Clandestine circle

With the book tucked under her arm, Linsha searched the cabin for the cat. There was no sign of it in there or in any of the small cabins under the aft deck. She looked through the crew’s quarters, the sail locker, and the galley to no avail. Finally she took a small hand lamp and climbed down the ladder into the hold, where the cargo of sheep and cattle had been contained in two rows of pens. The pens had been cleaned and washed down after the animals were unloaded, which held the odor down to a tolerable level. Thick, hot darkness filled the hold and hid a myriad of places a cat could hide. In the aisle that divided the two rows of pens, a few bales of straw gleamed pale gold in her lamplight. Barrels of oil, ready for the fire that would consume the Whydah, sat close to the curving wooden sides of the ship.

Linsha walked several paces down the aisle and shone her lamp around. There was no cat in sight Something moved in the darkness behind her, a small pattering something that dived into the bales of straw. A furry form flew after it.

“There you are,” Linsha said under her breath.

She turned around, and suddenly a heavy weight slammed into her back. She lost her balance, and she fell heavily to the planked walkway. Her lamp smashed into the floor and went out.

Hard and heavy, the weight pressed into the small of her hack. A blade nicked her throat.

“What in the name of Reorx are you doing down here?” growled a voice in her ear.

Chapter Seven

Linsha considered her options for a moment, then decided to He quietly and try to placate the opponent on her back. If that knife hadn’t been there, she could have flipped him off and kept him at bay, but an armed enemy she couldn’t see in the intense darkness, who had a sharp blade so close to her jugular, was too great a risk.

“I said, what are you doing down here?” he repeated fiercely.

“I am with the Governor’s Guards. I’m looking for the cat,” she said as calmly as she could.

The voice snorted behind her. “You’re wearing a City Guard’s uniform, and a stinking one at that. Why were you sneaking around down here? All the guards have been ordered off.”

“Lord Bight sent me to look for the ship’s cat. Now get off!” Linsha insisted.

The knife moved away from her throat. “The governor’s here already?”

Linsha realized her eyes were growing more accustomed to the dark. She could see faint shapes amid the deep shadows, and the glimmer from the hatch above seemed to grow brighter. She turned her head slightly and saw a gleam of light flicker on the long blade of a dagger, now pointed toward the floor and away from her neck. That was enough for her. As quick as a striking snake, she reached behind her shoulder, grabbed the wrist with the dagger in both hands, and wrenched it toward the floor. At the same time, she rolled in the same direction, dislodging her attacker and knocking him into the wooden walls of a pen. Linsha sprang to her feet, a back-alley curse on her lips, and she pulled her own dagger and crouched, ready to attack.

With a disgusted grunt, a short, stocky figure pushed himself upright and spat into the straw. “I suppose I deserved that,” he said. “But you startled me. The ship is supposed to be empty. I thought you were a looter.”

Linsha relaxed slightly. She could see well enough now to make out the face and form of a dwarf. “Now it’s my turn to ask. What are you doing down here?”

“Governor’s business,” he growled.

“Well, he’s right outside,” Linsha responded irritably. She was really too tired to be polite to grumpy dwarves, especially ones that put bruises on her back and stuck knives at her throat. She returned her dagger to its sheath, picked up the logbook from where it had fallen, and turned her back on him to search through the straw bales. As she hoped, a slender calico cat was there, sitting behind the bales and staring at a hole where a rat was hiding. Linsha scooped up the cat and, without a word to the dwarf, climbed up the ladder to the deck. She could hear him come up behind her, but she didn’t bother to turn around until she had crossed the ship and stepped off the plank onto the pier.

In the light of the torches, she could see the dwarf clearly now as he walked down the plank. She gave him the barest nod of greeting.

A hint of amusement lightened the frown on his face, and he returned the nod. “I am Mica, healer to the Governor’s Court and priest in the Temple of the Heart.”

So, he was a mystic healer from the newly refurbished temple on the hill. Interesting. “I am Lynn of Gateway, newest member of the Governor’s Guards,” she replied.

He stood barely four feet in his handmade leather shoes, yet he still managed to look down his nose at her sweat-stained uniform. “You must be very new. Had a busy day?”

The lady Knight examined the dwarfs immaculate brown jacket, linen shirt, and beautifully tailored pants and rolled her eyes. Even after the tussle below deck, he was fastidiously clean and unwrinkled. She felt like a pile of worn-out, discarded rags beside him. “You wouldn’t believe it,” she muttered and was about to walk away when Commander Durne joined them.

“Ah, Mica. You’re still here. The governor would like to talk to you.”

The dwarf inclined his head to them both and walked to join Lord Bight at the end of the pier, where he and his officers waited for the rowers.

Commander Durne looked at Linsha, then took a closer look. “You have straw in your hair and a cut on your neck that wasn’t there earlier.” He grinned. “Did the cat put up a fight?”

To her surprise, Linsha suddenly became very self-conscious of her dirty, smelly clothes and her grimy face and intensely aware of how close Commander Durne was standing to her. She clutched the cat and the logbook close to her, like a shield, and sidled a step away. Fortunately the cat was perfectly comfortable where she was and made no effort to squirm away. A purr rumbled contentedly from her furry throat.

“Ah, no,” Linsha said quickly to hide her discomfort. “The dwarf ambushed me in the cargo hold.”

“Mica?” said Durne, surprised.

“He thought I was a looter.”

“I didn’t think he had it in him. He’s usually too fussy about his appearance to bother attacking people.”

Linsha heard no derision in his words, only an observation. “He said he’s the healer to the Governor’s Court.”

“Yes. He’s very good. He read the previous healer’s report and insisted on examining the Whydah for himself.”

“Have any of the healers recognized this illness?” Linsha asked.

Durne crossed his arms and stared out into the darkness of the harbor. “No,” he said briefly.

They lapsed into silence and stood together, gazing into the night. The darkness was velvety black, heavy with heat and haze. The moon had not risen yet, and little could be seen beyond the scattered lights on ships and pleasure craft anchored beyond the piers. There was still no hint of wind, and the water rested quietly under a gentle swell.

“Good night to burn a ship,” Linsha said softly.

They heard the splash of approaching oars, and two large towboats appeared out of the night. Quickly and efficiently, ropes from the Whydah’s bow were attached to the sterns of the two boats while the plank was drawn aside and the freighter’s moorings were cast off. A chanter on the foremost towboat began a slow, rhythmic song, and the oars on both boats bit deep into the water. The Whydah began to move.

Lord Bight and his bodyguards, the City Guards, Mica, and Linsha watched without speaking as the doomed vessel began her slow journey to the funeral pyre. They watched her glide slowly into the darkness until she was little more than a vague shape against the distant lights, then she vanished completely. Minutes ticked by.

In Linsha’s arms, the ship’s cat lifted her head and pricked her ears. A yellow light flared far away in the inky blackness, followed by a second burst. Two lights, like tiny dancing flames, faded, then brightened and spread into two glowing balls. Suddenly there was a muffled explosion, and the two lights soared into one furious column of flame that consumed the ship and cremated the dead in one last glowing conflagration that could be seen from all sides of the harbor and as far as the city walls.

When the flames at last began to die, a loud, sonorous horn blew a farewell call from the harbormaster’s