"I can and do!" Fowler pulled a key from a chain around his neck and passed it to the man. "Now, you alley-spawned son of a tavern hag, open the weapon lock- ers before the witch calls the squids to drag us all down to Umberlee!"

The youth's eyes darted toward Ruha. Though the witch did not know who the squids were or how to sum- mon them, she took some lint from her pocket and tossed it to the wind, making many strange gestures and recit- ing her lineage in the lyrical tongue of the Bedine. The sailor leapt off the stairs and ducked into the somer- castle. Two of his fellows followed him inside, while sev- eral others struggled forward to the forecastle, fighting their way through the churning froth that boiled over the bow twice every minute.

The magic wind continued to drive the little cog onward. At intervals, Captain Fowler adjusted the tiller or ordered the crew to tighten a line, and each time they crested a dune, Ruha marvelled at how the distance between the Storm Sprite and her goal had closed. The sailors who had gone into the somercastle returned with boarding axes and spears for their companions, and those who had struggled forward to the forecastle also reap- peared, laden with thick-braided skeins and barbed har- poons twice a man's height. They tied lines about their waists and clambered onto the foredeck, where they pulled the oilskins off three ballistae and, fighting against raging waters and the ship's mad pitching, set to work stringing the heavy weapons. By the time they finished, the caravel lay a hundred yards ahead, lumbering forward at a shallow angle that would present her star- board side to the Storm Sprite.

The battered caravel stretched to five times the length of the little cog. Her hull, looming dark and sheer in the night, rose from the sea like a cliff. The wales were crowned by a crest of white railing, broken in many places and draped with shredded rigging. Her foremast, all that remained of three, could have scraped a cloud, and carried more cloth than three of the Storm Sprite's sails.