Stalking Darkness

catching his drift. “In the proper navy they’d call that a dishonorable trick.”
    “Which is why I stick with privateers,” Seregil replied, grinning back. “The closer we get to Plenimar, the less attention we’d attract, at least from a distance.”
    “By the Old Sailor, Lord Seregil, you’ve the makings of a great pirate in you. Trouble is, if you want the sails off her, we can’t use our fire baskets.”
    “Keep it as a last resort and throw everything else you’ve got at her.”
    “All hands, prepare for battle,” Rhal sang out, and the call was passed down the deck.
    The crew of the
Lady
sprang to action with a will. The pilot hove the ship around to meet the Plenimaran challenger. Hatches were dragged back, the catapults fitted into their bracing sockets along the deck and on the battle platforms fore and aft, and baskets of stones, chain, and lead balls hauled up from the hold. Rhal’s archers took their places and the edge of every sword and cutlass was given a final touch of the thumb.
    “She’s showing the battle flag, Captain,” the lookout shouted as they bore down on the enemy ship.
    “Run up the same!” answered Rhal.
    Micum lost sight of Seregil in the general confusion, but his friend reappeared moments later with Alec’s bow.
    “Here,” he said, handing it to Micum without meeting his eye. “You’re better with this than I am.”
    Before Micum could think of a reply, Seregil hurried off to join one of the catapult crews.
    The Plenimaran ship swooped toward them across the waves like an osprey, closing the distance rapidly.
    “A warship, Captain, and they got fire baskets lit!” the sharp-eyed lookout called down.
    “How are they set?” Rhal bellowed back.
    “Two catapults to a side, fore and aft! Fire baskets to the fore.”
    “Keep at her bow, helmsman!”
    As the ships closed within a few hundred yards of each other, archers on both sides took aim. Standing with Rhal’s bowmen along the port rail, Micum listened to the bowstring song of Alec’s Black Radly as he loosed shaft after shaft at the enemy. The song was quickly answered. Plenimaran arrows whined and buzzedacross the water at him like angry dragonflies. Welken, the faithful lookout, crashed to the deck with a shaft through his chest. Nettles was hit in the leg but kept on shooting. Others fell and the shouting and screams on both sides echoed over the water between the vessels.
    No shortage of arrows
, Micum thought, pulling enemy shafts from the deck and rail and sending them back the way they’d come.
    The heavy thud of the catapults sounded fore and aft as catapults on both sides let fly. Flaming balls of a pitchy concoction known as Sakor’s Fire sailed across the
Lady’s
bow, narrowly missing her forward sail. The
Lady
responded with double loads of chain that clawed through the enemy’s rigging, collapsing one of her mainsails like a broken wing. Panicked shouts rang out on the enemy ship as she slowed.
    “Hard about and give her another!” Rhal ordered. Skywake fought the rudder to port and the
Lady
leaned dangerously into the waves as they wheeled to press their advantage. A groaning volley from the port catapults smashed the Plenimarans’ forward mast and the enemy ship yawed, wallowing in the swells.
    Like a wounded dragon, the Plenimarans released a second volley of Sakor’s Fire as the
Lady
passed. This one found its mark, striking the forward platform. An oily sheet of flame engulfed a catapult and its crew. Burning men fell writhing to the deck or leapt overboard. Sailors tore the covers from sand barrels lashed against the rails, smothering the flames before they could spread.
    Choking on the smell of burning flesh, Seregil dropped his load of chain and ran up the platform ladder to help drag the wounded away from the flames.
    “What now?” he called, spotting Rhal on the deck below.
    “Hard around, strike sails and board ’em,” Rhal yelled. “Makewell, Coryis, tell your group to stand ready with the grapples.”
    A final volley of stones from a Plenimaran catapult shattered the
Lady’s
main mast as she bore down on them. Dodging the fallen spars, the grappling crew tossed their hooks across and hauled the two ships together before the Plenimarans could cut the ropes. As soon as the bulwarks were close enough to leap, Rhal’sfighters boarded the other ship and waded into the black-uniformed marines massed to repel them.
    From his vantage point on the platform, Seregil