The Thunderchild sped on, then veered towards the oncoming vessel. On the prow the dark-bearded warrior was still waving the gleaming axe – and in that instant Earin Shad knew he had miscalculated. ‘Bring in the oars!’ he shouted.
Patek glanced up, astonished. ‘What, Lord?’
‘The oars, man! They’re attacking us!’
It was too late. Even as Patek leaned over the side to shout the order The Thunderchild leapt to the attack, swinging violently towards Darkwind, the prow striking the first ranks of oars. Wood snapped violently with explosive cracks, mingled with the screams of the slave rowers as the heavy oars smashed into arms and skulls, shoulders and ribs.
Grappling-lines were hurled out, iron claws biting into wood or hooking into The Thunderchild’s rigging. An arrow slashed into the chest of a corsair; the man pitched back, struggled to rise, then fell again. The corsairs hauled on the grappling-lines and the two ships edged together.
Earin Shad was furious. Half the oars on the starboard side had been smashed, and the gods alone knew how many slaves were crippled. Now he would be forced to limp to port. ‘Ready to board!’ he yelled.
The two ships crashed together. The corsairs rose and clambered to the rails.
In that moment the black-bearded warrior on the enemy ship stepped up to the prow and leaped into the massed ranks of waiting corsairs. Earin Shad could hardly believe what he was seeing. The black-garbed axeman sent several men spinning to the deck, almost fell himself, then swung his axe. A man screamed as blood sprayed from a terrible wound in his chest. The axe rose and fell – and the corsairs scattered back from the apparently deranged warrior.
He charged them, the axe cleaving into their ranks. Further along the deck other corsairs were still trying to board the merchant ship and meeting ferocious resistance from the Drenai warriors, but at the centre of the main deck all was chaos. A man ran in behind the axeman, a curved knife raised to stab him in the back. But an arrow slashed into the assailant’s throat and he stumbled and fell.
Several Drenai warriors leapt to join the axeman. Earin Shad swore and drew his sabre, vaulting the rail and landing smoothly on the deck below. When a swordsman ran at him he parried the lunge and sent a riposte that missed the neck but opened the man’s face from cheekbone to chin. As the warrior fell back Earin Shad plunged his blade into the man’s mouth and up into the brain.
A lithe warrior in black breastplate and helm despatched a corsair and moved in on Earin Shad. The Corsair captain blocked a fierce thrust and attempted a riposte, only to leap back as his opponent’s blade slashed by his face. The man was dark-skinned and dark-eyed, and a master swordsman.
Earin Shad stepped back and drew a dagger. ‘Ventrian?’ he enquired.
The man smiled. ‘Indeed I am.’ A corsair leapt from behind the swordsman. He spun and disembowelled the man, then swung back in time to block a thrust from Earin Shad. ‘I am Bodasen.’
*
The corsairs were tough, hardy men, long used to battles and the risk of death. But they had never had to face a phenomenon like the man with the axe. Watching from the tiller deck of The Thunderchild, Sieben saw them fall back, again and again, from Druss’s frenzied, tireless assaults. Though the day was warm Sieben felt a chill in his blood as he watched the axe cleaving into the hapless pirates. Druss was unstoppable – and Sieben knew why. When swordsmen fought the outcome rested on skill, but armed with the terrible double-headed axe there was no skill needed, just power and an eagerness for combat – a battle lust that seemed unquenchable. No one could stand against him, for the only way to win was to run within the reach of those deadly blades. Death was not a risk; it was a certainty. And Druss himself seemed to possess a sixth sense. Corsairs circled behind him, but even as they rushed in he swung to face them, the axe-blades slashing through skin, flesh and bone. Several of the corsairs threw down their weapons, backing away from the huge, blood-smeared warrior. These Druss ignored.