The Empire Stone by Chris Bunch

caravel’s sails, slatting in the light wind, muttered a prayer, and shouted for the men to arm themselves and prepare for boarding.
    Peirol obeyed, hurrying to his cabin. Outside came shouts and the thunder of feet.
    “What’s going on?” a wide-eyed Zaimis asked.
    “Pirates, my lady,” the dwarf said. “You’d best stay below, and not let them see your beauty and become more determined.”
    Even now, Zaimis managed a white-faced coquette before she went back into her cabin and closed the door.
    Peirol went back on deck. The crewmen now wore motley leather armor and were armed with cutlasses and knives. One or two had javelins, another pair sporting bows.
    Someone said in a low voice, “Best just surrender. There’s no more’n a handful of us, against how many soldiers?”
    “I count thirty, mebbe more,” another said. “And a few hunnerd oar-slaves on each boat. And cannon. But we’ll never raise a white flag. If th’ skipper’s right, and we’re off Parasso, likely th’ ships hail from Beshkirs.
    “Th’ mate spent half a dozen years on their damned galleys, and I’ve never known anyone who pulled an oar for them who didn’t swear he’d rather die’n go back.”
    “Edirne must’ve assed somebody fair,” a second sailor put in. “None of us’d end up a galley slave, as long as we can shinny up a mast and box a compass. Beshkir’s hurting for sailors, always has been, always will be. As for bein’ a slave, who hasn’t gone overside in a fair port to get out from under an asshole skipper? Chains won’t hold me for long, nor any of you, I’d bet.”
    “There you have it,” a third said. “I’d
allus
rather take a chance on life over death.”
    There were mutters of agreement, but the sailors, at Edirne’s command, drew heavy, wide-meshed rope nets from below and draped them loosely from the yardarms to the railings, so boarders would ensnare themselves.
    Peirol stared, fascinated, at the oncoming galleys. They were very narrow-beamed, and bulwarks were built overhanging the hull, rowing benches on them. He counted five slaves on each oar. Gleaming bronze cannon lay in a low carriage in the bows, with two smaller swivel pieces on either side. Men with whips trotted back and forth on catwalks, lashing the oarsmen while thudding drums gave the rhythm. The galleys were twin-masted, with huge, single yardarms on each mast hanging at an angle, sails furled, great banners on one end of each. On the stern of the galleys was a canopy, sheltering the ship’s officers and rudder, and above it a huge ornate lantern.
    Peirol admired their strange grace — but then the wind brought the stink of the ships, the unwashed, closely packed men, their shit and blood. His stomach roiled.
    A sailor was praying loudly for wind, for a sea monster to rise up and save them, but the gods didn’t appear to be listening.
    Peirol went up to the poop deck, sword in hand. He hoped he didn’t look as scared as the man at the rudder.
    He saw a man in the bows of the second galley wearing robes, moving his hands back and forth. A feeling of weakness, of panic, swept across him, and Peirol realized there was magic being set against them as well.
    A man in the stern of the leading galley shouted through a speaking trumpet. Peirol understood what he was saying and realized that Abbas’s spell was at work, for the words changed as he heard them and became familiar.
    “What’s he saying?” Todolia asked. “I don’t speak whatever heathen language he’s blathering.”
    “He wants us to surrender,” Peirol answered, before Edirne could interpret.
    The mate gave him a suspicious look but didn’t have time for anything else, as the lead galley’s cannon boomed, white smoke plumed, and a ball bounced across the water, just in front of their bows.
    Edirne picked up a great double-curving bow, nocked an arrow, and sent the shaft arcing toward the first galley. It splashed just short of the ship.
    “That’s reply