The Gentleman Bastard Series 3-Book Bundle: The Lies of Locke Lamora, Red Seas Under Red Skies, The Republic of Thieves (131 page)

“Two masts,” said Jean. “Brig, flying
loads
of canvas.”

Locke felt an unexpected urgency; he tried to restrain his excitement as the
Messenger
plodded feebly to the southwest while the newcomer steadily gained on her. Now the
strange vessel showed her starboard side to them. As Jean had said, she had two masts,
as well as a swift low profile and a hull so black she gleamed.

A dark speck appeared in midair above her stern. It moved upward, expanded, and burst
apart into a huge fluttering flag—a banner of solid crimson, bright as fresh-spilled
blood.

“Oh, gods,” cried Locke. “You have to be fucking kidding!”

The newcomer raced on, foam-capped water surging at her bow, closing the gap with
the
Red Messenger
with every passing second. Low white shapes appeared from behind her—boats crammed
with the dark specks of sailors. The new ship swung round to the
Messenger
’s lee like a hungry beast cutting off her prey’s escape; meanwhile, her boats knifed
across the gleaming water to launch their attack from windward. Whatever Jabril and
his crew did to try and foil their entrapment, it wasn’t enough; chorus after chorus
of belligerent cheers echoed faintly across the water, and little black specks were
soon swarming up the
Messenger
’s sides.

“No!” Locke was unaware that he’d leapt to his feet until Jean pulled him back down
hastily. “Oh, you bastards! You rotten, miserable, skulking bastards! You can’t take
my fucking ship—”

“Which was already taken,” said Jean.

“I come a thousand miles to shake your bloody hands,” Locke screamed, “and you show
up two
hours
after they put us overboard!”

“Not even half that,” said Jean.

“Bloody fucking limp-cocked witless laggard
pirates
!”

“Thieves prosper,” said Jean, biting his knuckles as he snorted with laughter.

The battle, if it could be called that, didn’t last five minutes. Someone on the quarterdeck
brought the
Messenger
around, luffing straight into the wind, killing what little speed she’d had. All
her sails were taken in, and she soon drifted gently with one of the marauder’s boats
tied up at her side. Another boat hurried back to the ship that had birthed it. That
vessel, under a far lazier press of sail than it had set out to snatch up the
Messenger
, then came round on a starboard tack and began to bear down in the general direction
of Locke and Jean—an ominous monster toying with its next tiny meal.

“I think this might be one of those ‘good news, bad news,’ situations,” said Jean,
cracking his knuckles. “We may need to ready ourselves to repel boarders.”

“With what? One stiletto and hurtful insinuations about their mothers?” Locke clenched
his fists; his anger had become excitement. “Jean, if we get aboard that ship and
talk our way into her crew, we’re back in the game, by the gods!”

“They might just mean to kill us and take the boat.”

“We’ll see,” said Locke. “We’ll see. First we’ll exchange courtesies. Have ourselves
some diplomatic interaction.”

The pirate vessel came on slowly as the sun sank toward the west and the color of
sky and water alike seemed to deepen by a shade. She was indeed black-hulled, witchwood,
and larger than the
Red Messenger
even at a glance. Sailors crowded her yardarms and deck railings; Locke felt a pang
of envy to see such a large and active crew. She sliced majestically through the water,
then luffed up as orders were shouted from the quarterdeck. Sails were reefed with
precise and rapid movements; she slowed to a crawl,
blocked their view of the
Red Messenger
, and presented her larboard side at a distance of about twenty yards.

“Ahoy the boat,” cried a woman at the rail. She was rather short, Locke could see—dark-haired,
partially armored, backed up by at least a dozen armed and keenly interested sailors.
Locke felt his skin crawl under their scrutiny, and he donned a cheerful mask.

“Ahoy the brig,” he shouted. “Fine weather, isn’t it?”

“What do you two have to say for yourselves?”

Locke rapidly considered the potential advantages of the pleading, cautious, and cocky
approaches, and decided that cocky was the best chance they had of making a memorable
impression. “Avast,” he cried, standing up and hoisting his stiletto over his head,
“you must perceive we hold the weather gauge, and you are luffed up with no hope of
escape! Your ship is ours, and you are all our prisoners! We are prepared to be gracious,
but don’t test us.”

There was an outbreak of laughter on the deck of the ship, and Locke felt his hopes
rise. Laughter was good; laughter like that rarely preceded bloody slaughter, at least
in his experience.

“You’re Captain Ravelle,” shouted the woman, “aren’t you?”

“I, ah, see my reputation precedes me!”

“Previous crew of your previous ship might have mentioned you.”

“Shit,” Locke muttered.

“Would you two care to be rescued?”

“Yes, actually,” said Locke. “That would be a damn polite thing for you to do.”

“Right, then. Have your friend stand up. Both of you get all your clothes off.”

“What?”

An arrow hissed through the air, several feet above their heads, and Locke flinched.

“Clothes off! You want charity, you entertain us first! Get your big friend up and
get naked, both of you!”

“I don’t believe this,” said Jean, rising to his feet.

“Look,” shouted Locke as he began to slip out of his tunic, “can we just drop them
in the bottom of the boat? You don’t want us to throw them overboard, right?”

“No,” said the woman. “We’ll keep ’em plus the boat, even if we don’t keep you. Breeches
off, gentlemen! That’s the way!”

Moments later Locke and Jean stood, precariously balanced in the
wobbling boat, stark naked with the rising evening breeze plainly felt against their
backsides.

“Gentlemen,” yelled the woman. “What’s this? I expect to see some sabers, and instead
you bring out your stilettos!”

The crew behind her roared with laughter. Crooked Warden! Locke realized others had
come up along the larboard rail. There were more sailors just standing there pointing
and howling at him and Jean than there were in the entire crew of the
Red Messenger
.

“What’s the matter, boys? Thoughts of rescue not enticing enough? What’s it take to
get a rise out of you down there?”

Locke responded with a two-handed gesture he’d learned as a boy, one guaranteed to
start fights in any city-state in the Therin world. The crowd of pirates returned
it, with many creative variations.

“Right, then,” cried the woman. “Stand on one leg. Both of you! Up on one!”

“What?”
Locke put his hands on his hips. “Which one?”

“Just pick one of two, like your friend’s doing,” she replied.

Locke lifted his left foot just above the rowing bench, putting his arms out for balance,
which was becoming steadily harder to keep. Jean did the same thing beside him, and
Locke was absolutely sure that from any distance they looked a perfect pair of idiots.

“Higher,” said the woman, “that’s sad. You can do better than that!”

Locke hitched his knee up half a foot more, staring defiantly up at her. He could
feel the vibrations of fatigue and the unstable boat alike in his right leg; he and
Jean were seconds away from capping embarrassment with embarrassment.

“Fine work,” the woman shouted. “Make ’em dance!”

Locke saw the dark blurs of the arrows flash across his vision before he heard the
flat snaps of their release. He dove to his right as they thudded into the middle
of the boat, realizing half a second too late that they’d not been aimed at flesh
and blood. The sea swallowed him in an instant; he hit unprepared and upside down,
and when he kicked back to the surface he gasped and sputtered at the unpleasant sensation
of salt water up his nose.

Locke heard rather than saw Jean spit a gout of water as he came up on the other side
of the boat. The pirates were roaring now, falling over themselves, holding their
sides. The short woman kicked something, and a knotted rope fell through an entry
port in the ship’s rail.

“Swim over,” she yelled, “and pull the boat with you.”

By clinging to the gunwales and paddling awkwardly, Locke and Jean managed to push
the little boat over to the ship, where they fell into
shadow beneath her side. The end of the knotted rope floated there, and Jean gave
Locke a firm shove toward it, as though afraid they might yank it up at any second.

Locke hauled himself up against the fine-grained black wood of the hull, wet and naked
and fuming. Rough hands grasped him at the rail and heaved him aboard. He found himself
looking at a pair of weathered leather boots, and he sat up.

“I hope that was amusing,” he said, “because I’m going to—”

One of those boots struck him in the chest and shoved him back down to the deck. Wincing,
he thought better of standing and instead studied the boot’s owner. The woman was
not merely short—she was petite, even from the perspective of someone literally beneath
her heel. She wore a frayed sky-blue tunic over a loose black leather vest decorated
with slashes that had more to do with near misses than high fashion. Her dark hair,
which piled curl upon curl, was tightly bound behind her neck, and the belt at her
waist carried a minor arsenal of fighting knives and sabers. There was obvious muscle
on her shoulders and arms, an impression of strength that made Locke quickly stifle
his anger.

“Going to
what
?”

“Lie here on the deck,” he said, “and enjoy the fine afternoon sun.”

The woman laughed; a second later Jean was pulled up over the side and thrown down
beside Locke. His black hair was plastered to his skull, and water streamed from the
bristles of his beard.

“Oh my,” said the woman. “Big one and a little one. Big one looks like he can handle
himself a bit. You must be Master Valora.”

“If you say so, madam, I suppose I must be.”

“Madam? Madam’s a shore word. Out here to the likes of you, it’s
lieutenant
.”

“You’re not the captain of this ship, then?”

The woman eased her boot off Locke’s chest and allowed him to sit. “Not even hardly,”
she said.

“Ezri’s my first,” said a voice behind Locke. He turned, slowly and carefully, to
regard the speaker.

This woman was taller than the one called Ezri, and broader across her shoulders.
She was dark, with skin just a few shades lighter than the hull of her ship, and she
was striking, but not young. There were lines about her eyes and mouth that proclaimed
her somewhere near forty. Those eyes were cold and that mouth was hard—clearly, she
didn’t share Ezri’s sense of mischief about the two unclothed prisoners dripping water
on her deck.

Her night-colored braids, threaded with red and silver ribbons, hung in
a mane beneath a wide four-cornered cap, and despite the heat she wore a weather-stained
brown frock coat, lined along the insides with brilliant gold silk. Most astonishingly,
an Elderglass mosaic vest hung unbuckled beneath her coat. That sort of armor was
rarely seen outside of royal hands—each little slat of Elderglass had to be joined
by a latticework of metal, since humans knew no arts to meld the glass to itself.
The vest glittered with reflected sunlight, more intricate than a stained-glass window—a
thousand fingernail-sized chips of gleaming glory outlined in silver.

“Orrin Ravelle,” she said. “I’ve never heard of you.”

“Nor should you have,” said Locke. “May we have the pleasure of your acquaintance?”

“Del,” she said, turning away from Locke and Jean to look at Ezri, “get that boat
in. Give their clothes the eye, take anything interesting, and get them dressed again.”

“Your will, Captain.” Ezri turned and began giving instructions to the sailors around
her.

“As for you two,” the captain said, returning her gaze to the two drenched thieves,
“my name is Zamira Drakasha. My ship’s the
Poison Orchid
. And once you’re dressed, someone will be along to haul you below and throw you in
the bilge hold.”

THEIR PRISON was at the very bottom of the
Poison Orchid
, on what was ironically the tallest deck on the ship, a good ten feet from lower
deck to ceiling. However, the pile of barrels and oilcloth sacks crammed into the
compartment left nothing but a coffin-dark crawlspace above their uneven surface.
Locke and Jean sat atop this uncomfortable mass of goods with their heads against
the ceiling. The lightless room stank of muck-soaked orlop ropes, of moldering canvas,
of stale food and ineffective alchemical preservatives.

This was technically the forward cargo stowage; the bilge proper was sealed behind
a bulkhead roughly ten feet to their left. Not twenty feet in the opposite direction
the curved black bow of the ship met wind and water. The soft waves they could hear
were lapping against the ship’s sides three or four feet above their heads.

“Nothing but the friendliest people and the finest accommodations on the Sea of Brass,”
said Locke.

“At least I don’t feel too disadvantaged by the darkness,” said Jean. “Lost my bloody
optics when I took that tumble into the water.”

“Thusfar today, we’ve lost a ship, a small fortune, your hatchets, and now your optics.”

“At least our setbacks are getting progressively smaller.” Jean cracked his knuckles,
and the sound echoed strangely in the darkness. “How long do you suppose we’ve been
down here?”

“Hour, maybe.” Locke sighed, pushed himself away from the starboard
bulkhead, and began the laborious process of finding a vaguely comfortable niche to
slide into, amidst barrel-tops and sacks of hard, lumpy objects. If he was going to
be bored, he might as well be bored lying down. “But I’d be surprised if they mean
to keep us here for good. I think they’re just … marinating us. For whatever comes
next.”