The Steadfast took aboard the fresh water and provisions needed to leave Purdue. Cutter was released from the hold and ordered to get back to work under Lazare’s watchful gaze. I was left on tenterhooks one more day, although Croaker stopped by to take one last look at my stump — almost healed, he declared with wonder — and discuss prostheses. I swallowed hard as he described my options. The thought of strapping something of leather, metal and wood over my still-sensitive stump turned my stomach. Nje’s bale-hand would be a better option, I thought, even though I couldn’t let him create it while the pirates were watching. I said I didn’t want anything yet, and Croaker shrugged.
Later, the short, heavyset pirate who regularly drew prisoner duty brought me food and water. He set the plates down and then cast a furtive eye around the hold.
“Here….” he muttered, sliding a fabric-wrapped bundle out from under his shirt. “Soap and a cloth. I’ll get you some more water tonight, so you can use what you got.”
I couldn’t help but raise the sliver of soap to my nose. Naval issue, harsh but effective. I guessed it had come from the Chaser. It was nothing at all like the soft, scented soaps I’d used in Cislunar, but right now it smelled like heaven.
“Thank you,” I said. “You’re called Check, right?”
He nodded and stood, looking around again with a nervous air before hurrying away.
As hungry as I felt, I ignored the food in order to wash up before anybody could stop me. A scrap of soap, a bit of tattered sailcloth, and a pitcher of water didn’t allow for much in the way of hygiene, but I still felt much better after removing a layer or two of sweat from my skin and hair. My borrowed garments were an odorous, salt-stiffened lost cause, though. There wasn’t enough water to wash them, and I was loathe to strip naked while I was a prisoner, even with Nje there to guard me.
He makes appeasement to Saint-Cloud, Nje whispered. This is good.
“Yes … I wonder if Cutter’s spreading stories about me again. I suspect Mister Falliard dropped a word or two, as well.”
This wait is bad-long. I will be happy when we leave this chains and prison and you are power and fear to ship, men on ship. Why do you not want to be ship captain?
“Instead of escape?”
To leave prison here and be free and feared is to escape. Escape to where is not important if we are free and safe. Maybe to live free on this ship with pirates is more free than to live on Navy ship. Pirates is less … Nje paused. Is less you-must-do-this.
“I think the word you want is ‘less authoritarian.’ Or maybe less disciplined? Captain Lazare seems pretty authoritarian.” I considered Nje’s words. “Don’t you like authority?”
I like authority. Is good for a Saint-Cloud to do authoritarian — to do authority? — to crew, Nje replied at once. Is not good for a Saint-Cloud to be crew and work for authoritarian.
“Ah, I see. For a moment I thought you might be getting soft on me.” I smiled to myself as Nje began to query me about the grammar of ‘authoritarian’ and ‘discipline’ and what ‘soft’ meant. Nje could be a nag, but at least our conversations helped the time pass.
Several hours later I was unlocked from the hold and escorted in chains to the top deck, where the captain ordered me to help the crew. Cutter was kept under close guard, I saw, and I was informed that his guards had orders to maim him if I tried to escape.
I performed my duties quietly and professionally, using my time on deck to clear my head and regain my sense of direction. We set sail that evening, and I was kept on deck, ordered to call balelight to assist the pirates while we worked our way out of Perdue’s harbor and into the wider river. The Shrike was left behind, and from comments around me I learned that the other ship would sell the rest of the Chaser’s plundered cargo — weapons, ammunition, and supplies. It surprised me that the Steadfasts trusted the Shrikes to hold their share of the profits for them, but it seemed Lazare and Desmairais had forged a working relationship between themselves.
Master Caraby had been correct; Perdue was located some miles from the coast. Over the next two days the Steadfast sailed slowly along the river’s length, still searching for any sign of the escaped Chasers. At times the crew spotted search teams on foot, plying their way along the river’s edge, and the groups shouted back and forth to exchange information. No escapee had been recaptured yet. I maintained a neutral expression as I listened, although I was grateful for the news.
At night the pirates chained me in the hold, close to the powder kegs. It was hardly a deterrent, but as Xavier had pointed out, nobody on the ship seemed to have a clear grasp of what a sentinel could and couldn’t do. Cutter was kept under guard elsewhere, also chained to a powder keg. If I decided to set the ship ablaze, Captain Lazare informed me with a sneer, I’d blow up “Jimmy” in the process. I let him believe I’d been cowed.
We could have tried to escape into the jungle along the river banks, but it was full of searchers, and I still felt tired and groggy. It took me two days to realize my water was being drugged. When I accused Check, he recoiled in shock and promptly brought me extra bread and a jug of fresh water. Over the next few days my head gradually cleared, although I pretended to be drugged whenever I was around the other pirates.
Eventually Captain Lazare cursed and ordered the Steadfast to give up the search and pile on more sail. Soon we had left the river behind and were hugging the coast, looking for prey. I began memorizing the ship’s rhythms, planning an escape.
It was on our third morning on the open sea, in the midst of a steady drizzle, that a lookout shouted and pointed. I stood, my chains rattling where they were locked to the deck, and barely spotted white sails against grey clouds and water.
“A merchant!” one of the pirates shouted. A cheer went up and Lazare began shouting orders. The Steadfast began the chase, its preparations for battle less orderly and much louder than the Chaser’s. The rain made the decks and lines slippery, and I didn’t need the captain’s threats to keep my eye on the crew, keeping them — especially Cutter — safe as they worked on the rigging.
Half an hour later, Lazare strode up, pausing an arm’s distance away. Nje had made the pirate captain cautious around me, and I appreciated it.
“All right, Linedog,” he growled. “I want you to help us take that ship — intact, do you hear me? If it’s got a beck on deck, you keep the Steadfast secure, but if it don’t, you shred its sails, crack its rudder, and do anything you can to bring it ‘round in one piece. Try anything, and Demas has orders.” He pointed. I glanced over, but I already knew what I’d see — Cutter with a knife to his throat. When we finally escaped, I hoped the cadet would forgive me for having put his life in such constant danger.
“Nje will protect me if the merchant fires at us,” I said. “Tell your man — Demas? — not to slit Cutter’s throat if I’m suddenly wrapped up in bale armor.”
Lazare scowled and spat on the deck, but a few minutes later I saw him pause to talk to the other pirate. Satisfied, I turned my attention to the Steadfast’s prey.
Seasoned sailors had a remarkable skill at identifying ships by the configuration of their sails, but that skill eluded me, and I had to take the pirates’ word that the ship ahead of us was some sort of merchant. Cislunar might have been a major port, and my family wealth tied up with shipping, but I’d never engaged with the actual seafaring side of the business. My brother and his family had usually hosted our ships’ captains and visited their vessels while I handled the paperwork, and I’d been content with our division of labor.
I pressed my hand over my heart as I stood by the rail. I missed them. I hated feeling so alone in this wooden world, where so many of my skills were utterly useless and the one skill that had always made me one of the most powerful people in the room was the very reason for my mutilation and imprisonment.
Maybe Nje was right to scold me, I thought with despair. High-society manners and civilized codes of behavior still had some cachet in the Imperial Navy, but they were pointless among pirates. Could I reject forty-nine years’ of propriety to become the ruthless Saint-Cloud that Nje wanted and everyone else seemed to expect?
“Well,” I sighed aloud, “I’m on the right path for it. Nje, it seems we are about to become pirates.”
We should be free pirates, it grumbled. This battle is a good … opportunity, yes, is a good opportunity to escape, be free to do fear and be authority.
I smiled wryly. Authority I could manage. Fear … well, I’d mastered the sort of cold look and cutting remark that could make my peers in Cislunar tremble, but I didn’t think receiving a cut direct would mortify any of the pirates around me.
“Soon,” I promised. I was more patient than Nje, but after weeks of sleeping on hard wood and being rubbed raw by my chains, I was also feeling every one of my forty-nine years. Or was it fifty, now? I’d lost track of time. It was quite possible my birthday had already passed. The season was right for it.
I looked over my shoulder and saw the pirate Demas with a handful of Cutter’s hair, a knife close enough to the cadet’s throat to make me worry about the ship’s natural tilt and sway.
“As soon as I can,” I muttered.
The merchant ship had realized what the Steadfast was up to and sent up more sail. I idly wondered how much the rain affected a ship’s speed, or if it did at all. Surely wet sails made some sort of difference?
“Do you think we’ll be able to catch her?” I asked aloud. Check had taken up a position close to me and was studying the other ship through a spyglass. He wasn’t the only one; several of the pirates waiting by the cannon were doing the same.
“She’s heavy in the water,” Check replied. “She knows she can’t escape. This is just show, so her captain can tell the company they tried.”
“You plan to leave the captain alive?”
“If they surrender.” Check lowered the glass and glanced at me with a crooked grin. It was, I thought with surprise, the first time I’d seen him with anything other than a scowl on his face. “Only you Navy’s damnfool enough to fight a pirate. Merchants just hand over their cargo and stay alive. Makes it easier for everyone that way.”
“Doesn’t Lazare want more prisoners to sell?”
Check’s smile faded.
“Not this time. We want us some goods don’t run away before they’re sold.”
The pirates around us made noises of agreement, several spitting over the edge of the ship.
“I see. Thank you, Mister Check.”
Several of the pirates repeated ‘Mister Check’ with mocking laughter, but Check ignored them.
“You’re welcome, Grandeu’ Saint-Cloud,” he said, awarding me the title with rough dignity. I nodded, groping to recover the sort of chilly aplomb with which I’d once guarded the door to the Vigilance’s front desk. I was certain that I looked ridiculous, trying to act forbidding while barefoot, chained, and dressed in rain-drenched rags, but the nod felt … familiar. Like I was reclaiming some shard of the self-possessed sentinel I’d been before a series of explosions had shattered my life.
As Check had predicted, the Steadfast began to gain on the merchant. Lazare ordered a cannon fired — a warning shot. Minutes later, the merchant raised a white flag.
The pirates surged forward, cheering and readying their weapons. The ship, Sugar Star, carried no cannon as far as I could see, and I could discern no calls or sorcerous defenses. With a shrug, I leaned my forearms on the rail, chains rattling, to watch. No reason to shred its sails or shatter its rudder if the ship was going to hand itself over peacefully.
No battle, Nje said, disgruntled. And no escape?
I looked over and saw Demas still holding Cutter close. When he saw my glance, the pirate grinned, tilting his knife slightly to catch the sunlight.
The pirates began throwing lines to grapple the hulls closer. I wondered if I could destroy the Steadfast and neutralize the pirates before Demas could cut Cutter’s throat. Could I keep the merchant ship and its crew safe, if I did? Balefire was ruthlessly effective, but it could easily spread to the Sugar Star now that the ship was grappled to us.
“Not today.” I sighed. “Not unless Lazare starts slaughtering people.”
“Balewall planks,” Lazare bellowed. I straightened and erected balewalls between the ships, and the pirates scrambled across.
Everyone seemed to understand their respective roles, and the boarding proceeded just as Check had foretold. Lazare and the Sugar Star’s captain exchanged some words. The merchant captain ordered his crew back, and they glumly watched as pirates began hauling crates out of their hold.
While the plunder progressed, the Sugar Star’s captain inspected the Steadfast as though taking mental notes. When his eyes fell on me, he frowned. I cocked my head. Had we met? He didn’t look very Chevachèchen, but perhaps we’d crossed paths in Cislunar. I lifted my good hand in a short wave, letting him see my manacle and chains.
“No signaling,” Demas growled. I let my hand drop, but the merchant captain inclined his head and then looked away.
Several hours passed as the cargo was examined and brought aboard. Lazare didn’t bother to take it all; it seemed from the chatter that the pirates were only interested in items that could be easily resold. The crew seemed too eager to recoup lost profits to take anything without an immediate resale value.
At last the Sugar Star was allowed to pull away and Xavier unlocked my chains from the deck. I raised my eyebrows, but he shook his head.
“Hold the crates fast while we stow them,” he ordered, leading me by my neck-collar down below. I lit up the hold with balelight, paler but brighter than the lanterns the pirates were using, and then gave a short, resigned laugh.
“Something funny?” Xavier asked, eying me.
“I just know the logo,” I said, gesturing at the stormcloud-and-lightning insignia burned into the wood. The first mate grunted, unimpressed.
“Great. Now make sure nothing falls over.”
“Aye, Mister Falliard,” I said, smiling wryly as the pirates secured my own company’s stolen goods in their hold.