David Brin - Glory Season

Maia wasted no more time. While her right leg and back throbbed, her arms felt refreshed, so they did most of the work at first. Soon she was shinnying almost vertically, with the hull stroking her back. It was a journey she could never have imagined making as a newly fledged fiver, stepping out of her mother-hold. Now she thought no further ahead than the next straining pull, the next coordinated slither of hands and knees and ankles. When, at last, one leg floundered over the side, Maia rolled onto the ship’s lower deck and quickly sought shelter behind the mainmast, panting silently with a wide-open mouth, waiting for the pain to dull. Waiting till she could listen once more to the sounds of the night.

There was a faint creaking as the ship rocked gently at anchor. The lapping of wavelets against the hull. A soft murmur of conversation. Maia lifted her head to look across the wharf toward the smaller pirate vessel, the Reckless . A pair of women in red bandannas crouched next to an upturned barrel with a lantern set upon it. Although they were playing dice, no coinsticks lay in sight, which explained the desultory nature of the game. The players seemed not to keep score as they alternated rolls of the ivory pieces, talking quietly.

Turning around, Maia realized with some shock that Manitou looked deserted. Of course, from Thalia’s description, there would be a brace of beefy vars on duty below, just outside the cargo hold. Still, whatever had pulled the rest of the reavers away must be awfully important.

Sound and sight were vital for warning of danger. Once she felt more secure, however, Maia felt a sudden wash of other sensations, especially smell. Food , she realized suddenly, acutely, and hurried aft quick as she could scuttle silently. Just below the quarterdeck, she found where supper had been prepared and eaten. Stacks of grimy plates lay within a stew pot, soaking in a swill of brine. The resulting goulash was hardly appetizing, even in Maia’s state, so she kept looking, and was rewarded at last in a far corner when she found a small pile of hard biscuits atop a rickety table and an open cask of fresh water nearby.

She drank thirstily, alternately moistening baked crusts into a feast. While devouring voraciously, Maia searched for a sack, a piece of cloth, anything to stuff and take back to Brod. At least she could leave a stash of food for him in the little boat.

There was nothing in sight to use as a bag, but Maia knew where else to look. With biscuits in each hand, she hurried to a row of narrow doors at the rear of the main deck. Opening one, she looked down a slanted ladder into the selfsame room where she herself had lived, up to a few weeks ago, along with a dozen other women, amid bunk beds stacked four high. Maia descended quietly, eyes darting till she verified by close inspection that no bed held sleeping reavers. It hadn’t seemed likely, with everyone called off on some mysterious errand.

She had entered in search of a bag, but now Maia noticed she was shivering. Why not swipe fresh clothes, as well?

She started with her old bunk. But somebody several sizes larger, and much smellier, had taken over occupancy since the battle on the high seas. She moved on, sorting in near darkness until at last she found a shirt and well-mended trousers roughly her size, neatly folded at one end of a bunk. Still munching stale bread, Maia wriggled out of her own tattered pants and slipped into the stolen articles. The rope belt had to be cinched extra tight, but everything else fit. A clean, if threadbare, coat finished her accoutrement, though she left it unbuttoned, in case it became necessary to dive back into the water. The thought made her shudder. Otherwise, Maia felt better, and a little guilty about poor Brod, cold and hungry, almost half a kilometer overhead.

What next? she wondered, picking up her cudgel and sticking it in her new waistband. The rads might be imprisoned on the Manitou, but Maia doubted Renna would be kept anywhere so insecure. Probably, he was deep inside the sanctuary. Did she dare try to brazenly walk in, looking for him? The more she thought about it, the idea of springing Thalla and the others made sense. If the rads could take over Manitou, then lay doggo while Maia snuck near the sanctuary entrance, they might at a chosen moment create enough distraction to let her slip inside.

First task is eliminating their guards. Sounds simple. Only, how am I supposed to do it?

She pondered possibilities. I could go to the cargo gangway and pretend to be a messenger… shout down some made-up call for help. When one emerges, I’d knock her out and then … try the same thing again? Or go down after the other one?

What if there are three? Or more?

It was a lugar-brained scheme… and Maia felt fiercely determined to make it work. At least once that phase was over, she wouldn’t be alone anymore. Maybe the rads would have an idea or two of their own to offer. Maia cast around the room one last time for weapons. She only found a small knife, embedded in the wooden post of one of the bunk beds, which she wrestled out and slipped into the coat pocket.

She was halfway up the ladder when the door suddenly swung aside, spilling light upon her face and outlining a large figure. Maia could only stare upward in dismay.

“ Thought I heard someone down here,” a gruff woman’s voice said. “Come on, then. No duckin’ work. I won’t cover for ya, next time!”

The silhouette turned, leaving Maia blinking in surprise. Hurriedly, she followed, hoping to catch the reaver from behind while they were still out of view from the Reckless. At the doorway, however, Maia’s heart sank upon spying four other women on deck. They were wrestling open a sealed box, pulling out long gleaming objects.

Rifles, Maia realized. They seemed well-supplied, this bunch. Even the Guardia at Port Sanger wasn’t better armed. Maia was past being shocked, however. It is the victors who write history, she now knew. If Baltha and her gang succeed amid the chaos they want to create, no one is going to quibble over a few extra crimes.

“Well? Come on!” The first woman called to Maia, who shuffled forward unwillingly with her head averted, eyes downcast. She concealed her surprise when three of the slender, heavy weapons were thrust into her arms, and clutched them tightly, not knowing what else to do.

“Don’t forget to bring enough ammo, Racila,” the leader told a slight, scar-faced pirate, who pounded the crate shut again. “All right, you lot, let’s get back, or Togay’ll have us eatin’ air for a week.”

Maia tried to take up the rear, but the leader insisted that she go ahead, tromping with the others down the gangplank, onto the pier, and then along thumping, resonant wooden slats toward where bright sconces cast twin pools of brilliance on both sides of the sanctuary entrance.

Loaded rifles, shouted calls, groups of anxious women hurrying through the night. This was surely no Farsun Eve celebration. What in the name of the Founders was going on? For Maia, the worst moment came as they climbed spacious, cracked steps and passed under the fierce electric dazzle of the sconces. When she wasn’t denounced on the spot, she realized it hadn’t been darkness that saved her, back at the ship.

Either there are so many women in the gang that they don’t all know each other —which seemed highly unlikely— or else they think I’m Leie.

The possibility of playing such a ruse—pretending to be her sister—had naturally occurred to Maia. Only it had seemed too obvious, too risky. All Stratoin children, whether clone or var, learned to notice subtle differences among “identical” women. Leie no doubt wore her hair differently, carried distinct scars, and would acknowledge with a thousand disparate cues that she knew these people who were utter strangers to Maia. Besides, what to do when Leie herself showed up?