But the coral mesh held together. She chanted a prayer, and the few stray blades of grass pushing up between the flagstones at the human’s feet abruptly multiplied, thickened, and grew tall. For a split second, they undulated like eels then whipped around the human and yanked themselves tight, binding his limbs. They crawled higher still, seeking his head to gag, blind, and smother him.

  The Talassan had no choice but to try to dissolve the effect. Otherwise, it would render him helpless. He started jabbering a counterspell, and Tu’ala’keth cried, “Silence!” The charge of magic infusing the word stole his voice only for an instant, but that was enough to spoil the rhythm of his conjuration.

  Green strands coiled around his mouth then masked his face completely. He heaved and thrashed, lost his balance, and fell. Tu’ala’keth hefted her trident and ran at him.

  “Enough!” Vurgrom bellowed.

  Tu’ala’keth felt a pang of frustration and nearly defied the command. But to do so might hinder Umberlee’s cause, so she halted short of her target.

  An instant later, the coils of grass burned away in a flash of fire. Even bound as he was, the Talassan had somehow managed to destroy them. He sprang to his feet, raised his spear over his head, and shouted rhyming words.

  “I said, enough!” Vurgrom said. “The fight’s over, Kassur. The shalarin beat you, and her friend beat Chadrezzan.” The spectators cheered or groaned and swore, depending on their sympathies.

  The man with the eye patch shuddered as if he found the words unbearable, as if the violence of his nature left him no choice but to ignore them. It made Tu’ala’keth feel an odd twinge of sympathy. They might be enemies, but they were also both priests of the Gods of Fury, and understood that by rights, a duel such as theirs should end in death.

  But they were also trying to make their way among folk who lacked their sacred insights. So in the end, he broke off his conjuring and gave a curt, grudging nod, and she, too, forbore to strike at him again.

  Several paces away, Chadrezzan lay on the ground with blood seeping from a torn lip, while Anton stood over him, cutlass poised to chop. But when the spy saw that the wizard intended to obey Vurgrom’s command, he grinned and reached to help him up. Chadrezzan spat, ignored the proffered hand, and rose on his own, moving in a slow, pained manner that suggested that, at some point during the fracas, Anton had kicked or kneed him in the crotch. The spy shrugged and sauntered back to Tu’ala’keth’s side.

  “Good,” Vurgrom said. “Freebooters brawl, if they’re any good at their trade. It’s natural and gives the rest of us something to bet on. But I don’t see any point in letting you butcher one another when you could all be useful to the faction.”

  “But in what roles?” asked the tattooed woman, her manner that of a protege seeking guidance of a mentor. “I’d like to bring all four of them aboard Shark’s Bliss, but I can’t lead a company that’s all officers and no common hands.”

  The huge man chuckled. “It’s your ship and your decision, honey cake. I can only advise. Though I will say that I would never have taken all the prizes I have, nor won eternal fame, if I hadn’t favored men who’d already proved they knew how to win a fight.”

  “Hmm.” “Honey cake” took a second, pretending to deliberate, though it was plain to Tu’ala’keth that Vurgrom’s words had already decided for her. “Waveservant, Anton, my name is Shandri Clayhill. I’d like to bring you aboard Shark’s Bliss as ship’s priest and mage.”

  “That’s outrageous!” Kassur exploded. “You already offered the positions to Chadrezzan and me, and he’s a master wizard, able to slay a dozen men or shatter a hull with a single spell. All you’ve seen this impostor do is cast a couple of petty charms.”

  “He’s right, of course,” murmured Anton to Tu’ala’keth. “The mute’s a true magician, far more powerful than the likes of me. But I recognized him as an elementalist, and elemental magic isn’t dainty. It takes up space. So I hovered close to the crowd as I advanced on him, and he couldn’t throw his most potent spells at me for fear of hitting them as well. Vurgrom wouldn’t have stood for that.”

  Captain Clayhill glanced at Vurgrom, evidently making sure KaBsur’s outburst hadn’t swayed him, then said, “My decision stands. But you and your comrade are welcome aboard the Bliss as well, on the understanding that, for the time being, anyway, you’ll serve as ordinary gentlemen of fortune, receiving one share each, not two.”

  “We accept,” gritted Kassur, “for now.” He glared at Anton and Tu’ala’keth, and she answered with a sneer.

  ^ome of the folk in the boisterous crowd staggered or moved with exaggerated care. Others spoke too loudly or slurred their words. Despite the noise and the frequent jostling, a few snored, sprawling back in their chairs with limbs akimbo or with their heads cradled in their arms on wet, scarred tabletops.

  Puzzled, Tu’ala’keth turned to Anton. “Is this a sick house?” she asked.

  Anton grinned. “A tavern. Don’t you have taverns-and intoxicants, and drunks-in Seros?”

  “We have intoxicants, but no establishments like this.”

  “Well, now that you’re a pirate, you’d better get used to them.”

  Captain Clayhill motioned to them, and they followed her and the rest of her officers on through the press.

  Toward the rear, the common area with its benches, hearth, and hard-packed bare-earth floor broke apart into hodgepodge of smaller rooms, niches, and closets fitted haphazardly together. The captain was evidently familiar with the layout, for she led her officers-save for Tu’ala’keth, a mix of humans and the stooped, brutish, gray-skinned race known as ores-straight to the private chamber she’d hired for the occasion.

  Tu’ala’keth was grateful when the door shut out the noise and stink of the common room. Someone had already brought in pewter goblets and bottles of wine, and several of her companions made haste to pour themselves drinks, but she didn’t follow their example. No sea creature drank anything-or else, depending on how one looked at it, one drank constantly, simply by using one’s gills-but even if she had been susceptible to thirst, she would have been more interested in the map spread on the table, the curling corners weighted by extra cups.

  She saw with relief that she could pick out the place Anton had specified when he’d sketched a far cruder chart in the sand. By her standards, she knew a fair amount about the shape of the world. She could have drawn a map of Seros in considerable detail. But she’d never had any reason to concern herself with what lay beyond its waters.

  “Are you ready?” Captain Clayhill asked. Though still aglitter with jewels and frills, she was no longer the girlish sycophant taking her cues from Vurgrom. Away from him, she put on a harshness, a striding, shoving impatience, which had taken Tu’ala’keth by surprise.

  “Yes,” the shalarin said.

  “Then find us a worthy prize.”

  “As you wish.” Tu’ala’keth seated herself, yet another action that felt clumsy in a medium as lacking in buoyancy as air. “It will be helpful if everyone stays quiet.”

  The pirates settled to watch her. She gripped her skeletal pendant with one hand, poised the other over the chart, murmured words of praise to Umberlee, and pretended to slip into a trance.

  It gave her a vague sense of shame. Her creed taught her to use every weapon and seize every advantage in the pursuit of her ends-to resort to subterfuge whenever she deemed it useful. Still she couldn’t help feeling it was one thing to lie about mundane matters, and something else, something akin to blasphemy, to claim she was employing her sacred gifts when, in fact, nothing of the sort was going on. Despite Anton’s assertions to the contrary, she had no more talent for divination than any other cleric.

  But the spy insisted they needed to exploit her cachet as an exotic shalarin waveservant to further their mission. Since it was manifestly Umberlee’s will that the endeavor succeed, Tu’ala’keth swallowed her qualms as best she could.

  She let the litany of praise fade into a wordless croon. She’d once known a genuine oracle who made sounds like that. When she felt the first phase of the charade had gone on long enough, she brought her index finger stabbing down.

  Everyone leaned to see where she was pointing. “Saerloon,” Captain Clayhill said.

  “I see docks,” droned Tu’ala’keth. The somnolent voice she’d adopted made her sound like the drunken men outside. “Buildings with a wall around them, an enclave accessible from land or sea. People bring bags and chests stuffed with gold to buy what the folk in the compound have to sell.”

  “It all fitth tho far,” said Sealmid. He was the first mate, a human with a broken nose, many missing teeth and, in consequence, a lisp. “A good many rich traderth have a thetup like that. But which-“

  Harl the helmsman, an ore whose garments of clashing colors were garish even by freebooters’ standards, shushed him.

  “I see the men in charge,” Tu’ala’keth continued. “They carry staves and wands. They wear red.”

  Everyone stared at her. Finally the helmsman said, “Are you talking about Thayans?”

  “I do not know,” Tu’ala’keth said. She wanted them to believe that, as a gifted seer, she could perceive all matter of hidden things, but her instincts told her the ploy would be more convincing if her powers fell short of omniscience. “But Saerloon is not their homeland. They trade talismans and potions for heaps of yellow gold.”

  “Thayanth,” Sealmid sighed. “All honor to the Bitch Queen, but thith doethn’t help uth.”

  “Hear her out,” said Anton, his gaze fixed on Captain Clayhill. “Please.”

  The pirate leader shrugged her tattoo-covered shoulders, where images of blossoms and butterflies mingled with skulls, snarling basilisks, and bloody swords. “I suppose we might as well.”

  Tu’ala’keth rambled on, laying out the rest of the information in a disjointed sort of way, as if, in her daze, she failed to comprehend its meaning. She reckoned that too would make it seem as if she were plucking it from the spirit world as opposed to repeating facts and rumors Anton had gleaned during his years as a spy.

  When she reached the end, she sat quietly for a moment then gave a little jerk as if waking from a doze. “What did I say?” she asked.

  Harl gave her a yellow-fanged smile. “You told us a lot, waveservant. Unfortunately, it was all about Thayans. Nobody raids Thayans. It’s bad luck.”

  “The kind of bad luck where the Red Wizardth turn you into a worm or light you on fire like a candle when you try,” Sealmid said.

  Tu’ala’keth scowled. “Umberlee has chosen these folk to be her prey, and ours. We will not fail.”

  Captain Clayhill sat frowning, staring into the depths of her amber wine, then gave her head a shake. “If it worked, we’d make a fortune. But the risk is too great. I waited too long to command Shark’s Bliss to lose her now.”

  According to Anton, in theory, pirate crews elected their captains, but the truth was more complex. On Dragon Isle, no one ascended to such a position without the approval of one of the several factions. Tu’ala’keth could readily believe Shandri Clayhill had spent a long, dreary time cultivating Vurgrom before he endorsed her aspirations.

  “Try again,” the human continued. “Find us another target.”

  Tu’ala’keth ostentatiously folded her arms. “No. The goddess has already spoken.”

  Captain Clayhill glared. “I revere Umberlee, and I respect her clerics. But you’re one of my officers now, and you’ll follow orders.”

  “Hold on,” Anton said. “Let’s at least discuss the Thayans before we give up all hope of robbing them. Tu’ala’keth has given us their secrets. That should enable us to discern their weaknesses and put together a plan to exploit them. What if…”

  Pretending to devise it on the spot, he laid out his scheme. The notion was that she would prove herself a powerful seer and spellcaster, he would establish himself as a cunning strategist, and as a result, the pirates would come to hold them both in high regard.

  After he finished, the reavers sat quietly for a heartbeat or two, pondering. Then Harl said, “It isn’t the stupidest plan I ever heard. I can halfway imagine it working.”

  “Can you halfway imagine the part that cometh after?” Sealmid asked. “Thay we do escape with the loot. Then a bunch of the really powerful Red Wizardth get together and lay a curthe on uth.”

  “They have an ugly reputation,” Anton said, “and deservedly so. But they’re not gods. They have their limits.”

  “Whereas Umberlee is the greatest of gods,” said Tu’ala’keth. “Do her bidding, and she will protect you.”

  “I believe you,” Captain Clayhill said. “I do. But to hazard Shark’s Bliss in the way Anton suggests-No. It would be too easy for things to go wrong.”

  Tu’ala’keth stared into the captain’s eyes. “You say you believe, but in truth, you have no faith at all, neither in Umberlee nor in yourself. No faith and no courage. Perhaps you had them once, but as you toadied to Vurgrom-and surrendered yourself to his lusts-they withered inside you.”

  Captain Clayhill sprang to her feet. “Give me your sword,” she snarled to Sealmid.

  Tu’ala’keth remained seated, as if the human’s anger was of no concern to her, thus maintaining the appearance of strength. “Will you strike me, then? To what end? Will the other reavers finally respect you if you kill me sitting in my chair?”

  The captain gripped the hilt of Sealmid’s broadsword but didn’t raise it to threaten Tu’ala’keth-not yet. “The other reavers do respect me!”

  “No,” said Tu’ala’keth, “they do not. To gain their admiration, you strove for your captaincy, but the manner in which you achieved it makes it a lewd jest.

  “You know this, and it gnaws your soul. You tell yourself you would do anything to achieve true respect, but you lie. The trouble with the mask of servility is that, worn too long, it starts to impress its shape on the face beneath. Without realizing it, the pretender opens himself to genuine meekness and uncertainty.

  “So it is that you fear to wager what little you have already gained. Even though no pirate wins glory except through daring and ferocity.

  “Umberlee wishes to wake these sleeping virtues in you. Because you have the potential to be the greatest of reavers and stain the waters red with the blood of your prey. I see it now. It is why she sent me to you.

  “But to achieve your destiny, you must pay heed when she speaks through me. It begins here. Do what other captains fear to do. Plunder the Thayans. Win the respect of Dragon Isle, so that one day, you may rule it. Vurgrom and his rivals aspire for supremacy, like Immurk in his day, but the prize will be yours if you find the strength to take it.”

  Captain Clayhill stared at Tu’ala’keth in manifest astonishment. Finally the human’s lips quirked upward. “It’s tricky to know how to respond when somebody insults you with one breath and praises you with the next.”

  “I did neither. I spoke the truth as the Queen of the Depths revealed it to me. Hear or ignore it as you please.”

  Captain Clayhill turned to Anton. “Tell me your idiot plan again,” she said, “from the beginning.”

  ***

  When she’d set sail, Shark’s Bliss had been a sleek, handsome, two-masted caravel. As Anton considered her now, he supposed she was still handsome, but it was harder to see. The primary impression was one of calamity. The ship wallowed low in the waves, as if she were sinking. The sails hung in tatters.

  The crippled state of the vessel made the pirates grumble. Just as tense, Captain Clayhill stood beside Anton on the aft castle gazing out over the heaving, gray-green expanse of the sea. Her fingers with their gleaming rings kneaded the rail. Even on the brink of battle, she still wore a frilly, impractical gown, like a lady attending a banquet or ball.

  “Where is she?” the captain asked.

  “She’ll be back soon,” said Anton, hoping it was so. Tu’ala’keth could take care of herself, and was inconspicuous when she swam primarily beneath the sea. Yet even so, it was chancy to go looking for a Red Wizard’s vessel. She couldn’t know what enchantments he had in place to detect sentient creatures, or spellcasting, in his vicinity.

  Finally Durth, the ore in the crow’s next, called, “I see her!” In another moment, Anton did, too, as she parted company with her seahorse and swam to the ship. He tossed the rope ladder over the side, and blue skin and black fin wet and gleaming, the shalarin climbed upward with a facility that demonstrated she’d finally mastered the knack of moving nimbly even out of the water.

  “Did you find them?” Captain Clayhill asked.

  “Yes,” said Tu’ala’keth. She adjusted the strap securing her tinted goggles to her head. “I spoke to the wind and current, and they shifted their courses. As a result, the Thayans will come close enough to sight us.”

  “Good.” The captain turned and shouted down the length of the ship: “It’s time! Go below if you’re supposed to. If you’re staying on deck, look tired, thirsty, and helpless. If you’re carrying a weapon bigger than a knife, get rid of it.”

  “Prejudice against ores, that’s what this is,” Harl said. All the members of his warlike race had to hide in the cramped, half-flooded hold. Otherwise, the Bliss wouldn’t look as they needed her to look. He gave Anton a wink and headed for the companionway.

  Kassur and Chadrezzan had to go below as well, but did so with an ill grace. Tu’ala’keth dived back over the side to conceal herself beneath the waves.

  Then, once again, there was nothing to do but wait. Anton had spent much of his life on one ship or another, and knew how long it took for two vessels to rendezvous on the open sea. Still time crawled.

  At last, squinting, he glimpsed the Thayan caravel, a speck far to the northeast. He was sure the Thayans’ lookout had spotted Shark’s Bliss as well. But would they change course to meet her?

  He thought so. She flew the flag of Aglarond, Thay’s bitter enemy, and looked defenseless. Were Anton a Red Wizard, he’d certainly take the time to plunder the foundering ship, capture those on board to ransom or enslave, and salvage the vessel itself if possible. It was too juicy an opportunity to pass up.