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From: (Anonymous)

Nicolò leans on the railing, and frowns. There is a ship on the horizon that is noticeably closer than it was; catching up to them, and along the same line of travel. It is likely a merchant, but...he goes to find Nile.

“No, I know,” she says. “Probably nothing. But you’re right; if they’re not following us, it’s hard to tell. They would have caught up with us yesterday if the wind had been in their favour. We sail better into it, they’re faster with the wind behind them.”

Nicolò looks up at the sail. “And it’s behind both of us now.”

“Yes it is.” Nile drums her fingers meaningfully on her swordhilt. “Dammit, I really wasn’t expecting this.”

“Well, then,” he says, and goes to find Tayyib.

“Do you know how to use a sword?” he asks.

“Yes. Though not the type you carry. Why?”

“We are being followed,” he tells him. “I will see if one can be found for you, if it is necessary; I do not want to assume, but we need the crew to sail the ship, and so...”

“Those of us who are not necessary to sailing it should fight first?” Tayyib nods. “I understand that. Where is this ship?”

His face goes very grim when he sees it, and then sorrowful. “I told you I did not know if I would be pursued. I think this may be an answer.”

“Then go below,” Nicolò says at once. “We may be able to talk our way out of it, if that is the case.”

Tayyib looks startled. “You don’t owe me that.”

“You were swimming to shore, and you might or might not have made it. I know how badly you want to avoid this.”

“I did think better of it partway,” Tayyib admits ruefully. “But...no, I still would have done it. It is just that –”

“Go. Please. It will be better for everybody if we do not have to fight. They cannot be sure you are here.”

Tayyib shakes his head, but he goes.

The other ship comes up very fast, and alongside. It is a dangerous maneuveur, but Nile is convinced of their ability to get free, if they need to. Nicolò is expecting they will attempt to board, but instead they convey that they wish to send someone for a discussion.

“We can repel them,” Nile says quietly to him. “Your choice.”

“We’ll talk,” Nicolò replies. “If what they want is not here, they may yet leave peacably. And we are not here to start fights if we can avoid them.”

Their leader is a tall man with a certain swagger to him.

“I apologise for making your day difficult,” he says in the trading tongue. “My name is Aziz of Tripoli, and I am looking for something which belongs to me; you may have seen it.”

“We left Tunis three days ago, and have seen nothing unusual, except other ships,” says Nicolò. Tripoli; that is in Fatimid territory. “What is it that you seek?”

“My future husband.” Aziz sighs. “He had an attack of nerves, and fled the ship. Yours is the only one that was within sight, an hour either side of when it happened, two days hence. If he is not here, then I am afraid he may be lost.” His expression sobers further. Nicolò would believe he is genuinely concerned. And maybe he is; men are complicated.

“Then I fear you must expect the worst,” Nicolò says. “Though two days ago, we were anchored close to shore – might have have swum to land?”

“We searched, and I do not believe so.”

“That is grave tidings. But, may I ask – if your husband-to-be was so eager to flee you that he jumped from your ship, why do you pursue him?”

“It is a matter of politics.” He takes Nicolò in critically. “You look as if you might understand that, by your dress, and your bearing. I need the marriage. And he was all for it – it is only that he is a romantic at heart, and did not like to think I might not only want him for love. I am sure, when I find him, he will reconsider.”

“I wish you good fortune, then, in your search, and in reconciling with him when he is found,” says Nicolò, itching to get this man off the ship. There is no way this ends well, if Tayyib is spotted, he knows. “But we cannot help you.”

“Surely you will not mind if we search.”

“Surely you understand that you are a stranger with an odd tale, and there are pirates in these waters,” says Nicolò. “I feel for you – I have a husband-to-be of my own who is curiously absent. But I do not owe you a search of my ship.”

Aziz’s eyes narrow. “That is not unreasonable, but – who are you, anyway? You never named yourself.”

“Nicolò of Genoa,” Nicolò says; he is the youngest in his family and the name does not identify him so closely that he is reluctant to give it in this circumstance. He would not want to embarrass the queen or his mother by airing their difficulties, otherwise.

He is not expecting the response he gets.

Aziz’s face hardens. “Then I am afraid we will have to search your ship.”

“We’ve just agreed that’s not going to happen,” says Nile.

Hands go to sword-hilts, and there’s a moment when the sea itself seems to hold its breath.

“Tell me,” Nicolò says. “Are we enemies, and I am unaware of it? Because I have never heard your name before; nor am I aware that Tripoli has a quarrel with Genoa.”

Aziz laughs, incredulously, like Nicolò has just said something very stupid. It’s somewhat offensive. But not as offensive as the fact that he draws his sword, and, there it is, they are being boarded.

Nicolò is not new to battle, and he’s not even new to battle on board ships. He fends off the first man who engages him, and puts him out of combat with a clean thrust through the thigh; he goes down on one knee, and will likely bleed out. If someone is coming at you with a sword, there are no second chances and no reprieves.
But the ship is moving and tilting, Nile having sprinted to the rudder to pull them away from their unwanted companion vessel, and the deck is getting bloody, and Nicolò’s foot goes out from under him. Out of the corner of his eye he sees Marco bodily heave another man over the side, and further away, hears Nile yell. It’s the sort of yell that means someone else is having the worst of it, but Aziz is looming over him and Nicolò has to roll to avoid a sword through his throat. He’s not going to be fast enough to avoid the follow-up. He knows it, dimly. Sometimes that’s all it takes. Luck, or the lack thereof.

There’s another surprised yell, much closer, and Nicolò heaves himself to his feet with the roll of the ship, to see Tayyib in between him and Aziz. He’s speaking very rapidly in Arabic, not a dialect Nicolò knows well, and it’s nearly impossible to follow. He can follow the point of the sword in Tayyib’s hand, though. He has put himself between Nicolò and his attacker.

Nicolò just about makes out that Aziz believes passionately that Tayyib could have – have something, and him. He circles, but hesitates to intervene. The fight is dying down, anyway.

“I loved you,” Tayyib says, then something else, and then “Only tell me you feel the same!”

Aziz hesitates. Whatever he is going to say, it is lost – not because of anything Tayyib does, but because Marco skewers him from behind. He collapses.

Tayyib goes to his knees next to him.

“Well, I think that’s the last of them,” Marco says, wiping off his blade. “Nicolò? What is it? Why are you looking at me like that?”

*

“Are you alright?” Nicolò asks Tayyib, what is probably only an hour or two later but feels like a lifetime. Nile is organising her crew across both ships; once the fighting on board was done, they had circled back, unwilling to risk pursuit. Nicolò had not particularly wanted to take the other one, but under the circumstances they couldn’t really do anything else. The crew had accepted it relatively quietly when told that they would be sailing to Malta. They seem to be hired, not Aziz’s sworn men. Those are all dead.

Tayyib just stares at Nicolò. “Am I...alright?”

“I do not entirely understand what is going on, and I do not think you mean me to,” Nicolò says, “but you did not speak to him like someone you did not care for, and Marco very nearly killed him. He may yet still die. So. Are you alright?”

“No.” Tayyib continues to stare at him. “No, I...do not think I am.”

“You can’t really be alone on a ship, but if you go up to the bow, I think perhaps you will be...more alone. Or, if you do not wish to be, I can sit with you for a while.”

“You are very unexpected, Nicolò of Genoa.” His voice is shaky.

“It really is the least thing I could offer.”

“Thank you,” Tayyib says, “and yes, I think I would like to be alone for a while.”

The ship isn’t that big, though; Nicolò can feel his eyes on him for most of the rest of the day.

“What were you arguing about?” Nile asks Tayyib that evening. “I heard it, but I couldn’t understand it.” Tayyib had spent some of the afternoon sitting with his – Nicolò cannot think what to call their relationship; the man he had once meant to marry. He is not yet dead, but nor has he woken.

“You don’t have to tell us,” Nicolò adds, “but I would like to know what enemies I have made, beyond a single name. I do not think he will awake to tell me anytime soon.”

“I – find it hard to speak of right now. We...could talk in Malta, perhaps,” Tayyib says, looking down at the deck. “But I – do not think you will have made any more thank you already have.”

“Well, thank God for that,” says Marco. Nicolò kicks him in the ankle. “Nicolò, what?”

“Marco apologises,” Nicolò says, “for not simply taking him captive.”

“They boarded and attacked us,” Marco says.

“No, I know,” says Tayyib. “And he was not planning to show you any mercy.”

“Yes, I noticed that when he was about to run me through.” Nicolò remembers he has forgotten a courtesy, too. “Which you prevented, and I have not thanked you for.”

Tayyib starts to laugh at that, but it’s the sort of laughter that says he’s been pushed over an edge; everybody quiets while he works through it. It doesn’t turn to weeping, which Nicolò is half-expecting.

“Don’t make me regret it,” he says when he’s done.

“I cannot think of any way I could,” Nicolò says, bemused. “But I owe you, and will not forget it.”