Linsha saw Rolfe step up the ropes and slowly reach his arm over the platform to grab the sailor’s ankle. She did not think that was a very good idea until he caught her eye and pointed downward. On the deck below, she saw Lord Bight, the two guard officers, and the harbormaster. They had found a length of sail and stretched it out like a net to catch anyone who fell. Perhaps that was for the best, she thought. If she and the first mate couldn’t talk the sailor out of the rigging, they might have to knock him down. Meanwhile, the guards, the sailors, and the spectators out on the pier watched the unfolding action in noisy excitement. A few prayers were said and a few bets were made, and one enterprising youngster came out to sell cupfuls of water to the spectators.
Up in the crow’s nest, Rolfe’s hand suddenly clamped around the young man’s ankle. With a shriek, the sailor wrenched away from him, leaped over Linsha’s head, and crawled out onto the yardarm.
“Wait!” Linsha cried. “Please…” She pulled herself up and onto the wooden yard and crawled slowly toward him. The yard, heavy with drooping sails and the weight of one man, swayed beneath her. She clung to it with all her strength, her eyes on the sailor.
He crept away from her until he could go no farther, and there he perched, where the end of the yard leaned out over the water. His arms and legs trembled and his body swayed.
Linsha carefully eased her hand out toward him. “Come on. Come off there. We’ll find medicine and water for you. We’ll find a place where you can rest.”
A deep, racking sob shook his entire body. For just a moment, Linsha hoped she had convinced him. His hand lifted toward hers, and his face relaxed into a semblance of peace. The hope lasted only a heartbeat.
Abruptly the sailor’s bloody eyes rolled up in their sockets, his muscles failed, and his body slipped off the narrow yard and plunged toward the water below.
Linsha threw herself toward him, but his hand slid beyond her grasp. Then, in an instant, she had herself to worry about. Her balance, already unsteady on the swaying yard, rocked forward with her sudden movement and tipped sideways. Her upper body slid off the beam, and she found herself hanging upside down from the yard by her toes.
Rolfe gasped and scrambled toward her.
Shouts rose from the crowd on the dock as the sailor’s body hit the water and disappeared in a splash of white foam, then all eyes turned back to the woman dangling over the deck of the runaway.
Linsha tried frantically to grab a handful of sail. She could feel her feet slipping. Her boots were made for walking, not gripping the smooth sides of a wooden beam. There was no time to find a convenient loop of rope or dangling lifeline. Her feet slipped free and her body dropped, its weight wrenching her grip loose from the heavy sails. She fell, tumbling, toward the deck nearly thirty feet below.
The fall happened so quickly Linsha barely had time to draw a deep breath and force her body to relax before she landed with a hard
“Th-thank you,” Linsha said breathlessly.
“Lynn of Gateway, you are either incredibly brave or incredibly foolish,” Lord Bight commented as he offered her his hand to help her rise.
Linsha climbed to her feet and looked over the rail where the sailor had disappeared. There was no sign of him in the warm, dark waters under the ship.
“That was a brave attempt,” Commander Durne said from beside her.
“But a vain one,” she replied sadly. The rush of excitement had ended abruptly and left her exhausted and drained. She stood limply, drooping in a weariness that seemed to deprive her of thought and energy. She glanced back at the lord governor and saw he had already moved away and was talking to the harbormaster about the damaged
Commander Durne understood her exhaustion. He, too, had felt the loss of strength and will after a heartfelt struggle. He bowed slightly to her, a mark of respect for an underling. “I will tell Sergeant Amwold you are dismissed. You may return to your horse.”
She pushed hack her damp hair, finished the movement in a salute, and turned to make her way hack to the pier.
Commander Durne stood thoughtfully and watched her until her form blended into the busy traffic.
Chapter Four
Linsha’s lodgings were small and rundown and, best of all, inexpensive. They also had the advantage of being close to Windcatcher’s stable on a side street halfway between the West Gate and the harbor. Although she could have chosen to get a free bed in the billets at the guards’ camp, being one of the few women in the guards prompted her to look for her own place. Besides, as Lynn, she would have much preferred a room closer to the action of the gaming houses and taverns.
With a tip from her leader, Lady Knight Karine Thasally, she found an elderly widow seeking to rent the top floor of her house. Despite Lynn’s uncouth, uneducated manners, the widow Elenor took the wild Lynn under her wing and did her best to care for the young woman. Perhaps she appreciated having a member of the guards under her roof; perhaps she was lonely. Whatever the reason, Elenor reminded Linsha of her grandmother, and she was not loath to return the regard.
After stabling and rubbing down Windcatcher, Linsha walked gratefully home. The house was a narrow two- story timber-and-stone edifice with a tiny garden in the back and leaded windows that looked out toward the harbor. Elenor’s husband had built the house for her shortly after the arrival of Hogan Bight, and for over twenty years, she had lived in the house while her husband plied his trade in the Newsea. Time and illness had taken her husband, worn down her house, and aged her once pretty face, but Elenor seemed to Linsha to be indomitable.
Elenor was standing on a ladder, slapping whitewash against the stone chimney, when she saw Linsha approaching.
“Oh, thank goodness, I can take a break,” she said as Linsha came closer.
“Elenor, what are you doing? I thought we agreed you would hire the Kellen boy to do that! You shouldn’t be up on a ladder in this heat.”
Elenor came carefully down her ladder one step at a time. “He was busy. But I think you’re right. I’m parched. And you look all wrung out. You’re late! What did they have you doing today?”
Linsha gave her a weary smile. She was tired and wanted to get out of her sweat-soaked clothes, but Elenor loved to hear the news and gossip of the city and counted on Lynn to spend a few minutes to tell her all about her duties and activities. In return, she plied the young woman with ale, tea, or cooled juice, and honey cakes, tea cakes, cookies, shortbreads, or whatever she had taken from the oven that morning. Linsha thought it was a fair return. She crossed her arms and said casually, “I had to take a message to Lord Bight.”
Elenor’s creased face lit up. “My dear, come in the kitchen and tell me all about it. We’ll hang that tunic of yours in the breeze to dry and share a pitcher of cold cider.” She rubbed her whitewash-speckled hands on her apron. “Do you know, old Cobb down at the Dancing Bear contrived to bring some ice down from the mountains. Oh, my stars, you should have seen the crowd there this morning! When I took the order of tea cakes to his kitchen, he gave me a bowl of ice in thanks. Come have some before it melts.”
They walked through the small house down a central hallway to a kitchen attached to the rear and finished several glasses of icy cider and a stack of tea cakes. Linsha thought she had never tasted anything so delightful. It was nearly noon before she reached the end of her tale and exhausted all of Elenor’s questions.
Drooping with weariness, Linsha trudged up the narrow stairs to her room. Elenor had opened the two small windows wide for ventilation and cleaned the room as usual. The largest room contained a bed covered with a faded quilt, a chest, a few pegs for clothes and weapons, a small table and chair, and a lamp. The furnishings were plain and simple and showed little of the occupant’s personality. The second room, hardly larger than a pantry, was used mostly for storage. The little apartment was hot, but after the oppressive heat outside, the shade and the
