SeaJourney: Arken Freeth and the Adventures of the Neanderthals, Book 1

Chapter 3: Yolanda Raids Baltak

Disaster! Baltak has fallen after a moonth's siege. My generals promised years of safety while the Amarrats pursued a useless siege, yet today the Amarrats breached the walls! My beautiful city, my friends, all lost! Baltak burns as we sail for Lanth, home of my future husband. Foul Tookan pirates allied with the Amarrats chase us as I write. We pray for escape in the nightmist.

—Diary of Princess Sharmane of Tolaria

"Faster!" Yolanta roared. "We have to catch them." The drumbeat quickened, and with each oar pull the ninety-five foot Reaper surged across the flat sea. Yolanta pressed his thighs against the bow railing and glared ahead at the fleeing Tolarians, wishing his stare was a grappling rope able to pull ships back.

Water sparkled off the Tolarian ships' oars ahead, making rainbows from the sunset beyond. The last of the fair, offshore winds had quickly carried the Reaper close to the fleeing Tolarians, but just moments ago the winds had died.

The five green-hulled Tolarian ships with large slave crews and long, thin hulls had quickly lowered sail and set the slaves to rowing. They were so close Yolanta could see Princess Sharmane standing on the command deck of the lead ship. He shook his sword overhead.

"Curse Tol and the Tolarians!" he screamed at the Princess's ship. But if the Princess had heard across the three-hundred-leg gap of water between them, she didn't look upset. Yolanta hated the Tolarians. They had plagued his Tookan people since before his father's time. The Amarrats, his new allies and invaders of Tolaria, were welcome to the Tolarian land as long as they left his Tookans alone to plunder trade on the Circle Sea.

"They will escape soon," Brumbal, Yolanta's second-in-command stood at his side. "Our ship is not as fast-rowing as those long hulls. If they make it until nightfall we will never find them."

Yolanta was the Admarg of the fleet and the king of his small country. Brumbal served as captain of the Reaper and commander of the fleet.

"Nightmist always favors the hunted." Yolanta glanced up at Brumbal, the only man on board taller than him. Looking at Brumbal felt like looking in a reflecting plate because they both had the radiant blue eyes deep set behind the heavy brow, sloping forehead, and large jaws of the Tookan people.

"If only we knew their destination," Yolanta said in a low voice. "With the compass the Amarrats gave us, we could cross the Circle Sea and surprise them."

Yolanta spoke quietly because the existence of the compass was a secret. Yolanta had told only Brumbal about the compass given to them by the Amarrat king. The Tolarians and Lantish had used the compass for years. They had learned to rely on the compass to guide them directly across the Circle Sea.

Yolanta's forces could never sail beyond sight of land for fear of becoming lost in the vast Circle Sea. Would his men trust that the compass could keep them on course? Or would his men mutiny? It was impossible to know without trying. And Yolanta didn't want the men to know he had a compass or was considering taking the risk of using it until he found the right moment to tell them.

"Perhaps if we grapple one and persuade the Tolarians to reveal it," Brumbal whispered to match Yolanta's guarded conversation. Brumbal did this by placing one of his large hands by his mouth. He was the largest man on the ship, and he looked funny when he tried to do something delicate. Yet there was no humor in this moment as Yolanta glared at his enemies ahead.

"We need to be closer to grapple one of their ships and take them prisoner. I'm sure we can get one of them to tell us their destination. But even if we know that they are crossing the Circle Sea directly and know their destination, will our men let us sail across the Circle Sea? I wonder if they will obey my orders or their fears?" Yolanta asked.