“You’ve changed, Longbow,” Zelana observed. “You wouldn’t have done this sort of thing back in Dhrall.”
“It’s not all that much different from what I did back in the forest, Zelana,” he disagreed. “I still hunt, but the hunting ground has changed, that’s all. My eventual target is still a creature of the Wasteland, but I may have to kill several shiploads of the kinsmen of the one called Kajak before I can get a clear bowshot at the servant of the Vlagh. In good time, however, I will find it, and then I’ll kill it. That’s what hunting is all about, isn’t it?”
“It turns out that you were right, Longbow,” Rabbit said very quietly when the two of them met in the bow of the Seagull at dawn the following morning. “A fair number of Kajak’s crewmen were falling-down drunk last evening, and their mouths were running a mile a minute. I was lucky enough to catch a few bits here and some pieces there, and it’s starting to come together.”
“You’re a good hunter, Rabbit,” Longbow congratulated his little friend. “Where does the trail you found go?”
“That’s a woodsy way to put it,” Rabbit noted, “but down at the bottom it comes fairly close. Kajak’s sailors were all agreed that the idea of letting any gold get away from him makes Kajak want to break down and cry. Cap’n Sorgan told him about all that gold over in Dhrall, but that was only words. Kajak saw real gold here on board the Seagull, and he wants it. He’ll worry about the gold in Dhrall after he steals the gold here in Maag. You were also right when you said that Kajak and his cousins won’t do a thing until after Skell leads most of the fleet off toward the east. They said that so many times that I got a little sick of hearing about it. They don’t know exactly when Skell’s planning to sail away, but they’re hoping that he won’t do it for several more days. They’ve got five ships here in the harbor of Kweta, but there’s more on the way. They aren’t too thrilled about taking on the ships that guard the Seagull when there’s an even match. They’d be a lot happier if they could make their move when they outnumber us by about three to one. The way they seem to see it is that they’ll have to make their move during the night after Skell moves out. The word’s out all over Maag about what the cap’n’s doing and how much he’ll pay, so more ships are coming here every day. If they hold off too long, they’ll be outnumbered again. If Skell sails before their friends get here, they’ll have to move whether they like it or not. They have come up with an idea that might give them an edge, though.”
“And it involves fire, doesn’t it?” Longbow suggested.
“You knew that all along, didn’t you?”
“It was just a guess. It needed some confirmation before I could base any plan on it.”
“We’d better warn the cap’n,” Rabbit said gravely.
“That won’t be necessary. The captain and the rest of the crew would only get in our way.”
“Are you trying to tell me that just the two of us are going to fight off five Maag longships all by ourselves?” Rabbit demanded incredulously.
“Of course not, Rabbit,” Longbow replied with a faint smile. “Zelana and Eleria will help us. That’s all the help we’re going to need.”
“Have you been drinking?” Rabbit asked suspiciously.
“Rabbit’s visit to the local taverns confirmed our suspicions, Zelana,” Longbow reported a little later. “It will be Kajak who’ll come bearing fire. That’s going to be our first enemy. Can you make it rain?”
“I’ll speak with Mother Sea about it. I’m sure she’ll be happy to oblige. What did you have in mind?”
“When Kajak’s men row their skiffs up to the ships of Sorgan’s kinsmen and throw their torches, rain would put out the fires before they could spread. Then Kajak’s going to have to fight five ships when he only wants to fight one. He might just give up at that point and try to sail away from here.” Longbow paused and thought for a moment. “I don’t think we should let him get away. There are a lot of Maag ships nearby, and Kajak’s not the only greedy one. Other Maag ship captains might find his plan very interesting. If he’s dead, he won’t be able to tell his plan to others here in the world of the living. I don’t think we’ll need to be very worried about what he says in the world of the dead, but I don’t know very much about the world of the dead. If you think it might cause us some problems, you might want to look into it.”
“You’re teasing me, aren’t you, Longbow?”
“I wouldn’t even consider doing something like that, holy Zelana,” he replied with an absolutely straight face. “I’ve given this a great deal of thought, and I don’t think we’ll want to bring this to Sorgan’s attention. Rabbit and I can deal with it by ourselves, and Sorgan would just be in the way.”
“You’ve been in the Land of Maag too long. You seem to have picked up their habit of boasting. You don’t really believe that you and Rabbit can attend to Kajak all by yourselves, do you?”
“Kajak’s only got five ships, Zelana. That shouldn’t be much of a problem.”
“He said that as if he really believes it, Beloved,” Eleria noted.
“I know. And that’s starting to worry me.”
Sorgan’s cousin Skell was finishing his preparations to set sail for the Land of Dhrall with the Maag ships that had been gathered so far, and Longbow spoke privately with Red-Beard. “It’s not a matter of any great concern,” he told his friend. “I’ll see to it that Kajak doesn’t live to see the sun come up on the morning after he comes to visit the Seagull. One or two of his kinsmen may see that things aren’t going very well, and they might decide to leave here in a hurry. If they should happen to try to join Skell’s fleet, you might want to let Skell know what they tried to do here in the harbor of Kweta. I don’t think Skell’s going to want people like that in his fleet.”
“I’ll do that,” Red-Beard promised. “Should I warn Skell that the servants of the Vlagh are venomous?”
Longbow considered it. “Probably not until his fleet reaches Lattash,” he decided. “Let’s get him there before we tell him the whole truth. The Maags are much bigger than the creatures of the Wasteland, so they have a much longer reach. Their swords and spears should give them an advantage when the fighting starts.”