This is sort of an answer to Havard's question about Captain Harchar and his strategies; it was one of Dave Arneson's better moments in command at sea...

First, like any good movie, here's the track from the album...



(Have a listen; leave it up and running while you read this little story; thanks!)

and then...

The Shores of Haida Pakalla, Winter, 2360 A. S.

The ship came about, feeling the wind in her sails as they hoisted in the two great stone anchors and made everything ready for sea. Harchar wanted to be off; he hated any time that he had to spend in harbor, and was always unhappy when he was not at sea. Chirine was startled when the summons came for him to, as the sailor informed him, "Lay aft to the poop; the cap'n wants to see ya!" by which Chirine guessed that Harchar wanted him to appear before him on that maritime Holy of Holies, the uppermost deck of the after-castle of the ship from Harchar surveyed his maritime domain and upon which he was normally found bellowing orders to his crew.

No mere mortals, such as the paying passengers, were ever allowed up there to disturb Harchar's sang froid; if they were really lucky, or especially esteemed, they were occasionally allowed to ascend to the quarter deck, the one below the poop, where the officers had their quarters and from which the quartermaster on duty steered the ship. A summons like this was, in Chirine's experience with Harchar and his crew, totally unprecedented. Something, as the sages would say, was up.

Harchar stood at the stern of the ship, leaning on the rail and looking out over what the locals grandly termed a 'city'. Everyone else, Chirine suspected, called it a slum, but it did not do to insult the corsair chieftains of Haida Pakalla in their own lairs. Chirine approached the captain respectfully, and attempted to salute in a sailorly fashion. Harchar simply snarled. "Priest, you know better then that; you've sailed with us before, and you have no little experience of ships and boats. Kindly dispense with the flummery; we have a problem. Three problems, in actuality." Chirine joined him at the rail, and waited for him to continue.

"The locals," Harchar said, spitting over the side; he had no love for them, and often showed it, "have had a bright idea. Don't turn around, but there are three of them waiting for us just outside the harbor mouth. One sailing ship, and two galleys full of thugs. I expect that they'll try to board us when we come out of the harbor; you know what it'll mean if they take us, of course. Especially for your Princess and her 'maid'."

"So, Captain, you have an idea of your own. What would you like me to do?"

"Kill the galley on our left as we sail out of the harbor. My crew will try to kill the one to our right, and if you'd care to help with that it would be appreciated. I will kill the sailing ship in the center of the channel." He paused, spat over the side again, and ground out his next words with all the enthusiasm of a virgin Priestess of Dilinala giving birth to a Serudla. "We'll recompense you for your professional services as a sorceror, of course." Chirine nearly fell overboard in his astonishment; Harchar must be really worried, if he was willing to actually part with any of his hard-earned and probably ill-gotten cash.

"No need to worry about accounts, Captain; consider it a favor between friends. I'll go below and get ready, shall I?"

"Keep things quiet; our best chance in this is to surprise the scum, so stay under cover as much as you can as we set sail."

Chirine took that as a dismissal, and went below to his cabin at the stern of the weather deck that he shared with Vrisa. He gave her what information he had, and the two started to get their armor on. The girl helped as much as she could, tightening straps and fastening buckles as she was told; there was a pause, and Chirine unwrapped a breast- and back-plate set and helmet of chlen-hide that was sized for a smaller person then either himself or Vrisa. He and Vrisa started getting the girl into this armor; then added weapons to match. Two sharp daggers went onto her belt, one on each side; last but not least, the open-faced burgonet-style helmet. The girl marveled at the two daggers, as they were made of steel and worth a fortune.

Chirine apologized for the poor fit of the armor, saying that it was the smallest that the ship's armorer had in his stores; the daggers, on the other hand, came out of one of his traveling chests along with enough weapons for all three of them.

He gestured, and the three of them went forward along the lower main deck, below the open weather deck and out of sight of any curious on-lookers. The deck was crowded; the ship's crew was mustering themselves there as well, and getting their own weapons and armor in order. The weapons seemed to include a medium-sized stone-thrower, which was being readied on a sort of turntable that would be raised up to the weather deck through the large cargo hatch in the center of the deck. Harchar, it seemed, had more then one surprise in store for any attackers.

The three of them clambered up to the top deck of the forecastle; they crouched in the shadow of the bulwark, and Chirine and Vrisa handed the girl their helms and stuck their heads above the rail for a very cautious look at the situation. The sailing ship that Harchar had been concerned about was ahead and to their left; the two galleys were farther out, to the left and right, with the one on the left on the far side of the presumably enemy sailing ship. The one to the right was the slightly larger and broader of the two galleys, with the one on the left slimmer and faster-looking - and with what looked like a ram on her bow, which explained why Harchar wanted this particular ship killed and killed quickly.

He warned the two women to hang onto the safety ropes their crew had rigged; he expected their own ship to heel to the left as soon as Harchar gave the word. He looked back at the captain, who was making sure his own ship was as ready as possible for battle. The crew were assembling four bolt throwers, two on the forecastle and two aft on the corner of the quarter-deck; the hatch opening in the weather deck had been cleared, and the stone-thrower below was just visible in the opening. The quartermaster who normally steered the ship at this time of the day had been replaced by the third mate, 'Fishface'; she was reputed to be the best of all the crew at the ship's helm, and stood at the wheel waiting for Harchar's commands. The captain himself stood just above her, at the rail of the poop deck just over the wheel, and looked - to Chirine, at least - like a man in his element. There was no fear in his look or voice, just the supreme contentment of a man confident in his ship and in his crew. His topmen had trimmed the ship's sails to catch as much of the wind as possible; the ship continued to accelerate, building speed as the water in the channel deepened.

Chirine chanced another quick look; they were just beyond the line of over-grown isles that protected the harbor from the sea's long swells. The sailing ship off their bow was already slackening the three lateen sails, one per mast, in order to lose speed and come alongside; the two galleys also had slackened their square sails, and would use their oars to circle the two sailing ships in order to find the best point to attack. He looked back at Harchar; it would be any time, now.

The captain timed it perfectly, and roared a command to his crew. Fishface spun the wheel, timing her own manuver to aim at the gap between fore- and mainmast of their opponent. Any doubts that Chirine had had about the speed and manuervability of their own ship was answered as she heeled over into the turn; Chirine guessed that the portion of their ship that could be seen above the waterline had a very different hull below. Their bow crashed into the side of their smaller opponent, and rode up on the other ship's side before the speed and mass of the larger ship rolled the smaller over. Below Chirine, the two mates - Staffswinger and Swordswinger - roared their own commands, and the two great stone anchors dropped free to crush the smaller ship's hull in a welter of splintered wood. Just as quickly, the mates ordered the crew below decks to haul the anchors back in, both to keep the ship from slowing and to make them ready for another attack.

The purser, who normally saw to the passengers' needs - at a price, of course! - now seemed to be in command of the artillery; his men had been tracking the larger galley, and now mounted the bolt- and stone-throwers in position and started launching their missiles at the targeted ship. Bolts winnowed through the steersmen aft, and a cluster of firepots from the stone-thrower landed amidships amongst the rowers.

Covered by the noise and confusion of ramming the sailing ship, Chirine stood and locked his gaze on the smaller galley, which was now very close and beginning to turn to attack them. Chirine launched a rippling bolt of energy into the galley, using the other-planar lighting to scythe through the crew. He followed it with a cloud of greenish fog that the wind carried across to the galley to suffocate the rowers and keep them from their oars.

He crossed over to the other side of the forecastle, and launched a powerful spell at the larger galley. There was a sharp crack, and an explosion of crimson energy erupted amidships on the galley's deck. He didn't wait to see what effect his sorcery had had on the galley, but instead crossed back to the opposite side of the forecastle and launced one last spell, exhausting the last of what other-planar energy existed here. A huge fist of energy hit the smaller galley, and stove in the light planking of her hull; the dead on dying on her deck had barely enough time to scream before the water closed over them. He unclipped the short sword and the mace from his belt, and stood ready to kill any enemies who still lived and who had made it aboard their ship. Vrisa took her helmet from the wide-eyed girl, put it on, and unsheathed her own sword. All of this had been done in the time that it had taken their own ship had taken to run over the smaller sailing ship and clear the broken and drifting wreckage. The bodies of the sunken ship's crew, both alive and dead, were already being savaged by the sea's predators.

The purser raked the two galleys, to port and starboard, with everything his crews at the artillery could bring to bear as they passed between the burning and sinking galleys. If there were to be any survivors from these two ships, they would have to fend for themselved in the hostile waters; Harchar and his sailors has no love for the Haida Pakalan seaborne brigands, and Chirine suspected that more then a few old scores were being settled on this day.

Harchar continued on his easterly course until well outside of sight of land, then steered sharply to the west. His crew cleared away the artillery and cleaned up the decks; they had little to repair in the way of battle damage, as the speed and violence of their attacks on the enemy ships hadn't given their opponents much of any chance to launch their own attacks. The crew also cleared their sorceror and his bodyguards off the deck, and they retired to their cabin to get out of their armor and get both armor and weapons stowed away.

The girl started to return both armor and weapons to Chirine, but he pointed to a new wooden chest that the ship's carpenter was bringing into the cabin. "Your equipment goes in there, along with your clothes and sleeping mat. It's your chest, for your possessions." She looked at Vrisa, about to ask a question. Vrisa forstalled her, and spoke first.

"Yes, even the daggers. Those are yours, and I'll show you how to take care of them. If you want my advice, always take care of your weapons and armour first, even before you eat or sleep. You'll live longer, that way."

from "To Serve The Petal Throne", a book about the adventures of one Chirine ba Kal, and dedicated to M. A. R. Barker and David L. Arneson...

("We made stuff up, and we had fun" - DLA)

Thanks for sharing this great story! The music was just perfect with the narrative.

If I wasn't already sure that I would buy your book, this would have helped me make up my mind! I feel like I am starting to get to know Harchar and Chirine by now :)

-Havard