Breezerunner around. 'Can you pinpoint the area?' he asked her.
'I can give you my best guess,' Sabyna answered.
Slowly, the ship came around, working with the wind. After only twenty minutes' searching, one of the sailors called out, 'Found it, cap'n! Sunken ship by the looks of it!'
Sabyna felt a chill shoot through her stomach. A ship sunk this far out from Amn, there'd be no chance for any survivors that hadn't made the lifeboats or a rescue ship. It was too far to swim and the ocean was filled with savage creatures. She followed Tynnel to the starboard side and gazed out at the water as Breezerunner slowed from a crawl to a gentle bob fully stopped on the ocean's surface.
Three men handled lanterns in the prow, lowering them over the side by ropes. As clear and as clean as the sea was, even the lantern light at full night was enough to reveal the outlines of the small cog listing nearly upside down in the water. The stern area wasn't visible at all.
Tynnel gave orders to lower a rowboat with Mornis in charge. Shrill squeals whined around the deck as the block and tackles were used. The first mate quickly picked his people.
'Probably a damned waste of time,' the captain said angrily as he peered at the stricken ship, 'but we've got to investigate and see if there's any potential salvage value.'
'She's not resting on the bottom,' Sabyna said. 'She's drifting. That's why we passed over her instead of her ripping our bottom out. There won't be any salvage. I've never seen a cog less than thirty feet long, and if it was longer than that, my alarm would have sounded. What we're seeing out there is part of a ship. Something broke it in half.'
'We'll see.'
'I'd like to go with the rowboat crew,' she said.
He glanced at her with a sour expression. 'I'd feel better if you stayed aboard Breezerunner.'
'My magic will allow me more salvaging time and ability than anyone else you could send,' she pointed out. 'In these currents, that ship could be gone in moments, taken completely to the bottom.'
Tynnel gave a short nod. 'First sign of trouble, I want you back here.'
Sabyna joined the rowboat crew, scrambling down the rope ladder that had been thrown over Breezerunner's side. Her feet reached the rowboat and Mornis guided her to secure footing.
'Lady.'
She looked up at the young sailor who lied about his true name. 'What?'
He held a lantern and the illumination turned the bronze of his face to smooth butter. 'I've some experience in salvage work,' Jherek said. 'If I could be of assistance?'
'We don't need some wetnose along on something that could be a dangerous bit of business,' Mornis stated gruffly. 'Assuming there's nothing nasty waiting in that ship's carcass, if it goes down, there could be a hell of an undertow.'
'He's worked as a shipwright,' Sabyna said. 'He could be of help.' She glanced to the right and saw Tynnel standing there. 'Captain?'
'Let him go,' Tynnel said. 'It's Sabyna's call.'
Sabyna knew he was giving her back some of the authority and respect he'd stripped from her earlier. She kept the smile from her face and nodded to the young sailor.
Jherek joined them in the rowboat, hardly causing any rocking. Seating himself, he took up an oar and shoved it into an oarlock, then awaited commands.
Sabyna deliberately distanced herself from him and watched him as she sat in the middle of the rowboat. The slat felt hard and unyielding.
Mornis bawled out orders, getting the rowing groups into action. The rowboat came about smartly in the water, cutting through the gentle waves to the area marked from above by the lanterns.
Reaching into the bag of holding at her waist, Sabyna seized the hunk of ivory and off-white cloth inside and unfurled it into the air before her. All of the rowboat's crew except the young sailor drew back.
The cloth resembled a patchwork quilt without the stitching. When Sabyna released the cloth, the scraps fluttered and flew, twisting as if caught in a gentle hurricane. Then they bunched into a serpentine figure that wafted gently in the breeze six feet above the boat and the cowering sailors.
'Guard,' Sabyna ordered.
The serpentine shape stretched out and flattened, riding the winds just above and in front of the rowboat.
'What is that?' Jherek asked.
Sabyna looked at him, searching for any reproach in his gaze. She didn't find it and guessed that he'd never heard of the creature. 'That's a raggamoffyn,' she told him. 'My familiar.'
'Some say those are creatures of evil,' Jherek said, and several of the sailors quietly agreed with him.
Sabyna watched the raggamoffyn change its shape as if luxuriating in the freedom. Since it wasn't well received aboard Breezerunner, she didn't often let it out of the bag of holding except in her cabin.
'Some are evil, I suppose,' she agreed. 'Some are only pranksters and don't know anything of accountability. Pretty much, they're whatever they want to be. The raggamoffyns known as shrapnel are evil to the core. There are those who say that they're a race of creatures unto themselves, and still others who say they are the minions of a faceless wizard with a black heart. I don't know what to believe about all that, but this raggamoffyn does what I ask it to.'
'I see.'
The rhythmic sweep of the oars through the water provided an undercurrent to their conversation. Sabyna held her lantern aloft, searching the water ahead of the row-boat. The raggamoffyn involuntarily flinched away from the flame, creating a momentary bow in its present linear shape. 'Its name is Skeins. I created it when it came time for me to take a familiar. The cloth it's made of is the shroud that covered my brother Dannin for his funeral service. I was ten when he died and I saved it, knowing exactly what I was going to do with it. When it was time, I sought out another raggamoffyn and made it perform the rites necessary to give life to Skeins.'
'Ship the oars,' Mornis ordered. 'Get ready to pull away.'
Sabyna stood in the rowboat's prow, gazing down into the water where the cog lay. The ship twisted and turned a little, rocking with the currents that held it. The wreckage appeared lifeless, white wood showing where some of the hull had been splintered and cracked under pressure.
Something thumped the inside of the ship, the hollow gonging noise echoing through the water was barely heard above the creak of the rowboat.
Jherek listened to the thumping coming from inside the wrecked cog. It sounded across the flat sea, and stopped after less than a minute.
'All right,' Mornis said, 'I need two volunteers to investigate the wreck.'
None of the sailors raised their hands.
'I'll go,' Jherek said.
'An' you're a damn fool if you do,' Aysel said from further back in the stern.
Jherek had seen the big man come aboard when the rowboat had been loaded, but had ignored him. He ignored him again and rose easily to his feet. He pulled off his boots and shucked his cutlass, keeping only the hook and a knife in a scabbard on his shin.
'Anyone else?' Mornis asked.
No one volunteered.
Jherek didn't blame them. If someone else had volunteered to go, he'd have let them. The water was dark, the illumination wouldn't travel very far into it, and there was no telling what lay below. He walked to the rowboat's edge and started taking deep breaths to completely fill his lungs for the dive.
'Brave bunch, aren't you?' Mornis challenged. He pulled off his own boots, then his shirt. He kept a long saw-toothed knife. He flicked his gaze to Jherek. 'You might want to take that shirt off too, lad.'
'I'll be all right,' Jherek replied, not wanting to chance the tattoo being seen. 'The water will be cold.'
The first mate chuckled. 'About to dive into something like that,' he gestured at the sunken cog, 'and you're worried about a little chill.' He shook his head. 'You ready to do this?'
'Aye.' Jherek marshaled his control, pushing away the fear that filled him. He didn't know any of these people, much less whoever might be in the sunken cog. He had no business jumping into that water, but he couldn't
