“That’s ridiculous! Who told you—? Hey! You’re—!”
Mari crouched slightly, spun, and kicked out, catching the Senior Mechanic in the gut and knocking him backwards. Straightening, Mari grabbed Alain’s hand. “Jump!” she whispered urgently.
Alain, bless the Mage, didn’t ask any questions, but went over the rail with her. The side of the ship rushed past as they hurtled downward, the drop briefly terrifying, then they hit the water and went at least a lance length underwater. Mari fought her way back to the surface, spluttering and trying to swim toward the lifeboat bobbing in the water nearby, the weight of her boots and her clothing trying to drag her back down.
For several heart-stopping moments Mari wondered if she would make it, then made a desperate lunge and closed one hand over the rail of the boat. Alain reached it at the same time she did and they helped each other in. Mari rolled onto the bottom of the boat, coming up against their packs and staring upward, where she could see the silhouette of the Mechanic who had been questioning them visible against the ship’s rail. The Senior Mechanic was pointing toward them and yelling. “Get the sail set, Alain. We’ve got to get out of here.”
The Mage stared helplessly at the mast mechanism.
“Sorry, I keep expecting you to do everything,” Mari gasped as she elbowed him aside, swinging up the small mast and locking it, then yanking at the lines holding the sail bound tightly to the mast. Her hands shivered with cold and water dripped off her clothing and hair in steady streams, but Mari tried to ignore those distractions. The sail came free, flapping for a moment before billowing out. “I’ll trim it. You get to the tiller and steer us out of here.”
“Tiller?”
“That stick thing at the back! Move it from side to side and the boat will turn. Hurry!”
As Alain threw himself to the back of the boat and awkwardly grabbed the tiller there came the unmistakable boom of a rifle shot, followed immediately by the flat, hard slap of a bullet hitting the water nearby. The lifeboat swung around, wallowing in a way that ironically made it harder for someone to aim at, then steadied, the sail now taut and the boat oh-so-slowly gaining speed away from the looming mass of the Mechanic Guild ship.
More shots rang out and tiny geysers erupted around the lifeboat. Mari grabbed one of the rifles she had thrown in the boat, then looked upward and back at the Mechanics shooting at her, knowing that she couldn’t fire back when some of her targets might be Mechanics like Kalif or Apprentice Madoka. Instead, she pointed her weapon nearly straight up and fired several shots, pumping the lever awkwardly with the rifle held that way, hoping the sound of the shots would frighten the Mechanics aiming at her and praying a lucky hit wouldn’t strike her or Alain. A plonk marked a hit on the boat, wood splintering under the impact. “What of the big Mechanic weapon?” Alain called. “The one on the front of the ship?”
“With power out on the ship they’ll have to train and load it manually. Hopefully they’ll be too busy with the fire to think of that until we’re too far away.” On the heels of her words, as if mocking them, a deep boom came from the direction of the ship, causing Mari’s heart to stutter with fear.
Chapter Nine
Mari waited for the roar of a heavy shell headed their way, frozen with dread of what even a near-miss would do to the frail wooden lifeboat. But then she realized that there hadn’t been any muzzle flash from the big gun and saw the dark shape of the Mechanic ship alter as it listed to one side. “Something blew up on that ship.” The ship listed more. “They’re flooding. Alain, they’re flooding the boiler room to put out the fire before it destroys the ship.”
“Will that sink them?”
“If I remember right, the idea is to take in enough water to put out the fire but not enough to sink yourself.” A few more shots rang out in a ragged volley and Mari heard bullets snapping by overhead. “We’re almost out of range.”
“They cannot pursue?” His voice had calmed, she realized, as her own tone had grown less worried, but Alain still sounded exhausted.
“No, they can’t follow us. That boiler room is out of order for a long time. I’d stake my Mechanics jacket on it.” She yanked open the lifeboat’s tiny emergency locker and checked the compass. “Which direction are we going, anyway? Let me see. East? Alain, you’re taking us back toward the Empire!”
“You told me to get away from the Mechanic ship as fast as possible,” he complained.
“Oh, yeah. All right, let’s go out a little farther until they’ve lost sight of us, then do a wide turn and head west. As long as we go west it should be impossible to miss the Sharr Isles since they’ve got some good mountainous heights.” She laughed, giddy with relief. “This’ll actually work out. We’ve escaped and the ship saw us heading back toward the Empire so maybe they’ll warn the Guild to look for us there. But we’ll still get to Caer Lyn and take a ship out of there to Altis.”
She could see Alain nod. “Our plan worked,” he said.
“Our plan?”
“The plan not to use a plan.”
“Oh, that plan. Are you being sarcastic, my Mage?”
“Perhaps,” Alain said.
“How long have you been planning to say that?”
“I just made it up.”
Mari couldn’t quite suppress another laugh. “All right, just for that, you can keep steering for a while, even though I’m happy to hear you making a joke.” Mari settled herself in the bow, trembling as reaction to recent events set in. She was torn between total tiredness and the residue of the fear which had been driving her. “It’s been another long day, hasn’t it? Once we’re on course we can tie that tiller to keep us going straight and maybe both get some sleep. It’s got to be several hours’ sailing time to the vicinity of the Sharr Isles.”
She saw Alain drooping over the tiller. “You went beyond your limit again to do what I asked, didn’t you?”
He raised his head and nodded. “It was necessary.”
“It’s still amazing what you can do, and that you keep finding the strength to do it.” Mari moved cautiously to sit next to Alain, uncertain of the stability of this boat, then held him tightly. “Have I told you today that I love you?”
“When you were being taken off the Sun Runner,” Alain said.
“I was afraid that would be the last time I could say it to you.” She took a deep breath. “Get a little sleep, Alain. You earned it. I’ll keep on eye on things for a while.”
He didn’t answer, and when she looked over at him Mari saw that his eyes were already shut.
She braced him against her, held the tiller, and looked up at the stars.
Mari blinked up at the darkness, wondering where she was. She looked to one side and Alain was there, lying right next to her, smiling at her. She smiled back, reaching for him. His hands were on her body, touching everywhere, and it was feeling very, very good and—
The door crashed open. Men and women came storming in, their faces shadowed but their Mechanics jackets a clear sign of their identities. The Mechanics were leveling weapons at her, demanding that she raise her arms high, and stars above she was naked in front of all of them and—
Mari jerked into wakefulness, staring at the bow of the boat , her breath coming rapidly, heart pounding in her chest. She must have fallen asleep next to Alain. The gentle rolling motion of the lifeboat hadn’t changed, providing a strange contrast to the violent action of her nightmare. Its sail was still drawing a good breeze,
Alain was stirring next to her, sitting up. Mari tried to pretend that she was still asleep, but it didn’t do any good. “You had another bad dream,” Alain said in a soft voice.