Alan Akers - Swordships of Scorpio

In the wooden barn-like house where most of the higher ranks in Viridia’s confidence were carousing, the atmosphere billowed thick with the fumes of wines culled from the freight holds of a hundred ships. Heaping platters of food loaded the heavily-timbered tables. Disheveled wenches darted in and out avoiding clutching hands in giggles or shrieks or abuse, each according to her nature. Food appeared on the tables in bounteous abundance, and disappeared down gullets with fascinating speed. The wine that was drunk! Men would suddenly screech and leap up and dance a wild jig, or leap head-over-heels across the floor, or two would fall into a deadly dagger fight that ended with one coughing his guts out bloodily across the floor, the other ready to face the render court of inquiry. Other half-men half-beasts drank and caroused in their own ways, and all were equal here, under the captains. To this select company Viridia had bidden me, Dray Prescot.

As I approached where she sat at the head of a long table, quaffing her wine and roaring like any jack-booted man of the sea, I noticed Valka sitting at the lower end of the table, his nose in a blackjack. He looked up as I passed, and winked. Shades of Inch, I said to myself, and planted my feet down on a clear space among the litter of bones and discarded meats on the floor. One blessing there was in all that pandemonium and guzzling and drinking and wenching, one evil we were spared; the only smoke in the room came wafting in from the glowing cook fires or rose from the succulent dishes covering the tables.

“Dray Prescot!” shouted Viridia, lolling back. Her blue eyes were not clouded with wine and I saw in their depths a deep and shrewd intelligence; yet her body lolled and her head jerked and she laughed shrilly, as though she were drunk. Near her a Chulik captain sat, a mass of gold lace and crimson silk, his tusks gleaming and — a fashion I had noticed before — tipped with gold. He was plying Viridia with wine. She laughed and drained the cup, and thrust it forward for replenishment. In general Chuliks can be trained into seamen; of the halflings the Hobolings are unquestionably the finest top-men in the business, and I wouldn’t give berth space to a Fristle, be wary of an Och, and detesting Rapas as I then did, would haul up the gangplank before letting one aboard my command. I knew that the Relts, those more gentle cousins of the Rapas, went to sea as supercargoes and clerks, but I doubted even them.

This Chulik captain, one Chekumte, was trying to sell a swordship to Viridia. His ploy was transparent to me, and, I saw, to Viridia also. I fancied she could drink him under the table.

“She is a fleet craft, and nimble, Viridia,” Chekumte was saying. He spilled wine as he slanted his cup in eagerness to lean forward in friendly converse. “She rows a hundred and twenty oars and sails like a king korf!”

“A hundred and twenty oars,” said Viridia, properly contemptuous. “Zenzile fashion!”

“And what of that? She has served me well; but I have captured a new swordship from Walfarg, and my force is balanced so that I no longer need her.”

“And you seek to dispose of your old scows to me, Chekumte.”

I stood there, listening, for listening brings information.

Viridia lifted her cup to me. The fingers she wrapped around the glass stem glittered with gemmed rings. Her tanned face was, minute by minute, growing more flushed. “Dray Prescot! You are not drinking.”

“When I find out what you wanted, Viridia, I will find some wine.”

She scowled as though I had insulted her, but heaved up and glared sullenly at me.

“Have you seen Strom Erclan? I want him to discuss this business. Chekumte is a wily rogue, for a Chulik.”

Chekumte guffawed, polished his tusks, and quaffed wine.

I would not lie. “I saw him up the beach half a bur ago.”

“Wenching again, I’ll be bound.” Viridia slumped back, that sullen expression on her face turning all her features lumpy. “I keep my render maidens locked away from the likes of him.”

I did not say: “You will have no need of that anymore.”

It would have been a nice line, but I wanted no more trouble. If I had to tear the hearts out of all those here, I would do so if that was the only way to return to my Delia. But only a fool buys trouble. Instead, I said, casually, “A zenzile swordship would not fit in with your squadron, Viridia. And if she rows only a hundred and twenty oars she must be short, and if short then narrow to retain her speed, and if narrow then useless in a sea. I can’t get your calsanys to shoot straight from the deck of your flagship as it is.”

Chekumte surged up. His eyes were bloodshot. His thin lips ricked back from those gold-tipped tusks. Little of humanity is known to a Chulik. About the only thing I have heard in their favor is that they are loyal to whoever pays them.

Mind you — that is a valuable attribute in any mercenary.

Now this Chulik glowered down on me and spouted obscenities at me. He rounded on Viridia. “Do you allow Likshu-spawned offal like this to teach you your trade, Viridia the Render?”

Viridia was annoyed. She twiddled with the hilt of her rapier. As though transmitting her anger to her Womoxes who stood in partial shadow at her back, she herself stood up. For a moment we three stood, confronting one another, and gradually the uproar died as the roisterers realized the tension gripping us. Chuliks make a habit of adopting the weapons and customs of the race employing them. Now Chekumte was a render captain in his own right and he had adopted the weaponry of his peers. He drew his rapier and, slowly, pushed it forward until the point touched my breast. He did not prick the skin.

“This thing must be taught a lesson, Viridia.”

I looked at her. This was a test for her. I knew that. I wondered if she had realized that yet.

“For the sake of the cursed Armipand, Chekumte! Leave him alone!”

“Not until he grovels on his knees and begs my pardon.”

So far I had not moved. Still I looked beneath lowering brows at Viridia. Her bosom beneath that armor heaved. She was clearly in distress — and I marveled.

“Leave it, Chekumte! I will buy the swordship. There! Will you shake hands on it?”

But the Chulik kept his rapier point pressed against my breast.

“Not until this cramph apologizes!”

I said, “This island is called the island of Careless Repose. I did not expect to find a quarrel here.”

“There is not a quarrel, cramph! You, Prescot! Down on your knees! Lick my boots! Beg my pardon else I run you through.”

“Now, Chekumte!” protested Viridia. She began to lose her temper and a spark of that wildness flared.

“I have men here! Would you drench our safe haven in blood?”

“This is a point of honor, Chulik honor! By Likshu the Treacherous! I’ll have his tripes!”

Still I glowered down on Viridia the Render — and still she would not meet my gaze. A ruffianly towheaded pirate down the board laughed and yelled. He was of The Bloody Menaham or Menahem — either spelling conveys the meaning — and he had no love for anyone of Tomboram, from which country he believed me to originate. “Stick him now, Chekumte! What are you waiting for?” He waved his goblet and spilled wine over the brilliant blue and green cummerbund he wore, the blue and green of his national colors.

“Hold!” shouted Viridia. Her blue eyes blazed on me now with a violence of passion I knew would break out any moment and that would be followed by a battle royal and bloody corpses strewing the pleasant island of Careless Repose.

“There seems no holding the Chulik, Viridia,” I said. With a quick and startlingly sudden movement I stepped back so that Chekumte was left with his rapier pressed against thin air. I lifted my voice and shouted. “Listen, renders of the islands! I will fight this rast of a Chulik in fair fight! It lies between him and me! In all honor is this not so?”