Chapter Eleven
Lorath said nothing to Adreona as the cutter rowed them from the harbor out into open water, and she said nothing to him.
After they passed under the colossal statues of angel and demon, they worked together to raise the Arabel ’s sails, but neither of them spoke more than the few words necessary to set the rigging.
Lorath genuinely felt no anger toward her, despite their brief imprisonment at her insistence, and despite her desire to banish them from Skovos.
He did not resent her personally for the relative prosperity of Skovos compared to other cities and regions in Sanctuary.
Yet he sensed her anger toward him, radiating off her like heat ripples off an Aranoch horizon, and in truth he found that more than a little unjust.
They had the wind at their back, out of the southeast, and the Arabel galloped with glee across the waves.
Once they were underway, Lorath took up a position near the stern, next to Keldon at the tiller.
Adreona stood on the other side of the captain.
Keldon seemed quite content with the silence, but Lorath was not. Eventually, he had to speak his mind.
“Captain,” he said, “this arrangement may not be what either of us would’ve wanted, but you can trust me. I swear I will do my best to fight for you and—”
“I don’t want you to fight,” she said, as if the words had been waiting on her tongue. “Not for me, and not for Skovos. I want you to stay out of my way. I don’t have time to be your minder.”
Lorath worked to keep his pride in check. “Look, I did not want to come to Skovos in the first place. But now that I’m here, your queen has commanded me to fight. That’s what I was doing before we sailed to your islands, and that’s what I plan to do while I’m here. I could be of help to you.”
“I doubt that,” she said. “I plan to keep you where you can do no harm.”
“Do you often disregard the orders of your queen?”
That finally turned her head toward him. “Queen Etara did not give any command as to how you would fulfill your duty. There are many tasks within our ranks, and all of them are important. All of them are performed in service to the islands we safeguard.”
“Why am I sensing latrine duty in my future?”
“Perhaps you should be with the seers instead of troubling me.”
“We’re luffing,” Keldon said between them.
Lorath looked up, then moved to trim the mainsail, while Adreona saw to the jib. After that, they resumed their silence for a time, until Adreona spoke with a somewhat gentler manner than before.
“This isn’t personal,” she said. “How can it be, when I don’t know you?”
“If you did know me, you would—”
“Please, I am trying to explain something.”
Lorath closed his mouth and nodded.
“You are strangers,” she said. “You are unfamiliar with our customs, but you do know something of the threat we face, since that threat would’ve killed you if we had not arrived when we did.”
“And I’m grateful you—”
“I’m not finished. I said you know something of the threat, but you don’t know all of it.
The Amazons lost many, many warriors during the Reaping.
We were slaughtered, and our legions have not recovered.
Meanwhile, the Drowned have only grown their ranks.
My forces are barely holding the line. If we should break…
” She paused, as if momentarily seized by that thought.
“So, you see, our position is fragile. We cannot risk any weakness or disruption, no matter how well intentioned. As I said, I don’t know you, and it is because I don’t know you that I cannot afford to trust you with the lives of my troops. ”
“I understand,” Lorath said.
“Do you?”
“I do. I was a soldier. I understand the importance of troop cohesion and the danger of a weak link.”
She tilted her head. “I’m glad to hear it.”
“Put me to work in whatever capacity you deem best.” Lorath had accepted he would get nowhere convincing her with words. “I can dig a hole as well as anyone.”
“I never doubted that, ” she said.
They had come to a workable understanding, at least for now, and the tension between them eased.
Even Keldon appeared somewhat more relaxed at the tiller.
Lorath did not look forward to the menial tasks he would soon be assigned, but he knew that he could earn Adreona’s trust in time, if not her respect.
He wondered only if they would be in Skovos long enough for him to achieve it.
As the Arabel approached Athulua, Adreona directed Keldon away from the island’s main commercial port and toward a fortified Amazon harbor farther along the coast. There they sailed into a shallow bay, where thick tree trunks had been sunk deep into the silt to form an enclosing palisade out in the water.
But this fortification had not been raised against storm surges and tidal swells.
It was a martial defense. At their approach, a sea-gate opened in the wall to allow the sloop entrance into the harbor.
“This was built after the Drowned attacked our fleet at anchor,” she said. “They managed to sink several ships before we even knew they were down there.”
“That shows greater intelligence than I thought the Drowned possessed,” Lorath said.
“Yes. They seem to be getting smarter.”
Inside the palisade were many dozens of tall-masted warships secured to rows of floating docks like ranks of soldiers standing at attention, waiting for their orders.
As in the Great Harbor of Temis, the seawall thwarted the wind, and a rowboat approached the Arabel to tow them in.
The delay and extra labor set Adreona pacing the deck.
“Your ship needs oars,” she said to Keldon.
“Never required them before,” he answered. “The wind never stops a-blowing off Westmarch.”
Where the palisade met the shore, the wooden fortification became a wall of stone that continued overland, securing a large patch of earth with a central keep much like the garrison where they had spent the previous night.
Beyond the wall to the west, highland fells brooded over a rolling farmland of pasture and crop.
“This stronghold is called Fort Galina,” said Adreona. “Named in honor of an Amazon captain. It was from this fastness that she defended Athulua against a pirate armada three centuries ago.”
The tug rowed them to a floating pier not far from the fort’s main wharf. After securing the Arabel, they marched from their dock to the shore, where they were met by several warriors. Some of them eyed Lorath and Keldon with suspicion, others with curiosity, others with derision.
The foremost of them bowed her head to Adreona and said, “It’s good to have you back, Captain.”
“Believe me, Tavie,” Adreona said, “it is very good to be back.”
The woman grinned. “I take it you did not enjoy your time among the silks?”
“I did not.”
Tavie appeared slightly younger than Adreona, with dark skin and sharp cheekbones.
She wore her black hair in thick, twisted locs, each ringed with bands of silver; the emblem of a serpent coiled across her armor.
She craned her neck to look at Lorath and then raised her eyebrow at Adreona in an unspoken question.
“Yes, our guests,” Adreona said with a deep sigh. “This is Lorath and Keldon. The queen has shown forbearance toward these mainlanders. They will be with us for the time being. They’ll need rations and billet, preferably somewhere I can keep an eye on them.”
“Very good, Captain. But if I might ask…”
“Yes, Shieldmatron?”
Tavie leaned in. “What will they be doing here?”
“Queen Etara sent us to help you,” Lorath interjected, “in whatever ways your captain sees fit to use us.”
The intrusion earned him a glare from Tavie, while Adreona simply ignored him and strode away in the direction of the keep. Lorath, Keldon, and the Amazons all fell in behind, but Tavie quickened her pace to march beside her.
“I have not decided what to do with them,” Adreona said, loudly enough for Lorath to hear behind her. “For now, put them to work in the stables.”
Then it was Keldon who glowered at Lorath. “I should’ve gone with Donan,” he said.
To reach the keep, they passed through the encampment that surrounded it, and everywhere Lorath looked, he saw the familiar signs of an active military campaign.
They passed sheds for storing and dispensing supplies, both food and other equipment.
They passed infirmary tents where healers tended to Amazons—some of them grievously wounded, it appeared.
They passed training areas, though they were not as numerous or as large as at the garrison in Temis.
They passed the kitchen, the ovens, and the mess tent where warriors sat eating their food rations.
From somewhere inside the fortress walls, Lorath heard the metallic hammering of a smithy, and he smelled smokehouses curing fish and pork.
They passed orderly columns of tents used as personal quarters, outside of which Amazons sat sharpening their blades.
A small group of them made music together on flute, lyre, and hoop drum.
All along the way, Adreona received the sincere welcome and affection of the warriors under her command, and she took the time to speak with many of them, calling them by name.
Between those interactions, she had Tavie catch her up to speed on the fort’s activities.
Lorath tried to listen in without making his interest obvious.
“How many patrols in the field?” she asked.
“Three,” Tavie replied.
“Are they all on schedule?”
“Yes, Captain.”
“Any Drowned incursions to report?”
“No, Captain.”
“Any news from the Athulua Garrison?”
“No, it’s been calm.”
“I don’t like that word,” Adreona said. “It invites the storm.”