Raymond E. Feist - The King’s Buccaneer

Turning to Nicholas and Harry, Martin said, ‘Better start gathering firewood, Squires. We make camp.’

Harry and Nicholas glanced at each other, but both knew it was futile to ask where one finds firewood. They moved away from the clearing and began looking about. Many fallen branches and some dead trees were in sight. As Nicholas started to pick out a deadfall, a hand touched him upon the shoulder. Nearly jumping straight up, he turned to find Marcus behind him, holding out a hatchet. ‘This might be easier than trying to chew through the branches,’ he said. He handed another to Harry.

Feeling foolish, Nicholas watched his cousin return to the others. He said, ‘Sometimes I could really learn to hate him.’

Harry began chopping at the deadfall. ‘He doesn’t seem overly fond of you, either.’

‘I have half a mind to take Abigail and return to Krondor with Amos.’

Harry laughed. ‘Oh, what I’d give to be a fly on the wall when you explain that to your father.’

Nicholas fell silent as he continued to hack away at the wood. When a full armload was ready, they gathered it up and returned to the clearing. Martin had already begun a fire with twigs and some moss, and fed the branches into the flames. ‘Good, this is a fine start. Bring us three times that, and we’ll have wood for the night.’

With a barely hidden groan, the dirty and sweating Squires returned to the deadfall and resumed hacking.

The sentry leaned out of the tower. Something was moving across the water into the harbor mouth. His station at the top of Longpoint lighthouse was the most vital post in the Duchy, as Crydee was more vulnerable from the sea than from any other quarter, a lesson hard learned during the Riftwar. The Tsurani had burned half the village with fewer than thirty men.

Then he saw: six low shapes gliding across the water. Each shallow boat was rowed by a dozen men, with another dozen standing in the middle, armed and ready.

The soldier had orders to toss a pot of special powder on the fire that would turn the flames bright red; then he was to strike a gong. Reivers were entering the harbor! As he turned, a line snapped out, weighted at one end, and before he could take another step, his neck was broken.

The assassin had concealed himself beneath the window of the tower, crouching low upon a support beam, barely two inches of which protruded beyond the stone. He quickly pulled himself into the window and removed the metal hooks he had used to climb the wall by embedding their points in the mortar between the stones. He hurried down the winding stairs, killing two more guards along the way. Three men served each night in the tower, with another three in a small guard shack at the base. As he reached the shack, the assassin saw three bodies slumped over a table, while a pair of black-clad forms moved away. He quickly overtook them, and the three killers hurried along the causeway of land called Longpoint that led from the town to the lighthouse. One of the black-garbed killers glanced toward the harbor. Another dozen pinnaces followed the first six, and the raid would soon begin in earnest. Still no alarm sounded, and all was proceeding as planned.

Longpoint broadened, with a low dock on one side and shops and storage buildings on the other. Silent ships rested alongside the quay, with half-alert sentries dozing upon their quarterdecks. A door opened as the three assassins passed, and the last patron of a dockside inn stumbled out. He was dead before he took two steps, as was the innkeeper who had shown him the door. One of the three killers glanced through the door, and the innkeeper’s wife died from an expertly thrown knife before she realized it was a stranger in the doorway instead of her husband.

They would fire the docks and destroy the ships at anchor, but not yet. It would alert the castle, and if the raid was to succeed, the garrison must not be roused until after the keep gates were opened.

The three killers reached the main docks. They passed one last ship in its berth and saw movement at the bow. One assassin drew back a throwing knife, ready to kill any who might give alarm too soon, but a familiar black-clad figure waved once, and climbed over the rail, shinnying down the bowline to join his three companions. The guards on that ship were now all dead. They continued south along the docks, to where they found the small boats pulling in. Two other black-garbed men waited. They kept their distance from the armed men who now silently climbed up from the shallow boats tied off below. This was a murderous crew, men of no loyalty and one goal: killing and booty. The six men in black felt no kinship with these brigands.

But even these hardened men stepped away in dread to clear a path for the hooded and robed figure who climbed up from the last boat. He motioned toward the castle, and the six dark assassins sped up the road toward the keep. Their task was to climb the walls and open the gates. All other considerations were to wait for the breach of the final defense of Crydee.

The robed man beckoned and a small group stepped away from the main force. This band he had picked to be the first through the gate. They were the men he judged most likely to keep their wits and follow orders during the first frenzied moments of combat. But to drive home their instructions, he said, ‘Remember, your orders. If any man breaks my commands, I will personally cut out his liver and eat it before life fades from his eyes.’ He smiled, and even the hardest of these men felt a chill, for the man’s teeth had been filed to points, the mark of a Skashakan cannibal. The leader threw back his hood, revealing a head devoid of hair. His massive brow was close to a deformity, as was his protruding jaw. Each earlobe had been pierced and stretched until long loops of flesh hung to his shoulders, with gold fetishes tied to the loops. A golden ring decorated his nose, and his fair skin was covered in purple tattoos, which made his blue eyes even more startling and terrifying.

The captain glanced back into the harbor, where the third wave of pinnaces should be approaching, another three hundred men. Silence was less a problem for the third wave, as he fully expected the alarm to sound before the third band of raiders reached the docks.

Another man approached and said, ‘Captain, everyone is in place.’

To the group nearest to him he said, ‘Go, the gates will be open when you reach them. Hold or die.’

To the man who had approached he said, ‘Does everyone understand the orders?’

The man nodded. ‘Yes. They can kill the old men and old women, and any children too young to survive the journey, but everyone who is young and healthy is to be captured, not killed.’

‘And the girls?’

‘The men don’t like it, Captain. A little rape is part of the caper. Some say it’s the best part,’ he added with a smirk.

The captain’s hand shot out and gripped the man’s shirt. Pulling him close enough so his sick-sweet breath filled the man’s nostrils, he spoke in tones of low menace. ‘Vasarius, you have your orders.’ He pushed the man roughly away and pointed to where a half-dozen men stood silently observing. Cross-gartered sandals too light for these cooler climates were all the protection afforded their feet, and except for the black leather harnesses that formed an H on back and chest, and leather masks covering their faces, they wore no clothing save black leather kilts. They stood motionless in the cool night air, ignoring whatever discomfort the other men might have felt. They were slavers from the guild in Durbin, and their reputations were enough to cow even as hard a crew as Captain Render’s band of cut-throats.

Render said, ‘Well enough I know who put that complaint in the men’s minds. You’re too hungry for the feel of young girls’ flesh to make a good slaver, Quegan, so mark this: if one of these maidens is violated, I will kill the offending man and take your head for good measure. With your share of the gold you can buy yourself a dozen young girls once you reach Kesh. Now see to your men!’ He shoved the Quegan pirate away and turned to the remaining reivers, who stood ready to attack.