To Take a Treasure Fleet

 

    Maria Cristina offered Freddy another cup of tea and smiled at him. "We can never thank you enough, Freddy and friends. You saved us." Her husband, Governor Davila, nodded gravely. "Indeed. While my brave Musketeers would have sold their lives dearly, it was only a matter of time before they would have been overwhelmed. Without your intervention, even now, I would be in chains. Or worse.” 

    Davila suddenly stood up, rattling the fine china that adorned the large, richly adorned round table. The shock of his near escape seemed to be passing. His eyes burned with fury as he slapped one hand down on the table, hard, once again rattling china. "This will not stand sir, this will not stand! To assault me in my own abode! To do harm to my servants! To violate the Constitution of the Republic! The oligarchs have gone too far this time! We must take action. This will not stand!"

    Maria Cristina laid a calming hand on her husband's arm. Freddy also sensed anger radiating from her as well, but a colder, calculating anger. 

    "They will claim it was a mistake, of course. That the Republican Guard gave in to their longstanding animosity for their rivals, the Imperial Musketeers. That it was all a matter of hot blood and not cold calculation. The Guard will take the blame." 

    Davila grimaced. "Indeed, no doubt, their lies are only surmounted by their cowardice. Nonetheless, we cannot sit idly by and suffer such an insult. Not to mention that this attempt was nearly successful; the next may well succeed." 

    "Yes," Maria Cristina said softly. "We must take action, but it must be in accordance with our strategies, not simply a reaction to our enemy. And this is where our friends come in."

    As he saw her eyes turn toward him and his companions, Freddy felt a sinking sensation in his stomach. He liked Maria Cristina in many, many ways, and wanted to help her. However, that last encounter had been a near thing. Those Golden Company mercenaries had been far tougher then anything they had expected. They had managed to fight them to a standstill but not defeat them. It had been, at best a draw. They were still out there, waiting.   

"We'd really rather not tangle with those Golden Company bastards again, if it's all the same to you," Ricmo chirped up, reading Freddy's mind. "That last tussle was entirely too close for my liking."

Dakhir nodded, as did Whisperleaf.  Entirely too close.

"Of course, we would not ask that of you," Maria Cristina agreed. "Besides, that is what they would expect. We do not want to attack our enemies where they are strong. We want to attack them where they are weakest. Consider, the strength of the Merchant Houses is their wealth. Take that from them, and they are nothing."

"That is wisdom," Tello replied gravely.  "As it is said in 'Master Splinter's Art of War', 'Fight the enemy where they are not'."

"You're back on the treasure fleet again," Freddy guessed, warily. 

"Indeed. It is their Achilles heel. Take that fleet, and the Merchant Houses will be beggared."

Freddy sighed. "I can't imagine that will be easy, though. Aren't there hundreds of ships sailing in convoy?" 

The Governor joined the conversation, smoothly supporting his wife. "Aye, there are. But it has been so long since the Houses felt seriously threatened that they have become lazy. My spies inform me that the fleet no longer bothers to sail in close order; their ships stretch across dozens of miles of sea. They sail with their guns showed below deck, and many carry little armament at all, preferring to exchange it for cargo.  Even a smaller force, if it fell on them by surprise, could defeat them in detail."

"And take the treasure. A king's ransom in treasure, nah an emperor's ransom." Maria Cristina murmured. 

Ricmo perked up at that.  

"I like the sound of that!"

"We have plenty of treasure already; we don't need any more," Dakhir countered. "This all seems like a big distraction. Besides, even if we attack them piecemeal, we are still only one ship. We'd need a fleet. We don't have one." 

"No one is suggesting a solo assault," the Governor agreed.  "But, while you say you do not have a fleet, I think perhaps you do and just don't realize it. If you can convince it to follow you."

Freddy didn't quite follow that and opened his mouth to ask for clarification, but before he could speak..."

"The Pirates!" Ricmo guessed. "The Pirate Lords of Skull River Bay, is that what you are thinking?"

"They would never sign up for something so risky," Dakhir argued. "Or something with so much potential blowback."

"I think you misjudge them," Maria Cristina said quietly. "The pirate lords of today may seem a sorry lot, skulking in the shadows, with only a fraction of the power they had before the Pirate Crusade brought them low seventy years ago. But they've grown strong in those shadows. They yearn to strike against the forces that harry them. And to do great deeds as their forefathers did. An opportunity to strike out, take the riches of the Treasure Fleet, which even the greatest of their forebearers never managed to do, and with the promise of a full pardon from the Governor afterward?"

"A pardon, now that's bold," Freddy thought. "I wonder how he plans on getting away with that?"

Maria Cristina turned her luminous eyes toward Freddy.

"Would they do it, Freddy? Could you convince them?"

Freddy stared away into the distance, thinking about it, running potential tactics over in his head. Then he answered softly.

"Not for gold, nor vengeance, no. But, perhaps. For Glory. For glory, they might. I think that is the angle."

"Eternal glory," the Governor agreed. Then his eyes swept over them all, burning.

"But will YOU do it then? Sail to Skull River Bay and rally them? Lead the first Pirate Armada in almost a hundred years? Go down in history for all time as the greatest pirates the Thousand Isles have ever seen?"

Rationally, Freddy could realize how stupid that would be. He could feel himself getting played. But still...

He slowly started to grin. He locked eyes with Ricmo, who also had a massive grin on his face. Even Whisperleaf was standing up a little straighter,  a gleam in his eye. The Sturg made a fist with his mighty hand. 

"Oh shit," said Dakhir. "We're going to do this, aren't we?"

———

A few minutes later, the party, now left to themselves to drink tea and plan, considered their options.

“Unfortunately for our ambitions, I am afraid the math does not work out.” Tello said sadly. It will take a minimum of two weeks to sail to Skull River Bay. Then we need to convince the Pirate Captains, gather a fleet and return in time to intercept the Trade Fleet on its return journey. Which will be too late, the Merchant Armada is likely to be safe at anchorage in Haven Bay by then. And we cannot attack them at anchorage, the fortifications of this harbor are impenetrable.”

Freddy agreed with that wholeheartedly. There were forts on top of forts ringing this Bay and he had no desire to mess with any of them.

“What if we were to sail The Shadow Sea?” Ricmo suggested. “That could speed us up.”

“Speed up the initial outward voyage to Skull River Bay perhaps but not the return trip.” Tello replied. “Since I do not think it would be wise to take an entire pirate armada along that perilous route. And even that might still take too long, the amount of time and distance saved by the dark paths is unpredictable. The Treasure Fleet could sail into Haven Bay at any time. Allowing for weather.”

“And weather might well be a problem,” Whisperleaf chimed in. “I suspect there is a full fledged hurricane forming out there, to the east. I can feel it.”

“Weather might work to our advantage,” Ricmo pointed out, ever the optimist. “If it is east of the city it will slow the returning fleet down and not interfere with us. Initially that is.” 

“We could teleport to Skull River Bay,” Dakhir pointed out. “We know there is a teleport circle in the church there and we wrote down the runes for it. We still have two of those scrolls, one to get us there, one to get us back.”

“True however we need a teleport circle on this end as well,” Tello mentioned. “And I do not yet have the skill to craft such a thing, the science behind it is quite complex.”

For a moment the group was quiet, despondent. Then, slowly Whisperleaf spoke. 

“I bet there is a teleport circle somewhere in Haven University. But we have no idea where and those wizards are not at all friendly to us.”

“They tried to kill us actually,” Ricmo responded. “I’d say that goes a bit past ‘unfriendly’. How would we even get in to search for it without fighting half the city?”

Freddy started to smile, he had an angle on that at least. “Never fear chaps, I happen to know that the University isn’t just a school for Wizardry. It also has a half way decent music school.”

“And let me guess, some of those musicians are fans of yours aren’t they Fred?” Ricmo grinned. 

“Possibly, possibly,” the bard replied. He tried to look humble, but suspected he failed at it. The penetration of his fandom and music still caught him by suprise sometimes, they seemed to be everywhere and cropped up in the strangest places.

The others considered this for a moment.

“So, to summarize,” Dakhir spoke. “We sneak into the University using Freddy’s contacts. We find the teleport circle. We use the scroll to teleport to Skull River Bay. We convince a gaggle of pirate captains to form into an Armada and follow us into the maw of a hurricane and attack the never-successfully-attacked Treasure Fleet. Fame, glory, riches, political revolution are thus achieved. Sounds simple, what could possibly go wrong?”

Tello grinned his scaly grin. 

“Many things could go wrong, though I suspect that query was rhetorical. This is a complex plan. With many moving parts and many opportunities for failure. However it has at least some opportunity for success, which is more than inaction provides.” A little more soberly then “but I worry about time. We will be very short on time. It would be quite awkward to rally an entire pirate armada only to discover we were too late and missed our window of opportunity. Awkward and potentially fatal. I wish we had more time.”

“It’s not our craziest plan to date. Not by a long shot.” Ricmo laughed. 

“What about The Lady Jezebel? She can’t teleport, and we will need her for the fight,” he continued.

“She will have to rendezvous with the pirate fleet somewhere then, halfway and out of the path of the storm?” Dakhir conjectured. 

“She will meet us by the basalt pillars.” Radiant Lightbringer responded confidently.

“What?” Ricmo asked.

“I have seen it. In a dream.” Radiant replied simply. “A stormy sky. A lone ship, our ship, at anchor near a dark rock formation, black pillars that reach up to the sky. A great fleet approaches. And a voice says ‘carried by the wings of the storm you will fall upon the wicked and bring them to justice.”

“And you’re just bringing they up NOW!” Ricmo accused.

“I have a lot of dreams. Most of them don’t make any sense,” Radiant replied defensively. 

“It must be really weird to be you,” Ricmo responded. 

“That sounds like the Basalt Fingers,” Whisperleaf replied thoughtfully. We passed them once not too long ago . Located to the southwest of here near southern tip of the island. A reasonable gathering place for a fleet. Hurricanes spin counter clockwise in this latitude so we’d have the wind gauge at least.”

Tello nodded. “I would not call this a good plan, but it is a plan nonetheless. Still, I wish we had more time.”