Melas and Maq looked down at Fritzen. His breathing was shallow, but his eyes were wide open and glassy. "Poor man," Melas said sadly. "He's probably seeing only what is playing out in his mind. If he makes it, I'll take him on. I've heard he's a good man, an acrobat who gave up the circus life for the sea."
The captain padded away from the half-ogre and strode toward the center of the Perechon. "As for the rest of us, let's get this ship moving! We've got a race to win, and time is a'wasting." After casting a last, concerned glance at the Torado's first mate, Melas bounded up the steps to the aft deck, taking the helm from Vartan and shouting orders to the crew. Lendle, summoned from the galley, dragged Fritzen forward with the help of the other two sailors. Maq shook off the shock and amazement she was feeling and focused once again on winning the race.
The delay caused to the Perechon by picking up Fritzen enabled the Katos to achieve what it hadn't been able to do by means of its own power for a day and a half-take the lead. The ship had sailed well into the Eye of the Bull, putting almost a league between itself and the Perechon. These particular waters gave Melas little room to maneuver and regain the lead. Cliffs towered over the edge of the channel on the Mithas side so that waves pounding into their base were reflected straight back, where they often collided with oncoming crests, creating a thunderous crash and an almost vertical wall of water. On the Kothas side, the channel appeared calmer. However, Melas knew the surface hid treacherous currents and deadly reefs that sheltered sea hag coveys.
"We'll have to come up as close behind the Katos as we dare, then break for the lead as soon as we leave the channel!" Melas shouted, trying to be heard over the sound of the pounding water.
The Perechon pitched and bobbed as it followed the minotaur vessel through the Eye. The water churned and surged, and waves spilled up over the deck, sending sailors scrambling to find something to hold on to. Maquesta held on to the rigging and tried to climb higher on the rope ladder of the mainmast. She wanted to get a good view of how far ahead the Katos was. She gained about ten feet, then decided she had better stop. She wrapped her arms around the ropes and held fast while the Perechon continued to dance on the turbulent waters. Down below she saw one of the newer crewmembers latch on to the capstan and bend over and wretch from motion sickness. She grimaced. If her father saw the green sailor, she knew Melas would give him a stern talking to and force him to find work elsewhere.
A large wave crested over the bow of the ship, throwing a wall of water on the hapless sailor. Maq grinned, but then scrambled for her own purchase as the ship rocked and nearly dislodged her. She gripped the rope ladder even tighter, but her legs waved free below her, as if she were a flag blowing in the strong breeze. Glancing up, she saw the topsail strain against the masts, and she heard the tall timber creak, but she breathed a heavy sigh of relief when the ship passed through the Eye and the water began to calm.
The sick sailor regained his composure, and he busied himself checking the rigging. Smiling widely, Maq watched him for a moment, then climbed higher to get a better look at the Katos. Melas was maneuvering the Perechon close in behind the minotaur ship as they neared the end of the channel.
"Faster, faster," Maq urged as she climbed even higher and inspected the sails. The cloth and the rigging was holding, though she made a mental note to talk her father into a new topsail when they had the prize money in their grasp. This one had been patched too many times.
Finally the Katos and Perechon emerged from the channel, and Maquesta descended the ropes rapidly and rushed to her father's side. "Pull!" he barked at her,, thrusting her in front of the wheel. She gripped two of the wooden spokes that extended from the wheel and served as handholds and turned them rapidly to her right. The motion caused the system of pulleys attached to the rudder to move, and the Perechon pulled, to the starboard side of the Katos. "Keep it up!" Melas yelled. His voice was raised to be heard above the crackling of the sails in the wind. "I'm going to adjust the rigging to see if we can get a little more speed out of her!"
Maquesta tingled all over with excitement. She'd been given the wheel at the most crucial part of the race. The Perechon had been entered in many such contests, but this was the first time a ship was presenting a serious challenge. She breathed faster and felt her heart hammering fiercely in her chest. Her course took the ship so close to the Katos that she imagined hearing the conversations of the minotaur sailors on deck. Risking a glance to the side, she saw the captain and his mates working the wheel. Another group of sailors were laboring over the rigging. She doubted they had her father's skill.
With her hand on the king's spoke, the largest handhold that pointed up when the rudder was straight, Maquesta turned the wheel hard to the left, taking her farther away from the Katos and closer to the treacherous shore. Maq doubted her father would have tried this maneuver, and likely would have stopped her had he been within arms' reach. She didn't want to risk the two ships bumping in the unpredictable water, and she wanted to attempt what Limrod had-but in a little deeper water. She knew the Perechon didn't sit quite as heavy in the water as the Torado had, and secretly she wanted to impress her father and prove something to the crew. A spray of seawater splashed in her face, refreshing and cooling her. Taking another sidelong glance, she noticed the Perechon had made some headway-it was pulling ahead of the Katos. Her maneuver had caused the Perechon to regain the lead!
Cheers erupted from the sailors on the Perechon deck. A loud cheer behind her signaled the approach of her father. Melas slapped her strongly on the back.
"Good job, Maquesta!" he beamed. "And it was a good thing I gave you the wheel-I certainly wouldn't have done that." More softly, he added, "And I'd better not catch you trying to do something like that ever again. I made a few adjustments, and that should help us pick up even more speed. It will tax the sails and the rigging a bit, but I want very badly to win this one."
She grinned up at him and stepped back, returning the wheel to his control and forgetting his gentle scolding. Nothing could dim her spirits now. She had succeeded at the Torado's failed gambit-keeping the Perechon close to the Mithas coast. They had squeaked between the Katos and the shore, recapturing the lead with a vengeance.
The summer's evening sun still warm against her skin, Maq allowed herself to think about the celebration she knew would take place that night in Lacynos. Standing next to her father at the helm, Maq grinned up at Melas, who winked back. Maq had remained on the aft deck, within earshot of her father, while he continued to lengthen the lead they had on the Katos. As she had on countless occasions throughout her youth, Maq had performed tasks as ordered and listened as Melas explained his strategy to her: why the sails needed to be trimmed a certain way, what potential hazards or advantages particular waters held, how the king's spoke felt in his hand in certain conditions versus others. When she was younger, Averon would sometimes join them, and Maq and her father would spend hours discussing the finer points of navigation-with the boisterous first mate throwing in his opinion here and there. In more recent times, however, these had become exclusively father-daughter occasions. Everyone else, including Averon, was discouraged from interrupting unless the matter was extremely urgent. As Maq's knowledge and experience had grown, Melas had increasingly solicited her opinion, not Averon's. These times always caused a thrill of pride to course through Maq.