A Mighty Fortress (32 page)

He ignored the lubber’s hole when he reached the maintop, hanging from his fingers and toes as he climbed the futtock shrouds
around
the top instead, then swarmed on up the topmast shrouds. Wind whistled chill around his ears and burned cold in his lungs, and his eyes were bright with plea sure as the shrill whistle of one of the sea wyverns following the ship, perpetually hopeful of snapping up some tasty tidbit of garbage, floated to him.

“Where away, Zhaksyn?” he asked the lookout as he reached the sailor’s dizzying roost. The lookout was perched on the crosstrees, one leg dangling nonchalantly between the weather hounds, one arm wrapped around the foot of the topgallant mast, and he grinned as his eyes met Hektor’s.

It was colder up here, and the wind always grew fresher as one climbed higher above the deck. (That much was a known fact, although Hektor had no idea why it should be so.) Despite the exertion of his climb, he was grateful for his thick watch coat, heavy gloves, and the soft, knitted muffler Princess Zhanayt had given him last Midwinter Day. The main topmast head was almost a foot and a half in diameter where its upper end passed through the cap above the crosstrees, which helped support the topgallant mast, and it shivered against his spine as he leaned back against it, vibrating like a living thing with the force of wind and wave. When he looked straight down, he saw not
Destiny
’s deck but the gray- green and white water creaming away from her leeward side as she leaned to the press of her canvas. If he fell from his present position, he’d hit water, not planking. Not that it would make much difference. As cold as that water was, his chances of surviving long enough for anyone aboard ship to do anything to save him would be effectively non ex is tent.

Fortunately, he had no intention of doing anything of the sort.

“There, Sir,” the lookout said, and pointed.

Hektor followed the pointing finger, nodded, and hooked one knee securely around the topmast head as he used both gloved hands to raise the heavy telescope and peered through it.

Steadying something the size of a powerful telescope, especially while one swept through a dizzying arc with the ship’s motion, was not a task to be lightly undertaken. The fact that Hektor would never be a large, powerfully built man like Lathyk didn’t make it any easier, either. On the other hand, his slender boy’s frame was filling out steadily into a well- muscled wiriness, and he’d had lots of practice. He supported the tube on his left forearm, swinging it through a compensating arc, and captured the pale flaw of the distant ships’ topsails with a steadiness a landsman would have found difficult to credit.

Even from here, the ships to whom those sails belonged remained hull-down. He could see only their topsails fully, although the tops of their main courses came into sight when both they and
Destiny
happened to rise simultaneously. Assuming their masts were the same length as Destiny’s, which would put their main yards about fifty feet above the water, that made them about fourteen and a half miles distant.

He studied them carefully, patiently, evaluating their course and trying to get some feel for their speed. His eye ached as he stared through the spyglass, but he neither blinked nor lowered the glass until he was satisfied. Then he sighed in relief, let the glass come back to hang from its shoulder strap once more, and rubbed his eye.

“What d’you make of ’em, Sir?” the seaman asked.

Hektor turned his head to arch one eyebrow at him, and the sailor grinned. It was unlikely, to say the least, that he would have been forward enough to pose the same question to Lieutenant Lathyk, and Hektor knew some of his fellow officers—Lieutenant Garaith Symkee,
Destiny
’s second lieutenant, came rather forcibly to mind—would have been quick to depress the man’s “pretension.” For that matter, he supposed a mere ensign had even more reason than most to be sure he guarded his authority against overfamiliarity from the men he commanded. Captain Yairley, on the other hand, who never seemed to have any particular difficulty maintaining
his
authority, would simply have answered the question, and if it was good enough for the captain...“Well,” Hektor said, “it’s still a bit far away to be making out details, even with the glass, but unless I’m mistaken, at least the nearer of them is flying a Church pennant.”

“You don’t say, Sir!” Zhaksyn’s grin grew considerably broader. He actually rubbed his hands together in anticipation, since the presence of the Church pennant automatically made the ship flying it a legitimate prize, waiting to be taken, and Hektor grinned back at him. Then the ensign allowed his smile to fade into a more serious expression.

“You did well to spot them, Zhaksyn,” he said, patting the older man (although, to be fair, Zhaksyn was only in his late twenties; topmen were generally chosen from the youn gest and fittest members of a ship’s company) on the shoulder.

“Thank’ee, Sir!” Zhaksyn was positively beaming now, and Hektor nodded to him, then reached for the shrouds once more. He was strongly tempted to slide down the backstay, but the youthful exuberance of his midshipman’s days was behind him now—Lieutenant Lathyk had made that point rather firmly just last five- day—and so he descended in a more leisurely fashion.

“Well, Master Aplyn- Ahrmahk?” the first lieutenant inquired as he reached the ship’s rail, hopped down onto the deck, and made his way aft once more.

“There are definitely two of them, Sir—that we can see so far, at any rate. Galleons, ship- rigged, but not as lofty as we are, I think. They aren’t carrying royal masts, anyway. I make the range about fourteen or fifteen miles, and they’re sailing on the wind, almost exactly northwest by north. They’re showing their courses and topsails, but not their topgallants, and I think the closer of the two is flying a Church pennant.”

“Is she, now?” Lathyk mused.

“Yes, Sir. And as she lifted, I could just catch a glimpse of her mizzen. I couldn’t see her headsails, so I can’t say for sure that she’s got the new jibs, but she’s definitely got a gaff spanker. She’s wearing new canvas, too—it’s hardly weathered at all—and I think she’s big, Sir. I’d be surprised if she were a lot smaller than we are.”

Lathyk’s eyes narrowed, and Hektor could almost
feel
him following the same logic chain Hektor had already explored. Then the first lieutenant nodded, ever so slightly, and turned to one of the midshipmen hovering nearby.

“My respects to the Captain, Master Zhones, and inform him that we have sighted two galleons, bearing almost due north, distance about fourteen miles, running northwest by north, and Master Aplyn- Ahrmahk”—the first lieutenant smiled slightly at Hektor—“is
firmly
of the opinion that at least one of them is a large,
newly rigged
galleon in the ser vice of the Church.”

“Aye, aye, Sir!” young Zhones squeaked. He couldn’t have been more than twelve years old, which struck Hektor as absurdly young... despite the fact that he himself had been at sea for three years by the time he’d been that age.

The midshipman started for the hatch at a semi- run, then froze as Lathyk cleared his throat loudly enough to be heard even over the sounds of wind and wave. The boy peered at him for a second, huge- eyed, then hastily straightened and came to attention.

“Beg pardon, Sir!” he said, and then repeated Lathyk’s message word for word.

“Very good, Master Zhones,” Lathyk confirmed with a nod when he’d finished, and the midshipman darted away again. Hektor watched him go and remembered a time when
he’d
garbled a message, and not to any mere master-after- God captain, either. He’d been positive he was going to die of humiliation right on the spot. And, assuming he’d survived that, he’d
known
Captain Tryvythyn would give him The Look, which would be considerably worse, when
he
heard about the transgression.

I suppose it was just as well,
the ensign reminded himself, managing not to smile as Zhones disappeared down the main hatch,
that His Majesty forgave me after all
.

“So, Ruhsail, what do you make of her?” Commodore Wailahr inquired as he stepped out from under the break of the poop deck, and Captain Ruhsail Ahbaht, commanding officer of the Imperial Desnairian Navy galleon
Archangel Chihiro,
turned quickly to face him.

“Beg your pardon, Sir Hairahm.” The captain saluted. “I didn’t realize you’d come on deck.”

“Well, I hadn’t, until this very minute,” Wailahr said just a bit testily. The commodore was a solidly built man, his dark hair starting to silver at the temples. There were a few strands of white in his neatly trimmed beard, as well, but his dark eyes were sharp and alert.

He was accompanied by Father Awbrai Lairays, his chaplain, in the purple, flame- badged cassock of the Order of Schueler.

“Yes, Sir. Of course you hadn’t,” Ahbaht replied quickly, but his voice still held that same edge of half- apprehensive apology, and he looked so much as if he were planning to salute yet again that Wailahr found it difficult not to grimace. He knew he was lucky to have a flag captain of Ahbaht’s experience, but he did wish that, after more than three thousand miles and three and a half five- days at sea, the captain would forget he was related—distantly, and only by marriage—to the Earl of Hankey.

“No reason you should have realized I was here, until I spoke.” The commodore tried (mostly successfully) to keep any exaggerated patience out of his tone and glanced rather pointedly up at the lookout whose report had summoned him to the deck.

“It sounds like it’s probably a Charisian galleon, Sir,” Ahbaht said in response to the hint. “The lookout ought to have sighted her sooner, but she’s still a good eleven or twelve miles clear. Still, she’s close enough for us to get a good look at her canvas, and she’s obviously got the new rig. She’s also carrying a lot of sail for these weather conditions, and she’s making straight for us.” He shrugged very slightly. “Given that almost all the armed ships cruising these waters have been Charisian for the better part of a year, I doubt anyone but a Charisian would be making sail to overhaul anyone she hadn’t definitely identified as a friend.”

Wailahr nodded slowly as he considered Ahbaht’s analysis of the other galleon captain’s thinking. It made sense, he decided, and after twenty- six years in the Crown’s ser vice, he had more than enough experience as an officer himself to appreciate what his flag captain had offered about the probable Charisian’s thought processes. Unfortunately, he was far less well qualified to evaluate some of the other factors involved in the developing situation, since almost all of his own experience had been ashore, most of it as a cavalry commander in the Imperial Army. As in the majority of Safeholdian realms, traditional Desnairian practice had always been to assign army commanders to its warships (of which it had possessed precious few), each with an experienced seaman to translate his decisions and commands into action. It was a warship commander’s job to
fight,
after all, and a professional military man had more important things to worry about than the technical details of making the boat go where it was supposed to go.

Or that’s the
theory
, at any rate
, Wailahr told himself sourly.
And I suppose if I’m going to be fair, it’s always worked well enough against other people who do the same thing. Unfortunately
— there was that word again—
Charis doesn’t. And it
hasn’t,
not for a long time
.

As a loyal subject of Mahrys IV and an obedient son of Mother Church, Sir Hairahm Wailahr was determined to make a success of his present assignment, but he had few illusions about his own knowledge of things naval. He was out of his depth (he grimaced mentally at his own choice of phrase) as the commander of one of the Navy’s new galleons, much less an entire squadron, which was the reason he was so grateful for Ahbaht’s experience.

Even if he did want to kick the captain in the arse from time to time.

“You say he’s making for us, Captain,” Wailahr said after a moment. “Do you mean he’s
pursuing
us?”

“Most likely, Sir.” Ahbaht swept one arm in a half circle in the general direction of the other ship, still invisible from
Archangel Chihiro
’s deck. “There’s a lot of ocean out there, Sir Hairahm, and not much shipping on it since the damned Charisians started privateering. It wouldn’t be unreasonable for a merchant galleon to be making for Terrence Bay, just as we are. But, as I say, without positively knowing we were friendly, I’d expect any merchant skipper to keep his distance. He’d certainly have reduced sail to maintain our current separation, I’d think, even if he’s headed for Silk Town or for Khairman Keep, like we are. And even though the lookout isn’t positive, he thinks this fellow has made
more
sail.”