Corsair

Moonshark’s moved on by now. I don’t like to linger here.”

“No such luck, I fear.” Hamil pointed over the rail at a customshouse close by the water’s edge. As Seadrake slowly sculled across the harbor, the slender black hull of the pirate galley- concealed by the ruined building at first-came slowly into view, drawn up on the shore behind the structure. “There she is! It looks like we’ve caught Moonshark on the beach.”

The pirate galley was drawn up on the strand a short distance outside the city walls, well hidden by the headland that sheltered the city’s old harbor from the westerly winds. If the rain had been a little heavier, or Seadrake a little farther out from the shore, they might have sailed past without spotting the other ship. Geran signaled to the helmsman, who turned the wheel and brought the ship into the harbor. All over the Hulburgan vessel, the soldiers and sailors scrambled to make themselves ready for battle, quickly donning mail shirts or leather jerkins and uncovering the ship’s catapult. The swordmage peered toward the shore, looking for signs of commotion-the Black Moon pirates might try to launch their ship and make their escape before Seadrake landed, or at the very least make ready to defend the ship. But he saw no one moving on the shore.

“Where are they?” he muttered. “They must have seen us by now.”

“I don’t care for the looks o’ the shore,” Andurth said in a low voice. “I can beach if you insist on it, but we’ve a deeper hull than that galley there, and I fear we’ll be stuck fast. It’ll be a devil of a job to get back in the water.”

Geran frowned. The dwarf was right; there was good, deep water by the quays in the city proper, but he was not about to tie up in the middle of the ruins. The shore the pirate ship was drawn up on looked wide and muddy. “Very well. We’ll land by boat.” He hesitated then asked, “Hamil, can you see anyone ashore?”

The halfling shook his head. “It looks like there’s a camp on the beach, but there’s not a soul in sight. I’d suggest that perhaps they’re all belowdecks on Moonshark or sheltering from the rain in the ruins, but somehow I don’t really think they are. I don’t like the looks of this, Geran.”

“Nor do I,” Geran answered. “But we’re here, and we need Moonshark’s compass.” He sighed and looked over to Andurth. “Master Galehand, drop anchor and put the ship’s boats in the water. I’ll take twenty hands ashore.”

“Aye, Lord Geran,” the dwarf answered. He shouted commands to the sailors on deck. The crewmen aloft began to furl the sails one by one, while others hurried to the ship’s anchor or began to unlash the ship’s boats.

Geran absently listened to the bustle and commotion. His attention was fixed on the mist-wreathed ruins looming over the harbor, concealed by veils of rain. Some dire peril awaited within, he was certain of it. But he had no idea what it might be.

TWENTY

12 Marpenoth, the Year of the Ageless One (1479 DR)

Wet gravel grated under the longboat’s keel as it grounded on the strand a bowshot from where the silent Moonshark was drawn up. Geran vaulted over the side into knee-deep water and splashed ashore in the cold, steady rain, sword in hand. Weathered gray battlements and crumbling temples towered over the landing party, clinging to the edge of the steep bluff that marked the western side of Sulasspryn’s bay. The harbor proper lay several hundred yards to the east, where the remnants of a stone jetty sheltered the city’s old quays from the Moonsea storms. On this side of the harbor, a causeway ran out to the old customshouse across a thirty-yard-wide strand at the foot of the bluff. It was the only place in Sulasspryn’s bay flat enough for a ship the size of Moonshark to haul her prow out of the water-and it was well hidden from ships passing by at sea, not that many ever had reason to sail along this desolate coast.

“It seems your guess was right,” Sarth said to him. The tiefling pointed to the camp set up not far from the beached galley. Several fresh logs lay stacked there, partially stripped of their bark. The ship’s bow was braced atop two more logs set like rollers under the keel, and a simple framework of timbers held her in place. “Murkelmor must have decided he could not sail any farther without first mending the damage to the bow.”

“He would’ve been wiser to find a cove a few miles back, then,” Geran said. He reminded himself that few in Moonshark’s crew had any reason to be wary of Sulasspryn. None of them hailed from Hulburg or the lands nearby, after all. But he would have imagined that any grim old ruin of a city should have commanded some respect. Everyone knew that all sorts of curses, ghosts, and hungry monsters might lurk in any long-abandoned castle or city, even if few of the pirates were familiar with the specific perils of these ruins.

“There aren’t many trees along the coast, but there seems to be some good timber here,” Hamil pointed out. “Or perhaps Murkelmor was counting on the reputation of the place to ward off pursuit and chose to land here for that very reason.”

“We’ll ask Murkelmor when we see him,” said Geran, although he was beginning to doubt that they would. He had a hard time believing that the pirates of Moonshark would have been willing to strand themselves beneath Sulasspryn’s brooding ruins even for a few hours, let alone the days of work that would be needed to effect serious repairs. He waited for his armsmen to drag their longboats up onto the beach and then motioned for them to follow him. “Come on, fellows. Stay close, and keep your eyes and ears open. Assume it’s a trap until we know for certain that it’s not.”

They marched toward the pirate galley, boots crunching in the pebbles underfoot. As they neared, they saw that the pirate crew had set up a worksite on the beach to cut and shape new timbers for their ship. It looked as though they’d simply walked away from their work. Saws, axes, and other tools lay scattered around the site. The Shieldsworn and sellswords with Geran kept their thoughts to themselves, but Geran noticed that they redoubled their vigilance, watching the bluffs to their right and keeping a wary eye on the shadows of doorways and windows above.

Where are they? Hamil said silently to Geran. Did they flee into the ruins when Seadrake appeared in the bay? I can’t believe Murkelmor would let us have his ship without fighting for it.

“I don’t know,” Geran murmured in reply. He circled around the prow of the galley with caution, just in case his former shipmates were waiting in ambush behind the ship’s hull-and then he found the first of Moonshark’s crewmen. The body sprawled at the water’s edge, facedown in the small wavelets lapping alongside the black hull. His back was a gory mess, ripped open in great furrows; several small, pale crabs scuttled away from the corpse as Geran approached.

“I think that’s Khefen,” Hamil said in a low voice. He grimaced. “Poor bastard.”

Geran glanced around and then crouched by the body to study it closely. “Dead a couple of days, I think. The wounds show a lot of tearing. Claws or talons, not blades. If I had to guess, I’d say that some beast drove him to the ground from behind and ripped him to shreds. Kara could tell us more, if she were here.”

“Whatever it was killed him here and left him,” Hamil said. “Most animals would have dragged him off or eaten their fill.”

“There’s another over here, m’lord!” one of the Shieldsworn guards called. He stood by one of the large logs at the side of the worksite. A moment later another guardsman peering into the tangled scrub and brush at the foot of the bluff added, “And half a dozen here in the briars, m’lord!”

“None of this is our affair any longer,” Sarth said in a low voice. “We should retrieve the compass and go.”

“You’re right.” The longer they stayed, the more likely it was that whatever had fallen upon Moonshark’s crew would fall on Seadrake as well. And while Geran would have been happy to take away any surviving pirates who appeared and asked to leave, he didn’t feel obligated to search them out, not when the lives of Mirya and Selsha might be hanging by a thread on some far island in the sky. To the soldiers poking around the campsite, he called, “Gather up the bodies you can find without straying too far and bury them together in the sawpit. But keep your weapons close to hand!”

The corsairs had rigged a simple rope ladder with wooden rungs from the half galley’s deck to the beach. Geran caught hold of it and climbed to the main deck, followed by Hamil and Sarth. He saw two more dead