Authors: Christopher Rowley

Tags: #Fantasy, #Fantasy fiction, #General, #Fiction

The Shasht War (55 page)

Finally pulling up on the woman's shoulders, then pushing her down again, Simona got her own shoulder in past the knife point. She could lean down now and drive her forehead hard into the woman's face.

However, the pain that this blow provided brought stars to Simona's eyes. Then she saw that Yomafin's wife was done with fighting, having been knocked unconscious.

Simona wrested the knife away. The woman's nose was bloody. Simona's head was still ringing, when she turned around in time to see Mentu go staggering back into the stern-castle wall while Yomafin struck him with a heavy belaying pin, wrenched from the pinrail.

The bows kept coming, and Mentu collapsed to the deck.

Simona stepped forward and thrust at Yomafin with the knife. He saw her from the corner of his eye and stepped back with a growl.

"Abomination!"

He hit her with the belaying pin across her shoulder, and she almost dropped the knife. He swung the pin again, but she ducked.

He came on, swinging the pin with all his strength, keeping her tumbling backward. She backed into the stern-castle steps and almost fell in her effort to get out of the way. Behind her she heard the pin splinter wood as she spun and dodged away.

Around the waist they went, circling the mast. Mentu was struggling weakly to get back on his knees. There was no help there. She remembered the knife.

Yomafin swung at her, she tried to parry with the knife, but the end of the pin caught her on the back of the hand and the knife flew away while pain shot through her body.

Someone screamed as she ran for the steps. She got up the first three and then Yomafin's strong hands caught the back of her jacket. She clung to the rail, but he was too strong and her grip was broken as she was flung down, cannoning into the mast before falling to the deck.

Yomafin dragged her back onto her feet and held her up until his face was right before hers.

"Listen to me, you bitch. We will leave now. I will lower the sails. You will steer. I will kill you if you betray me."

Simona stared at him blankly, her head whirling while she struggled to find a breath.

But Yomafin was already busy releasing the lashings of the mizzen sail. He went about the task like the experienced sailor he was.

Simona looked around for the knife, but couldn't see it. She didn't know what to do. Blood welled from a cut along her cheekbone. Her shoulder ached where he'd struck her with the belaying pin.

The lashings were undone. Yomafin was raising the sail.

Mentu was still unable to stand. Simona watched in horror as the sail was raised and then Yomafin ran forward, holding the kitchen knife. In less then a minute of frenzied sawing, he cut the line holding them to the anchor buoy.

Sea Wasp
came free, and the breeze immediately filled the big triangular mizzen sail.

"Steer, damn your eyes!" snarled Yomafin to Simona as he came running back from the bow.

The barque was alive now, the prow turning as the wind took her slowly sideways. Simona climbed the steps and took hold of the wheel, holding it hard over to the left. The stern began to pick up momentum, swinging the barque's nose back to the north and the open bay.

Yomafin came up beside her in a moment. He saw that she'd done exactly what was needed. The barque continued to swing smoothly around, her bow aimed for the ship channel. Simona turned the wheel slightly, adjusting the rudder's drag and slowing the motion of the bow.

Yomafin grunted, surprised somewhat by Simona's skill with the steering wheel after just a few days of handling it.

Yomafin adjusted the big triangular sail, letting the boom out. Now the light breeze would waft the ship straight out into the channel. The tide was running their way as well. Simona felt a very slight bump from the ship, but saw no obstruction.

Yomafin seized her by the shoulder and leaned into her face.

"Steer!" he snarled.

Terrified, she took hold of the wheel. Yomafin ran forward with the knife in his hand.

Someone clambered over the gunwale down near the bow. Yomafin surged up the deck and sprang on the intruder with an oath.

The two engaged for the briefest moment, and then Yomafin went flying outboard, arcing away from the ship's side to fall below with a heavy splash. Fortunately he fell on the side of the ship hidden from the Red Tops, who right then were studying the
Sea Wasp
with suspicion as she suddenly unfurled a sail and began to move out into the channel.

Yomafin had barely surfaced, spluttering, when Simona glimpsed another figure dive overboard, knife into the water with hardly a splash, and swim with strong strokes to Yomafin's side. There was a muffled cry, the sound of a blow and then the figure had turned back and was towing Yomafin toward the ship.

Simona swung the wheel hard back the other way, fighting the resistance with all her strength.
Sea Wasp
responded after a short hesitation, her stern swinging back, cutting the distance to be swum. Simona knew that the water was dangerously cold.

Another splash caught her eye, and a moment later she saw a second swimmer surface beside Yomafin. The two worked together to heave Yomafin's body toward
Sea Wasp's
side.

Other figures had appeared on the deck all around her. A very large mot dropped in front of her. His face was marred hideously by some violence in the past. Then she realized with a shock that it was a brilby, except it wasn't quite, and she simply stared in confusion. She hadn't seen a brilby since she'd left the Land, and she'd never seen a kob close up.

Now, beside the kob, stood a man, very gaunt in the face. He wore clothes of quality, but torn and dirty. There was something vaguely familiar about him as well, but she could not place it. Perhaps it was the beard.

"Greetings, Mistress Simona," said this fellow. "I am Janbur of the Gsekk."

She put a hand to her mouth in shock.

"Janbur of the Prime?" No wonder. She had seen him many times at Gsekk clan gatherings.

"The same. But now a fugitive."

The "brilby" had left them to join two other mots throwing lines down to those in the water.

"Good gracious," said Simona with the instinctive manners of her class. "I am of the Gsekk as well. My mother was of the Shalba."

"I know, as soon as Thru Gillo told me about you, I knew who you were."

Simona felt a shiver. He meant no insult, she was sure, but she also knew that to him she was the infamous "red mark girl" that eleven men had viewed but none had bid for.

"All that is behind us now. I am simply Simona."

"Yes," he smiled. "And I, Janbur."

Simona saw friendliness in this man's eyes.

"Thank you," she said.

He nodded and turned away. Purdah still exerted its power, and Janbur was struggling with his feelings about a woman like Simona unveiled, wearing trousers, out in the open air.

Ter-Saab and the others had hauled Yomafin onto the deck and laid him out as wet and flat-looking as the fish he dealt from his slab.

The brilby immediately straddled Yomafin and began pumping vigorously on his chest. After a few hard compressions the fish dealer gave an explosive gasp and then began coughing.

Thru Gillo came over the gunwale, followed closely by the other mot. Both crouched down beside the coughing form of Yomafin, curled up, shivering, wet and cold.

"Better find him some blankets. He took chill from the water."

Thru left Yomafin to recover and stepped over to crouch beside Mentu, still lying against the wall of the stern-castle in a daze. After a moment's study he came up the steps to embrace Simona by the wheel. Janbur had taken over the wheel, though, for now all that had to be done was to hold to the course Simona had taken.

"I knew it was you who was steering." He spoke in the tongue of the Land.

"I knew it was you out there swimming," she replied just as if they were alone.

Janbur shivered when she spoke the alien tongue so smoothly. He tried not to think about the sight of a noblewoman embracing a mot like that. Abandoning purdah was one thing, but this hinted at abomination!

"Many men would have left Yomafin to drown."

"I am not a man. And if he had been seen by the Red Tops, it could have caused great difficulties anyway."

For a moment Thru reached up to her face.

"He did this?"

She tried to smile. "I'm all right. Nothing broken, I think."

Janbur coughed. The tenderness in the mot's voice disturbed him. Janbur had learned a little of the tongue of the Land, but not enough to converse like this!

Simona ignored the man.

"And you found your friends!"

"Those that survived, anyway."

Someone was up on the foremast letting down the mainsail.

Sea Wasp
had come around into the main channel now and was gathering speed.

Ahead, no more than a mile distant, the estuary opened out into the bay. Behind them the city rumbled to the drums.

Somewhere back there some Red Tops were making inquiries about
Sea Wasp
, but too late, for she was out of the harbor under sail with a good offshore breeze and a running tide.

CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT

In the end, after some argument, they put Yomafin and his family ashore on the northern tip of Cape Shebba.

The boat scraped onto the sand. Yomafin, his children, and wife got out and splashed up to the beach. A path lead up the ocher cliffs beyond. A dry wind blew off the land. The woman's veils fluttered about her head as she struggled up the sand. Yomafin made no move to help her.

"Yomafin, I am sorry that it has come to this."

"You destroyed my life, friend Mentu."

"But we let you live."

Their eyes met for a moment, then Yomafin looked away to where
Sea Wasp
rode at anchor.

"And now? You will sail away with the abomination on either side of you?"

"The lady gave you gold, Yomafin. She did not ask for your life. Many would have simply thrown you over the side after what you did."

Yomafin knew this, but his anger still ruled him.

"Abomination, Mentu, you cannot go against nature."

Mentu made no reply, then said, "Where will you go?"

"To Gzia Gi. I have friends there. They will help me. Perhaps I will become a dealer in fine arts. I have always liked that trade."

"A step up from fish anyway."

"Yes. Good-bye, Mentu. I am sorry we fought."