Sasharia En Garde (16 page)

“How far back shall I go?” Elva asked, and then, her eyes
rounding, “If you’ll pardon my saying so, you have a
lot
of hair.”

“Oh yeah. My dad was a frizz-ball too. Made Einstein look
bald—never mind who Einstein was. Let’s say that where I come from, big hair is
totally
uncool
.” The word came out in
English. There wasn’t anything close. “I made the mistake of cutting it when I
got mad at my mom, not long after we got through the World Gate, and for a
couple of years I looked like a walking mushroom. Growing it long at least
weighs it down, and I can braid it.”

She grinned as I yanked out another braid, which sprang into
determined curls adding to the mass hanging down my back to my butt. When I
pulled it straight, I could easily sit on it.

“All right. Well, in ’36, there was a strange incident we
call the Siamis War, but it wasn’t a war, it was more of an enchantment, and
extended over the world.”

“Oh yes, someone mentioned that. I wondered if ‘Siamis’ was
a place or a person.”

“Someone from Norsunder. An original Old Sartoran, I mean
from four
thousand
years ago.” She
hunched her shoulders. “He was young-looking and handsome and charming, and he
enchanted people by just thinking at them.”

“That sounds nasty.” I watched the archery teams climb to
the tops.

“It was. Though nobody remembered much afterward. It was
like we all lost a year. I was a toddler, so I didn’t really notice anything,
but the adults still talk about it, and they’re worried because Norsunder is on
the move, they say.”

“That sounds even worse.” The clatter of arrows and weapons
from outside brought us to the cabin door as the archery teams took their
places on the mastheads and readied themselves.

“Yes, Devli says the mages—” Elva stiffened, her face
blanching.

I leaped up and joined her, my hair half-combed in a curling
mass, the other half in ratty braids, as the deck crew lined up along the
rails, weapons at hand.

Things had changed far faster than I’d expected.

Our pirate schooner lurched toward the navy ship, which
looked enormous as it loomed steadily closer. High-hanging lanterns augmented
the fading light in the west. Zathdar’s crew waited, motionless except for
nervous hands on weapons, and quick head-turnings. Ah. So they were scared,
too. I could see it in tightened shoulders, in stiff fingers, shufflings, and
restless checking and rechecking of weapons.

For some reason the sight of their tension actually eased
some of mine. So I was not the only scared person on board. The proximity of
violence, deliberately chosen, jetted a mingling of emotions through me, most
negative, but somewhere in there was anticipation. Even readiness. I could feel
it in the way my muscles tightened along my spine and through my back, a
feeling akin to the moments before a match at a big competition, but at a
fuel-injected hyper-level.

Zathdar spun the wheel. Sail parties brailed up two sails
with lightning speed and the ships thumped together, yards and rigging
entangling, masts creaking. We all staggered, then shadowy figures crouched
below the rail jumped up and swung over to the navy ship from ropes. More ran
across entangled yards to the other ship, roaring and howling.

“Inside! Shut the door!” Owl bawled at me as he ducked under
a swinging lantern, sword raised. He and two others took up station in front of
Elva’s and my cabin, obviously on defense duty. Either that or to keep Elva and
me from running to the navy guys.

The mass of surging figures shouted and fought, dashing to
and fro. Annoyed as I was with Zathdar, the name Randart had scared me. I had
no intention whatsoever of leaping from Hurricane’s frying pan into the fire of
Canardan’s sinister war commander.

But Zathdar didn’t know that. Where was he, anyway?

The lanterns shone through the ropes in wild spider-web
patterns, creating intersecting geometric light patches and shadows, making it
impossible to tell the surging figures apart.
At least the darkness has to be hiding blood and guts . . .
sure don’t see any, don’t want to see any—

I peered around the cabin door.

The tweet of a whistle—a roar of triumph—and twenty or
thirty armed silhouettes jumped down from the navy ship’s higher deck. A
surprise squad of marines held back as reinforcements leaped over the rail onto
our ship and fought their way down the deck, outnumbering the defending
pirates.

“They know you’re here,” Elva said flatly, and I threw open
the door.

Owl twisted round. “You know Randart does not mean safety
for you.”

My jaw was locked, teeth gritted. “I’m out here so I have
room to defend myself. I. Do not. Want. To be.
Anyone’s
. Prisoner.”

From overhead a colorful figure swung, and Zathdar landed on
the yard directly above us.

A quick exchange of glances between him and Owl, then:
“Here!”

Zathdar flung a cavalry sword through the air toward me.

One sharp thud of heart against ribs, and years of kata
training took over. I knew sword forms. I knew how to throw and catch a
spinning sword. You don’t take it standing still, but match movement, and so I
flowed into kata mode and clipped the sword out of the air, bringing it down
with a swoosh before the first naval warrior reached us.

He leaped back, joining his companions in the brown
uniforms. For a split second they all stared at me, eyes so wide twin lantern
flames reflected in them, their heads turning slightly as I swung the saber
back and forth, back and forth, trying to get the feel for its unfamiliar
weight and shape.

“That’s the one,” the lead man said. “Take her.”

My heartbeat shifted into overdrive, drumming in my ears.

Owl, two of his sailors, and Elva (who’d ducked into the
cabin and returned with a knife) formed a line in front of me, all of us
keeping clear of the others’ reach.

“No kill,” Owl ordered hoarsely.

Elva sent him a distracted glance. “I thought that was all
hot air.”

“No. True,” he snapped. “Why do you think the bow teams are
waiting?”

I remembered them, crouched there overhead. I realized no
arrows had been loosed.

Yet.

I swung my cavalry saber, which was much heavier than I was
used to. I noted the red tassel on it. This was the one from the weapons locker
that no one had touched. Zathdar’s fighting blade! But he was nowhere in sight.

A short, barked word and the navy guys rushed us. Then time
stopped. The universe narrowed to my trembling fingers, my chi breathing, and
the cut and thrust of swinging steel.

No kill? No chance to ask. It made me faster, surer, because
I fought as I always had in practice, only one step harder. I did not care if I
hurt anyone. I didn’t want to
kill
anyone—

—and they were not trying to kill me. Disarm, yes. Wound,
even. But not to kill.

And so I parried, blocked, deflected, kicked, punched,
nicked, thumped (and used my knee once to unfair but effective advantage—sorry,
guy) but I never stabbed.

The endless moment stretched into a roaring blur as sweat
stung my eyes and my throat rasped raw. Abruptly I swayed there on the deck,
whooping for breath, peering this way and that for the next target, but there
were no more targets. There were only four people lying on the deck, either
unconscious or wounded. The rest retreated fast, vanishing over the rail as a
mass of gathered pirates, fresh from the supporting ships, chased them aft.

As the navy guys swarmed back to their own ship, the battle
shifted to the other deck. I rushed to the side, Owl next to me, in time to
witness the end of a saber duel between Zathdar and their captain. The latter’s
sword clanged to the deck, Zathdar held his point at the man’s throat, and
shouted something, echoed by a woman at the other end of the navy ship. One of
Zathdar’s other captains.

The result? Weapons clanking and whanging to the deck, hands
rising in the universal “I surrender. Don’t hit me!” The king’s sailors were
obviously not going to test the pirates’ willingness to stick to the rules at
the price of their captain’s life, and I wondered if that was out of loyalty or
fear.

Zathdar flicked a look our way.

Owl moved with the speed of someone who had received orders.
As I leaned on the rail, still breathless, the pirates dragged the unconscious
navy guys to the rail and attached them to ropes to be boomed over to their own
deck. Meanwhile Zathdar prodded the captain and they vanished into the
clipper’s broad cabin.

The pirates herded the navy below the clipper’s decks, then
closed and barred the hatches. After that they moved about, some purposeful,
most just talking, pointing, and demonstrating their individual battles with
their still-bare weapons, the restless rattling about of people shedding
adrenaline.

Devli emerged from the hatch, papers clutched to his orange
shirt, his unlikely blond mop bouncing as he bounded toward the place where the
two rails ground together on the pitching waves.

On a sharp whistle, pirates swarmed aloft to free rigging
and spars; others got busy hacking, chopping, tearing, and cutting ropes. They
were doing enough sabotage to ensure no chase would be made without a lot of
repairs first. Some returned to the
Hurricane
,
carrying pretty much anything the navy guys hadn’t nailed down. There wasn’t
much to loot on a navy scout, but they’d done their best.

Elva joined me. “Ow,” she said reflectively, binding a
length of cloth round one forearm. “I hope that’s the last pirate battle we’re
in. No matter what my brother says.”

“Tell me about this no-kill order.” My brain had gone oddly
numb, and my hoarse voice sounded far away, like someone else.

“Oh. That. It’s just, the Fool, that is, Prince Jehan, who
is supposedly in charge of the guard, the navy, and I forget what else his
father wants to duck the blame for,
supposedly
issued this command to their forces that in any skirmish they can’t kill anyone
until our side, that is, the resistance, does. He
supposedly
doesn’t want our countrymen killing one another if it
can be avoided. It seems to be the same for the pirates, too. Anyway, I always
thought it lies. Canardan’s people trying to whitewash their rotten reputation.
But I guess it’s true. For the navy and army, I emphasize,” she added, her brow
furrowed. “Not for War Commander Randart’s private guard.”

The two ships jolted, staggering everyone on both decks,
then parted with a groan of timbers. I wondered if Zathdar had made it back
just as a colorful figure emerged from the navy captain’s cabin. He climbed up
the shrouds, caught a rope I hadn’t seen in the wavering light from the
lanterns (it was quite dark by now) and swung over lightly, landing on the
topsail yard just as two arrows hissed through the air from the other ship.

He caught one of the backstays, and slid to the deck near
us. A last arrow thunked into the coaming round the fore hatch directly behind
him, then someone on the other ship shouted an order, and no more arrows
whizzed over.

Zathdar gave us all one comprehensive glance. “All right?”
He addressed everyone, but his glance rested last on me.

“Alive,” I said, and Elva echoed me. Then I drew in a deep
breath.
Keep it neutral. You still have
to land
.

But I had to ask. “Was it really necessary, this raid? Or
just, you know, your typical pirate idea of fun?”

“Oh, let’s say that this fellow has been doing a bit of
piracy on his own.” Zathdar tipped his head toward the ship. “Under orders from
the war commander.”

His manner was too airy, a contrast with that tight gesture.
Plainly I was not the only one keeping crucial info behind buttoned lip.

He grinned at me. “And you think I look strange.” He took
the cavalry sword from my unresisting fingers, stepped back, and flicked the
point through the air a yard from my head—a gently mocking salute.

I clutched at my hair, feeling the one side with ratty
braids dangling down, the other a tangled mass of frizzy curls, emphasis on the
tangled. Total big-hair crisis! I had to laugh, the sheer, squeaky laugh of a
sudden rush of knee-whacking relief. It was really over. My muscles turned to
Smuckers’ finest.

“Well done.” He flourished the sword as he smiled at us all.
But again I had the distinct sense he was talking to me.

Then he turned away, lifting his voice. “Captain’s punch for
every hand!”

The sailors responded with a loud, hearty cheer as Zathdar
bent to yank that last arrow out of the coaming. He straightened up, flushed
with triumph. “Come down in the wardroom to celebrate?”

Again, he did not quite address me, but the air in my
general direction. Owl, overseeing the last sweep of the deck, raised a hand in
agreement. This was a general invitation, not a private one. He’d said it would
take place in the wardroom. No harm in that.

Then Zathdar turned my way. “Join us, Sasharia?”

“Sure.” And to Owl, who was rubbing his hands and laughing
under his breath, “Captain’s punch?”

“Oh, it’s good.” Owl chuckled. “But it’ll knock you back if
you’re not careful.”

The crew divided up into two parties, with off-duty crew
members carrying food up to those on duty. The watch captains crowded around
with us at the battered table in the wardroom, roaring again as the grinning
cook muscled in a huge tureen of something that smelled like citrus, with hard
liquor undertones.

A variety of cups, mugs, and glasses passed from hand to
hand, everyone dipping into the tureen. Next came the sounds of slurping and
sighing. The punch tasted of berry, citrus, wine and a raisiny liquor that was
very smooth going down, with a delicious bite. Warmth rushed through me,
smoothing away the aches.

“Good, eh?” Owl dug his elbow in my side.