You are lucky, mauling. I will suffer you to live. As long as you have knowledge that I need. She sounded closer than ever. His head felt near to splitting.
Droust closed his eyes at that cruel promise. It would be better if he were to throw himself onto the knife the man held at his throat. At least then he would die and be done with whatever evil the lady had in store for him.
“It’s the Spellplague.” Droust knew he should tell them she was coming, but he couldn’t. They would kill him outright. “It isn’t me.”
“The Spellplague was fourteen years ago.” Captain Porgad slapped him again. “I saw it happen with my own eyes.” He shoved his broad, ugly face into Droust’s. “But in all that time I’ve been out here, before and after the Spellplague, I’ve never had such ill luck.”
There it was then: luck. The one thing that all sailors insisted must be on their side. They made donations to all the gods and goddesses that kept watch over sailors and the sea while in port. On the ship, they offered food and prayer to Umberlee, the Bitch Queen who didn’t care for the lives of humans but sometimes spared them all the same. She commanded the wind and the waves, and she could remove them from the storms and give them safe passage. If she could be wooed. If they were lucky.
Droust had come between Captain Porgad and his crew and their luck.
“I’ve sailed Grayling for seventeen years without such ill fortune.” The captain’s bloodshot eyes narrowed. “Most of this crew has been with me nearly as long.”
“You are the only new thing on this vessel.” Porgad grabbed Droust’s shirt and shoved him backward.
“That and the ill luck he brought.” Someone slapped Droust’s head.
In the dark, with his arms held behind his back, Droust trembled. “What are you going to do to me?”
“We gotta get rid of the bad luck.” Captain Porgad pulled back into the darkness, somehow more frightening when Droust couldn’t see him. “Gotta keelhaul you. We’ll ask Umberlee to spare your soul and wash you of whatever curse has rooted within you.”
Keelhauled. The thought of being dragged under the ship from stern to prow caused a sour bubble to burst in the back of Droust’s throat. He’d never seen anyone subjected to that, but he’d read about it. And he was sure he’d drown before he was brought back up. Most victimsand that’s what they were because no one suffered that harsh challenge willinglydrowned.
The storm he heard raging outside would make keelhauling him even more difficult. He wasn’t going to be given a cleansing. He was going to be executed.
“Bring him.” Captain Porgad stepped away. “Let’s get accounts settled before this blasted storm wreaks havoc with Grayling.” He turned and headed for the door.
If you let them kill you, manling, I will bring you back from death itself and torture you in ways you’ve never dreamed of.
Droust braced himself and fought against the crewmen trying to drag him from the cabin. The ship heeled sharply to port. Droust lost his footing and slammed against the bulkhead. The sailors tumbled against it as well. In the confusion of tangled arms and legs, Droust threw elbows and knees into his captors. They tried to fight back and maintain their holds on him, but the dark and the heaving ship confused them.
Despite the bad luck the sailors accused him of, luck was with Droust now. He swept aside arms that grabbed at him, ducked under others, and walked on anyone in his path. When he reached the cabin door, he opened it and hurled himself through.
Heavy rain drummed into him hard enough to sting his skin. He blinked against the storm’s fury as he tried to get his bearings. The strong downpour dimmed the lanterns that marked Grayling’s prow.
Lightning blazed across the sky and made the billowing canvas strung through the rigging stand out the color of yellowed corpse bone. The sails strained at their moorings and timbers creaked as they held tight. Water cascaded across the deck and splashed across Droust’s bare ankles. In just that short time, rain drenched his light sleeping robe, turning the material heavy and cold.
“Get him!” Lightning blazed and lit Captain Porgad standing in the open cabin doorway.
Frenzied by the command, Droust ran forward.
Grayling lurched again, caught up in the power of the storm that buffeted her. Incongruously, a line of poetry from a book Droust had read while studying in Candlekeep wound through his frightened thoughts: And lo, as the ship struggled in the sea’s embrace, she gave in and allowed the vessel to win her over with hard driving need. Tonight the sea would not be seduced and was as savage and as furious as a spurned paramour.
Another lurch steered Droust toward the mainmast. He tried to shift direction, but his bare feet slid across the slippery deck. His face collided with the rough wood. Pain filled his cheekbone and nose as splinters gouged his flesh. He staggered and went down to one knee as another lightning bolt seared his gaze.
The woman screamed at him so loudly her voice rang inside his head and made his teeth ache. Dazed and dizzy, he forced himself up. Before he regained his footing, two sailors crashed into him and drove him against the mainmast. The impact almost robbed him of his senses.
Thunder rolled over the deck and vibrated within Droust’s body.
BAYEL DROUST!
The woman’s voice cut through the scholar’s frightened thoughts even as the sailors spun him around and looped rope around his wrists. They tied his hands together this time. His fingers went numb almost at once.
“Bring him!” Captain Porgad stood in the ship’s stern. Lightning flared along his bared cutlass. “Bring him now before this storm takes us down!” He started up the sterncastle steps.
The crewmen dragged Droust. He fought them, kicking and elbowing, but his efforts failed and he got battered for his trouble.
The storm continued to rage. One of the sails ripped free of the yards and tumbled to the deck. Grayling foundered and lost control.
Captain Porgad lunged over the stern railing. “Tie that down! Save that sail!”
Black clouds swirled down from the sky and formed an inky cloud over the ship. The lanterns at Grayling’s prow vanished, lost in the darkness or doused by the cresting waves. Crewmen shouted at each other, but the sudden rolling thunder swallowed the words.
Live, mauling. Live that I may have you.
Unashamed and fearful of his life, Droust pleaded for his life. “Captain Porgad! Please! I’ve done you no wrong! None of this is any doing of mine! You’re making a mistake! Don’t kill me!”
Rain sluiced down the captain’s craggy face. “I pray that you’re right, scholar, for I’ve come to taking a liking to you.” He turned his gaze toward the swirling blackness that surrounded him and obscured view of half his ship. “But your life is in Umberlee’s hands now.” He looked back at Droust. “This is the only way I’ve ever seen to break bad luck.”
Crewmen held Droust’s legs while another tied a length of rope around his ankles.
Droust wanted to ask if anyone had ever survived keelhauling, but he was afraid of the answer. He tried asking for Umberlee’s mercy, if she wasn’t the Blue Lady herself, but the woman shouted inside his skull again. The pain of her voice drove him to his knees.
“Be strong.” Captain Porgad clapped Droust on the shoulder. “One way or the other, this will soon be over.”
White-capped waves slammed into Grayling. The ship shuddered like an animal in its death throes. The howling of the storm and the hammering of the ocean near deafened Droust.
One of the crewmen threw lengths of rope over the side as he raced forward. Three others followed him. All of them dived to the ship’s deck as lightning touched the mizzenmast. Flames twisted up around the wet wood and stabbed into the angry sky like a torch. Even the downpour couldn’t quench the fire.
Grayling twisted and heaved like boar fighting wolves. The crewmen holding Droust banged into each other, but they managed to keep hold.