The Dragon Round by Stephen S. Power Read Free Book Online Page A

says, “But I’m a mate.”
    Jeryon says, “Then I won’t need to chain you to a bench.” He tells the sailors, “Take Solet to his new station.”
    Solet says, “Livion.”
    Whining , Livion thinks, is not Ynessi . Deception, though, is very Hanoshi. Has the captain overheard them? Has he divined Solet’s scheming? It would surely leave its stench on him. And it’s better to fire a maid, Trist once said, before the jewelry’s gone. If Solet is put in chains once he’s below, how long until I am too? If we don’t hang together now, we could hang separately later .
    â€œLivion,” Solet says.
    Livion curses Jeryon under his breath. “Belay that order,” Livion says to the sailors. “As first mate I am declaring the captain unfit for command: for disobeying the rules of engagement, for endangering the ship and her cargo, for putting us behind schedule, for abandoning his post, for doing so during an emergency, and for failing to seek reliable profit by not rendering the dragon.”
    â€œAs second mate,” Solet says, “I concur.”
    â€œHa!” Jeryon says. “Using the book against me. The Trust will see through that.”
    â€œLock him in the hold,” Livion says.
    â€œYou can’t hold me,” Jeryon says as two sailors grab his arms.
    â€œWait,” Solet says. He pushes out Jeryon’s arms and runs his hands over his torso and hips. Solet smiles, digs out the razor case from the captain’s pocket, and flips it into the sea. “Now we can hold you,” he says.
    Whatever confusion and anger the sailors feel as the captain is dragged below is quickly replaced with the joy of avarice and potential advancement as Solet gathers a rendering crew. An Ynessi could expect nothing less from a Hanoshi crew.
    â€œThis is wrong,” Beale says. “He saved us. They’re relieving him because he saved us.”
    â€œWhat could we do?” Topp says. “We just float on the waves. The mates, they are the waves.”
    â€œAt least the shares will buy us a better boat,” Beale says.
    Tuse says, “Your charges are true. Your motives are nonsense. This is mutiny, plain and simple.”
    Livion says, “So you’ll oppose us.”
    â€œYes,” Tuse says. He tightens a seeping bandage. “You can’t deal me into a game I won’t play. I won’t have him killed.”
    â€œNo one said anything about—” Livion said.
    â€œAre you soft-hearted or soft-headed?” Tuse says, holding up a burned hand. “Do you think you can just take him to Hanosh and make your case at the inquiry? Sort this whole thing out? Have everything be normal?”
    Livion says, “We’re going by the book.”
    â€œYou’re holding it upside down,” Tuse says. “Let me explain something to you: When you punch a man, you put him down. Otherwise, he’ll put you down.” He jerks his thumb at Solet. “He’d agree with me.”
    Solet guides the half-completed rendering. The dragon has been tied to the galley, and, not having a cutting stage, sailors work on it from the starboard rail and the ship’s dinghy. Its head, feet, and wing claws have been hacked off with axes, wrapped in canvas, and put in the captain’s cabin. The dragon’s body is tied to the starboard rail, and is being spun so the skin can be stripped off in great sheets. This work is easier. The trick was flaking some vertebrae into blades, attaching them to handles, and using these shards, incredibly sharp and difficult to dull, to cut the skin and flay it from the meat.
    Meanwhile the sharks work on the meat, exposing more bone, which they’ll harvest next.
    Livion wishes he had more spit in his mouth. He says, “If we have to kill him, Tuse, we have to kill you. He’d agree with that too.”
    â€œYou don’t have the stones,” Tuse says.
    â€œI