that had been why Kennit had chosen the Marietta to ship aboard. Her lines were lovely beneath the debris of years of neglect and the badly patched canvas on her yards. And the captain was ripe for overthrow. Any ship’s master who had not even the leadership to let his mate do his cursing and brawling for him was a man whose reign was ending. It took Kennit seventeen months to overthrow the captain, and an additional four months to see his mate over the side as well.
By the time he stepped up to command the ship his fellow sailors were clamouring eagerly to follow him. He chose Sorcor with care, and all but courted the man to make him his loyal subordinate. Once they had taken command, he and Sorcor took the vessel out on the open seas, far from sight of land. There they culled the crew as a gambler discards worthless cards at a table. As the only men capable of reading a chart or setting a course, they were almost immune from mutiny, yet Kennit never let Sorcor’s strictness cross the line into abuse. Kennit believed that most men were happiest under a firm hand. If that hand also supplied cleanliness and the security of knowing one’s place, the men would be only the more content. Those that could be made into decent sailors were. They sailed to the limits of the ship’s biscuits and the stars he and Sorcor knew.
By the time he and Sorcor brought the Marietta into a port so distant that not even Sorcor knew the language, the ship had the guise of a prim little merchant vessel, and a crew who scrambled at a glance from either captain or mate. There Kennit spent his long hoarded crew-shares to refit his ship as best he could. When the Marietta left that shore, it was to indulge in a month of precision piracy such as the little ports on that coast had never faced before. She returned to Divvytown heavy with exotic goods and oddly stamped coins. Those of the crew that returned with him were as wealthy as they had ever been, and as loyal as dogs. In a single voyage, Kennit had gained a ship, a reputation and his fortune.
Yet even as he stepped down onto the docks of Divvytown, thinking he had realized his life’s ambition, all his joy in his accomplishment peeled away from him like dead skin from a burn. He watched his crew strut up the docks, dressed in silk as if they were lords, their swag-bags heavy with coins and ivory and curiously wrought jewellery. He knew then that they were but sailors, and their plunder would be engulfed in Divvytown’s maw in a matter of hours. And suddenly the immaculately clean decks and neatly sewn sails and crisp paint on the Marietta seemed as brief and shallow a triumph as his crew’s wealth. He rebuffed Sorcor’s companionship, and instead spent their week in port drinking in the dimness of his cabin. He had never expected to be so disheartened by success. He felt cheated.
It took him months to recover. He moved through that time in a numb blackness, bewildered by the hopelessness that had settled on him. Some distant part of himself recognized then how well he had chosen in his first mate. Sorcor carried on as if nothing were amiss, and never once inquired into the captain’s state of mind. If the crew sensed something was odd, there was no evidence of it. Kennit was of the philosophy that on a well-run ship, the captain need never speak directly to the crew, but should only make his wishes known to the mate and trust him to see them carried out. That habit served him well in those despairing days. He had not felt himself again until the morning that Sorcor had rapped on his door to announce that they had a fine fat merchant vessel in sight, and did the captain wish him to pursue it?
They not only pursued it, but grappled and boarded her, securing for themselves a fine cargo of wine and perfumes. Kennit left Sorcor in charge of the Marietta’s deck while he himself led the crew onto the merchant vessel. Up to that time, he had viewed battle and killing as one of the untidy aspects of his chosen career. For the first time that day, his heart caught fire with battle fury. Over and again he slew his anger and disappointment, until to his shock there was suddenly no one left to oppose him. He turned from the last body that had fallen at his feet to find his men gathered in knots on the deck, staring at him with a sort of fascination. He heard not so much as a whispered remark, but the combination of horror and admiration in their eyes told him much. He thought he had won his crew to him with discipline, but that was the day when they actually gave him their hearts. They would not speak familiarly with him nor ever regard him with fondness. But when they went forth to drink and carouse through Divvytown, they would brag of his strict shipboard discipline that marked them as men of endurance, and his savagery with a sword that marked them as a ship to be feared.
From that time on, they expected their captain to lead their forays. The first time he held them back and accepted a captain’s surrender of their ship, the crew had been somewhat disgruntled, until he shared out amongst them the greater crew-shares from the ransom of the ship and cargo. Then it had been all right; the satisfaction of greed can make most things right with a pirate crew.
In the intervening years, he secured his little empire. He cultivated in Chalced both merchants in the seedier ports that would buy unusual cargos with no questions asked, and lesser Chalcedean lords who did not scruple to act as go-betweens in the ransoming of ships, cargos and crews. One got far more from them for pirated cargo than one did in Divvytown or Skullsport. In recent months he had begun to fantasize that these Chalcedean lordlings could help him gain recognition of the Pirate Isles as a legitimate domain, once he had convinced the inhabitants to accept him as their ruler. He once again tallied up what he had to offer both sides. For the pirates, legitimacy, with no threat of a noose to haunt them. Open trade with other ports. Once he unified the Pirate Isles and towns, they could act together to put an end to the slavers raiding their towns. He worried briefly that that would not be enough for them, but then pushed that thought aside. For the merchants of Chalced and the Traders of Bingtown, the benefits were clearer. Safe use of the Inside Passage up the coast to Bingtown, Chalced and the lands beyond. It would not be free of course. Nothing could be free. But it would be safe. A smile ghosted across his lips. They’d like that change.
He was broken from his reverie by the flurry of activity as the deck crew hastened to throw and secure lines. The hands turned to with a will, positioning the heavy hemp camels that would prevent the Marietta from grinding against the dock. Kennit stood silent and aloof, listening to Sorcor bark the necessary orders. All about him, the ship was made tidy and secure. He neither moved nor spoke until all the hands were mustered in the waist below him, restlessly awaiting the division of the loot. When Sorcor mounted the deck to stand beside him, Kennit gave him a brief nod, then turned to his men.
‘I make to you the same offer I have made the last three times we’ve made port. Those of you who choose may take your shares as allotted and carry them off to trade and peddle as best you can. Those of you with patience and good sense can take a draw against your share, and allow the mate and me to dispose of our cargo more profitably. Those who choose to do so can return to the ship the day after tomorrow to take their remaining share of those profits.’ He looked out over the faces of his men. Some met his eyes and some glanced at their fellows. All shuffled restlessly as children. The town and rum and women awaited them. He cleared his throat. ‘Those of you who have had the patience to allow me to sell their cargo for them can tell you that the coin they received as their shares was greater than if they had tried to barter on their own. A wine merchant will pay more for our whole shipment of brandy than you will get for a single keg you bargain away to an innkeeper. The bales of silk, sold as a lot to a Trader, will fetch far more than you can trade a single bolt to a whore for.’
He paused. Below him, men fidgeted and shifted impatiently. Kennit clenched his jaws. Time and time again, he had proven to them all that his way was more profitable. They knew it, any man of them would admit it, but the moment they were tied to the dock, all good sense deserted them. He permitted himself a brief sigh of exasperation, then turned to Sorcor. ‘The tally of our gains, Mate Sorcor.’
Sorcor was ready with it. Sorcor was always ready with everything. He held up the scroll and unfurled it as if reading from it, but Kennit knew he had actually memorized what they had taken. The man could not even read his own name, but if you asked him what each crew-share should be from forty bales of silk, he could tell you in an instant. The men murmured appreciatively amongst themselves as the tally was read aloud. The pimps and
