snagged in the tangled rigging, another crunched into timber; there was a splintery groan as the cleats took up the strain and strong hands heaved at the ropes, the current pulling them around. The hull touched sand, a brief grating and Rilla felt a cold hand seize her heart; then the sharp reinforced prow was slicing into the steep outer face of the sandbank, a jarring thud and enormous hissing that ran through the hull and snapped her forward against her hands' grip on the rail. Above her, the mainstays hummed as the tons' weight of inertia flexed the masts forward, strong supple wood bending and the thigh-thick cables sounding a note that ran up the scale until her teeth ached with waiting for it to end in a disastrous snapping.
No break; instead a grinding crash as the two bows met, the smooth surface of the Zingas Vryka meeting the rough, lapstrake oak planks of the Kettle Belly, a sharp jolt throwing anyone standing forward and to port. The two ships pivoted, tied nose to nose, shifted on the sand and stopped as the greater weight and solid hull-grounding of the merchantman held both against the river's thrusting. Current heaped the water high against them, waves breaking over the starboard rail of the Vryka as it dipped against the ropes that bound it to its prey. The ruined mast and rigging of the Kettle Belly leaned again, groaning, felling and tangling against the forward mainstay of the Zingas Vryka.
"Grey Wolff Grey Wolf!" her followers shouted, pouring forward. Rilla let go, snatched dartcaster and twofeng, leaped the quarterdeck railing and landed with a boom on the main deck, started forward with the helmscrew behind her. The mercenaries were already hacking at the grapnel lines, crowding to the rail of Kettle Belly and trading thrusts with spear and twofang and boarding-pike with the Zingas Vryka crew below; they were outnumbered now, but they had the advantage of height and better armor, and the springsteel could fire over their heads to wreck the privateer if they held their line for long enough.
Inu howled, a stunning sound, unbelievable even from an animal as large as a saddle horse; the snarl that followed ratcheted upward into an open-jawed bellow, and the hull of the Lady rocked as he leaped. Even the grounded merchantman moved as he landed, soaring over the points that tentatively probed for him. A long boarding-pike thrust as he landed, crouching as the momentum of nine hundred pounds pushed him to the deck. He seized the ashwood shaft between his jaws, bit; it splintered, and he threw the piece that held the spearhead over the side. An axe-wielder charged, double-bitted weapon swinging; Inu's head darted out, snake-swift, closed jaws on his waist. The dog braced his forefeet and flipped his head, a rat-killing gesture, and the armored man went over his back, struck a railing, and dropped into the water.
Rilla could see the top of Inu's head behind the line of points, heard his bellowing roar over the flat thuds and unmusical, scrap-metal sounds of combat; then the enemy line was breaking, as the Kettle Belly's fighters turned to guard their backs. A man's voice on the other ship was calling retreat, calling for archers to kill the monster, but another shout of "Grey Wolf echoed across river and marsh, and her followers were over the bows and swarming up. Shyll's blond head was beside the dog, helmetless and laughing as he whirled and thrust with dagger and smallsword; Moshulu's great hammer boomed on a shield. It broke, and the arm beneath it; the Moryavska heaved the huge weapon aloft, swept it down on a helmet that crumpled with a clamor of yielding steel, stepped over a body leaking brains and brayed a warcry.
Above her head, sailors were fighting in the tangled rigging, knives and hatchets and bare feet cat-agile on the ropes. Rilla sprinted, vaulted from her ship's rail, touched the Kettle Belly's and came down with the dartcaster up. Pick target— jolt of wood in my palm. Cast. Cast. Drop the caster—duck! The foredeck of the Kettle Belly was jammed with naZak. I can't even see my own crew—
The Zak had the advantage in the tight space, the deck lurching randomly as Inu moved. Splashes marked people falling into the river. Twofang block side, slash across helm, SWING! The end of her twofang burred through the air with the sound of a banner cracking in the wind, slashing groin height. The Aenir leaped back, jolted into the fight behind him; knocked off balance, he almost fell onto her point.
Another CHIINNNG from the stern and a crescent-head javelin, points forward, tore through the Kettle Belly's sail and rigging, plunged into the tangled fight in the bow. The inner edge of the sickle-moon head was razor sharp and half a meter across; it cut one sailor in half. Blood splashed as if a bucket had been dumped and the decks were greasy with it. Someone had died, someone else was screaming in an impossibly high shriek that went on and on.
Damn you, damn whatever you're protecting. Rilla skidded on the oily, salt-and-iron stinking deck, caught herself from going over the rail into the river.
Inu was tossing whoever smelled wrong into the water, like a puppy throwing bones, but his growls were loud enough to resonate in the wood of the ship. The fighting was breaking up into knots where sailors and mercenaries tumbled and fought through the rope-littered deck, and the wounded lay and shrieked or crawled into the scuppers to tend their hurts, or sat staring incredulously at the stump of a hand… Halfway down the hull, the sail hung, folds tumbling to the planking except where an intact line hung the right corner man-height from the deck. Another javelin from the steelspring through the sail; this one tumbled a Kettle Belly sailor in pieces from the rigging and plunged through to slice a ratline on the Lady. Faces turned as the merchantman's crew cried protests at the blindsided firing that endangered them as much as their foes. Splashes followed, as sailors threw aside their weapons and went eel-swift over the side; Habiku did not pay enough for them to stay and be shot in the back.
The mercenaries were truer to their salt, or perhaps simply more heavily armed and less easy in the water. They broke, but in order, retreating past the sail and setting their weapons to hacking it down from behind; a rearguard held the gap between canvas and rail. The Zingas Vrykas folk gathered, made a rush, were cast back panting and holding their wounds; except for one who crawled under the jabbing spearpoints, sank down, lay still.
Her crew stood, growling, as Rilla came up. A brief silence had fallen; she could hear the wind, the heavy breathing of exhaustion, Inu's claws on the deck, a metallic chinking from behind the curtain of sail that had to be some further devilment with the steelspring. The mercenaries were shrinking their rearguard, shuffling backward through the gap until only the Rand stood holding it. He swung the long, curved blade around his head, visibly relieved to have room to use it properly. Not a tall man, though taller than any Zak, blocky-shouldered, armored from head to toe in steel enameled with violent patterns of yellow, green, blue, purple. The helm's triangular visor covered most of his saffron-yellow face, concealed his slanted black eyes; the mouth below it was expressionless.
A dart snapped forward, rang harmlessly against a curved steel shoulder-guard. Another flicked toward his face: the long sword whipped around fast enough to blur, and the hardwood clanged off the metal of the blade. Two crew ran in, four hands, four knives flickering; there was a series of movements too fast to follow; a knife grated over the Rand's thigh, his sword took both the wielder's arms off at the elbow, and in a turn-and-strike of the same movement he kicked the other Zak under the chin with an iron-toed boot. The woman flew backward and landed with her head at an impossible angle.
"Back!" Rilla shouted. "Shyll, Inu, Moshulu, you three. Quickly!" There were heavy ripping sounds, and blades appeared through the sail, ripping at the canvas. A steelspring bolt snapped through, aimed low this time, chopped through the deck; she heard it cut through the hull planking below.
Inu paced forward, doubly masked with steel and leather and blood, snarling endlessly; his head was held low, no more than waist-height, and he came at the Rand in a slinking, side-crabbing rush. Moshulu followed, at a trot that made the deck boom; Shyll ran at his greathound's hindquarters, long hair and headband bobbing, strands clinging to the sweat-dampness of his arms.
The Rand did not brace himself. Instead he waited, flat-footed but not heavy, knees bent and one toe behind the other, almost a standing version of a sprinter's crouch. The sword raised, point at Inu's throat-height, poised not in quivering tension but lightly, relaxed.
The greathound lunged, jaws darting down for a grip on the Rand's leg, jaws strong enough to crumple the thin metal of plate armor. The boot met his nose instead, with a thump that ran back through the dog's massive body to quiver his feathered tail; Inu hesitated an instant, then drove in again, snarling as the curved sword squealed off the metal spikes of his collar. It bit through, he yelped as it gashed the ruff above his spine and the heavy muscles of his neck.
Rilla heard Shyll yell, "Inu, DOWN!" The dog dropped flat, completely vulnerable; the Rand ignored the foreign shout, assuming the first hit had been enough to stun, lifted his sword for the killing blow. Light broke off the edge, still slicing-sharp after the battering it had taken; the Rand warrior stepped forward with easy confidence, ignoring the big Moryavska with his hammer. He was beyond the reach even of long arms and a long haft, and besides, so heavy a weapon would be slow.
Moshulu threw. The forging hammer flashed across the gap in an instant that stretched; even then the Rand was dodging. It took him in the upper chest with a clang that struck like a gong in the temples of his home city. He was flung back with a dent the depth of a fist in his armor. He stumbled back two, three steps, arms wide in spasm; not even a sword-pledged Rand could ignore the first pain of cracked ribs, and his gasp of pain levered them into metal bent too close to let him draw full breath.
The curved sword wavered, then froze as Inu sprang up and seized his right arm at the elbow; clung grimly with flattened ears as the armored fist of the left pounded on the whalebone-backed leather of the dog's helm. That stopped as Moshulu stepped near and caught the man in a bear-hug; Shyll was on Inu's other side, smallsword poised as he danced about for an opening.
Inu released the Rand's arm; the armor had not been pierced, but the limb hung limp and blood ran from the dangling fingers of the gauntlet as the sword clattered to the deck. Moshulu hoisted him up, grinning in the depths of his russet-brown beard; that turned to a roar of pain as the warrior snapped his helmetted head forward into the Moryavska's face, drove a steel-capped knee toward his groin. Moshulu took the knee on his thigh, spat blood and teeth, squeezed with a bull-bellow of effort. Metal squealed, bending, and at last the Rand was making a sound, desparate grunts to match his thrashing. The Moryavska roared again, raised the man over his head and slammed him down on the railing; it broke with a splintering crash and the body fell from his hands and into the shallow water of the sandbank to be slowly nudged away from the ships, barely submerged and face-down. One or two bubbles broke the surface, then nothing. Moshulu dropped to his knees, panting, dazed, watching thin runnels of blood drift downstream as the crew of the Zingas Vryka charged past him, cheering.
"Hold! HOLD! Lady take it! Stop right there!" Rilla shouted through her curled hands. "Truce!"
Silence fell as she stepped to the gap where the Rand had stood. She looked backward; barely half her crew were still on their feet, there must be ten dead at least, as many again too badly hurt to stand and fight. "Fight," she muttered softly to herself. "This is a massacre and it has to stop, right now." To her own:
"Annike—no, Piashk, light me a torch. Everyone else hold your places." There was quiet at last, quiet enough to hear the water gurgle and the snick and flare of a sulphur match. She took the torch and shouted around the gap. "Will you give truce?"
"Had enough?" a voice gibed.
Then another, the Captain's voice that had called for archers earlier: "Truce; oath by the Lady and the Lord's shadow." A Zald accent, F'talezonian Middle Quarter; that oath would be kept, at least in public. She stepped through to the rear section of the deck. The mercenaries held their ground; about ten left, battered, bleeding, leaning on their weapons or making half-hearted efforts to cut away the tangle of rigging. The Captain and second mate standing among them, both Zak…
Zrinchka, she thought, recognizing him from one of Megan's gatherings in the old days; an up-and-coming captain of thirty or so, with a half-interest in his own vessel and the rest belonging to a consortium of small traders. The Kettle Belly was not his usual stamping ground at all. Behind him, the quarterdeck and the springsteel six marines and a HandLeader. He perched with a leg swinging on one of the leg-struts of his weapon, face calm in contrast to the tension of his troops. Thin, dark River-Quarter face, middle-aged, a professional who followed orders. Probably disgusted to have his machine in civilian hands, she thought. Also thanking the Lady he's under a merchant skipper, not a naval noble who'd order a stand to the knife.
Rilla sniffed, spat to clear her mouth, coughed to clear her throat. I'm soaked to the waist in blood. Bile rose thick at the back of her throat, and she choked down the overwhelming urge to vomit. I don't have time to throw up. She had seen death before… but so many, so many.
"Shyll, Temuchin, shields, please." Zrinchka's word she trusted, but one of the naZak mercenaries might risk a throw and his anger, for Habiku's reward. She called over the shield rims, her voice forced to lightness:
"Zrinchka, I didn't think you were this hard up. What are you doing aboard this tub?"
The man straightened and shaded his eyes with a hand, the twofang loose in his grip. "Dark Lord's dung, it is Megan Whitlock's patrischana, father's sister's child," he said, and then shrugged. "The Wild Goose was laid up with a cracked strake, and Smoothtongue offered me a one-time charter to run this bucket down to Rand; said he had an important cargo to transport quietly, and I needed to meet my payroll or put my crew on the beach…" Anger creased his face.
"I lost my bosun and four good hands to this." His eyes went to the torch. "And didn't Whitlock teach you better than to carry an unshielded flame on deck?" His face was pale too; a merchant skipper on the Brezhan could expect to see the odd skirmish, but river pirates were in the trade for profit, not blood—they rarely pushed home an attack against a well-defended vessel.
Rilla forced cheeks that felt stiff and numb to grin. "You pushed into a private quarrel, Zrinchka," she said. More formally: "Honorable Captain, we have the option of casting off. Unfortunately I don't believe that choice is open to you. Though I hesitate to burn one of my own ships, I will if I deem it necessary." She moved her hand toward the dangling, shredded canvas. "You can swim to shore before she goes up, of course. I wouldn't bet on being able to take much with you. Surrender and you can take your personal gear, and I'll leave you enough supplies to walk it upriver to the nearest settlement."
Zrinchka bit his lip, held up a hand for time, turned to speak to the marine NCO on the quarterdeck. Rilla could hear their voices murmuring; she could also see the mercenaries look at each other out of the corners of their eyes. The blood-rush of combat was fading, limbs and wounds stiffening; they fought for money and their reputations, coin was of little use to a corpse and nobody could fairly say they had not done an honorable day's work, with half their number dead.
"—not enough for my life!" Rilla heard the merchant captain say.
"All very well for you, Teik," the bandy-legged little marine was saying, crouched to bring his head within talking distance of Zrinchka. "Is the one what has to answer to the Teik Captain back at the fort for this buggering load of scrap." A thumb jerked over his shoulder toward the low-slung spider shape of the steelspring. "Much as my balls is—"
The ragged edges of sail flapped in a sudden gust of breeze. She could catch only a word or two: "orders." "papers." Behind her, she heard Shyll whisper to Inu, and a basso growl rumbled out; the mercenaries looked at each other again, openly, and one of the marines made an averting sign against evil. At last Zrinchka grabbed a folded document from the sergeant, scribbled angrily and turned.
"We accept your terms, pirate!" he snapped. "On one condition."
"Which is?" Weariness crashed down on Rilla like a blanket of resilient air, and she fought not to stagger.
Zrmchka's voice was grim. "That until we're gone, you keep that Dark Lord damned dog away from us!" Weapons clattered to the planks, and Zrinchka drove his twofang to stand, humming to match his frustration.
Rilla sat on the sterncastle of the Kettle Belly watching as they finished swabbing the deck. The marines and the mercenaries stood together on the starboard side, with the dejected look that prisoners always had; Iczak had attended to their hurts after seeing to the Zingas Vryka's folk, but the sheer physical misery of after-combat letdown was on them. Not to mention the pain of financial loss; hired fighters carried much of their profits on their back in equipment, and she was leaving them their clothes only, and one belt-knife each. It would mean long years of lower pay and greater risks, unless they could dun Habiku Smoothtongue for their losses. The marines were more philosophical, since the DragonLord would have to replace their gear.
Near them Shyll tended Inu's cuts. The dog whimpered, shivering as Shyll, frowning, carefully cleaned the wounds. His tail was tucked between his legs and he pressed his head flat to the planks in propitiation, flinching as the needle and catgut closed a long gash on his flank.
"Quiet, Inu. Good boy, good boy." A feeble wave of the tail, and the dog bent his barrel-sized head to lick at the wound. Shyll gently pushed the nose away. "No, Inu. Understand? No." The greathound looked at the teRyadn with melting amber eyes and laid his head down again with a gusty sound halfway between a whimper and a sigh. Shyll finished, straightened, glared at the prisoners with more anger than he had shown during the fight. Two of the marines were bouncing a pair of dice against the scuppers; they continued their game, but one of the mercenaries rolled his eyes at Inu and fingered his hair earring.
Rilla climbed stiffly to her feet and walked over to them, addressed the marine commander in high Zak.
"Teik." Her bow was exaggeratedly polite, and so was the form of address: the sergeant blinked in surprise and instinctively braced into the regulation rest position. "I'm so sorry to have deprived you of your transportation but I'm sure the short walk to F'trovanemi, no more than two or three days, won't harm you." A pause. "Do you know whose ship this is?"
No break; instead a grinding crash as the two bows met, the smooth surface of the Zingas Vryka meeting the rough, lapstrake oak planks of the Kettle Belly, a sharp jolt throwing anyone standing forward and to port. The two ships pivoted, tied nose to nose, shifted on the sand and stopped as the greater weight and solid hull-grounding of the merchantman held both against the river's thrusting. Current heaped the water high against them, waves breaking over the starboard rail of the Vryka as it dipped against the ropes that bound it to its prey. The ruined mast and rigging of the Kettle Belly leaned again, groaning, felling and tangling against the forward mainstay of the Zingas Vryka.
"Grey Wolff Grey Wolf!" her followers shouted, pouring forward. Rilla let go, snatched dartcaster and twofeng, leaped the quarterdeck railing and landed with a boom on the main deck, started forward with the helmscrew behind her. The mercenaries were already hacking at the grapnel lines, crowding to the rail of Kettle Belly and trading thrusts with spear and twofang and boarding-pike with the Zingas Vryka crew below; they were outnumbered now, but they had the advantage of height and better armor, and the springsteel could fire over their heads to wreck the privateer if they held their line for long enough.
Inu howled, a stunning sound, unbelievable even from an animal as large as a saddle horse; the snarl that followed ratcheted upward into an open-jawed bellow, and the hull of the Lady rocked as he leaped. Even the grounded merchantman moved as he landed, soaring over the points that tentatively probed for him. A long boarding-pike thrust as he landed, crouching as the momentum of nine hundred pounds pushed him to the deck. He seized the ashwood shaft between his jaws, bit; it splintered, and he threw the piece that held the spearhead over the side. An axe-wielder charged, double-bitted weapon swinging; Inu's head darted out, snake-swift, closed jaws on his waist. The dog braced his forefeet and flipped his head, a rat-killing gesture, and the armored man went over his back, struck a railing, and dropped into the water.
Rilla could see the top of Inu's head behind the line of points, heard his bellowing roar over the flat thuds and unmusical, scrap-metal sounds of combat; then the enemy line was breaking, as the Kettle Belly's fighters turned to guard their backs. A man's voice on the other ship was calling retreat, calling for archers to kill the monster, but another shout of "Grey Wolf echoed across river and marsh, and her followers were over the bows and swarming up. Shyll's blond head was beside the dog, helmetless and laughing as he whirled and thrust with dagger and smallsword; Moshulu's great hammer boomed on a shield. It broke, and the arm beneath it; the Moryavska heaved the huge weapon aloft, swept it down on a helmet that crumpled with a clamor of yielding steel, stepped over a body leaking brains and brayed a warcry.
Above her head, sailors were fighting in the tangled rigging, knives and hatchets and bare feet cat-agile on the ropes. Rilla sprinted, vaulted from her ship's rail, touched the Kettle Belly's and came down with the dartcaster up. Pick target— jolt of wood in my palm. Cast. Cast. Drop the caster—duck! The foredeck of the Kettle Belly was jammed with naZak. I can't even see my own crew—
The Zak had the advantage in the tight space, the deck lurching randomly as Inu moved. Splashes marked people falling into the river. Twofang block side, slash across helm, SWING! The end of her twofang burred through the air with the sound of a banner cracking in the wind, slashing groin height. The Aenir leaped back, jolted into the fight behind him; knocked off balance, he almost fell onto her point.
Another CHIINNNG from the stern and a crescent-head javelin, points forward, tore through the Kettle Belly's sail and rigging, plunged into the tangled fight in the bow. The inner edge of the sickle-moon head was razor sharp and half a meter across; it cut one sailor in half. Blood splashed as if a bucket had been dumped and the decks were greasy with it. Someone had died, someone else was screaming in an impossibly high shriek that went on and on.
Damn you, damn whatever you're protecting. Rilla skidded on the oily, salt-and-iron stinking deck, caught herself from going over the rail into the river.
Inu was tossing whoever smelled wrong into the water, like a puppy throwing bones, but his growls were loud enough to resonate in the wood of the ship. The fighting was breaking up into knots where sailors and mercenaries tumbled and fought through the rope-littered deck, and the wounded lay and shrieked or crawled into the scuppers to tend their hurts, or sat staring incredulously at the stump of a hand… Halfway down the hull, the sail hung, folds tumbling to the planking except where an intact line hung the right corner man-height from the deck. Another javelin from the steelspring through the sail; this one tumbled a Kettle Belly sailor in pieces from the rigging and plunged through to slice a ratline on the Lady. Faces turned as the merchantman's crew cried protests at the blindsided firing that endangered them as much as their foes. Splashes followed, as sailors threw aside their weapons and went eel-swift over the side; Habiku did not pay enough for them to stay and be shot in the back.
The mercenaries were truer to their salt, or perhaps simply more heavily armed and less easy in the water. They broke, but in order, retreating past the sail and setting their weapons to hacking it down from behind; a rearguard held the gap between canvas and rail. The Zingas Vrykas folk gathered, made a rush, were cast back panting and holding their wounds; except for one who crawled under the jabbing spearpoints, sank down, lay still.
Her crew stood, growling, as Rilla came up. A brief silence had fallen; she could hear the wind, the heavy breathing of exhaustion, Inu's claws on the deck, a metallic chinking from behind the curtain of sail that had to be some further devilment with the steelspring. The mercenaries were shrinking their rearguard, shuffling backward through the gap until only the Rand stood holding it. He swung the long, curved blade around his head, visibly relieved to have room to use it properly. Not a tall man, though taller than any Zak, blocky-shouldered, armored from head to toe in steel enameled with violent patterns of yellow, green, blue, purple. The helm's triangular visor covered most of his saffron-yellow face, concealed his slanted black eyes; the mouth below it was expressionless.
A dart snapped forward, rang harmlessly against a curved steel shoulder-guard. Another flicked toward his face: the long sword whipped around fast enough to blur, and the hardwood clanged off the metal of the blade. Two crew ran in, four hands, four knives flickering; there was a series of movements too fast to follow; a knife grated over the Rand's thigh, his sword took both the wielder's arms off at the elbow, and in a turn-and-strike of the same movement he kicked the other Zak under the chin with an iron-toed boot. The woman flew backward and landed with her head at an impossible angle.
"Back!" Rilla shouted. "Shyll, Inu, Moshulu, you three. Quickly!" There were heavy ripping sounds, and blades appeared through the sail, ripping at the canvas. A steelspring bolt snapped through, aimed low this time, chopped through the deck; she heard it cut through the hull planking below.
Inu paced forward, doubly masked with steel and leather and blood, snarling endlessly; his head was held low, no more than waist-height, and he came at the Rand in a slinking, side-crabbing rush. Moshulu followed, at a trot that made the deck boom; Shyll ran at his greathound's hindquarters, long hair and headband bobbing, strands clinging to the sweat-dampness of his arms.
The Rand did not brace himself. Instead he waited, flat-footed but not heavy, knees bent and one toe behind the other, almost a standing version of a sprinter's crouch. The sword raised, point at Inu's throat-height, poised not in quivering tension but lightly, relaxed.
The greathound lunged, jaws darting down for a grip on the Rand's leg, jaws strong enough to crumple the thin metal of plate armor. The boot met his nose instead, with a thump that ran back through the dog's massive body to quiver his feathered tail; Inu hesitated an instant, then drove in again, snarling as the curved sword squealed off the metal spikes of his collar. It bit through, he yelped as it gashed the ruff above his spine and the heavy muscles of his neck.
Rilla heard Shyll yell, "Inu, DOWN!" The dog dropped flat, completely vulnerable; the Rand ignored the foreign shout, assuming the first hit had been enough to stun, lifted his sword for the killing blow. Light broke off the edge, still slicing-sharp after the battering it had taken; the Rand warrior stepped forward with easy confidence, ignoring the big Moryavska with his hammer. He was beyond the reach even of long arms and a long haft, and besides, so heavy a weapon would be slow.
Moshulu threw. The forging hammer flashed across the gap in an instant that stretched; even then the Rand was dodging. It took him in the upper chest with a clang that struck like a gong in the temples of his home city. He was flung back with a dent the depth of a fist in his armor. He stumbled back two, three steps, arms wide in spasm; not even a sword-pledged Rand could ignore the first pain of cracked ribs, and his gasp of pain levered them into metal bent too close to let him draw full breath.
The curved sword wavered, then froze as Inu sprang up and seized his right arm at the elbow; clung grimly with flattened ears as the armored fist of the left pounded on the whalebone-backed leather of the dog's helm. That stopped as Moshulu stepped near and caught the man in a bear-hug; Shyll was on Inu's other side, smallsword poised as he danced about for an opening.
Inu released the Rand's arm; the armor had not been pierced, but the limb hung limp and blood ran from the dangling fingers of the gauntlet as the sword clattered to the deck. Moshulu hoisted him up, grinning in the depths of his russet-brown beard; that turned to a roar of pain as the warrior snapped his helmetted head forward into the Moryavska's face, drove a steel-capped knee toward his groin. Moshulu took the knee on his thigh, spat blood and teeth, squeezed with a bull-bellow of effort. Metal squealed, bending, and at last the Rand was making a sound, desparate grunts to match his thrashing. The Moryavska roared again, raised the man over his head and slammed him down on the railing; it broke with a splintering crash and the body fell from his hands and into the shallow water of the sandbank to be slowly nudged away from the ships, barely submerged and face-down. One or two bubbles broke the surface, then nothing. Moshulu dropped to his knees, panting, dazed, watching thin runnels of blood drift downstream as the crew of the Zingas Vryka charged past him, cheering.
"Hold! HOLD! Lady take it! Stop right there!" Rilla shouted through her curled hands. "Truce!"
Silence fell as she stepped to the gap where the Rand had stood. She looked backward; barely half her crew were still on their feet, there must be ten dead at least, as many again too badly hurt to stand and fight. "Fight," she muttered softly to herself. "This is a massacre and it has to stop, right now." To her own:
"Annike—no, Piashk, light me a torch. Everyone else hold your places." There was quiet at last, quiet enough to hear the water gurgle and the snick and flare of a sulphur match. She took the torch and shouted around the gap. "Will you give truce?"
"Had enough?" a voice gibed.
Then another, the Captain's voice that had called for archers earlier: "Truce; oath by the Lady and the Lord's shadow." A Zald accent, F'talezonian Middle Quarter; that oath would be kept, at least in public. She stepped through to the rear section of the deck. The mercenaries held their ground; about ten left, battered, bleeding, leaning on their weapons or making half-hearted efforts to cut away the tangle of rigging. The Captain and second mate standing among them, both Zak…
Zrinchka, she thought, recognizing him from one of Megan's gatherings in the old days; an up-and-coming captain of thirty or so, with a half-interest in his own vessel and the rest belonging to a consortium of small traders. The Kettle Belly was not his usual stamping ground at all. Behind him, the quarterdeck and the springsteel six marines and a HandLeader. He perched with a leg swinging on one of the leg-struts of his weapon, face calm in contrast to the tension of his troops. Thin, dark River-Quarter face, middle-aged, a professional who followed orders. Probably disgusted to have his machine in civilian hands, she thought. Also thanking the Lady he's under a merchant skipper, not a naval noble who'd order a stand to the knife.
Rilla sniffed, spat to clear her mouth, coughed to clear her throat. I'm soaked to the waist in blood. Bile rose thick at the back of her throat, and she choked down the overwhelming urge to vomit. I don't have time to throw up. She had seen death before… but so many, so many.
"Shyll, Temuchin, shields, please." Zrinchka's word she trusted, but one of the naZak mercenaries might risk a throw and his anger, for Habiku's reward. She called over the shield rims, her voice forced to lightness:
"Zrinchka, I didn't think you were this hard up. What are you doing aboard this tub?"
The man straightened and shaded his eyes with a hand, the twofang loose in his grip. "Dark Lord's dung, it is Megan Whitlock's patrischana, father's sister's child," he said, and then shrugged. "The Wild Goose was laid up with a cracked strake, and Smoothtongue offered me a one-time charter to run this bucket down to Rand; said he had an important cargo to transport quietly, and I needed to meet my payroll or put my crew on the beach…" Anger creased his face.
"I lost my bosun and four good hands to this." His eyes went to the torch. "And didn't Whitlock teach you better than to carry an unshielded flame on deck?" His face was pale too; a merchant skipper on the Brezhan could expect to see the odd skirmish, but river pirates were in the trade for profit, not blood—they rarely pushed home an attack against a well-defended vessel.
Rilla forced cheeks that felt stiff and numb to grin. "You pushed into a private quarrel, Zrinchka," she said. More formally: "Honorable Captain, we have the option of casting off. Unfortunately I don't believe that choice is open to you. Though I hesitate to burn one of my own ships, I will if I deem it necessary." She moved her hand toward the dangling, shredded canvas. "You can swim to shore before she goes up, of course. I wouldn't bet on being able to take much with you. Surrender and you can take your personal gear, and I'll leave you enough supplies to walk it upriver to the nearest settlement."
Zrinchka bit his lip, held up a hand for time, turned to speak to the marine NCO on the quarterdeck. Rilla could hear their voices murmuring; she could also see the mercenaries look at each other out of the corners of their eyes. The blood-rush of combat was fading, limbs and wounds stiffening; they fought for money and their reputations, coin was of little use to a corpse and nobody could fairly say they had not done an honorable day's work, with half their number dead.
"—not enough for my life!" Rilla heard the merchant captain say.
"All very well for you, Teik," the bandy-legged little marine was saying, crouched to bring his head within talking distance of Zrinchka. "Is the one what has to answer to the Teik Captain back at the fort for this buggering load of scrap." A thumb jerked over his shoulder toward the low-slung spider shape of the steelspring. "Much as my balls is—"
The ragged edges of sail flapped in a sudden gust of breeze. She could catch only a word or two: "orders." "papers." Behind her, she heard Shyll whisper to Inu, and a basso growl rumbled out; the mercenaries looked at each other again, openly, and one of the marines made an averting sign against evil. At last Zrinchka grabbed a folded document from the sergeant, scribbled angrily and turned.
"We accept your terms, pirate!" he snapped. "On one condition."
"Which is?" Weariness crashed down on Rilla like a blanket of resilient air, and she fought not to stagger.
Zrmchka's voice was grim. "That until we're gone, you keep that Dark Lord damned dog away from us!" Weapons clattered to the planks, and Zrinchka drove his twofang to stand, humming to match his frustration.
Rilla sat on the sterncastle of the Kettle Belly watching as they finished swabbing the deck. The marines and the mercenaries stood together on the starboard side, with the dejected look that prisoners always had; Iczak had attended to their hurts after seeing to the Zingas Vryka's folk, but the sheer physical misery of after-combat letdown was on them. Not to mention the pain of financial loss; hired fighters carried much of their profits on their back in equipment, and she was leaving them their clothes only, and one belt-knife each. It would mean long years of lower pay and greater risks, unless they could dun Habiku Smoothtongue for their losses. The marines were more philosophical, since the DragonLord would have to replace their gear.
Near them Shyll tended Inu's cuts. The dog whimpered, shivering as Shyll, frowning, carefully cleaned the wounds. His tail was tucked between his legs and he pressed his head flat to the planks in propitiation, flinching as the needle and catgut closed a long gash on his flank.
"Quiet, Inu. Good boy, good boy." A feeble wave of the tail, and the dog bent his barrel-sized head to lick at the wound. Shyll gently pushed the nose away. "No, Inu. Understand? No." The greathound looked at the teRyadn with melting amber eyes and laid his head down again with a gusty sound halfway between a whimper and a sigh. Shyll finished, straightened, glared at the prisoners with more anger than he had shown during the fight. Two of the marines were bouncing a pair of dice against the scuppers; they continued their game, but one of the mercenaries rolled his eyes at Inu and fingered his hair earring.
Rilla climbed stiffly to her feet and walked over to them, addressed the marine commander in high Zak.
"Teik." Her bow was exaggeratedly polite, and so was the form of address: the sergeant blinked in surprise and instinctively braced into the regulation rest position. "I'm so sorry to have deprived you of your transportation but I'm sure the short walk to F'trovanemi, no more than two or three days, won't harm you." A pause. "Do you know whose ship this is?"
