The hatch was latched but not locked, and he cracked it and peered out. The deck was mostly quiet and only faintly lit by a moon he could not see. Two men were standing by the wheel, speaking in soft accents. Another stood against the steerboard rail a few kingsyards away. There was no one to backboard, however.

Keeping low, he pushed the door a little wider.

He nearly hit a man with it. He sat just beyond the hatch, a spear across his knees.

She was right. She needed better guardians. But Neil couldn't be one of them.

No one called out as he approached the side of the boat. He strained in the moonlight, trying to make out whether or not the land he had seen earlier was still close. He thought he saw distant lights, though it could have been sparks from the fire in his side.

With no further hesitation, he slipped over the rail.

He hit the water with a splash. The cold shocked him, but he managed to turn onto his back and begin stroking and kicking with his feet, hoping the wound in his side didn't come open again. He had no plan for what he would do when he got to shore, but every day on the ship took him farther from where he had to go.

"Hwas ist thata?" someone shouted. " someone shouted. "Hwas fol? Airic?"

"Ne, ni mih."

Neil grimly kept stroking with dogged determination. He knew the language-it was Hanzish, the tongue of the enemy.

The sound of voices receded. Once he thought he heard Swanmay's voice, but he wasn't certain. Then there was only his own struggle with the waves.

His arms became leaden all too quickly, and despite the fire in his ribs, he felt the warmth draining from his body. If shore was not near, then he would complete the death Swanmay had saved him from.

Was she right? Did he want to die?

He summoned an image of the queen, her pale face and dark hair, and hands reaching for her from every direction, but he could not hold it. Instead, in the half-face of the moon, he saw Swanmay's blue eyes. A strange despair seized him, and more questions, always questions. If she was Hanzish-and he was now certain of that-then why had she helped him? Whom was she fleeing?

The ocean swelled beneath him, and his face went under. He sputtered the water from his mouth and nose and turned to swim on his belly. He heard a faint shushing that might be surf and might be the dying beat of his heart.

He swam on. It was all he could do.

He woke to a blue sky and the warm crackle of a fire. For a moment he thought he'd been dreaming, but then Swanmay's voice broke through it. He felt immensely better, as if he had slept for ten days. The pain in his side was only a dull ache now, and for a moment he thought that perhaps everything that had happened since he had left Eslen was merely a dream.

But then he heard the chatter all around him, in Hanzish, and reached for his sword.

"You are a very stupid man," Swanmay's voice informed him.

He opened his eyes and sat up. He lay on a blanket. The fire was nearby, and beyond it there was a sandy shingle and the sea. Two langschips were pulled up on the beach, and Swanmay's ship was anchored a hundred kingsyards offshore.

In the other direction was a plain covered in short, wiry grass. Swanmay sat beside the fire, on a small stool. Her men seemed to have set up camp. Nearby, two of them were dressing a small, odd-looking deer.

Swanmay wore a broad-brimmed hat, as if she really were a Sefry, but her face looked drawn and weary. The blue in her eyes had dulled, as if something vital had left her.

"I'm sorry," he said. "I had to try."

"I understand that now," she replied. "It makes you no less stupid."

He conceded that with a nod.

She shrugged. "We weren't able to fully provision at z'Espino. My men are remedying that now." She cocked her head. "How do you feel?"

"Wonderful," he replied.

"Good. Do you remember anything?"

"The last thing I remember was hearing the sound of the surf."

"We found you on the strand. Your wounds were open, and your breath was faint. You were very cold."

"But now-what happened?"

"As I told you, I know some arts. I hesitate to use them, because there is a price." She smiled fiercely. "You are fortunate that the walls between life and death are so thin."

A sick dread fluttered in Neil. "Was I dead? Did you-?"

"You were not dead. The life in you was a flickering candle, but it was not extinguished."

"Lady, whatever sorcery you used, you should not have. Tell me its price, and I will pay it."

"It isn't yours to pay," she said softly. "And it is already done." Her voice grew firmer. "And I make my own decisions. Have no fear, you are not cursed or possessed of spirits unhultha. You will not walk the night and do evil at my bidding."

"I could never imagine you doing me harm," Neil replied.

"No? Yet you spurned my company when you owed me your life." Her voice rose. "Do you understand? You threw your life away in z'Espino, and with it any duty or obligation you ever had. You threw it away and I picked it up. Can you not concede that it is mine now? Do you feel no duty toward me?"

"Of course I do," Neil blurted, "and that that is the problem. And now I owe you twice, but I cannot repay you. That is agony to me, lady. Do you understand? You have put me between the rising tide and the cliff-" is the problem. And now I owe you twice, but I cannot repay you. That is agony to me, lady. Do you understand? You have put me between the rising tide and the cliff-"

"And can think of nothing better to do than drown yourself again." She snorted. "Enough. I am done with this."

"Done?"

"You will never enter my service, I see that now. But you do owe me twice, and I do not expect you to forget that. One day I will ask you a favor and you will answer. Do you understand?"

"If I can."

"No. If you feel obligation toward me, then take it as a geis. I will not call on you soon."

He sighed and bowed his head. "Are you saying you will release me now if I accept this geis?"

"Hush. By noon we leave here, and I will take you to Paldh, no matter what you say now. But if you have any of the fabled integrity of Skern, you will take my geis."

"I swear by the saints my fathers swore by, and take this geis," Neil said. "When you have need of me, I will come, so long as it does not bring harm to those it is my charge to protect."

"Very well," she said. She stood and looked off across the distant fields. "I never went ashore in z'Espino," she said softly. "This is the only strange land I have ever set foot on. It is fair."

"Lady-"

"Make the ship ready," she called to her men in Hanzish. Then she strode away from him without even a backwards glance.

CHAPTER NINE.

THE W WIND AND THE S SEA.

WILL THEY CATCH US?" Anne asked, watching intently as the masts of the pursuing ship appeared and disappeared behind the high swells. The sky was a turquoise gem, flawed only with a few streaks of white cloud. There was no land in sight.

Captain Malconio put his callused hands on the rail and leaned forward. Perversely, she noticed that he exuded the same faintly almond scent Cazio had when he sweated.

"Lord Netuno knows," he said. "That's a fast ship, a brimwulf built in Saltmark. And they've got a strong wind behind them."

"Are they faster than us?" Anne asked.

"Much faster," Malconio said.

"Then they will will catch us." catch us."

Malconio scratched his beard. "Ah, well-there's more to it than speed, della. We can run against the wind a little better than she can, and we've got a shallower keel. If we can reach the shoals around Ter-na-Fath before nightfall, I give us a chance."

"Only a chance?" Cazio sneered.

Malconio regarded his brother with narrowed eyes. "It's not often I have the need to outrun a man-o'-war," he said acidly. "In fact-why, that's never never happened to me before. It took you to come along and present me this delightful opportunity, happened to me before. It took you to come along and present me this delightful opportunity, frater mio frater mio. Indeed, it occurs to me our pursuers might be satisfied if I just gave up my cargo."

"You won't do that," Anne said.

Malconio's eyebrows shot up, and he looked at her as if she had just asked to cut off his foot. "Pardon me? I wonder how you formed that opinion?"

"These men came after me when I was in the coven Saint Cer. They killed every sister there. What makes you think they would spare you?"

"There's also the maritime guild to consider," z'Acatto added a bit drunkenly. He waved the narrow-necked bottle of wine he'd found somewhere. "You know they would never stand for it if one of their ships had been accosted, for any reason. The captain of the ship behind us won't take that risk-he'll never give you the chance to report him. So don't be a collone collone."

"Easy, old man," Malconio said. "You know I was just talking-it's the family curse. But if we can't slip them, we'll never be able to fight them. A ship like that will carry three or four arbalests, probably armed with sea fire. My brother will never even get to use his sword, unless they want the girl alive, for some reason." He looked back at Anne. "Is that likely to be the case?"

"I don't think so," Anne said. "I think they just want to see me dead."

"And you still won't tell me why?"

"I still don't know why," Anne said helplessly.

"Well," Malconio said. "So we run, and hope the breeze favors us."

They tacked hard to the north, and at first the larger ship seemed to drop back a bit, but then it started picking up speed again. It wasn't even noon yet.

"Unless we get some luck, they'll have us long before we reach the shoals," Malconio finally admitted.

"Well, then, they're in for a fight," Cazio told his brother, resting his hand on the hilt of his rapier.

"I told you before," Malconio said, "they've no reason to come close when they can sink us from a distance." He put his hands on his hips. "But suppose they did try to board us-that fellow with the glowing sword-how do you intend to fight him? Your friend back at the docks dealt him a blow that should have had him buried in two places. But he was walking fine, last I saw him."

"I've fought his kind before," Cazio said with that overabundance of confidence that Anne found so infuriating. "I'll cut off his head and send him to the bottom of the sea."

"Last time you had me to drop bricks on him," z'Acatto reminded him. "What shall I drop on this one?"

Cazio shrugged. "Perhaps an anchor? Surely we can find something."

Malconio folded his hands. "What? No single combat this time? What of your honor?"

"It's hardly honorable to fight with the aide of hell," Cazio replied. "I've sworn to protect these ladies. I'll do that even if I have to fight with less than perfect honor."

Malconio rolled his eyes. "It doesn't matter anyway," he said. "They've twice our numbers without taking Casnar z'Estrigo z'Estrigo into account. Drop an anchor on him if you wish, though I have only so many anchors." He nodded at the approaching ship. "But it won't come to that. See those arbalests? What did I tell you?" into account. Drop an anchor on him if you wish, though I have only so many anchors." He nodded at the approaching ship. "But it won't come to that. See those arbalests? What did I tell you?"

Anne could see some sort of ungainly devices mounted on the other ship's deck, but couldn't make out what they were supposed to do. Austra saved her the embarrassment of asking what an arbalest was, by asking herself.

"It's a huge mechanical bow," Malconio replied. "Hurls stones, lead balls, pots of flame-things like that."

"Don't you have any sort of war engines, Captain?" Anne asked. "Some way to fight back? Surely you've had to fend off pirates before."

Malconio shook his head. "We've got one small arbalest. It's all we ever needed against the few pirates that dare the wrath of the guild."

"I suggest you set it up, then," z'Acatto said.

"I suppose you're right, old man. A little fight is better than none at all. And perhaps Netuno will smile on me. He has before."

Five bells later, their pursuer lobbed a few experimental stones at them. They fell short, but not far short, and Malconio's sailors stood nervously with their bows and set up their arbalest-which did indeed resemble a large crossbow. Anne could hear the sailors on the other ship now and see them scuttling about on the deck and in the rigging.

"We'll be within their range long before they're in ours," Malconio said. "Ladies, I suggest you go below." He glanced off toward the horizon, where black clouds were piling up. "It's not often I wish for a storm, but you might pray to whatever saints you revere that that one catches us before they do. In a blow, we might be able to lose them."

"I'll stay up here," Anne said.

"And do what?" Cazio asked. "Can you shoot a bow?"

"I could try."

"We don't have enough arrows to waste them," Malconio said. "Go below. It's my ship, and that's an order."

Anne prepared another objection, but let it fade behind her lips. Sir Neil had died because of her last poor decision. Malconio knew his business far better than she did.

"Come on, Austra," Anne said.

"Take this," Cazio said. He held out the hilt of a dagger.