Gregor helped them climb aboard their little fishing boat. “And how shall we get aboard the galleon? I know the routes of this area well enough—if it passed by Ontia, then I should have a good idea of its approach, and we should be able to see the thing from a mile away—but a galleon has a great deal of defenses. A fishing boat such as ours will be no issue for them.”
“I shall let Berenice answer that,” said Orso. He bowed to her, hand extended.
“The Frizettis tried to find a scrived method of purifying water,” said Berenice. “They brought Sancia and myself in to consult and help them find a solution, and we got to keep the sigil strings. They mostly found a very efficient way of boiling water…but that is all we need tonight.”
“Ah,” said Gregor. “Steam—or fog?”
“Fog,” said Berenice. She opened the pack on her back, revealing dozens of small iron-and-wood balls, each about the size of a small melon. “We place this in the ship’s way, and when it gets close, they’ll create a massive fog bank.”
“And I can see the scrivings in the ship itself,” said Sancia. “So we’ll still be able to navigate blindly in the fog, so to speak.”
“And how shall these steam rigs work?” asked Gregor. “We’ll be miles from any lexicon.”
“Not the one in the galleon,” said Berenice. “It was simple enough to adjust the Frizetti works to use Dandolo scriving languages.”
Gregor stared at her. “How much are we paying you, again?”
“Averting the apocalypse is payment enough,” said Berenice. She sat down in the fishing boat. “Speaking of which—I suggest we get on it.”
* * *
—
Exposed in the back of the little fishing boat, Sancia felt a raw, screaming terror when she looked back and saw there was no sign of Tevanne, or indeed land at all. It felt like they were in a tiny bucket with the whole hostile world waiting to swallow them up.
Berenice, however, did not seem to mind at all. As Gregor piloted the ship northeast, she worked on the mast and the boom and the bow, either planting pre-written sigil plates on their surfaces or writing out strings of sigils herself. “These are Dandolo strings designed for sailing,” she called down to Gregor as he worked away in the cockpit. “Not much use here, but…when we’re close to the galleon, they should make us much faster and more agile.”
“Excellent!” said Gregor. And for once, he sounded genuinely joyful. Perhaps being back at sea was good for him.
When she was done, she sat back down next to Sancia. “Still feeling anxious?” she asked.
“How can I not? There’s a big goddamn world of water around me!”
“I see. Well. It could be worse for you.”
“How?”
“You could be like me.” She crossed her legs. “I don’t know how to swim.”
Sancia stared. “You…You don’t know how to swim? And you’re not worried?”
“Oh, I’m worried. I’m just managing that worry. After all, we’re not in the water. We’re on a boat, in the water. Which is very different. Now. I have some things to reflect on…but I’ll be here if you need me, love.”
Then she shut her eyes, put her hands in her lap, and began to meditate. Sancia glared at her, but before she could get too angry the boat lurched to the side again, and her stomach flipped, and she did her best not to squeak out loud.
Night fell on them quickly. The gray sea and gray clouds were full of weak, watery light—and then, suddenly, they weren’t, and it felt as though the ship were drifting atop a wide, black chasm, the sky a smear of dark blue above.
“Time?” asked Gregor.
Orso—his face white with seasickness—consulted his mechanical timepiece. “It’s past eight in the evening,” he said.
“How much past?”
“I don’t know, this scrumming thing’s crude as hell. I’d say half past.”
Gregor nodded grimly. Then he began to scout.
He cut the ship this way and that, carving through the wind and waters with a grace Sancia would have found admirable, had she not been aboard the boat with him. She and Orso both vomited over the side of the boat once, twice, and then they lost count.
“Trying to see as much of the ocean as I can,” Gregor explained. “We cannot let this ship slip by us.”
“How can you see anything at all?” said Orso.
“The art of spying ships at night,” said Gregor, “is about spotting lights and silhouettes and forms on the horizon. And spotting the galleon should be relatively simple, because it will be extremely bi…Uhh. Hm.” He leaned forward.
Berenice stood up. “What is it?”
Gregor pulled out his field glass and peered at the horizon. “I…see it.”
Sancia wrenched herself away from the side of the boat. “Are you sure?”
“I am positive,” he said. There was an unnerving calmness to his words. As Berenice joined him in the cockpit, he handed her his spyglass.
She peered through it and gasped. “Oh. Oh, my…”
Sancia staggered over to them—but then stopped when she realized she didn’t need the spyglass at all.
Something big and blocky sat on the horizon. She wasn’t sure how far away it was…but she suspected it was very, very far. It looked like a giant wooden triangle clutching the horizon, as big as two if not three campo blocks. It was obviously, obviously not something that should ever actually float on the water—not unless there were a lot of rules and arguments convincing reality that it should.
“Holy shit,” she said. “Is that…it?”
“Yes,” said Gregor, still in that unnervingly calm voice. “That is a merchant house galleon.” He turned the wheel and pointed their ship at it. After a minute or so their boat suddenly lurched forward and sped up.
Berenice looked at the sails. “The scrivings have kicked in. We’re close.”
Sancia felt a slow leak of dread in her stomach as the giant blocky shadow on the horizon grew bigger and bigger.
“Great,” she said.
* * *
—
When they were about a quarter mile in front of the giant ship, Gregor turned the wheel and began sailing away from it, like the galleon was chasing them. Berenice started dropping the little water rigs into the sea behind them, one after another. There had to be at least fifty of them.