Isle Saliz
After three days of fair winds and a following sea, Isle Saliz appeared on the eastern horizon, just as Julian had predicted. To the southeast, the faint lines of Saliz’s sister isle, Huerta, were just visible through the haze of mist. It was growing warmer. Selena, standing on the quarterdeck, felt the encroaching heat as a tingle over her skin. She wasn’t comfortable but she no longer feared being debilitated by her chill and was able to leave her heavy cloak in her cabin. But the heat was apparent on the faces of her companions; sweat beaded every forehead and clothing stuck to the backs of the men who toiled to sail the ship that was damaged and already short-handed of crew.
“Watch the water,” she heard Julian tell Whistle as she went to the aft rail. “If something moves in it, I want to know. Any godsdamnn thing at all.”
Now that they had arrived, Selena felt she could not watch the island approach. At the rail, she watched the Black Storm cut a gentle wake behind them. Ilior joined her.
“It is like the quiet before the battle,” he said.
“Yes,” Selena said. “I feel as if storm clouds hang over the island. Perhaps that is the danger of Isle Saliz, but now… She is there, waiting for me. Now that I speak it aloud, I believe she’s been waiting for me.”
“For what purpose?”
Selena’s hand went to the pocket of her overtunic where the coin of Oshkat still lay. It had survived her fall into the ocean. She hadn’t thought of An-Lan’s reading in weeks, but now the seer’s words were coming back. Beware for the dark will try to swallow you, consume you, to make you something like itself.
“I don’t know,” she whispered. Selena remembered another of the images An-Lan’s smoke had shown her: the Sacrifice. He is wounded. He bleeds. He will die for you.
She glanced up at Ilior fearfully. “You should stay. All of you should stay here on the ship. I will fight her myself. It’s not safe—”
Whistle whistled. A short, shrill tweet.
Julian held up his hand and the crew froze at once. The water was dark blue and rolling with mild swells but closer to the islands it bore a strange, ruddy color. Like blood, Selena thought, turning around to look for whatever it was that had caught Whistle’s attention. Then she noticed Julian wasn’t watching the sea with his sharp eyes, but listening carefully. For long moments, only sounds were the creaking of the ship and the snap of canvas sails against the wind.
Selena went to the helm, beside Julian. “What did Whistle see?”
“I’ll be pricked if I know. But maybe it’ll keep on…”
The captain sucked in a breath and then Selena heard it too. A clacking sound at the bow, like someone tapping on the wood with a sharp stick. All heads turned to look and Whistle let out another blast, this one tapering away in breathy fear.
Selena saw an enormous red pincer, like that of boiled lobster, reach up and over the prow. A second pincer followed a moment later, and then the head. Six black teacup-size eyes appeared over a round O of a mouth that was clustered with spiny teeth. Its body was covered in segmented chitin plates in fiery red, and eight pointed legs clicked and clacked as it scrabbled over the rail. A hooked tail curved over the body; the tip was huge and bulbous, sprouting a black stinger as long as a dagger. It landed on the deck with a thud and began to scuttle.
“Fuck me dead,” Julian breathed, and tore aside his long coat to draw his scimitars while Svoz materialized beside him.
Ilior unsheathed his long sword. “It looks like…”
“Why, it’s a sea scorpion,” Svoz said airily.
Selena licked her lips and tightened her grip on her sword that she didn’t remember drawing. “There’s only one. Svoz, kill it,” she ordered as Julian shouted for the crew to get back.
“There’s only one now,” Svoz smiled broadly to show a row of black teeth. “They travel in schools. Or is it swarms?” He tapped his chin with a black nail. “Herds? I can never remember…”
“Svoz, shut up and get down there,” Julian said through clenched teeth. “We’ll back you up if you need it.”
“Back me up? Against one?” The sirrak snorted. “You amuse me, Captain.”
“Is it true they come in swarms?” Selena asked Julian without taking her eyes off the sea scorpion that was scuttling back and forth along the main deck like a roach searching for scraps. The crew had scrambled up the rigging and watched from above as the sirrak moved to do battle with it.
“Yes, but they live in shallows,” Julian said. “We’re too deep. I don’t know how this one found us. It must be a rogue or straggler.”
Selena watched Svoz stride to the scorpion and realized his weapon of choice this day was a cudgel, the head of which was the size of an ale cask.
“Svoz, no! Stop!” Selena shouted. “The deck!”
Julian made a strangled sound as Svoz brought the enormous cudgel down on the scorpion’s back. It exploded in a mess of shattered exoskeleton and greenish innards. Under the gore was a cudgel-sized crater of cracked wood. A pincer twitched in death throes. The sirrak raised his weapon again out of pure murderous glee rather than necessity.
Julian loosed the vilest oath Selena had ever heard and then said, “Svoz, stop! My deck, damn you!”
Svoz stopped his downward blow and rested the cudgel on his shoulder. He regarded the damage he had done with mock dismay.
“Oh dear. Do you have a throw rug? A mat, perhaps? None will be the wiser…”
“Bloody shit-eating bastard.” Julian started down the ladder but Selena grabbed his arm.
“Why is Svoz ignoring my orders but obeying yours?” she demanded. Ilior’s shadow fell over both of them.
Julian’s lip curled and he tore his arm from her grasp. “Maybe because you already have your own winged pet to do your bidding.”
Selena straightened. “Answer my question.”
“Because I bought him.”
The ship lurched; sending them all off balance, and there was a grinding sound beneath their feet.
“Bought him? With what?”
But Whistle was whistling again and Julian ignored her. “We’ve run aground.” He dashed down to the main deck and Selena had no choice to but to follow. “How in the bloody Deeps…?”
Julian ran to the rail and peered over. The deep blue water was gone, and instead the ship was cradled by the light, rust color of the shallows. The bottom silt was visible. Isle Saliz, once a distant mass of dark green was now looming before them in the early morning light.
“I don’t understand it,” Selena said. “We were two leagues out before the scorpion. It’s not possible…”
“It’s not possible,” Julian sneered. “And yet we are now a few hundred spans from the shore and my ship has bloody run aground. Grunt! Cat! Furl the—”
Ilior was suddenly there, his shadow falling over Julian. With one smooth motion, the Vai’Ensai reached down and gripped Julian by the throat and jerked him close. Every person on the ship froze, watching, as the air thickened with tension.
“She is a Paladin of the Aluren and a veteran of the Zak’reth war,” Ilior said, his voice dangerously low. “I grow weary of listening to you talk to her with such contempt.”
“Ilior, stop.” Selena pulled at his arm but it was unmovable as a tree trunk.
But while she struggled against the Vai’Ensai, Julian did not. His face was turning an alarming shade of red and the veins were beginning to bulge in his forehead but he made no effort to extricate himself from Ilior’s grip. Perhaps he knew it would be futile. Instead, he pulled the flintlock from his belt, brought it up between him and the dragonman, and aimed it square between Ilior’s eyes.
Selena gasped. “No, Julian. Ilior, stop…”
Ilior paid the gun no heed. “You will apologize,” he said, “and that will be the last thing you ever say to her.”
Julian cocked the flintlock.
The crew recovered themselves and surrounded the pair, brandishing their cutlasses at Ilior. It was Svoz who touched a weapon to Ilior’s neck, leveling the tip of his pike at the vein pulsing there.
“Tut, tut. Master Captain might blow your face off before I get to have any fun with you, but in the meanwhile, I feel I must make my new allegiances clear, brother.” He pushed the blade into Ilior’s neck just deep enough before drawing blood.
Selena slipped under Ilior’s arm to put herself between them. “Enough! Ilior, let him go! Julian, put the pistol away. Now!”
The Vai’Ensai released Julian with agonizing slowness and Selena was certain Julian was going to pull the trigger anyway. But when the captain was free he stepped back, taking in deep breaths without panic or loss of composure. He put his flintlock back in his belt and straightened his shirt that had been rumpled, all the while meeting the Vai’Ensai’s gaze. His expression blank, his eyes unreadable, but his trembling hands and tense jaw said that he was seething with fury. He shrugged his black long coat into place and nodded at Svoz who lowered his spear.
“You have three days to find your witch and kill her,” Julian told Selena, his voice flat and emotionless. “Then I sail. With or without you.”
He strode away without another word, Svoz at his side. The rest of the crew remained, their eyes on Selena, before Julian began barking orders. The crew moved off; Whistle the slowest, his eyes full of worry. The captain snapped at him and he jumped and scurried away, giving her one last glance over his shoulder. Niven remained by her side.
“I’ll go with you,” he blurted. His gaze darted to the jungle of Saliz and back to her again. “It’s my duty.”
“You will stay here,” she told him. “This is my battle and I will face it alone. I will not put your life in jeopardy.” The adherent started to protest but she silenced him with her hand held up. “I will not.”
“I can’t help but feel a terrible dereliction of duty,” he said. “But worse, I feel relieved. If I weren’t such a coward, I’d insist on going with you.”
“You are no coward. Your duty will be to take care of the crew until I return.” Her eyes sought the quarterdeck where Julian stood at the wheel. She saw Niven follow her gaze and quickly looked away. “How did Svoz come to serve Julian?”
“I don’t know, but if I had to guess, it would be when you fell into the water,” Niven said. He cleared his throat. “Captain Tergus was quite frantic over your accident.” He inclined his head and said in a low voice. “Quite.”
“Aye, frantic over not getting paid,” Ilior said.
Niven frowned and looked about to say more, but the Vai’Ensai glowered at him.
Selena watched the exchange while her pulse quickened. Frantic?
“Never mind,” she said, drawing herself up. “Please retrieve our belongings,” she commanded Ilior.
He seemed to relax ever so slightly. His mouth was turned down but Selena could see the satisfied smile in his eyes. “As you wish.”
Sebastian watched Selena, Ilior, and the adherent converse briefly. The Paladin glanced his way, just for a moment and he swallowed hard. His throat ached where Ilior had choked him. He had almost killed the dragonman. He had been a hair’s breadth away from pulling the trigger when lack of air had made his vision swim with dancing lights. Then Selena had appeared.
And so I didn’t shoot.
He lit a cigarillo; he hadn’t had one in days and it scratched his raw throat.
Let it happen. Let it all happen, as it should. She’ll kill the Bazira and the island will kill her. My last job…
He tried to conjure the memory of his secret atoll and couldn’t.
“To the Deeps with it,” he muttered. He watched Selena descend belowdecks. “She can have it.”
“Dispensing gifts?” Svoz appeared beside him at the helm, hulking and red and glistening as though he’d bathed in blood.
“No,” Sebastian said.
“I do wish you hadn’t been so rash with the dragonman. I was ever so eager to enter the jungle with the godly bitch and kill many, many things.”
“We’ll go in.”
“Will we?”
“Aye.” Sebastian exhaled smoke from his nose in twin plumes. “To collect their bones.”