The fishing boat Merrias Lar wallowed and staggered as the two men at her steering oar held her at an angle across the waves. She wore no canvas that night, not even her jib, getting her steerage from the brawny backs of eight men at the oars. The wind was a hoarse bass, the foaming surf a distant growl, but through the darkness, the skipper had seen a gap in the breakers, the sort of gap that should mean a stream mouth, and they angled toward it, hoping to reach its channel before the surf grabbed them.
They rode a wave in diagonally, the steersman fighting the oar, and shallow though they drafted, both skipper and steersman tensed, half expecting to run aground. Then they were through, into a river channel some sixty or seventy feet wide, flanked with rushes eight feet tall or more.
The skipper knew what it was, or thought he did. On the Gulf of Storms, much of the Djezian shore was marshland. Several rivers came down from the north, each forming a delta at its mouth, emptying into the gulf through multiple channels. This would be a lesser channel of the River Bron, the skipper told himself, unless they'd been driven farther west than he thought.
He walked between his oarsmen, slopping ankle deep in water they'd shipped, to the bow where he took up the sounding pole. This lower reach of the channel was deep; he couldn't find the bottom with it. Some two hundred yards upstream, they came to a rough wharf, shored with logs laid end to end behind stout pilings, and semi-decked with ill-sorted poles. On it a row of boats lay upside down.
He waved a thick arm, then gestured. "We'll land here," he said quietly, and the steersman angled them toward it. Two of the seamen crouched, and as the Lar drew close alongside, they jumped, lines in their fists, and made fast to pilings.
"Take up the decking and bail her out," the skipper ordered. "We'll wait here till the storm eases." Then he and his steersman got out and examined the boats on the wharf. There were ten of them, a somewhat varied lot, of a size for fishing. But why here? There was no hamlet in sight, no habitation at all, no racks or reels for drying nets and lines.
The rain, which had become intermittent, had turned off now, at least for the moment, and stars shown through breaks in the clouds. Great Liilia peered at them through scud, lighting the scene.
He went to an end boat and called to his men. "Help me turn her over," he ordered. They did. It was a fishing boat, fairly representative of the others there, a bit over twenty feet long—maybe twenty-two or three, with an eight-foot beam, and a sixteen-inch keel that ran most of her length. Stowed beneath her were ten oars plus a steering oar. And a stubby mast with folded canvas, the sort of thing you might give a landlubber to sail.
"Look at all the benches in her!" the steersman said. "I've never seen the like!"
The captain's eyes took it all in. These were no seats for a single oarsman, but ran across from flank to flank. "Aye," he said. "And the size of her water cask." He stepped quickly to the next boat in line, and they tipped it enough that he could see her equipage. "The same, or close enough," he muttered. "They'll seat thirty men, about."
"What in Hrum's name are they for?" one of the men asked.
They looked at one another. Several had the same thought. They tipped up two more; each had benches like the first two. "One'll get you three," the steersman said, "that there's boats like these in every channel around here. And these ten alone would carry three hundred men."
"Aye," said a sailor. "Meanwhile I'll bet there's damned little fishin' gettin' done. Old Gamaliiu probably commandeered every boat on the south Djezian shore."
The skipper's eyes were hard. "Let's turn this one back over," he said. "Then bail the Lar and stretch the awnings. We'll catch some sleep and leave as soon as the wind allows. Usippi, the first watch's yours."
"And take the hatchets to these?" one of the men asked, gesturing at the Gorrbian boats.
The skipper scowled; the thought of holing a boat made a bilious taste in his mouth. "No," he said. "We'll leave 'em as is. They're just ten out of however many; and if they know we've found 'em, they'll be warned and set guards.
"Leave no sign we've been here. We'll take the word home and let Leonessto and his folks decide what to do about 'em."