as he died.
The sailor knew that if they were being boarded, staying aloft was not a good idea. He swung from the crow’s nest and slid down a stay sheet to the deck below as another ball of flame appeared in the sky, arcing down to strike the foredeck.
As his bare feet touched the wooden planks, another sailor who shouted, ‘Quegan raiders!’ handed him a sword and buckler shield.
The thudding of a hortator’s drum echoed across the waves. Suddenly the night came alive with noise and cries.
From out of the gloom a ship reared, lifted high by a huge swell, and the two sailors could see the massive serrated iron ram extending from the galley’s prow. Once it slammed into its victim’s hull, its teeth would hold the rammed ship close, until the signal was given for the galley slaves to reverse their stroke. By backing water, the galley would tear a massive hole in Ishap’s Dawn’s side, quickly sending her to the bottom.
For an instant the lookout feared he would never see his children or wife again, and hastily uttered a prayer to whatever gods listened that his family be cared for. Then he resolved to fight, for if the sailors could hold the raiders at the gunwale until the priests emerged from below, their magic might drive off the attackers.
The ship heaved and the sound of tearing wood and shrieking men filled the night as the raider crashed into the Ishapian ship. The lookout and his companions were thrown to the deck.
As the lookout rolled away from the spreading fire, he saw two hands gripping the ship’s gunwale. The lookout gained his feet as a dark-skinned pirate cleared the side of the ship, and boarded with a leap to the deck, others following.
The first pirate carried a huge sword, curved and weighted, and he grinned like a man possessed. The lookout hurried towards him, his sword and shield at the ready. The pirate’s hair hung in oiled locks that glistened in the light from the flames. His wide eyes reflected the orange firelight, which gave him a demonic cast. Then he smiled and the lookout faltered, as the filed pointed teeth revealed the man to be a cannibal from the Shaskahan Islands.
Then the lookout’s eyes widened as he saw another figure rear up behind the first.
It was the last thing the lookout saw, as the first pirate swung his sword and impaled the hapless man, who stood rooted in terror at the sight before him. With his dying breath, he gasped, ‘Bear.’
Bear glanced around the deck. Massive hands flexed in anticipation as he spoke. His voice seemed to rumble from deep within as he said, ‘You know what I’m after; everything else is yours for the taking!’
Knute leaped from the raider’s craft to stand at Bear’s side. ‘We hit ’em hard, so you don’t have much time!’ he shouted to the crew. As Knute had hoped, Bear’s men rushed to kill the Ishapian sailors, while Knute signalled to the handful from his old crew, who headed towards the hatches and the cargo nets.
An Ishapian monk, climbing up the aft companionway to answer the alarm, saw the pirates spreading out in a half-circle around him. His brothers followed after. For a moment, both sides stood motionless, as they measured one another.
Bear stepped forward and in a voice like grinding stones said to the first monk, ‘You there! Bring me the Tear and I’ll kill you quickly.’
The monk’s hands came up and moved rapidly in a mystic pattern while enchanting a prayer to summon magic. The other monks took up fighting stances behind him.
A bolt of white energy flashed at Bear, but vanished harmlessly just inches before him as the ship heeled over and started to dip at the bow. With a scornful laugh, Bear said, ‘Your magic means nothing to me!’
With surprising speed for a man his size, Bear lashed out with his sword. The monk, still recovering from the shock of his magic’s impotence, stood helpless as Bear ran him through as if cutting a melon with a kitchen knife. The pirates let loose a roar of triumph and fell upon the other monks.
The monks, though empty-handed and outnumbered, were all trained in the art of open-handed fighting. In the end they could not stand up to pole weapons and swords, knives and crossbows, but they delayed the pirates long enough that the forecastle was already underwater before Bear could reach the companionway leading below decks.
Like a rat through a sewer grating, Knute was past Bear and down the companionway. Bear came second, the others behind.
‘We’ve got no time!’ shouted Knute, looking around the aft crew quarters; from the abundant religious items in view, he judged this area had been given over to the monks for their personal use. Knute could hear water rushing into the hole below the forecastle. Knute knew ships; eventually a bulkhead between the forecastle and the main cargo hold would give way and then the ship would go down like a rock.
A small wooden chest sitting in the corner caught his eye and he made straight for it, while Bear moved to a large door that led back to the captain’s cabin. Movement was becoming more difficult as the deck was now tilting, and walking up its slick surface was tricky. More than one pirate fell, landing hard upon the wooden planks.
Knute opened the small chest, revealing enough gems to keep him in luxury for the rest of his life. Like moths to a flame, several raiders turned towards the booty. Knute motioned to two other pirates close by and said, ‘If you want a copper for all this slaughter, get up on deck, help open the hatch, and lower the cargo net!’
Both men hesitated, then looked to where Bear struggled to open the door. They glanced at one another, then did as Knute instructed. Knute knew they would find two of his men already at the hatch and would fall in to help. If Knute’s plan were to work, everyone would have to do his part without realizing that the order of things on the ship had changed.
Knute unlatched a trapdoor in the middle of the deck, and let it swing open, revealing the companionway leading down into the cargo hold. As he stepped through the opening towards the treasure below, the ship started to take on water, and he knew she was fated to go down quickly by the bow. He and his men would have to move fast.
Bear was smashing himself uphill against a door that obviously had some sort of mystic lock upon it, for it hardly moved under his tremendous bulk. Knute cast a quick glance backwards and saw the wood near the hinges splintering. As he lowered himself into the hold, Knute looked down. He knew that there was enough treasure below to make every man aboard a king, for the odd man named Sidi who had told Bear about this ship had said that ten years’ worth of Temple wealth from the Far Coast and Free Cities would accompany the magic item Bear was to bring him.
Knute regretted having met Sidi; when he had first met him, he had no idea the so-called trader trafficked in the magic arts. Once he had discovered the truth, it was too late. And Knute was certain there was far more to Sidi than was obvious; Sidi had given Bear his magic amulet, the one that he refused to remove, day or night. Knute had always stayed away from magic, temple, wizard, or witch. He had a nose for it and it made him fearful, and no man in his experience reeked of it like Sidi, and there was nothing tender about that reek.
The cargo hatch above moved, and a voice shouted downward, ‘Knute?’
‘Lower away!’ commanded the little thief.
The cargo net descended and Knute quickly released it. ‘Get down here!’ he shouted as he spread the large net across the centre of the deck. ‘We’re taking on water fast!’
Four sailors slid down ropes and started moving the heavy cargo chests to the centre of the net. ‘Get the small one first!’ instructed Knute. ‘They’ll be gems. Worth more than gold, pound for pound.’
The sailors were driven by two goals: greed and fear of Bear. The massive captain was smashing through the door above with inhuman strength, and everyone in the crew knew as well as Knute that Bear was becoming more violent by the day. Even his own crew now feared to be noticed by Bear.
One of the men paused to listen to the fiendish shout as Bear finally smashed through the door. A half-dozen pirates, finished with butchering the ship’s crew, descended the ropes from the deck above and looked questioningly at the