The Night of the Swarm

warships began a mile or two from beyond Simja’s rocky terminus and ran away northwards, bow to stern, bow to stern. And west of them, in a curving, swift-running line: the white ships of the Mzithrin. Both sides belching fire, selectively where the lines diverged, frantically where they neared. At the closest point the battle was an orgy of blackness and flame, the ships’ masts rising out of the gushing, enveloping smoke. The tarboy brought a second telescope: Isiq reached for it automatically, but Suthinia turned and snatched it; the scope was for her, of course.

Isiq squinted, shading his eyes. Plenty of death to go around. Ships on both sides maimed and burning, some limping out of formation, others helpless and adrift. A Mzithrini Blodmel was canted over on her beam-ends: fouled on a reef, most likely. Nearer at hand, an Arquali vessel was sinking fast, the decks awash, the men streaming out of her in crowded lifeboats.

Gregory pointed at the doomed ship. ‘That’s the Vengeance, I believe. One Captain Kesper. You know him, Isiq?’

‘I know him. And the Vengeance as well. I trained on that ship, by damn.’

‘Hmph!’ said Gregory. ‘Now Arqual will be wanting a Vengeance II. Maybe they can give it to Kesper’s son.’

Kesper, dying before his eyes! Isiq squinted at the line, wondering which of the young men he’d commanded were out there, dying in a battle that should never have begun.

‘Humourless old dog, Kesper,’ said Gregory. ‘Lend Isiq your scope, won’t you, Suthee, there’s a good girl.’

Suthinia gave her ex-husband a withering glance. The man liked to bait her; who wouldn’t? Nonetheless she slapped the telescope into Isiq’s waiting palm.

The carnage was worse than he’d thought. The Mzithrini were outnumbered but they had the wind, and their ships were smaller and faster. Where the Black Rags’ line bent closest to the Arqualis they were emptying their guns, one after another, then heeling about and running west. They were giving better than they got, and it was all the Arquali cruisers could do to hold the line.

Isiq felt his chest constricting. Just as well he’d bucked up the giant lad when he did. He was not sure he’d be able to manage it now.

‘Who is winning?’ asked Suthinia.

The captain and the admiral glanced at each other. ‘No one, I think, m’lady,’ said Isiq. ‘This battle is immense, to be sure, but it is just one battle, and little tactical change will come of it. The Mzithrinis cannot push east through the Straits, not with the heavy cannon on Cape Coristel, and the Third Fleet massed and waiting in the Nelu Peren. Nor can Arqual extend its reach far to the west. There is no base to hold, no part of the Mzithrin lands we can reasonably contest.’

Suthinia gaped at the carnage. ‘Do you mean to say the Arqualis will withdraw?’

‘Both sides, most likely,’ said Gregory, ‘after dark.’

‘Then why are they fighting?’ cried Suthinia. ‘Why did the Arqualis leave the Straits to begin with? What in the Nine Pits is this for?’

Huge and sudden flames from one of the Mzithrini ships: her powder room had exploded. A quarter of her portside hull simply flew out in burning fragments, a whirlwind of fire that raced horizontally over the water and across the deck of the Arquali warship that had bombarded her. The rigging of the Arquali ship bloomed bright orange; tiny figures leaped burning into the sea.

Gregory looked at Suthinia and shrugged. ‘Practice?’ he said.

Eberzam Isiq lowered the telescope. His hands were shaking. ‘You mean to run that gauntlet?’

Now Gregory was amused. ‘Not to your taste, old man?’

‘Tell me your mucking intentions, or send me below if I’m no use.’

‘My mucking intentions are to leave these poor sods behind by nightfall, to stay out of the crossfire and the lee shore and that blary boat-gobbler of a reef, to lighten your purse by three-quarters, to get close to the Arquali flagship — and incidentally you’d better find me that flagship — and finally, to be sure none of your ex-proteges see your face. So yes, I will be stashing you below, and not very comfortably, I’m afraid. Enjoy your liberty while you can.’

‘You are a pig, sometimes, Gregory,’ said Suthinia. ‘Enjoy that? Do you enjoy it when your mates in the Fens get slaughtered?’

‘It’s a pleasant morning all the same. Look at them clouds, Suthee. That one looks like a sheepdog.’

‘Go rot in the Pits. They’re his countrymen. You didn’t even ask if Kesper was his friend.’

‘Didn’t need to ask,’ said Gregory.

Isiq cleared his throat. ‘Your heart is kind, Lady Suthinia-’

‘Put your eye to that blary scope!’ she said. ‘Tell Gregory what we’re looking at. You’re the war-maker, and that’s your fleet.’

‘Alas for Arqual, that is merely a squadron.’

Suthinia’s eyes danced with fire. ‘You spent your life among those people. You must know something about them — something beyond how to make them tear defenceless cities apart.’

Isiq raised the telescope. Rin’s heart, that’s much woman. A few hours in her presence and he’d stopped craving deathsmoke. And who knew? A few days, if they lived that long, and the witch might cure him of missing Syrarys as well. Just as well that she despised him and all he stood for. There was no room for love in his plans.

So: northwards. Three impossibilities to choose from. You could tack west for hours, in plain sight, and hope the Mzithrinis give you the freedom of the waters they held. You could run between the opposing forces and be pulverised. Or you try to slip east of the action, between the Arquali line and Cape Coristel. And that option was at least as mad as the others. Yes, there was a fair mile between the battle-line and the sawtooth rocks of the Cape. But the wind was onshore, and would contend with the Dancer league by league, trying to drive her onto those rocks. Such a wind called for prodigious leeway: a good skipper would sail another eight or ten miles west, before starting his northward tack. Of course that wasn’t going to happen today: that whole Arquali squadron would have been better off eight miles west. The Black Rags were not letting it happen.

Gregory had them on a beam reach, sailing right into the slaughter. It was tactical, of course: you needn’t chase a boat that was coming straight for you. But soon enough he’d have to show his hand. They had to round Cape Coristel: Isiq knew no more than that. What cove or uncharted island or waiting boat they were making for neither Gregory nor Suthinia would reveal. Beyond the Cape lay the Chereste Sands, a long flat dunescape separating the Gulf of Thol from the vast, steaming Crab Fens. Isiq had guessed at first that they would make a landing there and trudge into the interior — but King Oshiram had heard that Arqualis were holding the Cape, with great guns hauled from Ormael, ready to blast any Mzithrinis who broke through the line. They would not put ashore on the Chereste Sands.

Could they be bound for Tholjassa? Maisa had indeed fled to that mountainous land, decades ago, with her two young sons. Naval gossip had confirmed it, along with the fact that Sandor Ott had pursued them, assassinated the children, brought them back to Etherhorde on slabs of ice as warnings to any future foes, royal or otherwise, of His Supremacy Magad V. Isiq had always assumed Ott had killed the mother as well. Halfway measures were not to his liking.

The cannon roared. They crept nearer the mayhem. Before them a Mzithrini ship dragged herself to shelter behind the line, trailing rigging, her foremast in pieces on the deck. Then Isiq saw what he’d been looking for. Behind the Arquali warships, lighter auxiliary craft were running the line, bringing fresh powder and replacements for fallen men. One of these, a sizeable brig, was trimming her sails afresh. Isiq pointed to her with the telescope.

‘Breakaway, Captain. They’ve been ordered to pay us a visit, sure as Rin made rain.’

‘We’ll be ready.’

‘Is that certain?’ asked Isiq. ‘You’ve never dealt with the navy until you’ve seen them on a war footing.’

‘What will they do to us?’ asked Suthinia.

Isiq looked at her. ‘Anything remotely useful in a fight they’ll appropriate,’ he said, ‘water and provisions included. Then they’ll turn us back to Simjalla, and they won’t listen to a word we have to say.’

The brig heeled round, and her sails began to fill. ‘They’re on intercept, true enough,’ said Gregory. ‘Right, old