'They can barely walk.' Kheda winced as the grievously mistreated Chazen islanders stumbled and crawled across the sands, their captors forcing them on with blows and kicks.
Dev let out an explosive breath and cackled with delight. 'That's got them on the move!'
'What has?' asked Kheda, exasperated.
Dev ignored him. 'Risala, hang on to that tiller. We need to get on our way before any of that lot get close.' The sails swelled with unnatural wind as he spoke and the Amigal dipped and shivered.
'What did you do?' Kheda persisted.
'Later.' Dev held out an insistent hand. 'The map.'
Kheda handed it over, doing his best to contain his frustration.
Dev studied it for a moment before flicking at a carefully inked cross with a newly pared fingernail. 'That one.' Giving the paper back to Kheda, he sat and turned his back on them both as he lay and rolled himself in his blanket, pulling a fold over his head.
Risala looked at Kheda, uncomprehending. 'Is that it?'
'So it would seem, until we. reach this encampment.' Kheda showed her the map. 'Which won't be long. They have all moved close together, Dev was right.'
'The wind's in our favour and it's building.' Risala looked up at skies now dappled with thickening cloud.
Kheda grimaced. 'There'll be rain tonight. Let's hope we can get all this done before it arrives.'
'I think it'll be over one way or the other,' Risala said grimly. 'All those log boats and rafts are following us.' Turning her back on them, she gripped the tiller tight, as if her urgency would somehow force the Amigal on.
'I'll get those arrows tipped.' Kheda lifted the hatch to the cabin below. 'We'll want something to hand, if any savage mage catches us while Dev's still snoring.'
In the dimness of the lamplight in the main hold, he worked rapidly to blend half of Shek Kul's powder with a little sailer pottage and some of the fish-scale glue. He counted out the arrows. Thirty for him. Thirty for Risala. Half the ripping arrow heads, half the piercing missiles. He carefully tipped them with the paste, resolutely turning his thoughts away from the odds against them as he set them to dry.
That done, a new thought struck him. He went to look again in the chests where he'd found the bows. In the bottom of one, Kheda found a selection of daggers, old and new, plain and ornamented, some in styles he recognised and others entirely unknown to him. In among the sinuous shapes of the central domains, there was one with the curved blade and cross-braided handle of Daish. It was old, the silk braid dark with grime and sweat, the leather of the scabbard cracked and peeling away from the wood beneath.
Let this be an omen then, that I am right in coming back to fight for my own with whatever weapons come to hand.
Kheda tested the edge with a careful finger. It was as blunt as the crude knife he'd stolen from the Ulla domain farmer. Rummaging in the chest he found a whetstone and set about remedying that. He had just about restored the dagger to a state Telouet would have grudgingly approved when he felt the Amigal change course. Returning swiftly to the deck, Kheda saw Dev throwing aside his blanket and striding to the rail, expression one of intense concentration. As before, Kheda could see absolutely nothing happening ashore until the savages all roused as one man, thrown into utter confusion.
When they reached the next island, the pattern repeated itself, as it did on the following island and the one after that. By the time they had left all eight of the savage mages surrounded by encampments in chaos, Kheda's frustration was all but choking him and he had honed the Daish dagger he had claimed and the Viselis blade to an edge sharper than any razor. He watched the final island on the course Dev had plotted grow closer and closer. Finally he couldn't stand it any more. He strode down the deck to Dev.
'Just what are you doing?'
Dev was leaning on the Amigal's rail, breathing heavily. He hadn't moved since they had fled the uproar wreaking havoc on the last savage wizard's encampment. 'Now would be a good time for that white brandy.' There was a dangerous light in his dark eyes.
Kheda fetched a bottle without comment. The stopper came out with a shrill squeak. Dev took a long swallow of the aromatic liquor and jerked his head towards the stern. 'The girl will want to see this, I daresay.'
Kheda followed him and stood beside Risala. She was looking back along their wake. Kheda looked too. More than one of the invaders' log boats was visible in the distance, single-hulled vessels speeding ahead of the bigger raft-like ships. All were hurrying along the same course, hastening towards the mage with the dragon-hide cloak.
'Don't forget to look ahead as well,' Dev warned with a taunting grin. 'Don't run my ship on to any rocks.'
'In a channel this wide?' Risala retorted. 'Even you could steer it falling down drunk.'
'I could thread the Amigal in and out of the Serpents' Teeth dead drunk.' Taking another pull from the bottle of brandy, Dev smiled cheerily at her. Then his face turned serious. 'Just so you know, this is what I was showing each of those wizards.'
Dev concentrated on the empty air between the three of them and a faint golden glow began to build. A disc formed, coalescing into a perfect image of a beach. The radiance took on a greenish hue and diminutive trees and bushes flourished around the edges. An encampment appeared, larger than any they had just visited, with three corrals for captives and towering piles of booty heaped between them, crudely covered with palm thatch ripped from the ravaged huts of the village.
Kheda took an involuntary pace backwards and Risala's sudden clutch at the tiller put a visible kink in the Amigal's wake.
Where are the people? There are no people.
A snap of Dev's fingers put paid to Kheda's unspoken bemusement. Two figures appeared, disproportionately large for the floating scene but all the more identifiable for that. One was the savage wizard with the dragon-hide cloak. The other was Dev, or at least Kheda guessed it was, from the bald head and arrogant stride. If it was Dev, he was dressed in more finery than Kheda would have guessed the wizard could boast.
The mage chuckled as the two little figures squared off against each other. Risala and Kheda both jumped as flames erupted around the dragon-hide wizard. The illusory blaze died away and a miniature sandstorm enveloped the Dev image. In the next breath, it exploded outwards in a ring of fire that broke, curled back on itself and wrapped around the dragon-hide mage. This time the flames didn't yield, rising every higher and shrinking inwards to a tight pillar of fire. The tiny Dev waved a hand and the blaze died away. There was nothing left of the dragon-hide mage but a twisted heap of scorched scales. The real Dev snapped his fingers and the illusion vanished.
'That's what you've shown the other invading mages?' Kheda stared at the empty air, the brilliance of the magic still seared on his vision.
'It is,' Dev confirmed. 'Which is why they're all scurrying along to see if it's true. If it is, they're doubtless eager to grab as much of Dragonhide's loot as they can.'
'And when they find out it isn't true?' Kheda asked with a frown.
'They'll have to explain themselves to Dragonhide.' Dev was unbothered. 'He'll want to know why they've all turned up, full of concern and clutching empty sacks. That should keep them arguing for a while.'
'Is that what you're going to do to him?' Risala's voice shook slightly.
'I don't know.' Dev shrugged. 'I'll give it a cursed good try, though. It depends what he throws at me.' Kheda saw that dangerous glint was back in his eye as the wizard took the helm from Risala, who yielded it without argument. 'We're going to make landfall just this side of that headland. Dragonhide's camp's in the bay beyond, so we'll cut across to a vantage point I've scryed out.'