At a hand on his shoulder the pirate spun around, eyes blazing, ax coming up by sheer reflex and stopping just before it came down on Blade's head.

«Khraishamo. Our next enemy isn't Sarumi.» He pointed to the approaching galley and the flag at its masthead.

«Ah.»

«Coming right into our hands, too.» He spoke quickly, summarizing his plan in a few sentences. Khraishamo nodded, then started strapping his ax to his belt.

«No. Sword and knife only. The ax will weigh you down too much.» They were going to have to swim like fish, then possibly climb like monkeys.

«All right.»

Blade looked to starboard again. Kloret's galley was heading straight for Lioness. Now she could hardly avoid ramming if she wanted to. It was time for him and Khraishamo to get over the side, before anyone aboard the approaching ship recognized them.

Lioness's bow was now down so far her deck was only five feet above the water. Khraishamo swung himself over the railing and lowered himself into the water. Blade followed. Then both of them took several deep breaths and plunged under, heading toward the rammed Sarumi ship.

They dove completely under the sinking ship. Looking up, Blade could see barnacles and waving weeds on her keel, timbers cracked and planks bulged from the ramming, and the dim shape of Lioness with her ram embedded in the enemy's side. Looking downward, Blade saw only a greenish darkness. The sea here was no more than sixty or seventy feet deep, but the water was murky with silt churned up from the bottom by the recent bad weather. Blade saw a number of large fish moving slowly in the dimness, and hoped none of them were sharks attracted by the noise of the battle and the scent of blood.

They popped to the surface on the far side of the ship, nearly amidships. Both Blade and Khraishamo kept their heads low as they breathed. They didn't want to be spotted by the people on the ships, who were now shooting arrows and throwing spears indiscriminately at the swimmers.

Another dive, and they swam aft along the side of the rammed Sarumi. Air was beginning to bubble out of her through ruptured seams as she sank lower and lower. They came up under the overhanging stern of the ship. For the first time in several minutes they could see Kloret's galley. She was still driving in at nearly full speed, her decks packed with archers and soldiers. Blade could make out Kloret himself in gilded armor, standing by the break of the foc'sle.

Now it was impossible to doubt that Kloret was headed for Lioness, and hard to doubt that he was planning to ram. Both Mythorans and Sarumi stopped fighting, to stare at the massive green hull driving down upon them. Then the archers on Kloret's foc'sle let fly, some of the starers fell, and the rest scrambled wildly for the railing.

Kloret's rowers trailed their oars, and a moment later his galley rammed Lioness. The smaller galley was thrown nearly on her beam ends, and the foremast went over the side to crush swimmers in the water. Her ram twisted free of the planks of the Sarumi ship, and air poured out in great bursts of foam as water poured in. As the Sarumi ship's bow disappeared below the surface, Blade and Khraishamo took their bearings on Kloret's galley, gulped air, and dove.

Kloret's flagship was so large Blade saw its shadow in the water the moment he went under. It was easy to keep a straight course toward it, then surface alongside. Khraishamo surfaced beside Blade, his knife already drawn. He gripped a trailing oar with one hand, pulled himself up until he could reach the leather seal of the oarport, and slashed away with the knife.

In three cuts, the leather was gone. Blade put both hands on the port sill and hauled himself up until he could look in. As he'd expected, three grim faces stared back at him. Two were Sarumi, one was human, and all three were pinched with starvation and exhaustion. All three men were chained to the bench under him, and both of the Sarumi had fresh lash marks across back and shoulders.

For two men to attack Kloret's galley would have been madness even in the middle of a confused and desperate battle, except for one thing. Most of Gohar's galleys were rowed by free men who could double as fighters. The work of rowing the big two-deckers was too brutal to let a rower also remain in shape. So the big flagships carried their fighting men on deck, and were rowed by two or three hundred chained Goharan and Sarumi slaves. Blade intended to unchain the ones aboard Kloret's ship.

He shifted his grip, then heaved himself completely out of the water. One of the Sarumi stopped staring and gave Blade a hand. Blade practically flew through the port and sprawled across the knees of the three slaves.

«Huh, what gives here?» came a shout almost in Blade's ear. It was an overseer who'd run aft between the benches. Blade coughed and choked, pretending to be half-drowned, until he saw that the man was within striking distance. He also saw that the overseer carried a bunch of keys at his waist.

Blade rolled off the knees of the galley slaves, fell to the deck, gripped both the overseer's ankles, and jerked his feet out from under him. He fell with a crash and a surprised yell, then let out another kind of yell as Blade chopped him across the throat. With one hand Blade drew his sword, with the other he picked up the keys and handed them to the nearest slave.

«Get yourself loose.»

An arrow whistled past Blade and struck a slave on another bench. He screamed and fell to the deck, nearly rolling under Khraishamo's feet as the pirate climbed in through the hatch. He spotted the archer standing amidships and nocking another arrow, snatched up a wooden bucket, and threw it as hard as he could. It didn't hit the archer but it spoiled his aim. Before he could shoot again, Blade and Khraishamo were on him. The archer went down and didn't get up again. If he wasn't dead from Blade's sword, he certainly died as the first of the freed galley slaves swarmed over him.

Blade and Khraishamo charged ahead of the slaves, their swords and knives slashing a path through the guards. They didn't bother killing, just knocked the guards down or disabled them and left them for the galley slaves.

The lower deck of Kloret's flagship quickly turned into an inferno of blood, weapons, and screaming or dying men. Bench after bench of slaves set themselves free. As word of what was happening reached the soldiers above, they swarmed down the main ladder. Blade and Khraishamo stationed themselves just out of bowshot, one on each side of the ladder, and tackled the soldiers as they came down.

Blade put his sword into a soldier's throat, then jerked the weapon free to parry a club swung by a second man. The soldier with the slashed throat reeled off, into the arms of the galley slaves. The man with the club was good. He and Blade stood toe-to-toe for nearly a minute before Khraishamo ran the soldier through from behind. Khraishamo left his position to do this, though, and two soldiers got off the ladder on to the deck. One of them stepped on a dying slave, who bit him in the ankle. The soldier screamed and fell against his comrade, knocking the man against the stairs and making him drop his sword. Another slave snatched up the fallen weapon and attacked both soldiers.

At last the flow of soldiers down the ladder slowed, and Blade noticed that among the slaves Sarumi and humans were fighting side by side. He saw a blond-bearded man trip a soldier so that a pirate could stamp him into the deck. He saw two Sarumi pull a soldier off a human's back with their bare hands, both taking wounds in the process.

If you'd been a slave aboard this ship, it didn't matter whether you were human or Sarumi. You were a friend.

Then the soldiers stopped coming down the ladder. Khraishamo was only a moment behind Blade as they both scrambled up the ladder to the ship's middle deck. As they came up through the hatch, they dropped to the deck and rolled one to either side: Several arrows smacked the deck where they'd been. Then they were up and charging the archers.