Scott Lynch - Red Seas Under Red Skies

"RAVELLE! I KNOW YOU" RE IN THERE, AND I KNOW YOU CAN HEAR ME!"

Locke stepped up to the cabin door and shouted back through it: "Marvellously clever, Jabril! You" ve tracked me unerringly to the cabin in which I" ve been fast asleep and motionless all bloody night. Who tipped you off?" "We have all the bows, Ravelle!"

"Well, damn," said Locke. "You must have raided the weapons lockers, then. I suppose I was hoping we could have one of those pleasant dancing mutinies, or maybe a singing-and-card-games mutiny, you know?"

"There's thirty-two of us as can still move, Ravelle! Two of you in there, no food, no water… the ship's ours. How long do you figure on staying in there?"

"It's a fine place," shouted Locke. "Got a hammock, a table, nice view out through the stern window… big door between us and the rest of you—"

"Which we can smash at any time, and you know it." Jabril lowered his voice; a creak of shifting weight in the companionway told Locke he'd stepped right up to the other side of the door. "You're glib, Ravelle, but glib's no good against ten bows and twenty blades." "I'm not the only man in here, Jabril." "Aye. And believe me, there's not one among us who'd like to face Master Valora; not with fuckin" four-to-one odds. But the odds is better than that. Like I said, we got all the bows. You want it to come down hard, we'll do what it takes."

Locke bit the inside of his cheek, thinking. "You swore an oath to me, Jabril. An oath to me as your captain! After I gave you your lives back."

"We all did, and we meant it, but you're not what you said you was. You're no sea-officer. Caldris was the real thing, gods rest him, but I don't know what the fuck you are. You deceived us, so the oath don't stand."

"I see." Locke pondered, snapped his fingers and continued: "So you would have kept to the oath, had I… ah, been what I claimed to be?" "Aye, Ravelle. Fuckin" right we would" ve."

"I believe you," said Locke. "I believe you're no oath-breaker, Jabril. So I have a proposal. Jerome and I are willing to come peaceably out of the cabin. We'll come up on the deck, and we'll talk. We'll be pleased to hear your grievances, every last one. And we'll keep our hands empty, so long as you swear an oath to give us that much. Safe conduct to the deck, and an open talk. For everyone."

"Won't be no "hearing grievances", Ravelle. It'll just be us telling you how it's to be."

"As you wish," said Locke. "Call it whatever you like. Give me your oath of safe passage, and it'll happen. We'll come out right now."

Locke strained for several seconds to hear anything from the companionway.

At last, Jabril spoke: "Come up with empty hands," he said, "and don't make no unkind moves, especially not Valora. Do that, and I swear before all the gods, you'll come up to the deck safe. Then we'll talk." "Well," whispered Jean, "at least you got us that much."

"Yeah. Maybe just a chance to die in the sunlight rather than the shade, though." He considered changing out of his wet clothes before going up on deck, then shook his head. "Hell with it. Jabril!" "Aye?" "We're opening the door."

The world above the deck was one of rich blue skies and bright sunlight; a world Locke had almost forgotten over the previous days. He marvelled at it, though Jabril led them to the waist under the eyes of thirty men with drawn swords and nocked arrows. Lines of white foamed on the sea at the horizons, but around the Red Messenger the waves rolled softly, and the breeze was a welcome kiss of warmth against Locke's skin.

"I'll be damned," he whispered. "We sailed right back into summer again."

"Stands to reason that we got blown a ways south even in the storm," said Jean. "We must have passed the Prime Divisor. Latitude naught."

The ship was still something of a shambles; Locke spotted makeshift and incomplete repairs everywhere. Mazucca stood calmly at the wheel, the only unarmed man on deck. The ship was making steerage way under nothing but its main topsail. The mainmast rigging would need one hell of a sorting-out before it would carry any useful canvas; the fallen topgallant mast was nowhere to be seen.

Locke and Jean stood before the mainmast, waiting. Up on the forecastle, men were looking down on them from behind their bows. Thankfully, none of them had drawn their strings back — they looked nervous, and Locke trusted neither their judgment nor their muscle tone. Jabril leaned back against the ship's boat and pointed at Locke. "You fuckin" lied to us, Ravelle!"

The crew shouted and jeered, shaking their weapons, hurling insults. Locke held up his hand to speak, but Jabril cut him off. "You said it yourself, down below. I got you to bloody admit it, so say it again, for all to hear. You ain't no sea-officer."

"It's true," said Locke. "I'm not a sea-officer. That should be obvious to everyone by now."

"What the hell are you, then?" Jabril and the men looked genuinely confused. "You had a Verrari uniform. You got in and out of the Windward Rock. The Archon took this ship, and you got it back. What's the gods-damned game?"

Locke realized that an unsatisfactory answer to this question would have hard consequences; those things really did add up to a mystery too considerable to brush off. He scratched his chin, then put up his hands. "Okay, look. Only some of what I told you was a He. I, ah, I really was an officer in the Archon's service, just not a naval officer. I was one of his captains of intelligence."

"Intelligence?" cried Aspel, who held a bow atop the forecastle. "What, you mean spies and things like that?"

"Exactly," said Locke. "Spies. And things like that. I hate the Archon. I was sick of his service. I figured… I figured with a crew and a ship I had a sure way to get the hell out and give him grief at the same time. Caldris came along to do all the real work, while I was learning."

"Aye," said Jabril. "But that's not what happened. You didn't just fie to us about what you was." He turned his back to Locke and Jean to address the crew. "He brought us out to sea without a woman aboard the ship!"

Scowls, catcalls, rude gestures and no few hand-signs against evil. The crew were not well pleased to be reminded of that subject.

"Hold fast," shouted Locke. "I meant to bring women with us; I had four women on my list. Didn't you see them at the Windward Rock? Other prisoners? They all went down with a fever. They had to be put back ashore, don't you see?"

"If that was you," shouted Jabril, "maybe you thought of it once, but what did you do to fix it when they fell sick?"

"The Archon took the bloody prisoners, not me," said Locke. "I had to work with what that left me. It left meyouV

"So it did," said Jabril, "and then you fuckin" brought us out here without one single cat neither!"

"Caldris told me to get some," said Locke. "Forgive me, I just… I said I'm not a sailor, right? I got busy sneaking out of Tal Verrar and I left them behind. I didn't understand!"

"Indeed," said Jabril. "You had no business out here if you didn't know the bloody mandates! Because of you, this ship is cursed! We're lucky to be alive, those of us that is. Five men paid for what was rightly your sin! Your ignorance of what's due Iono Stormfather by those that sail his waters!" "Lord of the Grasping Waters shield us!" said another sailor.

"Our misfortune's been made by you," Jabril continued. "You admit your lies and ignorance. I say this ship ain't clean "til we get you off her! What's the word of all?"

There was a loud, immediate and unanimous chorus of agreement; the sailors shook their weapons at Locke and Jean as they cheered. "That's that," said Jabril. "Drop your weapons on the deck." "Wait," said Locke. "You said we" d talk, and I'm not finished!"

"I brought you on deck safe, and we did talk. Talk's finished, oath's paid off."Jabril folded his arms. "Lose your weapons!" "Now-" "Archers!" yelled Jabril. The men atop the forecastle took aim. "What's the choice?" Locke shouted angrily. "Disarm so we can what}"