seated for an age.
“Not just yet, Mr. Vishby. Some of my friends may have forgotten me.”
Unix was also freed, and went immediately to work, stripping K-Max of his boots and belt. He shrugged off the top half of his own jumpsuit and tied it off at his waist, so the scar tissue of his wing nubs could get a little air.
Turnball felt a twinge of unease. Unix was a disturbing fellow, loyal unto death, but strange beyond strange. He could have had those wing nubs carved down by a plastidoc, but he preferred to wear them like trophies.
“Everything all right, Unix?”
The pale sprite nodded curtly, then continued to frisk K-Max’s person.
“Very well,” said Turnball, taking center stage for his big speech. “Gentlemen, we are on the brink of what the press often refers to as
“I choose to survive,” said Ching Mayle, a gruff goblin with bite marks on his skull, and muscles up to his ears.
“Not so fast, Mayle. A leap of faith is involved.”
“You can count on me, Captain.”
This from Bobb Ragby, a dwarf fitted with an extra restraint in the form of a mouth ring. He had fought at Turnball’s behest in many a skirmish, including the fateful one on the Tern Islands, where Julius Root and Holly Short had finally arrested Turnball.
Turnball flicked Bobb’s mouth ring, making it ping.
“Can I, Mr. Ragby, or has prison made you soft? Do you still have the gumption?”
“Just take this ring off and find out. I will swallow that guard whole.”
“Which guard?” asked Vishby, nervous in spite of the thrall rune that pulsed at his throat.
“Not you, Vishby,” said Turnball soothingly. “Mr. Ragby didn’t mean you, did you, Mr. Ragby?”
“I did, actually.”
Turnball’s fingers flew to his mouth. “How troubling. I am conflicted, Mr. Vishby. You have done me no little service, but Bobb Ragby there wants to eat you, and that would be entertaining, plus he gets grumpy if we don’t feed him.”
Vishby wanted to be terrified, to take some radical action, but the rune on his neck forbade any emotion stronger than mild anxiety. “Please, Turnball, Captain. I thought we were friends.”
Turnball Root considered this. “You are a traitor to your people, Vishby. How can I take a traitor for a friend?”
Even a magic-doped Vishby could see the irony in this. After all, had not Turnball Root betrayed his kind on numerous occasions, even sacrificing members of the criminal fraternity for creature comforts in his cell?
“But your model parts,” he objected weakly. “And the computer. You gave the names of-”
Turnball did not like how this conversation was going and so took two quick steps and buzzed Vishby in the gills. The water elf fell sideways on the pilot seat and hung in his harness, arms dangling, gills rippling.
“Jabber jabber jabber,” said Turnball brightly. “All these guards are the same. Always sticking it to the cons, eh, my boyos?”
Unix spun Vishby’s chair around and began a thorough search, taking anything of potential use, even a small pack of indigestion tablets, because you never knew.
“Here’s the choice, gentlemen,” said Turnball to his captive audience. “Step outside with me now, or stay and wait for an assault charge to be added to your sentence.”
“Just step outside?” said Bobb Ragby, half chuckling.
Turnball smiled easily, charming as a devil. “That’s it, lads. We step outside into the water.”
“I read something about there being pressure underwater.”
“I heard that too,” said Ching Mayle, licking an eyeball. “Won’t we be crushed?”
Turnball shrugged, milking his moment. “Trust me, lads. It’s all about trust. If you don’t trust me, stay here and rot. I need men with me I can rely on, especially with what I’ve got planned. Think of this as a test.”
There were several groans. Captain Root had always had a thing for tests. It wasn’t enough to be a murderous marauder-a person had to pass all these tests. Once he had made the entire group eat raw stink worms just to prove that they were prepared to obey any order, however ludicrous. The hideaway’s plumbing had taken quite a battering that weekend.
Ching Mayle scratched the bite marks on his crown. “Those are our choices? Stay here or step outside?”
“Succinctly put, Mr. Mayle. Sometimes a limited vocabulary can be an advantage.”
“Can we think about it?”
“Of course, take all the time you need,” said Turnball magnanimously. “So long as your cogitations do not take more than two minutes.”
Ching frowned. “My cogitations can take hours, especially if I have red meat.”
Most fairies found animal flesh disgusting, but every enclave had its omnivorous faction.
“Two minutes? Seriously, Captain?”
“No.”
Bobb Ragby would have wiped his brow if he could have reached it. “Thank goodness.”
“One hundred seconds now. Come on, gents. Ticktock.”
Unix rose from his search and stood wordlessly at Turnball’s side.
“That’s one. Who else is willing to place their lives in my hands?”
Ching nodded. “I reckon, yes. You did good by me,
Captain. I never even smelled fresh air till I cast my lot with you.”
“Count me in,” said Bobb Ragby, rattling his bar. “I’m scared, Captain. I won’t deny it, but I would rather die a pirate than go back to the Deeps.”
Turnball raised an eyebrow. “And?”
Ragby’s voice was guttural with fear. “And what, Captain? I said I’d step outside.”
“It’s your motivation, Mr. Ragby. I need more than a reluctance to go back to prison.”
Ragby banged his head on the restraining bar. “More? I want to go with you, Captain. Honest I do. I swear it. I never met a leader like you.”
“Really? I don’t know. You seem reluctant.”
Ragby was not the sharpest spine on the hedgehog, but his gut told him that going with the captain was a lot safer than staying here. Turnball Root was famous for dealing with evidence and witnesses in a severe fashion. There was a legend going around the fairy fugitive bars that the captain had once burned down an entire shopping complex just to get rid of a thumbprint that he may have left behind in a booth at Falafel Fabulosity.
“I ain’t reluctant, Captain. Take me, please. I’m your faithful Ragby. Who was it that shot that fairy on Tern Mor? It were me. Good old Bobb.”
Turnball wiped an imaginary tear from one eye. “Your pathetic pleadings move me, dear Bobby. Very well, Unix, release Misters Ragby and Ching.”
The mutilated sprite did so, then popped Vishby’s harness and hoisted him upright.
“The turncoat?” said Unix.
Turnball started at the sound of Unix’s reptilian voice. He realized that in all their time together he probably hadn’t heard the sprite speak more than a hundred words.
“No. Leave him. Rice wine turns my stomach.”
Other lieutenants might have requested an explanation on this point, but not Unix, who never wanted to know stuff he didn’t need to know and even that information was ejected from his brain as soon as it outlived its usefulness. The sprite simply nodded, then tossed Vishby aside like a sack of refuse.
Ragby and Ching stood quickly, as though repulsed by their seats.
“I feel funny,” said the goblin, worming his little finger into one of the tooth marks on his bald skull. “Good ’cos I’m free, but a little bad too ’cos I might be about to die.”
“You never did have much of a filter between your brain and mouth, Mr. Mayle,” moaned Turnball. “Never mind, I’m the one paid to think.” He faced the remaining prisoners. “Anybody else? Twenty seconds left.”
