“Grinwoody, you’re looking well!” Kip said with false cheer, deliberately invoking the familiarity of using the slave’s name. How long had Grinwoody been there? Dear Orholam.

“Your grandfather requires you.”

“For Nine Kings?” Kip asked.

“I believe so.”

“I’ve got Blackguard training,” Kip said. “I don’t want to play him now.”

“Your desires are irrelevant. The promachos has summoned you. You will come with me. Immediately.” The old man seemed to enjoy making Kip furious.

The promachos? Dear Orholam, no. So that’s how he had the authority to shut down access to the libraries. Dammit!

“Or what?” Kip said. He just couldn’t help himself, could he?

The Parian slave turned to Teia. “Or your friend here will be expelled.”

“Excuse me?” Teia said.

“You’ve not been addressed, slave. Be silent,” the old slave told her. Asshole.

“I’m not a slave,” Teia snapped.

“My mistake,” Grinwoody said. It clearly hadn’t been a mistake.

Well, that answered one question. Teia wasn’t working for Andross. He wouldn’t threaten one of his own, would he? Or would he, so secure in his belief that Kip wouldn’t let harm come to her?

Was Andross so good that he was comfortable playing against his own cards, knowing someone else would save them?

Kip felt ill, and he felt afraid. He was trying to match wits against this? Andross Guile was godlike in his intellect, and in his ruthlessness. Kip had called Magister Kadah’s bluff, saying she could never expel someone who was nearly a Blackguard. But Andross could expel anyone he wanted. He was now the promachos. It was a calamity.

“I’m not ready,” Kip said.

“He doesn’t require your readiness, he requires your presence.”

Kip cursed under his breath. “I really hate you, Grinwoody,” he said.

Grinwoody gave a thin-lipped grin. “The heart breaks, sir.”

Chapter 35

A few of the galley slaves whooped at the discovery of the key. The others were more wary, more frightened, maybe more cynical. Orholam took the key and ran around the galley, unshackling slaves.

“Grab ten of us to free so we can cut the boarding nets,” Gavin said. “We need the rest of them still on the oars.”

“Free us all!” a slave near the front shouted.

“In time!” Gavin said.

“You’re lying to us! Freedom now or never!” the man shouted back.

Gavin couldn’t believe it. They were going to jeopardize the escape attempt. They had no time for this. “Some of us are going to risk death cutting the ship free. If we don’t get separation from that ship as fast as possible, they’ll just come right back across the nets, or they’ll load the cannons over there and kill us all. If you don’t like it, don’t row. Go ahead, kill us all.”

With that, Gavin dashed toward the stairs. They’d been ripped halfway off in a cannon blast. He grabbed a length of wood that had been torn away, and leapt up to the remaining stairs. Antonius Malargos followed him unquestioningly. The stairs led past the puzzled slaves on the next deck and to a cramped landing.

The hatch was concealed around two half-turns of the stairs, and closed. Gavin, Antonius, and half a dozen slaves stacked up at the door. It was locked.

Gavin threw his shoulder into the hatch. It was an awkward maneuver to attempt, given that it was almost directly above him.

“Orholam have mercy, what do we do now?” Antonius asked.

One of the slaves reached over Antonius’s shoulder and found a latch hidden in the darkness. He slid it open, grinning, nothing but his teeth showing in the darkness. Gavin had hoped that perhaps his monotone vision would help him see better in the dark. So far as he could tell, it didn’t. It was purely handicap. Unlike the wild stories he’d heard about blind men having preternaturally acute hearing or sense of smell, he had no counterbalancing ability.

It was, perhaps, just. When he’d been Prism, he’d had no handicaps. He’d moved from strength to strength. Now he had no strength at all.

“We need blades,” he said. “Anyone have a knife? A sword? Anyone know how the boarding nets are attached? Is it grapnels, or are they tied on this side?”

Gavin prided himself on his memory, but he’d been unconscious when he was brought aboard. “Doesn’t matter,” he said, thinking aloud. “We won’t be able to untie them if they’re under tension. We’ll need to cut them regardless.”

Someone handed up one knife. One.

Gavin handed it back. He had training, and a piece of wood. “Boarding nets first,” he said. “Our only advantage is our numbers. We gain nothing if they get reinforcements. Nets off, get some separation. Kill men to get their blades, and cut those nets. Ready?”

He didn’t wait for an answer. He threw the hatch open and jumped onto the deck.

The sudden, harsh light nearly blinded him, and being free of the confines of the ship let a flood of sound wash over him. A musket cracked fifteen paces away, but the pirate was shooting at a marksman in the rigging of the other galley. Gavin ran at him.

The pirate didn’t even see Gavin coming. He swiveled to start reloading, and that move turned his back to Gavin. Gavin’s makeshift club swept into the pirate’s head like an oar cutting the sea. The man went flying in a spray of blood, and Gavin was on him in a second, ripping a knife from his belt.

Then he was up again, running. Speed and surprise were the slaves’ only advantages. One pirate with a sword would be able to cut through half a dozen of the unarmed slaves and end their escape before it began.

There was one more pirate stationed at the nets at the stern of the ship, and this one saw Gavin coming. Through stupidity or shock, the man didn’t shout an alarm, but he did ready his saber.

Gavin barely slowed. He lifted the knife and whipped it forward as if he were throwing it. The man flinched, bringing the point of his saber in as his muscles tightened. Gavin brought the knife down to parry the saber and threw his torso to one side as he closed the distance. Knife and saber slid against each other, the cheap metal throwing sparks. Gavin’s club, wielded left-handed, only struck a glancing blow to the pirate’s forehead.

But it was enough to stun him. Gavin followed the first with a full backhand swing. Teeth sprayed, and the man dropped. Gavin knelt on the man’s back and jabbed his knife through the base of the pirate’s skull. He rose with the saber, and threw the knife handle-first to whoever had followed him. It was Antonius, and for a second he looked like he thought he was being attacked himself, a victim of friendly attack.

Antonius dodged out of the way of the knife, and it clattered to the deck. He bent over to pick it up, and a musket ball whistled right over his head, scoring the deck ten feet behind him.

The other galley was taller than the Bitter Cob, and that could be good or bad news, depending on how enraged and careless the pirates were. If they wanted to get across the gap fast, they could sheathe their swords and simply roll down the boarding nets and be across in seconds. No man in his right mind who felt threatened would do that, though, and climbing down a declined rope net wasn’t easy.

Of course, betting that pirates who followed Gunner were in their right minds might be a poor gamble.