Racing Banners

When I ascended the rigging again, it was with my brother's quill in imperishable dragon glass. My crew came, as I suspected, shortly before the bells. They walked with their heads high though it was obvious some of them came with a less merry will than I would have liked. But the promise of fare lured them here. I wanted no fair-weather pirates though. I counted them from my place above and found us to be short. Three were missing. "Where are Yeli and Than?" I slid down the main line and landed lightly on the deck facing Jemek. "They did not come." From his tone of voice I couldn't tell if they had walked away or been laid low. I hoped they had been sent away. To be laid low in the shallows was ill against us. "Where is Coram?" My master at arms asked in return. "I sent him at business. He'll make the cruise or die trying." I saw him nod, and knew he was praying that my words were true. To lose crew on dry land was a bad end. My patron and his men arrived, as before he had the boy with him, who still spoke no word, and behind him, two other men, who by their very demeanor were mysterious. I saw a key tattoo on their wrists and knew that these were the so-called Keepers of Wisdom. They were dressed, as all keepers, in black traveling cloaks that hid their faces. Their flame-red tunics with the sleeves that only came just below their elbow, made them easily identifiable beside. The first bell sounded and the quay exploded to life as the shops began to throw open their shutters and the barkers began to cry like the incessant sea birds "Kim Kawa,"Besides being a blessing, Kimkawa was a dried foodstuff that we captains hated to buy. We always kept some in reserve, but we never liked it. It was a type of dried meat that was thin, leathery, and tasted like the inside of sea boots. After two days, a crew would lay against just from the taste. But if there was no food, it did keep a man alive. Though what sort of life it would be was a mystery, for no crew willingly ate it either. In my couple of hundred talon I had had to resort to it only once. It was after the second bell that I saw him. Coram was charging down the hill from the Library. He carried a satchel under his arm and his bare feet flew along the rutted path with a sort of panicked abandon I had never seen before. He wove his way through the crowd without so much as a 'kemsa' or 'your pardon.' His head was down and something stained his shirt. I wasn't sure if it was blood from the wings I had given him earlier or if it was something else. By now the third bell had rung, and our mooring lines had been cast off except the main lead. The main lead was a tow-line until we could get water under our keel. I kept it on as long as I dared hoping Coram would catch up. The Wynd was beginning to buck as she pulled on the Tow. We had water under our boards and we trimmed sail. Coram put on another burst of speed as the wind drove us away from our berth. I wanted to come around but I didn't have time, nor could I. The channel was too narrow for my ship to turn again before it curved around to avoid the reef. Coram didn't seem concerned. He simply tucked the satchel further under his arm and ran down the quay. His footsteps rang hollowly on the old boards, and the cadence was unreal. Finally he got to the end of the boards, and without so much as a pause, he tucked his head and jumped. I had never seen a run and jump such as this. I didn't even know if Gemtel could have matched that distance at that speed, and he was the winner of the Games. Coram's momentum carried him over the boarding rail and he landed hard on the deck, sprawling to a stop. The Crew cheered, but almost before we could believe he could rise, he did. "Run up the banner, set shields, we must make the tide. Make for the Outer Waters. Fly!" The fact that he didn't even stop had me worried. He rose and raced to the rails, his hands grasping for the last mooring line, which was about to run out. "Away! Away!" My men hopped to and began to work the heavy line free, allowing it to drop back into the water. We had water under our keel and were cast off from all help. "Aka! Away! I race dragon banners. They mean to bring us to blades and shallows, Aka!" Aka was a command for a Dragon. To find anyone, even someone like Coram who was up on Dragon lore, using it this deep in Empire lands, said that there was something amiss. Finally I saw them, men dressed in black armor had begun to fill the quay, they were walking toward our berth, but already there was too much water betwixt us. "Make for the Channel, we need to get to open water." My voice was suddenly hoarse with shock; I knew what it meant. I could see the green banners with the Dragon Rampant. The Dragon had been advanced against my house and my crew. There was nothing left for me here. I could come back only to the noose. I saw some of the other ships heaving to, I didn't know if they meant to follow me out as the forerunner, or if they meant to stop me by standing abreast the channel. "To the rigging, String your bows, hold hard until you see them drawing breath." I wasn't about to volley unless they made it clear they meant to overtake me and even then, only when I had no choice, and was close enough to hit them with every shot. "What of the treason against these boards?" "We will deal with it once we have crossed the reef, I'll not stand aside and let them board us." I handed Coram my flask and watched as he took a drink. His skin was as white as the parchment he had brought me, and now that he was close I could see that the blood on his shirt was not his own. I knew enough battle to know when someone had been standing too close to the dead. "Run down Colors." For we were still flying the colors that told others we were at port and to seek the Captain ashore. "Shall we raise bones?" My master-at-arms asked. "Not yet. Let's keep that card a while. But if they will advance dragon against my boards as a shallows bound, then I will not raise a Dragon, even as convenience." I paused to think a moment. I had to raise some sort of Colors or those of the Sea would set against me as a man held to no code. "Raise waves." I turned back to Coram, now intent on his story. I had to know how bad things were. Though I had the feeling I really didn't want to know. "What happened?" "I was at my leisure in the library, I had what you wanted and the Empire came, they made it clear they meant to drag me to the Cove in chains, and they charge you, and through you, all who fly bones, that you did willingly kindle forbidden Magika." "I would not." "It gets worse captain. Your father's other children are laid low. You are now what you proclaimed yourself to the Magistrate as. Leshawn." "The last Shenn." Coram nodded. "I was there when they brought them low. I was there when they sent orders to bring low your mother's other children as well." "Rejik and his kin are Kindled on." I patted the satchel I wore across my body, tucked up under the crook of my arm. "I bear them away." Coram nodded, and as we rounded the edge of the island we saw them. Two large ships pulled in at the harbor on the deep side of the island. Fortunately for us, the islands were connected by a natural sand bar that forced Empire ships to go all the way to Hespid before they could round the point and come after us. "Make for the current." Making sail with the current it was ten days to the reef, but we still had to stop in and provision. If we could make it to the Reef in eighteen days we would come out ahead. Then the only problem would be running the reef. There was still unpaid treason against our boards. "The Empire has advanced banner against kin and crew. They thought to overtake us asleep at Corimar, my kin and half-kin are brought low and they kindle war against my very name it seems." Coram nodded. "What of Marek?" Jemek asked. "Marek is not of these boards and if we ever see him again he has much to answer for." Those were the harshest words of debt I could use. Literally, in illis, the phrase meant that if he ever came aboard again he was a 'shade' of the pirate we knew. "You think he is twice-bought?" Jemek seemed stunned at that. "Nothing else makes sense. Who protected my wife? And now the reports meet my ears that she is betrayed to Empire. What is more I have seen her, but I do not see braid nor sash of him, he has not come within the range of my reach since I sent him away with Mirana. How else am I to take that Jemek?" "Why would he go to dragon?" I shrugged, "Perhaps it is in his blood. But either way, his word is as dry sand to me, there are no debts nor honors between us, and these boards forget his name." That was the strongest thing I could say, I had, effectively stricken him from the crew. "Unless he face his crime he goes to the waters unremembered." "The boards have forgotten him." Jemek replied. He would pass the word to the rest of the crew. Jalen had spoken, Marek was dismissed from service just the same as if he had laid blood against these boards.