The Fox (34 page)

Barend whistled. “Now, you know I usually don’t think much about sex, unless I’m in port. An indifference I seem to have inherited from my mother. Easy, that way. No problems. But if Nestra’d done that to me, well, Norsunder take the rule.”

“She made the fun last all night,” Inda said with real regret.

The cabin door opened on Barend’s whistle and Fox strode in, his black silk fighting scarf tied around his head for warmth. Strange, how a ruby-set golden hoop at one ear made him look threatening. Even rat-faced Barend, with gold swinging at his ear, looked tough. Inda fingered his ear again and wondered if he alone looked stupid: though he’d scowled into a mirror, looking at the earring, his new shirt, even his scars not two days before, his mental image of himself was still the round-faced eleven-year-old boy who’d glanced every morning into the academy barracks mirror to see if his gray smock was straight before running out to callover.

Fox leaned against a bulkhead. “Problem?”

“No,” Inda replied. “But send Nestra in last.”

Barend rose. “This I don’t want to hear.”

“I do,” Fox drawled. “Let me be the one to fetch her.”

Inda had handed out the second to the last bag when Nestra stamped into the cabin, Fox right behind her, and started yelling. Nestra was a smuggler born and bred and to her it had seemed perfectly acceptable to expect benefits from sleeping with the captain.

Inda waited out her tirade, trying (with little success) not to watch her splendid bosom rising and falling under her silken shirt, and when she was done he said, “Everyone takes a watch.”

She stared at him, then snorted. “On some ships it’s a fair enough trade—you give your fun to a dull dog, and get some ease in return.”

Inda figured at least his face couldn’t get any redder. He opened a hand in apology. “Maybe you could have trained me to be a fun dog?”

“Eat shit and die,” was her unequivocal response.

Fox offered her bag of coins, his manner a polished insolence much more effective than words. She grabbed it out of his languid fingers and swaggered topside, pausing in the middle of the deck to shrug into her jacket. When she saw Inda emerge from the cabin she yelled back over her shoulder, “Especially when he’s the worst lover I’ve ever had.”

Then she stamped to the rail, hips rolling, hoisted her waiting gear to her shoulder, and scrambled down the rope ladder to the liberty boat.

Of course everyone was smirking, or even worse, trying not to smirk as they studied the sea, the sky, the ropes with totally unconvincing attempts at disinterest. Would his face catch on fire? It sure as damnation felt like it!

“That’s all right, Elgar,” called Gillor, who had been a top-hand on Walic’s ship—another forced into piracy. She swung down from the mainmast, where she’d made a last check on the rigging and sails, as she was mainmast captain. She thumped him on the shoulder. “I’m a better hammock dancer than she ever could be. You give me a try.”

“How about after we take the Brotherhood,” Inda mumbled. Barend was snickering loudly behind him, being no help, damn him. “Go on,” he added awkwardly. “Enjoy your liberty.”

Gillor stepped close, so close they stood eye to eye. She had black eyes, with long lashes, and a steady gaze. “You don’t want any Coco,” she breathed, and he felt her breath on his cheek, warm and slightly spicy smelling from mulled wine. “Only we on the old crew knows what that means. You don’t want any Coco, and I don’t want to be one. But I don’t like being an only, see?”

Inda felt his mouth go dry. “Maybe we can talk about it after . . .” He waved a hand, the heat of embarrassment now prickling in his armpits, despite the bitter wind.

With a hearty laugh Gillor flipped back her ribbon-braided black hair and swung down into the first liberty boat, where she promptly got into an insult fight with Nestra. Inda was relieved when they all picked up their oars and the gig started away.

“Nestra will blab our strengths and weaknesses all over the island,” Fox said. “Unless you want her stopped.” His eyes looked hard as glass in the wintry light.

“No,” Inda said. “It’s not like the Brotherhood doesn’t have spies all over who can count us as fast as she can talk anyway. There’s no way our coming is a surprise. Still, I want you two to scour the harbor. Listen to every scrap of news while I set up supplies.” He looked down at his hands, then shook his head. Rubies, cold in the winter wind, thunked against his jawbone on either side.

I’m a pirate fighting pirates
.

"First thing I want to see to is getting barbs on my wrist guards.”

Chapter Twenty-one

THE new harbormaster chuckled in welcome. "Well, here ye are at last.” He lifted a gnarled finger and pointed at the ruby on Inda’s nearest ear hoop. "Brotherhood ship kills, eh? Ha ha ha! I ain’t seen anything so good since Ramis came in here and slammed Sharl the Brainsmasher and his ugly crew through the Black Gate into damnation. What a fight that was! And not a blink of regret, not after them made life so bad here these ten years.”

Black Gate
. There it was again, a reference to a hole ripping in the air and water and soil of the world, and people being thrust through it into somewhere dark and timeless, to vanish when the hole did. Unbelievable—yet there were too many witnesses to attest to it.

“There are some who sez they want to join you against the Brotherhood, if you’ll have them,” the harbormaster continued. “Me, I say, talk to Swift first. He’s the best of ’em, and knows the rest. You’ll find him like as not over at the Dancing Sun, t’ other end o’ the harbor on the hill. But that’s for drinkin’ and talkin’—for eating, all the captains prefer Svanith’s, down Middle-street, hard against the hill.”

Inda thanked him, paid the anchorage fee, and departed.

“They all know who we are,” Thog whispered as they started down the rain-washed, flagstoned street lined with storage and supply houses, all low buildings designed to withstand wind.

“They’ll be comin’ to offer info about Marshig, you watch,” promised Lorm the Cook, his watery eyes crinkled in anticipation.

“Then we can compare rumors,” Inda said.

Thog huddled in her woolen coat. “We will not know if Brotherhood spies will be offering themselves as allies.”

Inda said, “Tau can sort out the possible allies. He always catches something I miss.” He turned. “Mutt, go tell Taumad to take up station at the Dancing Sun, will you? I’ll meet with him tomorrow. Today is for ordering stores and looking at what’s going on in the harbor. I have an idea.”

Mutt took off at a run. Inda, Thog, and Lorm emerged from the warehouse street into a broad polygon that opened onto five streets—probably the only five streets on the island. They crossed the polygon and headed up Middle-street, which curved along the base of white chalk cliffs parallel to the shoreline. Thick-walled shops lined both sides, many shut up; in most living spaces above the shops shutters were open and windows ajar for air. Mellow golden light slanted down, stronger than the cold, weak glow of the sun above the northern mountains. Restday’s songs and laughter sounded from behind windows and briefly opening doors.

Inda thought of his home, the drums and songs, the wine and bread. A door to an ale shop opened wide as they passed, light and the aromas of dark barley-brew and its drinkers enveloping them; somewhere inside a small boy sang a ballad in Sartoran.

Lorm, the former cook aboard Gaffer Walic’s pirate flagship, had been struggling to stay sober since Walic’s death. As the warm, spicy air bathed their faces he lifted his chin, his breath hissing in through his teeth. The light outlined his tense profile; beyond, Thog’s head was bowed, her blue-black fall of hair curtaining her round, flat Chwahir face, her night-black gaze bent to the rain-slick flagstones below her feet.
I have a family, at least,
Inda thought.
One day I will see them. He will never see his. And neither will Thog
. He drew his jacket tighter against him, though the chill was not on his skin but inside it.

They worked their way down the street to begin the task of victualing and resupplying, finding business done much like it was in Freeport Harbor: polite and straightforward, as you came to expect when dealing with violent people. Open curiosity, asking questions only after he indicated he was willing to answer them in exchange for news.

As in Freeport everyone seemed to be aware of their business. He heard many variations on words like: “And so you’re Elgar the Fox? Wearin’ rubies, I see, heh heh! I hope you’ve got a hundred more rubies waitin’ for you on the other side o’ the Narrows! Now, what they tell me is this...”

When at last they had finished, Lorm—who acted as fleet bosun as well as flagship cook—returned to the dock to supervise the transfer of goods aboard their ships. Inda and Thog walked on to Svanith’s Inn at the end of the street; beyond were mere pathways. When they entered the common room went quiet and all eyes turned their way.

Thog ignored the stares. Inda felt the pressure of their interest, their expectation, as he sank down at the table that Jeje had been holding.

Once he felt the gazes withdraw again, and voices rose, resuming conversations, he said, “Any news?”

Jeje made a sour face. “I had Uslar follow Nestra. She went up into the hill behind us to a bow maker, where she started blathering about us.”

“Go on.” Inda fingered his earring. How did Brotherhood captains manage with itchy ears in a fight? “These’re a stupid idea,” he muttered. “Wish I’d stayed with one. Better, none.”

“Wrong.” Jeje pushed her palms toward him. “Tau thinks it was a great idea. They make us look tough. We have to swagger, see? Brotherhood struts and dresses like kings in whatever fashion they like, and people are so scared of ’em they’re half defeated before the Brotherhood even draws a knife. Now we have to do the same. It’s war up here.” She tapped her forehead, and Thog nodded with small, defined movements, her little chin jabbing the air. “As for Uslar, he reported the bow maker just laughed at her. Said they knew all that already. Somebody’s been watching us since we took the pirate base at the mouth of the Sartoran Sea.”

Inda groaned, reached for his knife and spoon (he still didn’t like forks, though he’d seen them often enough over the years), and was about to dig into the fast-cooling braised chicken and cabbage before him when Thog flicked her gaze upward, eyes narrowing.

Inda tightened, shifting his weight, hands poised—but it was Fox.

His mouth, as always, was sardonic. He would meet death with sarcasm, that one; but right now his manner was tense. “There’s something you had better see,” he said—in Marlovan.

“Now?”

In Dock Talk, “Barend awaits you at the chart maker’s off the quay.” Back to Marlovan, “It is a matter of family honor.”

Inda’s spoon clattered to the table and he got to his feet, face grim. He walked out, queue swinging, boots clattering, scratching with exasperation at his ear, this time unaware of how every head in the place turned to watch him. Jeje repressed a flutter of laughter at Inda’s obliviousness.

Thog rubbed her small hands together, her expression apprehensive. Seeing that she wouldn’t speak, Jeje said, “What’s wrong?”

Fox dropped down at Inda’s place, his fine-woven black wool longcoat open, the gold-tipped edges of his shirt laces swinging. Then he leaned back, arms crossed, studying Thog with his usual lazy mockery. Jeje had rarely spoken to him, and this was the first time he’d actually sat down anywhere near her. He was tall—towering over them both— hard-muscled though lean in build, always dressed in black, which, it was said, he preferred because it didn’t show blood in battle or dirt in everyday life. Jeje knew he washed his shirts every day in the good water, that his cabin was cleaner than most, his manners neat, unlike Inda who never noticed what he wore or ate.

The silence was too long. Fox was staring through those nasty winter-sea-colored eyes of his at Thog, and Jeje held her breath.

But when he spoke, it was to both of them. “Inda sent Barend and me to scout for news. Barend thinks that the best news is to be got in whatever dockside taverns are closest to the water, but I believe that the truth—what the mainland merchants call the sved—is easiest found at charthouses. ”

Thog whispered, “Yes.”

Fox watched the reflection of the fire dancing in her eyes, reminded of pinpoints of fire in her black eyes after that long night on the water at The Fangs, when she had deliberately and single-handedly set up Boruin’s pirates to burn to death aboard their own ship.

He looked away, and only then could he think. “We decided to go to the charthouse first. We found an old fellow in charge who speaks Iascan. He has the latest chart of the islands and the coast north of the Narrows, and when he unrolled it, I saw on his finger a silver ring set with a big square emerald. Carved on it was the Algara-Vayir symbol, an owl in flight.”

Inda found Barend standing outside the charthouse, his posture a startling change from his usual slouch. He stood there with his feet apart as though he wore cavalry boots, his back straight as if fitted into the tight gray military coat that he had never actually worn. One thumb was hooked in his crimson sash, whose color Inda recognized for the very first time was that of the Montrei-Vayirs. Barend always wore something crimson, whether a silken shirt in summer or a crimson knit cap in winter or this old sash for liberty trips. Until now Inda had assumed the crimson to be part of the bravura costume of the pirate, but Inda now saw the ironic significance of that color.

“Here.” Barend held out on his palm a heavy silver ring.

Inda stared down at the owl carving. Disbelief—sick certainty—made his body go hot, then cold. The last time he had seen that heavy signet it was hanging around his mother’s neck—

Mother
. He mouthed the word. His mother would never have relinquished that ring alive.