* * *
“All-father Greatest and Best,” Justiciar Demansk said. “They’re going to be massacred.”
The Confed triremes were strung out almost in a line, as close to the shore as they could and not be in the surf. Demansk was no seaman, but he could see the mistake there—the commanders were landsmen like him, and they thought of the shore as safety. Instead it was a trap waiting to kill them on their left hand, while the Islander squadrons’ rams—
No, not Islanders, by the gods! he thought. A banner was flying from the quarterdeck of the leading enemy ship, and it had the silver owl of Solinga on it! Not royal ships. Mercenaries. That must be Esmond Gellert, the man who’d vowed to see Vanbert burn.
Justiciar Demansk lowered his head a little, unconscious of the movement, like an old battered greatbeast, lord of the herd, snuffling the air and shaking his battered horns. We’ll see about that, bucko, he thought.
A quick glance showed him that his squadron overlapped the landward end of the Islander fleet now; the ships there were opening out their spacing to compensate for the squadron that had peeled off, moving with dancer’s grace. Still, they’d be thinner—probably wouldn’t try anything, not for a while.
And while Esmond-burn-the-Confeds Gellert takes the detached squadron in their flank, I can take him in his, he mused.
“Signal,” he said. “Squadron will form on me, and advance to the attack. Flank speed!”
* * *
“They’re coming after us,” Esmond said, pounding one fist lightly on the rail. “Damn! That’s more initiative than I’d have expected from a Confed commander, and as tight a formation as they’ve been keeping.”
“They’re certainly making a hash of it, though,” Adrian said, watching two of the Confed triremes fall afoul of each other, oars clashing. Confusion followed, until enough oars could be remanned to push the vessels apart. “They’ll be late to the party.”
Esmond shook his head, looking right to the Confed squadron that was his prey, and left to the other arrowing in to the rescue. “Or waddling to the rescue,” he said. “They might as well be barges, but we can’t let ourselves get trapped between them.” He swore again, vicious disappointment in his tone.
“No, wait!” Adrian said, pointing seaward. “Look!”
There where the massive quinqueremes faced each other, something was happening. A snarling cheer ran down the Islander line, and a drumbeat signal from ship to ship. Signalers with flags relayed it.
“General Attack, by the Gray-Eyed Lady of Solinga,” Esmond swore, but happily this time. His head whipped back towards the Confed line. The squadron that had lunged out to protect its comrades had halted. No, they were backing water! Probably recalled by their high command, to meet the Islander charge.
“Steady as she goes!” he shouted exultantly, looking ahead to the ten Confed ships. “Their arses are ours!”
“Ram, sir?” the helmsman said.
“By no means,” Esmond laughed. “Bring us parallel, just out of dart-caster range.”
He grinned like a direbeast, and Adrian nodded agreement. The enemy ships grew nearer with the always-surprising speed of meetings at sea, where you could be alongside one minute and hull-down when you looked back. Suddenly the ant-tiny figures along the enemy rail were men, and human limbs could be seen through the oar ports of the outriggers as their rowers strained and heaved to a quickening beat of the hortator’s mallets.
Adrian winced mentally, imagining being down there . . . never knowing when a dart, or fire, or the bone-crushing blow of an enemy’s ram was going to come through. Solinga had been a democracy for a long time after the League Wars—a democracy as far as freeborn male citizens were concerned, at least—and the main claim of the lower classes to equality with the farmers who provided their own armor was that it was the poor freemen who rowed the City’s ships to battle. The Scholars of the Grove had always held that a specious argument, a sign of the City’s decline. Now he was inclined to agree with the rowers.
His voice was steady as he spoke: “Aim for their catapults. The catapults only until further orders.”