On the deck, Gendry gripped the cold hammer haft and surged forward with savage intent. He felt like an arrow loosed from the string, like furnace fire hungry for blood and victory. If you wanted to stop the raiders, you struck at the head first. Goldtooth had to go.
The spiked head of the warhammer smashed toward Goldtooth's temple. The weapon was made to crack plate, and Goldtooth wasn't even wearing a helm. Nothing was faster than caving in a skull.
Thud.
Blood spilled down Goldtooth's cheek from a torn, ruined wound. But the blow didn't catch the temple cleanly. It shattered the right cheekbone instead.
In the breath between life and death, Goldtooth's instincts saved him. He'd been wary of the iron-masked boy, but he'd still underestimated him.
"Damn you, you little shit!" Goldtooth howled, clutching at his face as blood slicked his palm. "I'll butcher the lot of you, chop you into eight pieces, and throw you to the sea!"
The sound of that hammer hit was dull and heavy, and the pain that followed was worse. Bone splintering. If Goldtooth hadn't shifted at the last instant, and if the boy hadn't been a novice with a touch of nerves, that strike would have pulped his skull. Even so, the weight behind it left him reeling.
Half his face looked crushed, blood pouring, a horrific mess.
"Damn it," Gendry thought, eyes on the pirate's ruined cheek. He should have gone for the throat. That would have been certain. He snatched up a shield, and the fight turned truly brutal.
"Die, brat!" Goldtooth rushed him, twin blades flashing, intent on carving Gendry into meat.
In a fight like this, momentum mattered. The pirates didn't have more men than the merchant crew, and if they lost their nerve, the people they'd cornered would shove them right back into the sea.
Goldtooth's long blades moved fast enough to blur. He fought through the agony in his face, slashing for Gendry's head and throat.
It happened in a heartbeat, too quick to follow. Before any of the other pirates could even move, the two of them were already locked together.
Gendry raised his shield. He wasn't fearless, not truly, but fear was drowned by a fierce, sharp excitement. Strength and speed had never been his problem. What he lacked was battlefield experience. Blood didn't frighten him.
Dodge. Then hit.
He kept the shield high and the warhammer ready. Goldtooth's wound was bad. The more blood he lost, the more his vision would blur. Refusing to bind it and choosing instead to press a frantic attack was, in its own way, a fool's strategy.
Steel rang against steel, hard and forceful, almost like a violent dance. They couldn't break away from each other. Goldtooth grew more and more frantic as Gendry shifted across the deck, left and right, shield up, hammer ready, making him chase and burn his strength.
"Now!" Qyburn shouted.
The Myrish sailors finally snapped out of their shock. If they lay down and took it, the pirates would repay obedience with cruelty. This was their opening, bought by the boy's courage. They grabbed their weapons again and threw themselves back into the fight.
"Fight me, you little bastard!" Goldtooth snarled as he saw the tide turning, rage spilling over.
"Gendry! Back!" Qyburn shouted.
A packet of powder flew from Qyburn's sleeve, bursting into the air as it drifted toward Goldtooth. Gendry took the cue and stepped back at once.
Goldtooth froze. The powder stung his eyes, clouding his sight, and when it touched the open wound, the pain flared twice as sharp. He couldn't stop himself from screaming.
"Coward! Coward!" Goldtooth slashed wildly with his twin blades, hacking at empty air. His vision swam, his chest tight with suffocating rage.
Clang.
One blade skimmed across Gendry's arm. The cut wasn't deep or long, but blood flowed all the same. In the same instant, Gendry's backhand swing came roaring through. The warhammer landed solidly, and Goldtooth's skull burst apart. Blood, shattered bone, and brain matter sprayed across the deck, fouling it completely. Goldtooth collapsed bonelessly, like a dead fish slapped onto the boards. Gendry didn't pause. He lifted the hammer again and rushed to support the fighting elsewhere.
"Never look down on an old man," Qyburn said calmly as he glanced at Goldtooth's corpse. "This old fellow still has his uses."
"Kill them!"
The remaining pirates were far easier to deal with. They wore only leather armor and no helmets. A spiked hammer, a crossbow bolt, even a short blade was enough to finish them.
"Throw down the ladders! Cut the ropes!" Captain Dunstan shouted.
The Myrish sailors surged forward with renewed fury, shields raised as they hacked apart ropes and shoved ladders into the sea. They were exhilarated and terrified at once. After killing so many pirates, there was no turning back. This was a fight to the end.
For reasons he couldn't quite explain, the blood and pain pushed Gendry into a strange state. His excitement burned hotter, strength flooding his limbs.
"I am the blood of the Storm," he thought. "The gales of the Narrow Sea, the raging rain of the straits. A warrior as terrifying as the storm itself."
"Die!"
Shield up, warhammer raised, Gendry charged back into the fray.
Only one pirate remained on deck. A crafty old one, crouched behind the mast, firing a crossbow. No one dared rush him head-on. But he had already been hit by Myrish bolts, his movements slower, his strength fading.
Gendry lifted his shield and waited. The moment the pirate paused to reload, the hammer came screaming through the air. Wind howled with the swing, and the blow split the old pirate's skull nearly in half, brains spilling onto the planks.
Pirates lay strewn across the deck in every direction. Gendry lowered his warhammer. Blood soaked his sleeve, making him look frighteningly feral.
The fighting on deck ended quickly. When the pirates who had rushed into the hold heard the shouts and scrambled back up, they were met only by a storm of arrows. One by one, they fell, bristling with shafts like hedgehogs.
The two pirate longships lingered nearby. They were smaller than the merchant vessel and could hear the battle, but they couldn't see exactly what was happening. By all rights, Goldtooth should have been signaling them to seize the ship by now. Instead, they saw the ruined ropes and ladders and felt a chill of dread. Their best men were dead on the deck. Pressing the attack would only mean heavier losses.
"Show them Goldtooth's head!" Gendry shouted. "Show them Goldtooth's head!"
The Myrish sailors understood at once. They found a long pole and hoisted Goldtooth's severed head onto it, letting it sway in the wind.
The sight froze the pirates on the longships. Half the skull was crushed, but the gold teeth were unmistakable. So was the purple hair.
"Let's board and avenge the boss!"
"Goldtooth got taken out! Damn these Myrish dogs. Do they have sellswords now? Even a merchant ship has real fighters!"
"Your brain's full of seawater. Too many good men are dead already. I'm not dying to crossbows. Row! Get us out of here!"
The pirate ships chose not to seek revenge. Their oars dipped into the water, and they fled in the opposite direction, abandoning the fight. Gendry had been the unexpected variable.
The pirates were nothing if not practical. The black ships were short on hands. Too few to manage both oars and heavy crossbows, and their boarding party had taken severe losses. They couldn't afford another assault. Boarding uphill from low decks was dangerous to begin with, and the first wave had paid dearly for underestimating the Myrish crew.
"The gods be praised!" Captain Dunstan wept openly, feeling as though he'd clawed his way back from death itself.
The sailors didn't bother cleaning the deck. They drove the ship hard, fleeing the Stepstones as fast as they could. Neither side had any desire for a final, bloody reckoning.
Gendry finally let out a long breath. Luck had been on their side. He'd feared the pirates might decide to drag the merchant ship down with them, and even more that more pirates would come from the Stepstones. The pirates feared the men aboard. Gendry feared a desperate last stand. Thankfully, the pirates were ruthless enough to cut their losses and leave.
"Thank the gods," Qyburn said as he rolled back his sleeve to treat Gendry's arm. "The blade wasn't poisoned. Just a shallow cut. This is Myrish fire-herb powder. It'll sting a bit. That's what I threw earlier."
"Thanks," Gendry said.
The gray powder burned like flame against his wound, a sharp, cleansing pain.
"You've got the makings of a fierce warrior," Qyburn said quietly. "Strong talent, and a steady mind. On the battlefield, those qualities are deadly."
"Thank you," Captain Dunstan said earnestly as he came over.
Around them, the Myrish sailors and the passengers broke into applause for the iron-masked warrior.