"Come in, outlander. I've been waiting for thee." The room carried the heavy smell of homebrew usquebaugh.

On the table near the bed was an assortment of Pyra Quadde's toys: three whips of varying length, one with tips made from tiny steel nails; an open razor, its edge dulled with old, dried blood; a broad-bladed cleaver and a slim dagger; several coils of silken cord, one with knots all along its length; a mask of supple leather, with what looked like an inflatable phallus-shaped gag attached. A dirty hypodermic needle rested in a stained metal kidney-dish over a small spirit lamp.

"What dost thou want us to do with him, ma'am?" Walsh asked.

"Strip and cuff him, o'course. Didn't think thou wouldst need telling, Mr. Walsh."

Ryan saw then that the bed had a frame of solid iron, painted black, with several sturdy metal rings set into it at both top and bottom. Once a man was chained there, his life would be done.

"No!" Johnny Flynn shouted, backing up against the door of the cabin.

"How's this, madman?" The captain stood up slowly.

"No. This must stop. Thou dost bring this on thyself by thy..." His voice trembled into stillness, but the pistol in his hand remained steady.

Ryan recognized it as a Polish blaster from the middle of the twentieth century. Called a Duo, it was a pocket-sized 6.35mm handgun. Not of much use above twenty paces, but sufficient in a small, cribbed room.

"Thought I heard a rat sneaking around the ship's gun chest an hour or so back," the woman said gently. "And it was little Johnny, all along."

"Let him be," Flynn said. "Come, outlander. Move cautious, and we'll go over the side. The boats are in the water, ready. Two men can manage 'em. Pull for the shore, eh? Never find us in the fog out yonder. Come on."

Something was wrong. Ryan's fighting sense told him that. Brandt and Walsh were both scared of the blaster. Jehu didn't seem as if he'd even noticed it. But Pyra Quadde acted as though it weren't even there. She was either mad or...

The woman picked up her own blaster from the bureau under the stern window, keeping it pointed at the deck.

"I'll chill thee..." Flynn shrilled, leveling the Duo at her face.

"Not with an empty blaster, cully." She smiled. "Try it." She walked toward him, lifting her own, much larger pistol.

Ryan hissed between his teeth. That was it! She'd known all along there was no danger. The trigger snapped, the action of the blaster clicking, the noise thin and feeble. Flynn tried again. And again.

"Open thy mouth, cully," Quadde ordered, standing right against the quivering man. "Open it now."

The cut-down twin muzzle of the scattergun pressed hard into Ryan's back, keeping him very still.

Flynn turned his eyes to Ryan, tears gathering in the swollen corners, trickling down his stubbled cheeks. The useless, empty blaster was still in his hand.

"I'm sorry, Johnny. Real sorry. Thanks for trying."

"Yeah," the captain said, ramming the short barrel of the handgun between Flynn's toothless gums, making him gag. "Yeah, thanks from me, too. Been meaning to rid the ship of thee for some time, cully. And this'll give me a special taste for the main course of my meal, will it not?"

"She's there," came the word, carried in whispers along the deck of the Phoenix.

J.B. had relayed his orders to Deacon and his red-sweatered crew.

"Our fight, not yours. Lay alongside and hold there. That's all. We'll go in. We want the woman and to free our friends. But I guess it'll mean breaking a few heads. If all goes well, she'll be ours within fifteen minutes." He turned to Deacon. "Got your word not to cut free and run?"

"Thou hast my word."

"Then let's do it. Jak. You and Krysty with me to the stern. The back. Find the woman. Watch out for Donfil and Ryan. Lori and Doc, take the front. Chill anyone who even looks like resisting. Let's get to it now."

Deacon had persuaded him not to try to hole the Salvation, pointing out there was little point in scuttling such a valuable vessel.

Now, the five champions stole out onto the damp deck, blasters cocked and ready, seeing for the first time the spectral masts of their prey, only feet away from them.

In the enveloping stillness they all heard the sudden, unmistakable noise of a blaster, the explosion oddly muffled.

Chapter Thirty

A large chunk of bone was raised from the crown of Johnny Flynn's skull, as a gentleman would lift his hat to a lady.

A brief eruption of blood and brains came puffing out through the crack, leaking down across the forehead and the pale skin of the seaman's face. The force of the .44 slug punched Flynn's head against the paneling with a solid thumping noise. The actual sound of the Astra firing was muffled by the barrel's being jammed inside the wretch's open mouth. But it was still sufficiently loud to be heard throughout the length of the ship.

Pyra Quadde held Johnny upright, gripped by the throat, as his heels drummed against the cabin door. The Duo dropped from the dead man's fingers, rattling on the floor. Smiling broadly, she removed the pistol from Flynn's mouth, tugging it from where he'd clamped his jaws on it in a dying spasm of pain and shock.

As she released him, the corpse clattered to the deck, twitching. She pushed at it with her foot, her smile now directed at Ryan.

"We'll have this removed and tossed over the side, I think. Unless we leave it here to spice our pleasure. What thinkest thou, Outlander Cawdor?"

Ryan thought that the pressure of the shotgun had eased a little. But still not enough for him to make the play that his life would totally depend on.

The Salvationshuddered gently, as if some great undersea creature had scraped itself beneath her keel. The captain turned immediately, sensitive to every shift and movement of her beloved vessel.

"What was?.." she began.

Now they couid hear feet pattering on the deck — the heels of combat boots — shouts and the unmistakable chattering sound of an Uzi submachine gun.

The captain swung around to face Ryan, her ornate finery rustling. Her heavy features were convulsed with an almost insensate anger, and a worm of spittle inched down her chin. "By all the gods!" she spit. "Thou bastard... bastard! We are done!"

Walsh was heading for the door, but his boots slipped in the spreading puddle of Johnny Flynn's blood, sending him careening sideways. He clutched at the arm of Brandt, who held the scattergun, finger on the slim trigger.

The jolting shock was all that it took. The sawed-off blaster boomed, both barrels firing in a single convulsive explosion.

Brandt had been half turning, eager to get out of the confines of the cabin and onto the deck. Walsh had been less than a foot away from him. At that range, the double shock of the 10-gauge lifted him clear off his feet and threw him across the cabin, where he knocked into Quadde, sending her tumbling backward. Her pistol rattled into the corner beneath the long stern window. The second mate thrashed on the floor, his blood and guts adding to Flynn's. The entrance hole in Walsh's stomach was smaller than the fist of a woman, but the buckshot had ripped him apart, the exit wound large enough to hold an iron bucket. Fragments of splintered bone were embedded in the far wall, along with the clotted pellets of distorted lead.

Brandt staggered, holding the empty, smoking blaster, his face slack with shock. Jehu had fallen to his knees in the slippery scarlet lake, still gripping the belaying pin. Ryan could see no sign of Walsh's battered Glock. The floor was so deep in blood and intestines that the blaster could have fallen anywhere.

Above his head, he could hear yelling and more blasters going off. He hadn't the least doubt that a rescue party had emerged from out of the fog.