This caused a sustained babble among the Convenors. It rose until they were on the verge of shouting.
Finally, the speaker hammered his gavel, eventually silencing the hubbub. “What could you possibly have to indicate the Ualtarites are in possession of the Heart?”
Sophie limped to Maray’s side. She picked the white fleck out of the fringes of her long golden robe.
All a show, she thought, raising it high. Constitutional chicken. Take your time. Pacing out her steps with deliberation, she crossed the floor, finally dropping it in the speaker’s palm.
“And so?”
She fished in her skirt, groping for the sealed tube full of packing peas. She rubbed the glass on her princess skirt to build up a bit of static, uncorked it, and flung the peas out on the scribes’ table. They did what they always did: bounced everywhere and stuck to things. Those that didn’t cling to the inside of the jar scattered, some lodging on the papers. A few spilled onto the carpet and rolled under the desks.
Suddenly Maray looked disturbed.
The Speaker was, visibly, puzzled. “And these are?”
“These? I call them packing peas. They’re polystyrene—”
“Are they inscribed?”
“Nope. They’re ordinary everyday technology. And I’m betting you’ve never seen anything like them,” she said.
The speaker squeezed the foam experimentally. “They fall outside my experience. Anyone?”
“They are mundane gadgetry from the outlands,” Annela said. “Not commonly available within the Fleet.”
“So recorded. What’s the point of these packing peas, Kir Hansa?”
Sophie said. “Before I turned Yacoura over to the pirates—”
“Point of fact: nobody from my nation has laid hands on the Heart,” said Convenor Brawn.
“Whatever. I packed the Heart in these things before I gave it up.”
“Who says so?” Maray was looking uneasy. “You? We’ve established that your word is worthless—”
“Captain Garland Parrish—”
“Ah! Parrish!”
“—and Tonio Capodoccio, the first mate of Nightjar, saw me do it. Think you can impeach their honor too? They’re right over there.”
Maray flinched, ever so slightly. “Kirs, she could easily have concealed that item in her hand before seeming to take it from my garment. She might have dropped it on me in the petitioner’s loft.”
“Ah, but they don’t travel alone, do they?” Sophie addressed the Speaker again. “You search Maray’s rooms on Ascension. I guarantee you’ll find packing peas there. She may be honorable, but she is messy. That place was an absolute junk warren, and there’d be no cleaning the peas out once she opened up the bag. See how far two tablespoons of them have gone in thirty seconds? There’s one under that guy’s—that Convenor, sorry—his foot. Garbage spreads.”
Maray was trying—and failing—to hold onto a derisive expression. “This is a child’s gambit.”
Sophie decided not to give her a chance to get the wind back in her sails. Instead she pointed across the floor at Parrish’s satchel, as though it were her own.
Theater, she thought again.
“While we’re talking about weird mummer garbage from my insignificant nation, I’ve been making pictures of everything I could since I got here. I’m curious, which you guys seem to hate. I’ve been asking questions and noting answers and even taking the occasional name.”
“Kirs—” Maray protested. “This woman has no standing.”
“Sophie,” said Annela Gracechild. “The materials you’ve gathered—”
Oh, don’t go telling them you had Verena erase them all …
“No, no, no,” she said. “Explaining where my information comes from is your problem, Convenor. Maray says I’m a liar. If I’ve figured out anything about all this—” She waved a hand at the big room. “—it’s that that’s a huge insult. Am I allowed to prove my honesty or not?”
This raised a small spontaneous cheer, led by the little sylph from Erinth.
She couldn’t quite wait until the speaker re-established order. “I’m not sitting here with my mouth shut like a mouse and letting her label me a liar and a thief.”
“Your documents are no substitute for your good name,” Maray said.
“You just made it, like, the word of law that I don’t have a good name,” Sophie said. “But you know what? Keep it. I have more to back up my words than just hot air and dead slaves. What did you do, enchant him so he could swing a sword? What happens if we look for polystyrene peas aboard your ship? Will we find them? Yes or no?”
“Consider your answer, Maray.” The speaker raised his hand; the styrofoam pea lay in his palm, a nonbiodegradeable pearl. “If Ascension were to be searched and any sign of the Heart’s having been there were found, your people would face significant loss of face. If you were proved to have lied to the Watch and this Convene, I need hardly tell you how serious that would be.”
Maray swallowed. “Yes, Speaker.”
Annela wasn’t one to ignore an advantage: “Kirs, the penalty for attempting to break the Fleet Compact is a sinking. If Ascension has Yacoura—if it were to be found there—I would move that the Captain of Temperance be ordered to speak that ship’s name.”
Complete silence spilled from that. The tension in the room ratcheted up, up, so high it felt like Sophie’s eyes might start bleeding.
“Leave that for now, Convenor Gracechild,” the speaker said. “Well, Tanta? Do you wish to answer Kir Hansa’s question? Has Yacoura been in your keeping? Shall we put your word to the test with a search?”
Maray was now the color of cottage cheese. “What if the inscription were to turn up by … say, sundown?”
Snap. The tension broke.
“Say noon. The blockade of Tiladene is to be withdrawn. I believe we’ll be tasking a body of warships to return Kir Lais Dariach to his homeland and inspect the region.”
“The naval maneuvers that were so lately misunderstood by the Duelist-Adjudicator are coming to a close,” Maray said, bowing her head. “The ships will embark for our capital within two days.”
There were shouts from the starboard side of the galley, but the speaker waved them down. “Acceptable. Now, to the matter of spiritual reparations to Isle of Gold for the sinking of the Lucre. This is an active case and the Convene will continue to await a Judicial ruling.”
“We must protest,” said the old Isle of Gold Convenor, Brawn, but he seemed almost bored now. He knew it was over.
“So recorded. Kirs Hansa and Maray, unless either of you has something to add, why don’t you surrender the floor?”
Sophie gathered her skirts, fought down an urge to make a rude gesture at Maray, and made her way back to the petitioner’s bench.
Bram nudged her with an elbow. “I think you won.”
Sophie nodded, a little breathless. They’d bought it: a whole world’s government, and she’d got them with an empty satchel and some litter. “Chalk one up for the girl with no poker face.”
“You were angry,” Bram said. “Hides a lot.”
“Are you still with us, Kir Hansa?”
She leaped to her feet, cheeks flaming.
“Kir Gracechild informs us you have violated the terms of your travel visa. You are ordered home as soon as is practicably possible, and if you wish to return to the Fleet, you must convince the Passage Office that you can keep your agreements. Bramwell Hansa, you are likewise deported, but without prejudice.”
Ouch.
“You win, thanks much, get the hell out,” Bram murmured.
“Excuse me?”
“Nothing,” he said. “Thank you, Speaker.”
“This emergency session of the Convene is closed.” He clanged his hand bell.
Sophie managed to emulate Parrish’s bow and leave the Convene with her head high.
CHAPTER 27
Annela’s reward to Sophie for a job well done was to more or less put her
under house arrest.
“I confess you had me worried, but you did well,” she said, after she’d marched them back up to the suite of rooms she occupied on Constitution and had ordered a host of clerks and other assistant types to pack up the few remnants she was allowing her and Bram to take home. “We’ll have Yacoura in government hands by dinnertime, and we’ve dispatched battleships to Tiladene. With Lais Dariach secured and restored to health, the Ualtarites’ pretext for the invasion has been undermined.”
“So war’s gonna fizzle out before it begins?” Sophie asked.
“That’s the likely outcome,” she said. “It’s not an exaggeration to say you’ve prevented a catastrophe.”
“You’re welcome. Will the Tiladenes succeed in breaking Ualtar’s silk monopoly?”
“Hard to say. The Ualtarites will file for an order of restraint, in all probability.”
“Why didn’t they just do that in the first place?”
“They preferred to invade, primarily—they regard the Tiladenes as thoroughgoing perverts, not to mention easy prey. They’re part of the bloc that resents the Cessation and would like to resume hostilities. We can wager they didn’t hatch this plan in a vacuum. That aside, they had no reasonable proof of what Lais was up to. Now it’s been discussed in the Convene; it’s a matter of record. They can use the transcripts of this morning’s session as grounds to file a suit.”
“Loopholes and paperwork,” Sophie said. “You guys seem to have an excess of legal maneuvering and a shortage of common sense.”
“Sofe—” Bram said.
“It’s a fair point. It’s also the price of the peace,” Annela said. “Bureaucratic warfare. Less bloody than the real thing.”
As she said the words, her eyes fell on the lily wristlet, the mourning corsage. She pulled it off, letting her thumb roll over one of the petals.
“I don’t suppose Gale’s life was much like this,” Sophie said. “Sailing madly from place to place, uncovering plots?”
“It was, actually. Though there weren’t as many formal inquisitions. Her word had got to be almost as good as an adjudicator’s.” Annela looked at her sideways. “You’re suited to it. You have the right spirit.”
“I can’t fight.”
“That’s one thing Parrish is good for.”
“Are you saying I should snatch Verena’s life out from under her?”
“Merely wondering if you’re having second thoughts.”
Am I? No. When Sophie thought of what Stormwrack offered her, she thought of Cly, of the otters and the sea raft and exploring, all the things she could see and learn. A passport to a weird matriarchy and Nightjar’s pink slip weren’t on the list. “What do I do to have to sort out the inheritance?”
“I could challenge you,” Verena said. “It’d delay your leaving, but—”
It was a bit of a test. “I know you guys don’t have much use for Cly, and I can’t say I understand the problem there.”
“Yeah,” Bram said. “What’s the deal?”
Annela drew herself up. “I can’t comment on the Duelist-Adjudicator’s personality, but his reputation is impeccable.”
“You don’t want to get sued,” Sophie said.
“You’re franker than you should be, child.”
“I’ll grant you this much about Cly,” Sophie said. “I don’t quite trust him not to insist on a dueling proxy for me … especially since I’m injured.”
Annela said. “You told the Convene you meant to repudiate your Verdanii citizenship.”
“And you jumped all over that offer, didn’t you?” Bram said.
“It’s okay, Bram.”
I’m being tossed out of a party I didn’t know was happening, Sophie thought. The thought lacked its usual sting. Whatever she’d been looking for, it wasn’t a seal of approval from some far-off politician who called herself the Allmother. “What’ll that take?”
“Sincere intentions and a few signatures.” Annela produced a sheaf of documents.
Sophie looked over the pages. They were densely written, in tiny script, all Fleetspeak. “I’m not agreeing to anything else here, am I? Not to give up eating meat or never talk to Verena again or, I dunno, move to Oakland?”
“The document says you relinquish any claim on the blessings of the Allmother, and the property, talents, and entitlements of the Feliachild family. It specifies that your offspring and heirs are likewise without entitlement, and that you won’t show up on Verdanii territory uninvited, except in the case of shipwreck, imminent starvation, serious injury, or other extreme hazard.”
“Oh, is that all?”
“It’s a standard clause.”
Damn. She’d have to read it from start to finish.
“Want me to go over it?” That was Bram.
“You barely speak Fleet, Bramble,” she said.
“I’m making out okay.”
“I’d help,” Verena said.
“What if we three wade through the mumbo jumbo together?” she said.
Annela looked as though she approved of that. “I’ll leave you to it. Please don’t go anywhere, Kirs. Verena, when’s the next opportunity to get them home?”
“The sun’s angle should be right in about two and a half hours.”
“Fair winds, then.”
It took them about an hour to read through the document. When they’d done so, Sophie put her name on it. “What’s the date?”
“Fifteenth day, third month, hundred and ninth year of the Fleet Compact,” said Verena. “Thanks, Sophie.”
“Bram? Can you witness this?”
He took the pen and scrawled his first and last names across the bottom.
Sophie took out Gale’s courier purse, holding it over the contract as if it could see it. “You got that, magic handbag? Break-up time. You’re so over me.”
Then she tried to unlace it.
Nothing happened.
She handed it to Verena. “I’m yesterday’s news.”
Verena drew a finger across the join. The purse, after a pause that was just long enough to seem insulting, somehow, gaped.
“Congratulations,” Bram said.
“Thank you,” she said, sounding relieved. “Seriously, Sophie—thank you.”
“No problem. Oh, hey—my phone’s in there,” Sophie said, keeping her eyes on the documents she’d just signed, folding them.
Verena pulled out Sophie’s smartphone, and instead of handing it over she started tapping on the screen. “Sorry, but I’ve gotta wipe this.”
Damn. “I know.”
“I’ll take you home as soon as—”
There was a tap at the door. “May I interrupt?”
It was Lais Dariach.
Lais had an ugly scar on his scalp, a pink line like an earthworm just below his hairline, and the same expression of mischief she remembered. He let his eye roam over Bram and Verena.
“These are my siblings,” Sophie said.
“What a beautiful family you have,” Lais said.
She giggled. “Shut up.”
Bram took that as a cue to get lost. “We’ll go pack up. Come on, Verena.”
When the door shut behind them, Sophie said to Lais. “So … are you okay?”
“Thanks to the Duelist-Adjudicator,” he said. “I’d got my skull cracked. You heard?”
“They don’t have magic healers on Tiladene?”
“It’s the rainy season and there was some trouble with a foal on the other side of the island,” he said. “Both of them had been marooned.”
“Convenient.”
“All carefully orchestrated, I’m sure. Makes me feel terribly important. So much fuss over a few spiders.” He put an arm around her waist, laying the crease of his scar against her forehead, flirting. “Princess Zophie—”
“I’m no princess.”
“That boobie dress you’re bursting out of begs to differ.”
She gestured at the paper. “It’s official. I’m not Verdanii.”
<
br /> “As I hear it, you’re a Sylvanner heiress instead. That makes us pepper and chocolate, darling. Sweetness and spice—”
“All that’s pending a paternity test. And me finding out something about Sylvanna. Which isn’t happening anytime soon.”
“Mmm. Is this Convenor Feliachild’s desk? Looks … what was that Anglay word of yours? Comfy.”
“Did the magical healing leave you more determined than ever to live up to the Tiladene reputation for randiness?”
“Ah, Kir Sophie, I believe it’s an accepted truth that a brush with death tends to make a gentleman—” He fluffed her skirts. “—energetic.”
“That’s a hard effect to measure when the test subject apparently never thinks of anything but sex.”
“You malign me, Kir. I also think about horses and spiders.”
“Which you breed.”
“Fair point.” He kissed her. “But I didn’t come here solely to raise your voluminous skirts.”
“Could’ve fooled me.”
He leaned against the desk. “Sophie, you’ve done a great thing. For me and my people, but also for the peace. And not only are you stripped of rights on Verdanii, it’s my understanding that you’re being sent into exile.”
“I do have to go home,” she said. “Bram too. I’m hoping to wangle permission to come back.”
“If need arises—” He produced a heavy envelope. “This might help.”
“What is it?”
“A summons, actually. Requires you to appear in court.”
“Just what I need, more court. Appear for what?”
“The phrasing is vague. I’ll come up with something legitimate, I promise. It’s our way of thanking you.”
“That’s an even weirder present than your spider collection, Lais. Weird, but sweet.”
“I’m all about the sweetness.” He caressed the edge of Annela’s desk again.
She felt a little surge of heat. Did she want this? The shipboard affair had had been pretty nice, but …
But what?
By way of buying time, she asked: “Aren’t you weakened?”
“Magically restored, or so they say. I haven’t had a chance to assess my potency yet. Don’t you want to help?”
She chortled, and he took that as a yes, sweeping her into his arms, dragging the weight of the skirt with him.
Child of a Hidden Sea Page 35
