On the sunlit deck, Gendry gripped the cold haft of his warhammer and launched himself forward like a loosed arrow. He felt like the roaring heart of a forge furnace, desperate for the quenching hiss of blood. Cut the head off the snake, he thought. Kill the captain first.
He drove the beak-like spike of the warhammer straight toward the Tyroshi's temple. The weapon was forged to punch through plate armor; against a man wearing no helm, there was no faster way to end a life than shattering the skull.
CRACK!
Blood sprayed across the deck, but it wasn't a killing blow.
In the fraction of a second before impact, the pirate captain's lethal instincts flared. He had kept half an eye on the masked boy, and at the last possible moment, he jerked his head aside. The spike missed his temple, instead tearing through his cheek and utterly pulverizing his right cheekbone.
"You little Westerosi shit!" the corsair roared, staggering back. Blood poured from the ruined side of his face, soaking into his black iron scales and running down his sword hands.
The dull, sickening crunch of shattering bone echoed over the deck. The pirate captain was reeling in agony, half his face turned into a mangled mask of gore. Had he been a hair slower, or had Gendry not been a fraction too tense on his first true swing, the corsair's brains would have painted the deck.
"A pity," Gendry muttered, his eyes cold behind his iron mask. He should have aimed for the throat. He reached down with his off-hand, snatching a discarded wooden buckler from the deck.
"I'll carve you into chum! I'll feed you to the crabs!" the gold-toothed captain shrieked, spinning his twin swords in a blinding arc. He charged Gendry, intent on hacking the boy into pieces.
War is governed by momentum. The pirates were vastly outnumbered; if their captain fell, the boarding party would break.
The corsair's blades moved in a blur of steel, slashing at Gendry's throat and head. It happened so fast the other pirates didn't even have time to react before the boy and their captain were locked in a desperate melee.
Gendry raised his buckler. Between life and death, he found he wasn't paralyzed by fear, he was vibrating with a strange, dark excitement. He had the strength of a Baratheon and the speed of youth; all he lacked was the bloody experience of the fighting pits. The sight of blood didn't frighten him.
Block. Parry. Wait.
Gendry kept his shield high and his hammer ready. The pirate's face was a ruined mess, and the heavy blood loss would soon blur his vision. Pressing a frantic attack without binding the wound was the tactic of a rabid dog, not a master swordsman.
The clang of steel on iron rang out like an ugly, violent song. The corsair grew increasingly erratic. Gendry simply backed away, circling the mast, letting his shield absorb the glancing blows while the pirate exhausted himself.
"Now! Strike them down!" Qyburn suddenly screamed from the rear.
The Myrish crew finally snapped out of their terror. Seeing the fearsome pirate captain engaged in a bloody, stumbling duel with a boy gave them the spark they needed. Realizing that submission would only lead to a crueler death, the sailors scrambled to retrieve their dropped short swords and crossbows, hurling themselves back at the distracted boarders.
"Fight me, you little coward!" the pirate captain spat, his panic rising as the sounds of his men dying reached his ears.
"Gendry! Step back!" Qyburn shouted.
From the folds of his grey robes, the disgraced maester produced a small leather pouch and hurled it straight at the corsair's face. A cloud of fine, grey powder erupted in the air. Gendry immediately threw himself backward.
The pirate captain gasped, inhaling the dust. The powder settled into his eyes and the gaping, bloody crater of his cheek. The pain was instantaneous and blinding, a chemical fire that doubled his agony. The corsair shrieked, dropping his guard and clawing blindly at his face.
"Cowards! Filthy cowards!" he wailed, swinging his swords wildly at empty air. His vision was entirely gone, replaced by a searing, white-hot agony.
Clang!
One of the pirate's frantic, blind swings caught Gendry's forearm. The blade bit through the sleeve of his tunic, slicing a shallow gash across his flesh. Blood welled up instantly.
The sharp sting of pain didn't slow Gendry down. It did the exact opposite.
The moment his blood flowed, a strange, terrifying clarity washed over him. The dormant "Storm's Fury" in his veins ignited. His muscles swelled with a sudden, explosive power, and his mind felt as cold and merciless as a winter gale. I am the blood of the storm. I am the wrath of the Narrow Sea.
With a terrifying roar, Gendry stepped into the pirate's guard. He swung the warhammer in a devastating backhand arc.
CRUNCH.
The heavy, flat face of the iron hammer caught the gold-toothed captain flush on the side of the head. His skull caved in like a cracked melon. Brain matter and bone fragments splashed across the wooden planks. The corsair collapsed like a puppet with its strings cut, dead before he hit the deck.
"Never underestimate an old man, child," Qyburn remarked mildly, looking down at the ruined corpse. "We still have our uses."
"Slaughter them!" the Myrish sailing master roared.
Without their captain, the remaining pirates were easy prey. They wore only boiled leather and lacked helms. The revived Myrish crew, wielding short swords and point-blank crossbow fire, butchered them mercilessly.
"Cut the grapples! Throw off the ladders!" Captain Dunstan yelled, his voice thick with hysterical relief. The Myrish sailors, riding the high of adrenaline and terror, hacked furiously at the thick hempen ropes binding them to the longships. They knew they had crossed the line; having killed this many pirates, there would be no quarter given if they were boarded again.
Gendry felt the storm raging in his blood. He hoisted his shield and hammer, plunging into the fray to assist the crew.
Near the mainmast, a cunning older pirate had taken cover, hastily cranking a Myrish repeating crossbow he had scavenged from the deck. But he had already taken a bolt to the shoulder, and his movements were sluggish.
Gendry raised his buckler and charged. The pirate fired a wild shot that thudded harmlessly into the wood. Before the man could crank the lever again, Gendry was upon him. The iron warhammer descended with the whistling scream of a gale, shattering the pirate's skull down to the jawline.
By the time the remaining pirates who had gone below deck to loot the hold rushed back up the stairs, the battle was over. The Myrish sailors were waiting. The looters were turned into pincushions of poisoned bolts before their boots even cleared the upper steps.
Down on the water, the crews of the two longships heard the slaughter but couldn't see over the high rails of the merchant cog. They expected to hear their gold-toothed captain order them to tow the prize away. Instead, the grappling hooks were suddenly severed, and the boarding ladders were kicked away.
"Hoist the head! Show them the head!" Gendry barked at the crew.
A Myrish sailor grabbed a long boat hook, impaled the ruined, purple-haired head of the corsair captain on the tip, and hoisted it high into the air for the longships to see.
The pirates in the longboats froze. The face was crushed, but the purple dye and the scattered gold teeth were unmistakable.
"They butchered the captain!"
"It's a trap! The Myrish must have mercenaries below deck!"
"You want to climb up there and take a crossbow bolt to the throat? Row! Get us out of here!"
The corsairs were brutal, but they were deeply pragmatic. They had sent their best fighters over the rail, and the longships were currently under-crewed to operate the ballistas and oars effectively. Climbing a hostile hull was suicide even on a good day. Without hesitation, the pirates threw their oars into reverse and abandoned the Spyglass, fleeing back toward the jagged rocks of the Stepstones.
"The Seven bless us," Captain Dunstan sobbed, collapsing against the rail.
The crew didn't bother scrubbing the blood from the deck. They manned the oars and hoisted every sail they had, fleeing the waters of the Stepstones as fast as the wind would carry them.
Gendry let out a long, shuddering breath, the storm in his blood finally beginning to recede. He had feared a protracted, bloody siege, or worse, that the longships would summon reinforcements from the islands. But the pirates' innate cowardice had saved them.
"Thank the gods the blade was clean," Qyburn said, inspecting the gash on Gendry's forearm. The old man pulled a small vial from his robes and sprinkled a pinch of grey powder into the wound. "Myrish fire-powder. A caustic coagulant. It will sting fiercely, but it burns away infection. I used a modified version of it to blind our purple-haired friend."
"Thank you," Gendry grunted through clenched teeth as the powder flared like liquid fire against his exposed flesh.
"You possess a terrifying aptitude for violence, Gendry," Qyburn murmured, his pale eyes gleaming with clinical fascination as he bandaged the arm. "To remain that cold and precise when the blood begins to flow... that is a rare and lethal gift."
"We owe you our lives, boy!" Captain Dunstan cried, rushing over. The surviving Myrish sailors and the trembling Westerosi passengers erupted into ragged cheers, applauding the masked boy who had cracked the pirate captain's skull.