Chasing the Lantern (17 page)

The last pirate stared at Fengel, eyes wide, aware that he was outmatched. Fengel dispatched him with a flourish, barely turning in time to parry the wild blow that Natasha had launched at him from behind. The pirate princess fought with abandon, hate in her eyes, careless of the disarray her clothing hung in. "Is it any wonder?" She yelled at him. Fengel lost his smile, concentrating on deflecting her wild blows. "Marriage to you would drive a saint to drink!" She hacked at him again. "You and your pompous, arrogant, holier-than-thou attitude. You wear a
monocle,
for Her sake. Why? Your vision is perfectly fine!"

Fengel sniffed. "A gentleman of breeding maintains a specific standard of—"

"Ha!" cackled Natasha. "You're even more baseborn than I am. You just never got over that Perinese press-ganging of yours, being passed up for every promotion. So now you play pirate, pretending to be the gentleman officer you never were!"

Fengel growled, composure cracked. He parried her blows and then went on the offensive, a blurred wall of steel that licked around her defenses. Natasha's eyes widened and she took a step back, then two. She shut up, all her attention focused on keeping the man before her at bay.

Mordecai stepped in from behind. Quick as an eel, he thrust squarely at Fengel's back. The pirate captain wheeled, knocking the blade away at the last second. Mordecai blinked, surprised. Fengel must have noticed his approach, but how, he could not say.

Fengel quickly backed away, putting both of them within his field of vision. "Oh, basely done," he said, disgustedly. "Is that this excellent skill that I keep hearing of?"

"So long as it works," replied Mordecai, voice more even than he felt. His arm still ached from the ice. He raised his sword back into guard position. Fengel did as well, a fencer's stance, body narrowed, facing them both, off hand tucked behind his back. Natasha moved apart from him, circling around, attempting to split Fengel's attention.

Mordecai struck first, a low-quarter blow to test his opponent's defenses. Fengel parried, playing along, not revealing a single weakness of form. Natasha tried to take advantage. Fengel wheeled about, parrying, binding her blade, and giving her a nick along the back of her hand in one smooth motion. She hissed and fell back, shaking her arm.

Fengel wasn't done. Before Mordecai could even rally for another blow the other pirate was back, beating on his own blade. Shock travelled down the hilt, into his numbed fingers and forearm. Mordecai gave ground, step after step, as Captain Fengel fought them both back.

This isn't going to work
. The thought was galling. Fengel really
was
a skilled swordsman, as good as him or better. But the aetherite's Working had him in poor condition; even with Natasha's help, maybe even with half a dozen more men, they would not be able to subdue the pirate captain.

He spat at Fengel's eyes. The other man drew back, automatically bringing up his guard just long enough to blink. Mordecai didn't bother to follow up. He turned and fled, moving back into the press of the crowd. Fengel took a step after him, then turned as Natasha entered the fray again.

The fight dragged on. A quick glance about the deck told Mordecai that things were still evenly matched between the two airship crews.
So maybe it's time to make things
un-
even.
Fengel may have been peerless, but everyone knew he had one particular weakness.

Mordecai glanced at the crowd for a handy victim. Lucian Thorne moved about the far end of the deck, flailing away while the giant piratess Lome bulled her way through Natasha's crew.
No, someone else
. He spied a lithe young woman, the one Fengel had brought to the Bleeding Teeth several nights ago. She jabbed a dagger in a pirate's shoulder, then ducked around as he screamed to cut his throat. Mordecai took a step toward her, but quick as a cat she looked up at him, checked herself, and ducked between two others fighting.
Not her then, either.

Another of Fengel's Men stood nearby, hard pressed against two of Natasha's pirates. Mordecai smiled in recognition.
This one.
He stepped up neatly behind the man, catching him roughly by the back of his collar with his free hand, sliding his blade up against his victim's throat during a break in the action. Mordecai glared at his crewmen, who paused at the sight of their first mate. Then he smiled down at the figure he clasped.

"Hullo, Henry Smalls," said Mordecai.

"Mordecai!" growled the figure. "Let me go, you lickspittle dog! I'll—"

"Help me do whatever I want, I think," replied Mordecai. "This way. Smartly, now." He nodded for his men to cover him, and whirled the steward around, marching him back to where Fengel and Natasha fenced near the helm. Natasha was backed up against the gearbox. Two more of her men lay at her feet, wounded and groaning.

"Once again," said Fengel calmly, "you are outmatched. Give in now and save some face."

"Never," gasped Natasha. "If you could have shown this kind of stamina somewhere else but swordplay, you'd have found another woman by now."

"Enough!" called Mordecai. The others turned to look at him. "Captain Fengel. Drop your weapon and order your men to stand down, or I slit your steward's throat this instant."

Fengel stared. "You dog! You dishonorable—"

"Call for quarter, or this fellow gets it in the neck."

Henry fought. "Don't do it, Captain!"

Fengel stared at them, at the fight raging up the rest of the deck, and then back to Mordecai. He glared at Natasha, who smiled sweetly. He turned back to Mordecai.

"Face me fairly," growled Fengel. "You hull-sucking worm. Fight me fairly!"

Mordecai raised an eyebrow and pulled his blade tighter. Henry Smalls gasped in pain. Fengel chewed his lip and then tossed his saber to the deck. "Damn you," he hissed to his wife. "Quarter!" he called to the deck at large. "Stand down, men! Stand down!"

Mordecai glanced around. Fengel's Crew were pausing, uncertain, pulling back to stare disbelievingly over at their captain. The fighting slowed, then stopped. Natasha's Reavers moved to take immediate advantage, disarming the losers and herding them together.

Mordecai let Henry go as more of Natasha's men moved up to take the captain and the steward captive.

"Curse you," hissed Fengel. "You dishonorable dog. You can't beat me in a fair fight—"

"Which is why we don't fight fair," said Natasha. She gestured and two of her men grabbed Fengel, wrapping his arms around behind him. She reached up to pinch his cheek. "We're pirates, after all." She laughed as her husband jerked away.

Mordecai glanced around the deck again. They'd won. "Let's get rid of him, now," he said to his captain. "Clear them all off the ship to feed the sharks. We can be under way and at the treasure wreck by tomorrow night."

Fengel started. "What? You can't! I've called for quarter!"

Mordecai smiled. "I think I can, and I will."

"No." Natasha tapped her lower lip with one finger, smiling.

Mordecai frowned. Of all the times for
this
to come into play. "That's foolishness. Let's kill him and be done with it."

"I think not."

He sighed. "Captain, you yourself suggested it just the other night! He took the damned ship! Just off him and be done with it, and whatever miserable latent feelings—"

"Enough," said Natasha, voice low and deadly. "Remember Mordecai, who is in charge here. I'm sure you do. Why don't you tell me?"

Mordecai ground his teeth. "You are. Captain."

"And don't you forget it." She turned back to her husband, golden eyes flashing. "But you. You did steal my ship. And made me a laughingstock back in port." She grinned. "I think I'm going to have a little fun. Don't worry, Mordecai, they'll pay." She turned back to her crew. "Bind them. And someone find a net from down in the cargo bay."

Mordecai watched, angry, his arm aching, as the men scurried to obey her orders.

Chapter Ten

The world turned.

Lina watched it spin through the rope mesh of the cargo net. At the back of her head swelled a throbbing goose egg, a constant reminder of their struggle and loss. She'd
thought
she'd been quick enough, clever enough, to avoid getting hit. She had been wrong.

"Harridan!" yelled Captain Fengel. Lina winced at his voice, strident and close. She felt him shift directly below her in the pile, pulling himself up against the net they were all balled into. He thrust an arm through the mesh and shook his fist at the dimly visible shape of the
Dawnhawk
, fast retreating on the horizon. "Slattern!" he continued. "You besotted, hair-brained wench!"

Lina realized that in other circumstances she would feel giddy. Fengel was just below her, she could smell his sweat and cologne and feel the hard lines of his officer's coat. But she was weary, she ached, and there was a hollow in the pit of her stomach. Her new home was gone, along with her knives, her new pet, and even some of her new friends.
Why? Why did we surrender? Were things really going that badly?

She lay atop the pile of pirates, dangling out over the ocean in a cargo net hung from the bow of the
Copper Queen
. The dark ship sagged above them, creaking and groaning, an uncertain anchor in the sky. Below them roared the ocean, its susurrus backdrop to the groaning and grumbling of her crewmates. Their mood was low. Some had lost crewmates, some were wounded. Many wondered aloud why Fengel had called for quarter.

Lina had just stowed her new pet belowdecks when she'd heard the call to arms. She'd raced out of the storage lockers near the furnace-room and armed herself, coming back up to the deck just in time to see Natasha's crew close in. Then the battle was joined, and she'd been gratified to find that in the press and fury she didn't back down; in fact, Lina found she
liked
it.

Things were going well then. So well that when she'd heard Fengel's call Lina had been confused. Only when it became clear what was going on had she been afraid. Fengel's harpy of a wife herded them all atop a cargo net laid out on the deck and Lina’s fear had turned to sick terror when they'd been forced at gunpoint to fling themselves over the edge. Embarrassingly, she'd lost her lunch. It was then that they'd found that drowning wasn't their fate. At least not right away. The cargo net was tied by a heavy rope to the other airship, the
Copper Queen.
Natasha's men flew away laughing, leaving them to dangle over the Atalian sea.

Goddess above. What a bitch.

Fengel quieted, panting, as the twilight glimmer on the horizon faded. Lina tried to get comfortable. She lay at an awkward angle, atop both her captain and a knot of muscle and hair that she deduced to be Henry Smalls.

"Miss Stone," said Fengel. "You are an
excessively bony
individual."

"Sir!" cried Henry.

Her captain fell silent. "My apologies, Miss Stone," he said. "I find myself somewhat vexed at the moment."

"It’s all right, sir," she said.

"I am
rather
upset. And being stuck in this net is not helping my disposition."

"I've got my knife still, sir," said Henry Smalls.

Captain Fengel made a disgusted sound. "And what would we do with it? We cut this miserable net too much and we all run the risk of being dumped into the ocean."

"Aye sir. But we could make a small cut near the top. Miss Stone's up top, and she could probably slip through and shimmy up to the ship. She's small enough." The groaning and rustle of the massed crew beneath her fell silent. Lina couldn't see them, but she could almost feel their gazes turn upward.

"She puked on me!" cried Oscar Pleasant, voice muffled and echoing up from somewhere below.

"That'll only improve how you smell," said Andrea Holt. Despite their mood, several pirates chuckled.

Fengel cleared his voice. "Well?" he asked. "What do you think, Miss Stone?"

Lina looked up at the
Copper Queen
. The makeshift airship hung like a black moon above them. The rope supporting them climbed up to the prow, suddenly all too thin a thing to ascend. The idea was madness.
But let's consider my options. I could refuse and end up starving over the ocean with a bunch of scurvy brigands. Again. It’s rather a long drop, and the water sounds very cold, but what more have I got to lose?

Lina eyed the net around her. It tented above them, rising sharply to meet the rope they dangled from. The mesh was tight, tough, and narrow. But if she cut
there,
and
there...
"Yeah," she said eventually. "I think I can fit through this, if I'm careful. Give me the knife."

The crew below her grew silent, stifling their groans and curses, waiting to see if she could escape. Someone shoved something hard up past her rump, which Lina might have taken exception to in other circumstances.

"Here," said Fengel, muffled, arm pinned against the net by her thigh. He pressed a heavy knife, sheath and all, to her. Lina felt a glimmer of the butterflies. She took it, drawing the blade free. It was a heavy thing, meant for both utility and fighting, bigger than the duelist's cutters she'd lost.

The ambient twilight faded with every passing moment. Lina took a breath and sat up, moving until she hunkered in the little hollow where the mesh of the net came together.

Lina took the rope in one hand and bent to work. The tough fibers split beneath the sawing of her blade, first only a few and then in bunches. With a jerk that shook their whole net, the rope split. The pirates gasped, likely staring at the ocean below. Lina couldn’t see it, but she could hear it in the dark.  Somewhere below the waves crashed and roared as they were pushed onto each other by the wind.

In quick succession she cut through another two pieces of mesh, the net jerking and swaying. "Captain," called Lucian from somewhere below. "Perhaps we should think up another plan?"

"This'll do," said Lina, fingering the hole. It was just barely wide enough for her to squeeze through. She replaced the knife in its sheath. "Captain," she said, looking down below. "What am I supposed to do once I get up there?"