“That’s tacking,” Nugget instructed. “Haven’t you learned anything? Our sails can tack back and forth, north side to south side, but the Venn? When the wind’s strong enough, they can tack and tack, but they get pushed right back to the west.”
“So why do they have the square sails?” the older boy asked.
Nugget was quite certain he’d been taught, but she remembered her ship rat days, when she paid attention to maybe one in five things the oldsters droned on about.
She also loved showing off. A trifle self-consciously, she said, “Those big square sails are best at deep water sailing. They rig different because they sail different. We can get much tighter up into the wind but we have to hug the coasts. You go deep water, and next thing you know, people are singing ‘Leahan Anaer,’ only you don’t know it because you’re lost at sea.”
Mutt straightened from tying down a shallow iron pan on an iron-work support, and saw the tight-lipped fright in the stuttering boy’s face. Did his family sing the ‘Leahan Anaer’ for his parents, vanished somewhere at sea between pirate attacks and Venn? He was the one who’d been crying at nights. No wonder the Marlovans wanted to be rid of him, Mutt thought impatiently, then he moved away from the pans, goaded by memories of his own.
“If they tried coming up the strait in winter, they’d wallow worse than those Chwahir tubs,” Nugget went on, always glad to have an audience. “I sure hope the wind doesn’t veer anymore’n it has. Look at the pickle-butts shifting to cut ’em off if they turn southward out to sea.”
“
W-wuh-we
have
h-h-horses
.” The boy seemed to find comfort in that. “
Much
faster than shuh-shuh-ships.”
“Well, they’re no use at sea,” Nugget pointed out.
Jeje heard a chuckle from Viac Fisher as he tested the tautness of the sail and grinned. The tall, tough, hawk-nosed Fisher brothers had become
Vixen
’s regulars. They were Venn-descended Gerandans—which was why Inda renamed them “Fisher” for their earlier trade—but Jeje had discovered they’d never been loyal to their ancestors. In fact, they had only just stopped the habit of spitting over the rail whenever the Venn were mentioned.
Loos Fisher called from the mast, “
Death
just a finger off the bow.” He dropped lightly to the deck.
Jeje swung the tiller, the Fisher brothers shifting sail without having to be told.
The Fox Banner Fleet had been hiding on the west side of the rocky promontory away from Jaro Harbor; the rest of the alliance lay far to the east. Jeje hoped.
Now the
Death
was in the lead, tacking hard to the southeast. Jeje jinked southward to intercept
Death
, and the wind hit with a smack on the other side of
Vixen
’s hull, nearly lifting them out of the water. The Fishers whooped and the rats shrilled in delight and alarm. With the wind abaft,
Vixen
was practically flying.
A tousled fair head popped up from below a moment later. “Are we sinking?” cried the youngest, sister to the stutterer.
Jeje laughed as she peered through her glass and spotted the Fox Banner capital ships hull up on the horizon. “No.” She smacked the back of her thigh. “Got the wind right where we like it! Gotta report what I saw.”
Nugget ducked under the mainsail yard, her frizzled cloud of sun-bleached hair blowing back from her brow. “Think he’ll let us thread the needle?”
“Might have to,” Jeje yelled, though she knew that being forced to sail between these tight, disciplined Venn meant they’d end up as fireships. Nobody believed they could outfight the bigger, well-drilled and disciplined Venn warships.
They had to get to the weather side of the Venn.
On the
Death,
two men reinforced Fox at the helm. They watched sea, sky, and horizon as the
Death
surged forward, masts aslant. If they kept the wind amidships they might make it, but if the oncoming storm veered to blow from the southeast, even fast schooners couldn’t sail straight into the wind.
Barend ran aft, his sharp-boned face ruddy from the brisk air and occasional splashes of water from the surging sea. Despite the cold he had a crimson kerchief twisted around his broad brow to catch the sweat. He’d been driving ship and crew to their limits since they emerged from hiding beyond the promontory west of Jaro Harbor. At dawn it had been all hands: luff, reef, jib-sails in and out, sails belling, tightening, flashing in near synchrony, Fibi the Delf bringing the best out of
Cocodu
to match Barend’s demands of the
Death
as they fought to get between the chasing Venn and the Chwahir, as promised.
“Damn Chwahir are slow,” Barend commented, peering eastward—straight into cloud and rain.
Fox finished the thought. “Won’t matter if our loyal allies are in position. Signal! I want
Vixen
—”
“Already here,” Barend commented, glass to his eye. “Look behind you. She’s flying in on us there on the weather beam.”
Vixen
ranged up on their lee side shortly after.
Fox leaned against the stern rail, smiling down at Jeje, whose dramatic line of black brow made her mood clear. “Well?” he prompted.
“The Venn are in that band o’ rain, hot after the Chwahir. We’d better put on some speed.” Jeje scowled eastward. Was Deliyeth out there, or holding back?
Barend cursed as he tipped his head. “Wind might shift to the southeast.”
“Then why are we waiting around?” Jeje’s deep voice roughened. “You already got Fangras shifted, I just saw that comin’ up. We better get ahead, or we’re all going to have to thread the needle. Give me
Sable
and her pack o’ schooners, that way you can use Fangras to protect the Chwahir’s sterns if Deliyeth hangs back to see if we get cut up first.”
“You think so too, eh?” Fox lifted a shoulder. “Take Eflis, then. She’d like nothing better than to attack an entire squadron of Venn with only your little boat as backup.”
From her position abaft
Death,
Eflis watched
Vixen
through her glass. The scout slanted at a dangerous angle, speeding so fast white water arced a lacy feather behind. Eflis could barely make out the small crew standing at the high rail to stiffen the scout a bit more, the barrels of fish oil they’d been gathering for months lashed behind them.
Jeje did not slow when she neared, just cut across the bow, then splashed down the weather side. Jeje yelled up toward the captain’s deck, “They’re in that rain! We gotta top the needle, thread it if we can’t make it!”
Eflis let out a whoop, then called to her flag mid, “Signal! All my ships, arrow formation, on me! Barrels at the ready!”
Crew swarmed above, putting on every stitch
Sable
could carry, in a long-practiced maneuver that made this the fastest capital schooner in the eastern seas. Eflis whooped again as the deck lifted under her feet.
A sweet tinkle of braid chimes—Sparrow was there. Not just there, but wanting Eflis to know she was there. Sparrow usually moved around noiselessly.
As the
Sable
plunged into the white-topped waves, sending cold spray down the deck, they stood shoulder to shoulder, Eflis laughing aloud as she tended the wheel herself. When it came time to fight, she’d roam the ship as she always did, but now, she needed to feel the pull of wood and wind and water, taking
Sable
to just the edge of snapping a mast, or broaching to . . .
Vixen
sailed past the stern. Nugget’s curls streamed as she kissed her fingers to Eflis, then cut her eyes to the right to see how lean, dark-haired young Mutt was taking her extravagant gesture.
Eflis flickered her fingers from the wheel to wave back, then gripped the spokes again.
“Eflis.” Sparrow’s voice was nearly lost on the wind.
“Aw, Sparrow, you know why she’s doing that.” Eflis laughed. “A few kisses, me teaching and her flirting, isn’t that fair exchange? Heyo, look starboard. Venn prows coming out of the cloudburst, what a tight formation.”
Sparrow’s hands tightened on the binnacle awning. How alive Eflis was, how strong, how beautiful! At fourteen Sparrow had been a runaway, talking herself aboard a suspicious trader as a deck scrub. Two attacks later, she ended up wounded on the shore of Khanerenth, where she met Eflis, whose family had lost everything in the revolution. The girls had taken to pirating in revenge against the new king.
Sparrow never thought about the future; life with Eflis had seemed like endless youth, love, adventure lived at a dashing pace under the threat of sudden death. Then one summer morning she’d been shocked by the lines crinkling the corners of Eflis’ eyes, the faint blurring beside her mouth and under her chin revealed in that clear light. Time and age were even more inexorable than enemies, because no matter how fast you moved, how well you drilled, you could not fight them.
“It does mean something.” Sparrow was surprised when her voice went unsteady. “Kisses mean something.”
Eflis flicked a round-eyed glance of surprise, then another, longer glance. “Sparrow? You’re not carrying a hate for young Nugget? You
know
I don’t mean nothin’ by any of ’em, boys or girls.”
“Nugget’s not the cause. Only a result.” Emotion swelled, difficult to define, to catch and hold. “She’s young, young as we once were.”
Sparrow had always distrusted words. On Toar, where she had come from, people used words as weapons, or as art, for mood, for gain. For fun. Not for the truth.
“But we aren’t young anymore,” Sparrow said, her voice husky. “Time’s against us . . .”
Eflis had been intently watching the angle of the fast-moving armada of Venn ships angling in on the weather side as they pursued the fleeing Chwahir. Her mind streamed with images that flitted by too fast to form full thoughts: wind shifting with the storm brought Venn out, Fox miscalculated? Get there in two waves, maybe Fox figured on that,
why does Sparrow hate time?
“What are ye wantin’, love?” Eflis turned her head. “Deck! Weapons at the ready. Torches at the ready.”
Out on the water, the triangle steadily shrank: the Chwahir the base, their round-hulled tubs blundering straight downwind. The Venn in pursuit formed one side of the triangle, and racing close-hauled to the breaking point to intercept the Venn were
Vixen
in the lead, the
Sable
and the Fox Banner Fleet all in a line.
They had to cross in front of the Venn to make the plan work or their smoke would just blow across them, and their allies—supposedly coming up from behind The Fangs from the east—would be seen and pounced on by the Venn.
“Topgallants,” Eflis called.
Frightened looks were sent her way; this breeze was too high for three levels of sail.
Eflis kicked off her shoes and spread her stockinged feet on the deck, testing the vibration from keelson to the masts. If they carried away a spar from the press of sail, they’d die. No second chance: the Venn were distinct now.
“Arrow crews aloft!” she cried when the topgallants were sheeted home.
Sable
jerked twice, trembled, then up came the bow. It plunged down, sending a wash of water down the deck. Those with torches braced with one hand, the other held up to keep their flames alight. The sail crews scrambled to ease the weather helm—the gathering of water on the lee side which could slow them down.
The ship responded like a sea bird taking flight.
Two cableslengths ahead,
Vixen
had just crossed the tip of the Venn wedge, barely beyond arrow range.
“Screens!” Eflis yelled, and the netting dropped, tenting them, blurring the sea, sky, enemy, and friend alike.
A faint crow from the scout ship carried back, despite the whipping wind cutting across the beam at a sharp angle. Eflis leaned her entire body into the wheel, holding, holding . . . her feet began to slide . . . “Brace!”
Sparrow and her ship master sprang to each side, adding their strength to keep the helm steady despite the massive forces of water and wind torquing the ship from different angles.
“Steady,” Eflis shouted as arrows began to zip and hiss through the air overhead: the Venn were not aiming at crew from their extreme range, they were trying to puncture the drum-taut sails in hopes the wind would shred the canvas and the ship would turn up into the wind and founder. “Ready about!”
The command was unnecessary: everyone was in position, hands to the line. Each leaned unconsciously forward, stomachs tightened in an effort to speed the
Sable
a little faster . . .
And the schooner knifed past the point of the Venn arrow. For a moment they stared straight into the enemy formation in all its power. Those great warships, the towers of sail, everyone on station—and this was considered a small reinforcement?
If we ever have to face their entire navy . . .
Eflis left the thought unfinished. As soon as she caught sight of the starboard side of the Venn flagship she spun the wheel. “Helm down,” she yelled, easing the wheel.
Her sail crew, practiced after years of tight maneuvers, eased off the jib sails as the spanker boom hauled amidships.
“Helm’s a-lee!” Eflis cried, loving this moment when the ship was poised in the turn, a desperate situation even without an enemy aiming straight for the hull.
Foresails thrown aback, yards braced up sharp.
“Haul taut!” Yard arms swung. Sails thrummed and bucketed, fighting the line of crew using their entire bodies to get the sails snugged up tight. The little speed
Sable
had lost was made up in surges as each sail filled, held. Now they were running along the outside of the Venn, the wind on the forward beam, spars rigid.
Eflis laughed for joy. “Fire away!”
Already the intense whiff of rotten fish oil whipped past from the
Vixen
ahead; streamers of blue-tinged dark smoke drifted toward the ships forming the tip of the Venn arrowhead.