To Lie with Lions - Dorothy Dunnett [177]
It was then, from the other ship, that the hail came.
De Fleury, if it was he, was a big man, and fluent in the German the Hanse merchants spoke. With moderate politeness, he was inviting Benecke to take the way off his ship and surrender.
‘You must excuse me, Nikolás-riddari,’ Benecke said, cupping his hands. Then, gesturing, he sent for a trumpet. Every moment’s delay was of use. The cliffs were ahead. In a very short time, he must either turn or tack to the south, presenting his beam to the guns of the Svipa. He needed time to set guns amidships. Those in the poop were already half restored to their moorings, and his hackbutters and bowmen in place. There were more of them than Svipa carried. The trumpet came, and Benecke spoke through it. ‘I have no quarrel with you. You must excuse me. A ship has run upon reefs. Men are dying.’
‘We shall gladly offer our chaplain,’ said the hollow voice helpfully. ‘Meanwhile, we are too close for our guns to miss. I suggest that …’
‘Fire,’ said Paúel Benecke in a murmur. He did not speak through the trumpet, but directed it at the gunner beside the one culverin primed and ready. The gunner lifted his taper and stretched. The roar that followed came not from his gun but the Svipa’s. With intolerable prescience, de Fleury had fired before he did.
It was a direct hit. The mainmast broke with an echoing bark; the noise shot about within the deeper reverberations of the cannon, and the ship jarred as if rammed. He would have been thrown off his feet but for his grasp of the rail. He knew from the screaming behind that some of the men in the stays had been hurled to the ground; he could see others clinging. Arrows were flying aboard. He lifted his mailed arm to his bowmen, to command them to answer the fire. There was a hiss as they shot. He found, to his amazement, that his arm would not drop to his side.
He assumed at first, with annoyance, that he had been wounded. Then he saw that a thick piece of cordage had settled across his gorget and cuirass, and was tightening fast. He drew out his sword, but already his feet were leaving the deck. He dangled, half-choked. Men were picking themselves up and running towards him, staggering as timber and blocks rained about them. The cans had spilled, and there was powder all over the deck; he saw his gunners, returned to their posts, looking up at him with blankest astonishment. Then, with a stupendous jerk to his ribs, he was taken sailing over the gunwales and across the patch of rough sea that separated his ship from the Svipa. He saw there was a ship’s boat below.
He gave the whole matter a moment’s consideration: they had rigged a cargo hoist from a spar, and someone had hurled over a noose. They did such things, he had heard, in the Tyrol. He gave further consideration to the benefits of travelling light. He was sufficiently stirred to decide to make his own gesture. As he swung over the boat, he lifted his sword and slashed through the rope by which he was suspended. He rather hoped, as he landed in a welter of splintering timber, that he had killed somebody.
*
‘He’s broken his arm,’ Robin said. ‘Father Moriz says he’s black and blue everywhere. He’s got a cut on the face from his helm, and a stave got through the joint in his greaves and he’s still got a headache from being knocked out by the fall. Otherwise he’s just fine.’
It had been his first engagement, and there had been eight injured and no dead, and they had taken Paúel Benecke hostage, and the enemy’s ship had surrendered, to save the life of their famous commander. For the moment, Robin had forgotten that the enemy was the man who had the right to be here, and that M. de Fleury was the pirate.
Father Moriz said, ‘Get that boy out of here. I am ashamed. I collaborated in a piece of chicanery while men on Adorne’s ship were drowning.’
‘The Pruss Maiden’s physician has gone to them,’ Robin said. ‘In our boat, with a crew from the Maiden. There’s no one of Ser Adorne’s on the Unicorn now, just the Vatachino and their friends. And they’re on rocks: they can