Friday, December 6, 2013

Thrilling Adventure - Now on Amazon and B&N!




Aeolus grabbed Dami and pulled him back before a small ax would have smashed his head open.  Neither had time for discussion, but Dami gave him thanks anyhow, without meeting his eyes, and slashed his attacker’s throat open.  The Cilician dropped his ax and pushed his hands into the wound, desperate to stop the flow of his life blood.

"The Cilicians outnumbered them . . . It was only a
matter of time."
The stout sailor took a fresh grip on his single-headed ax but didn’t move.  He looked around at the battle.  They were doomed.  Already, Wavedancer’s crew had been reduced to three small pockets of resistance.  Aeolus, Dami and Gaul—whose name no one could pronounce, so they called him by the name of his homeland of Gaul—formed one ring on the upper deck near the rudder.  The second pocket held Paetur and one of the Nubians—Aeolus wasn’t certain which one—as they tried to keep the Cilicians from taking the stairs.  The third pocket was further away, cut off from everything.  There were three men, and their backs were all to him.  He thought it was Sillinian, Cerxes and Kiros.

It doesn’t matter, he thought.  We’re either dead men or slaves now.

The Cilicians outnumbered them four to one, and they hadn’t even fully emptied their ships.  It was only a matter of time.

“Dami,” he began, about to tell his friend that he should give the order for surrender and save as many men as they could.  With luck, only half the crew would die in irons from the battle.  That would leave ten or twelve with a chance, though slim, of a life.  It wasn’t much, but it was all they could do now.

Dying wouldn’t earn them anything.

“Dami,” Aeolus started again, and got interrupted by a sound that chilled him to the bone.  It sounded like a cross between a hyena’s shriek and an eagle’s call.  High-pitched, piercing and louder than any creature he’d seen or heard.

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