The Captain's Blade — Mary C. Findley

After Tristan's disappearance from his home country, his best friend Jonathan has no hope that Tristan survived an attack at the hands of his half-mad brother, the newly-crowned king Dunstan. Jonathan has responsibilities beyond Captain of the Guard, however, when he sails on a quest to fulfill Tristan's long-held wish: To build a navy to protect their country from pirates. Complications arise with that plan when Jonathan encounters an island kingdom in the grip of devilish wickedness and an exotic woman mercenary who demands information but keeps her own quest a secret. Another beautiful stranger claims she is a shipbuilder in a land where women are mere slaves and marriage chattel. The creation of that marvelous navy of three ships costs Jonathan pain and turmoil he can hardly imagine. The shipbuilder vanishes and Jonathan is nearly killed, but the warrior woman and her six soldiers for hire rescue him and beg passage home with him. Distrust of everything in that violent land makes him refuse her, but Jonathan will find more trouble and distress back home even amid the joy of discovering his lost friend is alive. What will happen when Jonathan sees again the beautiful mercenary his mother calls "his warrior woman?" His navy will eventually return to the country where it was born, but will it be for a rescue or a war? Jonathan thinks he is prepared for spiritual warfare but he has no inkling of the grip demons have on the kingdom of the South Crescentlands and the principal island of Kolt'Kutan.