PIRATIANS BEGONE

Chapter Three

From the instant he saw it, it took all of Harod's control not to snatch at it. Never had he seen such a cunningly wrought bleebs. It was a bubble of clear glass, an absolutely perfect sphere. The surface was not marred with so much as a scratch. The glass itself had a very faint blue cast to it, but the tint did not obscure the wonder within. Three tiny figurines, garbed in motley with painted faces, were fixed to a tiny stage and somehow linked to one another so that when Ragul shifted the ball in his hands, it sent them off into a series of actions. One pirouetted on his toes, while the next did a series of flips over a bar. The third bobbed his head in time to their actions, as if all three heard and responded to a merry tune trapped inside the ball with them.

Harod allowed Ragul to demonstrate it for him twice. Then, without a word, he extended a long-fingered hand towards him gracefully, and the sailor set the treasure in his palm. Harod held his bemused smile firmly as he first lifted the ball to the sunlight, and then set the tumbs within to dancing for himself. The ball did not quite fill his hand. “A mate plaything,” he surmised loftily.

“If the mate were the richest prince in the world,” Ragul dared to observe. “It's too fragile a thing to give a 'mate' to play with, sir. All it would take to destroy would be dropping it once. . . . ”

“Yet it seems to have survived bobbing about in the waves of a storm, and then being flung up on a beach,” Harod pointed out with measured good nature.

“That's may be true, sir, that's true, but then this is the Treasurers Beach. Almost everything cast up here is whole, from what I've heard tell. It's part of the magic of this place. ”

“Magic. ” Harod permitted himself a slightly wider smile as he placed the orb in the roomy pocket of his grey jacket. “So you believe it is magic that sweeps such trinkets up on this shore, do you?”

“What else, Captain? By all rights, that should have been smashed to bits, or at least scoured by the sands. Yet it looks as if it just come out of a jewellery shop. ”

Harod shook his head side to side sadly. “Magic? No, Ragul, no more magic than the rip-tides in the Ordans Cramples, or the Speed Waves that speeds sailing ships on their journeys to the Islandes and taunts them all the way back. It's but a trick of wind and current and tides. No more than that. The same trick that promises that any ship that tries to anchor off this side of the Islandes will find herself beached and broken before the next tide. ”

“Yessir,” Ragul agreed dutifully, but without conviction. His traitorous eyes strayed to the pocket where Captain Harod had stowed the glass ball. Harod's smile might have deepened fractionally.

“Well? Don't loiter here. Get back up there and walk the bank and see what else you find. ”

“Yessir,” Ragul conceded, and with one final regretful glance at the pocket, the older man turned and hastened back to the bank. Harod slipped his hand into his pocket and caressed the smooth cold glass there. He resumed his stroll down the beach. Overhead, gulls followed his example, sliding slowly down the wind as they searched the retreating waves for more finds. He did not hasten, but kept in mind that on the other side of the Islandes, his ship was awaiting him in treacherous waters. He'd walk the whole length of the beach, as tradition required, but he had no intention of lingering after he had heard the sooth-saying of an Outer. Nor did he have any intention of leaving whatever treasure he found. A true smile tugged at the corner of his mouth.

He strolled briskly, took his hand from his pocket and absently touched his opposite wrist. . It had bounded a tiny wooden tray tightly to his arms. The ornament was a carved face, pierced at the brow and lower jaw so the face would be snugged firmly against his wrist, exactly over his pulse point. At one time, the face had been painted ash, but most of that was worn away now. The features still stood out distinctly: a tiny mocking face, carved with the most care. Its visage was twin to his own. It had cost him an inordinate amount of coin to commission it. Not everyone who could carve wizardgame would, even if they had the wits to steal some.

Harod remembered well the artisian who had worked the tiny face for him. He'd sat for long hours in the man's shop, washed in the cool morning light as the artist painstakingly worked the iron-hard wood to reflect Harod's features. They had not spoken. The artist could not. The piratian did not. The carver had always needed absolute silence for his concentration, for he worked not only wood but a spell that would bind the charm to protect the wearer from enchantments. Harod had had nothing to say to him anyway. The pirate had paid him an exorbitant advance months before, and waited until the artist had sent him a messenger to say that he had obtained some of the precious and jealously guarded wood. Harod had been outraged when the artist had demanded still more money before he would begin the carving and spell-setting, but Harod had only smiled his small sardonic smile, and put coins and jewels and silver and gold links on the artist's scales until the man had nodded that his price had been met. Like many in lidded eyes. Small. The runt, most likely. It was sodden and cold and disgusting. A ruby earring like a fat tick decorated one of the wet ears. He longed to simply drop it. Ridiculous. He plucked the earring free and dropped it in his pocket. Then, moved by an impulse he did not understand, he returned the small blue bodies to the bag and left it beside the tideline. Harod walked on.