Buzzing sedately between the masts, Bellis saw suspended figures, three or four of them, harnessed to balloons like the first scout, flying low over the fighting, firing flintlocks into the crowd.

Gore stained the deck.

There was more and more screaming. Bellis was trembling. She bit her lip. There was something unreal about the scene. The violence was grotesque and hideous, but in the wide eyes of the sailors Bellis saw bewilderment, a doubt that this could possibly be happening.

The pirates fought with heavy scimitars and squat pistols. In their multicolored clothes they looked like rabble, but they were quick and disciplined, and they fought like an army.

"Dammit!" shouted Captain Myzovic, then looked up and fired. One of the dangling balloonists jerked, and his head snapped back in an arc of blood. His hands clutched spastically at his belt, releasing ballast like heavy droppings. The corpse began to rise, swiftly, spiraling into the clouds.

The captain gesticulated frantically. "Regroup, for fuck ’s sake," he shouted. "Take that bastard on the poop deck!"

Bellis twisted her head, but she could not quite see the captain’s target. She heard him, though, close to her, giving terse orders. The invaders responded, breaking off skirmishes to form tight units, targeting officers, trying to break the line of sailors blocking their way to the bridge.

"Surrender!" shouted the voice beside her window. "Surrender and this finishes now!"

"Dispatch that bastard!" the captain shouted to his crew.

Five or six sailors ran past Bellis’ window, swords and pistols drawn. There was a moment of silence, then a thud and a faint crackling.

"Oh Jabber…" The cry was hysterical, but it broke off suddenly in a retching exhalation. There was a blossoming of screams.

Two of the men stumbled back into Bellis’ view, and she cried out aghast. They collapsed to the deck in great gouts of blood, and died quickly. Their clothes and bodies were savaged with an incredible number of wounds, as if they had been outnumbered by hundreds of enemies. There was not a six-inch space on any of them that was not scored with some deep gash. Their heads were shredded flesh and bone.

Bellis was transfixed. She trembled, her hands at her mouth. There was something deeply unnatural about those wounds. They seemed to shiver between states, deep rends that were suddenly insubstantial and dreamlike. But the blood that pooled below them was quite real, and the men were really dead.

The captain was staring in shock. Bellis heard a thousand overlapping whispers of air. There were two blubbering screams, and wet drumbeats as bodies fell.

The last of the sailors ran past Bellis, back the way he had come, howling in terror. A hurled flintlock smacked solidly into the back of his head. He fell to his knees.

" You godsforsaken swine!"Captain Myzovic was screaming. His voice sounded outraged and deeply afraid. " You demon-loving bastard!"

Paying him no attention, a grey-clad man walked slowly into Bellis’ field of vision. He was not tall. He moved with studied poise, carrying his heavily muscled body as if he were a much more slender man. He wore leather armor, a dark charcoal outfit studded with pockets, belts, and holsters. It was streaked and streaked with blood. Bellis could not see his face.