Tina Daniell - Maquesta Kar-Thon

"At your request, we've organized teams for rowing. They'll be starting…" His voice trailed off.

A discordant collection of groans, wheezes, clicks, and whirrs issued from belowdecks. A loud, sputtering belch discharged, and a great gout of black smoke puffed up through every hole in the deck. Maquesta jumped to her feet and clamped her hands over her ears. The air became filled with a cacophonous clanking, grinding, squeaking, and banging sound. Smoke poured forth again, and then the Perechon jerked forward. Maq climbed down from the aft deck and dashed through the smoke. Standing at the side of the ship, she glanced over. The oars were moving. All in unison.

"Mymachineisworking!" cried Lendle.

The gnome rushed on deck, and all eyes turned toward him. A triumphant cheer went up from the Perechon's crew, and Lendle's eyes filled with appreciative tears. His clothes were in tatters, and burn marks were evident all over his small form. The tips of his boots had burned away, and his toes, covered with soot, wiggled excitedly. There wasn't much left of his beard, and his once-white hair was now as dark as Maquesta's. His face was smudged all over, except for a small track, down each cheek, that his tears had washed clean.

"MaquestaKarThonmymachineisworking!"

She rushed to the gnome and picked him up, hugging him fiercely and covering herself with soot and dirt in the process.

His face broke into a broad grin, and he talked slower to accommodate her. "Now we can make it to Lacynos on time. With one sail and my oar machine, we'll make better time than ever before."

"But the morkoth!" Maquesta cried. "Tailonna! Do you think the octopus is still down there?"

The sea elf rushed to Maq's side and gave Lendle's head an affectionate pat. "I think that octopus is long gone from these waters. Let me take a cable over the side and see if the beast is still in the cage. If so, we'll hoist him up. If not, we'll go looking for him again."

Maq shook her head. "This quest has been too expensive already. I'll not jeopardize another life on Lord Attat's creature hunt."

The Dimernesti nodded, somehow understanding what was going on in Maquesta's mind. She ran to the aft of the ship and dived over, hardly making a splash as her form cut through the water.

"Lendle, can you make the oars stop-without turning off your machine? Perhaps just raise them up out of the water so we don't go anywhere?" Maquesta looked into his bright eyes, hoping she wasn't about to make another mistake. "I'm afraid if you turn it off, you might not get it started again."

"Oh, it will work from now on, Maquesta Kar-Thon." Lendle was beaming with pride. "When you directed us to set up a winch and pulley on the aft deck to pull up the morkoth's cage, I had to take the big winch out of my oar engine. It seems I had a few too many parts in the engine, because when I closed it back up, and turned it on, it started right away. Of course, there is the matter of a little smoke."

"So you have a winch set up?"

"Oh, yes, Vartan and I did that while you were… busy underwater."

"And it looks like we're going to need that winch and pulley!" Fritzen was calling from the aft deck. "I'll need some help with the crank. Tailonna says the morkoth is still caged!"

Several long minutes later, Tailonna's head cleared the water. "I've hooked up the cable. And it looks as if the morkoth is decidedly unhappy about all of this."

As she climbed on deck, the sea elf explained that she'd had to chase away a veritable army of crabs that were hard at work trying to free the morkoth. The steel bars were tougher than their claws, and all the experience had done was make the little crustaceans grumpy, she added.

It took shifts of three men, taking turns working the crank, to pull up the cage. As its top broke through the water, Maquesta ordered the men to look away. She dashed to the hold and retrieved one of the old sails that she had stored in the event her new ones needed repairs.

Tailonna drew the material about the cage, so the morkoth could not look out of the bars and hypnotize any of the men. She left only a small hole, just large enough to slip fish through to feed the beast. And the hole had a flap of material attached to it, so when the creature wasn't eating, it would not even be able to see a speck of sky.

"Reminds me of an orange parrot my mother had," Fritzen mused. "The little bird was so loud that she had to completely cover the cage every night. She used a white sheet, and when I was a child I would have nightmares about the ghost in the kitchen."

"I dare say the morkoth is more annoying than a bird," Maq quipped.

"I'm not sure you could convince my mother of that."

"At least you still have a mother."

"Somewhere," Fritzen answered.

The cage secured to the aft section of the ship, Maquesta nodded to Lendle to put his oar engine into its highest gear. All of the crew had assembled on the deck to watch the gnome's machine at work. They anxiously stared over the sides, looking at the oars that hovered just above the water. Finally, the oars began to move, their oarlocks creaking. Slowly at first, then gathering speed and power.

The crew broke into spontaneous applause, and Lendle's blush could be seen even through the soot on his face.

During most of the next day, Lendle tended the engine as if it were a newborn baby, emerging from the cargo hold only to take an occasional bite to eat, and forcing Vartan to stand in as chef. The Perechon was making better time than ever before-and was also making more noise than Maquesta would have believed possible. She made a mental note to ask Lendle-after they arrived in Lacynos-if he could make the oar machine work quietly. She didn't want to ask him now and risk him doing something to stop it from functioning.

Maquesta and Fritzen stood by the helm, listening to the odd collection of sounds and watching the sun drop toward the horizon. It was the evening of the second day that the oar engine had been in use, and the Perechon , within less than a dozen hours, would be approaching the entrance to Horned Bay-its prize captive in tow, and more than a half day short of Attat's deadline.

Clanking, wheezing, and belching gouts of black smoke, the Perechon pulled into Lacynos's bay shortly after dawn the next day, beating Lord Attat's deadline. Sailors on the wharf looked up in amazement at the wounded ship that was sailing smoothly but loudly.

Maquesta directed Lendle to cut his oar engine, and the ship coasted into the fetid waters in time for the crew to see a minotaur crewman throw the entrails of some large animal over the side of a schooner. Maq turned up her nose in disgust and was thankful that within a few hours Melas and the Perechon would be out of Lacynos-forever as far as she was concerned. She doubted the minotaur lord would put up any argument to keep the Perechon when he spotted the ship's condition and lack of a mizzenmast. Fritzen asked about making repairs in the port, but Maq only scowled.

"As soon as we have my father and Ilyatha has his daughter, we're leaving. We can find another port a few days away. Maybe it won't have as good facilities, but I'm sure the hospitality will be better," Maquesta told him.

Bas-Ohn Koraf stood near the bow. Maquesta could tell the minotaur had sunk into a deep state of depression. Before sunset his freedom would be taken from him, though she was hopeful Attat would allow her to purchase him with some of the morkoth's gems. Then there would be the matter of her father getting used to a minotaur crewman. That might be difficult after everything Attat had done to him, but she had come to rely too much on Kof to simply dismiss the minotaur first mate.