“What’s happening?” she said again, louder this time.
Akella whirled. “Your shite-for-brains Imperial captain wants to send us all to Pardesta’s black hell!”
The ship headed up a wave. All of them – the sailing master, Akella, Joslyn, the Captain, and the two other sailors skidded a few feet backwards before finding some piece of ship to hang onto. The sea disappeared; for two long seconds Joslyn could only see sky. Then the bow dipped, the sky vanished, and for a moment, it looked as if their ship really would plunge straight down into whatever Pardesta’s black hell was.
Akella seized Joslyn’s forearm, and at first Joslyn thought it was to get her attention, but then the hull crashed into the water, sending up a fountain of white. The sea swallowed the entire front third of the ship. The sailing master crashed against the ship’s wheel, letting out a grunt that Joslyn assumed meant the wind had been knocked out of her. The Captain knocked into her back; the two sailors behind him braced against each other, but one lost his grip and tumbled forward, stopped from falling to the deck below only by the railing. Joslyn would have fallen, too, but for Akella’s tight hold on her arm.
“Have mercy on us, Mother Moon,” the Captain muttered. He faced the two sailors. “Tell the riggers to take down the top foresail and the jib now!”
“Tell them that and you sink this whole vessel and drown every soul on it!” Akella screamed.
“I’mthe Captain –”
“Aye, and an incompetent one at that!” Akella shot back. She faced Joslyn. Speaking quickly, she said, “We only survive this by keeping up our speed and sailing at an angle. Your ensign –” Akella waved at the sailing master “– has the angle right, and aye, we ought to take down most of the sails, but if we take down all of them, we lose the speed. We lose our speed and the wave crests us before we crest it. And over we go, tits over arse.”
“We leave those sails up, we snap our foremast like a twig against a knee!” the Captain countered.
Lightning flashed.
“Overwhelmed!”someone called from below. More cries went up – “Overwhelmed – Rooster’s Comb overwhelmed!”
The two sailors exchanged glances with their captain. Even the ensign at the steering wheel, whose steely-eyed focus had seemed unshakeable, sucked in a sharp breath and turned her head towards the disaster.
Joslyn followed the ensign’s gaze. At first, she saw nothing but the shadows of waves. Then lightning flashed again and she saw it: The ship she’d seen teetering atop the waves earlier had rolled onto its side. It floundered in the water like a wounded animal. When they crested another wave and the lighting flashed again, the vessel was completely belly-up.
Akella grabbed Joslyn again, but this time it wasn’t to brace her. “There’s nothing we can do for your Rooster’s Comb. But we can still save ourselves. Give me command of this ship. In the name of Preyla, Commander, give me command.”
The ship tilted hard to one side, and Joslyn stumbled once before catching herself. A wave crashed against them from port, lashing their backs with water.
All eyes were on her.
Did Joslyn have the authority to relieve the Captain of duty? And even if she did … should she?
“Commander, please,” Akella said. There was nothing cocky or defiant or manipulative in her tone. It was pure pleading.
“Captain Nonts,” Joslyn said, “I’m giving the Rizalt Akella command of this ship.”
He scoffed. “Ye can’t do that, ye Terintan whore. This is my ship.”
“No, Captain,” Joslyn said. “This is the Empress’s ship, and I speak for the Empress. You are hereby relieved of command.”
The sailors stared at their Captain. The ensign glanced from Akella to Joslyn before returning her attention to the wheel.
“Look here,” the Captain snarled. He reached for something at his belt and took a menacing step towards Joslyn. Joslyn was tall for a woman, but the Captain was taller still. He tried to use his superior size to force her back. “Ye don’t know the first thing about a ship. Ye don’t know a porthole from yer arsehole. Ye can’t –”
Joslyn seized the man by the collar and put her dagger to his throat. “You will stand down now voluntarily, or I will force you down by putting this blade through your throat and tossing you overboard myself. Which will it be, Captain?”
The Captain said nothing. Joslyn shoved him backwards, then gave Akella a single nod as she sheathed her dagger.
“You,” Akella said, turning to one of the sailors. “Get to the riggers. Tell them we’re keeping the top foresail up, along with the jib. Don’t know if it’ll be enough,” she added, more to herself than to anyone else, “but it’ll have to do.”
“Aye,” the sailor said, heading for the stairs with a nimble sure-footedness that Joslyn couldn’t match on a ship like this.
“And you,” said Akella to the other sailor. “Go belowdecks. Cram as many of the passengers still on the top levels down to the bottom levels as you can. We need the ballast.” Akella didn’t wait for the sailor to acknowledge her order; she turned to the sailing master. “New course. Your captain had you south by east; I want you southeast by south.” She rattled off another series of instructions that Joslyn didn’t understand. But the sailing master did.
Joslyn faced the Captain and extended a hand. “Give me your weapon.” He opened his mouth to argue, probably to claim he didn’t have a weapon. “I saw you reach for it. Give it to me now.”
Reluctantly, he handed over a long knife, hilt first. It wasn’t quite a dagger; it looked more like a hunting knife, part of its edge saw-toothed.
Joslyn gave the knife to Akella. “You have leave to kill him if you need to – if you need to. Don’t make me regret giving it to you,” she said. “I need to find the Empress.”
After several minutes of shouting and panicked searching, Joslyn finally found Tasia belowdecks, soaked yet otherwise unscathed. Two men in palace blacks stood on either side of her, faces tense.
“Joslyn,” Tasia said, the name escaping as a sigh of relief. “I was on my way back to you, but they –”
“I gave command of the ship to Akella,” Joslyn told her.
Tasia’s eyes widened. “You what?”
“She was convinced Captain Nonts was sailing us to our doom. I gave her command.” Joslyn paused. “The Rooster’s Comb is lost. Probably others, too, but I saw the Rooster’s Comb go down with my own eyes.”
Tasia covered her face with both hands while the two guards beside her exchanged worried glances. “There were almost two hundred people on that ship.” She looked at Joslyn again. “Linna. She was on the Rooster’s Comb until a few days ago.”
Linna. Joslyn had left her in Tasia’s quarters by herself.
“She’s still in your cabin. I should go get her,” Joslyn said, turning to go.
Tasia reached out and grabbed her wrist. “Don’t go up there again. Stay with me. Linna can take care of herself.”
“She’s all alone.”
“And stronger than you give her credit for. She’ll be alright.”
Joslyn hesitated, thinking of Linna bracing herself in Tasia’s empty quarters, imagining the girl wondering where her two mistresses had gone.
“She’ll be alright,” Tasia repeated. “And going above decks to fetch her risks both of you. Besides, if this galleon doesn’t hold together, or if we capsize, having her down here with us won’t save her anyway.”
Remembering that they were being watched by Tasia’s guards, not to mention at least some of the three score soldiers crammed together on the same deck, Joslyn gave Tasia a tight nod.
“Yes, Majesty,” she said. “As you command.”
The night was long. Tasia remained seated on the barrel, while her guards and Joslyn formed a protective triangle around her. The deck below them held almost every Imperial soldier aboard the ship, some two hundred and fifty of them, having been herded there by the sailor Akella sent. Joslyn felt suffocated even on the less crowded deck, breathing in the stench of sixty frightened souls. Most of those on this level were closely associated with Tasia’s household – black-clad guards, chambermaids, Wise Men, Brothers. From time to time, they glanced at their Empress. Maybe they looked towards her to see if she was still alright; more likely, they looked to give themselves confidence. If the Empress remained calm, they could, too.
Joslyn knew Tasia wasn’t calm. She could see it in the way Tasia discreetly pinched the inside of her palm every time the ship creaked and groaned. But Tasia’s face remained carefully relaxed, and Joslyn was certain she was the only one who noticed the Empress pinching her own palm. Occasionally, Tasia lifted her eyes towards Joslyn.
She relies on me for strength just as they rely on her,Joslyn realized. So she let go of the support beam she had been bracing herself against, set herself into bending reed once more, and worked to keep her balance using her breathing and her feet alone.
Maybe it would give Tasia some measure of comfort to see Joslyn turn the storm into a training exercise.
Long, silent minutes stretched into long, silent hours. Guards murmured to one another in quiet voices while the ship continued to buck and roll up and down the waves. Here and there, the relative quiet amongst them was punctuated by alarmed yells and bodies or cargo clattering against each other as the ship took a particularly violent turn.
Slowly the storm relented. The change was subtle at first; the severe angles of the ship’s rolling simply decreased. Then they decreased more. Then a sailor came down to tell them that all was clear; dawn had come, and so had calm waters. With Mother Eirenna’s grace shining upon them, everyone belowdecks made their way above, squinting against the sunlight like newborns.
“Where’s Akella?” Tasia asked Joslyn.
“Stern, probably,” Joslyn answered.
They picked their way to the back of the ship, walking around puddles that hadn’t quite dried and more than a little debris. Tasia stopped here and there to greet sailors or soldiers, thanking them, asking how they were. At last they reached the ship’s stern. Akella was exactly where Joslyn had left her: standing at the ship’s wheel on the deck just above Tasia’s cabin.
“Welcome back,” said the pirate, giving them a gap-toothed grin. Her hands rested casually on the spokes of the wheel as if it were any ordinary day and she was merely giving the Empress a tour of the harbor.
“Where’s the ensign?” Joslyn asked.
“I told her to get some rest. She deserves to sleep for the next two days after what she steered us through last night.” Akella raised one eyebrow and sucked at her teeth. “I might move my hammock next to hers, if you know what I mean. Haven’t met a woman like that in a good long while.”
Joslyn opted to ignore the comment. “And the Captain?”
Akella shrugged. “Sulking in a corner somewhere, if I had to guess.”
“Did we lose anyone last night?” Tasia asked.
Akella’s face grew somber. “Four sailors went overboard, Preyla bless them. A fifth, too, but we fished him out.” Her eyes hardened. “We wouldn’t have lost anyone if your moronic captain had listened to me in the first place and headed towards the shipping lanes while we still had time to beat the storm.”
“What about the rest of the fleet?” Tasia pressed. “Joslyn told me the Rooster’s Comb went down. What about the others?”
Joslyn glanced to port and starboard. Well over a hundred ships had sailed forth from Port Lorsin, with another fifty scheduled to depart the day after. Normally, on a clear morning like this, she would see dozens of vessels all around them. Today she saw none.
“I don’t know,” Akella said. “I set course for Tergos. I’d imagine at least some of your captains and sailing masters would’ve had enough sense to do the same, even if they are Empire-born, but I’ve only caught sight of one other vessel so far this morning, and she’s limping. I’d imagine some of the others are in the same shape, trailing along somewhere behind us like drunken fishermen.” Akella thought for a moment, eyes scanning the horizon. “No doubt your Captain Nonts wasn’t the only Imperial idiot who didn’t know how to sail a hurricane.” She met Tasia’s gaze. “Hard truth, Empress? I’m sure you lost quite a few more than the Rooster’s Comb last night.”
Tasia’s eyes went distant. “So many lives … Even the smaller ships carried at least seventy, eighty soldiers …”
She paled, hand going to her stomach, then rushed to the railing and leaned over it. Tasia dry heaved twice before Joslyn jogged after her, concerned.
Akella cocked her head thoughtfully but said nothing.
Joslyn placed a comforting hand on Tasia’s back, rubbing small circles against it.
“We’ve sent crows out,” Akella said. “I’m sure we’ll hear back from at least some of them by the time the sun’s at zenith.”
Tasia dry heaved one last time, then straightened and faced Joslyn. One hand still on her stomach, she used the back of her other wrist to wipe perspiration from her brow.
“I’m surprised you haven’t acclimated to the sea by now,” Joslyn said. A small V of concern appeared between her brows. “You didn’t mention having so much trouble when you sailed to Paratheen. Do you think it might be something you’re eating?”
Tasia’s eyes were distant.
“Doubt it’s seasickness,” said Akella. She paused. “Doubt it’s the food, either.”
There was a touch of something in her voice – amusement? Teasing?
Joslyn opened her mouth to say something sharp to the pirate. Akella might’ve saved them from the storm the night before, but that didn’t give her the right to make light of the Empress of the House of Dorsa’s discomfort.
But Tasia stopped Joslyn with a hand on her forearm. “Akella’s right.” She looked up. “I think I’m pregnant, Joslyn.”