Rise of the Blade - Charles Moffat [1]
With a silent prayer to his god, he touched the wound and it stopped bleeding. It still hurt like some fire demon was burrowing into his belly but he could ignore it. His healing skills would have to wait until after the battle.
Spitzer in hand, and Planereacher coming back out in the other, he met the five sailors with quick thrusts that fell the first three and made the last two wary as they levelled their weapons at him to fire. Witter was not about to be finished so easily and threw Planereacher towards one sailor, catching him in the side. Meanwhile he rolled desperately towards the other sailor and took the man's leg off with the extraordinarily sharp edge of Spitzer.
The man crunpled to the ground, his shot left to the open air as he landed beside Witter with a frantic scream. He grabbed at his leg in a bizarre attempt to reattach it. With pity in his eyes, the Harper removed the man's head.
"Wut in Cyric's black 'eart is going on up 'ere!" shouted a gruff voice, as a candle bearing captain appeared, lifting the latch with one hand and starting out.
Witter responded by cleaving through both boards and hand, ignoring the screams of the captain as he slammed a boot down on the latch and looked back at his only foe.
Who was gone except for Planereacher which lay on the deck, glistening red with blood. He scanned the ship quickly, trying to ignore the sounds below as more than a score of sailors rushed to the aid of their captain. Turning about, Witter saw the man scurrying up the ropes to unfurl a sail.
Looking to the docks of Waterdeep, Witter saw the beginnings of a crowd of spectators drawn to the sound of gunfire. No doubt a city watch patrol had already been alerted and was on its way. The watch rarely concerned themselves with gun smuggling, leaving that job to the Harpers who were more suited to intrigue.
The sailors, even the injured ones, knew the value of leaving the city and reaching the open sea before a patrol showed up and boarded the ship.
His originally purpose aboard this ship had been determine whether it truely held a vast hold filled with kegs of smokepowder. That had gone wrong the moment the sailor had chosen to carry a pistol instead of a cutlass which Witter could have handled quietly. Unfortunately, guns also happened to be very noisy and that plan had went overboard quite quickly and drowned. After all these years, Witter still had his sense of humour.
Now all that mattered was whether he could stall the ship until the patrol got here. Or at least, thats the way it should have been, were it not for the sudden emergence of sailors leaping out of the holds and diving overboard. More important than that was the presence of thick black smoke rising from latch where the captain had fallen.
On second thought, maybe it would be a good idea to get the ship as far away from docks and Waterdeep itself as soon as possible. Dropping Spitzer, he leapt up to the stern of the ship and wrestled with the wheel, turning the ship slightly to head out towards the open sea.
Already the sails were catching the strong wind pouring forth over the land, and pulling them out away from the dock. The mooring ropes reached their length and the entire ship creaked as it leaned to the starboard bow.
Even if the ship did topple, Witter doubted the water would douse the fire before it reached the volatile powder kegs. Vaulting back down to poop deck, he scooped up Spitzer and slipped across the tilting deck.
Stabbing into the wood with the saber like he mountain climbing, he scrambled up the deck towards the mooring lines that lined the port side of the ship. There was a loud snap as one of the lines broke under the strain of the large vessel and Witter clung to his sword as the entire ship shuddered, and took on an even more dangerous tilt.
Finally, with a groan that said his belly hurt like