Red Seas Under Red Skies: The Gentleman Bastard Sequence, Book Two (Gentleman Bastards 2)

‘With a will,’ shouted Lieutenant Delmastro, ‘with a will!’ As the blood-red flag rose to its full prominence above the stern of the Orchid and the first of the horde of maniacally cheering crewfolk began to crowd her starboard rail, the three boats surged across the waves.

Locke shed his parasol and jacket, tossing them overboard before remembering that they were worth quite a bit of money. He breathed in excited gasps, glancing over his shoulder at the fast-approaching side of the flute, a sheer wooden surface that loomed like a floating castle. Dear gods, he was going into battle. What the fuck was the matter with him?

He bit the insides of his cheeks for concentration and held on to the gunwales with white knuckles. Damn it, this was no grand gesture. He couldn’t afford this. He breathed deep to steady himself.

Locke Lamora was small, but the Thorn of Camorr was larger than any of this. The Thorn couldn’t be touched by blade or spell or scorn. Locke thought of the Falconer, bleeding at his feet. He thought of the Grey King, dead beneath his knife. He thought of the fortunes that had run through his fingers, and he smiled.

Steadily, carefully, he drew his sabre and began to wave it in the air. The three boats were nearly abreast now, slashing white triangles of wake on the sea, a minute from their target. Locke meant to hit it wearing the biggest lie of his life like a costume. He might be dead in a few moments, but until then, by the gods, he was the Thorn of Camorr. He was Captain Orrin fucking Ravelle.

‘Orchids! Orchids!’ He made a statue of himself at the bow of the boat, thrusting with his sabre as though he meant to ram the flute and punch a hole in her side all by himself. ‘Pull for the prize! Pull for yourselves! Follow me, Orchids! Richer and cleverer than everyone else!’

The Poison Orchid slipped ahead of the last of her smoke, streaming grey lines from her quarterdeck as though evading the grasp of some godlike ghostly hand. The teeming crewfolk at her rail cheered again and then fell silent together. The ship’s sails began to flutter. Drakasha was tacking, with haste, to bring the ship sharply around to starboard. If she pulled it off she would snug up, on the larboard tack, right alongside the flute at knife-fighting distance.

The sudden silence of the Orchids allowed Locke to hear noises from the flute for the first time - orders, panic, arguments, consternation. And then, over everything else, a tinny and desperate voice shouting through a speaking trumpet:

‘Save us! For the love of the gods, please ... please get over here and save us!’

‘Shit. That’s a little different from what we usually get,’ said Delmastro.

Locke had no time to think; they were up to the flute’s hull, bumping hard against the wall of wet planks on her lee side. The ship was slightly heeled over, creating the illusion that she was about to topple and crush them. Miraculously, there were shrouds and a boarding net within easy reach. Locke leapt for the net, sword-arm raised.

‘Orchids,’ he cried as he climbed the rough, wet hemp in an exultation of fear, ‘Orchids! Follow me!’

The moment of truth: his left hand found the deck at the top of the boarding net. Gritting his teeth, he swept upward with his sabre, clumsily and viciously, in case anyone was waiting at the edge of the deck. Then he heaved himself up, rolled under the rail - he’d missed the entry port by a few yards - and stumbled to his feet, screaming like a madman.

The deck was all chaos, and none of it meant for him. There were no razor-nets, no archers, no walls of polearms or swords waiting to receive the boarders. Crewmen and -women ran about in a panic. An abandoned fire hose lay on the deck at Locke’s feet like a dead brown snake, gurgling seawater into a spreading puddle.

A crewman skidded through that puddle and slammed into him, flailing. Locke raised his sabre and the crewman cringed, throwing up his hands to show that they were empty.

‘We tried to surrender,’ the crewman gasped. ‘We tried! They wouldn’t let us! Gods, help us!’

‘Who? Who wouldn’t let you surrender?’

The crewman pointed to the ship’s raised quarterdeck, and Locke whirled to see what was there.

‘Aw, hell,’ he whispered.

There had to be at least twenty of them, all men, cast from the same mould. Tanned, stocky, muscular. Their beards were neatly trimmed, their shoulder-length hair bound in rattling strings of beads. Their heads were wrapped with bright-green cloths, and Locke knew from past experience that what looked like thin, dark sleeves covering their arms was actually holy verse, tattooed so thickly in black and green ink that every trace of the skin beneath was lost.

Jeremite Redeemers. Religious maniacs who believed that they were the only possible salvation for the sins of their wicked island. They made themselves living sacrifices to the Jeremite gods, wandering the world in exile groups, living polite as monks until someone, anyone, threatened them.

Their sacred vow was to kill or be killed when offered violence; to die honourably for Jerem, or to ruthlessly exterminate anyone who raised a hand against them. All of them were looking very, very intently at Locke.

‘The heathen offers a red cleansing!’ A Redeemer at the head of the group pointed at Locke and hoisted his brass-studded witchwood club. ‘Wash our souls in heathen blood! SLAY FOR HOLY JEREM!’

Weapons high, they rushed the quarterdeck stairs and surged down them, fixed on Locke, all the while demonstrating just how madmen really screamed. A crewman tried to stumble out of their way and was swatted down, his skull cracking like a melon beneath the club of the leader. The others trampled his body as they charged.

Locke couldn’t help himself. The spectacle of that onrushing, battle-hardened, completely insane death was so far beyond anything in his experience, he coughed out a burst of startled laughter. He was scared to the marrow, and in that there was sudden, absolute freedom. He raised his one useless sabre and flung himself into a counter-charge, feeling light as dust on a breeze, hollering as he ran:

‘Come, then! Face Ravelle! The gods have sent your doom, MOTHERFUCKERS!’

He should have died a few seconds later. It was Jean, as usual, who had other plans.

The Jeremite leader bore down on Locke, twice his weight-worth of murderous fanatic, blood and sunlight gleaming on the studs of his raised club. Then there was a hatchet where his face had been, the handle protruding from the shattered hollow of an eye. Impact, not with the club but with the suddenly senseless corpse, slammed Locke to the deck and knocked the air from his lungs. Hot blood sprayed across his face and neck, and he struggled furiously to free himself from beneath the twitching body. The deck around him was suddenly full of shapes kicking, stomping, screaming and falling.

The world dissolved into disconnected images and sensations. Locke barely had time to catalogue them as they flashed by—

Axes and spears meant for him sinking into the body of the Jeremite leader. A desperate lunge with his sabre, and the shock of impact as it sank into the unprotected hollow of a Redeemer’s thigh. Jean hauling him to his feet. Jabril and Streva pulling other Orchids onto the deck. Lieutenant Delmastro, fighting beside Jean, turning a Redeemer’s face to raw red paste with the glass-studded guard of one of her sabres. Shadows, movements, discordant shouts.

It was impossible to stay next to Jean; the press of Redeemers was too thick, the number of incoming blows too great. Locke was knocked down again by a falling body and he rolled to his left, slashing blindly, frantically as he went. The deck and the sky spun around him until suddenly he was rolling into thin air.

The grating was off the main cargo hatch.

Desperately he checked himself, scrambling back to his right before he toppled in. A glimpse into the main-deck hold had revealed a trio of Redeemers there, too. He stumbled to his feet and was immediately attacked by another Jeremite; parrying slash after slash, he sidestepped left and tried to slip away from the edge of the cargo hatch. No good: a second antagonist appeared, blood-drenched spear at the ready.

Locke knew he’d never be able to fight or dodge the pair of them with an open grate behind his feet. He thought quickly. The flute’s crew had been in the process of shifting a heavy barrel from the main-deck hold when the attack had come. That cask, four or five feet in diameter, hung in netting above the mouth of the cargo hatch.

Locke lashed out wildly at his two opponents, aiming only to force them back. Then he spun on his heels and leapt for all he was worth. He struck the hanging cask with a head-jarring thud and clung to the netting, his legs kicking like those of a man treading water. The cask swung like a pendulum as he scrambled atop it.

From there, he briefly enjoyed a decent view of the action. More Orchids were pouring into the fray from the ship’s larboard side, and Delmastro and Jean were pushing the main body of Redeemers back up the quarterdeck stairs. Locke’s side of the deck was a tangled swirl of opponents: green cloths and bare heads above weapons of every sort.

Suddenly, the Jeremite with the spear was jabbing at him, and the blackened-steel head of the weapon bit wood inches from his leg. Locke flailed back with his sabre, realizing that his suspended haven wasn’t as safe as he’d hoped. There were shouts from below - the Redeemers in the hold had noticed him, and meant to do something about him.

It was up to him to do something crazy first.

He leapt up, holding fast to one of the lines by which the cask was suspended from a winding-tackle, and dodged another spear thrust. No good trying to cut all the lines leading down from the tackle. That could take minutes. He tried to remember the patterns of ropes and blocks Caldris had drilled into him. His eyes darted along the single taut line that fell from the winding-tackle to a snatch-block at one corner of the cargo hatch. Yes - that line led across the deck, disappearing beneath the throng of combatants. It would run to the capstan, and if it was cut . . .

Gritting his teeth, he gave the taut line a good slash with the forte of his blade, feeling the sabre bite hemp. A thrown hatchet whizzed past his shoulder, missing by the width of his little finger. He slashed the line again, and again, driving the blade with all the force he could muster. At the fourth stroke, it unravelled with a snap, and the weight of the cask broke it clean in two. Locke rode the barrel down into the hold, his eyes squeezed firmly shut. Someone screamed, saving him the trouble of doing so himself.

The cask struck with a resounding crash. Locke’s momentum smacked him down hard against its upper surface. His chin struck wood and he was tossed sideways, landing in an undignified heap on the deck. Warm, smelly liquid washed over him - beer. The cask was gushing it.

Locke climbed back to his feet, groaning. One Redeemer hadn’t moved fast enough and was splayed out beneath the cask, clearly dead. The other two had been knocked sideways by the impact and were feeling around groggily for their weapons.

He stumbled over and slit their throats before they knew he was even back on his feet. It wasn’t fighting, just thief’s work, and he did it mechanically. Then he blinked and looked around for something to clean the blade on; an old and natural thief’s habit that nearly got him killed.

A heavy, dark shape splashed into the beer beside him. One of the Jeremites who’d been troubling him above, the one with the spear, had leapt the six or seven feet down into the hold. But the gushing beer was treacherous; the Redeemer’s feet went out from under him as he landed and he toppled onto his back. Coldly resigned, Locke drove his sabre into the man’s chest, then pried the spear from his dying hands.

‘Undone by drink,’ he whispered.

The fight continued above. For the moment, he was alone in the hold with his shoddy little victory.

Four dead, and he’d cheated every one, using luck and surprise and plain skulduggery to do what would have been impossible in a stand-up fight. Knowing that they would never have given or accepted quarter should have made it easier, but the wild abandon of a few minutes before had drained clean away. Orrin Ravelle was a fraud after all; he was plain old Locke Lamora once again.

He threw up behind a pile of canvas and netting, using the spear to hold himself up until the heaving stopped.

‘Gods above!’

Locke wiped his mouth as Jabril and a pair of Orchids slipped down through the cargo hatch, holding on to the rim of the deck rather than leaping. They didn’t seem to have caught him puking.

‘Four of ’em,’ continued Jabril. His tunic had been partly torn away above a shallow cut on his chest. ‘Fuck me, Ravelle. I thought Valora scared the piss out of me.’

Locke took a deep breath to steady himself. ‘Jerome. Is he all right?’

‘Was a minute ago. Saw him and Lieutenant Delmastro fighting on the quarterdeck.’

Locke nodded, then gestured aft with his spear. ‘Stern cabin,’ he said. ‘Follow me. Let’s finish this.’

He led them down the length of the flute’s main deck at a run, shoving unarmed, cowering crewfolk out of the way as he passed. The armoured door to the stern cabin was shut, and behind it Locke could hear the sound of frantic activity. He pounded on the door.

‘We know you’re in there,’ he yelled, and then turned to Jabril with a tired grin. ‘This seems awfully familiar, doesn’t it?’

‘You won’t get through that door,’ came a muffled shout from within.

‘Give it some shoulder,’ said Jabril.

‘Let me try being terribly clever first,’ said Locke. Then, raising his voice: ‘First point, this door may be armoured, but your stern windows are glass. Second point, open this fucking door by the count of ten or I’ll have every surviving crewman and -woman put to death on the quarterdeck. You can listen while you’re doing whatever it is you’re doing in there.’

A pause; Locke opened his mouth to begin counting. Suddenly, with the ratcheting clack of heavy clockwork, the door creaked open and a short, middle-aged man in a long black jacket appeared.

‘Please don’t,’ he said. ‘I surrender. I would have done it sooner, but the Redeemers wouldn’t have it. I locked myself in after they chased me down here. Kill me if you like, but spare my crew.’

‘Don’t be stupid,’ said Locke. ‘We don’t kill anyone who doesn’t fight back. Though I suppose it’s nice to know you’re not a complete arsehole. Ship’s master, I presume?’

‘Antoro Nera, at your service.’

Locke grabbed him by his lapels and began dragging him toward the companionway. ‘Let’s go on deck, Master Nera. I think we’ve dealt with your Redeemers. What the hell were they doing aboard, anyway? Passengers?’

‘Security,’ muttered Nera. Locke stopped in his tracks.

‘Are you so fucking dim-witted that you didn’t know they’d go berserk the first time someone dangled a fight in front of their noses?’

‘I didn’t want them! The owners insisted. Redeemers work for nothing but food and passage. Owners thought ... perhaps they’d scare off anyone looking for trouble.’

‘A fine theory. Only works if you advertise their presence, though. We didn’t know they were aboard until they were charging us in a fucking phalanx.’

Locke went up the companionway, dragging Nera behind him, followed by Jabril and the others. They emerged into the bright light of morning on the quarterdeck. One of the men was hauling down the flute’s colours, and he was knee-deep in bodies.

There were at least a dozen of them. Redeemers, mostly, with their green head-cloths fluttering and their expressions strangely satisfied. But here and there were unfortunate crewfolk, and at the head of the stairs a familiar face - Aspel, the front of his chest a bloody ruin.

Locke glanced around frantically and sighed when he saw Jean, apparently untouched, crouched near the starboard rail. Lieutenant Delmastro was at his feet, her hair unbound, blood running down her right arm. As Locke watched, Jean tore a strip of cloth from the bottom of his own tunic and began binding one of her wounds.

Locke felt a pang that was half-relief and half-melancholy; usually it was him that Jean was picking up in bloody pieces at the end of a fight. Ducking away from Jean had been a matter of split-second necessity in the heat of the struggle. He realized that he was strangely disquieted that Jean hadn’t followed him, relentlessly at his heels, looking after him as always.

Don’t be an ass, he thought. Jean had his own bloody problems.

‘Jerome,’ he said.

Jean’s head darted around, and his lips nearly formed an ‘L’-sound before he got himself under control. ‘Orrin! You’re a mess! Gods, are you all right?’

A mess? Locke looked down and discovered that nearly every inch of his clothing was soaked in blood. He ran a hand over his face. What he’d taken for sweat or beer came away red on his palm.

‘None of it’s mine,’ he said. ‘I think.’

‘I was about to come looking for you,’ said Jean. ‘Ezri . . . Lieutenant Delmastro ...’

‘I’ll be fine,’ she groaned. ‘Bastard tried to hit me with a mizzenmast. Just knocked the wind out of me.’

Locke spotted one of the huge brass-studded clubs lying on the deck near her, and just beyond it, a dead Redeemer with one of Delmastro’s characteristic sabres planted in his throat.

‘Lieutenant Delmastro,’ said Locke, ‘I’ve brought the ship’s master. Allow me to introduce Antoro Nera.’

Delmastro pushed Jean’s hands away and crawled past him for a better view. Lines of blood ran from cuts on her lip and forehead.

‘Master Nera. Well met. I represent the side that’s still standing. Appearances to the contrary.’ She grinned and wiped at the blood above her eyes. ‘I’ll be responsible for arranging larceny once we’ve secured your ship, so don’t piss me off. Speaking of which, what ship is this?’

‘Kingfisher,’ said Nera.

‘Cargo and destination?’

‘Tal Verrar, with spices, wine, turpentine and fine woods.’

‘That and a fat load of Jeremite Redeemers. No, shut up. You can explain later. Gods, Ravelle, you have been busy.’

‘Too fucking right,’ said Jabril, slapping him on the back. ‘He killed four of them himself in the hold. Rode a beer-cask down on one and must’ve fought the other three straight up.’ Jabril snapped his fingers. ‘Like that.’

Locke sighed and felt his cheeks warming. He reached up and put a bit of the blood back where he’d found it.

‘Well,’ said Delmastro, ‘I won’t say that I’m not surprised, but I am pleased. You’re not fit to tend so much as a fishing boat, Ravelle, but you can lead boarding parties whenever you like. I think we just redeemed about half of Jerem.’

‘You’re too kind,’ said Locke.

‘Can you get this ship into order for me? Clear the decks of crewfolk and put them all under guard at the forecastle?’

‘I can. Will she be all right, Jerome?’

‘She’s been smacked around and cut up a bit, but—’

‘I’ve had worse,’ she said. ‘I’ve had worse, and I’ve certainly given it back. You can go with Ravelle if you like.’

‘I—’

‘Don’t make me hit you. I’ll be fine.’

Jean stood up and came over to Locke, who shoved Nera gently toward Jabril.

‘Jabril, would you escort our new friend to the forecastle while Jerome and I scrape up the rest of his crew?’

‘Aye, be pleased to.’

Locke led Jean down the quarterdeck stairs, into the tangle of bodies amidships. More Redeemers, more crewfolk . . . and five or six of the men he’d pulled out of the Windward Rock three weeks before. He was uncomfortably aware that the survivors all seemed to be staring at him. He caught snatches of their conversation:

‘. . . laughing, he was...’

‘Saw it as I came up the side. Charged them all by himself...’

‘Never seen the like.’ That was Streva, whose left arm looked broken. ‘Laughed and laughed. Fucking fearless.’

‘. . . “The gods send your doom, motherfuckers”. That’s what he told them. I heard it . . .’

‘They’re right, you know,’ whispered Jean. ‘I’ve seen you do some brave and crazy shit, but that was . . . that was—’

‘It was all crazy and none brave. I was out of my fucking head, get it? I was so scared shitless I didn’t know what I was doing.’

‘But in the hold below—’

‘I dropped a cask on one,’ said Locke. ‘Two more got their throats slit while they were still dumb. The last was kind enough to slip in beer and make it easy. Same as always, Jean. I’m no bloody warrior.’

‘But now they think you are. You pulled it off.’

They found Mal, slumped against the mainmast, unmoving. His hands were curled around the sword buried in his stomach, as though he was trying to keep it safe. Locke sighed.

‘I have what you might call mixed feelings about that right now,’ he said.

Jean knelt down and pushed Mal’s eyelids closed. ‘I know what you mean.’ He paused, seeming to weight his words before continuing. ‘We have a serious problem.’

‘Really? Us, problems? What ever could you mean?’

‘These people are our people. These people are thieves. Surely you see it, too. We can’t sell them out to Stragos.’

‘Then we’ll die.’

‘We both know Stragos means to kill us anyway—’

‘The longer we string him along,’ said Locke, ‘the closer we get to pulling off some part of our mission, the closer we are to a real antidote. The more time we get, the greater the chance he’ll slip . . . and we can do something.’

‘We can do something by siding with our own kind. Look around you, for the gods’ sake. All these people do to live is steal. They’re us. The mandates we live by—’

‘Don’t fucking lecture me about propriety!’

‘Why not? You seem to need it—’

‘I’ve done my duty by the men we brought from Tal Verrar, Jean, but they and all of these people are strangers. I aim to have Stragos weeping for what he’s done, and if I can spare them to achieve that, by the gods, I’ll spare them. But if I have to sink this ship and a dozen like it to bring him down, I’ll damn well do that, too.’

‘Gods,’ Jean whispered. ‘Listen you yourself. I thought I was Camorri. You’re the pure essence. A moment ago you were morose for the sake of these people. Now you’d fucking drown them all for the sake of your revenge!’

‘Our revenge,’ said Locke. ‘Our lives.’

‘There has to be another way.’

‘What do you propose, then? Stay out here? Spend a merry few weeks in the Ghostwinds and then politely die?’

‘If necessary,’ said Jean.

The Poison Orchid, under reduced sail, drew near the stern of the Kingfisher, putting herself between the flute and the wind. The men and women lining the Orchid’s rail let loose with three raucous cheers, each one louder than the last.

‘Hear that? They’re not cheering the scrub watch,’ said Jean. ‘They’re cheering their own. That’s what we are, now. Part of all this.’

‘They’re str—’

‘They’re not strangers,’ said Jean.

‘Well.’ Locke glanced aft, at Lieutenant Delmastro, who’d risen to her feet and taken the Kingfisher’s wheel. ‘Maybe some of them are less strange to you than they are to me.’

‘Now, wait just a—’

‘Do what you have to do to pass the time out here,’ said Locke, scowling, ‘but don’t forget where you come from. Stragos is our business. Beating him is our business.’

‘Pass the time?’ Pass the gods-damned time?’ Jean sucked in an angry breath. He clenched his fists and for a second looked as though he might grab Locke and shake him. ‘Gods, I see what’s twisting under your skin. Look, you may be resigned to the fact that the only woman you’ll ever consider is years gone. But you’ve been screwed down so tight about that, for so long, that you seem to think the rest of the world keeps your habits.’

Locke felt as though he’d been stabbed. ‘Jean, don’t you even—’

‘Why not? Why not? We carry your precious misery with us like a holy fucking relic. Don’t talk about Sabetha Belacoros. Don’t talk about the plays. Don’t talk about Jasmer, or Espara, or any of the schemes we ran. I lived with her for nine years, same as you, and I’ve pretended she doesn’t fucking exist to avoid upsetting you. Well, I’m not you. I’m not content to live like an oath-bound monk. I have a life outside your gods-damned shadow.’

Locke stepped back. ‘Jean, I don’t . . . I didn’t—’

‘And stop calling me Jean, for fuck’s sake.’

‘Of course,’ said Locke coldly. ‘Of course. If we keep this up we’ll be breaking character for good. I can prowl below myself. You get back to Delmastro. She’s holding on to that wheel to stay on her bloody feet.’

‘But—’

‘Go,’ said Locke.

‘Fine.’ Jean turned to leave, then paused one last time. ‘But understand - I can’t do it. I’ll follow you to any fate, and you know it, but I can’t fuck these people over, even for our own sake. And even if you think it’s for our sake . . . I can’t let you do it, either.’

‘What the hell does that mean?’

‘It means you have a lot to think about,’ said Jean, and he stomped away.

Small parties of sailors had begun slipping over from the Orchid. Utgar rushed up to Locke, red-faced with excitement, leading a group of crewfolk carrying lines and fend-offs to help hold the ships alongside one another.

‘Sweet Marrows, Ravelle, we just found out about the Redeemers,’ Utgar said. ‘Lieutenant told us what you did. Fuckin’ amazing! A job well done!’

Locke glanced at the body of Mal resting against the mainmast, and at Jean’s back as he approached Delmastro with his hands out to hold her up. Not caring who saw, he flung his sabre down at the deck planks, where it stuck tip-first, quivering from side to side.

‘Oh, indeed,’ he said. ‘It seems I win again. Hooray for winning.’