Tenorran made a face. Somehow he doubted his mother would order her own execution. His only other family, his father, had been captain of an Armada ship lost with all hands during a minor but costly skirmish with Marvanna three years earlier.
He went back to reading. Most of the strictures would be easy to follow. He’d never had difficulty keeping quiet about details of the ship’s next posting, unlike some of his fellow lieutenants. He never got drunk and bragged to a dockside whore about their most recent exploits. He never whispered a juicy tidbit to a close friend, or listened if anyone tried to pass one to him.
The requirement in the event of capture gave him a moment’s pause. He would be expected to end his own life rather than fall into enemy hands. He’d never realized the true significance of the Secrets emblem before.
He swallowed. Death was preferable to torture or rotting in a Marvannan prison. If suicide was required, it would be an honorable fulfillment of his duty, not a cowardly escape.
He reached the end of the document and stared at the blank space at the bottom. Was he ready for this responsibility? He was only twenty-four. Although sometimes it seemed he’d been at sea his whole life, it had only been six years. He’d learned an immense amount in that time about self-discipline, but he still had a long way to go before he would have the kind of steadfast courage and commitment to duty he admired so much in Captain Noshorre.
If he refused, though, it would affect his career, no matter what the captain promised. He might remain on the standard command path, but he couldn’t count on this offer ever coming again. While if he accepted, he’d be on track to become one of the highest ranking officers in the Armada. Admirals were drawn from the ranks of Secrets officers. They had to be, because only a man who understood the workings of the Armada’s secret weapon could devise strategies that effectively exploited its capabilities.
This had to be because of his mother. If not a result of her influence, an attempt to win her favor. Commander Kesolla would anticipate good things as the officer who’d chosen Verinna Fovarre’s only child for rapid advancement.
For a moment the old injustice caught at the back of his throat. He squashed it reflexively before it could blossom into bitterness. In every aspect of Ramunnan society save one, being male was a huge advantage. Men made up the military, and the aristocracy, and held every other position worth aspiring to. He could dream of achieving any height he desired—except the one that should have been his birthright.
A thousand years ago, when the ancient wizards had ruled an empire that encompassed all Ravanetha, pairs of Oligarchs, one male, one female, always a married couple, held power. The last female Oligarch, Tharanirre Fovarre, lost two husbands and fellow Oligarchs before marrying her third. The holy Yashonna had been much younger than she and devoted to religion, not politics, so for many years she’d ruled alone in all but name. Upon her death, in the chaos that accompanied the fall of the Marvannan empire, her daughter had fled to Ramunna and declared herself Matriarch on the strength of her mother’s reputation. For all the centuries since, the Matriarchy had passed from mother to daughter. Occasionally a Matriarch had died without a female child, and the office had passed to her sister or niece. But never in all the history of Ramunna had a son, or even the daughter of a son, inherited the Matriarch’s power.
If Tenorran had been a girl, he would have been prepared from birth to succeed his mother. Today he would be involved in every decision she made. She might even have begun transferring some of her responsibilities to her heir. The succession would be secure, and everyone in Ramunna would look forward to an orderly transition when in due time Verinna grew old and returned to the Mother.
Instead, the question of who would succeed the current Matriarch was a huge controversy. The upheaval Ramunna was experiencing, even their current military mission, was entirely due to his mother’s lack of a suitable heir. After his birth she’d suffered loss after loss, never again giving birth to a child that lived more than a few days. If she died daughterless, her cousin Malka would inherit the Matriarchy. And Malka was a devotee of the Purifiers, a strict and ascetic sect that held sway in Marvanna, although it remained a minority in Ramunna. If she became Matriarch, she’d made it clear she would promote the Purifiers to Ramunna’s official religion and seek political unification with Marvanna. The things that made Ramunna great—the profitable trade conducted largely by the heretical Dualists, the University whose investigations into the natural world were viewed by the Purifiers as sacrilege against the Mother, the Armada that ruled the seas in unchallenged might—would be lost forever.
In desperation, his mother had chased a legend, and impossibly, caught it. Tenorran had never believed the stories that a handful of the ancient wizards had retained their powers and fled across the ocean. But the ship Verinna had sent into the Eastern Sea to seek them had returned with confirmation of their existence. Before a year had passed, two of those wizards had arrived in Ramunna and turned their healing powers to helping Verinna conceive and bear a daughter.
What had followed was a matter for wild gossip and speculation. The official account, which had accompanied the orders which sent Tenorran’s ship and many others on their mission, stated that the wizards had succeeded and Verinna had become pregnant with a healthy girl. However, they’d proven to be Marvannan agents when they tricked Verinna into believing that her child was a boy. On the basis of that lie she had ended the pregnancy. But rumor suggested she’d actually been deceived by the wizards’ foes, and the aborted child had indeed been male.
The pain that had hit Tenorran when he first heard the news stabbed him again. Whatever the truth of the child’s sex, his mother had believed it to be a boy, and she’d valued her son so little she’d discarded him. She’d viewed him as nothing but an obstacle on the path to the daughter she wanted. The child who might have been Tenorran’s little brother was dead. She’d sacrificed him for the sake of his still-nonexistent sister.
Just as she’d done with Tenorran.
Even while she’d been married to his father, he’d seen his mother only rarely. She’d turned him over to nurses and nannies to raise. That was typical of aristocratic Ramunnan families—most of his friends and fellow officers had been raised the same way. But at least they’d known they were valued. He’d become aware very early that to his mother he was less than nothing. Between her rule of Ramunna and her obsession with bearing a daughter, there was no room in her life for her one living child. When she’d thrown his father out in the hope that some other man could give her the daughter she craved, she’d taken it for granted Shorren would take their son with him.
So if Commander Kesolla thought he could curry favor with the Matriarch by favoring Tenorran, he was sadly mistaken. She’d never notice. If someone called it to her attention, she wouldn’t care. He doubted she knew which ship he served on, or was aware that the Sinvanna was one of those she’d sent to wreak vengeance on the wizards of Tevenar.
He read the final line of the document, written in letters twice as big as all the rest. I swear before the Mother to be bound by these covenants. If I break them, may she cast my soul from her presence to wander homeless forever.
All right, then. Tenorran slapped the paper onto the desk and picked up the waiting quill. This opportunity was far too good to pass up. He would seize it, and he would meet and exceed all Commander Kesolla’s expectations. He would keep the Armada’s secret as well as he kept his own. He would devote himself to learning everything they taught him, and rise through the ranks as quickly as they could promote him. If the Mother willed it, someday he would earn a post as admiral. He would win power and authority by his own efforts, not as a gift from his mother.
He dipped the pen in the inkwell and inscribed his name in big, bold, letters. He looked up to find Captain Noshorre watching with a pleased expression. Tenorran nodded sharply to his superior, and the captain gave an answering nod.
Noshorre rose and went to the door. Opening it, he
called, “Kesolla, you have a new protégé.”
Commander Kesolla must have been waiting in the next cabin, because he appeared immediately. He was in his sixties, grizzled and weatherbeaten, face and hands marked by scattered burn scars. He nodded approvingly at Tenorran. “Lieutenant Fovarre. Welcome to Secrets. I’m ready to begin your initiation.”
Tenorran looked to Captain Noshorre. “I’m due to stand watch in an hour.”
Noshorre waved that off. “Commander Kesolla wants you for the rest of the day. I’ll take care of changing the roster. You’ll continue with your normal duties, but from now on Secrets training will be included in your schedule. Your first responsibility is to Commander Kesolla. If his orders interfere with your other assignments, send word to me or the duty officer and we’ll take care of it.”
Commander Kesolla said, “First things first. Give me your off hand, Lieutenant.”
Tenorran obediently extended his right arm toward the commander. Kesolla pushed up Tenorran’s sleeve and buckled a leather sheath around his forearm. The small dagger it held rested on the back of Tenorran’s wrist, where the pommel with its single diamond protruded slightly from the sleeve Kesolla pulled down over it. That subtle symbol was the only insignia Secrets officers wore.
Kesolla met his eyes gravely. “Lieutenant Fovarre, this is the sign of our brotherhood. Never take it off. Wear it day and night, waking and sleeping, when you bathe and when you piss and when you make love. When you die, you’ll be buried with it still on your arm. Once each day draw the dagger, inspect it to make sure it remains clean and sharp, tend it as necessary, and return it to its sheath. The only other reason you may draw it is to carry out your final duty.” He touched two fingers to the hilt of his own dagger.
Tenorran copied the solemn gesture. “I understand, sir.”
Kesolla saluted Captain Noshorre and turned to leave. Tenorran saluted in turn and followed him from the office. He flexed his wrist. The dagger’s sheath was well designed; it didn’t hamper his movement at all. He could almost forget it was there, and the deadly vow it represented.
Instead of going forward as Tenorran had expected, Kesolla led him back and down, to a small locked room deep in the stern of the ship.
Kesolla turned to him and eyed him critically. “Curious?”
“No, sir,” Tenorran answered, although of course he was burning with curiosity.
Kesolla snorted. “You’re a pretty good liar, son.” He gestured toward the door. “Our first secret. Most people believe that the heart of the mystery we guard lies in the Secrets room in the bow. That’s on purpose. The weapon is located there, but it’s not where we keep the true Secret. That lies here. The rest is only metal, something any smith could forge.”
He pulled a ring of identical looking keys from his belt, selected one, inserted it into the lowest of three keyholes, and turned it. He repeated the process for the topmost keyhole, then the middle. “Insert the wrong key, or in the wrong order, and the mechanism triggers. You’ve got ten minutes to repeat the process correctly. After that time, or after five wrong attempts, a device inside strikes a spark.” He raised an eyebrow at Tenorran and pushed the door open a crack. “It’s been twenty years since we lost a ship to a Secrets officer’s error. In that time, this arrangement has kept the Secret out of Marvannan hands more than a dozen times. Most recently three years ago.” He gave Tenorran a significant look.
Tenorran gulped and nodded. So that’s what had happened to Father’s ship. He’d always wondered why the Marvannans had sunk it instead of capturing it and trying to discover the Secret. Now it was clear they’d tried and failed.
He knew, as did everyone who’d seen it used, that the Secret produced violent explosions. But he’d never seen the Secret itself, and had no idea what form it might take.
Kesolla waved casually at the walls. “There are similar devices embedded in the walls, ceiling, and floor, in case enemies try to cut through.” He adjusted the lantern he held until only a few tiny openings admitted faint beams of light. “Do these precautions strike you as extreme?”
Tenorran knew better than to try to dissemble again. “Yes, sir.”
A smile answered his honesty, but it quickly faded. “This is the first thing a Secrets officer must learn. The Secret is more important than anything. The Armada only retains its supremacy while no other country possesses this weapon. We sacrifice anything to protect it. Our lives, the ship, a battle, even a war. If Ramunna itself falls, we destroy all traces the Secret ever existed.”
“I understand, sir.” Tenorran forced the words past a dry throat.
Kesolla pushed the door open. He stepped inside, Tenorran close at his heels.
The room was packed floor to ceiling with hundreds of barrels. Kesolla carefully shut the door behind them, relocked it, and hung the lantern on a hook in the center of the ceiling. He turned to a worktable beside the door, beckoning Tenorran to stand beside him. “This is where we store the secret and prepare it for use. You’ll learn how to perform all the steps in time, but for now, watch.”
Kesolla took a square piece of linen cloth from a bin and spread it flat. He lifted a barrel onto the workbench and released clamps that held the lid in place. After lifting off the lid and setting it aside, he selected a long-handled wooden scoop from a selection of tools hanging from hooks on the wall. Tenorran thought it looked like something a baker would use to measure flour.
With a conspiratorial glance at Tenorran, Kesolla dipped the scoop into the barrel. When he drew it out, it was full of a dark, grainy powder. Kesolla chose a wooden tool shaped like a flat-bladed knife and used it to scrape the excess powder back into the barrel so the scoopful was perfectly level. With measured, certain movements he poured the powder into a neat pile in the center of the linen square.
“Here it is, son. The Secret we’re sworn to keep. It doesn’t look like much, but this is what allows the Armada to rule the seas. This is what’s kept Ramunna free of Marvannan domination for the last fifty years. Go ahead, get a good look. You can touch it if you want.” Kesolla demonstrated, dipping a finger into the powder and rubbing a few grains between the tips of finger and thumb.
Tenorran gingerly copied him. The powder felt like coarse sand, each grain a distinct little dark grey sphere. “It burns?”
“That it does. Suddenly and violently. Pack enough of it into a confined space and touch it with a flame, and it explodes.”
So this was the source of the thunderclaps that shook the ship every time the secret weapon discharged its deadly projectiles. He rubbed it meditatively between his fingers a moment more, then followed Kesolla’s example as he dropped the grains back onto the pile, wiped his fingers on the cloth, then rinsed off the last grey smudges in a barrel of water beside the worktable.
Kesolla gathered the cloth around the powder and secured it with a length of twine. The resulting bundle was about the size of a man’s fist. After carefully returning all the tools and materials to their places, Kesolla hefted it. “We’re done here for the moment. Follow me.”
He retrieved the lantern and unlocked another door in the corner of the room. This one led to a narrow dark corridor that ran along the curved hull of the ship, all the way from the stern to the bow. At the end a steep stair led upward. Kesolla unlocked another door and led Tenorran into a room somewhat larger than the first. This one was wedge-shaped and lit by a number of narrow slits high up that admitted faint sunlight. In the center a huge horizontal iron cylinder rested on a wheeled wooden structure.
Tenorran caught his breath. He’d seen the tip of the long tube protruding through the hatch in the hull. But he’d never realized the whole weapon was so large.
A dozen Secrets officers were waiting. They saluted the commander and greeted Tenorran when Kesolla introduced him. Kesolla displayed the bundle of powder. “Let’s show Lieutenant Fovarre how it’s done.”
Tenorran pressed his back to the wall while the men went through a smooth, obviously well-rehear
sed ritual. One swabbed out the tube with a damp mop on a long handle. Kesolla placed the bundle of powder at the mouth of the tube, and another man shoved it deep inside with a similar tool, this one ending in a flat disk. Next a crumpled wad of rags was pushed in, and finally one of the officers took an iron sphere the size of Tenorran’s head from a neat pile next to the weapon and fitted it into the tube. Several men helped pound it into place against the powder and rags.
“Everything must be packed tight,” Kesolla explained. “We’re using solid shot for this exercise, but we’ve got explosive shot also, with some of the Secret inside a hollow shell, as well as scatter shot for use against infantry.” He rang a large bell mounted next to the weapon. Tenorran was familiar with the signal that indicated to the rest of the ship’s crew that this discharge of the weapon was a drill, not the herald of an enemy attack.
One of the officers turned a crank to open the shutters covering a small square hatch in the ship’s hull. Five men on each side rolled the massive tube forward until its tip protruded from the hatch. Kesolla beckoned Tenorran close to the rear of the weapon. He pulled a metal flask from inside his coat, uncorked it, and poured a small amount of the powder into a depression in the rear of the tube.
One of the officers brought forward a long coil of white rope that smoldered at one end. Kesolla straightened, took a visual inventory of each of the officers and their positions, and nodded. “You might want to cover your ears, son.”
Tenorran felt ridiculous putting his hands over his ears like a frightened child, but the rest of the officers were doing it, so he copied their gesture. Kesolla said, “Fire.” The officer touched the glowing end of the rope to the little pool of powder.
The powder sparked, releasing a puff of smoke. A moment later a wall of sound hit Tenorran like a blow. A brilliant flash and billows of grey smoke burst from the mouth of the tube. The weapon hurtled backwards and crashed into the rear of its wooden cradle. A metallic, ashy smell filled the room.
Beyond the Boundary Stones (The Chronicles of Tevenar Book 3) Page 54
