Dragonhammer: Volume II by Conner McCall

Author:Conner McCall [McCall, Conner]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Literature & Fiction, Action & Adventure, Fantasy, War & Military, Science Fiction & Fantasy, Sword & Sorcery
Amazon: B018CZV3ZK
Published: 2015-11-21T07:00:00+00:00

The Blackbrine

Hardly any of us sleep the remainder of that night. We may as well have marched out of the marshes but I didn’t want to take the chance. I had concluded, because we had seen none the day before, that they are nocturnal, and we’d be much safer during the day.

For the sake of time, we bury the dead by dropping them in the water. I hate to leave them in such a state, and in such a horrible place at that, but we have no time to do otherwise.

The horizon becomes blue in the distance. Our pace quickens, though the marshes worsen, and soon we come to Gull’s Landing.

Seagulls are everywhere. A titanic flat rock, much like Highrock Lookout, sticks out of the beach and partway into the ocean. Jagged outcrops guard its edges and sides, but a small path leads directly up the back and safely down onto the landing. The shore is rocky and gray, but the ocean water is clear and inviting. Much to my delight, a ship lies docked a little ways from the landing. Two small rowboats rock on the water, tied to one of the many boulders on the shoreline. Captain Alastair steps down from his perch on a rock, where he had been gazing at the sea, and comes forward to meet me.

“He’s a little creepy,” Nathaniel mutters.

“Dragonhammer,” the captain says. “I much prefer this meeting to the one we had only a fortnight ago.”

“As do I,” I reply, shaking his outstretched hand. “I don’t like sneaking around everywhere I go.”

“Yes.” He strokes his clean-shaven chin and says, “This is more men than I thought you would bring.”

“Is that a problem?”

He thinks for a moment and takes a breath. “No,” he says. “We’ll just have to squeeze.”

“Good,” I reply. “I’m not about to turn any of them back.”

“But there is the matter of my payment,” he says. “Do you have it?”

“You shall have it when we are in the city,” I reply.

“Then why should I take you to the port?” he asks with a sarcastically concerned expression on his face.

“Because then you won’t get it at all,” I reply coolly. “And this will have been a waste of your time that you could have spent travelling to a more… wealthy city.”

Alastair grimaces. “Don’t remind me.”

“We have a deal, then?”

“I believe we had a deal when you left me in Amnigaddah,” he replies coldly. “Let’s get this done with.” He signals his men on the rowboats and says to me, “I’ll ferry your men to my ship a few at a time. The shore is too treacherous to get my ship in close enough.”

I watch as the rowboats go to the ship and back, to the ship and back. Then I ride last, with Genevieve and Captain Alastair. As we climb the ladder onto his ship, the captain announces, “Welcome to the Blackbrine.”

“Raise anchor!” he calls as he climbs the steps to the landing on top of the first cabin. Several other nautical terms follow, but I do not understand them.

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