Bladesman of Antares

company.

Ob-Eye, his face congested, a beautiful swelling of magnificent coloration around his one good eye, saw me and yelled. He charged. There was no time for Bladesman’s work here. We had borne on past the track of the galleon, but she was bowling along in a stiff breeze and would be gone in a trice.

“You cramph, you rast — I’ll cut you down, by Lem!”

I slid his sword, circled, clunked him over the head, and dived over the side into the water. I started swimming, fast. I am able to swim fast, Zair be praised, and I had only to knock three clutching pairs of hands away as I scythed through the wreckage. The galleon, from this angle, towered into the blue sky, seemingly immense, a spired castle of white canvas, where before she had been a vulnerable toy on the ocean floor.

I yelled.

“Ovvend Barynth! Ahoy!” Water sloshed into my mouth and I spat, took a couple of strokes, and heaved up again, waving. “Ahoy! Ovvend Barynth! Ahoy, you pack of rascals! Vallia! Vallia! Ahoy!”

The galleon sailed on, leaning with the wind, remote and majestic, aloof. I cursed. Spitting water, I lifted as far as I could, waving frantically. Behind me the sea was covered with wreckage and heads bobbed. I looked hungrily at the galleon as she surged past, white water spouting under her, the long race-built lines of her gliding through the water.

What I would have to do I had no wish to do. But there was nothing else for it.

“Ahoy, Ovvend Barynth! ”I really yelled now. “Ahoy, you bunch of witless scow- bellied loons! Vallia! I am Prince Dray Prescot! Prince Majister of Vallia! Haul up, you bunch of famblys! Ahoy! Ahoy!

Vallia! Vallia!”

An instant that was as long as eternity — then the main-topsail yard went over, the sail went to the mast, and I knew my vaunting self-boasting had at last made the captain take notice. I lay back in the water and floated and waited until the boat came. Brawny suns-bronzed arms hauled me in over the transom and I tumbled down to the stern sheets.

“You said you were a prince!” The voice of the young officer was strongly accusative. I own I looked a sight, all hairy, filthy, blood smeared, and with the seat of my pants burned away. I fixed him with my eye.

“Is Captain Lars Ehren still in command of Ovvend Barynth!”

He looked bewildered. Water dripped from me: crimson water. Opaz knew what thoughts were going through the heads of his men. They had seen a great galleon of Vallia burn. They had seen one sky ship crash headlong into another and bring her down in destruction. And now a hairy maniac had swum over to them, bellowing like a chunkrah, claiming to be a prince of Vallia. No — not claiming to be a prince of Vallia.

Claiming to be the Prince Majister.

I had been through a pretty bizarre experience, and a fight that for all the lack of actual blade-to-blade contact was as deadly as any a Bladesman might covet, and so I now confess I was just a trifle sharp with this young man. And, too, wearing trousers without a seat is a far cry from not wearing trousers or a breechclout at all. .

“Well, youngster! Brace up! I asked you a question.”

We had pulled in close enough to Ovvend Barynth to make any reply of his superfluous. A chunky man with a huge spade beard leaped up onto the ratlines, gripping with one mahogany fist, peering down at his boat as she pulled alongside with the bowman standing up ready to hook on.

“Prince Dray!” bellowed down this squat and bearded man. He almost fell off his own slip, so excited were his movements, letting go of the shrouds to wave and yell. “Prince Dray!”

“Ahoy there, Captain Lars!” I roared up. “Lahal!”

“Lahal it is, my Prince! And may Opaz be forever praised for sending you to me in this evil hour. Nikvove of Evir burned, Majister, burned! Did you see?”

“I saw, Captain Lars.” Old naval habits impelled me up and out of the boat first. Captain Lars Ehren jumped to the deck and bellowed for due honors to be paid to me as I came aboard; but I roared at him, and clasped his hand. “You are for Hyrklana, of course? Vollers?”

“Aye, Prince.”

“It is a fruitless journey. Turn back, Captain. Put your helm over and brace your yards around. We can find our own fliers in Vallia, by Vox!”

The Vallian deputation for Hyrklana aboard, of whom I knew only one man, and that slightly, demurred, but I overbore them. Truth to tell, I think the ghastly sight of a great Vallian galleon burning — there was now no sign of Nikvove of Evir at all — convinced them with more urgency. We picked up a mere handful of the men from the doomed ship who had managed to hurl themselves overboard. Captain Lars Ehren turned his ship’s rakish beakhead to the north and with the wind over our starboard beam we punched into the seas, going home.

There was much to be accomplished still in Hamal, for I had not given up my schemes for that country, not by a long zorca-horn. Rees the lion-man, chinless Chido, they would not be forgotten — the Trylon Rees with his booming laugh and his “We’ll make you a Bladesman yet, Hamun!” — and there was, also, that extraordinarily unpleasant Queen Thyllis to be reckoned with, and the obnoxious King Doghamrei -

and there were others.

I fancied that Hamun ham Farthytu, Amak of Paline Valley, candidate for Bladesman, would one day ride into Ruathytu and go knocking on doors in the sacred quarter.

I did not forget the cramphs of Hamal had burned and sunk a fine galleon of Vallia. But, most important, glorious and wonderful despite it had been bought in cunning and treachery, I carried with me fifty percent of the secrets of the fliers, and the wise men of Vallia must supply the answers for the other fifty percent. The Emperor, my Delia’s father, would want to know the reason why if they did not.

Delia! Delia of the Blue Mountains, Delia of Delphond!

Home, home to Vallia! Blow the winds! Roar the gales! Bear me on and on to Valka and my high fortress of Esser Rarioch overlooking Valkanium and the bay! Home, home, home. .

“You shiver, my Prince!” Captain Lars Ehren looked concerned. “Your clothes — let me provide you with the best we have.”

“A simple breechclout will do, Captain.” I sniffed the breeze, hugely. “I shall enjoy this journey home. A breech-clout, if you will, Captain — provided it is a scarlet one!”