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  Helga decided he was right. As they neared, she recognized the shape and markings of the fins. These were what sailors called "redsharks." Not from their own coloring, which was basically a dull gray except for the white tips of the dorsal fins, but from their handiwork. Redsharks were almost as large as the much rarer "great blues," and their gaping jaws were fringed with grappling tentacles lined on the interior with nasty little barbs.

  They weren't even the same species — not even close — as most of the seabeasts which went by the generic name of "sharks." Men had been known to survive attacks by other types of sharks, even great blues. Most sharks were actually a little finicky in their tastes. They usually bit humans by mistake, thinking they were their normal prey. One bite was enough to find the taste of humans sour, and the shark went on its way.

  Of course, often enough that one bite was fatal, especially with great blues. Still, many men had lived to tell the tale afterward of a great blue attack; even if, as a rule, they told the tale with a wooden leg propped up on a seaside tavern stool. But Helga had never heard of anyone surviving a redshark which sunk its teeth and tentacles into them. Redsharks were about as indiscriminate in their taste as hogs in a trough, and they weighed on average half a ton. Once a human got into their grasp, that. . was it.

  "Good," she hissed. She caught a glimpse of Jessep giving her an odd look, but paid no attention. She was engrossed with gauging the battle raging on the ship alongside.

  By now, the Confederate marines had cleared the entire center of the enemy vessel and were beginning the butcher work. All of them had finished boarding. Half of the hundred was driving toward the stern, the other half toward the bow. Shields still locked — but now the assegais were flashing. And, like the legs, went back and forth like machines. Pistons, for all intents and purposes — except these pistons ended in two-foot blades sharpened to an edge which didn't quite match a razor's. Not quite.

  "This is finished, First Spear. Isn't it?"

  "Aye, ma'am. All but the killing."

  She shook her head. "No reason to risk any more losses." Losses had been few enough, in truth. Here as always, Confederate training and discipline counted. But Helga could see at least five soldiers of the hundred out of action. Three of them were only wounded — and not too badly at that, she thought. They were already attending to their own wounds.

  The other two. . One of them was dead, no question about it. A skillfully wielded blade — or just a lucky one — must have come over the edge of his shield and caught his throat. Blood was still gushing out of the wound, enough to make his survival a moot point.

  She wasn't sure about the other. He was lying sprawled across one of the benches, his helmet knocked askew. Might be dead, or just unconscious.

  But there was no need, any longer, to risk more casualties. She might well need her hundred again, in the weeks and months to come — and there'd be no way to replace lost men down in the southern continent. At least, she'd never heard of Southrons being recruited directly into a regular Vanbert unit. Many of the barbarians served in the Confederate army, of course, but to the best of her knowledge always as members of auxiliary units.

  "Call it off, First Spear," she commanded. "There's no need to lose any more of our people."

  Jessep was shouting the order before she even finished. Looking at him, Helga realized he was relieved to hear her order. He'd obviously been expecting her to insist on full revenge.

  Her jaws were tight. I'll get my revenge, never fear. I just don't need the hundred for it.

  The instrument of her revenge was trotting toward her even now. Trae, his mouth split in a wide smile, about to utter some words of glee and self-praise.

  He never got them out. "I'm not finished with you," hissed Helga. She pointed a stiff finger at the pirate ship. "Destroy that thing for me, brother."

  He came to an abrupt stop a few feet away and turned his head. "What for?" he demanded. Then, seeing the Confederate soldiers begin an orderly withdrawal: "And why'd you wait so long to call them back? Another five minutes and they'd have lost—"

  He broke off, seeing the expression on Helga's face. "Oh," he mumbled. "That."

  He took a deep breath. "Sorry, sister. Because you never act like. . what I mean is. ." Another deep breath. "Never mind."

  He gave the pirate ship a quick study. "Don't want to chance a grenade," he muttered, "and they're too hard to replace. Simple satchel charge should do the trick — and I've got something special I'd like to try anyway."

  As always, a technical project got Trae completely engrossed. Within fifteen seconds, he was back among his gunnery crew, shouting his usual mix of profanity and orders.

  It was all very quick. By the time the last Confederate marines trotted back across the ramps, carrying their dead and helping their wounded, Trae had his "special" ready. It looked like one of the other satchel charges Helga had seen, except for three flasks strapped to the side.

  Very quick, though not rushed. Thicelt even had his sailors take the time to pry loose the ends of the ramps and hoist them back into position, rather than simply jettisoning them by detaching the hinges. Then with a push of several oars, opened a space of about ten feet between the two ships.

  Two of Trae's men were standing on one of the still-fixed portions of the upper deck by now, holding the "special satchel" between them. At Trae's shout, a third man lit the fuse and the two tossed the thing onto the center of the pirate galley's deck. That area was cleared, except for corpses. The pirates still alive — a good half of the crew, Helga estimated — were cowering at the bow and stern. Even after the marines retreated, they hadn't been in the least inclined to "pursue."

  "Get us away from here, Sharlz!" bellowed Trae. "That's a short fuse!"

  The command was pointless, really. Thicelt already had the ship under way, the hortator pounding his mallets. Their progress was slow, at first, with only the lower bank of oars working. But by the time the satchel charge blew, less than a minute after it was tossed, Helga's ship was fifty yards away and retreating rapidly. Some corner of her brain was impressed by the speed with which Thicelt had gotten the upper bank back into action.

  But only a corner of her brain, and a small corner at that. Most of her mind was being washed over by a wave of sheer hatred, intermingled with horrible flashes of memories she had long suppressed. One male body after another — just pieces of bodies, really; a bare chest, a leg, a scrawny belly wet with her violation, another gap-toothed grin — slamming onto her, one after the other. She never knew how many; didn't want to know. It had lasted for three days.

  At first, she was disappointed by the burst of the satchel charge. She'd been expecting to see the pirate ship simply disintegrate. Break in half, at least. But then, not more than a second later, seeing the bloom of fire wash across the ship, she understood what Trae had meant by a "special." He must have designed this satchel charge especially for use against an enemy ship.

  Trae confirmed her thought immediately. "Beautiful, isn't it? There wasn't actually much powder in the thing. Just enough to set off the naphtha — some other stuff too — I had in those flasks. She'll burn down to the waterline, you watch."

  Helga didn't doubt it. Neither, judging from their looks of horror and their screams, did any of the pirates still alive on the ship. Seamen fear nothing quite so much as an uncontrolled fire on a wooden vessel. Even though the waters around the burning galley were now being crisscrossed by white-tipped fins, Helga could see at least a dozen more pirates jumping overboard.

  Her hatred now consumed her entirely. From the stern of the ship, she had a perfect view of the massacre. She pressed her groin against the rail, clutching the wood with hands like claws, and screamed across the waters.

  "Try raping the redsharks, you fuckers! I hope—"

  What she hoped, in shrieking and graphic anatomical detail, had Trae and Jessep and Lortz pale-faced within seconds. Minutes later, when she finally turned away, they were still pale.
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br />   Seeing the expressions on their faces, she snarled at them. "Tough men!" she jeered. "Try surviving three days of a gang rape, you pussies, before you think of telling me what 'tough' means."

  And with that, she stalked over to the hatch and lowered herself into the hold. Muttering under her breath all the while about her need for the company of women.

  * * *

  Once below, she found herself spending the next ten minutes trying to quiet her wailing infant. He and Ilset's baby daughter were producing a truly incredible volume of noise.

  " 'Twas the screaming did it," explained Polla apologetically. "Ours, I mean."

  She gave Helga another crooked little smile. "The sound of the guns made things worse for little Yuli, but it actually seemed to steady your boy for a bit there. Like father, like son, the old saying goes."

  Helga returned the smile with one that was probably just as crooked. She'd been careful, since Adrian had returned her to Demansk, to keep the identity of her baby's father a closely-held secret in the family. An unknown pirate's bastard was simply a tool for Demansk's enemies to shame him. Had it become widely known that the father of Helga's child had been Gellert himself, the repercussions might have been much worse.

  But once they'd left on this voyage, she'd seen no reason to keep the secret from the new friends she was making. By the time they got back to the Confederacy — if they ever did — it would all be a moot point, anyway.

  When she finally had her baby down to the point of occasional little sobs, Helga turned to Polla and whispered a few words of thanks.

  Polla shrugged. "Not the first time I've had to take care of scared kids. Not the worst, neither — not by a long ways." She shook her head sadly. "I hate to see it, I really do. Children, specially babies, shouldn't be inflicted with the ills of the world."

  Those words were the first thing which penetrated Helga's still-seething fury. Broke the rage, in fact, like a needle punctures a bubble.

  Children, specially babies. .

  There hadn't been any children, of course, on the pirate ship. But. . those "pirates," when all was said and done, had children of their own. Waiting for their fathers to return, back in a cluster of small fishing villages.

  Helga's breath came in a little shudder. There would be no fathers returning this day. Nor any other. Helga's vengeance had destroyed those villages along with the fathers. Within weeks, she knew, as the word of the disaster spread, the nearby villages would start predating on their own. Men would come in little bands, raiding on the outskirts at first to test the rumor. Then, seeing it was true, would swarm the shattered villagers. Kill the men left — old or crippled, most of them — then sell the women and children into slavery.

  Dozens of children, many of them no older than her own, had been doomed as well by Helga's vengeance. That vengeance had killed the fathers in less than an hour. It would torture their children for a lifetime.

  "And so what?" she muttered, half snarling. She gave Polla a look which was almost one of appeal. But Polla only returned the look with those same soft, sad brown eyes.

  "It's a pity," was all she said. "But that's the way of the world."

  * * *

  That night, as always, Jessep himself came down to the hold. The other senior men with "wives" aboard only visited them on occasion, but Jessep spent every night with Ilset folded into his arms.

  "Folded," that is, using the term loosely. Sound carried in the hold, the partitioning cloths being no better insulators than thin linen ever is. Helga had been amused, impressed — and envious, truth to tell — at the sounds issuing from Jessep and Ilset's little partition each and every night since the voyage began. Middle-aged or no, head injury or no, Jessep Yunkers seemed to have neither difficulty nor reluctance keeping his healthy young wife entertained.

  Unlike all the previous nights, however, Jessep came by her partition first. Helga heard him whisper through the cloth.

  "Are you all right, ma'am?"

  "I'm fine, First Spear." Then, moved by a sudden and powerful impulse: "Come in. Please."

  A moment later, a bit gingerly, Jessep moved aside the cloth and stooped into her section. Helga was propped against a little pile of cushions, with her son asleep in the crook of her arm. With her right hand, she patted a space next to her.

  "Sit. Please."

  Jessep did as she bade him, although it was obvious that he felt very awkward in such close and casual familiarity with a noblewoman.

  Helga gave him a smile which she intended to be reassuring. But, to her surprise, felt the smile dissolve into a little sob. A little sob which became wracking tears within seconds.

  Now it was her turn to be enfolded in Jessep's embrace. There was nothing sexual about the contact, however. The man's strong arms reminded her of her father's, in the years now long past when she had been a child herself. And, though she'd always been a self-confident girl, there had been times when she'd needed that comfort.

  "S'all right, girl," whispered Yunkers. " 'Ma'am,' I mean."

  A laugh burst its way through the sobs. "Call me 'girl,' Jessep. Or 'lass' or whatever else you want. Just 'Helga' will do fine, for that matter."

  She lifted her tear-blurred eyes and looked up at his blocky face. Smiling for the first time in hours.

  "I'm not sure exactly how I feel about men in general, right at the moment. But I'm partial to fathers, that's for sure. And you remind me a lot of my own."

  Jessep returned the smile with a little grimace. But it was a relaxed sort of wince. Even a bit of a serene one.

  "Don't know as I've got his spirit. Sure as anything don't have his brains. But I'll do my best, young la — Helga."

  She lowered her head and nestled it into his shoulder. "Tell me, Jessep. What do you think of vengeance?"

  She felt his thick chest rise and fall, twice, while he considered his answer.

  Then: "It's like this, girl. A bit of vengeance is a fine thing. Useful, now and then. But I think of it like a honing stone. You just want a little, when you need it, to keep the blade sharp. And that's it. Too much and. . you'll wear the blade away in no time."

  "I think that's good advice," she murmured. "And I think I'll take it from now on."

  They said nothing further for perhaps ten minutes. Then Helga lifted her head again and gave Jessep's chest a little push. "Enough. Your Ilset will be getting fidgety."

  Jessep chuckled. "She's not the jealous type, girl. And even if she were, I wouldn't have to lie anyway."

  " 'Jealous' be damned!" snorted Helga. "I know the two of you. I should, having to listen to it every night."

  Jessep flushed. Helga chuckled again. "So be off. Another ten minutes and she'll be so horny you might not survive the night. Old and decrepit as you are."

  The speed with which Yunkers scurried out of her partition gave the lie to that last jibe. Not that any was needed.

  Helga lay down and tried to find sleep. It wouldn't come at first, though. Jessep's advice was still rolling through her mind. Her brain seemed fixed on the image of a blade being sharpened to nothingness on a stone of hatred. After a time, the image of a blade shifted and she found herself remembering the face of Adrian's brother Esmond. A handsome face, it was. Very handsome, in fact — much more so than Adrian's, truth to tell. Even leaving aside Esmond's demigod physique, which Helga had seen more than once clad only in a loincloth, during the time she had spent as Adrian Gellert's "captured concubine."

  But there was no attraction in the memory. There had always been something wrong about Esmond. Always, whenever he looked at her, something evil and hollow in the stare. As if he saw nothing in the woman her brother had taken for his own than just another hated Vanbert.

  That's what Jessep's talking about, she realized. A splendid blade, worn down by endless honing. Such a waste.

  But she didn't spend much time on the matter. By now, one thought following another, her mind was focused on the brother himself. Adrian Gellert, in whose arms she had spent ma
ny a night lying naked — and enjoying every minute of it.

  New images came to her, then, of naked male body parts and a male face seen in focus — all of it and not just a leer. But there was no horror in these images. She thought she was done with that horror forever.

  She hoped so. The problem she faced now was a problem she hoped she would always face, whenever she had trouble falling asleep. For which there was a simple and practical solution, even if she had found masturbation a poor substitute for the real thing, since she met Adrian Gellert.

  Dammit, beloved enemy, if you're not there when I arrive—

  I'll kill you. I swear I will.

  * * *

  She finally managed to get to sleep then, wafted away on new thoughts of vengeance. The methods by which she planned her possible murder of Adrian Gellert varied quite a bit, in their precise details. But all of them involved death from exhaustion.

  Chapter 13

  Demansk's "tomorrow" had actually turned into four days before he was ready to strike against Governor Willech. He was learning that, in political as well as military maneuvers, logistics was always the lynchpin. It was easy to plan what amounted to a provincial coup d'etat, but actually implementing the deed required time to move the needed bodies around.

  Granted, there weren't all that many bodies to move, compared to the forces involved in a major military campaign. And since most of the bodies were already in the provincial capital of Solinga, there wasn't the usual endless difficulty with fodder and supplies. But those advantages were offset by the fact that the bodies in question had minds of their own — and it was a lot harder to get officers to agree to a coup than to a straightforward military assault.

  Demansk's own officers, the ones in command of the three brigades he'd brought with him to Solinga, were not the problem. Those three brigades had long been under Demansk's authority. Their officers and even the noncoms down to the First Spears of all the battalions had been personally selected by Demansk.