A bulky, low shadow glided along beneath that other pier and vanished behind the massive vessel docked across the way.
“Tavithê,” Én’nish whispered sharply, not looking away.
“What?” he asked, now standing beside her.
Én’nish kept her eyes on the other ship. “Find Dänvârfij.... Something strange is happening over there.”
His soft steps rushed off, and she walked back along the rail and peered all ways and over the Cloud Queen’s side, in case this was some human criminal element working to raid ships in the harbor. She found nothing until she raised her eyes again and froze.
A skiff slipped out around the huge ship’s rear end.
She heard no oars dipping the water. The shapes of two figures, as best she could see, were pushing the skiff along the waterline of the Bell Tower. Én’nish could not make them out, but who would round a ship in the dark in such a fashion?
She watched to see whether the little boat would keep on along the ship’s hull. The skiff stopped at a point directly below where the towering aftcastle’s wall met the deck. One figure remained low, perhaps seated, but the other rose.
Én’nish heard something like a soft whirl of air in the night. Then the standing figure began climbing up the ship’s outer hull. His white-blond hair gleamed as his head rose above the rail’s edge.
Leesil grabbed the rail and pulled himself up to peek over the edge for any crew nearby. There would be one in the crow’s nest above, but most likely all eyes were turned to the ship’s dockside or toward the waterfront. With no one close in sight on the deck, he slipped over the rail and tugged the rope sharply twice.
The rope pulled tight.
He looked over the side and watched until Magiere rose from the darkness below and climbed upward. He glanced out over the port for anyone watching, and as he was about to look down again, he noticed something that startled him—as if he’d walked into a dark room and caught the reflection of something there in a mirror.
Across the way, another skiff floated at the waterline of a large vessel. It took him a blink to remember that the vessel was the Cloud Queen. He couldn’t see the ship clearly, for there were fewer lanterns hanging over its deck than there were on the other ships about the port. It was too dark to spot anyone in its upper crow’s nest.
Magiere’s hand grabbed the rail next to Leesil’s. He reached down to help pull her up and over, but he left the rope dangling by its hook. It could serve in a hasty retreat if necessary and was less noticeable than if coiled on the deck.
A door waited three strides away along the aftcastle’s front wall. Looking toward the nearest mast, he spotted the first of three broad hatches along the deck’s center. Those probably dropped directly into the hold, or an upper one if the ship’s belly was multileveled.
If only he and Magiere could reach the first hatch unseen.
“Now?” Magiere whispered.
He was pondering their next move when a stocky man with a cudgel tucked in his wide belt came around the mast. The man stopped at the sight of them. Perhaps this ship had never been boarded before, for he just stared.
The last thing Leesil wanted was a fight attracting other sentries.
The man’s shock passed—and Leesil charged.
As the crewman grabbed the head of the cudgel to pull it, Leesil ducked into a slide across the deck. His right foot extended first, with his booted toe outward. As that foot passed the man’s right boot, the man faltered with his cudgel half-drawn. Perhaps he was caught between shouting, pulling the weapon, or even trying to hop aside.
Leesil twisted to the right on the deck. As he flopped over, his extended foot hooked the back of the man’s right boot. Leesil flattened his hands to the deck and pushed up as his left foot shot upward.
His left heel slammed in under the stocky man’s chin.
The maneuver was among a few that his mother had taught him in his youth, though he hadn’t learned a name for it until later. She, with her long legs, could use it to even greater effect as an anmaglâhk. Sgäile had once called it “the cat in the grass.”
The stocky guard never even grunted. The worst of the noise was the guard’s body toppling on the deck. That couldn’t be helped, and Leesil rolled into a crouch and listened carefully as he looked about.
All he heard was Magiere scurrying in low behind him. He saw no one else, even up in the rigging. Magiere helped him shove the unconscious guard in against the first cargo hatch’s frame sidewall.
The hatch wasn’t that large. In place of netting or a grate, it was covered with a lashed-down canvas. Leesil undid one corner to peek in, and Magiere tapped him on the shoulder.
She pointed around the hatch’s side, and there was a rolled-up rope ladder.
Dänvârfij stood beside Én’nish at the rail and stared toward the great ship at the end of the next pier.
“What do you mean, someone with white-blond hair climbed that hull?”
“Yes,” Én’nish answered sharply, “and when they were under the lanterns, I knew the second one by the sword on its ... her back. Léshil and his woman are aboard that ship, unguarded by the traitor!”
“There,” Rhysís said, pointing.
A loose skiff floated at the waterline of the Bell Tower, and Dänvârfij was at a loss. Though she believed what Én’nish claimed, she did not understand it.
Léshil and Magiere had boarded another vessel in secret. Had they arranged other passage in trying to flee the port unseen? Were they after something on that other ship? The latter seemed unlikely, and either way, why had Brot’ân’duivé let them go alone? Or had he?
It left only one tentative conclusion.
“They know we are here,” Dänvârfij whispered.
Worse, there was only one way they could have found out: Brot’ân’duivé must have spotted her when she had tried to follow him. But why was the traitor not with Léshil and Magiere? Had they tried to leave the greimasg’äh behind? If so, why abandon the majay-hì as well?
“If they are not fleeing by arrangement,” Eywodan posed, “then they are at risk of discovery. If they are killed before we can extract the information they have, then we fail in our purpose.”
Dänvârfij had contemplated this as well. Even if Léshil and Magiere were only captured, they could be locked away out of easy reach. That they had pulled their skiff around in plain sight of the Cloud Queen suggested one useful thing.
They did not yet know their own vessel had been taken.
“Rhysís, get over into that ship’s crow’s nest,” she commanded. “Cover us from above as we board it. Eywodan, remain here and lock up all of the crew. We need somewhere close to bring captives and quickly take them out of sight.” Glancing at Tavithê, she added, “Bring your bow, remain out of any conflict, and wound either of our quarry for easier capture.”
The team broke apart as Rhysís rushed to climb the Cloud Queen’s main mast and Eywodan began herding the few crewmen below deck.
Dänvârfij led the way as Én’nish and Tavithê followed her over the side, into the water, and then into their own waiting skiff. Once aboard the skiff, they pushed off with their hands and drifted to the starboard side of the Bell Tower.
Boarding was easier for the rope that had been left dangling, but Dänvârfij did not climb over the rail when she reached the top. She hung there against the hull and out of sight from its deck, and looked back to the Cloud Queen.