King of the Seas (6)
"If what you say is true, the Emperor is about to take a proper blow. Who would ever have dreamed that Duke Esterzy had secured himself an unfreezing port?"
Loki nodded slowly.
"But I'm not going to the Esterzy Duchy."
"Why not?"
"Just because a faction is anti-Empire doesn't mean it's on the side of justice. The way I see it, Duke Esterzy is nothing more than a junior edition of the Pellion Emperor. Word is they're both pillars of evil."
"I wouldn't say the Duke of Esterzy is quite that bad?"
"No. I'm certain of it."
Loki declared flatly.
"A man who locks his own brother in an underground dungeon and visits him every day to peel the skin off him can't possibly be right in the head. They say the people of Esterji Fortress City lose sleep every night over the screams of Young Lord Chris echoing through the dark."
"The Duke of Esterzy peels Chris's skin?"
"That's right. He flays him to the brink of death, then has a priest heal him, over and over. And that isn't the half of it. Word has it he recently kidnapped King Sandor's favorite concubine and shut her away in a tower. And then... honestly, how does a man with a fiancée stoop to something so filthy?"
"Pfft..."
Uld hastily ducked her head. She was very obviously fighting down a laugh.
Well, I had expected as much. Seize another man's woman, and you have to accept the sordid rumors that come with it.
Chris, though, was getting a raw deal. It was true I had locked him up, but I had never once tortured him. The bastard had tried to kill his own father, if anyone cared to recall.
It wasn't as if I'd never tried spreading rumors that Chris was the worse of us, but this region lay deep under imperial influence, and in its version of the story I seemed to be the only villain.
"I have principles too. If serving under a man simply because he was stronger was all it took, I'd have quit piracy long ago."
"Then what do we do now, Captain?"
"No idea. Drink."
Loki clinked cups with Raghas. Raghas looked none the worse for tipping back his rum, but Loki seemed due to stop drinking soon.
Then it happened.
"Hostages drinking with pirates — now there's a rare picture."
Harald appeared with his men in tow, far more of them than last time. By a rough count there had to be two hundred.
"What is it now, Harald? I thought we were done with each other."
"So did I, until one of your former men told me a most amusing story."
"Amusing story! Amusing story!"
Harald's parrot flapped its wings. Harald drew deep on his cigarette, the smoke sinking into his lungs.
"Those little brats of yours... I hear their ransom comes to 3.2 million bhat?"
"What business is that of yours?"
Loki's brow furrowed.
"Now, now, no need for that scowl. I'm only saying neighbors ought to help each other get by. Feeding and housing the hostages, sailing off to collect the ransom — none of that happens without a crew, does it?"
"So?"
"So hand the brats over. I'll shoulder all the tedious work, and you can take your cut and walk away. Hmm... how does 300,000 bhat sound?"
"Your news is stale, Harald. These two aren't hostages anymore. They're guests."
"Even better. If you've given up the ransom, there's no money to split. We'll simply take good care of them ourselves."
"I distinctly said guests. Has piracy dulled your ears, Harald?"
"My ears work fine. I heard you loud and clear: two brats, 3.2 million bhat. So do us all a favor and shut your trap and get lost, you washed-up old soldier."
Harald smirked. The pirates jeered as if daring them to try something — and about half of them had been Loki's own men until recently.
"...Now that I think of it, Raghas."
Loki said, turning to Raghas.
"I don't believe I was ever actually a pirate. To those bastards, I was nothing but an annoying nag."
"You're only figuring that out now?"
Raghas laughed with easy good humor.
"If not a pirate, then what was I?"
"A soldier, no? A washed-up soldier."
Loki stared down at the bottle in his hand.
"Take your clowning to that corner over there. Distinguished guests are enjoying the sea breeze, you see."
"Hostages! Big money!"
The parrot chimed in after Harald.
"...I've decided."
Loki said, his face set with resolve.
"No one here treats me as a pirate, so my judgment is this: from this moment on, I will simply live like a soldier."
Loki's blue eyes flashed.
"Vice Admiral Raghas."
"You called?"
"Clear those pirate bastards out of my sight."
"Heh, been waiting all night to hear those words!"
Raghas thrust both arms forward. A furious gust erupted and slammed into the gathered pirates, hurling them like toys to tumble off the edge of the dock.
"You mad bastard!"
"What's to be surprised about, Harald? Forgotten already how the Alkaraz Navy dealt with pirates?"
Loki joined in. Pillars of water rose from the sea like cannons and battered the pirates.
"Gwaaagh!"
"Seal their awakenings! Don't let them use them!"
In the blink of an eye, four or five pirates lay collapsed in their own blood. Their bodies would not move at all — they looked as good as dead. Loki, it seemed, had resolved not to let old ties hold him back.
"So the dogs have gotten bold, have they!"
Harald tore off his shirt and launched a bare-handed charge. Every muscle across his body swelled like a balloon in an instant, and with that bloated frame he met head-on the wind Raghas had summoned.
"Grrrnngh..."
Harald's face flushed red as though it might burst. Tendons bulged along Raghas's temples.
"Not once... not once have I ever liked you."
Harald pushed forward against the wind, inch by inch. A sharp cutlass was clenched in his fist.
"I'll carve that great skull of yours... into a drinking cup!"
"Before that happens, the first hole I punch will be through your head!"
Wham.
Harald took Loki's wave head-on and went flying.
"Press them!"
Harald jerked upright and screamed, spite thick in his voice.
"A million bhat for every one of their heads!"
"A million bhat!"
"WAAAAAGH!"
The pirates' eyes rolled back with greed. Loki and Raghas cut down every man who rushed them, but the enemy's numbers were far, far too many.
"It's a fight!"
"Protect Captain Harald!"
More pirates came pouring in from the village. Four ships in all were moored at the dock — even counting low, at least four hundred sailors had to be on the island, and of all those pirates not a single one seemed to be on Loki and Raghas's side.
"Shouldn't we go help them?"
Uld asked. Wounds were steadily multiplying across Loki's and Raghas's bodies.
"Help the men who kidnapped us?"
"I think they've been fighting their own private war for a country that no longer exists. Seen that way, it's easy enough to understand them. They did abduct us, but they've never once been rude about it."
"And what do you think of me taking them in as my men?"
She smiled faintly, as if she had seen the question coming.
"I don't mind at all. If it's you, Lord Iden, you'd have room to spare even after taking them in."
"And Harald?"
"...You're joking, right?"
"It's a joke."
I rose to my feet and stood at Loki's side.
"What are you doing here?"
Loki asked, startled. He thrust out a bloodied hand to bar my way.
"There's a boat on the stern deck. Take your fiancée and escape in it. I'll buy you at least enough time to row clear."
"If they catch me, I'm only a hostage. You, they'll actually kill."
"That's discipline. Wagering your life on things that amount to nothing."
Loki laughed bitterly at himself.
"...Harald was right. You were never cut out to be a pirate, Loki."
"Shut it, you brat. Just hurry up and run!"
Loki raised a wave to drive the pirates back. Harald crossed his arms and shouted anxiously.
"Hey, you idiots! That's 3.2 million we're talking about, 3.2 million! Don't go swinging those blades carelessly — you'll bruise the merchandise!"
Apparently Harald saw me as treasure, not as a man. I did not run. Instead I lifted a single finger toward the sky, and a bluish current sparked to life at its tip.
"There's something I never got around to mentioning. They say Duke Esterzy is a man whose nature demands he possess whatever he desires."
"...What did you say?"
The current blooming from my fingertip burst into full, dazzling flower.
"And what the Duke covets most, I hear, is people."
The current swelled at last into a massive sphere, spitting brilliant sparks in every direction. The pirates stumbled backward. Overwhelming mana stood the hair on their heads on end. Instinct alone would tell them this was no technique anyone could block.
"Blaze."
Five bolts of lightning embroidered the empty air like a net. The hundred-odd pirates caught in that web crumpled like so much rag.
Then Uld stepped forward. She had brought no sword, so she used her hand instead. The jet-black hardened qi sheathing her forearm —
SHRAKK—!
It severed men and ship alike in a single stroke.
The cloven sailing ship sank slowly into the sea. The groan of splitting timber, the waves crashing down with greedy hunger, the wails of pirates swept away by the current — every surreal noise merged into one discordant roar.
"Wh-what in the..."
Harald murmured, his soul gone from him. Loki and Raghas stared at me with eyes brimming over with shock.
I raised a hand and dispelled the disguise. My black hair rippled and turned white as snowfall. Uld's hair changed the opposite way, from white to black.
"Y-you're—!"
The pirates recoiled, eyes all but popping from their skulls.
"The Little Tyrant of the North...!"
I flashed them a wide grin.
"I really must tell people how much I hate that nickname."
My words drove their suspicion home as certainty. Harald looked as though he had seen a ghost. The sun-browned face drained white as if every drop of blood had fled it.
"H-how are you here...? Shouldn't you be in the north?"
"I have my reasons. I'm recruiting sailors. Not that it's any business of yours."
I raised my finger once more, and the flower of current bloomed again — an enhanced version of Thunderbolt Heaven Net, one I had not yet named.
"Damn it all..."
Terror flooded Harald's face.
"Block it!"
Even as he ordered his men to block it, he turned his back on me. But no man outruns lightning. The bolts made no distinction between captain and crew — they burned them all with perfect equality.
The few pirates who survived scattered across the island like grasshoppers. I saw no need to hunt them down. Fugitive pirates had nowhere to go and spill tales of me, and with their ships smashed to splinters they were dead men regardless.
"Are you truly the Duke of Esterzy?"
Loki asked carefully.
"I am. My apologies for hiding it. I wanted to see whether you would hold to your integrity — your discipline — to the very end."
"Then it's true as well, that there is an unfreezing port in the north."
I nodded.
"You seem to want us as your sailors. What happens if we refuse? That is... do we even have a choice?"
Raghas shot Loki an odd gesture — one that read, quite clearly, as mind your mouth before you get flayed. I gave them both the eerie smile befitting a Little Tyrant.
"None."
Loki laughed, as if he had expected exactly that.
"I need to fill my lands with people, not merely my ships with sailors. I didn't think you would refuse a way to preserve the displaced people of Alkaraz. Am I wrong?"
"You know my weak points all too well. In fact, I'm beginning to think you might be a decent man, Your Grace. I can only wonder whether all that drink has clouded my judgment."
"Since your judgment is already clouded, why not seal a vassal's contract while you're at it?"
"Even granting that I'm not in my right mind, surely you are, Your Grace?"
"A man in his right mind wouldn't be plotting to rob the Emperor blind."
"...Fair enough."
Loki dropped heavily to his knees on the sand, and Raghas followed him down. By rights I should have tapped each of their shoulders with a blade to declare them my vassals, but I hadn't brought a weapon either. So I drew a pen from my coat instead — the same one that had served me well in meetings aboard the yacht.
"Welcome to the family."
I tapped the pen on each man's shoulder in turn.
"Sign it! Sign it!"
The now-masterless parrot fluttered down onto my head, squawking.