Scholar

that none of the privateers commissioned by Bhayar had shells like the ones Shuld had used. And he doubted that either of Bhayar’s two warships had shells such as those, or bronze cannon.

“Puzzled, aren’t you, scholar?” asked the captain.

“I have to admit I am. Why don’t more ships have guns and shells like that?”

Shuld laughed. “More than a few reasons. Each shell costs a gold, maybe a bit more. I have no idea what the gun cost. I was told not to ask and not to lose it-ever. Pirates can’t afford guns and shells like that. Most merchanters can’t, either. Even if they could, who would they get to make the Antiagon Fire? It takes an imager who’s also an armorer and an alchemist. There are but a handful in all Terahnar, and all are employed by High Holders or rulers.”

“Such as High Holder Ghasphar?”

Shuld nodded.

“Still … they would make fearful armament for warships.”

“They would, until everyone had them.” Shuld smiled ironically. “Only the Antiagons have ever bothered with large numbers of warships, and they have but a triple handful.”

Put that way, it made sense, all too much sense. Antiagon Fire was useless against stone and earth ramparts, and that was why no fortifications were ever wooden. But it was effective against large bodies of men on foot, and that was one reason why most rulers used cavalry or mounted infantry that could scatter quickly. Quaeryt and every other scholar for generations had known that. The threat of Antiagon Fire had also affected the way war was waged, but Quaeryt was amazed and more than a little irritated at himself for not realizing why there had been so few naval conflicts. Yet it was obvious. Why would anyone want to build a fleet of warships that could be destroyed so quickly? If every ruler built and armed ships with cannons that shot Antiagon Fire shells, a war would ruin them all.

“You understand, I see.”

“I never thought of it that way,” Quaeryt admitted.

“No one cares if pirate vessels vanish, and we just hoist the Jewel ensign if privateers get too close. If they ignore it … well, then they’re pirates.”

“I imagine the jewel fleet is profitable.”

“Rather our losses are far less, and we keep good crews that way.”

“Do you see pirates on every voyage in or out of Solis?”

“Namer’s demons, no. One passage in ten is more like it, but we could see two on a single transit, and not another for years.” Shuld turned to the bosun. “You can handle it from here, Zoeryl. If you would excuse me, scholar?”

“Oh … I didn’t mean to get in the way, Captain. Thank you.” Quaeryt inclined his head and stepped back.

Then he eased his way to the railing just forward of midships and looked back to the west. Only a rapidly dispersing plume of mixed gray and black smoke remained of the pirate vessel.

9

The sun on Jeudi-the second Jeudi Quaeryt had spent on board-had been blistering hot, especially in the late afternoon, so hot that the fantail locker was still radiating heat well after sundown. That was only one of the reasons why Quaeryt stood on the poop, just short of where the two railings met on the forward port corner, looking out into a darkness little relieved by the reddish crescent of Erion. The other reason was that the captain had asked him to stand a watch as the port lookout and offer navigation calculations.

So far, over the past glass, he’d seen no other vessels and no inclement weather creeping up from any horizon, not that he would have expected that, not on a cloudless night with a mild following wind and only moderate swells.

According to the tables, at the longitude of Cape Sud, on Jeudi, the twenty-sixth of Juyn, Artiema should rise at two quints past eighth glass. By checking the deck glass, illuminated by a shielded lantern, Quaeryt could then determine how far west the Diamond was from the cape. That was only an approximation, of course, because even in a stabilized box, the glass sands did not run smoothly, but it was a start. Then, by sighting both moons, he could get an idea of their latitude.

“Scholar … I thought you might be here.” Ghoryn’s voice was barely audible above the sound of the ship cutting through the increasingly larger swells that the Diamond was encountering as the ship neared Cape Sud.

“It should be a bit before Artiema rises, but I wanted to sight Erion first.…” Quaeryt glanced toward the horizon again.

“Where do you feel we are?”

“I’d say we’re seventy to eighty milles west of Cape Sud, and twenty south. I’ll know better when I see Artiema.”

“Oh? And why do you think that?”

“The captain wants to be far enough offshore for us not to be seen, but not too far, just beyond sight from the cliffs. He’d be holding a course a half point north of southeast to keep us even with the coast.…”

Ghoryn chuckled. “We’ll see in a bit, won’t we?”

“That we will.”

“Don’t see many scholars at sea,” offered the first mate.

“I’ve never run across another scholar who went to sea,” admitted Quaeryt. Or much of anywhere if they didn’t have to. “Then there are more sailors than scholars.” He grinned in the darkness. “Why do you think that might be?”

Ghoryn laughed. “Most folk would say that there’s need of more sailors, and perhaps a need for fewer scholars.”

“Well put,” agreed Quaeryt. “There’s a need for scholars, but too many scholars in one place are like too many cooks in the kitchen.”

“You never did say much about why you needed to get to Tilbora. Not that I heard, anyways.”

“No. I didn’t. I think I told you I had a patron who commissioned a more recent history of Tilbor.” Quaeryt kept scanning the sea to port. He was still supposed to be a lookout.

“He’d pay for that?”

“Of course. Why do you think the frontispieces of so many books give the name of the patron who commissioned the work? That’s so that everyone who reads it for generations to come will see his name.”

“Sounds sort of like Naming,” mused Ghoryn.

“Ah … but he can claim that he is merely advancing human knowledge. A patron isn’t erecting a huge stone monument that everyone would immediately see as evidence of selling one’s integrity to the Namer.”

“A clever way of Naming, then. And you’d do it?”

“What’s a name in a book compared to saving knowledge that would otherwise be lost?” asked Quaeryt. “We all have to do things that aren’t ideal. Don’t you think that there were probably some crewmen on that pirate vessel that had little choice if they wanted to survive? But didn’t the good of saving the Diamond and her crew and cargo outweigh the evil of killing a handful of comparative innocents among the guilty?”

“You scholars … you could argue that Erion was the spirit of mercy, and not the great red hunter, and then you’d make out Artiema to be the evil moon.”

“I could,” replied Quaeryt with a laugh, “but I wouldn’t. There’s a big difference between light gray and black, and sometimes there’s an even bigger difference between those who claim to follow pure white and those who prefer slightly grayed white.”

“I have the feeling you’re not a follower of the Nameless, then.”

“Oh … but I am.” At least of the tenets, even if you’re unsure if there even is a Nameless. “Life is shades of gray. Those who claim to follow the absolute of pure white are disciples of the Namer, because insisting on absolutes in an imperfect world is another form of Naming.” He glanced