‘Three points to starboard,’ came the answer.
Jute turned to scan to the rear. No other vessel was in sight. The Malazans may have sunk; they’d looked uncommonly low in the water. He turned to find Buen on the mid-deck walk. ‘Light a smudge,’ he called.
The man gaped at him. ‘A smudge? Here? On an unknown shore?’
‘Do it!’ Jute snapped, suddenly annoyed at having his word challenged.
Buen seemed to remember himself and he ducked his head, touching his chest. ‘Aye, cap’n.’
‘Everyone’s on edge, luv,’ Ieleen murmured from his side.
‘I’ll give him the edge of my hand.’
‘It’s a steep gravel strand,’ Dulat shouted. ‘Wide, though.’
‘Have to do,’ he answered.
‘Steady on,’ the lad shouted to Lurjen.
Black smoke now wafted in a choking thick cloud from the pot Buen had set. Sailors moved the iron brazier to keep as much of the ship upwind as possible. The smoke plumed low and heavy over the waves, as if the Dawn were unravelling a scarf.
The shore now hove into view. In the deep gold of the setting sun Jute made out a steep rise of black stone gravel leading to the last remnants of the narrows’ cliffs: an inland rise of perhaps no more than a chain, topped by long wind-whipped grasses. And spread across the wave-washed gravel lay a litter of broken timbers, barrels, torn sailcloth and a tangled rigging, and the blackened skeletal hulls of two ships.
Jute tried to remember the stories he’d heard of the region and came up with a name. The south shore of the Dread Sea — the Anguish Coast. Wasn’t that the best of Oponn’s jests! They were like sailors on leave staggering blind drunk from one rats’ nest to the next. And he’d thought things couldn’t get any worse. ‘Any sign of survivors?’ he called up.
After a time the lad answered: ‘None as I can see.’
Jute wiped a hand across his brow and found it cold and sweaty.
‘Another ship!’ Dulat shouted then, making Jute flinch.
‘Whereaway?’ he snapped, alarmed.
‘Following. That Malazan galley p’rhaps.’
Jute let out a long breath. A hand brushed his and he snapped his head down: Ieleen reaching out. He took her hand and she gave a squeeze. Jute’s chest suddenly hurt with a great swelling pressure and he answered the squeeze. ‘Very good, Dulat,’ he said. ‘Take us in, slow and steady.’
‘Aye.’
The lad directed them to a relatively clear swath of strand and Buen drove them in at a strong speed. The bow ground and grated its way up the gravel and crewmen and women jumped over the sides, pushing and tugging on the hull. Buen then tossed out two stout hemp lines that most of the crew grasped to heave the Dawn as far up the slope as possible. The lines were staked into the gravel.
Jute climbed down over the side. Ieleen, he knew, would remain on board. She hadn’t set foot on land for some years now and he’d chided her on it, but she remained adamant and so he’d relented. It was a silly superstition to his mind, but it was important to her and he really couldn’t care either way.
The black gravel crunched under his boots. Letita stood awaiting him, still armoured, helmet under an arm. ‘I want a perimeter, a picket, and a watch. And send out some scouts. What’s past that short rise?’
She saluted. ‘Aye, captain.’
He next tracked down Buen. ‘Gather some of this wrack for fires. Both for cooking and for signals.’ The man nodded his assent but appeared unhappy with the idea of casting signals far and abroad. Jute then ran into a grinning Dulat who was inspecting the unpacked casks and kegs of their remaining foodstuffs. Jute made a show of studying him long and hard as if puzzled.
The lad’s smile faltered and he asked, uneasy, ‘Yes, captain?’
‘Why aren’t you at your post, sailor?’
‘My post? Ah, well — we’ve hauled up, haven’t we?’
‘What has that to do with anything?’
‘And it’s getting dark.’
‘You coming down makes it lighter, does it?’
The lad had to think about that, his head cocked. ‘No …’
‘Then get back up there and keep an eye out for those ships or any others!’
Dulat cast one last glance at the stores, sighed his longing, then saluted and jogged off for the ship. Jute clasped his hands behind his back and paced off to a vantage from which to scan this most southernly bay of the Dread Sea. The Malazan ship was a black dot making its way to their location; of the other two vessels he could see no sign. As he watched it occurred to him that the Malazan silhouette was canted rather alarmingly to the starboard. There’s seamanship, he told himself. Keeping afloat despite every reason to be underwater.
The dark silhouette limped nearer. Its oars, a single bank on each side, flashed in the weakening sunset. The fires piled on the beach sent out clouds of grey smoke that sometimes blew over Jute as the contrary winds gusted and shifted. He spotted one of Letita’s marines, Gramine, and waved the man over.
‘Any word from the scouts?’
‘No sir. Not yet.’
‘Send Letita over when there’s news.’
‘She’ll come, sir.’
Jute gave a light snort. Nerves. Damned nerves. ‘Yes,’ he allowed. He returned to examining the Malazan galley. ‘I suppose she will.’
The vessel drew nearer, silent but for the faint splash of oars. ‘I see the other ship!’ Dulat shouted then from his post atop the mainmast. ‘She has signal beacons burning at the bow!’
‘Very good, Dulat.’ He returned to watching the Malazan’s crippled approach. After a time, boots crunching through the gravel announced Letita. Jute turned and she saluted. ‘Grasslands inland,’ she reported. ‘Empty.’
‘These wrecks?’
‘Looted then burned here, on site.’
Jute eyed the charred skeletal ribs. He wondered aloud, ‘Burned on shore?’
‘Aye.’
‘Then someone’s here.’
Her gaze slid to the north where it rested, naturally narrowed and wary. ‘They’re gone now.’ Attractive eyes, he reflected as he had a number of times. Hazel with a touch of sea-green, if he had it right. The wind cast her ragged-cut black hair about.
‘You do not mix much with the crew,’ he observed.
Her gaze snapped to him. It remained narrowed, challenging now. ‘Nor do you.’
‘There is someone awaiting your return home to …’
‘Strike, sir. Yes.’
Strike still? He’d known she was a graduate of the famed military academy on that island, but was surprised to hear that she still considered it home. ‘Well … we’ll make it back. That’s the point of any journey, yes?’ and he gave a small laugh. She watched him in silence. He cleared his throat. ‘Well, that’s all for now.’
She saluted, ‘Very good, captain,’ spun on a heel and marched off.
So serious, he reflected. Well, she was early yet in her career. He returned to watching their companion’s progress. Closer now, the ship appeared even worse for wear. Battered and scarred. Its planking faded with age. He couldn’t make out the name scrawled below the bowsprit. It ground up on to the beach, but far lower than the Dawn. Some of his crew helped secure lines that they hammered into the gravel. Two figures clambered down its side. Jute went to meet them.
The foremost of the two was a squat wiry fellow, quite old. He was in much-worn leather armour, scoured where Malazan sigils of rank would once have ridden. His unkempt grey hair blew about in the winds and a grey-shot beard matched. His wrinkled features bore the faded slate hue of a native Napan. The second was equally wiry, spidery even, in common sailor’s jerkin and trousers, barefoot, with a mane of thin white hair and a pinched, worried face.
Jute extended an arm to the first fellow and they clasped wrists, sailor-style. ‘Jute Hernan, Master of the Silver Dawn. At your service sir. You have my eternal gratitude for getting us out of that trap.’
This fellow waved his other hand, dismissing the topic. ‘Ach — it was my own arse I was worried about. Cartheron, of the Rag-stopper. Our thanks for leading us through the rocks. We’d never have made it otherwise.’