‘Most of us, my queen— Sabula was shredded, the slow-witted cow, and Lodi as well. We are maybe a dozen strong now.’ Layla gestured to the smoking piles of shattered bone and smouldering armour. ‘And our escort fared even worse.’
‘They would only have slowed us down in any event,’ Neferata said. ‘Gather the others. We will proceed.’
‘Should we inform the Strigoi of the ambush?’ Layla said.
‘Oh, I’m quite certain that they already know,’ Neferata said, smiling crookedly. ‘In fact, I’m quite certain that a certain Arabyan princeling was hoping for just this sort of occurrence.’
‘Redzik’s scouts couldn’t have missed it,’ Naaima said, frowning. ‘The rangers perhaps, but the guns — never.’ She looked at Neferata. ‘Humiliation isn’t enough for that one, is it?’
‘Oh no, he wants me dead, my faithful Kontoi.’ Neferata licked her fingers and rubbed a smudge of blood from Layla’s face. ‘He knows that eventually I will worm my way out of this trap, as I have every other, and that when I do, I will come for him and his ending will be most unpleasant.’ She looked at the devastation caused by the ambush and nodded. ‘Let him think he succeeded, however.’ She looked at them and her eyes lit on Rasha. Something like satisfaction filled her and she pointed to the former nomad. ‘Rasha, you and Layla will stay here. Khaled is certain to send out search parties to ensure our deaths.’
‘And you want us to make sure they find nothing?’ Rasha said, flashing her fangs. ‘Just like the old days, my lady.’
‘Indeed. Messengers as well,’ Neferata said. She looked up the sky, where the snow’s incessant tumble had slowed somewhat. ‘The blizzard is lessening its hold. See that none of the messengers that either Khaled or Morath send out reach Mourkain.’
‘What game are we playing now, Neferata?’ Naaima murmured as the two vampires ran off.
‘The same one as always, sweet Naaima. The only game that matters,’ Neferata said.
SIXTEEN
Neferata lounged on the divan on the deck of the black ark, stirring the wine in her goblet with a finger. Khaled and Anmar stood behind her, their hands on their weapons and their eyes watchful. The druchii slave-master examined the line of shivering, weeping people, occasionally lifting a chin with the butt of a coiled whip.
‘They are pathetic,’ the white-haired elf woman lying on the divan across from Neferata said.
‘But serviceable enough for the mines,’ Neferata said, setting aside her goblet.
The elf glanced at it. ‘Are the night-grapes of Hag Graef not to your liking?’
‘I have little taste for grapes of any vintage,’ Neferata said. ‘You are satisfied, I trust, Megara?’
‘Never, Neferata,’ Megara said. The druchii corsair was as vicious and as treacherous a creature as Neferata had ever had the misfortune to meet. Clad in her armour and silks and dragon-hide cloak, the elf presented a lethal picture, much more so than Neferata herself, who reclined languidly. ‘But I suppose it must do,’ she continued in strongly accented Sartosan. Lavender eyes gazed unblinkingly at Neferata, who met the gaze without flinching.
‘And you will raid elsewhere?’ she said.
‘My word of honour,’ Megara said.
Neferata laughed. One of Megara’s guards hissed something in their own tongue and drew his curved, serrated blade and made to threaten Neferata. Khaled drew his own scimitar, but before he could move forwards, Neferata waved him still. Megara did the same to her guard. ‘Careful, Neferata,’ she said mildly. ‘My people take offence easily.’
‘But you don’t. And it was you I was laughing at, Megara,’ Neferata said pointedly. ‘Though perhaps I shouldn’t have. You do have honour of a sort. After all, you have kept faith with me ever since I rescued you from my greedy-gut servants that day in Sartosa.’ Neferata had pulled the mauled corsair from the jaws of her ghouls on a whim, an action which had since paid great dividends.
Megara frowned. She did not like being reminded of her debt. ‘We will concentrate our efforts on the far southern coasts. The Arabyans make terrible slaves, but they’re better than this rabble.’ She gestured to the quivering fishermen. Neferata gazed at them dismissively. She gave little thought to their eventual fate; such things were beyond her concern.
The slave-master was still going down the line. He stopped in front of a young woman, broad-shouldered and big-hipped. Honey-blonde hair tumbled down, hiding her face. The slave-master forced her chin up and she spat full in his face. The elf stumbled back, his narrow features twisting in a snarl. The woman lunged, snatching the hook dagger from the elf’s belt. With a screech, she swept it across his belly, spilling his guts onto the deck.
The guards glided forwards, heading off the potential revolt before it could begin. They stepped over the twitching slave-master and herded the woman towards the deck rail. Neferata sat up straighter. ‘What are you going to do with her?’ she said.
‘We’ll toss her overboard. The spirited ones are great fun, but that one will be more trouble than she’s worth,’ Megara said. She looked at Neferata. ‘Why?’
‘I would like her,’ Neferata said, tapping her lip. ‘I can use a woman with spirit.’
‘Better to kill her,’ Megara said. She raised a hand.
Neferata leaned back. ‘Kill her, then.’
Megara looked at her. ‘I thought you wanted her.’
‘I can get twenty such, should I wish. It was a whim.’ Neferata examined her fingernails. Megara did as well, remembering how those delicate-seeming fingers had ripped great gouges in the armour of her fellow corsairs and torn out throats. She did not know exactly what Neferata was, but she knew that she was no mere human, whatever she looked like.
‘Take her,’ she said, waving the guards back. Neferata rose smoothly to her feet and swayed towards the frightened woman. The guards fell back as she approached, their dark eyes watching her warily. The knife came up, but Neferata placed a fingertip on the bloody tip and pushed it gently aside.
‘What is your name?’ Neferata said softly, leaning close. The woman’s chest heaved and her face was dripping with sweat as she backed against the rail.
‘I… Lu-Lupa Stregga,’ she said, her eyes going unfocused as Neferata gazed deeply into them.
Lupa was the local word for she-wolf. ‘Appropriate,’ Neferata murmured. ‘Sleep, Lupa. You will be safe with me.’ Her will crashed over the woman’s, easily battering it down. She snatched the dagger from her slack grip as she slumped. Neferata caught her easily and motioned for Khaled to come and take her. The vampire did, wrinkling his nose as he did so.
‘She smells of fish,’ he growled.
‘So she does,’ Neferata said, licking the blood from the knife and closing her eyes as the heady taste of druchii blood burned pleasingly in her mouth and throat. She tossed the knife down, so that it sank blade-first into the deck.
Megara eyed the knife, and then looked up. ‘We’ll call it a gift, shall we?’