by A. C. Cobble
“No, ah, no thank you, m’lady,” stammered the duke.
She pursed her lips slightly, making them full, and waited.
“I’m afraid I have terrible news,” declared the duke. “Your father… He has died, m’lady.”
“I don’t understand,” she said, leaning forward, surprised and confused. “I saw him this evening. He was uninjured from the fight with the corsairs, and I was told they were eliminated. What happened?”
Duke Wellesley swallowed and shifted on the couch. “His heart stopped, the physician said. He… he just died, m’lady, right in his office behind the desk. I know it is no consolation, but he passed quickly, and it seemed there was little pain.”
“How do you know?” she wondered.
The duke ran his hand over his head, as if checking that his ponytail was secured before answering, “I was there, m’lady.”
“You found both my father and my mother dead, then?”
He winced. “I saw your father pass, m’lady. I merely investigated the death of your mother. I am sorry, Isisandra. This is terrible and I wish I was a better man to offer you comfort in this dark time. Whatever you need, I will help. You are not alone in this.”
The Cartographer X
“You found both my father and my mother dead, then?”
Inside, he groaned. “I saw your father pass, m’lady. I was merely investigating the death of your mother. I am sorry, Isisandra. This is terrible and I wish I was a better man to offer you comfort in this dark time. Whatever you need, I will help. You are not alone in this.”
The girl, still blinking sleep out of her eyes, barely dressed in her night-robe, looked back at him. Her lip began to quiver and her eyes filled with liquid.
He stilled his face, refusing to let an impending scowl show itself. The girl was barely eighteen winters. Barely more than a child. Twice within as many days, he’d told her she lost a parent.
Unsure what to do, he moved to sit beside her. He held her in his arms and felt the tremors in her body as she fought down sobs. Both of her parents dead in less than a month. Her mother murdered, her father… maybe. She was alone, isolated in a remote colony. Archtan Atoll had been her home, but without her parents, she would have no place there. She had a home back in Enhover, if she recognized it as such. There were others there of her station. Men and women who could help walk her through what was next. He had to get her there, to what would be her home and her future.
He had to find out what happened to her father.
“When you’re ready,” he offered, “you’ll have a ride waiting on an airship to take you back to Enhover, if that is where you want to go.”
“What do you think I should do?” She sniffed. “I haven’t been to Enhover since I was sixteen winters, and then only for two months while my father caught up on his business. Will you… will you help me?”
“Of course,” said Oliver. “We will stay here until you are ready, and then I will escort you back.”
“What of my father’s body?” she asked.
“We can bring him with us to ensure a proper burial at your family’s estate,” he offered.
“Will my mother be buried at the same time?”
Oliver winced. He was glad the girl’s head was buried in his shoulder and she was unable to see his face. “Yes, if that’s what you want. Your family’s staff at Derbycross will be able to assist, and the Crown and Company will make sure you have whatever you need.”
“May we leave soon? Today?” asked the girl.
“A-Ah…” stammered Duke. “There are some things that need to be concluded here. Matters that I have a responsibility to settle.”
“My father was the governor,” mumbled Isisandra, her voice tight with restrained sobs. “Foolish of me. You’ll need to name a replacement to handle administrative affairs. Tomorrow then, could we leave for Enhover? My mother dead, my father dead… I have no one else. No one is here for me except you, Duke Wellesley. Back home, I could grieve, I think.”
“Tomorrow?” asked Oliver. “Perhaps—”
“Is it normal to feel like hurting oneself after a loss like this?” asked the girl, raising her head.
She was a hand-length from his face, and he could see the tears in her eyes, see her quivering lips, and see where she’d bitten them. The impressions of her teeth were there, along with a speck of crimson blood, the same shade as her lip paint.
“We can leave tomorrow,” he stated. “I-I must attend to some things, though, first. Is there someone who can stay with you for now, a friend perhaps?”
“Yes,” answered Isisandra. She stood and adjusted her robe, her young body a breath away from him. “My maid will be with me. Tomorrow, Duke Wellesley, I will see you when we depart for Enhover.”
She retreated back into her bedchamber, and Oliver let out an explosive breath. The girl was as fragile as new-fired porcelain and just as beautiful. If she survived this unbroken…
He stood, glancing at the window where dawn’s light barely lit the horizon. He had much to do and little time to do it. The colony needed an interim governor, he needed to oversee the handover in power and establish a direction for Dalyrimple’s successor, and he had to figure out what the hell happened to the man.
“How did it go?” asked Captain Haines later that evening.
Evening. Eighteen, nineteen hours since he’d told Isisandra her father had died. He hadn’t had a wink of sleep or a moment to take a breath since then.
“Not well,” said Oliver with a snort. “She’s upset, as one might expect. She’s facing an uncertain future with little of the support she’s had throughout her life.”
“In Enhover, she’ll be sought after,” claimed the captain. “As the only child, she’ll inherit all of Derbycross. If I recall, that’s a rather extensive holding. She’ll be named a countess, won’t she?”
“I imagine she will,” confirmed Oliver, “and you’re right. Derbycross is extensive. Ten thousand head of sheep on those hills, or close enough. Lady Isisandra Dalyrimple is a rather wealthy girl, and she’ll be pursued by half the eligible peers in Enhover. She is just a girl, though, eighteen winters.”
The captain shrugged. “In Enhover, she would have been presented already. She’s not far past it, I admit, but she’s no longer just a girl.”
“I need a drink,” remarked Commander Ostrander.
Oliver waved offhandedly toward a hutch on the side of the room.
“I’ll get it,” offered Sam.
“Get a round for everyone,” suggested Oliver.
“Naturally.” Sam poured four glasses and handed them to the men.
Commander Ostrander accepted his wordlessly, and Captain Haines gave her an odd look. Oliver sipped his drink, letting the fiery gin burn down his throat.
“I’m not ready for this,” said Ostrander, his eyes down.
“You’re the only possibility,” responded Oliver. “Who else has enough credibility as a leader in the community to take over? Who else can manage both the Company’s assets in the colony and the Crown’s military might? You’re the only one, Ostrander.”
“I’m a soldier, not a merchant.”
“Trust your factors,” advised Oliver. “I wasn’t a merchant either when I joined the Company. No one is. You weren’t a soldier when you joined the royal marines yet that seems to have gone well. I’m confident you can do this. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have named you Interim Governor.”
“It will be worth it,” advised Captain Haines. “The Crown and Company take care of their friends. Can’t say I’m not a bit jealous, Commander. Or, I suppose I should say, Governor.”
Oliver frowned at the captain. Was the man angling to help improve Ostrander’s position or perhaps trying to subtly encourage a large bonus for himself?
Governor Ostrander chuckled painfully. “It’s not the way I meant to find advancement in this world. I never got on with the governor, that’s not secret, but from the moment you fetched me asking for irons, Haines, m
y life has been completely upended.”
Captain Haines, grinning, sat his drink down on a small table beside him. Oliver blinked, missing the conversation between the two men, watching as the captain turned the half-full glass on the table, the gin inside nearly invisible.
“Sam,” Oliver said suddenly, turning to look at her. “Where did you get Captain Haines’ glass? It wasn’t the one we took from the governor’s desk, was it?”
“I—”
“The one Dalyrimple was drinking from?” demanded Oliver, speaking over her quickly.
Sam stared at him in confusion.
Turning to Captain Haines, Oliver remarked, “Sorry about that, chap. I meant it as a memento for Isisandra, but I decided that was a bit too morbid. I’d set it out for the staff to wash, but I don’t think they have yet. It’s a dirty glass, I’m afraid. We’ll ring someone to bring you another.”
Captain Haines’ hand was frozen, resting on the rim of the glass. In a quiet voice, he asked, “The governor’s glass?”
“The one he was drinking from moments before he died,” confirmed Oliver, his gaze locked on the captain. “That’s a bit dark to give to the girl, don’t you think?”
“I have to go,” said Captain Haines, standing quickly. “I need to do a final check before the men turn in. Make sure we’re, ah, we’re ready to leave at dawn tomorrow.”
“No, no,” said Oliver, rising as well. “Stay and have one more drink with us and the new governor. I insist.”
“I, ah, m’lord…”
“Sit, Captain Haines,” instructed Oliver.
The captain ground his teeth, glancing between Oliver and the half-empty glass on the table.
“Captain Haines,” asked the duke, “is your face a little red? Perhaps you got too much sun today supervising the loading.”
“I-I have to go,” mumbled the captain and he began walking to the door.
“Captain Haines, sit and have one more drink. That is an order,” barked Oliver.
Sam stood, but Governor Ostrander remained seated, a look of confusion on his face.
“I’m feeling ill,” stammered Haines as he stumbled toward the door.
“Worried you drank poison, Captain?”
Haines paused, his hand outstretched to the exit.
“The same poison you slipped into Governor Dalyrimple’s drink?”
Not turning from the door, the captain claimed, “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I just have a bit of—”
“Stand there, Captain,” growled Oliver. “I forbid you to leave this room. You are either innocent, and I will look a fool, or you will die from the same poison you gave Dalyrimple.”
Ostrander suddenly jerked upward out of his chair cursing, staring at the captain in surprise.
Haines did not turn to look. Instead, he ran forward, grabbing the knob of the door.
Oliver charged the man, and as Haines flung the door open, the duke slammed into the back of the captain, knocking him over, both men scrambling on the floor outside of the room.
Oliver landed heavily on top of the captain but was nearly thrown as Haines struggled beneath him. Panicking, Haines threw back an elbow, catching the duke on the jaw.
Oliver, grappling on the man’s back, reeled from the blow, and the nimble captain wiggled out from underneath of him, kicking back and catching Oliver on the side of the head. Haines staggered to his feet, but the duke leapt to his as well, shaking off the sting from the captain’s kicks, and lunged after the man, grasping at his coat.
Spinning, Haines swung a fist at Oliver’s face.
The royal slipped the blow and with all of his weight behind it, swung a devastating uppercut, catching the captain square on the chin, rocking his head back and sending the man crashing to the floor in a heap. The captain lay there, motionless.
Sam and Governor Ostrander came running beside Oliver, the former commander shouting for his soldiers.
“Go get those manacles,” instructed the duke, rubbing his jaw where the captain’s elbow had caught him.
Sam pointed at the unconscious captain. “Now that is how you punch a man.”
“I have no idea why Captain Haines would want my father dead,” declared Isisandra. “I’ve seen the captain several times, as you know. His ship berths in Archtan Atoll a few times a year, I believe. Do you think perhaps he meant to somehow woo me with my father out of the way?”
Oliver fidgeted with the quill in his hand and looked at the blank piece of paper in front of him. He’d torn it from his notebook, thinking to take notes and share them with a professional investigator when they arrived in Westundon, but he’d found nothing to write. Captain Haines, for no apparent reason, had poisoned Governor Dalyrimple.
Oliver had intended to use the long voyage back to Enhover to question the man, but in the morning when they were meant to embark, the captain was found dead in the small room they’d imprisoned him in. The only mark on his body was a purpled jaw where the duke had knocked him unconscious the previous night.
The physician, the same small, suspicious fellow who’d attended Governor Dalyrimple, was yet again unable to provide a specific cause of death. People’s hearts just randomly stopped beating, according to the man. Glad he wasn’t the little doctor’s patient, Oliver had been left fuming. Dalyrimple had been poisoned, of that he had no doubt. The captain’s erratic behavior the moment he’d thought he’d drunk from the same glass confirmed it. That didn’t explain why, though. The captain was a wealthy man in his own right and in good standing with the Company. He had no debts from the tables or the races that anyone was aware of and no mistresses who could have threatened blackmail. Other than the professional relationship any Company airship captain would have with a Company governor, there was no overlap between the victim and the poisoner that Oliver could determine.
He sighed, still twirling the quill and didn’t look up from his page. Isisandra seemed just as inclined to silence as he was.
The room the captain had died in was small, no windows, only one door. It had been guarded throughout the night by two royal marines, men loyal to the interim Governor Ostrander, who was no close friend of Captain Haines or the former governor. He’d been unconscious when they laid him inside, and no food had been provided to the imprisoned captain through the night, but when the door was opened in the morning, he was dead. Oliver had considered whether someone had gotten to the two royal marines, a bribe of some sort, but searches of their bedchambers and persons uncovered no evidence. Oliver had been there when the door was opened, and the two guards had expressed genuine shock to see Haines dead. He believed the men, that they had nothing to do with it. Which left… no explanation he could fathom.
“Duke Wellesley, can we have this discussion another time?” pleaded Isisandra. “I’m rather put out at the moment.”
“Of course,” he said and quickly collected his blank sheet of paper and his quill. He stashed them in his satchel and buckled the flap closed. “We’ll continue another time when you’re ready.”
“I appreciate that, m’lord,” she murmured.
Oliver rose and left the former captain’s cabin, stepping onto the deck of the airship Cloud Serpent. Across the way, he saw Sam leaning against a gunwale, watching the door. She nodded when he saw her, and he made his way to stand beside the strange priestess.
“You were watching for me?” he asked.
“I wanted to see how long you’d be inside,” she answered.
“Why?”
She turned and looked up at the gloomy sky overhead. Thick, steel-gray clouds stretched from one edge of the horizon to the other.
“What?” he asked. “You thought I’d… I’d do something with her?”
Sam shrugged.
“I don’t understand. Are you jealous?” he asked. “I thought you didn’t…”
“I don’t,” interjected Sam. “There’s, ah, there’s a number of ways that… Maybe we should find somewhere more private to discuss this.”
> He frowned. “Hold on. Do you want to—”
“No,” snapped Sam, rolling her eyes. “Do you really think that every time a woman asks to speak to you alone that they want to have sex with you?”
He ran a hand over his hair. “Well, to be honest, most of the time they do.”
She stared at him, clearly at a loss for words.
“Why don’t we find a place on the forecastle we can sit down,” suggested Oliver. “We’re in the open there and can see if any of the sailors are approaching.”
She nodded and led him to the front of the airship.
One thousand yards above the sea, the air was crisp. It rushed past them in a steady, refreshing stream. Sam’s black hair flipped around her face until she sat down, finding shelter from the constant wind behind the railing of the ship.
Oliver settled down beside her, leaning against the wooden post of the railing until he thought about what was on the other side of it, and he shifted, moving toward the center of the ship and settling against a spare coil of rope.
He asked Sam, “What is it, then, why were you watching me?”
Sighing, Sam slipped a thin-bladed poignard from her boot and began to unconsciously toy with it as she spoke. “There are certain rituals which require fluids from a person’s body. They’re incredibly strong, and in the right hands, they could grant a sorcerer immense power over someone. Think of it like… like glue. These fluids are like glue and can be used to bind a spirit to a person.”
Oliver frowned at the girl.
“Sorcerers cannot merely wave their hands and kill someone,” continued Sam. “Despite the stories the old grandmothers tell, it doesn’t work like that. The spirits from the underworld have no power here unless they find a bridge, something to close the gap between their world and ours.”
“And bodily fluids do this?” questioned Oliver.
