Tracato

“If there’s an ambush, we’ll have enough warning to wake, dress and arm. Better to fight rested.”

Sasha nodded. “How’s your leg?”

“It’s fine, dammit woman,” Kessligh growled. “My mother died long ago, you don’t have to check on me every time you hear a noise.”

“Oh, but look at you,” said Sasha in consternation. “Your hair’s a mess, you haven’t shaved in two days…here, just let me…” She moved to comb his hair down with her fingers. Kessligh swatted at her, dangerously fast, and she danced away with a mischievous grin.

“You,” Kessligh said warningly, “will find you’re not too big for a spanking.”

“You’d have to catch me first, old man,” Sasha laughed. “Sleep well.”

She retreated back into her hammock. The ship lurched and rolled, but the only twisting in her stomach was from happiness. Woman. Kessligh called her “woman,” not “girl.” It was hard not to grin with delight.

Errollyn noticed. “What’s so funny?”

“Nothing.” Sasha turned onto her side, facing him. “Say, you want to go downstairs and fuck?”

Errollyn grinned. Spirits he looked nice when he did that. Those incredible green eyes flashed, full of humour. Sometimes she couldn’t believe her luck.

“You’re impossible,” he said. “Tracking your moods is like sailing through four seasons before breakfast.”

Sasha laughed. Impulsively, she leaned over and kissed him long and deep on the lips. Then she lay back again, and contented herself with holding his hand.

“Sasha?” Errollyn asked. “I’ve a question. Don’t kill me.”

“Ah,” said Sasha. “A stupid serrin question. Go ahead, I’m bracing myself.”

“Do you think…I mean, Kessligh is like a father to you. But it’s all very well to say that, it’s another thing when a man hasn’t had a partner in a long time, and after all, you’re not his daughter…”

Sasha frowned. “You know, for a serrin wordsmith, that’s an appallingly opaque question. Spit it out.”

“Do you think he’s ever fancied you?”

Sasha stared at him in horror. “No!” And remembered to keep her voice down. “How can you ask me something like that?”

Errollyn shrugged helplessly. “Stupid serrin question, remember?”

“We were…dammit, Errollyn, we’ve been together since I was eight! He still thinks I’m a little girl, or…or…” Only now, he called her “woman.” She broke off in frustration.

Errollyn put a hand on her arm. “Don’t be angry. I was just curious.”

Somehow, Sasha found that she wasn’t angry. If anyone else had suggested such an appalling thing, she’d have most likely hurt them. But serrin were so innocent, in some things. Not innocent like children, far from it. But they weren’t offended by the notions that most humans found so terrible.

He reached, and put a hand on her hip. “Do you still want to go downstairs and fuck?”

“Gods, never again.” In the dim wash of lamplight, Sasha thought she saw Errollyn’s face fall. As if she’d actually managed to offend him. She grasped his hand and held it tightly. “I’m joking! Errollyn, I’m kidding.” He looked a little relieved. “Just…maybe tomorrow. You’re fine in the dark, but I’ll whack my foot and break something.”

“Tomorrow we may die,” Errollyn said reasonably. “I’ll make certain you don’t break anything.”

Sasha gave him a hard look. She hated it when he did that-said exactly the right thing to talk her into something she’d already decided she shouldn’t do. “All right,” she sighed. “It’s not late yet. We’ll get a lantern and go down the front way.”

Sasha was up at dawn, and found their pursuers gone. What was more, the wind had fallen to a cool breeze and the seas were calming. She exercised on the deck, watching the sky change from dark to pale blue, then yellow, red and gold. To starboard, Windsprite gently rocked, her sails full as she cut through azure seas.

To port, Radiance lagged a little, and seemed to have damaged a foresail. At the captain’s wheel, the night helmsman cast dark looks in Radiance’s direction. When the captain rose to relieve him, some unimpressed gestures were aimed in the other ship’s direction.

Errollyn joined her soon enough, and was delighted to find their pursuit had vanished. He pulled off his shirt, and Sasha chided him in Saalsi for his vanity. She’d have been prepared to fall for a man less pretty than this one, so long as he’d been the right man. This, however, was serendipity. And what she’d done with him in the cargo hold last night had been considerably more than that. She couldn’t believe no one else on the ship had heard her. She’d tried to muffle it, but there’d been a few shrieks that surely could have been heard above a raging thunderstorm.

She and Errollyn sparred as the sailors watched them. Most Rhodaani men might have seen serrin women spar, but few would have seen human women at her standard. The svaalverd, at the level practised by Sasha and Errollyn, was blindingly fast. Neither of them missed a stroke, a shifting, circling dance of sliding feet and flashing wooden blades, the sharp cracking of wood-on-wood breaking the morning calm.

Errollyn suggested variations, and Sasha complied with flashing attacks, complete sequences but for the killing blow. She found herself actually enjoying the shifting deck beneath their feet. All svaalverd fighters were obsessed with balance, and anything that challenged it was an intrigue to be explored at length.

“Keep bossing her about, lad,” said one bald, pot-bellied sailor in passing. “You can still teach her a thing or two, I’ll wager.”

Errollyn grinned, windmilling an arm, sweat dripping down his flexing chest and hard stomach. Sasha realised the sailor had mistaken Errollyn’s suggestions for commands. “She’s teaching me how not to die,” Errollyn corrected the man. “If she came at me with something I was not prepared for, I’d last two strokes.”

A few listeners laughed, as if thinking him joking. Or chivalrous, complimenting the girl. Watchers could not see what both Sasha and Errollyn could feel, in every flashing combination, in every clash of wood-on-wood. She was better. Not faster, and certainly not stronger. She simply translated thoughts and forms into actions faster and with greater cunning than he did. In fact, the ease with which she was coming to handle Errollyn in sparring sometimes bothered her. Errollyn was formidably good, by any standard. Perhaps, she sometimes thought, she was simply coming to know him too well. Perhaps she was not truly as superior as her results suggested. Perhaps she was only getting better at beating him. On mornings like this one, however, she doubted it. She could feel herself improving, and it was addictive. She wanted more. She wanted to know where the boundaries lay. And she wanted to know for certain that, the next time she met her enemies in battle, as many of them as drew steel against her would die for it, no matter what their numbers and standard.

Tracato announced its proximity approching with an increasing number of ships converging on the sea. At first one sail appeared on the afternoon horizon, then a couple more. All resolved into traders of one sort or another. Then came another pair, larger, twin-masted with huge, billowing sails. They came close, cutting the water with greater speed than Sasha had ever seen. Sailors lined their sides, and up in the rigging, most with bows. Amidships was a pair of ballista-huge things that no doubt fired flammable oils over a range many times further than a longbow.

Serrin warships. They flew no flag, for serrin had never yet agreed on the necessity of a single banner to represent their diversity. Neither was the hull painted, nor figures mounted on the bow, nor gold trim about the captain’s quarters. Simple, they were, and beautiful in their sleek lines. Only the sails bore decoration, a dark embroidery on canvas white, a swirling pattern that might have made the outlines of a square or a rectangle.

“Saalsi script,” said Errollyn, leaning at her side to watch them pass. Sasha took a closer look, and suddenly she could see it. Saalsi letters, overlaid and stylised.

“What do they say?”

Errollyn smiled, and shook his head. “Oh, a thousand things.” Sometimes, even Errollyn failed the translation.

Toward evening, they came upon another warship, towing a second, half-size vessel in its wake. The captive’s sails were blackened, some furled, others missing. Half the usual, tangled rigging seemed gone, and the masts were burned in places. As the Maiden heaved alongside the slower tandem, Sasha saw folk huddled on the deck in tight groups. Some appeared injured, others sooty. Yet others with swords stood over them, guarding, and even from this range Sasha could see that those were serrin. She could tell from the way they stood, and grasped the blades in their hands. And some appeared to be women.

This time, it was Kessligh at her side as she watched. “Elissian refugees,” he said grimly. “Nobility, by the look