“Salt staining every breath,” the Seordah said now. “No earth beneath your feet. How can such a thing be borne for any time?”
“Greed or necessity,” Vaelin replied. “You recall your part in this?”
“Kill all the two-swords we find and make for the big black building.” The Seordah stirred as Vaelin rose, leaning forward, fixing him with the same questing gaze he had shown him since Alltor. What is he looking for? Vaelin wondered again as the war chief’s eyes met his. Does he ponder if there is another soul behind these eyes? Or is it more what I may have brought back?
“You . . .” The Seordah paused, searching for the right words. “You are more . . . you now, Beral Shak Ur.”
Vaelin replied with a cautious nod. In truth he felt stronger, the chill having lifted from his bones, for the most part. Also his final practice with Davern had actually seen him defeat the shipwright, much to his sister’s delight. She had taken to watching the daily contests and gave a squeal of triumph as Vaelin’s wooden sword found a gap in Davern’s defences, jabbing into his midriff with enough force to provoke an obscenity-laden shout of pain. His dark-faced fury at Alornis’s taunts had been something of a guilty pleasure, though Vaelin was careful to hide it as he thanked the sergeant for his service and released him from future obligations.
“I am,” Davern grated, “always at your disposal, my lord.”
He made his way to the top deck and joined Reva at the helm, dressed in her light mail shirt, sword on her back, and bow in hand, laughing at something the Shield had said. The man’s humour faded at sight of Vaelin and he beckoned his helmsman forward to take the wheel, offering a cursory bow. “My Lord of Battle.”
“Fleet Lord Ell-Nestra,” Vaelin replied, bowing lower. The Shield’s resentment was more carefully hidden than Davern’s, though, he suspected, no less deeply felt.
“Our pet savages are prepared, I take it?” Ell-Nestra asked.
“Don’t call them that,” Vaelin told him, annoyed at the ease with which the Shield provoked him. Defeat and humiliation are poor tutors, it seems.
“Your pardon, my lord. Though you must agree they make poor sailors.”
“Who can blame them?” Reva said, her face only slightly less grey than Nortah’s. “I’d fight half the world to get off this tub.”
“Tub?” The Shield rounded on her in mock fury. “My lady insults the finest vessel ever taken by a Meldenean sabre. Why, I would challenge you, if you were not merely but a feeble woman.”
He took the lightning slap she gave him with good grace, making her laugh again with a florid bow before striding off to order his first mate to muster a fighting party. I thought at least she’d be immune to his charms, Vaelin thought sourly.
“Your people are ready?” he asked her.
She jerked her head at the rigging above, Vaelin seeing the densely packed archers on the platforms at the top of the great ship’s two towering masts. A figure leaned over the side of the foremost platform to wave at them, Vaelin recognising Bren Antesh’s silhouette. He sensed a certain impatience in the archer’s movements. “I think your Lord of Archers is keen for you to join him aloft,” he advised.
“In which case he’ll be disappointed,” she replied with a level gaze.
He let the matter drop; cautioning her seemed irrelevant given their mission. A wasteful gamble, Count Marven had called it, not without justification. Vaelin looked at the two ships following in their wake, the only Volarian vessels captured by the Meldeneans during their brief campaign, each crammed with more Seordah. Beyond the horizon waited all the ships they could commandeer on short notice, thirty vessels laden with more forest folk and three regiments of Realm Guard, including the Wolfrunners. The cream of this new army, gambled on an expectation of Volarian arrogance.
The Shield had sailed into Warnsclave a day after Belorath’s arrival, his great flagship laden with stolen supplies, relating his dismay at failing to seize a ship of equal size and design to his own newly acquired monster. “It was like fighting a mirror image,” he told Lyrna, his usual ebullience muted somewhat, and unlike most, less inclined to stare at her face. “Except one captained by a fool,” he went on. “Sadly, the fires we birthed in her were too great and she went down, along with a few hundred Free Swords, judging by the screams.”
The idea had been birthed then, triggering instincts Vaelin had thought lost with his song. They expect the Stormspite’s twin at Varinshold. He had pondered it for a day and a night before seeking the queen’s approval. “We don’t have ships enough for the whole army,” she reminded him.
“But enough to seize the docks, and Varinshold will stand or fall on who holds them. Plus, Brother Caenis will relate the need to attack on Winterfall Eve to the Renfaelin host via Brother Lernial.”