An Empire Unacquainted With Defeat Read online

  But this was important.

  Maybe I made a mistake. The rest of us might not have been recognized. We were well-known, but there was nothing really unique about our appearances. Not the way Colgrave's was unique.

  I reached for my bow and quietly strung it behind the mask of the railing.

  IX

  Colgrave strode from his cabin dressed for a day at court. Mica dogged along behind him as he climbed to the poop. He turned his one grim eye on our watchers.

  "The dead captain!"

  It carried clearly over the water. Brush crackled. I leapt to my feet and pulled an arrow to my ear.

  "It's them! That's the Archer!"

  "Bowman. Let them run."

  I relaxed. Colgrave was right. Wasting arrows had no point. I could not get them all. Not through the trees.

  Still, a gesture seemed necessary.

  One turned, stared back through a small opening in the foliage. He bore a spade-shaped shield. A griffin rampant was its device. I let fly with a waste arrow, a practice arrow. It pierced the griffin's eye.

  I still had it. After however long it had been, my shafts still flew true.

  The soldier's jaw dropped. I bowed mockingly.

  "That wasn't smart," Priest told me.

  "Couldn't help myself. I had to do it."

  The black birds above cursed me in their squawky tongue. I glared my defiance.

  My archery was my one skill, my one way of defying the universe and its perversity. The gesture had been important to me. It was a statement that the Bowman existed, that he was well, that his aim was still deadly. It was a graffito on the walls of time, screaming I AM!

  Colgrave beckoned.

  I shook in my sea boots. I was going to catch hell for defying orders . . . .

  But he did not mention my shot. Instead, he gathered Toke, Lank Tor, and myself, and told us, "The decision is at hand. Within two days the whole island will know we've returned. They'll know in Portsmouth in three days, in Itaskia in four. They won't endure us anymore. Our return will scare them so much that they'll send out every ship they have. They won't trust warlocks this time. They'll destroy us absolutely, with fire, at whatever cost we demand."

  He stared at the western sea, his one good eye gazing on sights the rest of us could never see. He said again, "At whatever cost we demand."

  Tor giggled. Fighting was his only love, his only joy. He did not care whether he would win or lose, only that he would be able to swing a blade in another battle. He was the same old Tor. I did not think there was anything in him capable of change. He was a hollow man.

  Toke said, "There's no hope, then? We have to depart this plain memorialized by mountains of dead men and seas scattered with burning ships?"

  I sighed. "There's nowhere to run, Toke. Destiny's winds have blown us into the narrow channel. We can't do anything but ride the current."

  Colgrave looked at me strangely. "That's odd talk from you, Bowman."

  "I feel odd, Captain."

  "There's still the sorcerer who recalled us," he said. "And we aren't forgotten of the gods. Not completely." He glanced at the black birds.

  The creatures strained their necks toward us.

  I surveyed my long-time home. Forward, against the base of the forecastle, I could discern a tiny, almost invisible patchlet of dark fog. I had not noticed it since the day the sorcerer had boarded us. I imagined it had always been there, unnoticed because it stayed behind the corner of my vision.

  "I'll give my orders in the morning," Colgrave declared. "For today, celebrate. Our final celebration, Tor. See to the arms. Toke, tell Barley to use his keys."

  My guts snapped into an agonized knot. Rum . . . !

  "We'll sail at dawn," the Old Man told us. "Be ready. I'll tell you our destination then."

  He scanned us once with that wicked eye, and it seemed that there was pain and care in his gaze. He left us there, stunned, and returned to his cabin.

  Emotion? In Colgrave? It was almost too much to bear.

  I returned to the forecastle and plopped my ass down between the Kid and Little Mica. I leaned back and stared at the clouds, at the green hills where four terrified soldiers were racing to unleash the hounds of doom. "Damned!" I muttered. "Damned. Damned. Damned."

  The Kid was first to ask, "What did you say, Bowman?"

  I glared at the hills as if my gaze could drop those Freylanders in their tracks. "We sail with the morning tide. He hasn't decided where or why."

  The Trolledyngjan hooked a sand shark. We went through the routine, dumped it back.

  "Think it's the same one?" Priest asked. "It don't look any different."

  "Why would it keep coming back?" Mica wanted to know.

  The Kid asked me, "What do you think he'll decide, Bowman?"

  "To spill blood. He's still Colgrave. He's still the dead captain. He only knows one way. The only question is who he'll go after."

  "Oh."

  "Give me a line." I baited my hook and flipped it over the rail. "Priest, Barley's passing out grog." I needed a drink something cruel. But I was not going to give in first.

  I watched the torment in his face. And he watched it in mine as he replied, "Don't think so, Bowman. Too far to walk. Besides, I'm getting a nibble."

  He got the nibble, but I caught the fish. It was the same damned shark. What was the matter with that thing? Couldn't it learn?

  Dragon rocked gently on quiet swells. A breeze whispered in the trees surrounding the cove. We kept catching that sand shark and throwing it back, and not saying much, while the sun dribbled down to the horizon behind us.

  X

  Toke, Lank Tor, and I clambered up to the poop. The crew gathered on the main deck, their eyes on the Old Man's cabin door. The sun had not yet cleared the hills to the east.

  "Tide's going to turn soon," Toke observed.

  "Uhm," I grunted.

  Lank Tor shuffled nervously. The blood-eagerness in him seemed tempered by something else this morning. Had the changes begun to reach even him?

  Colgrave came forth.

  The crew gasped.

  Tor, Toke, and I leaned over the poop rail to see why.

  He wore old, battered, plain clothing. It was the sort a merchant captain down on his luck might wear. There wasn't a bit of color or polish on him.

  A new Colgrave confronted us. I was not sure I liked it. It made me uneasy, as if the man's style of dress were the root of our failures and successes.

  He ignored everybody till he had reached the poop and surveyed his surroundings. Then, "Make sail, First Officer. North along the coast, two points to seaward. They're watching. Let them think we're bound for North Cape."

  Toke and Tor went to get anchor and sails up. I stood beside Colgrave searching the shore for this morning's watchers.

  He said, "We'll keep this heading till we're out of sight of land. Then we'll come round and run south. We'll stay in the deep water."

  I shuddered. We were not deep-water sailors. Though hardly any of us had set foot on dry land in years, we did not want to let it out of sight. Few of us had been sailors before fate shanghaied us onto this devil ship.

  And deep water meant heavier seas. Seas meant seasickness. My stomach was in bad enough shape, having had no rum.

  "What then?" I asked.

  "Portsmouth, Bowman."

  "The wizard wins? Dragon runs to his beck? We do his murders for him?"

  "I don't know, Bowman. He's the crux. He's the answer. Whatever happens, it'll revolve around him. He's in Portsmouth. We'll take our questions to him."

  There was uncertainty in Colgrave's voice. He, the megalithic will round which my universe turned, no longer knew what he was doing. He just knew that something had to be done.

  "But Portsmouth? You're sure?"

  "He's there. Somewhere. Masquerading as something else. We'll find him." There was no doubt in him now. He had selected a course. Nothing would turn him aside.

  I could not fathom Co
lgrave's thinking. He wanted to take Dragon into the very den of our enemies? Just to confront that sorcerer again? It was pure madness.

  No one had ever accused Colgrave of being sane. Only the once had he come out a loser.

  We sailed north. We turned and ran south once Tor could no longer discern land from the maintop. A steady breeze scooted us along. By nightfall, according to Toke, we had come back south of the southernmost tip of Freyland. But Colgrave did not alter course till next morning. Several hours after dawn he ordered a change to a heading due east.

  He shifted course a point this way, a point that as we sailed along. He had Toke and Tor put on or take off canvas.

  A plan was shaping in his twisted mind.

  Time lumbered along. The sun set, and it rose. Tension built up till we were all ready to snap. Tempers flared. Some of the old hatred returned. We were not very tolerant of one another.

  The sun set again.

  I had seen Colgrave's matchless dead reckoning before. I was not overwhelmed when he brought Dragon into the mouth of the Silverbind Estuary with the same accuracy I showed in speeding a shaft to its target.

  We were all dismayed. To a man we had hoped that he would change his mind, or that something would change it for him.

  We had not seen one ship during our time at sea.

  They had taken our false trail for true. The fleet had cleared Portsmouth only that morning, heading north in hopes of catching us in the wild seas between Freyland and Cape Blood. The only vessels we saw now, as we eased along the nighted Itaskian coast, were fishing boats drawn up on the beaches for the night.

  Watch fires burned along the Estuary's north shore. They winked at us as if secretly blessing our surreptitious passage.

  Those winks conveyed messages. A steady flow were coming from the north. Fat Poppo tried reading them but the Itaskians had changed their codes since he had been in their navy.

  No one noticed our little caravel creeping along through the moonless night.

  The lights of Portsmouth appeared on our starboard bow. Little bells tinkled over the water ahead. Poppo softly announced that he had spotted the first channel-marker buoy.

  Its bell pinged happily in the gentle swell.

  Colgrave sent Tor to the forecastle to watch the markers.

  He meant to try the impossible. He meant to take Dragon up the channel by starlight.

  Colgrave's confidence in his destiny was justified. Dragon was surely a favored charity of the gods that night. The breeze was absolutely perfect for creeping from one bell buoy to the next. The current did not bother us at all.

  We penetrated the harbor basin two hours after midnight. Perfect timing. The city was asleep. Colgrave warped Dragon in to a wharf with a precise beauty that only a sailor could appreciate.

  Fear had the ship by the guts. I was so rattled that I don't think I could have hit an elephant at ten paces. But there I was on the forecastle, ready to cover the landing party.

  Priest, Barley, and the Trolledyngjan jumped to the wharf. They searched the darkness for enemies. Mica and the Kid jumped. Others threw them mooring lines. They made fast in minutes. The gangplank went down for the first time in anyone's memory. Toke and Tor started ushering the men ashore. Tor made sure they were armed.

  Some did not want to go.

  I was one. I had not set foot on any land in so long that I could not remember what it was like . . . . And this was the country of my birth. This was the land of my crimes. This land loved me no more, nor wanted its sacred soil defiled by the tread of my murderer's feet . . . .

  Nor did I want to do any sorcerer's bloodletting.

  Colgrave beckoned.

  I had to go. I relaxed my grip on my bow, descended to the main deck, crossed to the gangplank.

  Only the Old Man and I remained aboard. Toke and Tor were trying to maintain order on the wharf. Some of the men were trying to get back to the ship, to escape stable footing and everything that land meant. Others had fallen to their knees and were kissing the paving stones. Some, like Barley, just stood and shook.

  "I don't want to return, either, Bowman," Colgrave whispered. "My very being whines and pules. But I'm going. Now march."

  The old fire was in his eyes. I marched.

  He had not changed clothing. He still wore rags and tatters. Following me down the gangplank, he looped a piece of cloth across his features the way they do in the deserts of Hammad al Nakir.

  Colgrave's presence made the difference. The men forgot their emotions. Toke quickly arranged them in a column of fours.

  A late drunk staggered out of the darkness. "Shay . . . ." he mumbled. "What're . . . . Who're . . . ." He almost tripped over me and Colgrave.

  He was an old man young. A beggar, by his look, and a cripple. He had only one arm, and one leg barely functioned. He reeked of cheap, sour wine. He stumbled against me again. I caught him.

  "Thanks, buddy," he mumbled. His breath was foul.

  My god, I thought. This could be me if I keep on the grog . . . . I forced honesty. I was looking at what I had been when I had committed my murders, and most of the time since.

  All I could see was ugliness.

  The drunk stared at me. His eyes grew larger and larger. He glanced over the crew, peered at the Old Man.

  A long, terrified whine, like the plea of a whipped cur, ripped from his throat.

  "Priest!" the Old Man snapped.

  Priest materialized.

  "This man recognizes us. Man, this is Priest. Do you know him, too? You do? Good. I'm going to ask some questions. Answer them. Or I'll let Priest have you."

  The drunk became so terrified that for several minutes we could pry no sense from him at all.

  He did know us. He had been a sailor aboard one of the warships that had helped bring us to our doom. He had been one of the few lucky survivors. He remembered the battle as if it had taken place yesterday. Eighteen years and a sea of alcohol had done nothing to erase the memories.

  Eighteen years! I thought. More than half my lifetime . . . . The life I had lived before boarding Vengeful D. The whole world would have changed.

  Colgrave persisted with his questions. The old sailor answered willingly. Priest shuffled nervously.

  Priest had been the great killer, the great torturer, back when. He had loved it. But the role did not fit him anymore.

  Colgrave learned what he wanted. At least, he learned all the drunk had to tell.

  A moment of decision arrived. The old sailor recognized it before I did.

  It was the moment when a man should have died, based on our record.

  A black bird squeaked somewhere in Dragon's rigging.

  "There is a ship at the wharf," Colgrave said. "Barley! The keys." Barley came. Colgrave gave the keys to the drunk. He stared at them as if they fit the locks in the one-way gates of Hell.

  "You will board that ship," Colgrave told him. His tone denied even the possibility that his will might be challenged. "You will stay there, drinking the rum behind the lock those keys fit, till I give you leave to go ashore."

  The watchbird squawked again. Excited wings punished the night air.

  Fog started drifting in from the Estuary. Its first tendrils reached us.

  The drunk looked at Colgrave, stunned. His head bobbed. He ran toward Dragon.

  XI

  "Bowman, come," Colgrave said. "You've been to Portsmouth before. You'll have to show me the way to the Torian Hill."

  I did not remember ever having been to Portsmouth. I told him so, and suggested that Mica be his guide. Mica was always talking about Portsmouth. Mostly about its famous whorehouses, but sometimes about its people and their strange mores.

  "You will remember," Colgrave told me. He used the same tone that he had directed at the drunk.

  I remembered. Not much, but enough to show him the way to the Torian Hill, which was the area where the mercantile magnates and high nobility maintained their urban residences.

  Dawn launched its assa
ults upon the eastern horizon, though in the fog we were barely aware of it. We began to encounter early risers. Some instinct made them avoid us.

  We passed out of the city proper, into the environs of the rich and powerful. Portsmouth was not a walled city. There were no gates to pass, no guards to answer.

  We broke from fog into dawn light halfway up the Torian Hill.

  It was not like I remembered it. Mica's expression confirmed my feeling.

  "There's been a war pass this way," he said. "Only a couple years ago."

  It was obvious. They were still picking up the pieces. "Where are we going?" I asked Colgrave.

  "I don't know. This's the Torian Hill?" Mica and I both nodded.

  Colgrave dug round inside his rags, produced a gold ring.

  "Hey!" Mica complained. "That's . . . ." He shut up.

  A glance from Colgrave's eye could chill the hardiest soul.

  "What is it?" I asked Mica.

  "That's my ring. I took it off the wizard's ship. He said I could have it. I put it down in the ballast with my other things."

  "Must've been more than just gold."

  "Yeah. Must have been." He eyed Colgrave like a guy trying to figure how best to carve a roast.

  He would not do anything. We all had those thoughts sometimes. Nobody ever tried.

  Colgrave forced the ring onto a bony little finger, closed his eyes.

  We waited.

  Finally, "That way. The creature is there. It sleeps."

  I caught the change from he to it. What had changed Colgrave's mind? I did not ask. During the climb he had become the mad captain again.

  People began to notice us. They did not recognize us, but we were a piratical crew. They got the hell away fast.

  Some were women. We had not laid hands on women in ages . . . .

  "Sailmaker." Colgrave said it softly. Mica responded as though he had been lashed. He forgot women even existed, let alone the one he had begun stalking.

  We came to a mansion. It skulked behind walls that would have done a fortified town proud. The stone was gray, cold limestone still moist from the fog.

  "Bowman, you knock." He waved everyone against the wall, out of view of the gateman's peephole.