Off Armageddon Reef (76 page)

“Unknown ships entering the anchorage!”

Gahvyn Mahrtyn, Baron White Ford, jerked upright in his chair as the lookout's shout echoed down through the open skylight.
King Gorjah II
, the flagship of the Tarotisian Navy, moved uneasily to her anchor even here, in the shelter of Demon Head. Which was fair enough; everyone
aboard
her was much more than merely uneasy just to be here.

Someone knocked sharply at the great cabin's door, and he heard his valet open it. A moment later, one of the flagship's lieutenants appeared in his private chart room.

“Excuse me for disturbing you, My Lord, but—”

“I heard, Lieutenant Zhoelsyn.” White Ford smiled thinly. “Should I assume our unknown visitors are our long-awaited Dohlaran friends?”

“That's what it looks like, My Lord,” Zhoelsyn acknowledged with a smile of his own.

“Well praise Langhorne,” White Ford said lightly. “Please tell Captain Kaillee I'll be on deck in about fifteen minutes.”

“Of course, My Lord.”

Lieutenant Zhoelsyn withdrew, and White Ford raised his voice.

“Zheevys!”

“Yes, My Lord?” Zheevys Bahltyn, the baron's valet since boyhood, replied.

“My new tunic, Zheevys! We have a duke to impress.”

“At once, My Lord.”

Two hours later, White Ford stood on
King Gorjah II
's aftercastle in the cool spring sunlight and watched the Dohlaran Navy rowing slowly and heavily into Broken Anchor Bay. The bay, even though sheltered from the northeast wind by the projecting finger of Demon Head, was no glassy mirror. Outside the bay, ten-and-a-half-foot waves, whitecaps, and spray showed only too plainly what sort of weather awaited the combined fleets.

Not that White Ford had needed the reminder. He'd lost two galleys, with all hands, just getting here. And from the looks of the Dohlaran galleys straggling into the more sheltered waters of the bay, they'd had an even worse time of it than he had.

Several of the ships he saw flew command streamers, but none of them showed the red and green stripes of the fleet flagship. Then, finally, he saw a mammoth galley, dwarfing those about her, creeping around the southern headland. The single yard her mast crossed was too small, obviously a jury-rigged replacement for the original, and she towered above her smaller consorts. In fact, she was double-banked, something White Ford hadn't seen in at least twenty years, and he shook his head in disbelief as he watched waves sweep higher than the lower oar bank while jets of white water cascaded from her pumps.

“What
is
that thing, My Lord?” Captain Zhilbert Kaillee asked quietly beside him, and the baron snorted.

“That, Zhilbert, is the flagship of the Dohlaran Navy. The
King Rahnyld
.”

“
King Rahnyld
,” Kaillee repeated, and White Ford chuckled.

“At least we named
our
flagship for a
previous
king,” he said. “And unless I miss my guess, that monstrosity must've cost almost as much as two more reasonably sized galleys. Not to mention the fact that she has to be Hell's pure bitch to manage in a seaway.”

“To say the least,” Kaillee murmured as white water burst over the enormous galley's cutwater and swirled back around her struggling sweeps.

“But they got her here somehow,” White Ford pointed out. “Even if they are a five-day late.”

“For my money, My Lord, they did a damned incredible job to get her here at all.”

The baron nodded, gazing at the sea-slimed hulls, the occasional empty oarport, the patches of bare planking which marked hasty repairs. Just watching the way the Dohlarans moved through the water, it was obvious their bottoms were badly fouled from the long voyage, which must have reduced their speed even further.

He wondered once again what lunacy had possessed the genius who'd planned this campaign. It would have made so much more sense to send the Dohlarans up the western coasts of Howard and Haven, then straight to Tarot, where the host of minor repairs they so obviously required could have been seen to. But, no, they had to come
here
, to the most haunted, ill-fated, unlucky place on the face of Safehold, and sail directly from here against their enemies.

“Well, I suppose the
real
fun starts now,” he told Captain Kaillee, and there was no more humor in his tone.

Earl Thirsk watched from his place behind Duke Malikai as Baron White Ford and his flag captain were shown into
King Rahnyld
's great cabin.

The Tarotisian admiral was a small man, shorter even than Thirsk himself and slender, with dark eyes and dark hair, just starting to silver. Zhilbert Kaillee, the commander of his flagship, could have been specifically designed as a physical contrast. Nearly as tall as Malikai, he was far more massive, almost block-like, with enormous shoulders, and probably outweighed the duke by at least fifty or sixty pounds, none of it fat.

The two of them were followed by a small cluster of more junior captains and senior lieutenants, and Malikai greeted them with a broad, welcoming smile. Thirsk doubted the duke was even aware of that smile's patronizing edge.

“Admiral White Ford,” Thirsk murmured as it was his turn to clasp the Tarotisian's hand, and a flicker of amusement danced in the smaller man's dark eyes.

“
Admiral
Thirsk,” he replied, and Thirsk's mouth twitched in an effort not to smile at the Tarotisian's slight but unmistakable emphasis. White Ford had greeted Malikai as
Duke
Malikai, which was certainly correct, but obviously he'd recognized that however nobly born Malikai might be, he was no seaman.

Thirsk and the baron stood there for a few seconds, hands clasped, each recognizing a fellow professional, and then the moment passed and White Ford moved on. But Thirsk treasured that brief exchange, which seemed to promise a potentially sane ally. He hoped it did, at any rate, because he suspected he was going to need one.

“I apologize for our tardiness, Baron White Ford,” Duke Malikai said, as the formal after-dinner council of war got down to business. “I'm afraid the weather on our original route was worse than anticipated. I was forced to choose an alternate passage.”

“I anticipated that that was the probable cause, Your Grace,” White Ford said. “As you know, the semaphore system kept us reasonably well apprised of your progress. Given the weather we encountered on our own passage here, I wasn't surprised you were delayed. Indeed, I'm gratified you lost as few ships as you did.”

“That's very understanding of you, Baron.” Malikai smiled. “I'm sure I speak for all of us when I say I hope the worst of the weather is behind us now, and—”

“I'm sure we all do hope that, Your Grace. Unfortunately, it's most unlikely that it is.”

Malikai closed his mouth with an expression which was both surprised and perhaps a bit affronted by White Ford's polite interruption. He looked at the Tarotisian for a moment, as if unsure how to respond, and Earl Thirsk cleared his throat.

“I'm sure you and your navy are much more familiar with the weather in these waters, Admiral White Ford,” he said, and White Ford shrugged.

“We seldom come this far south, ourselves, of course. No one comes to Armageddon Reef unless he has to. But we are rather familiar with weather in the Parker Sea and the Cauldron. And at this time of year, weather seems to beget weather, as they say. This northeasterly may veer, possibly all the way round to the northwest, but it isn't going away. Or, rather, there's going to be another one, probably at least as strong, on its heels.”

“That sounds…unpleasant,” Thirsk observed in a carefully neutral tone, not even glancing at Malikai. For once, the duke appeared to have enough sense to keep his mouth shut, and the earl devoutly hoped it would stay that way.

“It's not that bad for galleons,” White Ford said with a casual little wave of his hand. “It's not often we get seas much over fifteen or sixteen feet. But it
can
get a bit—what was the word you used, My Lord? Ah, yes. It can get a bit
unpleasant
for galleys.”

There was a sudden, thoughtful silence from the Dohlaran end of the great cabin, and Thirsk had to raise his own hand to hide his smile.

“We do get the occasional full gale, as well, of course,” White Ford continued. “When that happens, the waves can hit as much as thirty feet, but they're more common in the fall than in the spring. And you practically never see a hurricane in these waters, even in the fall.”

“Since you're so much more familiar with the weather in these latitudes, My Lord,” Thirsk said, choosing his words and his tone with care, “would you care to comment on our course from this point?”

“Well, since you ask, Admiral,” White Ford said, “I'm afraid I feel we would be ill advised to cross the Parker Sea north of Tryon's Land, as our original orders specify. The weather's unlikely to cooperate with us, and we've both already lost ships and men. I'm no fonder of Armageddon Reef than any other sane human being, but my advice would be to continue around Demon Head, then pass between Thomas Point and the most southern of Shan-wei's Footsteps and hug the eastern coast of the Reef through Doomwhale Reach and the Iron Sea until we're at least as far east as MacPherson's Lament.”

“Excuse me, Baron,” Malikai said, “but that would add many miles to our voyage, and wouldn't we risk being caught on a lee shore if the wind does stay in the northeast?”

At least, Thirsk thought, it was a question, not an arrogant statement of objection.

“Yes, it would add some miles to the trip, Your Grace,” White Ford conceded. “But the weather in the Parker Sea isn't going to moderate very much, whatever we want. And the weather south of MacPherson's Lament is going to be worse—considerably worse. We don't have any choice about swinging south of the Lament, into the Iron Sea, and while there's something to be said for skirting around through Tryon Sound and avoiding as much as possible of the Iron Sea, we'd still have to cross the
Parker
Sea to get there.”

He paused, as if to see if his explanation was being followed. Malikai said nothing, and the Tarotisian continued.

“We're going to be looking at foul weather, whichever route we take, Your Grace, and while we'll certainly find ourselves traveling along a ‘lee shore,' the entire coast of the Reef is broken up by bays and inlets. If we hit the sort of weather that's already cost us so many ships, we'll probably be able to find cover, someplace we can anchor and ride it out.” He shrugged once more. “As I say, Your Grace, these waters aren't kind to galleys.”

There was silence in the great cabin.
King Rahnyld
's massive bulk shifted uneasily, even here, at anchor, as if on cue, and every ear could hear her the steady sound of the pumps, still emptying her bilges of the water she'd taken on through her lower oarports.