The Fox (33 page)

What he did not tell his sons—not because he lied, but because he’d come to believe his own romantic vision over the years—was that she’d been sixteen, and he eighteen.

The truth was this: during his academy days Mad Gallop Yvana-Vayir had been handsome, reckless, riding with a style that outshone both royal brothers, bringing him the hatred of Anderle-Varlaef, the future Harskialdna. The Princess Tdiran, with a sixteen-year-old’s short-lived and shallow passion, had fallen in lust with a handsome boy riding so dashingly in the summer games. And he fell in love with her royal name. His father had died in one of the northern battles with the old king, so no one could stop him from arranging for his own betrothed (who’d hated him more with every passing year as they grew up together) to marry a Khani-Vayir cousin who had not been assigned a future wife, being intended for service in the dragoons.

What his sons heard was this: “I loved your mother from the first moment I saw her in the stands during the summer games. And she loved me. After I had gained some experience in the north, I returned and found that my own betrothed wanted to marry elsewhere. So I courted Tdiran. Tlennen was newly king, and he told her the choice was hers. His brother resisted. Said such a marriage would disturb the balance of power in the kingdom. Tdiran chose me, but the king’s brother—the
Royal Shield Arm
—forced me to vow I would never captain an army.”

The boys were uneasy at the venom in their father’s voice when he spoke the Harskialdna’s title in Iascan. Iascan was the everyday language of peacetime. Marlovan was the language of war and honor and should be used then.

“So I promised. Only for the good of the kingdom,” the Jarl stated. His eyes narrowed to slits of anger. “And I kept my word, but I always understood that vow to hold only while the kingdom was governed well. The good of the kingdom, boys, requires peace within, and war with the enemy. As soon as someone in power reverses that, well, one must review one’s vows.”

Hawkeye’s back twitched again. “What d’you mean, Father? ”

“I want you to listen when Evred-Varlaef speaks. Badger! When you and Beaver return to the academy, you listen as well. If there is any talk that the Harskialdna has committed treachery against any Jarl or his people, I need to know.”

Hawkeye stared at his father. “Does that mean you’ll go to the king? Settle it that way?”

“Yes.” The Jarl smiled wide. Wider. Then shook with silent laughter, and while his sons regarded him in puzzlement, he said, “I will go to the king.”

Chapter Twenty

THE
Vixen
skimmed up the face of a cold green wave.

Jeje raised her glass to the foresail masthead on Boruin’s low, sharp-prowed trysail, which the crew had debated renaming
Boruin’s Death
, or
Majarian’s Death,
or
Pirates’ Death
—a debate Fox summarily shortened to just
Death
.

Inda stood on the masthead, one arm crooked around a humming taut brace, glass to his eye as wind snapped his clothing and did its best to free his curling hair from the tight sailor queue thumping his back. She watched him because she rarely saw him smile like that, especially in this cold winter wind, with the dangerous southern waters rising to mountainous, green-veined swells.

She frowned back at their fleet—colorful devices on pirate foresails, the Chwahir sails blank, and on theirs the gold fox on black—trying to find the source of that smile.

But Inda was not looking at his fleet, he was enjoying the exhilaration of riding so high in the wind as the ship cut through the swells and ran westward, bringing him ever closer to home. He hadn’t felt that exhilaration since the he was a ten-year-old in the academy, when they galloped the two-year-olds horses across the open plains.

A storm was coming, as was inevitable at this time of year. They sped before it, sending water streaming in high-arching lacework down the sides. The wind slammed into the taut sails from the starboard beam, sending them heeling dangerously in the growing swell, but fore-and-aft rigged ships with new, beautiful Chwahir sails loved this sort of wind.

He cut a glance down at the deck, pleased with the black knife-shape of the
Death
gliding with menacing elegance through the turbulent waters. Above, new sails the pale cream color of the excellent Chwahir flax described eye-appealing arcs against the gray sky above. Warmth bloomed behind his ribs at the beauty and speed of this ship—faster than the
Vixen
even, in the right wind.

But the cost was a very narrow hold, and that meant more frequent stops; even the other ships carrying extra cargo couldn’t keep both themselves and the
Death
supplied for protracted periods at sea.

There in the north lay the jagged purple juts of the passage called the Narrows that wound its way through the Land Bridge, linking two great continents. On the other side, they all knew, the Brotherhood lay in wait. Maybe close, maybe far. But there.

Before then, they had to stop. They were going to risk Pirate Island, supposedly reclaimed from the Brotherhood three years ago by Ramis of the
Knife
. If it had not been retaken by Marshig and the Brotherhood fleet, Inda ought to find news there for the buying.

Inda slid down a backstay, judging the tremendous roll of the ship with habitual ease.

Barend was sailing-master, and though Inda had been learning the finer points of wringing speed out of capricious winds, Barend—trained on capital ships instead of an old trading tub that took great care of their sails—was far more skilled in judging wind, sea, and how much each vessel could bear.

The mood of the crew Inda could gauge, even if he couldn’t always express what it was he saw. But he relied on Tau for that. Tau, or Jeje.

Jeje. He winced, his eyes straying to their last subject of disagreement—one of their very few. There was Nestra at the helm, her curly hair blowing, her winter jacket and heavy woolen trousers wind-pressed against her generous curves.

Inda jerked around again before their eyes could meet, and studied the others. The duty watch stared with fixed attention forward as if the exertion of will could pull them into harbor faster.

He’d better get their share of the loot counted out.

The storm had intensified into a gale by the time they sailed under reefed foresails and bare poles into the shelter of the harbor. Almost at once the wind diminished, fouled on the headland. Their vigilance increased, focused no longer on nature but on their fellow humans.

No pirate ships lay in wait, stripped to fighting sail, bow crews in the tops. They made it up the harbor and into the mouth of the river on the height of tidal flood. The storm pounded the other side of the island—here it was bitter and wet as they tied everything down, anchored, and drew lots to find out who got first liberty.

Inda was busy in the cabin, counting out fair shares from their last victory and tying them into the little bags that his new Sails and his mates had sewn together. The clink of coins, a stray current of air bringing the smell of baking biscuits from the galley, flung Inda back to summer in memory, and for a moment he was no longer sitting in the cabin aboard the
Death
, he was standing on the deck as they sailed into Freedom Harbor, the scent of baking biscuits mingled with brine. He breathed it in before saying to Tau,
Are we pirates? I don’t feel like one—but there isn’t a name for us. Because we’re still killing like pirates
.

And Tau said back, his mockery very like Fox’s,
I enjoyed killing Boruin. I guess that makes me a pirate. It certainly doesn’t make me peace loving.

Boruin was unarmed
.

Inda retorted, restless—almost angry—
So we’re pirates. If news has reached Freedom about Boruin, we’ll get lots of volunteers. Will you sort them for me?

And Tau’s mocking voice, later the next day:
Here are two lists. All of them can fight, and they all claim to be independents or privateers. This list I think will follow your orders. This list I don’t believe were ever privateers and will revert to pirates in the heat.

And despite the weeks of drill, Tau had been right. During the worst of the battle at the Sartoran Sea, most of his Second List hires reverted to pirate habit, fighting for him-or herself, forgetting the drills, ignoring orders.

Inda dug the heels of his hands into his eyes, his elbows knocking into his half-counted piles of coins, which clinked to the table, unnoticed.

“Inda.”

Inda pulled away his hands and flexed them, then rubbed his ear where the new hoop still itched.

Barend dropped down onto the other chair, elbows thumping to the table. The coins jingled faintly. “Memory? ” Barend asked, the swinging lamp overhead shifting the sharp-edged shadows of his face from one side to the other and back again, the light glowing like blood in the ruby earring dangling below the edge of his crimson knit cap.

Inda had never discussed Dogpiss even with the Marlovans. What would be the point? Those days were long gone. And as for piracy—

“How close we came to losing at the Sartoran Sea,” he said; now he understood Tau’s mockery. It wasn’t Inda he’d mocked, but himself. Tau had to be wrestling with the same question: if they deliberately sought pirates to kill and loot, were they pirates? Because killing was still killing, and taking loot was still taking loot.

Barend studied Inda, saw the familiar closed-in expression and thought back to the battle.

Which they near as damnation lost.

Discipline. Inda was right. You could have great plans, but they weren’t any good if you didn’t have the discipline to carry them out.

Like when the wind veered against Inda’s fleet and the three Chwahir smoothly cut off the two biggest consorts from the pirate flagship with a firestorm of arrows arcing with comet tails of smoke through the squall so that the minor ships had to concentrate on putting out fires instead of supporting their allies. The Chwahir definitely had discipline, though rumor had it they had terrible punishments for small infractions, something Inda was absolutely against. Inda said if people can’t follow orders, they get off the ship.

Fox didn’t agree, but he didn’t disagree. There were no punishment parades on Inda’s ships, no floggings . . . but Fox had a way of thrashing people at drill, using only his hands, when he thought they warranted it. So no one gave Fox any trouble.

And nobody wanted to fight with Inda, even at drill: they’d all seen him in action. Fox was his inevitable partner.

Barend remembered Fox and his handpicked assault band leaping down into the launch, racing to the second consort, swarming up the sides straight into battle against superior numbers. And winning.

Barend looked up. “Here’s what I know. Our own boys and girls have been a whole lot more serious about drill since then.”

Inda opened a hand. With the other he rubbed his ear, remembering how Dasta and some of the others had insisted, before they even cleaned the deck of the captured flagship, that Sails pierce Inda’s other ear, acknowledging, pirate fashion, that he was a commander who had beaten another commander.

Even though it had been some weeks since then—each day filled with drills and threatening weather—this ear seemed to itch and burn every time he thought about the Brotherhood. Fighting them
felt
right. They did nothing but loot and kill. But he was doing the same to them.

He stared out at the busy harbor without seeing it.

Did Ganan Marshig ever think about right and wrong?

Here’s the truth, Inda thought grimly. The Brotherhood lay waiting in the north. For him. And despite all the worries of planning, logistics, questions, he felt that stirring of excitement at the prospect of battle.

“Speaking of boys and girls. Liberty crews waiting,”

Barend said, thumb jerking back. “Want some help finishing here?”

Inda flicked a hand up and they swiftly finished counting out the piles.

“All right,” Inda said at last, leaning back. “Anyone who wants to be paid off send in here. Nestra will be last,” he added, feeling his neck heat.

Barend gave a nod of unqualified approval. “I guess you know she wouldn’t take a night watch if there was sleet,” he said. “At least, not since—” Barend flapped his hand vaguely between Inda and the upper deck.

“Since we started hammock dancing,” Inda said, the heat creeping up to his ears, which made the one itch even more.

He’d thought he was being so circumspect but everyone knew, and had known, and hadn’t said anything, not even Mutt, whose watch she’d refused to serve on. Inda himself had overheard her—the very night after he and Jeje had argued about her—when he opened his scuttle to get some air, and Nestra was right above, stating in a very different voice than the one she used with him,
I don’t have to go out in sleet now I’ve got Elgar by the prick. If you give me trouble, brat, I’ll give you more.

“She’s so good with a bow.” Barend sat back, arms crossed, grinning. “But she’s loud.”

“Jeje was the only one who said anything. If you all knew it, why didn’t anyone besides Jeje speak up?”

Barend’s smile faded. “Because maybe you wanted that. Maybe it was your deal. She warms your bunk, doesn’t have to do her share of the work.”

“She decided that herself. I didn’t see it. At first. Jeje came in to confront me, asked why I was setting up a Coco. I thought she was exaggerating because they don’t like each other. I should have known better,” Inda admitted.

“So you never saw her as trouble?” Barend asked.

Inda shook his head. “Back in Freeport, first night after she hired on. She came down into the cabin, right here. Midnight. I was at the charts. She had a bottle of wine, and this silky shirt on. No vest. She drank out of the bottle, handed it to me, soon ’s I took a pull she ripped off her shirt. Threw the bottle out the window there and then ripped off my shirt.” He tipped his head. “Maybe that was the first sign of trouble, but I really thought she was, oh, interested. In
me
. Not in—” He lifted his hand in a circle, indicating the captain’s cabin.