The next morning found them a long way above the ground - McKenzie wasn't a great judge of heights, but he didn't think it was the sort of altitude you got to on your average long-haul 747 flight - more like small-plane territory, three or four hundred metres. He could just about make out black and white dots moving over the green and rolling landscape below: cows.

He yanked his clothes on and wondered what he was supposed to do now. The Sky Reaper lacked the furious activity that often characterised a sail vessel, so he probably wouldn't be in the way if he wandered out.

This he did, noting odd mutterings from Danandra's quarters on the way past, and eventually fetched up on what could only be described as the bridge. This was a semicircular compartment at the nose of the vessel, windowed at the front so that Barden and his officers could see where the hell they were going and, if they were bold, crack open a window, lean out, and examine the bow.

"Morning, Captain. Nice day for it. Really impressed we're not going splat on the ground. Do I gotta ask for permission to enter the bridge?"

Captain Barden inclined his head and metered out a polite smile. "Good morning, Mr. McKenzie. We are not so formal - this is not a naval vessel, though I like to think that we would compare favourably with any imperial crew. I trust you slept well?"

"Like a log. Actually like a particularly relaxed log that's just won first prize in the all-woodshed sleeping competition for five years running and been awarded a medal for services to sleeping. Cheers. You?"

"Tolerably well, thank you," Barden replied. "Would you care to accompany me to the aft observation post? I believe there will be a sight that may interest you."

"Lead on," McKenzie said.

The aft observation post proved to be a very small cabin at the aftermost point of the Sky Reaper, cone-shaped and equipped with a small viewing hatch and a crewman with a complex-looking telescope, a clock, pencil and paper. The entire cabin was about the size of a small garden shed.

"Any change, Mizzars?" Barden asked.

"Yes sir. Two miles closer, sir, over the past hour." Mizzars scratched at his paper. "They should catch us two bells into the noon watch, sir."

"Thank you Mizzars. If you wouldn't mind?"

The crewman moved aside - Barden motioned McKenzie forward.

The telescope turned out to be equipped with some sort of ranging device - if you knew the approximate size of what you were looking at and had some patience and skill with numbers, presumably traits that could all be ascribed to Mizzars, you could work out how fast whatever you were observing was gaining on you.

In this case the objects in question were three airships - not as big as the Sky Reaper, McKenzie guessed, although he lacked Mizzars' knowledge.

"I hope you will not be offended if I proffer an explanation of what you are looking at," Barden said. "The three vessels yonder are all smaller, lighter and consequently much faster than the Sky Reaper: I can speak with confidence, as I know one of them quite well. We are carrying a relatively light cargo of spices, but nevertheless if this trio were laden normally they would fair fly past us. Yet they do not, they gain on us with a suspicious slowness."

"They're heavily laden?" McKenzie guessed.

"Indeed they must be, sir," Barden agreed.

"And not with a competing cargo of spices, I take it," McKenzie said.

- o O o -

"Hatches bursting with mercenaries, I would guess," Barden said later, in front of the entire group. "The Huntress is a ship of very dubious reputation - her mistress does not hesitate to turn pirate, I can assure you. Their objective is to take this vessel, I am certain."

"Well, that'll be unpleasant for them," McKenzie said. "I'll wait until they get a bit closer and-" He wiggled his fingers.

"No!" Danandra and Sharinta said at once. Danandra - visibly squaring her shoulders to keep her composure - went on. "You must never use it, McKenzie. It is utterly unpredictable and very, very dangerous. I would sooner you released an enraged wild dragon than use that power again."

"She really means it," Sharinta said. "Just thinking about magic like that is normally enough to send her to her bedroom for some private Danna time: if she's scared enough to talk about it coherently without tearing her clothes off then you'd best sit up and pay fucking attention."

Danandra let this pass, which, McKenzie supposed, served to emphasise the point.

"No-one seemed as reluctant to let me blow Mahrak into chunky kibbles with it - does this rule only apply when your collective arses aren't on the line then?" He pointed out.

"Mahrak was a special case, and in any case it hadn't really sunk in yet. Trust me on this, McKenzie - it's the most dangerous manifestation of magic there is," Danandra replied, again without sighing.

"Okay, fine. Point taken. I'll lay off the zap-fu. That still leaves us with three shiploads of badass pirates to somehow fend off. Captain, how many aforementioned badass pirates is each ship carrying, do you reckon?"

"A maximum of fifty men in each ship, Mr. McKenzie, I would estimate," Barden replied.

"Okay - you strike me as a ready-for-anything kind of guy, so I take it there's weapons and that for the crew. How many men can be spared from their duties to repel boarders? I'm assuming this is going to come down to knifework."

"The Sky Reaper has a crew of twenty-eight - she can manoeuvre with five men to operate her," Barden replied.

"Oh crap," McKenzie said, with feeling.

"Many a pirate has tried his ship against the Sky Reaper to his dismay," Barden asserted.

Have a hundred and fifty tried before? McKenzie thought, but didn't say it. "I don't doubt it," he said instead, then turned to Sharinta. "I take it they're after us?"

"How should I fucking know?" She asked. "I've only just got here."

"Danandra? Same question," McKenzie asked instead.

"Probably," Danandra shrugged. "Lord Lemuel has many enemies."

"Yeah, but we're all here," McKenzie pointed out.

"Normal enemies he hasn't cursed yet," Danandra corrected. "The mirror is easily worth a hundred and fifty lives - they could be after that."

"They can fuckin' have it at those odds, only I'm thinking the goddamn curse will probably preclude anything so sensible, am I right?" McKenzie asked, and Danandra nodded. McKenzie turned to Barden. "Will this chief pirate lady want to talk before she unleashes wave after wave of merciless killers at us?"

"Captain Jahistra usually seeks to obtain what she wants by threats, ruses and misdirection. I rate it as highly likely she will deliver some kind of ultimatum once the Huntress enters signalling range. It's entirely likely that those ships carry no more people aboard than their usual complements, but are simply being sailed as if they do," Barden said. "At any rate, it is my intention to fight. I do not negotiate with pirates."

"I do, especially if it gives us a chance to find out if she's really got a hundred and fifty blokes aboard those ships. Pity there isn't a boat or summat, I'd go and have a look," McKenzie said.

"There is," Barden said.

"Really?"

- o O o -

The boat in question turned out to be the Sky Reaper's launch, a fifteen-foot vessel that, save for the fins at the rear, looked suspiciously like a normal boat. It even moved slightly when McKenzie stepped into it, which gave him a moment's pause even though he was still inside the airship, in a little bay just big enough for the small craft.

"Are you certain this is a good idea, Mr. McKenzie?" Barden asked.

"Of course not. Fantastically stupid idea, probably. Never stopped me before, though," McKenzie replied, then moved onto technical matters with: "How'd you make this thing go?"

"The wheel controls port and starboard movement and also inclination - tip it forward to lower the bow and backwards to raise it. Power to the core is controlled with this lever - be sure to make yourself fast to something if you intend to fly at speed - if you need to slow down in a hurry, change your course frequently," Barden informed him.

"Cheers, Captain," McKenzie said.

"What exactly are you hoping to achieve by this?" Sharinta asked. "If you wanted to impress us with your courage, this isn't the way. This is impressing us with your crazy: not as good."

"I know this is going to come as summat of a shock, Shar, but I'm not really bothered if you're impressed or not. The point of this little exercise is to find out what pirate lady is planning," McKenzie told her.

"Open the bay doors and cast off these lines," Barden ordered in the background. The two bay doors were opened to the outside air.

"And how exactly are you planning to do that?" Danandra asked. The little launch bobbed free as the ropes holding it to the Sky Reaper at bow and stern were released.

"I'm going to fucking ask. Simple. Laters!" McKenzie said, and pushed the lever forward. The launch shot free of the boat bay.

It was a surprisingly difficult craft to keep pointed in the right direction. The skyboat resembled a boat in that it was made of wood and you sat in it, and a plane in that it flew through the air in a notional straight line, and that was it - it was pretty much it's own animal in all other respects. McKenzie's course therefore resembled that of a corkscrew in a bottle of wine - in a centrifuge - for the first few minutes of the journey, until he started to get the hang of it and was able to head for the Huntress. It wasn't the safest or most pleasant of sensations, and it got even worse once the Sky Reaper had begun to shrink behind him and the three pirate vessels had yet to appear noticeably closer: only the rush of wind through his hair told McKenzie that he was going somewhere and not simply hanging suspended in midair on a glorified plank of wood.

The little craft was prodigiously fast, though - it was just a few minutes before he was alongside the Huntress. It took a moment's fiddling with the speed lever to match velocities. She was smaller than the Sky Reaper, and sleeker in her lines, although even more patched and disreputable in appearance.

"Oi!" McKenzie shouted.

A hatch swung inwards to reveal a pair of archers levelling bows at him.

"Surrender!" One of the archers commanded.

"No!" McKenzie replied, not seeing any reason to complicate the issue.

"We'll shoot!" The spokesarcher replied.

"Well you'd hardly have gone to all the effort of drawing and aiming if not, now would you? Go on then," McKenzie said, steering the launch closer.

Whatever else they were, these guys weren't much on second chances. They both fired, and they both hit McKenzie squarely in the chest. McKenzie, who'd been shot with arrows a few times before and who therefore knew the drill quite well, had already braced himself for the impact, which was considerable and would have knocked him clear off the boat otherwise.

"Ow!" He said. It hurt like hell.

The two archers looked stunned, then: "Aim fer his head!" One exclaimed.

McKenzie shook said head and sighed. "It won't do any good! One of you go and fetch your guv, I only want to talk. For now."

No reply was made - the archers kept him covered: McKenzie supposed it probably made them feel better. After a few moments, one of them moved aside and was replaced by a woman who fitted Barden's description of Captain Jahistra.

That description had been tinged with dislike: a woman of moderate good looks, but tall and somewhat mannish in build. Her hair is black, and she habitually wears it in a most unbecoming sailor's queue. Her attire is that of a street-harlot.

McKenzie would have put it like this: quite fit, actually, about thirty-summat, tall, black hair in a ponytail. Sort of hawaiian-looking but also not, if you know what I mean. Looks like she'd whack you one if you looked at her funny. Her clothing was not like that of a street harlot, either, unless the working girls round Barden's way habitually wore no-nonsense leather armour.

"Hello the launch," she called. "Has Captain Barden sent you to discuss terms?"

"Not really," McKenzie replied. "I sent me to discuss terms. I'm gonna go out on a limb here and have a wild guess: you're not after the ship, you've been sent after three women and a bloke."

Jahistra made no reply, but just looked at him, waiting for him to continue. It was something he'd rarely been on the receiving end of, and he didn't like it at all.

"I see I'm going to have to get your attention," McKenzie sighed. "Back in a minute."

He steered the launch away from the Huntress - a pair of arrows swished past him, but missed - and made for one of the other ships. The nearer one was, well, nearer, so he made for her stern, slightly haphazardly.

They weren't asleep on the other ship - hatches opened as he drew closer and a fair few arrows were shot at him: judging by the volume of fire, it seemed a likely bet that there were a lot of archers inside, so Barden's theory about there not actually being any extra hands was starting to seem a bit iffy. McKenzie ignored them - even the ones that thudded into the launch or the three that hit him - and kept his course, such as it was.

The launch came equipped with a grappling hook and rope - McKenzie whirled it above his head and snagged the top tailfin of the ship, which, like the Huntress and the Sky Reaper, was wooden rather than sailcloth.

The launch was happy to be pulled closer to the ship - right up to it, in fact. McKenzie - a part of him wondering what the hell he thought he was playing at - jumped off the relative safety of the launch and onto the absolute unsafety of the ship.

Hatches slammed open on the top of the ship as he did so, and archers stuck their heads up. McKenzie took two arrows to the back as he bent down and re-sited the grappling hook from the tailfin to the deck, making sure it was firmly dug in.

During this procedure he received a third arrow directly into his left buttcheek.

"Ouch!" He snarled. "You're going to fucking regret that, pal!"

McKenzie set his feet, took a good hold of the tailfin's leading edge, and pulled. Hard.

For a few seconds nothing happened. McKenzie strained and growled. The wood below his feet gave vent to some ominous creaking sounds, and then, with a sudden splintering crack and a twang of severed rigging, McKenzie was holding the forcibly detached leading edge of the tailfin: a sizeable bit of wood perhaps twenty feet in length. He staggered backward but, luckily, kept his footing.

"Right you little fucker." He muttered, turned around, and raised the tailfin.

The archers were admirably quick-witted, considering. They ducked down out of the way as McKenzie slammed the piece of lumber down on the deck with a loud thump. He picked it up again, turned back, and used it to smash away the remaining bits of the tailfin, then hooked his foot under the grappling hook for some purchase and slammed it as hard as he could into the wood. Thankfully it smashed through the planking - if it had bounced off, McKenzie would probably have gone with it - and penetrated some four or five feet. McKenzie - now quite untroubled by arrows - yanked the grappling hook out, jumped back aboard the launch, and returned to the Huntress. Behind him, the damaged ship wobbled on it's course, robbed of some of it's stability.

Captain Jahistra evidently had a brain - there were no annoying arrows this time. She still stood in the doorway, and from her expression you'd think she saw this sort of thing every day.

"Right. Can we have a proper conversation now?" McKenzie asked.

"Yes," Captain Jahistra replied. "If you give me your word on your powers that you will return to the Sky Reaper without harming my ship or my crew."

"Unless I'm attacked, yes, I'll behave myself," McKenzie shrugged.

"Your word, on your powers," Jahistra insisted. Whatever that means, McKenzie thought.

"Fine, whatever. You have my word on my powers - unless I'm attacked, I'll leave your ship and crew alone until I go back to the Sky Reaper," McKenzie said, and seemed to hear a clicking noise. He ignored it: he was pratting about at high altitude, he supposed, must be the lack of air pressure.

"Make fast his launch, and see him to my quarters," Jahistra said, and turned away.

- o O o -

McKenzie passed many cabins on the way to Captain Jahistra's quarters, and all of them were packed with armed and armoured men. They shot him speculative looks as he was led past - maybe some believed that he'd just ripped the tail off a ship, but surely most of them had to be putting it down to exaggerated rumours.

McKenzie's guide - a squat sailor with an honest-to-goodness actual eyepatch - knocked on a door which was guarded by two burly sailors with axes.

"Send him in," Jahistra called. The door was opened and McKenzie walked inside.

Ah, he thought. Street harlot.

Barden's meaning became clear. Captain Jahistra had stripped off her armour, and had instead chosen to guard against the outside world with one layer of tattoos and one layer of silk, maybe two in certain areas of strategic importance. If there wasn't a lot of silk, though, there was a lot of ink - with the exception of her hands, her face and her neck, Jahistra was anything but a blank canvas. She'd chosen to drape herself over a couple of crates for the meeting.

"Say your piece," she stated.

"I've been around a bit, so if this is for my benefit, I'm afraid it's wasted effort," McKenzie said, "Nice tats, though," he was unable to prevent himself adding with a slight smirk.

"This is how I always dress. Don't flatter yourself."

"I rarely do. Anyshit, this is the deal. Reverse course and leave us alone, or don't. I should add that the 'don't' option probably involves everyone aboard these three ships dying," McKenzie said.

"I have a counter offer: if the elf, the cleric and the troll give themselves up and give their word not to try and escape, then I will spare Captain Barden and his crew, and even allow him to keep his ship," Jahistra said. "The women will not be harmed, but all their possessions will be confiscated."

"Did you actually notice when I just ripped the tail off the ship now?" McKenzie asked.

"You are one man. I have two hundred men in these three ships, and you will be more tractable when there is a knife at the cleric's throat," Jahistra replied.

"Seriously, don't bet on that. She's kind of annoying," McKenzie said. "Also, probably closer to a hundred and fifty, but never mind. Look, I don't know much about how things work round here, but you're about to tangle with four people who are very bad news. I don't actually have any doubt whatsoever about how this will turn out if you don't turn back, but since I'd rather not kill a hundred and fifty people before dinner today, why don't you tell me if you were sent to retrieve something specific, something shiny perhaps, and we'll see if there's room for a deal here?"

"Unacceptable - surrender the three women if you want to avoid bloodshed," Jahistra said.

"C'mon, there must be some reason why you've hired on a hundred and fifty mercs and presumably chartered two extra ships to go after three people. Work with me here, Captain."

Jahistra was silent.

"Fine. Fuck it. I tried," McKenzie said, shrugging. "Don't blame me if you finish the day off inside a troll."

McKenzie turned, hauled the door open, and left. His way to the hatch and the launch was not impeded, although he continued to receive appraising looks all the way.

Barden was waiting in the Sky Reaper's boat bay when he returned, with the three girls behind him.

"Did you just rip the fucking tail off one of those ships?" Sharinta asked him, looking slightly wide-eyed.

"Yeah, a bit," McKenzie answered.

"Hot damn," Sharinta replied.

"I could probably do that too," Leni muttered unhappily. "Show off."

"What news, Mr. McKenzie?" Barden asked as McKenzie stepped off the launch.

"Well, on the plus side, it's a lovely day out. In unrelated news, we're all going to be in a massive fight later on," McKenzie informed them.