Robin Hobb - Ship of Magic

He doubted the man heard him. Sorcor had already left his side and was shouting orders to deckhands on his way back to the helm.

“Let me take you back to the cabin,” the ever-present whore said from behind his shoulder. He had just been about to tell her to do that. Now, of course, he could not. He'd have to wait until she believed it was his own idea, or until he could think of a good reason why he had to go there. Damn her! His good leg was beginning to tire, and the bad one just dangled there, a hot heavy weight of pain.

“Retrieve my stick,” he ordered her. It pleased him to see her chase it across the wave-washed deck. At the same time, he noted that she definitely had her sea-legs now. There was nothing clumsy about her. Had she been a man, he'd have said she had the makings of a good sailor.

In that abrupt change so characteristic of these waters, the rain squall hit them. Torrents sheeted down over the ship, while the wind's direction seemed to switch almost constantly. He could hear Sorcor's bellowed commands to the deck crew. What had looked to be a simple little blow was now building up to something else entirely. There was always a current in Hawser Channel, and in some tides it could be difficult, but now the storm wind conspired with that current to send them racing. The liveship fled ahead of them. He watched her, expecting her to take in sail. Sorcor had their hands reefing canvas. Storm and current were driving them along swiftly enough without giving the treacherous winds anything extra to push on. Not far ahead was Crooked Island. To the east of the island was the better passage. The liveship would certainly take it. To the west of the island was how they would have to go. They'd use both storm and current to race ahead of the liveship and cut her off. It would be tricky, and no mistake there. He wasn't sure they'd make it. Well, he doubted he had long to live anyway. He might as well die on his own deck if he couldn't do it on the deck of a liveship.

Sorcor had taken the wheel himself; Kennit could tell it by the way the Marietta seemed suddenly to relish each challenging wave. He squinted his eyes against the downpour and tried to find their quarry again. For the space of three waves he could not see her. Then he spotted the liveship at the same time as he heard her distant scream.

She was taking the storm badly, her untended sails pushing her awkwardly against each wave. As Kennit watched in horror, she slid down the trough of a wave, disappeared, and then a moment later wallowed into view again. His straining eyes could pick out figures of men dashing about her dimly lit decks, lots of men, but no one seemed to be doing anything to save her. He gave a groan of despair. To get this close to capturing a liveship, only to see her go down right before his eyes because of her own crew's incompetency — it was too bitter to bear.

“Sorcor!” he bellowed through the storm's blast. He wouldn't be able to wait until they could cut her off. As she was going now, she'd end up on the rocks. “Sorcor! Catch her up and ready a boarding party of good seamen.” The rain and wind snatched the words from his mouth. He tried to work his way aft, holding to the rail and hopping along on his good leg. Each jarring motion felt as if he'd plunged his stump into boiling oil. Suddenly he was shaking with cold as well. The waves were running taller. As each wave broke, he saw the salt water rushing towards him and could do nothing save clutch tighter to the rail. Eventually one swept his tired leg out from under him. For an interminable moment he clung desperately as the water washed over his body and out the scuppers again. Then Etta had him, carelessly seizing hold of him with no mind for his injured leg at all. She wrapped one of his arms around her shoulders and hoisted him up, gripping him around the chest.

“Let me take you inside!” she begged him.

“No! Help me get back to the wheel. I'll take the helm; I want Sorcor to lead the boarding party himself.”

“You can't board another ship in this weather!”

“Just take me aft.”

“Kennit, you should not even be out on the deck tonight. I can feel your fever burning you up. Please!”

His rage was instantaneous. “Do you completely discount me as a man? My liveship is out there, her capture is imminent, and you wish me to go lie down in my cabin like an invalid? Damn you, woman! Either help me to the helm, or get out of my way.”

She helped him, a nightmarish trip across a deck that pitched with the fury of the storm. She hauled him up the short ladder as if he were a sack of potatoes. There was anger in her strength, and when his stump knocked against a rung, near stunning him with pain, she offered no apology. At the top she hauled on his arm as if it were a sheet, until she had it draped across her shoulders. Then she stood up under his weight and dragged him to the wheel. An incredulous Sorcor shook water from his eyes and stared at his captain.

“I'll take the helm. Our liveship's in trouble. Prepare a boarding party, as many sailors as raiders. We'll need to overtake her swiftly, before she gets too far into Hawser Channel.”

Far ahead of them, they caught yet another glimpse of the liveship as the seas lifted her high. She sailed like a derelict now, wind and waves pushing her where they pleased. A trick of the wind brought her despairing shriek to their ears as she dived down into a trough of water.

She was headed to the west of Crooked Island.

Sorcor shook his head. He had to shout over the storm. “There's no catching up with her the way she's sailing. And even if we had the crew to spare, we couldn't board her in this storm. Give her up, sir! There'll be another one along. Let that one go to her fate.”

“I am her fate!” Kennit roared back at him. A vast anger rose in him. All the world and everyone in it opposed him in his quest. “I'll take the wheel. I know that channel, I took us through there before. You work with the crew to put on a bit of sail so we can catch her up. Help me but overtake her and try to run her onto the shoals. And if nothing is to be done then, I'll give her up!”

They heard her cry out again, a long drawn-out scream of despair, haunting in its eeriness. The sound hung long in the air. “Oh,” Etta exclaimed suddenly with a shudder as it finally died away. “Someone save her.” The words were almost a prayer. She glanced from one man to the other. Rain had slicked her hair flat to her skull. The water ran like tears in streams down her face. “I'm strong enough to hold the wheel,” she proclaimed. “If Kennit stands behind me and guides my hands, we can keep the Marietta on course.”

“Done,” Sorcor replied so promptly that Kennit instantly realized that had been the man's true objection all along. He didn't think Kennit could stand on one leg and still handle the ship's wheel.

Grudgingly he admitted Sorcor was probably right. “Exactly,” he said, as if it had been his intent all along. Sorcor made room for them. It was an awkward transfer, but Etta eventually had her hands on the wheel. Kennit stood behind her. He set one hand on the wheel to aid her, and clasped her with his other arm to keep his balance. He could feel the tension in her, but was also aware of her pent excitement. For a moment, it was as if in clasping Etta he embraced the ship herself.

“Tell me what to do!” she called over her shoulder.

“Just hold it steady,” he told her. “I'll tell you when you need to do anything else.” His eyes followed the silvery liveship as she fled before the wind.

He clasped her close to him, and his weight against her back was not a burden, but a shelter from the wind and rain. His right arm wrapped her, his hand gripping her left shoulder. Still, she was frightened. Why had she ever said she would do this? Etta gripped the spokes of the ship's wheel tightly, so tightly her knuckles began to ache. She set her arms stiff to oppose any movement the ship might suddenly make. All around her there was only darkness and driving rain and rushing wind and water. Up ahead she could suddenly see flashes of silver-white water as waves dashed against barnacled rocks. She could not tell what she was doing; she could steer the ship directly into a rock and never know until they struck. She could kill them all, every man aboard.