Jareen remained within the pavilion, spending most of the day in her hammock behind her screen, listening to the ship cut the water and eavesdropping on the sparse words of Firnel and the other two sailors. Gyon and his vien had remained silent through the day. The notes of the ship were wrong, too discordant. The ropes vibrated more loudly, and at times the ship fell off the wind rather than keeping true. She had gotten to know the feel and music of the ship during the passage, and there was no question the sloppiness was deliberate. What was more, none of the sailors sang. The day passed in the quiet of anticipation.

  In the afternoon, one of the sailors led Gyon and his vien into the pavilion where Jareen had her screened area. The sailor deftly slid away the woven mat in the center of the floor. Jareen stood and watched from around her screen as the sailor lifted planks from the floor and leapt down into the cavity below. He lifted up long bundles of oiled canvas, followed by three large ceramic pots with clay-sealed mouths except for a thick lamp wick hanging out. The ceramic was intricately painted with vine motifs. Gyon and his attendants took the burdens from him and laid them out on the deck as the sailor leapt back up and replaced the planking. One of the embassy vien picked up a pot.

  "It is of Firnel's own design," the sailor said. "Spirits at the top, above the oil."

  "These would have served a time or two in the Mingling as well," the embassy vien answered.

  Gyon loosed a knotted cord and rolled open the first canvas bundle. Within it were gleaming curved swords of the Vien make. The blue-steel gleamed even in the shade of the pavilion, and the downswept guards were curved and twined, marvelously fashioned. She had grown used to seeing the sturdy but plain weapons and armor of the Noshian guards and constables, yet even the simplest Vien dish or tool was built for both function and beauty. The Vien prized skill and artifice above most else, and every surface was an opportunity.

  Another bundle held bows, and a third tight bundles of bright-shafted arrows. The sailor left again without a word, and Gyon and his attendants checked the beeswax on coiled bowstrings, cleaned the greased blades and honed them with fine-grained whetstones, and unbound the arrows and smoothed the fletchings.

  Jareen watched them work. She had seen such preparations before. In their youth, most vien and vienu were trained in the arts of combat—both unarmed and armed. It was considered a necessity in lieu of the perpetual war that always threatened to break forth in fresh fighting. Though the Synod did not send vienu to war, it was thought healthy for the body, mind, and spirit. Jareen’s mother had not permitted her to such training, but she had witnessed plenty of it.

  At last, darkness fell as myriad seagulls cried overhead. The seabirds told her that they could not be too far from the Findeluvié shore. Still, Jareen and the others stayed within the pavilion. The moon was bright, but it would set early. The smell of the sea air at night was strong and fragrant, and Jareen thought there was something new wafting with it—something that hinted of soil and lotus blooms. Jareen sat cross-legged near the edge of her screen so that she could watch the entryway.

  The sound of the wind lessened, and the ship straightened in the water, lessening the tilt of the deck. One of the sailors stepped into the pavilion and motioned to the embassy vien. Without a word, Gyon led them out, ducking through the door. Jareen followed, happy for the movement and freedom. As soon as she stepped out of the pavilion, she was met by a dense wall of fog. The wind had weakened dramatically. There was an almost perpetual band of mist where cooler seas met warmer currents of water and air near the coast of Findeluvié. They must have just entered the fog. The sailor led them back along the rail toward the stern. The second sailor held the tiller beneath his armpit while Firnel stared back into the mist and darkness. The wafting mist only allowed broken swaths of starlight to reach them, and it was difficult to make anything out beyond a few yards. The moon must have already neared the horizon.

  “How far back are they?” Gyon asked in a low voice.

  “They were only a mile, but I do not know if they will pursue into the mist.” Firnel glanced over his shoulder. “Prepare to come about,” he said to the vien at the tiller, then looked to one of Gyon’s. “Go prepare the lamps and the oil, but keep the light within.” The embassy vien hurried back toward the fore.

  “How will we trace them in this?” Gyon asked. “It damps even sound.”

  “It is only twenty or so feet above us,” Firnel answered. Before anyone could reply, Firel grabbed hold of one of the stays. With sinewy arms taut, he hooked his ankle about it and pulled himself up into the mist, disappearing overhead. The sailor at the tiller tilted his head up to listen. Barely a minute had passed when Firnel spoke from above:

  “Come about to bear east.”

  As the sailor at the tiller leaned, the other sailor moved with incredible alacrity, loosening the mainsheet as the ship bore off, letting the greased boom swing with hardly a creak before deftly looping the mainsheet fast again. In moments, the ship had come about. There was silence again except for the low swish of the water flowing past.

  “Prepare to tack southwest,” Firnel spoke from above.

  Jareen marveled at how smoothly just three sailors managed the ship as they came about once again, this time into the wind. The ring of mist varied from half a mile to a mile wide, and if they wanted to stay hidden, they could not sail north or south for long. She tried to imagine what Firnel saw up there, and what he was trying to do. Could he see the human ship without being seen, himself?

  Firnel kept calling orders and the sailors sprang to each one with the skill of centuries. At last, Firnel slid back down the rope through the mist and alighted upon the white-plank deck.

  “Hold this course fine,” he said to the vien at the tiller, then turning to Gyon he asked: “Where are the oils? They must be ready. We will come out nearly upon them. They will be to the east, and if they have eyes they will see us as we emerge. No doubt they are upon deck.”

  Gyon turned to stride back to the pavilion when he saw Jareen.

  “Get into the larder, Jareen,” he said, using her Noshian name and actually managing to pronounce the Noshian "r." There was a note of command in his voice that she had not heard there before. His face was grim, his eyes alight, his posture poised. There was ferocity ready to be unleashed. She obeyed, turning and heading along the rail to the fore.

  One of Gyon’s vien was already out of the pavilion, carrying ceramic pots beneath each arm. A lantern dangled from a strap at his wrist, its shutters closed.

  “Into quarters,” Gyon commanded.

  “Quarters, Liel,” answered the vien carrying the pots. As the others rushed past to enter the pavilion, Jareen kept heading toward the prow, her hand running along the smooth rail. A small door opened into a large cabinet-like hold nestled into the upthrust curve of the prow where the planking separated to form sides. She turned the latch and opened the door. The smell of fruit and wine rushed out to mingle with the sea-air. Through the angled entry were two narrow steps down which she descended. At the end of the voyage, there was more than enough room for her to sit comfortably upon one of the remaining waxed sacks of dried fruit.

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  She turned to close the door behind her but hesitated. The open door left her a view of some yards along both rails, until the sweeping edges of the pavilion blocked sight. She could see one of Gyon’s vien and one of the sailors kneeling next to a couple of the ceramic pots and one of the oil lanterns. Both held bows, and rows of arrows lay ready on the planking.

  Jareen had seen much of death, but she had never seen battle. Her heart raced and her stomach clenched, but she did not wish to look away. If the humans overcame them, it would make little difference for her to hide in the larder or not. She thought of what Gyon had said—slavers. Glancing over the rail into the mist, she tried to ready herself. If the humans prevailed, it would be better to jump into the sea than be taken. The urge to live surged in her at the thought. She would see so little of life as it was. She was caught in her own mind, visualizing the humans pouring over the decks, reaching out to grasp her. Could she jump or not?

  The ship sliced out of the mist and into open sea. She had her back to fore and could not see the human ketch, but the two vien looked up, their eyes locked onto something, their faces upheld into the starlight. The sailor glanced over and saw Jareen watching, but he looked away, unable to do anything about her. She felt the ship adjust course, heard the spray of the waves around the keel just feet from her. The vessel vibrated as it heeled.

  Someone shouted. It was a human voice somewhere ahead of the ship, but she did not catch the words. Gyon’s vien raised his bow above his head and drew down, extending his back as he used the thumbdraw to pull the string against his cheek. It was the practiced motion of a second, and the arrow loosed with barely a whisper. The sailor’s arrow flew only moments behind. While the embassy vien nocked another arrow, the sailor dropped his bow and opened one of the lantern shutters, letting light spill out onto the deck.

  More human shouts broke out. They were speaking a language that she did not know. Arrows sped forward in the dark, white and blue feathers like streaks in the starlight. So quickly they flew that it seemed there must be more than just the few vien aboard the vessel.

  The vessel heeled even more. She could tell from the direction of the two vien’s focus that the ship was no longer in front of them. . . She leaned out of the door and saw it. The rear of the ketch slipped into view as the vien craft veered toward it, closing the gap. Long poles extended from the sides of the human vessel with nets draped across them. She had heard of fighting nets in the stories of naval battles so often told by the Noshians. They looked like a nightmare of entanglement. The ends of the poles were topped with black sharpened spikes. Still, they careened toward the side of the human ship as the Vien bowstrings labored.

  It took her a moment to make sense of the confusion as the human ship drew closer. Their deck was much higher than the Vien vessel. The human rail was nearly ten feet above their own, and rather than an open rail with carven spindles, it was solid wood with little gaps near the bottom. She could not see the helm at the rear, for the ship walls were even higher there. Just before it looked like the human spikes and netting would snare their rigging, the Vien vessel bore off. No more than five yards separated the vessels. She saw movement, a human face peering over the wall.

  Shouts rose in both the foreign human tongue and Vien, as both Gyon and the foe called commands. The sailor lit a wick that dangled from the ceramic pot. With a two-handed heave, he threw the pot, trying to arc it over the netting and onto the deck. The weight of the pot was too much for the sailor, and it came to rest unharmed upon the net mere feet from the side of the human ship.

  Even as the pot was still in the air, a row of human shields rose up above their rail, and missiles arced overtop. The missiles tore into the Vien sail, and Jareen realized they were iron hooks tied to ropes. A few caught in the rigging, and the ropes went taut. Vien arrows sped toward the human shieldwall. She heard a cry and felt a shudder as their sheep heeled from above, the clinging ropes drawing the Vien craft closer to the spikes and the netting.

  All together, the humans leapt the rail of their ship, crawling out onto the netting. Jareen saw the flash of mail and the dull steel of helms. These were warriors, not mere sailors. Vien arrows flashed, but she could not tell what harm they did, so many humans crawled toward them. Gyon’s vien raised his bow, and she watched the arrow as he released. It sped and shattered the ceramic pot the sailor had thrown. A flare of light and flamed erupted. The netting around the pot caught fire, as well as the sleeve of one of the humans crawling beside it, but most of the contents fell flaming into the water below. The strong smell of burning liquor stung her nose.

  “Here!” the vien sailor shouted to his companion, holding up another lit pot. “Above them!” He threw it as high as he could above the netting, not aiming for the ship but above a clump of the crawling figures. His companion, arrow already nocked, drew and loosed. A plume of fire sprayed down upon the crawling humans. Screams broke out. Another pot erupted against the hull of the human ship further aft. Flames licked just above the water line.

  “Cut us loose!” Firnel shouted from the rear. The nearby sailor grabbed a stay and sprang up into the rigging. A few of the burning humans managed to put out their flames, but others writhed, screaming in netting which burned around them. Others scrambled forward as the Vien vessel was pulled to the edge of the nets. A spiked pole cut one of the Vien lines.

  A nimble human fighter leapt down onto the deck, but Gyon’s vien was on him. The human did not even scream as he went down in blood, but before he’d fallen back upon the white planking, two others had leapt. Jareen grabbed the door and yanked it shut, leaving only a narrow crack through which to look. She breathed hard, but she wasn’t aware of it. They would be overrun in moments.

  Then Jareen saw Gyon. He was scaling a stay with his feet and one hand, while in his other he held a lit ceramic pot. He was above the level of the human ship, and with a heave, he threw. The pot arched above the netting, and a flash of light bloomed upon the human deck, casting the men still at the rail in dark flickering silhouettes. The two Vien sailors were busy in the rigging, slicing the ropes from iron hooks with their knives. More humans leapt down from the netting. Even as she watched, an arrow sliced into the side of one of the vien sailors above, and he fell without a sound upon the pavilion canvas below. More arrows flew from the human ship, now. It appeared they no longer cared to capture the Vien.

  So close to Findeluvié! Two weeks prior she was living her life as a Voiceless Sister in Nosh, and now here she was, about to face pirates and slavers a mere few miles from home.

  Would she jump? The sight of the human warriors, the smell of burnt flesh. . . could she bare to go on living with what awaited her?

  She saw shouting human sailors running about on their deck as flames licked up above their ship’s rail. She saw a bucket of water thrown. More humans leapt onto the deck of the Vien ship—a man landed right in front of the larder door, and without thinking she pulled it closed. So that was it—she had not jumped. She had hidden in the darkness.

  There was no latch on the inside of the door; it was made to be closed from without, though a carved handle protruded inside. She grasped it and leaned back, knowing that she would never be able to hold it closed. There were some sacks she could hide beneath, but what would the humans do with the ship?

  Shouting and screaming continued from without. With a lurch, the ship righted itself. No one pulled on the door, nor did she hear footsteps nearby. She cracked it open again. The flickering light of flames filled the night. The human ship was slipping behind, the prow of the Vien craft now ahead of the human prow and angling away. The sail was snapping, rent in places from the human hooks, and some of the ropes hung limp. She saw the body of Gyon’s vien lying mere yards from her, surrounded by the prone forms of armored pirates. Dark blood stained the white planks. Arrow-shafts bearing red fletchings were buried in the Vien deck, shot down from the human ship. Shouts and commotion continued from the human ship, but it looked like they were putting out the last of the flames upon the deck. Sections of burning netting fell away into the sea as the humans cut it free. She saw other humans with bows, loosing arrows toward the rear of the Vien craft.

  “Firnel!” she heard Gyon shout. “Cross their prow!”

  The ship veered, responding sluggishly as it leaked wind from the rent sail, but turn it did. The human vessel bore down on them as they crossed its prow, its bowsprit looming at the level of their sail. Above the bowsprit, the humans had reefed their jib sails.

  “Get down!” Firnel shouted as human archers rushed into their bow. A ceramic pot shattered against the bowsprit, flames spraying up against the reefed jibs. The vien ship listed as it caught the crosswind, pulling past just before collision. Fresh shouts broke out in the foul human tongue as the Vien vessel righted north against the wind, the bottom corner of its sail snapping the tail end of a cut stay like a whip.

  The human ship did not turn to make chase. The canvas of the jibs had caught quickly, climbing upward in orange flame as some of the human sailors hurried into the rigging to try to cut the jibsail down before mainsails were jeopardized. Others threw fruitless buckets from the prow. Sparks trailed behind the jibs. A few arrows sped toward the Vien craft, but they were parting shots, for the human craft held course as it battled the flames. With a snap, the jibstay parted, spraying sparks onto the mainsail behind.

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