Black Seas of Fate
Shouts broke the silence of the morning, along with the drumming of hoofbeats on the boardwalk leading to the wharfs. Five figures fled for their lives. Pursuing them were 12 armored horsemen, followed at a distance by a squad of archers, henchmen of the Prince of Ogrothan, who had a keen interest in detaining the escapees. The harbor was nearly vacant, as news of the Prince's madness had flown on the wings of rumor. Only two ships remained in the harbor, one of them a black-hulled slave ship from the dreaded land of Leng. Boarding that ship would be worse than death, so the five fugitives passed it by and raced toward the farther ship.
Sailors were casting off the lines and beginning to push off from the pier. They stared in astonishment at the five strangers who leapt off the pier and hauled themselves up and over the railing. The sailors drew knives and cudgels, gaffes and hooks, and the five fugitives found themselves surrounded. The captain, a fierce, black-bearded old corsair, climbed down from the quarterdeck and drew his cutlass. "Who invited you aboard?" he roared, glancing at the horsemen thundering down the quay.
