Corsair

tonight-a big fellow, an ogre maybe, carrying a couple of people like the evening’s shopping down High Street toward the harbor. There was a thin man in a brown cowl with the big one. My cousin only saw the pair of ’em at a distance, but he told me that he would’ve sworn that it was Mirya Erstenwold the big fellow carried, all trussed up like a prisoner.” The militiaman shrugged awkwardly. “Mistress Erstenwold’s been on all our minds, I guess. He might’ve been seeing things as weren’t what he thought. But I thought you ought to know.”

An ogre and a man in a cowl? Geran could make no sense of that. There was no point in running off to comb the waterfront himself; if Brun was right, the Moonshields had already turned the town upside down, and the militiaman’s story might have nothing to it. But he knew who might be able to help. “My thanks, Brun,” he said. Then he climbed back up the steps to the store, let himself in by unlocking the door through its broken window, and hurried inside the darkened building.

A moment later he found what he was looking for and returned to the street with a well-worn white shawl clutched in his hand. Brun looked at him as if he’d lost his mind, but Geran showed him the shawl. “It might help,” he said. “If anyone asks about me, tell them I’ll be up to Griffonwatch as soon as I can.”

“Aye, Lord Geran,” Brun answered.

Geran nodded his thanks and rushed off down the street. He feared that he knew where Mirya was, but he had to make sure of it. He wound his way through the smoldering town, past bands of militia and soldiers searching for any pirates still hiding in the town, and hurried to Sarth’s home on the seaward slopes of the Easthead. The tiefling lived in a modest house attached to a small round tower rebuilt from the ruins of an older watch-post. Sarth was a man of means in Hulburg and could afford to live well.

Geran found a heavy bell by the front door and pulled it urgently. “Sarth!” he called. “I need your help!” He rang the bell again.

The door opened, revealing a stout, balding halfling of middle years with a small oil lamp in his hand-Sarth’s valet. The servant looked up at Geran and blinked sleepily. “Ah, Lord Geran! I’m afraid Master Sarth has retired for the evening,” he said. “Can you return in the morning?”

“I fear this can’t wait,” Geran answered. “Wake him, please. It’ll be on my head.”

The valet sighed. “Very well, then. Please wait in the foyer. Master Sarth will be down directly.” He retreated into the darkened house. Geran stepped inside and closed the door. Sarth’s home was plainly furnished in the simple, rough-hewn style most Hulburgans favored, although the decor included several fine Turmishan weavings. He paced anxiously across the flagstones of the foyer, trying to fight down the sick dread in his stomach.

Sarth and his servant appeared at the top of the staircase. The tiefling belted a light robe around his waist and descended. “What is it, Geran? What’s wrong?”

“Mirya Erstenwold and her daughter are missing. I fear they may have been carried off in the Black Moon raid. Can you find her?”

The sorcerer grimaced. “I am sorry, my friend. Of course I will do what I can. Do you have something of hers?”

Geran produced the shawl he’d picked up in Mirya’s store. “Here.”

Sarth took the shawl and nodded. “This should do. Come, let’s go to my workshop.” He led the way to the round room formed by the old tower adjoining the house. It was surprisingly uncluttered; in Geran’s experience most conjuries and laboratories were hopelessly messy, but Sarth hadn’t been in Hulburg long enough to accumulate the knickknacks, mementos, and curios that most sorcerers acquired over time. Over the last few months the tiefling had simply shrugged any time Geran asked him whether he was staying or not; Geran suspected that Sarth still entertained notions of recovering the magical tome known as the Infiernadex from the lich-king Aesperus, and spent his spare time investigating ways to do so.

“I hope you’ll forgive me for waking you up,” Geran said.

Sarth sighed. “I spent the last tenday unable to sleep a wink on that accursed ship. I think I managed half an hour before you woke me, but I am glad you did. Time may be of the essence.” He went to a cluttered bookshelf, considered the tomes crowded together there, then selected one to carry over to a reading stand in the center of the room. A circle of intricate runes and sigils was painted on the floor around the stand, and Sarth was careful to step over them as he entered. He opened the book, flipped through the pages, and found the spell he was looking for. “There, this should do. Stand over there, if you please, and keep still. I must concentrate.”

Geran did as Sarth told him. He’d learned a little about magic rituals himself during his studies in Myth Drannor, but Sarth was his superior in such things. The sorcerer ignited several candles around his rune-circle with a wave of his hand, and kindled a small fire beneath a brass bowl on a small table beside the reading stand. Into the bowl he threw pinches of various strange powders and began to intone the words recorded in his ritual book. Geran felt the stirrings of arcane power gathering in the candlelit conjury. Sarth continued with his magic and bent over the bowl to inhale deeply from the fragrant smoke that rose from it.

The candles flickered and guttered out; the sorcerer picked up Mirya’s shawl, holding it close under his nose, and closed his eyes. He stayed that way for a long moment then exhaled and opened his eyes. “She lives,” he said. He pointed toward one wall of the conjury. Its narrow window faced south, toward the Moonsea. “She is about fifteen miles in that direction and drawing farther away as we speak.”

“Kraken Queen,” Geran snarled. The only other pirate ship to escape the harbor had been Moonshark, and she’d never landed. He struck a fist against the wall. “Damn it all! How did she wind up a captive? Her house was nowhere near the harbor!”

“What will you do?” Sarth asked him.

“Go after her,” Geran said at once. “I’ll take whatever crew I can gather for Seadrake and sail within the hour, if possible. I have to overtake Kamoth before he disappears again.”

“I understand your desire for haste. But how heavy a blow have your enemies dealt the harmach tonight? Are you-and the company of Seadrake-needed here more?”

Geran hesitated. He understood Sarth’s unspoken question: were Mirya and her daughter already beyond help? Even if they weren’t, he was all too aware of the distant sound of fighting and the reek of smoke from the town below. Seadrake and her armsmen represented the better part of a quarter, perhaps a third, of the harmach’s strength. Hulburg might have repelled the Black Moon raid, but there was still the question of the Cinderfists to deal with. How would they react to the pirate attack? It might be wiser to delay a day or two, to take the measure of the town’s disorder and make sure that Hulburg was secure before setting out again. But each hour he delayed, Kamoth and Sergen improved their chances of escaping his grasp again-this time with Mirya and Selsha as their captives. He could imagine all too well what sort of fate might await the Erstenwolds in their hands.

Delay and risk losing them forever? he thought furiously. Or leave at once, hoping that he and the rest of Seadrake’s company weren’t needed to quell the troubles in Hulburg? Geran closed his eyes and made his decision. “If there’s any chance at all that I can save Mirya and her daughter from the Black Moon, I have to try, regardless of the consequences. I’ll sail at once.”

“So be it.” Sarth nodded. “As long as Sergen keeps Mirya aboard, I should be able to repeat my divination and sense the direction and distance to Kraken Queen. I know Mirya well. It will be difficult for the High Captain to hide her from me.”

“Thank you, Sarth.”

Sarth glanced back through the doorway to his living space, already missing the comforts of his own bed. He sighed. “I will get dressed and return to Seadrake.”

“Good. I’ll see you aboard.” Geran clasped the sorcerer’s arm in gratitude and then hurried back out into the night.

As it turned out, it was more than three hours before Seadrake could put to sea again. Geran could not leave without at least a brief visit to Griffonwatch-he had to seek the harmach’s blessing for taking the ship to sea again, and more importantly he had to relate to Harmach Grigor and Kara the story of his voyage aboard Moonshark and what he’d learned about Kamoth, Sergen, and the Black Moon Brotherhood. Kara dispatched Shieldsworn messengers to recall the crew and order the ship made ready for sea again while Geran reported his discoveries. The Hulburgan ship hurriedly reprovisioned, and the crew returned from brief visits home in order to get the ship underway again as soon as possible.

The morning was only an hour old as Seadrake cast off and sculled her way clear of