The smoke from the enemy's burning ship was still rising steadily from the quarter deck even though the flames had largely been extinguished by the rain. Anya was certain it would sink in a matter of hours; she'd sunk enough of them during her years as captain to know when they would be lost to the sea. The enormous craters in the ship's hull where her cannons found their targets were steadily drawing in water, and the though the ship's deck was still holding level and steady, the waterline had risen by two feet already. Some of Anya's best shipmen had already made it across to the enemy vessel and were rounding up the last of the survivors, disarming them, binding their hands behind their backs and pushing them to their knees in a single line under the threat of their swords.
As far as battles went, this was one of the more pathetic ones Anya had won. She'd faced skilled shipmen in the past to grow her fleet, which now stood at sixty ships strong, but these people were clearly not fighters. The enemy ship was much smaller, much slower, and was manned with a far smaller crew than the skilled group she kept with her aboard the Regium Maris. They didn't even have enough time to load their own cannons before they were overtaken. Anya couldn't feel any remorse about the loss of this ship, as there was no way something so pathetic would ever join in her ranks. This thing was better off rotting at the bottom of the ocean.
Lincoln, one of Anya's youngest lieutenants, waved his hands overhead, giving the all clear signal. After every victory Anya won, this was the last formality. She would command the crew, and once the battle was over, she would see to the execution of her last remaining enemies. As harsh as it seemed, the executions were necessary. Anya could not afford risking mutiny by having any crewmen with less than complete and total loyalty to her and her cause. Enemies offering loyalty when faced with the alternative of death did not make good soldiers, and this group wasn't skilled enough in combat to be worth keeping alive anyway. She sheathed her sword at her waist and proceeded to the main deck, where her crew was busy lowering a plank across to the enemy ship. Lincoln's grappling hooks had drawn the two ships close enough for her to walk across and would make raiding their supplies easier.
"Gustus, Indra—come with me," Anya called out behind her.
Both warriors did as they were told immediately. Their similar tattoos and scars marked them as comrades, but that was where the resemblance ended. Gustus was a tall, stocky man with a big, bushy beard and long, braided hair like many of his people. Indra was a shorter, lithe woman with short, cropped hair and a severe facial expression that would have made most people cower on the spot. A third followed after them without being told. As Anya's understudy, it was understood that she would follow anywhere Anya went, even into the thick of battle. She was quite young, possibly twelve years old at the oldest (none of the crew members knew their exact ages), wearing a miniaturized version of the captain's armor with a matching sheath for her sword and a bow slung across her back. She followed behind the Gustus and Indra wordlessly, moving to the captain's right side as soon as they boarded the enemy's ship.
Lincoln emerged from the smoky deck moments later. He said: "There are fourteen survivors in all, Captain. They've been restrained and await your judgment."
Anya nodded. "Very good, Lincoln. I need you to take Indra and Gustus to the hold and the gunroom. Take everything you can—food, supplies, weapons, ammunition. I want everything cleared out in the next half hour. Is that understood?"
"Aye, Captain." Lincoln was nothing if not efficient, and within seconds, he'd disappeared into the smoke and below deck, taking Indra and Gustus with him.
The rest of the lieutenants were still holding the prisoners on the main deck. Anya could only see their faint outlines through the smoke, but there didn't appear to be any struggling. It was a pity. There'd been so little excitement during the battle that she almost wished for one of them to resist so she had an excuse to unsheath her sword for once today.
"Are you ready, Lexa?" Anya asked the small girl beside her.
"I am," the girl answered with a confidence that was far beyond her years.
She was already an invaluable asset to their people, and one day after Anya resigned her post, Lexa would also make an excellent fleet commander, perhaps even better than Anya herself. Despite her youth, the more elite crew members already deferred to her. She was learning how to navigate faster than anyone Anya had ever seen, and she had blade skills of someone twice her age. Some of it was natural ability, but Anya had never seen a young warrior so driven to learn before. Her sense of duty to her people was unmatched, and for that, she was respected aboard the ship.
With Lexa following closely at her side, Anya approached the surrenderers, who looked upon her with terror in their eyes the moment she came into full view. The dark battle makeup around her eyes made her appear fierce and unforgiving, which suited her perfectly. As the captain's second, Lexa wore the same look, though none of the grown men on the ground considered her a threat—at least not yet. But they soon would. Anya halted at the first prisoner and stared down the line with hatred in her eyes. All of them cowered under her gaze.
"Which of you here is the most senior officer?" she called out loudly, making several of them jump in response. All of them stared into the planks and were too afraid to answer. "If nobody answers me, I'll start cutting off body parts, and I'll keep going until I get answers. Trust me when I say that will be a much worse fate that you will have to face otherwise."
There was another hesitation from the group, so Anya lifted her blade and pressed its edge firmly against the first prisoner's elbow, taking aim. The sword was honed to such a sharp edge that one firm swing would take off the arm completely. A thin line of blood emerged at the site where Anya held pressure against the skin, and the man whimpered helplessly, fearing the loss of his limb. He had a thin, wasted look, nothing at all like the heavily muscled soldiers Anya had in her army.
"It's me!" a voice called from toward the end of the line. He was far enough away that Anya couldn't get a good look at him.
When she removed her sword from the first prisoner's arm, he sighed in relief and began crying loudly. Anya hoped he would stop soon, or else she'd have to kill him prematurely. The man that called out to her was the second from the last in line. He too had a malnourished look, but in contrast to his fellow shipman who was weeping twenty feet away, this man was brave enough to look up to meet Anya's dark eyes with his own piercing light blue ones.
"What is your name and position?" Anya asked. She held her sword tip against his chest, drawing a few drops of blood, and the man remained still.
"Jake Griffin, master carpenter."
The master carpenter was an important role, but that was nowhere near one of the most important jobs on the ship. That meant that most of the senior crew had already been slain. Anya wished she could have spoken with the captain before she executed the prisoners, but this Jake Griffin person would have to do.
"My people have had control over these seas for the past fifteen years. All of us fly under the red flag. Since it's no secret that the penalty of challenging us is death, why were you and your crew traveling in our waters?" Anya asked.
"Our people are starving in the east. We've heard that the western shores are plentiful, but our attempts to cross the northern plains have been unsuccessful. We're not seafaring people—"
"Clearly."
"—but we hoped that we could cross the gulf unnoticed."
This man and all those that sailed with them were a deluded bunch. Anya had sailed past the northern plains at least fifty times; it was nothing but a vast expanse of volcanic rock with only a smattering of trees once every hundred miles or so. There was no food, no water, and no shelter from the burning sun. As foolish as the plan was, hoping to cross a seven hundred mile expanse of ocean that was heavily guarded by a fleet of sixty warships seemed almost wise by comparison.
"You were mistaken," Anya said. "And all of you will pay for it now with your lives. Those who resist will be keelhauled."
There was an outpouring of distressed shouts from the prisoners at this announcement. Anya's angry demands for silence went unanswered until a loud pop resonated through the smoky air. Everything went deathly silent then, and nobody could see the source of the noise. Anya's sword pulled away from Jake's body, clutching at her own chest. A steady flow of blood started pouring over her hands. Everyone who witnessed it knew the gunshot was a mortal injury, and Anya fell hard to the deck with a growing pool of blood around her.
At the sight of the fallen captain, a melee broke out. Lieutenants that were nearby began attacking the prisoners with their fists, and those that were below deck raiding supplies emerged to join the fight. The shooter was still at large, and chaos was beginning to take over. With the spatter of Anya's blood still on her face, little Lexa stepped forward into the center of the fighting and called out loudly, "Stand down!" Her voice had the high-pitched treble of a child, but all of her people recognized her voice instantly and obeyed.
With Anya on the ground and unquestionably dead, Lexa scanned the smoky air for the shooter. None of her people had climbed the masts to search for more prisoners, and with the poor visibility, one of them could have easily hidden on one of the masts unnoticed. The gunshot sounded like it came from the mizzenmast, and sure enough—draped across the yard was a man, who was clutching the beam with both legs and a single arm. In his other hand, he clutched a pistol. Lexa didn't give him time to reload it. In one quick, practiced movement, she pulled the bow from her back and an arrow from the quiver at her waist, letting it fly through the hazy air. An agonized yelp followed by a loud crunch as the body hit the planks signaled that the arrow found its mark. There was no need to check and see if he was alive. He'd fallen eighty feet from the post and landed on his head.
At that display, her people realized that Lexa had finally taken over. They awaited her command for further action. She sent Lincoln, Indra and Gustus back to the hold to continue their raid, and kept her lieutenants on the main deck. She would need them to dispose of the bodies later.
"An attack on my people warrants death, as my captain has told you. This is our way," Lexa said to the prisoners, who now looked at her with fear in their eyes. "I promise to end your suffering quickly."
One by one, she began to swipe her sword at their necks. Lexa was true to her word—she cut deeply enough to sever both the vein and the artery simultaneously so that the death wasn't drawn out over several minutes. Each took mere seconds before they expired, spilling most of their blood over the deck. By the time she'd reached the halfway point, much of the wood was now stained dark red. She approached Jake Griffin but stilled her blade before executing him.
"You are brave, Jake Griffin," Lexa said. "I understand your desire to help your people. Had our situations been reversed, I would have likely done the same for my own."
"Then why are you killing us out of revenge?"
"Your gunfire has spilled blood from my people. Our former captain, as you've just witnessed, and three from our crew. They were highly skilled sailors, and their loss will be difficult to replace. Their blood spilled must be repaid."
"Four lives were lost on your side, and we will be repaying fifty. That doesn't seem fair."
"We fly under the red flag, so our terms are given the moment our ship is seen." Jake's facial expression was confused, so Lexa explained: "A red flag means that in a battle, we suffer no prisoners. If you engage in conflict with us, you show no respect for our claim to the sea, nor the lives we've sacrificed to earn it."
"I didn't know that. I mean your people no disrespect. Please, I have a daughter your age… I did this for her, she and her mother deserve better than what our land can give her."
Lexa lifted her sword and swung it hard. Jake winced as the blade whooshed through the air, but the blow he was expecting never came. Instead, Lexa's sword struck the man next to him, and he collapsed in a crumpled heap with a gaping hole in his neck. Lexa stared at Jake Griffin with an impassive look.
"I don't wish to bring further death upon your people, but if they continue to sail across our seas, I will be forced to defeat them," Lexa said firmly. "I will need to send them a message so they know not to challenge my fleet again."
"How are you going to do that if we're all dead?" Jake asked.
"You will be the message."
At the wave of Lexa's hand, her second lieutenant stepped forward and began pummeling Jake, landing devastating blows across his face, chest and stomach. With his hands bound behind his back, Jake was powerless to deflect any of them, and it wasn't long before his body was covered in blood and fresh bruising. Lexa didn't want him dead, so once she was satisfied that he'd received a thorough punishment, she called off the attack. Jake stayed huddled on the ground in pain but stayed silent.
"We're less than a hundred miles from the eastern shores," Lexa said. "I hope you're strong enough to make it there alive."
"Am I to take one of the boats?" Jake asked, his swollen face causing his words to slur.
"We're pirates. There will be no boats given for prisoners sentenced overboard."
"How am I supposed to make it home? I can't swim that far—not like this."
Lexa scanned the water around them, noting the large chunks of the ship's hull floating nearby that had been torn off the vessel by cannon fire.
Lexa said: "I would suggest you find something that floats. There's a strong eastern wind that will carry the waves toward your home." She cut the ties from his wrists but left him lying on the deck. "Our fight is over, Jake Griffin. For the sake of your people, make certain that nothing like this happens again."
Several strong hands grabbed Jake's body and threw him into the water away from the ship's wreckage. He was struggling to swim with the pain from the beating, but Lexa watched as he located a wide surface of watertight planks and climbed on top of it. She was glad for him. She wasn't lying when she said she hoped he was strong enough to make it home alive, back to his family who would undoubtedly be waiting for him.
Gustus and Indra were standing behind Lexa when she turned back to her people. They'd finished the raids and by now, the hold was probably completely flooded. They were awaiting further orders, as it seemed Lexa had proven to her people that she was worthy to be considered their new captain. There would be no time to mourn the loss of Anya—not yet, at least.
"Return to our ship and cut the grapple hooks," she announced. A flurry of the crewmen left to tend to their orders. "Gustus, give Anya her last blessings, and see to it that her body is taken back to our ship. If you absolutely need to, you can place her in bilge, but make sure she is covered." Gustus nodded, and went to complete his task. "Indra, please set our course for Polis."
"You wish to return home, Captain?"
"Aye. We are low on gunpowder and ammunition, and I fear our next battle will not be so easily won."