by J M Sanford
Two Eradinian gentlemen here to see you about prospects for a student with a strong interest in poisons.
His diary showed no appointments for that morning, but in the old days the Eradinian royals had always sent their daughters to the Academy, and the school needed to regain some of that prestige. Greyfell hesitated a moment – he was still in his pyjamas. Damn that obstinate girl Elizabeth and all the trouble that attended her… He dashed off a quick reply.
Direct them to my office at once, thank you.
As the message whooshed back down to the front desk, Greyfell grabbed a pair of trousers from his room and buttoned his jacket over his pyjama top. He didn't want to keep the Eradinians waiting a moment longer than necessary, not when he had no lessons to teach until the afternoon, and it might temper Elizabeth's recklessness if he left her to stew for a while this time. The Headmistress would want to devise her own punishment for the unruly student caught out after curfew, and it was best that she did, since Greyfell knew he'd been much too lenient with Miss Castle. Elizabeth would be safe enough in classes or in detention. Still, if Prince Archalthus' men were targeting her in her capacity as candidate Black Queen, and so close to the Academy, her continued involvement in the contest might well be unavoidable…
He put away the book on the history of the City Guard, but didn't clear the line charts. In his experience, a Master with a clear desk was a Master with something to hide. He cast about for a comb, but by then the unexpected visitors were knocking at the door of his office.
“Enter!” he called, and stood behind his desk to hide the fact that he hadn't had time to put on any shoes.
The two gentlemen were blond, bland-faced and smartly dressed, though their clothes were nowhere near as opulent as those of the Eradinian courtiers of old, and they didn't have that languid manner the Eradinians cultivated. They appeared to be twins, identical in every detail. The stiff awkward way they moved, the dullness of their eyes, and a dozen other things Greyfell couldn't consciously identify put him on guard at once. If these were Eradinian gentlemen, then Eradinia had changed since he'd last been there. Elizabeth had said something about a set of twins at the jade temple, although she’d said they were dark-haired, and these two were blond.
“Our humble apologies for calling on you without an appointment, Master Greyfell,” said one of the twin gentlemen. “Thank you for taking the time to meet with us.”
“Not at all, please come in,” said Greyfell, summoning the two of them into the room, keeping the doorway clear, should he wish to make a hasty exit. “Is the young lady with you?” he asked, craning his neck to look out into the corridor. He kept his attitude civil, in case he was mistaken, but if they'd come alone then that only made him all the more suspicious. The majority of the Academy's prospective students were bright and inquisitive children – an indulged princess who didn't care to see the Academy for herself wouldn't make an apt student.
“A visit will be arranged for her if the Academy proves promising,” said the first of the two gentlemen.
“We have many schools to visit and consider,” added his twin. “Only the best for the child.” Neither of the two spoke with an Eradinian accent, but the flatness of their voices made it difficult to place where else they might have come from.
Greyfell nodded. “And you say she has a special interest in poisons?” An uncommon interest for a young girl, but not unheard of for a prospective student at the Antwin Academy.
“Yes, and the lady at the door referred us to you. You are a Master of Poisons, are you not?” asked the gentlemen, with a suspicious, disapproving look at the collar of Greyfell's pyjamas, visible beneath his jacket.
“I teach a first year Potions class, amongst other things. Perhaps I can arrange for you to speak with a Master of more advanced chemistry, although I'm afraid you may have to make an appointment and return at a later date.”
“We hear the Antwin Academy has a most remarkable young lady amongst the student body,” said one of the gentlemen.
“There are a number of remarkable young ladies studying here,” said Greyfell, truthfully enough. “I'm sure you'd recognise the names of many of our alumni. That reminds me: the young lady who wishes to learn more about poisons… what is her name?”
The gentleman gave a blank stare: the ruse had obviously been prepared in advance, and he didn't seem to have the imagination to invent a name for the fictitious child on the spot. His brother's gaze had drifted to the line charts on the desk: the last known locations of the Pirate City, on the borders of civilisation. The dull eyes became sharp and shrewd as he scanned the map methodically. Perhaps, Greyfell thought, he should have put the line charts away after all. “These are some very far-flung locales,” said the blond gentleman. “Are you planning a voyage, Master Greyfell?”
~
While Greyfell dealt with the visiting gentlemen, Bessie was in her Correspondence and Penmanship class, quite oblivious to the new threat present within the walls of the Academy. She slumped on her desk, struggling to pay attention to the finer details of how one should address royalty in writing, doodling gloomily with her calligraphy pen as she tried her best to keep her eyes open. The Headmistress had graciously allowed Bessie to continue with a handful of classes where she couldn't easily cause trouble, but Bessie didn't much see the point. She'd rather just be sent home in disgrace. Meanwhile, friends and enemies alike had been quick to remind her how the Headmistress liked to fit the punishment to the offender’s worst fears and pet hates, so Bessie would be cleaning the highest rain gutters before the day was out.
The door burst open, banging against the wall, and the Penmanship class erupted into shouts of surprise and squeals of chairs being pushed back.
“Miss Castle!” Master Greyfell scanned the roomful of third years, seeking the small dark-haired figure. His eyes were wild, his agitation barely restrained. A couple of girls giggled when they noticed his bare feet.
Bessie raised her hand tentatively, still fearing punishment. “Here, Master Greyfell.”
Greyfell grabbed her by her raised arm, wrenching her from her seat. His grip was slippery with blood, and Bessie smelled iron. “The Prince's men are here,” he said. “Run to the West Door. I'll follow.”
Bessie didn't need telling twice.
The Correspondence and Penmanship Master, while neither a soldier nor an assassin, had been teaching at the Antwin Academy long enough to pick up a thing or two, and at the first sign of danger had drawn a long knife. He'd recognised Master Greyfell at once, though, and now looked at him questioningly.
“Intruders – they'll be here soon,” Greyfell warned him. “They can't be killed, but you must delay them!”
Bessie had taken flight at once despite her sleepiness, but out in the corridor she slowed, enough for Greyfell to catch up with her easily. “Will they be all right?” An Antwin girl knows when to run and hide from too-powerful enemies, but did that make it right to abandon her classmates to them?
“You are the Black Queen,” Greyfell reminded her. “The target. Is your Argean friend still docked in Iletia?”
Bessie nodded, and they headed for the docks, the grey skies still drizzling in the aftermath of a sudden rainstorm. Greyfell had a heavy bag slung over his shoulder – he must have prepared for this eventuality, or something like it, though Bessie did wonder what had happened to his shoes. The bag slowed him, and Bessie refused to leave him behind, readying herself to fight. The Academy staff's first priority would be to protect the students, and Bessie hoped that they'd soon capture the intruders, but at the same time… her journey was under way again! She slipped through the crowds, past big men with barrels, and queasy merchants just alighted from skyships. She’d visited Bryn’s ‘ship not long ago, and looked for its bright yellow sails in the last place she’d seen it docked. There were dozens of vessels of all sizes tethered at the edge of the Flying City, bobbing in the currents of the unsettled sky. Beneath them, and beneath the boards on which Bessie stood,
it was five thousand feet down to the ground. She tried not to think about it – although she found that much easier to do indoors. She focused her attention on the skyships and not the sky. There: Sharvesh's yellow sails made a bright beacon against the deep blue of rainclouds, but Greyfell stopped Bessie even as she made a beeline for the familiar skyship. “Wait,” he whispered, catching his breath. “They have… anticipated our plan.”
And then Bessie caught sight of the two blond gentlemen, patrolling the limits of the City where the tethered skyships floated. The two gentlemen looked unruffled by the chase, as if it had been no more than a casual stroll. Bessie readied herself for a fight: a fireball from out of the blue would at least put the blond gentlemen on the back foot… Sparks crackled across her fists.
Greyfell gripped her firmly by the elbow. “No, Elizabeth. I killed each of those creatures twice before I escaped my office, and they were unarmed then. We must elude them if we can.” Easier said than done, as the two blond gentlemen had stopped right between them and Sharvesh.
Greyfell and Bessie moved into the shadows, edging closer to the yellow-sailed skyship and the gentlemen, until they could get no closer without being seen. They took up a position behind a tall sedan chair with blue gauze curtains fluttering in the breeze and four burly men waiting to carry some pampered person from their skyship and into the City. Bessie watched the two blond gentlemen through a gap in the gauze curtains. “What are they doing?” she whispered.
With a flash of silver, one of the gentlemen had produced a pocket watch on a chain from his waistcoat pocket, and was speaking into it. If Bessie strained her ears and watched the gentleman's mouth closely, she could just about make out what he was saying… “We were attempting to infiltrate a school for young ladies: we feared weapons would arouse suspicion,” she heard him say over the noise of the docks. She'd already noted that although one twin had a sword now, the one holding the pocket watch appeared to be unarmed. “Yes, in retrospect we realise that,” he said, and there followed a long pause – try as she might, Bessie couldn't make out the other half of the communication. “We beg your pardon, but what is an Argean?” Another pause, then “Of course, Commander Breaker. We will search any such vessels present.” And with a snap of the pocket watch and a quick look around, the blond gentlemen were moving: one towards a tiny two-person cloudskipper of a 'ship with Argean writing all along her side; and the other towards the gangplank leading up to Sharvesh.
Bessie turned to Greyfell, half-wild with fear and frustration. “How can we elude them now?” she hissed at him.
But before the blond gentleman could set foot on the gangplank, Sharvesh’s Argean captain appeared to bar the way, all gleaming fangs and round amber eyes. Bryn, with his enormous sensitive ears now folded back tight against his skull, must have heard every word of the gentlemen's conversation, and he had no intention of submitting his beloved skyship to a search. Spitting and snarling, the Argean leapt down onto the dock with a thud that shook the timbers, bearing down on the startled blond gentleman. Crouched on all fours and bristling fiercely, Bryn could have been mistaken for a lion. “You will not 'get rid of the Argean'!” he roared. “And you will not lie in wait for my dear friends!”
The blond gentleman took a step back – he hadn't quite been prepared for such a sight. What's more, an Argean against an unarmed man would by no means be a fair fight, and though Bryn had likely only meant to frighten the would-be hijacker away (both from his own skyship and every other Argean vessel in the future) the other gentleman had heard the commotion and came running to his twin's aid, sword drawn. This was a fairer match: a man's short reach and long blade against an Argean's long reach and wicked hooked claws. Tail lashing, Bryn whirled to meet the swordsman. He caught the twin behind him off balance quite by accident, sending the gentleman tumbling into the gap between dock and skyship with a cry of dismay.
The swordsman stopped dead, a look of terrible anguish coming over his bland features at the loss of his twin. Without a word, he sheathed his sword, stepped over the edge of the dock and fell earthwards.
All was silent, every eye on Bryn, the unwitting victor of the fight. He sat down, baffled and horrified by this strange turn of events, shivering despite the mildness of the day.
Bessie was one of the first to pull herself together after the shock. “Captain,” she called, striding out from her hiding place, “were you injured by those pirates? No? Good.” As she spoke, she marvelled at the steadiness of her own voice. Falls happened from time to time, but all her life she’d dreaded the thought of actually seeing one… She strode up the gangplank, beckoning sharply for Bryn and Greyfell to follow. “Let us be on our way, then.” There was no time to waste in any attempt to soothe Bryn's nerves or her own, not with the possibility of more servants of the dragon prince lurking nearby. She only hoped that her words would be enough to satisfy gossip and salvage Bryn's reputation, should they ever return to Iletia.
4: SEARCH FOR THE WHITE KING
Amelia Lamb had travelled further in less than a year than she had in her whole life leading up to that momentous journey: over the land, through the sky and along the seabed. She'd travelled by mobile castle and skyship, and even ridden on the back of a giant snail. Now her journey had led her and her companions to the crowded streets of a Flying City – not the first of its kind that Amelia had ever seen, but the overwhelming novelty of it had yet to wear off. The original builders had obviously deliberated over the use of each square foot in their efforts to squeeze in as much city as they could, and subsequent builders had reconsidered and managed to squeeze in a little more, so that the streets were really too narrow for the mass of people. To make matters worse, Amelia's mother Meg had insisted on bringing along one of her giant snails, Tallulah. Seven feet tall and with her shell covered in fierce spikes, Tallulah towered over many of the people they encountered. Intimidating despite her gentle nature, the colossal mollusc's great bulk cleared a path easily, so that Meg, Amelia and her Paladin Harold kept close in the giant snail's rather slippery wake. In the light misty drizzle, Tallulah was in good spirits, gliding easily but unhurriedly along the wet streets, giving Amelia the chance to look around a bit, sighing to herself now and then that she would have liked a chance to shop at her leisure.
“Chin up,” said Meg. “You were asking the other day how the Flying Cities move. You'll find out soon.”
“What?” Amelia's stomach flipped. “You don't mean we're going to… Oh no!” Fearing that the City might lurch into motion at any minute, she clutched at Harold’s arm, too panicked to really notice that her bodyguard still blushed at any contact with her.
“It's nothing to worry about, dear,” said Meg, exasperated and making no effort to hide it. “Come along now – we don't want to be late.” She wasn't enjoying the weather quite as much as her snail: the fine rain had turned her fair curls into a mass of straw-coloured frizz, and settled in tiny beads on her spectacles.
“Why can't we go by skyship, like we did before?” Harold grumbled. He missed the romance and adventure of what little he'd seen of a skysailor's life, and he was a country boy who didn't like people crowding in on him any more than Amelia did. Like Meg, he was too short to see over the crowd.
Meg shook her head. “Another jaunt in a skyship? Do you think money grows on trees, boy?” She gave Amelia a sharp look too, as they’d already had to pay out of their own pockets for a replacement soul for one skyship, and that had been entirely Amelia’s fault. “Better to be able to blend into the crowd, anyway.”
Blend into the crowd? Amelia kept quiet, although she’d have liked to remind Meg that they were shepherding a seven-foot high snail through the streets of a Flying City. Diverse as the City's population might be, Tallulah turned more than a few heads. Amelia herself wore a plain brown hooded cloak, less to keep the spit of rain off, and more to hide her striking long blonde braids from anybody who might recognise her. Meg had tried to talk her into cutting her hair off, saying that prett
y young women attracted enough trouble as it was, but Amelia was having none of it.
“What about Mimi, then?” Amelia asked. They'd left the giant snail's sister hibernating under a tree, half a world away. “Don't you want to get back to her?”
“'Course I do, but she'll be all right for a long while yet.”
Just off the Keystone Square, they came to a private house: a tall grand building, albeit narrow, like so many of the houses in Flying Cities. Meg knocked at the door, and a quiet young man ushered them into a parlour. He scarcely batted an eyelash as Tallulah oozed over the threshold behind Meg.
“The Archmage will be with you shortly,” he said, and disappeared.
Amelia looked around anxiously, trying to decide whether the seating was decorative or functional, while Meg kept the giant snail off the expensive rug. A window stretching from floor to ceiling afforded a breath-taking view of storm clouds sailing implacably across the sky, and Harold went to it eagerly – he took his duties as Amelia's Paladin seriously, and throughout their journey, he'd done his best to make himself as fearless of heights as any skysailor. Since their victory at the jade temple, where they’d won the White Queen’s crown, along with armour and swords for her companions, he'd taken to wearing his new armour proudly at all times. Amelia thought he looked quite handsome in it, although she hadn’t quite worked up the nerve to try on the crown, even at Harold’s urging. It just didn’t seem right, somehow. Not yet.
