title: Soldiers Lost at Sea: A Chronicle of Troopship Disasters in Wartime
author:  James E. Wise 
description: "Wise and Baron fill their book with fascinating bits of maritime history...compelling reading." -- <I><B>Northern Mariner/Le Marin du Nord</I></b>
zlib_text: Lost Empires, Book One
  
  The Lost Library of Cormanthyr
  
  Prologue  
  North of Mintarn in the Trackless Sea 600 Years Ago
  
  
  "May Lloth take your soul into her evil embrace, woman, as penance for killing
  us all!"  
  Her beautiful elven face drenched by the torrents pouring from the unbridled
  sea around them, Gyynyth Skyreach turned to face the speaker. Dark moonlight
  spearing through the black clouds overhead sparked fire from her pale green
  eyes. "On the contrary, Captain Rinnah, I ordered us into the only chance we
  had. If we'd tried to sail around the storm front, we'd have been caught by
  the pirates that pursue us."  
  The captain held on to the ship's rigging as his body swayed instinctively
  with the rolling pitch and yaw of his vessel. "Putting a dagger blade across
  the throat of every person on this ship would have been a cleaner death than
  the one you've ordained," Rinnah roared back at her over the crash of thunder
  and the horrendous splash of twenty-foot waves falling across the sh