Guild Wars: Sea of Sorrows (33 page)

The ship had two decks, with a thick hull designed to ram; she could take plenty of damage and still remain afloat, but that didn’t leave the
Brutality
with much space
to carry freight. As with most charr vessels, it was lightly crewed, and only two warbands—the Grim warband, and another called the Zeal warband—kept her running on long journeys up and down the coast. Those two warbands comprised fifteen sailors between them, plus three more that Sykox and Fassur snidely referred to as “honorless gladium” because they didn’t have a warband. Cobiah understood what that meant. Most humans didn’t.

The charr were also in the habit of maintaining a guard on their wharf. Day and night, at least two armed soldiers stood watch at the beach end of the pier. The
Brutality
had few visitors; charr ships were relatively rare, as the great cats weren’t a particularly seagoing people, and other races didn’t tend to make social calls on Grimjaw’s men. Cobiah stood in an alley across from the dock, rubbing his hand against his cheek as he contemplated the
Brutality.

“What are you thinking?” Isaye whispered, pressing back against the wall.

Macha interrupted, “Tell me it’s not the ear thing. Even if you could lift a charr, Coby, you just don’t have hands enough for all four of their ears. Please tell me—” Cobiah clapped a hand over the excited asura’s mouth before her chattering could attract attention. The sun was up over Lion’s Arch, and the streets were filling with people going about their morning chores. Shops were opening, fishermen were gathering their nets and heading out on the tide, and the charr were changing guard on their pier.

“Hush,” Cobiah hissed. Sullenly, Macha nodded, and he let her go.

“Force won’t work. We have to use guile,” said Isaye.

“Macha, can you make us look like charr?”

The asura nodded, braids bouncing. “Sure, but it lasts
only about five minutes. We wouldn’t even make it to the end of the dock.”

Cobiah cursed and struggled to think of another way.

“I’ve got an idea,” said Isaye. “Give me a few minutes and then head for the ship. You’ll know when to move.” She smiled, glancing down the street with sudden enthusiasm.

“What are you going to do?” Macha snorted. “Sex it up to distract them?”

Isaye glared at the little mesmer. “By the Six Gods! These are charr, not wharf rats. Get your mind out of the gutter.” She poked her head around the corner and took another look at the dock. “I’m going to give them the one thing no charr can resist. When that happens, you get in the water, slip up the anchor chain, and see if you can find anything that tells us whether Grimjaw made that bomb. I’ll meet you at the Captain’s Council later.

“And, by the way,” Isaye added, “I’d recommend you cover your faces in case you find yourself creeping into their sleeping area.”

“So they won’t recognize us?” Cobiah asked.

“No.” Isaye winked, slipping around the corner. “So you don’t get knocked unconscious by the smell.” She blended into the crowd easily, striding toward the wharf. As she approached the wharf, she singled out in the crowd someone along the way, raising her hand to catch the man’s attention.

“What’s she doing?”

Macha tugged on his sleeve. “No time. Whatever that crazy Isaye is doing, it won’t distract the charr for very long, so we’d better be in the water before she gets rolling.” The two edged through the crowd to the harbor. The
Brutality
was on a shared wharf, and three potbellied asuran schooners were also docked down its length.
Macha waved to one, passing the time as if nothing of importance was happening, while Cobiah kept a watchful eye on the
Brutality
’s guards.

Contemplating what Isaye could be doing, Cobiah leaned over the railing of the pier. He looked at the ocean churning far below, frothing in shades of white and gray against a cold, sandy beach. The wood of the railing was hard and cool, thick enough to walk on . . .

Did you really see a mermaid, Cobiah? A really-real one?

“Cobiah? Are you all right?” Several moments had passed while he stood in fugue. Macha waited at his elbow, her black eyes wide with concern. “It’s time to go. Isaye and Henst are making a distraction—”

“Henst?” Cobiah shook himself and raised his head.

The two charr at the end of the wharf were slouching, weary from a long night’s watch. Their hands rested on the hilts of their weapons and their conversation was kept low. Cobiah could see Isaye and Henst sauntering past the pier, talking a little too loudly. Although he couldn’t catch the words, Cobiah could hear their tone—snarky, taunting, and cruel. “By Balthazar,” Cobiah said, faltering. “She’s
provoking
them!”

“Using Henst as bait? Oh, that’s genius. Imagine if old Grist was here to see this! He’d have joined in faster than you can say ‘legerdemain.’ ” Macha eyed the fight with pure joy. “Isaye’s right, though: if there’s one thing those charr can’t resist, it’s battle. Better still if it’s an opportunity to get their claws on ol’ Mr. ‘I’m the prince of Ascalon’!” Macha jumped up, grabbing the rail and pulling herself up to stand on it. “Shrewd. I would never have guessed that human woman had the brains to come up with a plan like that—it’s positively asuran. Who knew? Let me get up here, and I can get a better look—”

Instinctively, Cobiah grabbed Macha around the waist
and swung her down. His reaction was swift and violent. “What the blue blazes are you doing? That’s dangerous! You could slip!”

“Cogswallop!” Macha yelped, shoving him away. “Coby! Ow, that hurt! What’s your malfunction? I was just trying to see what they’re doing!” Wincing, she grabbed her side where Cobiah’s arm had slung her.

“You can see just fine from down here.” Now that the adrenaline rush was passing, Cobiah felt vaguely sick to his stomach. Images passed before his eyes—a tiny black shoe with a rusty silver buckle beneath an old green blanket. A crowd of faces on the beach. His mother’s curses . . . Cobiah stifled the thoughts, trying to calm down. Macha stared at him furiously. Awkwardly, he added, “I’m sorry if I hurt you. I was just trying to keep you safe.”

The asura’s demeanor softened. “I’m fine.” Macha might have added something else, but she never had the chance. A roar on the charr dock grabbed their attention. As they watched, Henst slammed the butt of a boat hook into a charr’s belly. The second one charged the black-haired human, but Isaye hefted a huge coil of heavy rope at him. The wrist-thick strands of the coil, bundled together, slammed into the back of the second charr’s knees. He buckled, toppling forward with a yelp of pain. Whatever Isaye and Henst had said to the charr, it had apparently worked. They were certainly distracted.

“Now, Coby,” Macha insisted. “We have to go now!” She grabbed the rungs of a ladder that led down to the beach, but Cobiah stopped her.

“There’s still a guard. Look there, on the ship.” He pointed, and they could see a gruff-looking charr standing on the deck of the
Brutality
, watching the fight on the dock—but not moving. “I need you to cover me with an illusion, so he doesn’t see me swimming out to the ship.”

“But, Coby, I was going to go with you—”

“No time. You can’t cast that spell and swim, can you?” When Macha shook her head despondently, Cobiah grabbed the ladder. “I need you here. Cast your spell and then keep an eye out. After I’m on board, head for the drunk tank. Isaye and Henst are going to need you to bail them out of jail.” He shot her a smile.

Jumping onto the dock ladder, Cobiah climbed down, speeding along its length with the nimbleness of a moss spider. He pushed off the end of the ladder into the ocean, where the water was crisp and frigid, filled with the deep chill of the past night. He gasped as he sank into it. “Melandru’s waggling arse, that’s cold!”

“Shhh! Swim quietly!” On the dock above, Macha began casting. Cobiah looked down and saw his hands, his arms, his entire body turning the same color as the sea. He paused to give Macha a thumbs-up, then realized she probably couldn’t see it.

As Cobiah swam toward the ship, he could hear Isaye and Henst brawling with the two charr at the end of the dock. A crowd had gathered around them, taunting them and cheering on the fight. Henst had broken his boat hook in half and was pummeling one of the charr with a stick in each hand, while Isaye clapped the second guard over the head with the lid of a trash bin. Her opponent fell to the ground in a stupor, while his companion—momentarily escaping from Henst—tackled Isaye and bore her to the ground. Nobody was paying any attention to the docks or the
Brutality
.

Cobiah wrapped his arms around the anchor chain and pulled himself up out of the water. “By Grenth.” He hung there, shivering. “I think it’s colder
outside
the water.” Looping his arm through each chain link in turn, Cobiah pulled himself up toward the
Brutality
.

By the time he reached the ship’s hull, his clothing had begun to dry, and the coloring that made him near invisible was fading. The fight on the docks had started to peter out as well. He could hear the Lionguard breaking things up on the pier, and the charr replacements for wharf guard duty were taking their places. Isaye, Henst, and the two night guards were clapped in handcuffs and dragged off to the town jail. Macha stood on the dock, watching him with dismay. Unable to soothe her worries, Cobiah pulled himself through a nearby porthole, rolling forward in an effort to be silent as he landed inside. She’d just have to trust that he’d be safe.

The darkness of the
Brutality’s
cargo hold seemed impenetrable after the bright light of morning. Cobiah tried to see, but the room was little more than a dark blur after the brilliance of the morning sun. Sparkles of dust danced through the porthole window, glittering on the puddles of water around his feet. Kneeling behind a crate, he took a moment to let his eyes adjust, trying to pick out the details of the various boxes and kegs stacked within the
Brutality
’s hold.

As Cobiah’s eyes finally adjusted to the gloom, he could see that many of the crates in the hold were marked with warnings—“no fire,” “no impact,” “be careful around heat,” and so forth. Near the stairs to the upper deck stood a workbench covered with tools. Cobiah edged his way toward it, glancing up at the sealed hatch in the ceiling, above the narrow staircase. Once there, Cobiah ran his hands over the implements curiously.

Cobiah studied the tools, trying to find something incriminating among the screwdrivers, pliers, clamps, and . . . other . . . things. Some of the devices looked like those he’d seen in Sykox’s toolbox, while others were completely foreign. He picked up one of the rods and
twisted the handle, watching the tip rotate with a metallic buzzing sound. “Ooooh. Interesting.”

The hatch above creaked open with a sudden slam, and heavy boot steps pounded on the stairs into the hold. Thinking quickly, Cobiah ducked beneath the workbench. Realizing he was still holding the strange tool, he shoved it into his pocket with a silently mouthed curse. The sunlight had half blinded him when he first came into the hold. Maybe he’d get lucky and the charr would be similarly impaired. Or just not notice it was missing.

Voices bellowed from above as two charr made their way down into the hold. “A fight? By the lost Claw of the Khan-Ur. Can’t I trust those Zeal warband morons with the simplest tasks?” The voice belonged to Grimjaw, and he was complaining broadly as he stormed down the stairs. His first mate, a burly charr with a spiked orange mane, carried a lantern as he followed Grimjaw into the hold. “Every single time I ask them to take duty, they end up in a brawl.”

“What did you expect?” The first mate shrugged. “They’re Blood Legion. You knew that when you signed them aboard.”

“Yeah, I knew it. But I figured they’d at least need to take breaths between fights. This has been a nonstop problem, Krokar. They’re a complete waste of good munitions. We should have hired crew from our own legion, Ash.” Grimjaw walked among the crates in the hold, but the first mate paused at the bottom of the stairs. “Then we’d be on task for silent sailing.”

“Couldn’t find ’em,” Krokar said. “Blood was all the fort had to offer.” He watched as Grimjaw moved through the crates, opening one after the other. “What’d ya need down here, Legionnaire?”

“First plan didn’t work.” Grimjaw scowled, pushing
crates around. “Well, the bomb we sent to the
Nomad
worked fine, but that skritt-sucking courier screwed it all up. Now we’ve got a new plan, and that means we need another bomb.” He stuck his muzzle inside one of the boxes, sniffing its contents to detect what was inside. “Blew up a whole damn ship and still missed the target. We’re in for it if we don’t come up with something else—and quick. The meeting’s this afternoon, and if that vote goes the wrong way, we could lose everything.”

“Look, we did everything the boss wanted. What more can he ask?” Krokar complained.

“He asked us to do it
right,
and we chumped it, Krokar. This guy may not be a tribune or even a charr, but he’s dead-on dangerous. We screw this up again, and he just might toss a torch into our hold himself.”

The first mate groused, “C’mon, Grimjaw. This is ridiculous. Why can’t we just
seize
the ships we want? If we commandeer them, we don’t have to work with this human at all.”

“Commandeer them with what crew? We had a hard enough time finding troops to sail the
Brutality
. We’re only eighteen charr, and we’re promised six more ships. You think three charr can crew a clipper? A galleon? How about the
Pride
—do you think three lone charr can sail
that
ship? That engine’s the key to my promotion to the rank of tribune, and I’ll do whatever I have to do to get it.

“Shut up and bite your tongue ’til this thing’s over. We’ve got to have his help if we’re going to attack Orr, tub face. Use your brain,” Grimjaw groused, ripping another crate open to poke at the contents.

Cobiah stiffened. His hand clenched the table leg as he willed himself to stay silent. He didn’t think he could take the two charr in a fight, but he was still willing to try.
They wanted to steal his ship? What was this “plan,” and who were they working with?