White flashed in Argoth’s mind. He arched his back and gritted his teeth against the pain until he could no longer contain his cries. But by that time the Skir Master had walked out and shut the door.
____________________
For some time Argoth fought just to control himself. He moaned, panted, lost consciousness twice. And in the pain one thought rose and kept him from losing all hope: the barrels still sat below. Somehow he had to get to them. He had to get to them and then give the liquid inside one sweet kiss of fire.
Argoth multiplied himself, but found he could not break the bonds, could not wriggle out of them. He couldn’t rock the table for it was nailed to the floor. And so he lay there in his sweat and pain, praying to his ancestors to help him get just one more chance.
The Skir Master returned around midmorning. “Do you want us to splint that arm?”
He could barely control his voice. “Yes,” he said.
“A reasonable choice,” said the Skir Master, and he removed the pincers. He picked up a cloth from a cabinet and wiped the snot and tears from Argoth’s face. “It would be petty and pointless for anyone to expect you to choose otherwise since nothing but your comfort is lost.”
“I don’t know who or what killed Lumen,” said Argoth.
“We always need subjects for our experiments. In a few days I will know if you’re lying. If you are, we can put you to a great many uses. Of course, that’s after we’ve used up your wife and children.”
“I have talents,” said Argoth. “I have connections.”
“Your paltry talents I already possess. Your connections I will take from your mind.”
“I’ll prove myself,” said Argoth.
“Please,” said the Skir Master. “Your fate is set.” He felt along Argoth’s arm, then jerked the two ends out and reset the bone.
Argoth closed his eyes against the pain. He took three deep breaths. “The seafire,” he said. “That was mine. You’ll need more than facts, more than a simple recipe to make that.”
The Skir Master retrieved two thin slats to use in Argoth’s splint. He looked down at Argoth and said nothing.
“I could show you how,” said Argoth. “You could let my wife and children go free.”
“Stop it,” said the Skir Master. “I detest sniveling.”
Argoth looked away from the Skir Master’s face. “Yes, Great One.”
And in that moment he saw an opening, a slim one but an opening nevertheless. If he could only convince the Skir Master he was one easily turned.
“Why did you bring this thrall aboard?”
“To bind you, Great One. To take what we could from your mind, then destroy you to preserve our secret.”
“Ambitious. And who is your master?”
“Hogan, the Koramite.”
“The one the Fir-Noy so desperately wanted a seeking for?”
“The same.”
“And this man of grass and earth? Who does it belong to?”
Argoth paused. “We thought it was yours, Great One.”
The Skir Master stood silently looking into Argoth’s eyes. “Are you telling me there is more than one murder of soul-eaters in the New Lands?”
“I don’t know,” said Argoth.
The Skir Master laid his hand on the break he’d just set. “A broken arm is a small thing, Clansman.”
“I’m not lying,” said Argoth. “When you seek me you will see I tell the truth. Perhaps it is the Bone Faces. Perhaps someone else has begun to move their wizards. Perhaps that is what took Lumen in the caves.”
The Skir Master’s gaze bored into Argoth, his tongue feeling the edge of his lips as if he were in thought. “If you are lying to me-”
“No,” said Argoth. “No, I’m telling the truth. Why else would we risk something so stupid and foolhardy as attacking a Divine himself? Please, believe me.”
The Skir Master gazed at him a few moments more, then he shook his head in frustration, laid the splints on Argoth’s chest, and walked out.
He returned some time later with Leaf and two dreadmen.
“How long would it take to mount a fire lance on this ship?” asked the Skir Master.
Argoth thought. “A day, Great One, with a good carpenter.”
“And the seafire below, how many lances will it support?”
“That depends on the length of the battle and how hard the pump gang works. The distance too, for you have to force a large quantity to build the pressure that will send the fire even sixty yards.”
“How many?” the Skir Master snapped.
“Three,” said Argoth. “Three if they’re careful and do not waste.”
“Three?” said the Skir Master in amazement. “I saw lances on six galleys. Are you telling me that you left the seafire for those galleys behind?”
“No. We only supply the galleys on patrol. I dared not make great quantities. The Bone Faces sent many spies seeking to steal the seafire so that they might unlock its secrets.”
The Skir Master’s face turned to thunder. “So you had them load the few barrels of finished product and left the component materials on the land?”
“No,” said Argoth. “No, we have them aboard.”
Argoth could not read the Skir Master’s face. Could the man already know his thoughts? It was impossible.
“Splint his arm,” said the Skir Master to Leaf. “Then bring him below.”
Leaf took Argoth’s arm matter-of-factly as if Argoth’s arm were nothing more than a spade that had come loose from its handle. Then he splinted Argoth’s arm using strips of the surgeon’s cloths. Argoth studied the flaring eye tattoos as he worked. Each eye’s tattoo was different, one sharp-edged and jagged, the other smooth, but Argoth could not read their meaning. Leaf finished, then led Argoth out to the area of the lower deck where the barrels were stored.
The Skir Master stood, holding a covered lamp. “You’re going to teach me how to make this seafire. And then you’re going to teach my men how to use it.”
“Yes, Great One,” said Argoth. “Thank you.”
The Skir Master wanted four lances: two just off the prow on both sides, and two at either side of the ship’s waist.
Three triangular sails, jibs, were rigged to lines running from the foremast to the bowsprit that stuck out over the prow. Those jibs might prove troublesome if a crew on one of the fore lances were spewing fire and the wind changed. So Argoth convinced the Skir Master to move the lances back.
Argoth directed the carpenter and his boy for most of the day as they installed the fittings for the four lances. Three times during the day he felt an intrusion upon his mind, a constricting. He dismissed the first two as the effects of fatigue. But when the third came, he realized what it was: the thrall had begun working into him.
When they finished the last fitting and mounted the lance, it was early evening. The sun was an hour or so from setting. Argoth leaned against the railing and stared at the sails in the orange and yellow light. The ship had two masts that were three sails high, and, with the studding sail booms rigged on both ends of each yard, three sails wide-it was such an amazing press of sail.
He couldn’t see her, but somewhere above the sails in the clear evening sky, Shegom moved, the wake of her passing creating the wind that filled the canvas.
They moved south, at an angle to the normal winds. Argoth knew this because at the edges of Shegom’s wind, in an oval perhaps a league across, the winds clashed, kicking up a scud that blew westward.
He imagined the clan galleys in a battle against this ship now fitted with fire lances. With Shegom above, moving hither and thither to the Skir Master’s commands, the sails of the clan galleys would be of no use. They would have to furl them and move under the power of the oarsmen. And all the while the Ardent would race about them, blown by Shegom, throwing her deadly fire at will. She’d be a wolf roving among lambs.