Chapter 7 #2
With the zeal of men fleeing crucifixion, bisection, and the hanging of body parts, my new crew tore into the Marawati .
Hammers and crowbars, penknives and bare hands, they ripped into the false floorboards and smashed through the painted bark
panels concealing the oar frames. At the same time, another pair of men began hauling up the front anchor as Tinbu set the
side rudders at the slant I had indicated.
Chaos engulfed the warship. In the time it took us to break out the oars, the Mamluk soldiers had attempted to put out the
fire with their cloaks and waterskins—accomplishing nothing but spreading it farther. Panicked voices cried out in confusion
as the soldiers raced about the ship. Arrows had not started flying yet, but I knew they would soon enough.
It was a credit to Tinbu’s ingenuity and training that the crew had the oars out and set up so quickly, but as I took over
the rudders and he raced to lead the men in rowing, alarm spiked through me at their messy, uneven lines. The Marawati is not a large ship; the oars are light enough that they require only two men each rather than the giant galleys with a team
per blade. However, several men were hugging the oar to their chest instead of holding it by the handles, a couple facing
the wrong direction altogether.
“Nakhudha!” It was the outspoken Parsi youth, Firoz. He gestured wildly at the burning warship, and I glanced over just in time to see the spreading fire overwhelm their mainsail.
This had two consequences:
One, with naft burning in multiple locations, most of the soldiers jumped overboard, preferring to chance the short swim to
the beach and possible dishonor to a fiery death.
Two, the soldiers who stayed behind were that lethal combination of stupidly brave and well trained enough to pick up their
bows and start shooting at us.
“Heave!” I cried, ducking an arrow that whizzed past my face. “Stay low! Pull fast!”
The Marawati ’s sides were high and curved to protect the oarsmen, but my heart climbed in my throat as the few men not rowing rushed to
take shelter. Mercifully after a few false starts, the Marawati began to move.
Achingly, agonizingly slow at first. But as the men fell into a rhythm, we gathered speed.
We were not going fast —not without the sails.
But the burning warship lagged behind, the arrows less and less frequent until they fell away altogether.
Now I just had to get us out of the harbor.
I followed the stars, adjusting the rudders to lead northward out of the bay and searching for the waves crashing against
the breakwater that walled off the harbor and would mark where I could make my exit. But the sea was calm, and it was not
until we were quite close that I spotted the ancient stone causeway.
Along with the second warship, moving to block our escape.
Cursing, I tried to gauge the distance to the other vessel and our speed.
Beyond the warship beckoned the open ocean, where our small size would make us nearly impossible to catch in the dark.
And while the warship was not large enough to block the entire waterway, it had the advantage of a side position by which to loose an entire cavalcade of arrows as we approached.
I contemplated my options. None were great.
Dalila joined me. Her warning was low, for my ears alone. “They are watching you.”
She did not need to say anything else. The nervous, expectant eyes of my crew glimmered in the dark. I could feel the weight
of their doubt, their fear. They might have been willing to cut a deal to escape prison, but now their fate was in the hands
of a stranger. A woman. I have felt that tension too many times in my life, that knife’s edge where it would take very little
to tip into mutiny and a grisly death.
I glanced at Tinbu. “Speed up.”
He let out a soft sound of surprise. “Nakhudha?”
“Do it.” I raised my voice, knowing it would carry along the water to the approaching soldiers. “ RAM THEM! ”
Hamid, the cook who had spoken out of turn in the prison and lost two teeth for his trouble, took exception to this plan.
“ Ram them?” he repeated. “Are you out of your mind? We will sink both ships!”
“Whether or not we sink both ships is up to them. Because by the time we get close, we shall be going too fast to stop. Our
choice is between freedom and a brigand’s death. They know that.” I glared at him. “And a brigand’s death will be kinder than
the one I will serve you should you question me again.”
Hamid glanced desperately at Tinbu. He was not the only one, the crew looking to their old leader to step in.
But Tinbu was mine before he was theirs. “The nakhudha has already saved you once, has she not? Speed up!” He let out a howl,
clapping his hands. “Let those dirt-loving horsemen know the ocean’s sons are coming to drown them!”
I feel like I should clarify, for I have insulted them now at depth: the Mamluk soldiers stolen from distant lands who can barely tread water are genuinely admirable warriors.
Terrifying ones—when they fight Franks or rulers who don’t pay them.
They are astonishingly skilled riders, knowledgeable in weapons I’ve never even heard of, and well disciplined.
But they’re not locals. They’re not seafolk. And facing off against crazy sailors and divers who could swim before they lost
their milk teeth in the middle of a midnight bay?
I had made worse gambles.
“Speed up! Ram them!” Tinbu’s cry carried, the men adding their own shouted threats and wild hollers. Nearly all were rowing,
but those who were not stomped their feet, hurling insults.
The wind was flat, but we seemed to fly across the water, the men finally falling into tempo. The oars rose and fell with
great splashes that broke the black water, its spray drenching.
“Get down!” I ordered when we were within arrow range. “Move, you bastards,” I added under my breath, praying whoever was
in charge on the warship saw wisdom. I wasn’t confident; there was great commotion and confused yelling aboard the other vessel.
A few arrows were loosed our way—some of which were flaming. But our ship was already soaked, and they were quickly smothered.
However, the galley still wasn’t moving away. I spotted men at their oars, but the order must not have been decided.
Well then, I could give them something else to consider. “Tinbu, get your bow and a dry flint.”
He obeyed, returning with a handful of arrows already prepared. He gestured to the crow’s nest. “I will take the shot from
there. It offers the clearest view.”
I took the bow from his hands. “I will take the shot.”
“Amina...”
Tinbu’s voice was low, but I hushed him further. “Trust me, I know which of us is the better archer. But you’re injured and it needs to be me.” I was not customarily one to let pride dictate such matters: one cannot be a nakhudha without knowing when to delegate.
But I wanted to make damn sure the crew knew who they owed their lives to tonight.
I slung the bow over my shoulder and climbed the mast, clutching the worn rope ladder as my heart skipped in fear—I have always
hated heights. Pulling myself into the crow’s nest, I stood, bracing my feet.
Tinbu raised a pot of pitch-soaked arrows up the rig. I lit them carefully, relieved our own sails were still tied back. The
swaying of the ship and the salt-dried wooden mast were risk enough. I pulled back the bow. The string whispered against my
cheek, the fiery arrowhead cracking and hissing. The warship—which had seemed so close, the wall we would break ourselves
upon—now looked much smaller, a moving target on a churning midnight sea. I had only six arrows.
If he were here, you would not miss. That other ship would have already lost you in the blackness or the wind would be ripe for
the sails.
But he was not here, and I had learned the hard way not to rely on a demon’s luck. I let loose my arrows and by the grace
of God, they flew true. I was not as talented an archer as Tinbu, but enough arrows struck the warship’s mainsail that soon
it was aflame. That must have been enough for the soldiers aboard to decide being rammed by a bunch of crazy pirates and drowning
in the dark was a worse fate than obeying a power-hungry government official. Their oars began moving in the firelight and
so did their ship, leaving a clear path for us to escape.
“God be praised, they are retreating!” A cheer went up from among my men. “The nakhudha did it!”
“The nakhudha did,” I muttered, lowering the bow and murmuring a prayer of thanks. I leaned back against the mast, catching
my breath as we surged past the breakwater, the deep ebony of the open ocean pulling us into its concealing embrace.
Behind us, the ships were burning bright enough to light up Sira Bay, to light up Aden itself, the powerful city in which I was supposed to have met Salima and hunted down clues of her missing granddaughter.
Discretion, I had promised the Sayyida. A few careful questions of trusted contacts, I had sworn to my mother.
That night should have been a sign that this would only get worse.