Robert Redick - The Red wolf conspiracy

The Etherhorde Mariner

6th Umbrin 941

IMS CHATHRAND VANISHES AT SEA

Many fear a Tragic End for the Great Ship and her 800 souls

The Imperial merchant ship Chathrand {aka "The Great Ship," "Wind-Palace," "His Supremacy's First Fancy," etc.} has disappeared on the high seas and is feared lost with all hands. His Supremacy the Emperor wept at the news, calling the ship an irreplaceable treasure. Her owner, the Lady Lapadolma Yelig, spoke of nightfall on twenty centuries of shipbuilding art.

Months of hope are drawing to a close as shore fishermen on Talturi report the discovery of the wreck of the Chathrand's longboat and numerous bodies drowned in the surf. Of Captain Nilus Rose, her peculiar but long-standing commander, there is no word. Rescue efforts yielded no more than spars, rigging and other floating debris.

Last harbored in Simja, Chathrand set sail twelve weeks ago in the mildest of summer squalls, bound for her home port of Etherhorde with a company of 600 sailors, 100 Imperial marines, 60 tarboys and sundry passengers from the lowborn to the exalted. Letters deposited at Simja describe a calm ship and a voyage of surpassing ease.

Yet confusion persists as no actual wreck has been discovered. Nor can abundant rumors quell the public clamor to know.

What Doomed This Ship of Ships?

Six centuries of war and piracy could not sink her! Six centuries of typhoonery never flooded her hold! Are we then to believe that a most survivable squall overpowered Chathrand and her legendary Captain? The Lord Admiral does not believe it. No more do the sailing men of Arqual, and speculation of foul play is to be heard in every tavern of the capital.

Some few already look West for the culprit, and not infrequently pronounce a word politely shunned since the last war: Revenge. It is beneath the Mariner's dignity to fuel this fire by propagating (as other circulars do not hesitate to do) such hearsay as the presence of unusual riches aboard Chathrand, marks of violence on the recovered bodies, great musterings of our enemies' fleets, etc., but we must-in all fairness-note the lack of a competing theory…

1 Vaqrin (first day of summer) 941

Midnight

It began, as every disaster in his life began, with a calm. The harbor and the village slept. The wind that had roared all night lay quelled by the headland; the bosun grew too sleepy to shout. But forty feet up the ratlines, Pazel Pathkendle had never been more awake.

He was freezing, to start with-a rogue wave had struck the bow at dusk, soaking eight boys and washing the ship's dog into the hold, where it still yipped for rescue-but it wasn't the cold that worried him. It was the storm cloud. It had leaped the coastal ridge in one bound, on high winds he couldn't feel. The ship had no reason to fear it, but Pazel did. People were trying to kill him, and the only thing stopping them was the moon, that blessed bonfire moon, etching his shadow like a coal drawing on the deck of the Eniel.

One more mile, he thought. Then it can pour for all I care.

While the calm held, the Eniel ran quiet as a dream: her captain hated needless bellowing, calling it the poor pilot's surrogate for leadership, and merely gestured to the afterguard when the time came to tack for shore. Glancing up at the mainsails, his eyes fell on Pazel, and for a moment they regarded each other in silence: an old man stiff and wrinkled as a cypress; a boy in tattered shirt and breeches, nut-brown hair in his eyes, clinging barefoot to the tarred and salt-stiffened ropes. A boy suddenly aware that he had no permission to climb aloft.

Pazel made a show of checking the yardarm bolts, and the knots on the closest stays. The captain watched his antics, unmoved. Then, almost invisibly, he shook his head.

Pazel slid to the deck in an instant, furious with himself. You clod, Pathkendle! Lose Nestef's love and there's no hope for you!

Captain Nestef was the kindest of the five mariners he had served: the only one who never beat or starved him, or forced him, a boy of fifteen, to drink the black nightmare liquor grebel for the amusement of the crew. If Nestef had ordered him to dive into the sea, Pazel would have obeyed at once. He was a bonded servant and could be traded like a slave.

On the deck, the other servant boys-tarboys, they were called, for the pitch that stained their hands and feet-turned him looks of contempt. They were older and larger, with noses proudly disfigured from brawls of honor in distant ports. The eldest, Jervik, sported a hole in his right ear large enough to pass a finger through. Rumor held that a violent captain had caught him stealing a pudding, and had pinched the ear with tongs heated cherry-red in the galley stove.

The other rumor attached to Jervik was that he had stabbed a boy in the neck after losing at darts. Pazel didn't know if he believed the tale. But he knew that a gleam came to Jervik's eyes at the first sign of another's weakness, and he knew the boy carried a knife.

One of Jervik's hangers-on gestured at Pazel with his chin. "Thinks his place is on the maintop, this one," he said, grinning. "Bet you can tell him diff'rint, eh, Jervik?"

"Shut up, Nat, you ain't clever," said Jervik, his eyes locked on Pazel.

"What ho, Pazel Pathkendle, he's defendin' you," laughed another. "Ain't you goin' to thank him? You better thank him!"

Jervik turned the speaker a cold look. The laughter ceased. "I han't defended no one," said the larger boy.

"'Course you didn't, Jervik, I just-"

"Somebody worries my mates, I defend them. Defend my good name, too. But there's no defense for a wee squealin' Ormali."

The laughter was general, now: Jervik had given permission.

Then Pazel said, "Your mates and your good name. How about your honor, Jervik, and your word?"

"Them too," snapped Jervik.

"And wet fire?"

"Eh?"

"Diving roosters? Four-legged ducks?"

Jervik stared at Pazel for a moment. Then he glided over and hit him squarely on the cheek.

"Brilliant reply, Jervik," said Pazel, standing his ground despite the fire along one side of his face.

Jervik raised a corner of his shirt. Tucked into his breeches was a skipper's knife with a fine, well-worn leather grip.

"Want another sort of reply, do you?"

His face was inches from Pazel's own. His lips were stained red by low-grade sapwort; his eyes had a yellow tinge.

"I want my knife back," said Pazel.

"Liar!" spat Jervik. "The knife's mine!"

"That knife was my father's. You're a thief, and you don't dare use it."

Jervik hit him again, harder. "Put up your fists, Muketch," he said.

Pazel did not raise his fists. Snickering, Jervik and the others went about their duties, leaving Pazel blinking with pain and rage.

By the Sailing Code that governed all ships, Captain Nestef would have no choice but to dismiss a tarboy caught fighting. Jervik could risk it: he was a citizen of Arqual, this great empire sprawling over a third of the known world, and could always sign with another ship. More to the point, he wore a brass ring engraved with his Citizenship Number as recorded in the Imperial Boys' Registry. Such rings cost a month's wages, but they were worth it. Without the ring, any boy caught wandering in a seaside town could be taken for a bond-breaker or a foreigner. Few tarboys could afford the brass ring; most carried paper certificates, and these were easily lost or stolen.