Glory Season

cruised into view, some meters below their tiny vessel, undulating silently with sinuous power and speed. The largest of the creatures would have outmassed the Manitou, and took several minutes to progress, yet its smooth passage scarcely caused a ripple above as the skiff passed at an angle. Maia barely glimpsed the monster’s tail, then the mysterious underwater convoy was gone.

A few minutes later, Brod shifted forward in his seat, staring as he shaded his eyes with one hand, his body abruptly tense. “What is it?” Maia asked.

“I’m… not sure. I thought for a second something crossed the sun.” He shook his head. “It’s getting late. How close to Jellicoe?”

“We’ll be in sight after that next little spire, ahead.” Maia unfurled the chart. “It seems to consist of about two dozen teeth, all fused together. There are two anchorages, with some major caves noted here.” She looked up and gauged the rate of sunset. “It’ll be close, but we should have time to scout a channel before dark.”

The young man nodded, still frowning in concern. “Get ready to come about, then.”

The maneuver went smoothly, the wind snapping their rugged sail into line as it had all day. Maybe our luck really has changed, Maia thought, knowing full well that she was tempting fate. Once they were cruising steady on the new tack, she spoke again, bringing up another imminent concern.

“Naroin made me promise to try calling her superiors, in case we find a radio at Halsey.”

It wasn’t a vow she relished. Maia personally trusted Naroin, but her superiors? So many groups want Renna for their own reasons. He has enemies on the Council. And even supposing honest cops answer a call, will the reavers let Renna be taken alive?

One disturbing thought after another had occurred to her. What if the Council still has weapons like those that burned Grimké? What if they conclude a dead alien is better than one in the hands of their foes?

Brod’s answer sounded as halfhearted as Maia felt. “We could try for the comm room, I suppose. It might be unwatched late at night. The idea gives me a pain in the gut, though.”

“I know. It’d be awfully risky, combined with burgling the chart room—”

“That’s not it,” Brod cut in. “I’d just… rather someone else called the cops on my guild.”

Maia looked at him. “Loyalty? After the way they treated you?”

“That’s not it,” he said, shaking his head. “I won’t stay with ’em after this.”

“Well, then? You’re already helping me go after Renna.”

“You don’t understand. Another guild might respect me for helping you save a friend. But who’s gonna hire a man who’s squealed on his own crewmates?”

“Oh.” Maia hadn’t realized the added risk Brod was taking. Beyond life and freedom, he could lose all chance of a career. Something I never had, Maia almost murmured, but recanted. It takes courage for a person with prospects to gamble them on a hazard of honor.

The skiff began rounding the nearest headland. Beyond, just as Maia had predicted, a large, convoluted island hove gradually into view. To Maia, it looked as if a great claw had frozen in place while reaching out of the sea. Some mysterious geological process had welded the fingerlike talons, joining multiple slender spires in a mesh of stony arches.

Jellicoe Island had been even bigger, once upon a time. Stubby, fused remnants showed where a more extensive network of outlying islets had been blasted apart by an ancient power, presumably the same as excavated Grimké. Linear tracks of seared stone glistened like healed scar tissue across the jutting cliffs, adding contortions to the convoluted outlines ordained by nature. The resulting coastline had the horizontal contours of a twisted, many-pointed star, with rounded nubs instead of vertices and edges. Irregular openings broke the rhythmic outline.

A few minutes later, one of those gaps let Maia glimpse a lagoon within, as placid as glass.

“There it is!” she announced. “Perfect. We can sail right through and set anchor—”

“Shiva an’ Zeus!” Brod cursed. “Maia, get down!”

She barely ducked in time as Brod steered hard, sending the boom flying across the little boat, whistling where Maia’s head had been.

“What’re you doing?” she cried. But the young man did not answer. Gripping the tiller, his hands were white with tension, eyes all concentration. Lifting her head to see, Maia gasped. “It’s the Reckless!”

The three-masted, fore-and-aft schooner bore toward them from the southwest, almost directly out of the setting sun. The sight of its gravid sails, straining to increase a speedy clip, was breathless and dreadful to behold. While Maia and Brod had been wrestling their tiny vessel on a series of sunward, upwind tacks, the reaver ship had already crossed most of the space between two islands.

“Do you think she’s seen us?” Maia felt inane for asking. Yet, Brod was clearly counting on that hope, trying to duck back behind the spire they had just passed. If only the reavers had lazy lookouts…

Hope vanished with the sound of a whistle—a shriek of steam and predatory delight. Squinting against the glare, Maia saw a crowd of silhouettes gather at the bow, pointing. The image might have triggered deja vu, bringing back how the day began, except that this was no little ketch, but a freighter, augmented for speed and deadliness. Smoke trails told of boilers firing up. Maia’s nose twitched at the scent of burning coal. She did a quick calculation in her mind.

“It’s no good running!” she told Brod. “They’ve got speed, guns, maybe radar. Even if we get away, they’ll search all night, and we’ll smash up in the dark!”

“I’m open to suggestions!” her partner snapped. Perspiration beaded his lip and brow.

Maia grabbed his arm. “Swing back westward! We can tack closer to the wind. Reckless will have to reef sails to follow. Her engines may still be cold. With luck, we can dodge into that maze.” She pointed at the corrugated coastline of Jellicoe Island.

Brod hesitated, then nodded. “At least it’ll surprise ’em. You ready?”

Maia braced herself and grabbed the boom, preparing to kick. “Ready, Captain!”

He grimaced at the standing joke. Maia quashed rebellion in her stomach, where the bilious, familiar commotion of fear and adrenaline had come back, as if to a favorite haunt.

So much for that string of luck, she thought. I should have known better.

“All right,” Brod said with a ragged sigh, clearly sharing the thought. “Here goes.”

* * *

Everything depended on nearest passage. How tight could the bigger vessel turn? What weapons would be brought to bear?

As expected, the diminutive skiff was far better at drawing a close tack. The Reckless hesitated too long after Brod changed course. When the reaver ship came about at last, it fell short and wound up abeam to the breeze. Brod and Maia gained westward momentum, while seamen struggled aloft, lashing sails so the still- warming engines would not have to fight them pushing upwind. The rest of the reaver crew watched from the railings. Do they recognize the skiff? Maia wondered. By now surely they know something’s happened to Inanna and their friends on the ketch. Lysos, they look angry!

Even with the big ship wallowing, there would come a moment when the two vessels passed by no more than a couple of hundred meters. What would the pirates do about it?

Working hard to help Brod maneuver as tightly as possible, Maia trimmed the sail for maximum efficiency. This meant having to throw herself from one side of the skiff to the other, leaning her weight far out, wherever balance was most needed. She had never sailed a small boat in this way, literally skating across the water. It was exhilarating, and might have been fun if her gut weren’t turning somersaults. In glimpses, she sought to see if, by some chance, Renna stood upon the pirate ship. There were men on the schooner’s quarterdeck, as during the taking of the Manitou, but no sign of Renna’s peculiar dark features.

As the skiff swung broadside to the wallowing vessel, Maia heard furious shouts across the span of open water.

Words were indiscernible, but she recognized the livid, red-faced visage of the ship’s male captain, arguing