Authors: Scott Lynch
“Hello, boys,” said the stranger. He had a faint Verrari accent. “Welcome aboard the
Volantyne’s Resolve
. Solus Volantyne, at your service. And I do mean that! You boys are our first and
only business on this trip.”
“Whatever you’re being paid,” said Locke, “we can double it if you turn this ship
around right now.”
“Our mutual friend told me that was probably the first thing you’d say, Master Lazari.”
Locke cracked his knuckles and glared. He had to give Sabetha credit for at least
preserving their false identities, but he didn’t
want
to have any kind thoughts toward her at the moment.
“I’m inclined to agree with her suggestion,” continued Volantyne, “that I’m rather
more likely to enjoy success and fair compensation in partnership with the woman who’s
still at liberty, rather than the two men she brought to me in chains.”
“We can triple her payment,” said Locke.
“A man who’d trade a sure fortune for the promises of an angry prisoner is far too
stupid to be the captain of his own ship,” said Volantyne.
“Well, hells,” said Locke. “If you won’t turn coat, can you at least get me some ship’s
biscuit or something?”
“Our mutual friend said that food would be the second thing on your mind.” Volantyne
folded his arms and smiled. “But we’re not eating ship’s biscuit on this leg of the
trip. We’re eating fresh-baked pepper bread, and goose stuffed with honey-glazed olives,
and boiled lake frogs in brandy and cream.”
“I got hit on the head somehow,” said Locke. “This is the stupidest dream I’ve had
in years, isn’t it?”
“No dream, my friend. We’ve been set up with a cook so good I’d fuck him six days
a week just to keep him aboard, if only I liked men. But he’s another gift paid for
by our mutual friend. Come on deck and let me explain the conditions of your passage.
You lucky, lucky sons of bitches!”
On deck, Locke could see that the
Volantyne’s Resolve
was a two-masted brig with her rigging in good order; her sails were neither straight
from the yard nor frayed to threads. About two dozen men and women had been formed
up to watch Locke and Jean emerge from the great cabin. Most of them had the tan,
rangy look of sailors, but a few of the heavier ones, big-boned land animals for sure,
looked like freshly hired muscle.
“This is the easiest cruise we’ve ever been given,” said Volantyne. “We’re headed
west, up the Cavendria and out to sea. We’ll have an autumn excursion for a month,
then we’ll turn round and take it slow and easy back to Karthain. You gentlemen will
enjoy a luxurious cabin, books to read, fine meals. The wines we’ve laid in for the
voyage will make you think you’re royalty. All this, on one condition only—good behavior.”
“I can pay,” said Locke, raising his voice to a shout, “three times what each of you
is receiving now! You would have it merely for getting us back to Karthain! Two days’
work, rather than two months!”
“Now, sir,” said Volantyne, looking cross for the first time, “that’s not good behavior
at all. Any further talk in that vein will get you sent down to the hold. There’s
two ways to make this trip—with free limbs and full stomachs, or cinched up tight
in darkness, let out once a day to eat and piss. I’m to take the tenderest care with
your lives, but your liberty can go straight overboard if you give us trouble.”
“What about these things around our ankles?” said Locke.
“Shields from temptation,” said Volantyne.
“Gah,” Locke muttered. “Also, where’s this food—”
“Sirs, the thousand apologies,” cried a man in a stained brown robe who came stumbling
up from below via the main deck hatch. He was pale, with grayish-blond hair, and carried
a silver tray set with a plain iron tureen and several loaves of bread. “I have the
foods!”
“This famous cook of yours is a
Vadran
?” said Jean.
“Yes, I
know
,” said Volantyne, “but you must trust me. Adalric was trained in Talisham, and he
knows his business.”
“The oysters, in sauce from ale has I boiled,” said the cook.
He held the tray out to Locke, and the scents of fresh food were as good as a fist
to the jaw.
“Um, discussion of the situation,” said Locke, “can recommence in about half an hour.”
“So long as you quit trying to bribe my crew, you may speak as you please, honored
passengers,” said Volantyne.
AS THE
first day passed, and the second, it became clear that their situation was both the
most comfortable and the most vexing imprisonment Locke could have imagined.
Their meals were plentiful and magnificent, the wine better even than promised, the
ale fresh and sweet, and their requests were taken up without hesitation or complaint.
“These bastards have made their fortunes on this venture,” said Jean, over the remnants
of lunch on the second day. “Isn’t that right, shipmates? It’s the only possible explanation
for our treatment. A pile of gold in every pocket.”
Every meal was eaten in the presence of at least four attendants, silent and polite
and utterly vigilant. Every knife and fork was counted, every scrap and bone was collected.
Locke could have palmed any number of useful items, but there was no point to it,
not until the other difficulties of their situation could be surmounted.
Their bedding was turned out and replaced each day, and they were kept on deck while
it happened. Locke could see just enough of the activity within the cabin to depress
his spirits. All of their books were given a shake, their chests were opened and searched,
their hammocks scoured, the floor planks examined in minute detail. By the time they
were let back in, everything was restored to its proper place and the cabin was as
fresh as if it had never been used, but it was useless to hide anything.
They were searched several times each day, and weren’t even permitted
to wear shoes. The only extraneous object they possessed, in fact, was Jean’s tightly
bound lock of Ezri’s hair. Locke was surprised to see it on the morning of their third
day.
“I had a few words with Sabetha, after her people finally knocked me down.” Jean lay
in his hammock, idly turning the hair over and over in his hands. “She said that some
courtesies were not to be refused.”
“Did she say anything else? About me, or for me?”
“I think she’s said everything she means to say, Locke. This ship’s as good as a farewell
note.”
“She must have given Volantyne and his crew ten pages of directions concerning us.”
“Even their little boat is lashed tighter than usual, as though some god might reach
down and snatch it off the deck,” said Jean casually.
“Oh really?” Locke slipped out of his hammock, crept over to Jean’s side of the cabin,
and lowered his voice. “On the larboard side of the main deck? You think we could
make something of it?”
“We’d never have time to hoist it properly. But if we could weaken the ropes, and
if the deck was pitching …”
“Shit,” said Locke. “Once we hit the Cavendria, we’ll be steady as a cup of tea until
we’re out the other side. How many of our friends do you figure we could handle at
once?”
“How many could
I
handle at once? Let’s be pragmatic and say three. I’m pretty sure I could club the
whole crew down one or two at a time if nobody raised an alarm, but you’ve seen their
habits. They never work alone. I’m not sure the brute force approach will get us very
far.”
“You know, it certainly would be nice to receive an unannounced visit from our benefactor
Patience,” said Locke. “Or anyone associated with her. Right about now. Or … now!”
“I think we’re on our own,” said Jean. “I’m sure someone or some
thing
is watching us, but Sabetha put us here. It seems within the rules as Patience explained
them.”
“I wonder if
her
Bondsmagi would be so sporting.”
“Well, there is a bright side. We’re eating well enough. You’re not looking like such
a wrenched-out noodle anymore.”
“That’s great, Jean. I’m not just exiled; I’m being plumped up for
slaughter. Suppose there’s any chance we might run into Zamira if we reach the Sea
of Brass?”
“What the hell would she be doing back up here so soon after everything that happened?”
Jean yawned and stretched. “The
Poison Orchid
’s as likely to come over the horizon and save us as I am to give birth to a live
albatross.”
“It was just an idle thought,” said Locke. “A damned pleasing idle thought. So, I
suppose we pray for heavy weather.”
“And worry about cutting some ropes,” said Jean. “Ideas?”
“I could have a makeshift knife on an hour’s notice. So long as I knew it would be
used before they turned our cabin over the next day.”
“Good. And what about our ankle manacles? You’ve always been better with that sort
of thing than I have.”
“The mechanisms are delicate. I could come up with bone splinters small enough to
fit, but those are brittle. One snap and they’d jam up the locks for good.”
“Then we might just have to bear them until we can hit land,” said Jean. “Well, first
things first. We need to be within reasonable distance of a beach, and we need a rolling
deck, and we need to not be tied up in the hold when our chance comes.”
THE SKY
turned gray again that night, and ominous clouds boiled on the horizons, but the
gentle rolling of the Amathel barely tilted the deck of the
Resolve
in one direction or another. Locke spent several hours leaning against the main deck
rails, feigning placidity, straining secretly for any glimpse of a bolt of lightning
or an oncoming thunderhead. The only lights to be seen, however, were the ghostly
flickerings from within the black depths of the lake, twinkling like constellations
of fire.
Their progress was slow. The strange autumn winds were against them much of the time,
and with no mages to shape the weather to their taste, they had to move by tack after
long, slow tack to the southwest. Volantyne and his crew seemed to care not a whit.
Whether they sailed half the world or half a mile, their pay would be the same.
On the night of their fourth day, Locke caught flashes of whitish yellow illuminating
the southern horizon, but his excitement died when he realized that he was looking
at Lashain.
On the fifth day they picked up speed, and the capricious winds grew stronger. The
whole sky bruised over with promising clouds, and just after noon the first drops
of cool rain began to fall. Locke and Jean retreated to their cabin, trying to look
innocent. They buried themselves in books and idle conversation, glancing out the
cabin window every few moments, watching in mutual satisfaction as the troughs between
the waves deepened and the strands of foam thickened at their crests.
At the third hour of the afternoon, with the rain steady and the lake rolling at four
or five feet, Adalric came to their door to receive instructions for dinner.
“Perhaps the soup of the veal, masters?”
“By all means,” said Locke. If any chance to escape was coming, he wanted to face
it with at least one more of the Vadran prodigy’s feasts shoved down his gullet.
“And how about chicken?” said Jean.
“I’ll do one the murder right away.”
“Dessert too,” said Locke. “Let’s have a big one tonight. Storms make me hungry.”
“I have a cake of the honey and ginger,” said Adalric.
“Good man,” said Jean. “And let’s have some wine. Two bottles of sparkling apple,
eh?”
“Two bottles,” said the cook. “I has it brung to you.”
“Decent fellow, for all that he tramples the language,” said Locke when the door had
closed behind the cook. “I hate to take advantage of him.”
“He won’t miss us if we slip away,” said Jean. “He’s got the whole crew to appreciate
him. You know what sort of slop they’d be gagging down if he wasn’t aboard.”
Locke went on deck a few minutes later, letting the rain soak him as he stood by the
foremast, feigning indifference as the deck rolled slowly from side to side. It was
a gentle motion as yet, but if the weather continued to pick up it was a very promising
trend indeed.
“Master Lazari!” Solus Volantyne came down from the quarterdeck, oilcloak fluttering.
“Surely you’d be more comfortable in your cabin?”
“Perhaps our mutual friend neglected to tell you, Captain Volantyne, that Master Callas
and myself have been at sea. Compared to what we endured down in the Ghostwinds, this
is invigorating.”
“I do know something of your history, Lazari, but I’m also charged with your safety.”
“Well, until someone takes these damned bracelets off my ankles I can’t exactly swim
to land, can I?”
“And what if you catch cold?”
“With Adalric aboard? He must have possets that would drive back death itself.”
“Will you at least consent to an oilcloak, so you look like less of a crazy landsman?”
“That’d be fine.”
Volantyne summoned a sailor with a spare cloak, and Locke resumed talking as he fastened
it over his shoulders. “Now, pardon my ignorance, but where the hell are we, anyway?”
“Forty miles due west of Lashain, give or take a hair in any direction.”
“Ah. I thought I spotted the city last night.”
“We’re not making good westward progress. If I had a schedule to keep I’d be in a
black mood, but thanks to you, we’re in no hurry, are we?”
“Quite. Are those heavier storms to the south?”
“That shadow? That’s a lee shore, Master Lazari. A damned lee shore. We’re eight or
nine miles off the southern coast of the Amathel, and fighting to get no closer. If
we can punch through this mess and claw another twenty or thirty miles west-nor’west,
we should be clear straight to the Cavendria, and from there it’s like a wading pond
all the way to the Sea of Brass.”
“Well, that’s good to hear,” said Locke. “Rest assured, I’ve got absolutely no interest
in drowning.”