Richard Byers - The Reaver

A detonation boomed, and a tongue of flame leaped higher than Anton’s head. He just had time to think, Not bad, and then a far louder explosion jolted the caravel from bow to stern and sent him reeling. The initial blast had only been Umara’s spell birthing flame, while the one that followed an instant later had been the incendiaries detonating in response.

Staggering, ears ringing, he struggled to recover his balance. A part of him was appalled at what he’d done. But the ship he’d just scuttled didn’t belong to him anymore and never could have again. He thrust such sentimentality aside, pivoted to see how Umara was faring, and cursed.

The Red Wizard sprawled on the deck next to the hatch and had evidently bumped her head when she fell. Her eyes were open and her mouth was moving soundlessly, so perhaps she wasn’t entirely unconscious, but she was near enough that she wasn’t even trying to shift away from the heat of the flames shooting up right beside her.

She was useless in that condition, a liability, and Anton started to turn away. But then he hesitated. For all he knew, she might come to her senses in a moment. And he needed her to convince Kymas Nahpret to welcome him aboard the galley.

The Iron Jest was already listing to port-maybe the blast itself had punched a hole in the hull without the fire needing to burn through-and Anton dragged Umara until he could deposit her at the foot of one of the shrouds to keep her from sliding over the side. Had any of his fellow pirates been paying attention, the knave likely would have realized that an invisible agency was hauling the stunned woman along. But the crew had plenty of other matters to distract them, like their own falls and resulting injuries, the yellow flame leaping and black smoke billowing upward in various places-remarkably, somehow fire was already licking at the mainsail-and a first panicked scramble for the lifeboats.

Anton crouched beside Umara and patted her cheek. “Wake up,” he said, “we have to go.”

The green eyes blinked, but she still seemed dazed. She certainly wasn’t trying to get up.

“Come on,” he growled, “or I swear by every devil in every hell, I’ll leave you behind.” He pinched her cheek as hard as he could.

She pawed clumsily at his hand in an effort to push it away. Then he sensed a figure standing over them. He looked up and caught his breath.

Anton had known Evendur Highcastle was now undead. But he didn’t frequent any deity’s temple, even Umberlee’s, and he’d only glimpsed the Bitch Queen’s new hierophant at a distance in the streets of Immurk’s Hold. And now, even though he’d never liked the swaggering bully his fellow captain had been, it was revolting to finally, truly behold the slimy, swollen horror his transformation had made of him.

Evendur glared down at Umara. “You again,” he snarled. “You did this.” He bent to seize her in hands whose rings were all but buried in puffy rot.

Anton sprang up, whipped out his saber, and slashed.

The rapid motion compromised his concealment. Sensing something whirling at him through the rain, Evendur jerked backward. The tip of the saber still sliced him across the forearm, but the cut was scarcely the lethal stroke Anton had intended. It was, however, a sufficiently aggressive action to make opacity race up the blade from the sludge-smeared point to the guard and then on into his hand and arm.

Evendur peered at his newly revealed attacker with a mix of fury and surprise. “Marivaldi!”

“Wait,” Anton replied. Even as the request left his mouth, he recognized it as likely the most useless word he’d ever uttered.

“Kill him!” Evendur bellowed, and though many of the reavers were too busy trying to fight fires or abandon ship to heed even Umberlee’s Chosen, several came running.

The first one thrust with a boarding pike. Anton sidestepped, and momentum impelled his opponent another step down the slanting deck. That brought him into saber range, and Anton slashed his leg out from under him.

That was one adversary down, but Anton had to pivot instantly to confront the next. This time, the treacherous footing made him slip, and, off balance, he only just managed to parry a cutlass cut to the head and riposte with a slash that opened the other pirate’s belly.

The wounded man dropped the cutlass to clutch at his stomach. As the weapon started to slide and tumble away, Anton stabbed the tip of the saber into the loop defined by handle and guard, flipped the captured blade into the air, and caught it in his off hand.

That bit of panache made his other assailants hesitate, but only for an instant. Then they resumed their advance, and in a more organized fashion than before, spreading out to flank him. Meanwhile, seemingly untroubled by the fresh gash in his arm, Evendur unlimbered the boarding axe slung over his back, stroked a fingertip along the edge, and made it glow a sickly green.

A figure at the edge of Anton’s vision hacked with a broadsword. Anton whirled, parried with the cutlass, and saw that his attacker was Naraxes. He cut with the saber, and the former first mate blocked with a buckler. Steel bit into wood.

Anton heard or perhaps simply sensed motion at his back. With a hollow feeling in his gut, he realized it was likely suicide to turn away from Naraxes and suicide not to. He opted to turn and found Evendur rushing him with the boarding axe raised above his head.

Anton lifted the cutlass into a high guard and whipped the saber in a stop cut to the ribs. He scored, but it didn’t matter. The Chosen started to swing his weapon anyway.

Then, however, two luminous spheres leaped through the air to strike Evendur from behind. On impact, one vanished in a burst of flame, while the other winked out of existence with an earsplitting screech that flensed gobs of rotten flesh off his bones. He jerked, and the slanted deck betrayed him and sent him staggering, too. The flailing axe cut missed.

Anton spun back around toward his other foes. Though he was too late to witness it, magic had plainly attacked them, too. The front of his body encrusted with frost, Naraxes looked like a helplessly shuddering snowman. Two other pirates lay dead, each burned in one fashion or another, one with patches of flesh still bubbling and melting.

Traces of phosphorescence fading on the fingers that had cast the spell, Umara gripped the shroud and dragged herself to her feet. “You said we need to go,” she panted.

Anton grinned. “Now that you mention it.”

“No,” Evendur said. “Stay and die with your ship like a captain should.” He ripped the burning jerkin and shirt from his back and moved to place himself between his foes and the port edge of the deck.

Anton had just about reached the unhappy conclusion that while he and Umara might be able to slow the Chosen of Umberlee down for a breath or two, no power at their command was likely to stop him. But they might as well try. Hoping Evendur was unfamiliar with the stance and the combinations that flowed out of it, he raised both blades high in a guard his father’s master-of-arms had taught him.

Then the Iron Jest gave another great lurch as the sea surged into another breached compartment below deck. This time, the stern dropped, while the bow lifted out of the water.

The motion sent nearly everything and everyone, Evendur included, sliding, reeling, or tumbling helplessly aft. Umara, however, was still hanging onto the shroud, and, dropping the cutlass, Anton managed to snatch hold of a halyard.

Anton rammed the saber back into its scabbard. “Come on!” he said. “Evendur won’t give us another chance.” He made a floundering run at the port side of the caravel and dived into the sea. Umara splashed in after him.