All told, an intolerable situation. Mutiny was the obvious answer-but how, and against whom? Kruno Burnscove or Darius Plapp might have led a few hundred gang members in such a rebellion-but the ixchel, thorough to a fault, had seized these two rival gang leaders as well.
So it was that the roving eyes converged at last on a tiny, copper-skinned figure, balanced on the mainmast rail. He was attended by six shaven-headed spearmen, and he wore a suit of fine black swallow feathers that shimmered when he walked. Those who were close enough saw his haughty chin, the plumb-line posture, the eyes that managed somehow to convey both ferocity and fear. It was galling, but inescapable: the most powerful figure on the Chathrand was this young ixchel lord, a crawly they could have batted overboard with one sweep of the hand.
“Well, Quartermaster?” he demanded. “Hasn’t my crew thirsted enough? Will you deliver them from misery, or not?”
His voice came out high and reedy: the effect of bending it into the register of the human ear. It was clear from his expression that he found the effort distasteful.
Fiffengurt scowled and deliberately turned away, busying himself with a davit strap. “My crew,” he muttered.
One of the ixchel guards snapped furiously: “You will answer Lord Taliktrum at once!”
Fiffengurt, Pazel and Thasha exchanged nervous looks. Behind them, Hercol Stanapeth leaped onto the deck and bent to whisper in the quartermaster’s ear. Fiffengurt nodded, then turned uneasily to face the crew.
“Now, ah, listen sharp, lads,” he said. “There’s danger ashore. The villagers can’t let us back inside their walls-”
Roars, howls: Fiffengurt was announcing a death sentence. The only danger anyone believed in was thirst, and the only fresh water this side of the gulf was the well in the village square. The men pressed closer, and their shouting increased. Fiffengurt waved desperately for silence.
“-but they’ve agreed to fill any casks we bring ’em, and to hand ’em off right there at the gatehouse. Mr. Fegin, get that yawl in the water! Thirty hands for duty ashore! Who’s prepared? Volunteers get their ration first.”
Instantly the roars became cheers, this time in earnest. Countless hands shot skyward. “Let it be done!” cried Taliktrum from his perch, but no one listened to him now. Already Fegin was ordering men to the capstans, and topmen were loosing cables to allow the big yawl to be hoisted.
Pazel and Thasha grinned at Fiffengurt, who breathed a sigh of relief. Bolutu descended from the skiff, pushing his way through Turach spears. Haddismal directed the prisoners to climb down from the boat. “On guard, marines, those are blary sfvantskors!” he shouted over the mayhem.
Haddismal possessed a voice to cut through storm and battle. Yet somehow one of the newly summoned Turachs did not heed him, and in the space of five seconds disaster struck. The soldier was stationed behind Neda, who had yet to rise to her feet. Leaning forward, he prodded her with one hand in the small of her back. Then his eyes found a long rip in Neda’s breeches. His hand developed a will of its own, and three fingers groped for an instant over the flesh of her thigh.
Neda simply exploded. With a backward elbow-thrust she broke the man’s front teeth, then spun on the bench and delivered a lightning kick to the chest of a second Turach before he could bring his spear to bear. Suddenly everyone was moving. Cayer Vispek’s boot deflected another spear; then he leaped into the rigging as the startled Turachs stabbed at his legs. Jalantri whirled toward Neda, but Haddismal clubbed him savagely across the face, and three Turachs fell on the young sfvantskor like boulders, grappling, while a fourth kicked at his stomach.
Neda instantly pulled her legs back against her chest, then snapped forward, rolling over the side of the skiff with a violent lurch. She came out of the roll with a twist of her upper body, and rose facing her would-be attackers. To the crew she seemed to have passed through the Turachs like a shadow-except that two lay senseless on the ground.
The crowd drew back. Neda whirled, as though suddenly aware of the vast, empty deck surrounding her, the futility of flight. And now the Turachs had recovered. They did not have the grace of sfvantskors, but they were terrible fighters, and they could spear anything that moved.
Neda almost became the proof of this, for eight soldiers had taken aim. But before they could let fly Thasha flung herself between them and their target.
Her friends shouted in horror. But the Turachs froze. Neda seized Thasha brutally from behind, catching the younger woman’s throat in the crook of her elbow. Thasha gasped but did not fight back.
Half out of his mind, Pazel rushed at them. “Neda, don’t! Thasha-”
As Neda’s grip tightened, Hercol lunged forward and caught Pazel by the arm. “Hear me, all of you!” he shouted, raising his black sword high. “On Heaven’s Tree I swear it: the one who harms Thasha Isiq will answer to me!”
“Hold, you dogs!” bellowed Haddismal. “Damn you, Stanapeth, what do you expect of us? The girl went mad!”
“I am doing kill!” shrieked Neda, in rough Arquali.
“Neda,” said Thasha, her voice constricted but wry, “I just saved your blary skin.”
Then Cayer Vispek spoke from the rigging. “The Turach groped at her womanhood. Perhaps Arquali women brook such treatment, but ours do not. You gave your word she would suffer no man’s abuse-and yet it begins before she sets foot on the deck.”
“All the more reason to get her safely to the brig,” snarled Haddismal. Then he looked down at his fallen soldier. “You muckin’ dullard, Vered! If you’d raised your eyes from her crotch to her blary tattoos you’d still have all your teeth! She’s a sfvantskor!”
For an amazed moment the sailors even forgot their thirst. Sfvantskors! It’s true! Look at them tattooed necks! They’re the enemy, by Rin!
“Muckin’ Sizzies!” bellowed someone. “Killers! Crazies!”
“Animals, is what they are!” hissed another. “It’s one of them what hacked my old man’s arm off in the war!”
“We shouldn’t have to share our water-”
“We should gut ’em, here and now-”
“You will place them in the brig!” cried Taliktrum suddenly. “You above there, come down, unless you would fight the whole ship’s company. Girl, I will appoint one of my own lieutenants to watch over you-and besides, that part of the ship is off-limits to humans, unless escorted by us. Have no fear! We ixchel determine the course of events on the Chathrand.”
“The boy requires a doctor,” said Cayer Vispek, pointing at Jalantri.
Taliktrum studied the moaning figure. “Let him go to the forecastle house. Dr. Chadfallow is already there. Now yield, sfvantskor girl. We are in dangerous waters, and this delay imperils us all.”
Neda tightened her grip on Thasha’s neck. She looked quite capable of murder. Through her teeth, and still in Arquali, she spoke: “No… Turach… touching me… again.”
“Right,” said Haddismal, waving off his men with a sigh. “I’d say you’ve made that blary clear.”
But the other Turachs, and especially the friends of the wounded men, studied Neda with hatred, and their eyes seemed to mark her.
1. It should now be abundantly clear that all such cited dates are open to question. -EDITOR.
2. Sfvantskors may never conceal or fully cover these marks, which declare not only their tribe but their first master’s name, royal affiliation (pentarchrin) and stage of enlightenment. Facing execution, a sfvantskor will always ask to be stabbed or drowned rather than beheaded or hanged, so that his neck will remain intact, and his spirit pass with dignity through the regions of death. -EDITOR.