“The old emperor has died. All warlords of the empire have been summoned to pledge fealty to the new monarch. I left Tarsis with a small band so I could move fast.”

Xanka regarded him in silence, and Tol held his breath for a frozen moment. With a shrug of his meaty shoulders, the pirate chief finally said, “Lords die same as anybody else. String him up.”

He turned away, but his men did not move to carry out his command. He repeated his order more loudly and with obscene emphasis. Still the pirates hesitated.

“What ails you?” the King of the Sea bellowed, spittle flying from his lips. “Do as I say!”

“We ain’t never disobeyed you, Captain,” said a lean, bald buccaneer, “but if he’s truly Lord Tolandruth-”

“He bleeds the same as any man, don’t he, Faerlac? His neck will snap if I twist it, won’t it?” Xanka raged. He backhanded the bald pirate, and another man within reach.

“Your men have more honor than you,” Tol said haughtily. “Give me my sword-or are you afraid to meet me in fair combat?”

Blood suffused Xanka’s face and he charged, ready to trample Tol into the wooden deck. Darpo and Frez started to move to shield Tol but found it wasn’t necessary. A wall of pirates intervened, keeping the enraged Xanka off the shackled Tol.

“Fight him, Captain!” urged Faerlac, the bald sailor. His split lip dribbled blood. “Slay him fairly, and your name will resound beyond the narrow gulf. The great Lord Tolandruth, cut down in single combat by the mighty Xanka, King of the Sea!”

The vision of future glory he painted slowly soothed his angry commander. The purple veins in Xanka’s bulging neck lost their virulence and his high color lessened. Tol first thought the appeal of fame had caught the pirate chieftain’s attention, but he suddenly realized it was something else.

Xanka was afraid.

Of Tol? Perhaps, but as Xanka’s dark eyes flickered left and right, Tol realized he feared something else even more: his own men. Pirate chiefs ruled by intimidation, and their reigns lasted only so long as they were successful. If Xanka faltered in the face of Tol’s challenge, his men might abandon him. Or worse, Xanka’s heavy body might be the one swinging from a rope tied to Thunderer’s mast.

The pirate chief broke the tense silence with loud laughter and declared he would hang Tol’s head from the bowsprit, next to Torwalder’s and the dozen other moldering specimens already there. The fleet, he said, would sail to the Turbidus Sands, a shoal near the north end of the gulf. There, he and Tol would fight to the death on Thunderer’s deck.

The pirates raised a loud and lusty cheer. Tol felt like shouting himself. His plan to buy more time had worked.

When the cheering subsided, the shackles were removed from Tol’s wrists. Darpo and Frez remained bound. Unable to do more for them, Tol asked for Kiya and Miya.

“They’re my wives,” he told Faerlac. “While I live, I will not see them abused.”

The bosun saw the simple justice in this and sent for the Dom-shu. A long time passed before they finally arrived, and the four sailors bringing them looked rather battered. The women’s arms were pinioned with cloth straps, their ankles hobbled, and gags covered their mouths.

One sailor, sporting a darkening bruise under one eye, told Faerlac that Kiya was the fiercer fighter but Miya’s sharp tongue was lethal. She had, he said, all but flayed the skin off their backs with her curses. At Tol’s request, Faerlac agreed to remove Kiya’s gag.

“Husband!” she said. “I rejoice to see you living!”

Tol quickly explained the situation. The merest ghost of a smile crossed Kiya’s lips.

“May Bran protect you, Husband. We’re in the gods’ hands now!”

The captives were herded to the mast and left under guard. Tol was unfettered, but the pirates freed the others only long enough to bind their hands before them rather than behind their backs; at least they’d be able to balance more easily. Gongs sounded, and the great galley slowly got under way. The pirate fleet sorted itself into serried squadrons, with Thunderer front and center.

Xanka had one last chore before departing. Drawing away from the rest of the fleet, Thunderer turned ponderously in a half-circle. Below, the tempo of the rowing master’s drum increased. The great elevener plowed ahead, straight for the looted roundship, which rolled in the swell, her sails down, her helm unmanned.

Foaming green water curled back from the pirate’s saw-toothed ram. Xanka mounted to the forecastle and ordered ramming speed.

Thirty-two enormous oars rose and fell in perfect rhythm, the last light of day flashing off each blade as it plunged into the sea again. Although the ship was huge, Thunderer’s three hundred fifty-two rowers gave it considerable speed. Wind whipped the captives on deck.

Blue Gull awaited its destruction blindly, like a calf poised for the butcher’s blow. The pirates had no interest in horses, so Shadow, Pitch, and the rest were still in Blue Gull’s hold. There was nothing Tol’s party could do but watch helplessly as the pirate ship drove straight at the smaller vessel.

Cornets blared, warning of the collision. Darpo grabbed onto Frez, who held onto Miya’s waist. The Dom-shu clutched Tol.

Xanka laughed uproariously. “See, lubbers, what fate awaits the enemies of the King of the Sea!”

The bronze-covered ram hit the little roundship at the waterline. With a loud crash, it burst through the heavy planking. On Thunderer’s deck, the shock was surprisingly light. Splinters flew as Blue Gull was thrown up on the galley’s downswept stem, timbers snapping like reeds. A few fragments fell on deck as Thunderer swept through the debris unhindered, turned sharply on its own length, and returned to the waiting pirate fleet.

His point made, Xanka retired below, a broad grin on his fleshy face.

When the pirates tired of guard duty, they fettered Tol’s feet and left him with his shackled comrades. The Ergothians sat in a circle, their backs against the galley’s main mast. Their supper was brackish water and biscuits so hard Kiya vowed an ogre’s tusks couldn’t gnaw through them.

Thunderer was brightly lit by night, lamps glowing every few steps along the rail. As the hold was crowded with slave rowers and whatever booty had been garnered this trip, the pirates spent most of their time on deck. Eating and drinking were pastimes with them, not just necessities, and they gamed constantly, casting dice against the forecastle bulkhead.

Behind Thunderer, the pirate fleet spread out as far as Tol could see. Yellow lanterns winked from every mast. Kiya said Xanka commanded two hundred nine ships.

“How did you get such exact information?” Tol wanted to know.

She shrugged. “I asked.”

The ships ranged from the mighty Thunderer down to light galleots such as Torwalder had destroyed. Xanka’s was just one of several pirate fleets in the gulf.

The empire had nothing fit to oppose so many crafty pirates. Egrin, Tol’s former mentor, had been sent south after the defeat of Tylocost in Hylo to organize defenses against pirate raids. A dedicated warrior, Egrin had established flying patrols along the coast, to oppose any landing the pirates made. He tried to set up a squadron of fighting ships, but Ergothians weren’t sailors and their ships were usually swiftly destroyed. A stalemate had existed for ten years. Egrin’s troops foiled the pirates’ attempts to raid the rich coastal districts, but the swarms of pirates completely choked off the Ergothians’ sea trade.

With only his four companions, Tol couldn’t hope to destroy an entire pirate fleet, but he could try to unman the pirates by defeating Xanka. Although ruthless and powerful and half again Tol’s size, Xanka seemed too far gone in the pleasures of the table and bottle to be much of an opponent. The fleshy pirate reminded Tol of Lord Odovar in his later years, changed from a vigorous, hearty warrior to an overfed martinet because peace bored him.