Kellanved's Reach

He found her sitting up against the mizzen mast, legs straight out and crossed atop a spar. He took hold of the spar and swayed there in the netting far above the deck. From her papers he knew her name to be Hyacynth, but he suspected that she must be mortified by it as she was known only as Hy. ‘Going to hide up here all day?’

‘I’m not hiding,’ she corrected. ‘I happen to be in plain view.’

‘Okay – run as far as you can?’

‘I didn’t run,’ the pale, delicately featured redhead corrected again. ‘I climbed.’

Nedurian blew out a breath. ‘Look, child, I know this isn’t some fine salon in Quon, but you signed up for this, and this is how it is.’

She rolled her eyes to the sky. ‘What is that supposed to mean?’

‘It means that yes, they’re crude and lewd and ignorant and use rough language and just want to drink and screw, but what do you expect? Half are fresh off the farm or the fishing boat. You’ll just have to put up with it for now.’

Hy crossed her arms over her thin chest. ‘Why for now? What could possibly change?’

‘Action, child. Once you all see action, everything will change. Trust me. I’ve seen it a thousand times.’

She bit at a gnawed thumbnail. ‘You’re obviously an educated man, captain. How could you bear to serve with such … such …’

‘Peasants?’ he offered.

‘Gauche rubes,’ she supplied.

‘Because some of them proved to be among the best people I’ve ever known. Now, c’mon down and stop pouting.’

‘I’m not pouting,’ she corrected yet again.

He popped his head back up to say, ‘Yes you are,’ and climbed down.

*

At the stern deck he joined the fleet’s admiral, Choss, who alone among Surly’s Napans would not be accompanying the landing party. The burly veteran raider gave him a nod.

‘So, an attack on Dariyal’s harbour defences – defences that have never been breached.’

‘That’s the size of it,’ Choss affirmed, distracted, as he eyed the progress of the ragtag flotilla spreading out from Malaz.

‘After the failed assault we pull back to form a blockade.’ The admiral nodded. ‘Will they respond?’

‘Oh, they’ll probably come chasing out right after us.’

‘And that’s good?’

The fellow murmured orders to a flagwoman, then returned his attention to Nedurian. ‘Good and bad. We might be overrun, but at least everyone will be watching the harbour.’

‘Ah. And Surly?’

‘On board the Twisted, with the mage and Dancer.’

‘Will she head in with them?’

‘She keeps threatening to. So I wouldn’t be surprised. Now,’ and he gestured with a wide hand to the surrounding vessels, ‘I have to send some messages.’

Nedurian bowed, withdrawing. ‘Of course.’

Despite all his decades of campaigning, Nedurian had never before been in a proper naval engagement. Oh, he’d seen river crossings and lakeside assaults aplenty, but no ship-to-ship action. So he leaned on the side and eyed the preparations with the appreciative eye of an interested, if inexperienced, fighting man.

The trip would take nearly the full day. He watched the vessels using the time to order themselves. Fat and heavy modified merchant caravels lumbered to the front. These, he knew, from sitting in on briefings, had been adapted to look like the troop-carriers they would be in any normal port assault. In this case, however, they were not. They were hollow canards, meant to lead the way and attract the heaviest barrages from the formidable harbour mangonels, catapults, and scorpions.

Behind these would slip in the majority of the Malazan galleys. Swift and low, the troops they carried actually working the oars, they would strike while the caravels took the punishment – at least that was the plan.

The rest of the fleet, including the Insufferable, would follow.

Caught up in the atmosphere of the preparation, Nedurian had to remind himself that all this was actually merely a diversion, meant to keep attention focused on the water, and away from the palace.

It occurred to him that should these Malazans subdue Nap, they would effectively rule the seas and the entire coastline surrounding Quon Tali – a continent where none of the cities or states had invested in a navy of any significance. Why bother when you had potentially hostile neighbours on all sides? And hence his own lack of naval experience even after so many years.

So, he wondered, did this mage Kellanved know all this when he selected Malaz as a base from which to launch his ambitions? Or had he merely chosen to make the most of the available strengths of wherever he found himself? It was a debate that could go back and forth for ever, he supposed. Scholars might grind their quills down to nubs over it all – but only if they succeeded this day.

When afternoon came, he went from man to man and woman to woman, examining their gear, pulling on straps, and setting aside heavy equipment they wouldn’t be needing, such as the shovels and other siegeworking and saboteur gear. Their job would be to repel boarders. And there would be a lot of them, as the Napan fleet outnumbered them well over three to one.