Garibaldi stepped out into the afternoon sun. He could feel its heat through his hair. He squinted in the bright light shining off the road and houses. He walked out of the square and down the wide avenue that led to the wharves.
The harbor bristled with masts. The hot weather had brought calm seas and still air. Ships that arrived in Prudence Harbor, often towed by their own sailors rowing in longboats, could not leave by sailing. So they stayed. The sailors wandered the streets of the city, spending their money and getting into mischief.
Garibaldi walked along the length of the wharf to which the Reliant was tied. The harbor water was on either side. The water was warm and still and green, and smelled bad. With so many ships in the harbor, each of them letting their sewage into the water at night and dumping their kitchen garbage over the side during the day, the harbor was filthy. Whenever Garibaldi looked at it, he saw things floating in it that made him feel sick. Nobody swam in the harbor. Nobody wanted to eat the fish caught in it.
But the fish themselves didn't seem to mind: there were plenty of them swimming around in the filthy water.
The smell of the water was so bad during the day that the Captain kept only five or six sailors on board at a time. The rest of the Reliant's crew were free to go ashore and breath the clean air of the city. The Captain himself, being a fat man, did not like walking in the heat. Nor could he swim, so the swimming pools of the city did not hold much attraction for him. Despite the smell of the harbor, he spent most of his days sitting at a table under a sail-cloth canopy on deck. He wrote in his journal, received visitors, and watched the ship's carpenter and four or five other sailors putting up the new mizzen mast he had bought with Garibaldi's money.
Garibaldi walked up the plank to the Reliant's deck. The new mizzen mast was almost ready. The bottom two sections were in place and the sailors were slowly hoisting the third section to the top with a complicated system of ropes and pulleys that used the main mast as a high point, and the stern of the boat as a low point. The work proceeded slowly. Nobody was in a particular hurry. Nobody wanted to make a mistake. There were frequent stops to have a cup of tea with the Captain.
And so it was that Garibaldi found the Captain, Dan, Harry, Otis, and also Alicia, the Captain of the Endeavor, sitting on chairs around the table under the canopy drinking tea.
"Ah, Garibaldi," the Captain said, "You have arrived in time for tea. Come and join us."
Garibaldi stood beneath the canopy. He nodded to Alicia. "Good afternoon."
Alicia looked him up and down. "Good afternoon."
Alicia was about seventy-five years old. She was lean and strong and tanned. When she stared at Garibaldi, he always wondered if there was something he should tell her that he was forgetting. Otis sat next to her. The old man had his hand on her knee. He was smiling in the middle of his thick, white beard.
Alicia sipped her tea, staring at Garibaldi over the lip of her cup. "The way you were walking along the wharf," she said, "it looked as if you were about to break into a run. Most uncommon for you, I should guess. Whatever it is you have to say, it must be important."
Garibaldi sat down. The Captain poured him some tea. "I was just telling Alicia the story of the storm. But I had not yet come to your heroic and unlooked-for intervention."
Garibaldi wondered why the Captain had waited so many days before telling Alicia the story of the storm. Surely that would be one of the first things they talked about? He blinked. Everyone was watching him.
"There's trouble with Baat," he said.
"Oh?" the Captain said.
Garibaldi told them what had happened in the market, starting with Sallina's bet with Nerboculus. When he was finished, the Captain turned to Alicia.
"The boy tells a good story, doesn't he?"
"He does indeed," she said.
Dan picked up a square, red tin. He opened it and took out a cookie. He passed the tin to Garibaldi. Garibaldi took a cookie, and passed the tin to the Captain.
"What do you think Baat is doing?" Garibaldi said.
"Baat knew this Chimeg girl was here," Dan said, "I think we can be pretty sure of that. He's been looking for her, wandering around the city, hoping to catch sight of her."
"Why did she come to our stall?" Garibaldi said.
Dan chewed a piece of cookie. Nobody spoke. They waited for him to swallow.
"That was pure luck," Dan said.
Otis took his hand off Alicia's knee and pointed at Dan. "What about the wizard? If I were you, I'd not forget the wizard. Whenever wizards are involved, there's always trouble, strange trouble, with flashing lights and loud noises, and folks getting burned."
Dan shook his head, "Don't worry about the man in the hat. He's no wizard."
"Are there wizards?" Garibaldi said. His eyes widened. "Real ones?"
Dan smiled a crooked smile and nodded. "Aye, lad. There are. But not many. And they don't go around telling you that they're wizards. Nobody likes a real wizard, you see. A real wizard can mess with your mind." He tapped the side of his head. "And pretty soon everyone in town is blaming their troubles upon him, and nobody wants him around."
Garibaldi nodded. That seemed rather sad for wizards, if it were true. But he did not quite believe that there were such a thing as wizards and magic. Sallina did not believe in magic.
"This Sukh fellow," Alicia said, "He's a power in himself, is he not?"
"That he is," Dan said.
"And a crafty devil."
"Among the craftiest."
"There's a plot here to be worked out." Alicia frowned at her cookie. "A most intriguing plot."
"Yes," the Captain said. He put his hands on the table and tilted his chair backwards so he could stretch his legs. "Sukh and Baat knew this young woman was here. They knew she was a slave. They wanted to free her. But how? Does Baat intend to purchase her from her mistress? Has he gold in his chest to buy her? And if he does, am I supposed to go back to Kublaminsk with him and her, and drop them off, before we go south?"
Alicia shook her head. "No. If he was going to buy her, Sukh would have no reason to be crafty. He would ask you to bring Baat here, and bring the woman and Baat back home again. You would have done so gladly. It's not far out of our way, and you had much to gain by the arrangement."
Harry looked at Garibaldi. "Who is this young woman, this Chimeg? Is she Baat's sister?"
Alicia pointed at Harry with her teacup. "No, they are not sister and brother. If Chimeg were Baat's sister, she would be Sukh's daughter, and if she were Sukh's daughter, he would come himself, and immediately, to free her in person."
"Really?" the Captain said. "Sukh is a crafty devil. He is economical. Why come himself?"
Before Alicia could answer, a breeze carried the smell of the harbor water across the deck. Harry grimaced, "Ah! By all that's unholy! It's as if we were sitting at the bottom of the Devil's Latrine." He pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket and put it over his nose. Garibaldi tried to breath as little as he could. The Captain pinched his nose and took a breath through his mouth.
Alicia smiled at the Captain. "A father will not delay by even one second the rescue of his own daughter, nor will he assign the responsibility of the rescue to any other person if it is at all possible for him to do it himself."
"Yes," the Captain nodded. His voice was muffled because he was holding his nose between his fingers. He let his chair rock forward again until it was upright, and leaned one elbow on the table. "Yes, I believe you are correct."
"Begging your pardons, Captains," Harry said, from beneath his handkerchief, "If it ain't his sister, who is it? His girlfriend?"
Garibaldi decided not to answer. He was sure that Alicia would answer the question herself, and indeed she did, a few moments later.
"They might be related," Alicia said. "They could be cousins, or second-cousins. In fact: it's very likely that they are related somehow, because everyone's related to one another in a small town like Kublaminsk. But I think, Harry, that you are spot on with your suggestion. I think it's Baat's girlfriend, or the girl he loved back home."
Garibaldi nodded.
"Whoever she is," the Captain said, "what concerns me is what he intends to do about it. Will he buy her or steal her, or just say hello and then goodbye."
Another breeze coming up the wharf from the town drove the smell of the harbor away, and the Harry took his handkerchief from his nose. "Aye, that's a fair question. If he means to steal her, he'll be thinking to bring her aboard the Reliant and get away with her. We'll be accomplices to theft, that's what we'll be, and we'll have another passenger in the bargain."
The Captain let go of his nose and took a deep breath. Otis whispered something in Alicia's ear. She laughed and pushed him gently on the shoulder, shaking her head. Garibaldi wondered what the old man had said to her.
Dan did not seem to notice the smell of the harbor. He stared at his teacup. "If he's anything like his father," he said, "he's not going to be satisfied saying hello and then goodbye. He either means to buy her or he means to steal her."
Garibaldi put his teacup down on its saucer with a clatter. "Excuse me," he said. "What do you mean by steal her? She's a person, how can you steal a person? When you take a person you kidnap them, you don't steal them."
"She's a slave, my boy," Dan said. "She's property. When you take property, you steal it."
"Once again," Alicia said, "If Baat meant to buy her, Sukh would have told you so. Why would he hide the fact that Baat was going to buy back his girlfriend?"
"Aye," Harry said, "There'd be no sense in it. I don't care how great a soldier he is, Sukh would not want to make an enemy of the Captain. Not unless he had to, and not with his son on the Captain's ship."
The Captain smiled. "Thank you, Harry."
"Besides that," Alicia said, "a healthy, hard-working, young woman slave would cost a lot of money to buy back. I'm guessing she'd be around a thousand guineas. If Sukh had that much money to spend on buying back his son's girlfriend, he would not be trading fur with you for silk."
Harry slapped the table with his hand. "By the elementals! She has a point, Captain. The youngster means to steal away the girl. There's no other answer to the riddle."
The Captain nodded. "So it would appear," he said. He took a slow sip of tea and stared at the glaring roofs and drooping pennants of the town. "So it would appear."
At twenty past seven that evening, Baat came walking along the wharf. Sallina and Garibaldi watched him from the deck. The sun was near to setting behind the hills to the west. The air was cooler, and the smell of the harbor was less strong.
Harry had been walking up and down the deck since seven o'clock. Looped around his belt was a leather whip that Sallina had never seen before. Baat was supposed to be on board at seven o'clock to stand guard until midnight. He was twenty minutes late. It was Harry's job to make sure the sailors obeyed the Captain's orders, and Baat had disobeyed.
When Baat came along the wharf, Harry waited for him at the end of the gang plank. Baat was smiling when he stepped onto the deck of the ship. Harry was frowning.
"You are twenty minutes late. Was your life in danger?"
Baat stopped smiling. He looked at the sun and back at Harry. He tried to speak, but the scowl on Harry's face made his words come out jumbled up. "No. I am. I am not." He swallowed. "What is clock now?"
Baat did not bow his head down. He did not step back from Harry. He looked straight into Harry's eyes, shaking his head. His eyebrows were drawn together.
"Was your life in danger?" Harry said.
Baat shook his head again. "No, there was no danger."
"It is twenty minutes past seven o'clock. You will stand your guard tonight until midnight, and you will have no shore leave for two days without the Captain's special permission. If you leave the ship without the Captain's permission, I will flog you myself."
Sallina gasped. Garibaldi raised one eyebrow and leaned on the handle of his axe.
"I will not leave the ship," Baat said, "I am sorry late. I not know. I not leave the ship."
Harry pointed to the stairs that led down below decks. "Go to the Captain's quarters now. He is waiting for you."
"But I will guard ship now," Baat said.
Harry stared at Baat. "Yes, you will guard the ship, but after you see the Captain."
Baat walked towards the stairs. Harry pointed at Sallina and Garibaldi. "The Captain wants the both of you in his cabin also, if it pleases you."
Garibaldi followed Baat. Sallina stood at the top of the stairs. "Would you flog him?" She pointed at Harry's whip. "With that? Do you do that sort of thing on this ship?"
Harry looked at her and folded his arms. "Aye, Miss Sallina, we do. When we have to. Once or twice a year, maybe more often. We have to keep the law for ourselves. We have no police when we're out on the sea. We have no jail to throw a man into if he breaks the law. We can't leave a man behind in some foreign place, to rot in some jail far from home." He patted the whip at his belt. "We have only the whip."
Sallina shook her head and went down the steps to the Captain's cabin. Dan was sitting with the Captain at the table. Baat stood in front of them. Garibaldi sat down on the port side of the table, and Sallina sat beside him.
The Captain waved his hand at Baat. "No," he said, "You're not here to talk about being late. That's between you and Harry."
Baat said nothing.
The cabin door opened. Harry stepped inside. He closed the door behind him and sat next to Dan on the starboard side. Baat remained standing in front of them.
Sallina looked at the table. There was no wine or glasses upon it. Instead, there was a map of Independence Island spread out and held down at the corners by four smooth pebbles. She bent over the table to look at it.
"So," the Captain said, "We're all here. Baat, why did you come with us to Independence Island?"
Baat stared at the Captain, but said nothing.
"I'll tell you why you came here," the Captain said. He put both hands on the table and leaned forward. "You came her to find the girl you love. Her name is Chimeg. You came to steal her from her owner and take her back the Kublaminsk."
Baat's mouth dropped open. Harry smiled.
Baat looked at Garibaldi and at the Captain. "How you know this?"
"Garibaldi told us about Chimeg," the Captain said, "And we, especially Alicia, figured it out. Alicia is a smart woman."
Baat nodded. "Smart. Like my father."
Dan nodded. "Aye, lad, like your father."
"But there's one thing we don't know," the Captain said, "What we don't know is how on earth and over sea you planned to take Chimeg back to Kublaminsk. Did you plan to take her on this ship?"
Baat looked at Dan. "I don't understand."
Dan translated into Kubla. Baat nodded and leaned over the table. After a moment, he put his finger on the map and then removed it.
The Captain looked at the place that Baat had touched. "That's Resolution Town."
"We go there," Baat said, "We find friend of father. He help us."
They studied the map. Resolution was about ten hours walk from Prudence along the road marked on the map.
Dan shook his head. "You would be caught on the way, and they would make a slave of you also."
"No catch us," Baat said, "We go at night." He touched the hilt of his sword that stuck up from behind his back. "I fight if we are caught."
The Captain sighed. "Does your father know of your plan?"
"He knows. He not like it." Baat put his hand on his chest. "I beg him. He say go."
The Captain looked at the map again and drummed his fingers on the table.
"What else did your father say?" Dan asked.
"He say I go on Reliant. No other boat. I go now with you, or never."
The Captain frowned. "Why?"
Baat clasped his hands in front of him. "He not tell me. I ask, he not tell."
The Captain looked at Dan. "What do you make of it?"
Dan looked at the map. They waited for him to answer. He scratched his right shoulder with his left hand. He often did that. Dan had a long scar on his right shoulder. Sallina had once seen him rubbing red ointment on it in the infirmary. In cold weather, it ached. In warm weather, it itched.
Garibaldi pointed at something on the map and whispered in her ear. "What does that say?"
Sallina had been teaching Garibaldi to read during their long hours sitting at their market stall. He had learned all the letters of the alphabet, and he could write them down. But he still could not read long words, and he could not read handwriting unless it was clear and simple.
She looked at the place he was pointing at. Her eyes widened. "It says the mountain is a volcano."
She had never seen a volcano.
"Baat is an apprentice sailor on our ship," Dan said. He stopped scratching his shoulder and scratched his chin instead. "We are responsible for him. Sukh knows that. It's one thing for Baat to be lost at sea. Sukh would understand that. But it would be another thing entirely for us to let Baat run off and get himself killed trying to steal a slave."
Sallina looked up from the map. "He let Baat come with us because he knew we would not let Baat rescue Chimeg."
Dan laughed. "Now, Miss, let's not be calling it a rescue. I don't like the sound of that: a rescue." He shook his head.
"It think," the Captain said, "Sallina means that Sukh would not deceive his son."
Baat watched them talking. He was trying to understand, but Sallina thought he probably understood only half of it. She felt sorry for him. The girl he loved was a slave in Prudence City. If Garibaldi was a slave, she would do anything to rescue him.
But Baat must have understood most of what was said, because he folded his arms again, thrust his chin out, and said, "I get Altachimeg, or I die."
The Captain put his hands on the table, spread out his fingers and stared at them. "Yes. I figured you were going to take that position." He looked up at the boy. "What if I have you tied up and thrown into the hold?"
Baat looked at Dan. Dan translated.
Baat put his hand on the hilt of his sword. "I fight."
The windows of the cabin were open, and outside they could hear men shouting on the street by the waterfront. The shouting was angry. Garibaldi looked outside. The sun had set, and it was almost dark, but he thought he could see a crowd of men at the end of the wharf. After a while, they walked away and the shouting stopped.
Garibaldi turned to the Captain. "I'll help him."
"I beg your pardon?" the Captain said.
"I'll go with him to rescue Chimeg. I'm his friend."
Sallina stared at Garibaldi. She leaned back so she could see his face better. He seemed perfectly serious and calm.
"What?" she said.
"I'll help him," Garibaldi said.
"You mean you're going to go and rescue the girl with him?"
"Of course. He's my friend." He looked at Baat. "You found the place she lives?"
"Yes, I find. I hide, and I speak to her when she go out into garden."
"Does she want you to take her away?"
Baat's eyes widened. "Yes! Yes, many times yes."
"And you love her?"
Baat nodded. "Yes, I make wife. We love much." He put his hand on his chest. "Strong love."
The Captain waved his hand at Baat. "Yes, yes, we get the picture. Strong love and all that." He put his head in his hands.
Sallina turned to Garibaldi. "You'll get captured and thrown in jail."
Dan pointed at Sallina. "Wrong, Miss. He'll be enslaved. No need to waste a strong young man like him by throwing him in jail. They'll send him to the mines in the mountains and work him to death by the time he's thirty."
"Begging your pardon, Captain," Harry said, "But you can order them all to stay on the ship, and we'll just leave. I'm sure the lad is mighty clever with his sword, but, if you don't mind me saying so, you are not so bad with a sword yourself, if I remember rightly, and," he pointed to Dan beside him, "we have this rascal as well. I'm sure we can keep discipline on the ship, sir."
The Captain clasped his hands together and smiled. "Harry, my good man, Garibaldi is not under orders. He's a passenger, and can leave the ship at any time. More to the point: we owe him money. As to Baat, if he really means to fight, well," he looked up at Baat, "who knows what we'll be up against. He's his father's son, after all."
Dan said something to Baat in Kubla.
Baat nodded. "My father teach me well. He proud of me. I not afraid to die."
The Captain cleared his throat. "And despite what you say, Dan, the girl is a slave. She must have been stolen from Kublaminsk in a raid by another tribe, while Kuyuk was chief. And you know how I feel about slavery. It is an abomination."
Dan laughed quietly. It was not a pleasant laugh. It was not a happy laugh. It was not a laugh that invited you to laugh with him. It was more the sort of laugh that you hear and feel that you are the one being laughed at.
"Well," Dan said, "Here's trouble all right, just like I said. The Axe pegged you right and proper, Captain, for the soft-hearted romantic that you are. We can make enemies in Prudence by stealing the girl, or we can make an enemy out of Sukh by letting the boy go off on his own to rescue the girl. Which do you want as an enemy, Captain, an entire city, or one man?"
The Captain looked at everyone around the table, one after the other. Last of all he looked at Dan. "That's not how it is at all, Dan. This is how it is: we shall do what we have to do so that years from now, when we remember what we did, we will be proud of ourselves. Baat is one of us. That was our solemn promise to Sukh when we took Baat aboard the ship. And the girl is one of us also, just as every woman on the Endeavor is one of us, because the girl is beloved to one of our own people. We will rescue her, because she is one of our own, and rescuing her is the right thing to do, and we would rescue her even if Sukh were a harmless fool like me."
"Aye," Dan said, "And I'll be going along to make sure everyone gets back safely, is that right?"
"I'll not order you to do it, Dan, you know that."
Dan smiled. He opened and closed his right hand and looked at his outstretched fingers. "I know that Captain. But I'll go. It will do me good. I've been feeling old these past few months. A little excitement will do me good."
"Well then," Sallina said, "I'm going too. Garibaldi's going, so I'm going. If he's going to be captured and sent to the mines, I'll be captured and go the mines with him."
The Captain smiled at her. He looked up at Baat. "Do you want Garibaldi and Sallina to go with you?"
Baat looked at them. He frowned. Then he looked down at the floor and nodded. "Yes, I like. It would be honor for me. But I do not ask."
"Well then," the Captain said, "You three shall go, and Dan will go too. You will rescue the girl, and he will go to make sure that you come back if things go badly."
Baat stood with his chin thrust forward. "Yes."
"But," the Captain said, "You will obey me. We will make a plan, all of us together. You will follow the plan. If there is trouble, you will obey Dan. Do you agree?"
Baat looked at Dan and at the floor. "I agree."
The Captain clapped his hands. "Well, that's decided then. Sit down, Baat. Pull up that stool over there. Yes, that one. We have two ships, and an eager group of volunteers." He looked at the faces gathered around his table. He smiled. "How can we fail?"