Storms of Victory (Witch World: The Turning)

His arms were powerful, though, and he knew the ways of ships, and it was not long before he disappeared over the side. Several interminable seconds passed, then a rope snaked down to the remaining fugitives.

  The second sailor went up next. Una and Tarlach had literally to be drawn aboard. Their strength had been spent in fighting the cold and the water below both for themselves and for their less able comrades, and, once they were no longer buoyed by the sea, they found themselves nearly helpless.

  The wind was now high and very sharp. It cut through their soaked garments like a thousand daggers.

  Aye, it gave the pain of knives, the Falconer thought, and it would soon prove as deadly, but there was nothing he could do to defend against it save to sink down beside the Star's high side and hope the sturdy wood might break some of its force.

  The mariners would not permit that. They had known all the horror of helplessness below, but their own strength had not been squandered, and they now kept their companions on their feet.

  “It will be better once we are out of this wind, Captain, ‘’ Nordis said in a low voice, ever mindful of the ease with which sound could carry. “You can rest in the cabin.”

  Within minutes, they were inside, and the door was closed against the night.

  The Falconer was walking more steadily by then but still dropped gratefully onto the chair the sailor drew over to him.

  The temperature of the air was not so very low in itself, and he began to feel more comfortable almost immediately and almost to feel somewhat ashamed that he should be sitting at his ease while their party remained in peril.

  He started to rise, but Santor grinned and placed a restraining hand on his shoulder.

  “Let you and the Lady Una stay where you are a while, Bird Warrior. The turn to work is ours. Besides, I think we know more of a ship's cabin than either of you, even on a vessel of this size. Another chamber lies beyond this one. A man lived in it, and there will be things of his that we can use. Those bastards do not appear to have done much in the way of general looting.”

  “They have had no time for that yet.—Go to it, but guard your lights well.”

  “There is no port inside, and the moon is candle enough out here.”

  The two men were gone some time, but their arms were gratifyingly full when they did return.

  “Fortune smiles,” Santor declared triumphantly. “We found plenty for all of us, good-quality stuff, too, but that should be true, this being the master's quarters.”

  “I do not imagine he would have grudged us the use of them,” Tarlach replied, stripping off his own soaked garments even as he spoke.

  He dressed, rapidly, then sat back, closing his eyes. It was an ecstasy merely to be dry and truly warm once more.

  Una had changed as quickly, turning her back to her companions while she slipped out of her own and into the dead seaman's clothes.

  Facing the others once more, she smiled broadly.

  “That is a vast improvement, my comrades. Now, if we can just discover some food and drink, we shall be well fortified for our escape.”

  That proved to be a vain hope. They did find some wine, a little, but nothing at all of food in the cabin, and a hurried search showed that the galley and the hold containing the vessel's stores had been completely flooded.

  The mercenary shrugged. That was a disappointment but not a danger to them. They would have won home or be dead from other cause long before hunger became a threat to either their lives or their health.

  Thirst could be a very different matter, but he thrust his fear of it from him. They must act now whether drink was available to them or not.

  The dory was their only possible means of escape. None of them looked forward to a voyage in her, Tarlach least of all, but there was no choice before them if they were to give any battle at all for their lives. Had his companions been Falconers, combat trained and superbly capable in the water, they just possibly might have boarded and successfully made away with the wreckers’ vessel even outnumbered as they were, but those with him certainly could not accomplish such a feat.

  No, it was to this small craft that they needs must look to bear them on their coming journey.

  She seemed incredibly fragile even to the sailors’ more experienced eyes, yet they knew her to be a lucky vessel, having survived both the tempest and the rigors of shipwreck. Perhaps some of that fortune would flow to them when they took to her.

  It was well that they could think of her thus, for the threatening storm was fast approaching now. The seas were becoming short and high, and heavy clouds filled in most of the sky, closing off what had been a brilliant moon. To set out in so tiny a craft into such weather seemed little short of suicide.

  To remain was an even surer death, and all four preferred perishing in an attempt to gain their lives to being butchered as had the crew of the Dion Star.

  The memory of those slaughtered men served to strengthen their resolve. If they made the try, they might win through, one of them at least, and carry testimony of all they had seen and heard. Dead, they could not confirm Seakeep's suspicions of Ogin's guilt.

  Silently, the seamen examined the dory and found her sound. Even her oars remained. Any other equipment she might have held had been swept off, but she was such a tiny thing that it was doubtful very much had ever been stored in her. Santor and Nordis sought out several buckets to be used as bailers, for these they deemed to be essential, then declared, her to be ready.

  Tarlach ordered that they use the wine at once. It was not worth the saving—there was scarcely half a cup for each of them—and they had need of its strength.

  Once more, the Seakeep mariners took charge, launching the dory smoothly and silently despite the choppy waves in whose midst they set her. They gave one glance at the menacing shore and crouched down as far as possible they began rowing toward the open sea.

  20

  Although all of the fugitives kept low in their boat until they had left the wreck considerably behind them, none of the four had much fear of detection now. The night was dark with a trace of fog to further cloak them from unfriendly eyes which might turn on the Dion Star, and the wind was high enough to mask any modest noise they might make in rowing.

  All the same, it was with relief that they drew out of the narrow channel and rounded the spur of the mountain, out of sight at last of the dead merchantman and of those who had murdered her.

  To his comrades’ surprise, Tarlach ordered that they continue moving seaward rather than immediately assuming a course parallel to the land.

  “This is no deep-water vessel, Captain,” Nordis ventured, “and with heavy weather coming on …”

  “We shall be driven against the cliffs or onto the rocks if we remain here.”

  Una straightened suddenly, guessing the hope he had not dared voice.

  “We might even be picked up by the Tern farther out.”

  “The Tern! Aye, she will stay at sea since there is no port to which she can fly quickly enough!” exclaimed Nordis.

  “This blow will not be anything to drive her in search of one,” Santor said eagerly. “It should prove no more than any of those the fleet has weathered many a time. Even at its worst, it will in no way rival the last.”

  There was a grimness in his tone despite the hope of early rescue Una had given him. Neither he nor any of the others needed to be told that the gale, comparatively mild though it might be, would be impressive enough for people attempting to ride it out in this pitifully tiny vessel.

  “Forget the Tern," the Falconer warned sharply. “If we meet her, we can indeed rejoice, but it would require more a miracle than kindness of fate to accomplish that. It is on this dory and on our own strength that we are going to have to depend, and on nothing else.”

  His words cut down his companions’ newborn elation. There could be no gainsaying the rightness of them, and if the Daleswoman still nurtured some little hope in her heart of connecting with the second round tower vessel, she did not
attempt to argue its cause. They did better to forgo the brightness belief in such discovery could give their spirits now rather than risk its almost inevitable shattering later, at a time when physical exhaustion and the lash of the elements might make its breaking the breaking of their will to fight on.

  The Falconer commander and the Lady Una claimed the oars. The sailors made no protest, knowing that these two could handle them, at least well enough to bring the dory beyond sight of the land and start her toward home. After that, their greater experience would be needed, and they must be fresh and ready then to assume responsibility for their party's lives.

  The storm did not break suddenly but rather crept upon them as if it were half afraid to show itself. The rain began soon after the dory had left the wreckers’ cove but remained no more than an unpleasant drizzle for a long time. The wind, though bitterly cold, only gradually assumed the properties of a true gale. The ocean was more responsive to what was to come, but even she delayed some time before displaying her full anger.

  What she did unleash was bad enough. Tarlach's muscles ached with the strain of battling swells so short and sharp that the boat seemed to make no progress at all, but he stubbornly refused to surrender his place at the oars.

  Pride would have kept him there even if duty did not. The Holdlady, slender and fragile as she was, did not cry out against this same labor. While she held firm, so, too, would he until his skill was no longer the equal of the work before him.

  It was only after the rain had become an almost continuous downpour and the wind had roiled the water around them into a fury that the pair gave way to their more able comrades.

  The mercenary huddled in the rear of the boat, cradling the falcon on his lap to give him what little he could of heat and shelter. His comrade was dying. He knew that, although the crisis was still some time away, and he despaired because of his powerlessness to do more to preserve him. He could not even keep the rain off him. There was nothing he could do to help any of them, Tarlach thought listlessly. He was scarcely able at this point to rouse himself enough to intelligently watch the progress of the oarsmen.

  Una was beside him. He could not see her face, for she was sitting with her head lowered, but from the limp way she held herself, the droop of her usually straight shoulders, he knew that she was even more exhausted than he.

  Little wonder, that. The Daleswoman was fighting what must be fairly severe pain as well as weariness and the effects of hunger, thirst, and the never-ending cold. The salt and constant wet had gotten to the numerous cuts striping his body, and, although none of them save that on the shoulder, which was now giving him considerable trouble, were of any significance, each one of them felt sore and angry. He could imagine the torment to her seriously damaged hands, could well-nigh feel himself what each stroke of the oars had done to her—

  The shock of frigid water brought a gasp from him.

  The swell which had broken on them was passed, but a second followed fast upon it, sweeping over the foundering dory.

  “Bail!” Nordis roared. “Bail, or we are downed!”

  He leaped to obey, the Holdruler beside him. They worked with the desperate speed of their need, and soon they had the boat enough lightened that she could respond once more to the commands of the rowers.

  There was no returning to rest, however, not then, not in the hours which followed. The rain increased until it fell in an almost solid sheet, a deluge sufficient in itself to fill the open vessel, and it seemed that every third wave poured over the dory's sides.

  Nordis and Santor proved their skill and their courage that terrible night. It was they who fought the bucking vessel, guided her, tried to keep her facing into the waves so she should not ship water with every swell. Many were the times the two in the stern saw them raised almost vertically above them as their craft climbed some mighty wave, their bodies clearly visible in the eerie, frightening brilliance of a lightning-illumined sky, or below them as they raced into some stygian trough.

  Tarlach rested the bailer on his knee after clearing the boat for what seemed the thousandth time. The respite would be all too short, he knew, before he could be compelled to take it up again.

  It was then that he became aware of the emptiness. No other mind touched his.

  “No!” It was a moan. There was no body. He had failed even to preserve that.

  “Not so!” Una's icy, bloodied fingers closed on his hands. “Do not believe that, not yet.—One of us would surely have felt his dying, Tarlach. Neither of us did. He—he was not really that low when you last tended to him?”

  “No.”

  He looked at her, wanting to hope and fearing to chance this pain again if he did so and it was proved useless.

  “Where, then …”

  “Gone for help, perhaps.”

  “In this gale?” he demanded contemptuously.

  “Grant him that much, that he would strive with his last strength, even as we. He could not aid us here, but if he could still fly despite those wet wings, can you believe he would not make the trial?”

  “Flight should still have been possible,” he conceded after a moment, “and this storm is not like the other, perilous force though it is.” His eyes closed. “The Horned Lord guide and help him.

  “And Gunnora …”

  A bitter jolt of water silenced her, and they threw themselves back into their endless fight to keep the sea from closing over them all.

  Dawn broke and grew old before the storm showed signs of abating, and the morning was well on before the rain entirely ceased.

  All four slumped in their seats, too spent for the moment even to feel cheered, by the lessening of their sufferings.

  Tarlach's mouth tightened. No, that was scarcely accurate. The nature of their discomfort might have altered, but it was in no way reduced. They still had to combat high seas and sharp wind, and if there was no rain to torment them, thirst would soon make them long for its return.

  Una saw him lick the salt from his lips and touched his arm.

  “I managed to catch a little of the rain.’’

  She held out one of the baiters to him.

  “I am sorry, there is only enough for a few swallows, but it was impossible to collect any until we stopped taking so much water, and the rain had almost ended by then.”

  “Sorry? Lady you have revived our souls! That could be the saving of us in the distance we must go.”

  He took the pail from her. There was indeed only a small amount of liquid in it, and he took but a single sip. This he rolled around his mouth before allowing it to trickle down his parched throat. The taste was decidedly brackish, but he would not have relished the finest wine as much in a time of plenty.

  The Falconer did not delay in returning the bailer to her. She, too, drank, taking no more than he had, then she held it out to her companions.

  Both realized how little it contained and shook their heads.

  “We shall be home soon enough, my Lady,” Nordis told her. “Do you drink for us.”?

  “Take it, both of you,” the mercenary commanded sharply.

  The Seakeep men stiffened.

  “It is not our custom to deprive one weaker than ourselves …”

  He raised his hands in a gesture of peace.

  “It is our strength that your Holdlady needs now. We should be serving her ill to further reduce that even for her temporary comfort.”

  The mariners’ eyes fell, and they accepted the water, the last any of them was likely to have until they won through to safety, the last they might ever have if they failed to do that very quickly.

  The hours passed slowly. The fugitives had been nervous at first, fearing pursuit from the cove, for the storm, though violent, had not been Such as to intimidate a vessel of the wrecker's size if her master's purpose were strong, but they Soon relaxed. They had been careful to leave no sign of their presence aboard the Dion Star, and the loss of the dory, if noted at all, would be laid to the rough weather. The missi
ng garments would not be marked since there had very obviously been no close examination of the cabin from which they had been taken, and their own discarded things they had brought away with them. No, they had nothing to fear from Ravenfield now unless some freak twist of chance brought about their discovery.

  The warrior and the Daleswoman claimed the oars to give the others a chance to take some rest but were so weakened themselves that they could keep their places no longer than a couple of hours before having to surrender .them again.

  The work of rowing was brutally hard, and yet they dared not leave the oars idle for more than the few seconds lost in changing the team manning them. The storm of the previous night still kept its grasp on the sea—indeed, it was probably not truly ended at all but merely in a short-lived lull—and the waves continued to hurt themselves at the dory, as if enraged that she had outfought them for so long. It took the full of the fugitives waning strength, the full of their skill, just to keep their tiny craft afloat; to make any real headway toward their goal was impossible.

  Their spirits fell as time went on, precious time, time they could ill afford to squander. The overcast sky spared them much of what they might have endured from the blistering rays of the sun, but they were granted little else in the way of ease. Salt-fired thirst was a torture now, a draining torture that took power from muscles and mind alike, and ever in their thoughts was the knowledge that the return of the tempest, which by all the signs would not be long delayed, would mean at the least another day like to this if they could survive its pummeling a second time.

  Because of the constant strain of their labor and their rapidly deteriorating physical condition, it became necessary to change rowers every half hour lest they grow too exhausted to function at all.

  Tarlach took Una's hands in his after their third such turn. The bandages covering the palms were soaked with blood.

  He made no comment as he pressed the cold, white fingers between his, trying to give them warmth from his own meager store of heat.

  How much more of this could the Daleswoman take? Her will was strong, and so, too, was her body, remarkably strong for one of such delicate appearance, but all they were enduring would soon bring down the most powerful man, much less this slight lady. The fact that she was possessed of no great reserves of fat or muscle was in itself enough to doom her …