“Full sail, Mr. Buck!” he barked.
“Full sail! Aye, Captain!”
TheTouchstonesurged forward, creaking under the strain of a broken hull, as a battery of shot echoed from theEndorathil. We were coming around on theMarelethan, looking to rake theEndorathil’s foremast and chase guns with a volley. TheMarelethan’s chase guns fired anyway, shattering theEndorathil’s jigger, but her own foremast cracked and pitched leeward, crashing back onto the forecastle amid snapping sheetsand stays.
TheEndorathiljust had so many guns.
One of them boomed now, striking the cathead, and our last anchor plunged into the sea. The cable went wild, shredding the hawseholes and whipping the line through the body of the ship. Hands flung themselves to the deck to avoid being cut in two by the force of the line.
The sails boomed above us, and I looked up. TheTouchstone’s sheets were tattered, and she was struggling despite her will. I skidded over to her mast, laid my hands on the splintered wood.
Child
Her voice was weak, barely there, and once again, I sent all my chimeric into her. There wasn’t much, but I felt her rally as she threw herself to the wind. Our rudders were sound, and we banked hard, coming around on theEndorathil’s starboard side. For her part, theMarelethanwas sweeping in on her port, and my heart froze when I realized how we were positioned.
Suns. TheEndorathilwas between us, flanked on both port and starboard sides. I knew what was about to go down.
“All guns,” said Thanavar. “Fire.”
“Fire!” shouted Fahr.
“All guns fire!” shouted Smoke across the waters.
It was poetry and horror together as our guns fired simultaneously, raking her hard. With cannons from the gundecks and chasers from the main, the chimeric-laced shots tore theEndorathil’s canvas to ribbons, snapped shrouds and halyards, chewed up bulwarks, staves, and rails. Her capstan shattered under the onslaught, and her wheel cracked in two, grips splintering into a thousand pieces as they spun wild in the wind.
And for the crew, their blood turned the brightwork red.
We emptied our battery into her sails, and on the other side, theMarelethandid the same. The enemy ship was a fish in abarrel, and we held all the spears. Both ships fired and fired until wind and tide carried us past. It was over in a matter of moments. Our guns fell silent, and we waited.
Illuminated by the setting suns, Ilvalour stood on the quarterdeck by the wheel, his hair burned, his face bloody. He watched us as we swept onward, with only the wind and the waves for song. In her rigging, stays snapped and canvas groaned, but she coursed away, unable to steer, unable to sail, but also unable to sink.
“Come about, Mr. Neale!”
“Aye, sir.”
“Her hull is too strong!” cried Buck from the carronade. “The balls barely crack.”
Thanavar swore inRhi’Ahr.
“We shall not sink her this way, if we sink her at all.”
“Is she reinforced with magik?” asked Dev as he watched her smoking hull glide off.
“Undoubtedly,” said Thanavar. “But I would have hoped our chimeric-laced shot might have pierced it.”
Dev glanced up.
“Bring us close, Mr. Neale!”
Thanavar cocked his head.
“The chimericwillpierce it,” Dev said. “Aro’el has assured it.”
I gasped and swung around to him.
“Do you think?”
“Worth a shot,” he said.
