The Voyages of Trueblood Cay

by Suanne Laqueur

  What’s he like?

  Naria Nyland was hot-blooded and unapologetically carnal. Fen wasn’t at all surprised she wanted a piece of the young kepten. Who wouldn’t?

  But did it have to be Belmiro leading the lamb to the slaughter?

  At breakfast the next morning, the twins presented Trueblood with a set of pens and a new journal. It was larger than the ones he kept before.

  “We guessed you’d have a lot more to say,” Raj said.

  With his gifts under his arm and his soul brothers at his sides, Pelippé Trueblood walked to the wharves. The top of the Kaleuche’s main mast visible every step of the way, a needle growing into a spire, then into a tree trunk.

  He felt more incompetent and unworthy with every step. He’d be taking the helm of this behemoth at barely twenty years old, bereft of his father and many of the maristos he’d known since childhood. Old Rafil was gone—the faithful sailor followed his beloved commander into the eternal sea, and now lay interred in the mariners’ crypt. Merevhal was struggling through her difficult pregnancy. The Sisters, old and tired, were retiring together.

  Abrakam, thank Gods, pledged to stay. His wise, wonderful presence laid kindling on the hearth of Trueblood’s courage. As he always planned, Lejo was his boatswain and Raj his pilot. Calvo remained as quartermaster, Dhar and Beniv as the sail makers. Seven was still the cook, and with him came his younger brothers, Eleven and Sixten.

  Not all was lost.

  Maybe everything would be all right.

  Then Trueblood remembered his father was dead and nothing would ever be right.

  “Look,” Lejo said, pointing to the post by the Kaleuche’s gangplank. A little brown bird perched there, her expression cool, as if they’d kept her waiting.

  “It’s a lark,” Lejo said, holding out his hand. The old familiar jealousy in Trueblood’s stomach as the bird fluttered in the air and landed delicately on Lejo’s finger.

  “She’s brought us the soul of the Kaleuche,” Raj said.

  “This is a sign, Pé.” Lejo’s smile stretched east to west as he held the lark close to Trueblood, who held out his own hopeful hand. The lark trilled a two-tone whistle, then flew away.

  Trueblood led the twins to the aftercastle first. This had always been the center of his universe on the Cay, and it seemed a good place to get his bearings. It was laid out much the same, with two cabins off the foyer, a large sitting area, and the Kepten’s bedroom and study spanning the width of the stern.

  Kepten True’s blue coat lay neatly on the giant bed, sleeves spread wide, as if ready to welcome its new owner with a hug. Lejo picked it up and held it out by the shoulders.

  “No,” Trueblood said.

  “It’s time,” Raj said.

  “I can’t.”

  “It’s yours now.”

  “It won’t fit.”

  “Put it on, Pé,” Lejo said.

  He put it on. Barely holding his face together as he looked at his reflection in the cheval mirror. Behind him, the twins nodded, arms crossed and expressions sad, but satisfied.

  “You look good,” Raj said thickly.

  “Born to wear it,” Lejo said.

  “Fuck me.” Trueblood fumbled in the coat’s inside pocket, where Ikharus always kept a handkerchief. His hand came out holding a white feather.

  “Where’d that come from?” Raj said, taking it between his fingers.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Weird.” Lejo took it and ran the smooth vane alone his cheek before passing it back to Trueblood.

  They went into the study next, with its grand desk, inlaid shelves and cubbies, and the chart rack, which held the few rolled-up maps Raj had grabbed off the Cay. Everything else was empty—the drawers bare of even a scrap of paper.

  Trueblood sat at the desk and opened his notebook. With one of his new pens, he inscribed the first page:

  The Most Private Journal of Pelippé Trueblood

  An especial accounting of his life and voyages on the…

  The nib faltered, smudging the ink.

  “Strange to write Kaleuche now,” he said. “The Cay was my life.”

  “Make it part of your name,” Lejo said.

  “I can do that?”

  “Why not?” Raj said. “You’re the damned kepten.”

  “Pelippé Trueblood Cay.” It felt good on his tongue and sounded better in the air. He tore the page out of the notebook, crumpled it and started over.

  “Don’t forget your title,” Lejo said.

  The Most Private Journal of

  Kepten Pelippé Trueblood Cay

  An especial accounting of his life and voyages on the Kaleuche

  Today, with Raj Ĝemelos as my pilot and Lejo Ĝemelos as my boatswain, I, Kepten Pelippé Trueblood Cay take command of the giantship Kaleuche. All I do is as my father taught me. May he live in my heart, abide in my coat pockets and chart my course in all the days to come.

  The new kepten took the white feather, kissed it, and used it to mark his place before closing the notebook.

  They lunched at Merevhal and Dhar’s house, and the former boatswain gave Lejo her key to the Cay’s safe. “Take Abrakam when you open it,” she said. “He may need to explain some things in there.”

  So the centaur came onboard that afternoon, bringing the sack of books Raj had rescued from the Cay. They barely filled one shelf in his new cabin but he hugged Raj for the hundredth time after they were arranged, grateful beyond words.

  His keen, observant eyes never missing an opportunity to educate, Abrakam pointed out some of the Kaleuche’s architectural details. How the forecastle and aftercastle doors were carved with a nine-branched tree motif, a piece of faceted glass at the tip of each branch. The same motif was on the tiles of the sitting room’s hearth. The big round table was made from a cross-section of a Nye tree, its surface ringed with thousands and thousands of spidery lines.

  They went into the Kepten’s study and sadness pierced Trueblood as they opened the safe. He knew about a few things held within, but not all. Ikharus should’ve been here for this rite of passage.

  Raj’s eyes shone as Abrakam unrolled the delicate chart for the single accessible harbor on the Altynai coast. It was the only one of its kind in the world and it belonged to House Tru.

  “You can sell that and make a fortune,” the centaur said. “But you’ll also make a lifetime enemy of the Altyns. You decide.”

  A paper-wrapped object was unwrapped to reveal a small chunk of kyrrh, the rare healing resin.

  “This is over twenty years old,” Abrakam said. “The Altyns gave it to your father when he rescued Fen il-Kheir. Along with…”

  He opened a small pouch and tipped three waxy beads onto his palm. “Fadara.”

  “Holy Helos,” Trueblood said. “You could buy a house with that.”

  “Three houses.”

  “Get rid of it, Abe,” Raj said tightly.

  The centaur shook his head. “You’d be a fool to sail without it.”

  “But fadara’s illegal,” Lejo said.

  “Aye, and highly addictive,” Abrakam said, pulling the string of the pouch tight again. “But useful in an emergency or a dire situation. Kepten True kept it locked in the safe for twenty years but he was damn grateful to know it was there. I suggest you treat it the same way, Pé. Ah, look what we have here…”

  With two hands, the centaur lifted out a stack of small leather notebooks. All of Trueblood’s childhood journals. “See, Troubled? Your father taught you everything he knew and you wrote it all down. With pictures.”

  “You were smart to put them in the safe,” Raj said.

  “I wrote some things I didn’t want you to read.”

  Raj reached for a notebook and Trueblood smacked his fingers.

  “Oh Gods, Pé,” Lejo said, as he carefull
y pulled from the safe a remnant of green velvet, embroidered with red and gold leaves. The treasured piece of Noë Treeblood’s skirt.

  On Trueblood’s sixteenth birthday, when he became a majoro, he felt a need to put a symbolically childish thing away. He asked Ikharus to lock the cloth in the safe. If he hadn’t, the bit of green velvet would be rotting on the ocean floor. Same with the journals, along with all his father’s imparted knowledge.

  “Nothing’s an accident, is it, Abe?” he said.

  “No, lad. Everything happens for a reason.”

  “For the record, I don’t like this reason,” Raj said.

  Left in the safe were a few random trinkets—valuables given to the kepten for safekeeping. Last was a folded piece of paper with a list of cities, all crossed out save one.

  “What’s this?” Trueblood asked.

  The centaur’s face became serious. “During the sack of Alondra, the kheirons salvaged thirty casks of Nye from the vault. They flew the casks out to the Cay. Your father cached the spice in these cities, bringing them back to Valtourel a little at a time.”

  He smoothed the paper on the desk and pointed to the last name, Aybar—an unsavory port in the north of Minosaros.

  “Three casks are still there, lads. Hidden in the basement of a House Tru hostel are the last reserves of Nye in the entire world.”

  That night, when Naria sent for him, Trueblood asked if she knew about the secret caches of Nye.

  “Of course,” she said. “Mother told me. But not until she knew she was dying.”

  She stroked his head as he sighed away the last of the day’s bittersweetness.

  “I’ll be going back to Hokosia at the end of the week,” she said.

  “Unfinished business with the Emperor?”

  A tortured sigh. “Once a year, Xuan-Gavriel decides he wants to marry me and annex the western part of Pellandro. Not necessarily in that order.”

  “Do you ever want to get married?”

  “Not to him.”

  “Ever?”

  “I don’t think so. No.”

  “Why not?”

  “Never saw any need for it.”

  “Not even for love?”

  “I have plenty of love.” She stretched her chin out and kissed Trueblood. “Don’t I?”

  He laughed against her mouth, wondering what it was like to be so self-assured.

  “If you need anything,” Naria was saying, “you tell Belmiro. He’ll either know what to do or who to ask.”

  “What’s his official title?”

  “Belmiro?” She shrugged. “He’s my official know what to do-er.”

  Trueblood laughed. “No really. What is he?”

  “I’d tell you, but then I’d have to jail you. And we’d have nobody who could fetch the last of the world’s Nye.” She moved up and onto his chest, rubbing against his cock. “How does it feel to be indispensable?”

  “Hard.”

  “I grasped that right away,” she said, grasping it.

  They laughed and kissed. Then she fucked him senseless. Afterward they fell asleep and Trueblood woke to the longing pull in his heart. He kissed Naria and slipped from her bed.

  Walking back to his room, it occurred to him that for the second night in a row, she didn’t seem unhappy to see him go.

  Calvo ran a critical eye over the ship, taking inventory and making lists. The cabins had their giant bedsteads, the aftercastle had its massive furniture. Otherwise, the Kaleuche was bare bones. Trueblood had to outfit it with everything. Pots, pans, dishes, mattresses, bed linens. Barrels, crates, casks, hogsheads, demijohns. Rope, canvas, candles.

  “We have no godsdamned matches,” Calvo muttered, three times as irritable and moody as he was on the Cay. Trueblood took the quartermaster’s wrath in stride and was even grateful for it—without Calvo’s expertise, he’d be fucked.

  A stream of carts and wagons made its way to the ship and began unloading. At last the crew had something to do and they swung into action with a goodwill that made Trueblood suspicious.

  “Don’t get too used to this attitude,” Calvo said with a rare grin. “And next time you pass the tanner’s shop, I would invest in a new strap.”

  Trueblood didn’t relish being a disciplinarian any more than when he was a boy. He left Calvo in the holds and went on deck with the twins. The Kaleuche’s rigging was what concerned him next. They had the one set of sails they came home on. No extras and no supply of canvas. The Sisters, Beniv and Dhar were already hard at work weaving. Trueblood was more worried about what the sails hung on.

  The height of the main mast was beyond comprehension. Every crew member had stood at is base and looked up, but nobody ventured higher than the futtocks shroud. Someone had to go first.

  “Well,” Trueblood said, sliding out of his blue coat. “Let’s see if this boat likes me.”

  “Take a waterskin,” Raj said, looking up to the crow’s nest with crossed arms. “You may be away overnight.”

  “Or not at all,” Lejo said. The lark perched on his shoulder gave a two-tone whistle of agreement.

  “Then I leave everything to you, Raj.” Trueblood glanced at Lejo. “You get nothing.”

  Lejo turned slow eyes on him. “Kiss my ass.”

  “I love you, too.”

  Loaded up with a waterskin, Trueblood drew a last breath and put a foot on the rigging.

  Come with me, Da.

  He didn’t intend on an audience but when he reached the futtocks shroud, the entire crew was on deck. By the top of the first gallant, the wharves were getting crowded.

  “I said just Da come with me,” he mumbled.

  The fear stayed healthy and under his control. He stopped to rest frequently and plan, not looking up too long nor down too long. He put arms around the mast, closed his eyes and exhaled. He nearly jumped out of his skin when a voice shouted from quite near.

  “You going to climb that mast or marry it?”

  Heart pounding, Trueblood looked around to see Fen il-Kheir hovering in the air.

  “Kepten Trueblood.”

  “Fancy meeting you here.”

  “A kheiron always guards first-time climbers.”

  “I’m honored.”

  “And my father would geld me if I didn’t keep the tradition.”

  Trueblood felt his eyes narrow. “You know, some things are better off in the silence of your heart.” He reached for his waterskin and held the kheiron’s cold, blue gaze as he took a sip.

  “Just doing my job,” Fen said.

  “Then if you’ll excuse me, I’ll just do mine.”

  “Do you rather I fly in or out of your sight, Kepten?”

  “If you’re going to be a bitch, I’d rather you fly home.”

  Hovering between his beautiful wings, Fen glanced up at the crow’s nest, then back at Trueblood. “Out, then.”

  He stepped off the edge of nothing, canted forward and dove into an elegant spiral, disappearing behind Trueblood. In his wake, another voice spoke, this one even closer by.

  He’s testing you, Ikharus-Lippé True said. Don’t show off for him. Just do your job.

  It took Trueblood nearly an hour to ascend and descend. He rested, then climbed it again, this time with the twins, in about the same time.

  “Well, lads, we’ve got a problem,” he said.

  “Aye, it takes too fucking long to go aloft,” Raj said.

  “At this rate, we’ll be living on the masts day and night. And if the wind changes suddenly, we’re fucked.”

  Lejo’s mouth twisted as he looked from crow’s nest to deck. “We can learn to climb faster,” he said. “But…”

  “Or maybe we learn to climb better,” a shy voice said behind them. They turned to see young Sixten, a book in one hand, a sheaf of papers in the other. Pencil
perched behind an ear and a feverish excitement in his eyes. “I have an idea, Kep.”

  He spread out his materials on the big round table in the aftercastle. The book was called A History of Spice Cultivation in the Old Forest. Sixten opened it to the center, turning it sideways to show a Nye tree illustrated across both pages. “Maybe we shouldn’t treat the mast like a mast,” he said. “Instead, treat it like a tree. Which, technically, it is.”

  They studied the system of ropes, pulleys and harnesses that got the Nye harvesters from ground to canopy, and the baskets of flowers from canopy to ground. “Something like this would let us climb the masts faster and safer,” Sixten said, twirling his pencil through his fingers.

  “That’s how Da got Fen il-Kheir down from a tree,” Trueblood said. “The pulleys were already in place. Still waiting there and ready, hundreds of years after they were last used.”

  “It worked before, it can work again,” Raj said.

  “If it isn’t broken, don’t fix it,” Lejo said.

  Trueblood took a long, considering look at Sixten. He weighed the hunch in his gut against the lad’s youth, then clapped a hand on Sixten’s shoulder. “Let’s do it. What do you need and who do you want?”

  At the end of the week, Sixten was promoted to ŝnuromastisto—the rope master.

  “That’s the dumbest word I ever heard,” the lad said. “It sounds like I’m in charge of snoring.”

  “Or sneering,” Eleven said, his expression sour.

  I’m a bit worried about Eleven, Trueblood wrote in his most private journal. It’s obvious he feels his brothers have their specialties while he has none. It’s true not every sailor has exceptional talent for a task, but those who have a basic aptitude for all tasks are just as crucial to the ship. Eleven’s talent is showing up, day after day, and doing whatever job he’s given with consistency. I wish we had a title for this.

  Ha. The ink is drying on those words and I realize we do have one: maristo.

  The rope-and-pulley system was installed on the main mast, and Sixten and Lejo began training the crew on using it. Some of the maristos thumbed their noses at the harnesses, until one of them broke an arm falling from the futtocks shroud. Then a stubborn majoro climbed the mizzenmast without being roped in, lost his shit halfway up and had to be rescued. Trueblood waited at the bottom of the mast, his new strap doubled up in his hand. He gave the moron the traditional nine for breaking the kepten’s rule, and three more for wasting everyone’s time.