The wet alarm of Bit’s tongue woke him. His altered, larger form requiring more fuel than the slender adolescent body that had left Harup-taw-shet, Madrenga downed not one but two breakfasts before walking back to the stable where he had left Orania. It was while he was settling the bill that Quilpit arrived, looking more awake and alive than anyone his age ought to at that early hour of the morning.
“You’re sure now you want to try this, boyo? If the Captain agrees to take you, you’ll find the accommodations plain, the food simple, and the language rough.”
“I grew up on the street,” Madrenga reminded him. “I’ve plenty of experience with all three.”
The mate smiled. “So you may think. Right then. Let’s to it.”
They left from the stable area, Orania plodding along behind Madrenga, his saddle pack slung over her lower back and Bit trotting excitedly alongside. While the dog had shown himself capable of greater and greater feats of transformation, at heart he remained very much a puppy. He could not understand why strangers started in his presence or shied away from his innocent offers of friendliness. In his canine mind he was still small and weak, a conviction that persisted despite his greatly augmented mass, muscle, and dentition.
It was a strange sky that greeted them as Quilpit led the small procession from the waterfront boulevard out onto one of the many quays that protruded into the harbor like the steel spikes on Bit’s collar. It was not a fog but rather a lowing gray sky, less damp than a proper fog. The air pressed down on the town like a moist blanket into which the masts of the bigger ships poked like wooden needles. The heavy atmosphere muffled sounds and there was an utter absence of wind, as if the weather itself had yet to wake from a long night’s sleep. Other early risers spoke in whispers, as if by speaking loudly they might shatter the perspective and cause pieces of overcast to fall on their heads.
Halting near the end of the pier Quilpit eyed a knot of small boats that floated motionless in the water, pieces of a nautical puzzle tied to the quay and to each other.
“I see only one left from the Thranskirr.” Raising his gaze, he studied the crowded harbor. “The rest of the crew must already be back aboard and preparing to set sail. An unusually punctual shore leave, by my experience.” He started down the stone steps that led to, and into, the water. “Come on then, boyo.”
Madrenga hesitated. “What about Orania?”
Halfway down the steps the mate looked back. “I said I’d try to help you and your dog gain passage. Nothing was discussed about a horse.”
The youth drew himself up. “I’ve only two true friends in this world. I’m not going anywhere without her.”
Quilpit shrugged. “It’s your choice, boyo.” He pondered. “Best we can do is try this by degrees. Let’s see if we can persuade the Captain to take you and your monster. Then you can make whatever decision you think best about the horse.”
For a long moment Madrenga considered thanking the mate for his aid and friendship and then moving on in search of a more accommodating vessel. But if what Quilpit had been telling him about travel across the Shadows was the truth, finding such transportation was likely to prove difficult if not impossible. Why not, then, take his advice? If the Thranskirr’s Captain refused him passage, the question of transporting Orania would be rendered moot and he would have to start all over with another ship anyway. If Hammaghiri consented to let him and Bit come aboard, then Madrenga could plead that the horse had to accompany him as well.
One step at a time. It had been ever so since the day he had walked through the outer gates of Harup-taw-shet and left the city behind.
Having never been on a body of water larger than a lake and even though they were safely within the protected harbor, he was still thankful that his first encounter with the sea found her in a quiet mood. In truth, Madrenga thought as the mate rowed away from the quay, he had encountered rougher water in the public fountains where he and his fellow urchins had bathed and played. Peering over the side he found he could see a goodly distance into the depths. Several times schools of small fish wriggled by beneath the keel, shining like so many drops of mercury. Later something yellow and tentacled arrowed past in pursuit of one such school, paused on the other side to look up at him out of a single contoured eye, and promptly did its best to spit in his face. It missed, hitting Bit instead. Front feet propped on the gunwale, Bit unleashed a succession of frantic barks at the water, which troubled the spitting cephalopod not at all.
The Thranskirr might not have been the grandest ship on the Sea of Shadows, but to Madrenga’s inexperienced eye the big brig was most impressive. Her stout wooden flanks curved slightly upward near the top and her two masts seemed taller than the trees of the sacred grove that dominated the hills west of his home. Milled from pigo blackwood immune to insects, corrosion, or the debilitating effects of salt air and spray, the masts and the yards they supported needed neither paint nor varnish. Subjected to the effects of time and storm the rest of the ship might disintegrate, but her black masts, yards, and bowsprit would float on forever.
The hull was flanked by a pair of sturdy outriggers, one on either side of the ship proper. Each of these was attached to the main hull by means of a pair of pigo arches, four in all. The much smaller outrigger hulls, Quilpit explained, held additional stores for the journey ahead, from spare spars and rigging to barrels of salt meat and dried biscuit. In a dire emergency—for example an irreparable hulling of the Thranskirr—the outriggers could be detached, the single small sails stowed in each one raised, and the resulting configurations utilized as lifeboats.
As the mate continued to declaim on the virtues of his vessel, Madrenga struggled to memorize the seemingly endless list of descriptions and terminology. All the boats he had sailed previously had consisted of small, hand-made toys deployed in lakes, ponds, or fountains. They had been constructed for amusement. There was nothing amusing about the Thranskirr. Not just reaching Daria by way of Yordd but his very life depended on her staying sound and stable. So he paid attention to everything Quilpit was saying in the event his future might depend on him remembering a word, a term, a depiction.
Passing beneath the aft arch of the portside outrigger, the small boat drew up alongside the main hull. Securing a line from her bow to a bolt in the Thranskirr’s side, Quilpit started up a series of wooden steps that had been cut into the ship’s port flank. Following the mate, Madrenga soon found himself on deck. A seaman’s panorama greeted his willing gaze. Everything here was new, everything different, from what he had known in Harup-taw-shet. From the knots in the ropes to the packing of the cargo stacked on deck, at every turn strangeness and wonder greeted his inquisitive stare.
“Your animal?” Quilpit was standing nearby, watching his new protégé watch the crew finish final preparations for getting under way. “Can he climb the stairs?”
“I don’t think so.” Moving back to the railing the youth leaned over the side. Bit was standing in the small boat, gazing upward, panting excitedly. Quilpit joined the frowning youth.
“We could hoist him up in a cargo net,” the mate suggested. “He’ll be fine if he doesn’t struggle too much.”
“Let me try something first.”
The mate’s gaze narrowed. “More sorcery? Magic words?”
“I think they’re only magic when spoken by a boy to his dog.” Leaning over the side again, Madrenga extended his arms and called out. “Here, boy! Here, boy! Come on, boy!”
Bit drew in his tongue, crouched, and sprang. Legs that had long since ceased to belong to an ordinary canine contracted, and in one leap the dog had cleared the railing and landed in his master’s outstretched arms. That was Madrenga’s only miscalculation. Despite his own enhanced stature Bit’s weight was now too much for him to handle. Both master and dog went down in a heap, with Bit coming out on top frantically licking Madrenga’s face. Quilpit observed the affectionate goings-on with equanimity.
“I shouldn’t be surprised, I suppose. If you’d been standing atop the highest yard and made the same request, I imagine he would have made the jump to that height as well.”
Extricating himself from beneath his happily slobbering companion, Madrenga wiped at his sodden face. “I don’t know, sir. I don’t know what’s happened to me or to my animals, or how, or why, but I would be a blind fool if I didn’t think it had something to do with the carrying out of my mission.”
Quilpit shrugged. “In a world where nothing can be predicted or explained with overmuch certainty, boyo, I would not be hasty in my conclusions.”
Madrenga stared at him. “Are you saying you think there might be other reasons for what has happened—for what is happening—to me and my animals?”
The mate looked at him from the vantage point of many years spent voyaging the world’s seas. “I’m saying that I think. I think—I don’t try to predict. Except maybe the prospects for decent fishing and good weather. In a wooly world, boyo, certainty is the first casualty of assumption. Keep your mind open as to your options and you’ll live longer.” He grinned. “Something to keep in mind as we present you to the Captain.” Gesturing, he turned and started toward the stern. Pondering the mate’s wise words, Madrenga followed. As they passed by, members of the crew intent on their work eyed the tall, powerfully-built young man with interest, and his dog with something nearer to apprehension.
In the spacious main cabin at the rear of the ship, Madrenga stood silently while Quilpit related what he had seen and heard the previous day in the dog fighting arena. Seated behind his gimbaled desk, Captain Hammaghiri listened politely. Madrenga thought one could fairly smell the skepticism seeping off him.
While the same age as his first mate, the Captain looked younger. A little taller and a little wider, with a perfectly trimmed full beard and a full head of hair that flashed hardly any gray, his experience and profession were more forcefully represented by the look in his eyes. Deep-set and violet, they regarded both mate and visitor unblinkingly. So persistent and unwavering was that commanding stare that Madrenga found himself frequently turning away when it was aimed in his direction. There was about Captain Hammaghiri an air of repressed rage. Uplifting, encouraging rage, to be sure, but rage nonetheless. All but standing at attention, the youth did not think he would care to be the object of the Captain’s anger, should he have occasion to lose it.
Where another man might have interrupted querulously, or with derisive laughter, Hammaghiri sat quietly throughout the whole of Quilpit’s declamation. Expecting the Captain to question, or make rude noises, or respond in some patently negative fashion, Madrenga was surprised to hear not a word uttered in rebuttal to the mate’s story. It was only when Quilpit finished and stepped aside that Hammaghiri turned his full attention to the mate’s youthful protégé.
“So. You are a warlock.” His gaze ran his visitor up and down. “Stature notwithstanding, to me you look to be a prime example of a sorceral virgin.”
Having no idea how to respond to this demeaning observation, Madrenga stood silently while he tried to think of something not-stupid to say. A sideways glance showed Quilpit making barely perceptible motions with his right hand and considerably more agitated ones with his eyes. His meaning was clear enough even to one as artless as Madrenga.
Say something, boyo.
“I am no warlock, sir. I am but a student of a hard life who has been given a chance at something better. To this opportunity I have dedicated myself body and soul.” He spread his hands and adopted an expression of helplessness. “It has been made plain to me that someone or something else, some other power, has been manipulating both. Thus far, to my apparent advantage.”
Hammaghiri pushed out his lower lip (revealing a surprising abstract tattoo) and grunted. “And from what my hitherto trusted first mate tells me, to that of your animals as well.” He nodded toward Bit, who was sitting quietly by his master’s side. “Prove it, then. Confirm even a tiny amount of what Quilpit says. Show me something. I await with interest your effort to dispel common sense.”
Madrenga swallowed. While he doubted Bit would respond to a transmuting command of any kind, he knew he had to try. Hammaghiri was clearly not the sort to give a supplicant a second chance.
“Bit.” The dog looked up at him with characteristic wide-eyed eagerness. “Grow. Come on, boy, grow! Stand tall! Grow for the Captain!”
His canine companion responded immediately—by lying down, rolling over, and thrusting all four feet into the air. The tip of his lolling tongue made a damp spot on the wooden deck. Madrenga turned to plead with the Captain.
“He only responds—I only respond—defensively. That much I have learned about whatever transformative force clings to the both of us. Unless one of us is threatened, nothing changes.”
The Captain nodded thoughtfully. “So you transmogrify as well?” When Madrenga nodded affirmatively, albeit reluctantly, Hammaghiri turned to his mate. “You saw this also?”
“No, Captain. Only the dog. Believe me, sir, anyone who was witness to what happened to the dog had eyes only for it. The youth here could have changed into an owl and no one would have noticed.”
Again Hammaghiri nodded. “Perhaps another member or two of the crew noticed how much you had to drink in the hours before this supposed transmogrification took place?”
“Captain—sir!” Quilpit took a step toward the desk, then remembered himself and stopped short. “For once I was not drunk. I know what I saw. If needs be, I can go ashore and find several, or several dozen, others who saw what I saw and will attest to it even without having to be bribed.”
Hammaghiri grunted. “We raise anchor in less than an hour. In contrast to my happy, carefree crew, I am compelled to concern myself with such unimportant details as making deliveries on time and hewing to a set schedule.”
Seeing that he was losing both the argument and time, an anxious Madrenga stepped forward. “If I may make bold, if the Captain has on his desk something edible …?”
Hammaghiri frowned. Then he opened a small, exquisitely inlaid wooden box and removed a handful of nuts. Of these Madrenga recognized only half. Would they appeal to Bit? It was his experience that the dog would eat anything. But they were in strange surroundings, and he with nothing to offer but unknown foodstuffs. He could only try. He held the handful out toward his companion.
“Bit! Look! Food!” He tossed the handful into the air.
How the dog went from a semi-sleeping position on his back to flying through the air not even Madrenga could tell, such were the permanent changes that had come over his friend. One moment Bit had all four feet thrust skyward in a posture imitating death and the next he was soaring through the still air of the cabin to snatch up the handful of thrown treats. Quilpit leaned back out of the way while Captain Hammaghiri, his ingrained fortitude aside, practically fell out of his chair. Landing on all fours, Bit promptly sat down and chewed contentedly. But to catch the flung filberts the dog had been compelled to open his mouth, and in opening his mouth …
Trying not to show how much the dog’s leap had unsettled him, Hammaghiri collected himself and looked over at his mate.
“I have never seen teeth like that in a dog, Quilpit. I have never seen teeth like that in the jaws of any living creature.”
“I think they are akin to dragon teeth myself, sir,” Madrenga put in helpfully.
Instantly the Captain was himself again. “Have you ever seen a dragon, boy?”
Madrenga tensed. “No sir, but I have heard.…”
“Speculation is for the story-spinner, young man. Sailors have no time for it. Not those who wish to live.” He nodded to where Bit was contentedly swallowing the last of his unexpected treat. “I grant you that the dog, even if he cannot magically change size, would be a valuable asset in a fight. But I have confidence in my crew, each of whom knows the way of sword and spear. While I admit I would value your animal’s presence onboard and the deterrence value he embodies, I fear it is not enough to grant the both of you passage.”
“I can offer payment in addition.” At this Quilpit’s eyebrows rose, but the mate said nothing.
Stepping forward, Madrenga removed the purse from his belt, trying to keep both men from getting a good look at the corium container that held the scroll. Unsealing the sack, he measured out approximately half the coin Counselor Natoum had provided for his expenses. The glittering bauble Elenna and Bieracol had given him he kept hidden, knowing that its value was sufficient to buy several boats the size of the Thranskirr. He would part with it only in an emergency.
Hammaghiri did not have to pick up the coins to estimate their worth. Quilpit eyed his young friend with new respect. The Captain was silent for a long moment before he nodded.
“I grant you and your dog passage. What is your name, young man?”
“I am called Madrenga.” He waited for what seemed to be the inevitable reaction to the pronouncing of his name. But neither Quilpit nor Hammaghiri batted an eye.
“Welcome aboard the Thranskirr, young Madrenga. She’s no pleasure barge, but she’ll smack a storm quick as you would a pickpocket and get you to wherever you be going. Quilpit here will show you a berth.” He looked at the mate. “He and his animal can have the third mate’s cabin. The gods of Pelskran knows he’s paid enough for it.”
Madrenga blinked. “Where will the third mate sleep?”
Quilpit spoke up. “In the throat of the flying shark, which is where last we saw him. The vacancy he left has not yet been filled. His belongings have been sent ashore without him. Of course, if you find the quarters too inflected with recent morbidity for your liking you can always sleep belowdecks with the crew.”
“I’ve seen my share of death and managed to avoid it,” the youth replied. So far, he added silently. “I cannot regret the passing of one I did not know.”
“Spoken like a man.” Hammaghiri nodded approvingly as he scooped the pile of coins into a desk drawer. “A practical man. As the rare paying guest, you are welcome to time with myself, my two mates, and the ship’s doctor. I cannot vouch for the company, but the food will be better than what you would receive below.”
“The Captain is too modest.” Quilpit grinned. “A healthy ship survives on good weather, good seamanship, good commanders—and good food. Another Captain would let his men go without in order to pocket the provisioning money. Captain Hammaghiri feeds his crew well.”
“And drives them hard,” the Captain added tetchily. “There are times when an officer must ask from a man everything he can give, and you can’t ask everything of a man when he’s hungry.” So saying, he returned his attention to the pair of charts on his desk, one open and spread and the other still rolled. A moment passed. Seeing that both his first mate and young passenger were still present, an irritated Hammaghiri looked up and allowed his gaze to pass from older man to the younger.
“Well, was there something else?” One thick finger tapped the open chart. “The Thranskirr is a fine and willing ship, but she will not plot her own course.”
Madrenga licked his lips, glanced at Quilpit, back at the Captain. “Bit is not my only animal, sir.”
“Ah. You have another fighting dog. So much the better. Bring him aboard.” Hammaghiri returned his attention to his work.
“Not another dog sir. It’s—she’s—a horse.”
“A horse.” Looking up anew, Hammaghiri folded his hands atop his desk. “You want to bring a horse on the Thranskirr.”
Madrenga nodded, his voice eager and more boyish than he wished. “She’s very good, sir. She won’t be any trouble and I think I’ve paid enough to cover what feed she will eat. Please, sir—she’s been with me since I was a child. I can’t—I won’t—leave her behind.”
“A horse.” The Captain echoed himself. “As cargo I have carried horses. Paid for and delivered. Accounting one as a passenger would be something unique.”
Thinking desperately, Madrenga gestured at Bit. “You’ve agreed to take along my dog as a fighter. Orania can fight, too.”
Hammaghiri was less than convinced. “I don’t know what experience you have in war, young Madrenga, but I can tell you from my own that there is little opportunity to employ cavalry in a battle at sea.”
“She could do other things, sir.” Madrenga spoke as fast and earnestly as he dared. “She could—she could do work.”
Hammaghiri’s face screwed up behind his elegant beard. “Work? On a ship? What kind of work?”
“She could,” the youth thought fast, “she could raise and lower the anchor.”
The Captain let out another grunt. “The crew would like that, for sure. Though it’s hardly necessary to spoil them with less work.”
“I wager she can do it faster than the crew, sir.” Madrenga rushed on. “Haven’t there been occasions when you wished to raise anchor more swiftly than is normal?”
“There is truth enough in that statement.” Hammaghiri’s thoughts drifted back to an earlier moment in time. “There was that evening in the Foresworn Isles where we had to …” He broke off. “I’ll give your animal one chance, young Madrenga. If you can get her aboard. None of our boats is large enough to bring over a horse, and I’ll not take the time to weigh anchor and joust for an empty spot among the docks. If you can get her aboard, we’ll see what she can do.”
“Thank you, sir! Thank you!” Without waiting to be dismissed, he whirled and bolted for the door, Bit galumphing at his heels. Hammaghiri watched him leave.
“Odd young man, that.”
“I conjecture he is no odder than his dog, Captain.”
Hammaghiri sighed. “The things an honest seaman does for money.” He waved absently. “Go and see what transpires. If he gets the horse aboard, we’ll deal with it. If he falls overboard in the attempt, let him swim back to shore.”
Focused on the space above the Captain’s head, Quilpit’s gaze was impassive. “And if the latter, sir, what of his money paid?”
“Recompense for my patience and forbearance. Now leave me. I have real work to do.”
Back on deck the first mate searched for his young friend. He found him standing at the rail on the port side.
“What will you do, boyo? Hire a larger boat to bring your animal over?”
“Not unless I have no choice. But I think she can swim it.” Madrenga nodded at the mainmast. “You have crane and net for bringing large cargo aboard?” Smiling understandingly, Quilpit nodded. “She may struggle, but if need be I’ll get in the water with her. I think I can calm her enough to get a net around her.”
“We’ll try, anyway, boyo. Shall I have someone row you back ashore?”
“No need.”
Stepping up onto the railing and balancing himself by holding onto the rigging, Madrenga put fingers to lips and whistled. It took a couple of tries until the horse waiting patiently on the end of the nearest quay responded by looking up in his direction. Her master whistled again and then a fourth time, trying to put as much urgency into the call as possible. Without hesitation Orania took a couple of steps forward and, to the astonishment of a couple of elderly townsfolk who were fishing off the dock, plunged into the harbor.
Madrenga caught his breath when she vanished beneath the surface, only to relax when she popped up again a moment later. Did more than pop up, actually. As expected, she was swimming toward the ship. What was unexpected was the speed at which she was moving. All horses could swim: he knew that from childhood. But Orania appeared not only to be moving at excessive velocity, but to be gaining speed with each equine stroke.
Taking note of her approach, first one sailor and then another put aside what they were doing to watch. Soon many of the crew were crowding the rail or looking on from their positions athwart yards or in the rigging. As they kept a running commentary on her approach, an uneasy murmuring began to suffuse the air on the Thranskirr’s main deck.
“No horse swims like that.” Grizzled as a mummy and lean as a piece of piraya jerky from the ship’s commissary, the second mate squinted through the lingering mist as the high head in the water drew nearer. “No normal horse.”
Leaning close, the cook whispered to his old friend. “I think mayhap her owner no normal man, either. Look at him standing there and calling to his animal: he has the body and build of a warrior but the face of a youth: a callow one at that. One would not think such a sword as swings from his waist would belong to him.”
“Or he to it.” The second mate coughed. Though older than either the Captain or first mate, Korufh was content with his status, having by dint of sheer hard work raised himself up from common seaman to a position of responsibility. There was little about a ship with which he was not familiar, and the rest of the crew respected him unreservedly. To him the sea and all who sailed upon it were a well-thumbed book.
But this strange young man and his stranger animals—they were something new to him. He was not averse to newness. New things carried with them the promise of profit or an easing of hard work. But they could also bring danger. The youth looked innocent enough—indeed, his face was open and devoid of guile. But there was something about him that was not natural. No magus he: that was plain for anyone to see. That did not mean he was to be trusted; not yet. Quilpit was comfortable with him. That much was apparent. But just because a man kept coin in his purse and goodness in his heart did not perforce exclude him from carrying a curse on his back.
“A net!” someone shouted. The horse’s owner was not the only one who divined what needed to be readied. “Swing over a crane!”
Breaking away from the railing, several of the crew set about preparing the equipment that would be necessary to hoist the swimming horse aboard. They did not have to wait for formal orders from the Captain. Hammaghiri had always encouraged initiative on the part of his crew.
As it turned out, neither net nor crane would prove necessary.