Juliet McKenna - The Assassin's Edge

The next few all swore the oath, some with visible reluctance, two women stammering through their fear to insist they wouldn’t take part in any piracy. Muredarch treated them both with exquisite courtesy. The defiant few were stripped and either dragged off to some toil or thrown to the back of the stockade. Naldeth and Parrail watched glumly as pirates came to pick over the heap of clothes and boots on offer. Some of the apprentices who’d sworn Muredarch’s oath with suspicious enthusiasm joined them.

“Do you swear to obey me in all things, to treat all so sworn as your brothers and sisters in oath? Do you put your fate in my hands according to the vow we all trust in?” Muredarch was smiling at the woman who’d nearly been dropped in the water the day before.

“I so—” She broke off and swallowed hard. ”I so—” She tugged at the neck of the chemise below her bodice but the collar was neither high nor tight. “I so—” The woman coughed, face scarlet as she choked. She fell to her hands and knees, struggling for breath as Muredarch looked down impassively.

“Mama!” Her daughter screamed and would have run to her but the tattooed pirate caught her, one broad hand slapping over her mouth.

The woman collapsed, panting like a stricken animal, lips fading to a deathly blue.

The remaining prisoners stood frozen with shock but few of the raiders, men and women alike, spared more than a passing, regretful shake of their heads.

Parrail’s eyes were wide with horror as he nudged Naldeth. “Artifice,” he mouthed silently.

Naldeth was trembling, fists clenched, sweat beading his forehead.

“It’s her own fault.” Muredarch explained in conversational tones. “She tried to take the oath without meaning it. Oh, didn’t I say? We’ll have no falsehoods here. Try it and you’ll die like this poor fool. Think on that before you decide.” He smiled at the dead woman’s daughter whom the tattooed pirate released to sob out her heart over the corpse.

After that, the prisoners gave their oath or refusal with terrified speed and, finally, there was no escape for Parrail or Naldeth.

“I cannot swear to you.” The scholar shakily pre-empted Muredarch’s question.

The pirate chief assessed the scholar with merciless eyes, examining him from head to toe. “You might like to reconsider. Ingella tells me she wants a clerk.” He nodded and Parrail was handed over to the tattooed pirate and the lash man. They stripped him with ungentle hands and flung him into the dank shadow of the parapet where the other prisoners cowered.

He’d barely got his breath back when Naldeth landed on the trampled grass beside him. The mage winced, easing the leather collar away from the weal it had scored on his neck. “Bastard didn’t give me a chance to stand up.”

“On your feet.” The tattooed pirate surveyed the cowering prisoners. “You’re nameless and friendless and that’s how you’ll be unless you swear to Muredarch. You take any order you’re given and you’ll eat. No work, no food. Right, you can start by gathering firewood.”

Parrail reached out to help Naldeth up but a vicious stick smacked his hand away.

“If he can’t stand, he can sit there till he starves.” It was the Gidestan pirate, no hint of friendship in his eyes now. “It’s every slave for himself, soft hands and all.”

Parrail retreated, hugging his arm to himself.

Naldeth watched in wary silence until the Gidestan advanced on the dead woman’s daughter who was vainly trying to preserve her modesty in her torn shift, the mark of the tattooed pirate’s hand still scarlet on her ashen face.

“If they’re using Artifice, we have to let Guinalle know,” the wizard whispered urgently to Parrail.

The scholar’s face was tight with pain. “I’ll try tonight.” He winced. “But I think that bastard broke my wrist.”

To Keran Tonin, Mentor at the University of Vanam

From Rumex Dort, Archivist to Den Castevin, Toremal.

This is all I can find of recent record about pirates but we’re seldom involved in such things. I’ll ask around and see what else I can have copied for you. Next time you’re passing through this way, you can buy me a drink and explain what all this is about.

R

The captain of the ship Periwinkle was brought before the court after being taken by vessels of Den Fisce on the 35th of Aft-Summer on suspicion of piracy. The captain refuses to give his name and it cannot be ascertained from the crew, even after such prolonged close confinement. Three names have been given for the man but none can be found to be reliable. The ship contained goods proven as stolen from the docks at Blacklith and as looted from the wreck of the Shearwater , a ship owned by Tor Inshol and cast away on the rocks below Oyster Head. Captain and crew are sentenced to branding on the right hand as thieves and flogging on the dockside at Blacklith, that all ships’ masters may learn their faces and spurn them in future. Those who can prove title to their goods may reclaim them from Den Gennael’s Receiver of Wrecks. Any property remaining will be turned over to the Shrine of Dastennm, to be used by the fraternity for the relief of seamen’s widows and orphans.

Malbis Cultram was brought before the court by Den Hefeken’s Sergeant at Arms, arrested after three separate accusations of his involvement in piracy were laid. Silks, wines and fine spices were found in his cellars but Cultram can provide neither accounts nor yet trading partners to prove his title to such goods. He claims they were purchased for his own use but can show no trade or profession to justify either the quantities of coin found in his strongboxes or such excessive stocks of luxuries. Witnesses from Blacklith examined separately have identified Cultram as associating with known pirates. A series of coastal charts drawn up by the Pilot Academy of Zyoutessela were found among his private papers. Cultram has never been entered on the muster of the academy and his possession of such charts is therefore unlawful. Further, the Master of Pilots has sent his affidavit that these particular charts were issued to the helmsman of the Brittlestar . This ship of Den Rannion was lost to pirates in the tenth year of Tadriol the Prudent with all aboard put to the sword but for a few surviving by chance and Saedrin’s grace. One such sailor, Evadin Tarl, was brought to the court and identified Cultram as one of those same pirates. Cultram is sentenced to be hanged in chains on the dockside at Kalaven at Solstice, his body to be tarred for its better preservation and the continued warning thereby to any tempted to follow his example.

Kemish Dosin stood before the court of his own volition to meet the repeated accusations made by his neighbour Rumek Starn that he, Dosin, is in the habit of sailing with pirates. Dosin is resident in Savorgan, a man of no formal skills, having given up his apprenticeship as a joiner some years since. His former master will supply him with no character. Witnesses presented agreed that Dosin occasionally works as a labourer on river barges but deny that he has ever sailed on an ocean vessel. Harbour Masters at Kalaven, Blacklith and Zyoutessela find no record of him on any ship’s muster. Starn could bring no evidence beyond his unsupported accusation. Dosin called on the owner of the Black Rat tavern to confirm Starn’s considerable gaming debts to Dosin. The accusation is accordingly dismissed and an exaction of twenty-five Crowns is to be paid by Starn to the shrine of Raeponin in Savorgan no later than Solstice. Should he forfeit, he will be committed to the pillory for the duration of the festival.