Treason's Shore

by Sherwood Smith

  Jeje snorted. Then coughed, trying to hide expression of disgust. I’m a sailor. What I see is ports, mostly. I liked your city, with those terrace things. Waterfalls. Roofs with tile patterns. Joret Dei made me welcome. But my business is done. Time to get back on board before I forget what a gaff is.

  Wisthia was experienced with far more subtle evasions than Jeje’s. Though more intrigued as the days of their journey sped by, she could not get Jeje to talk about her purpose in traveling to Anaeran-Adrani. Jeje talked about anything and everyone except that, the more intriguing because Princess Joret had also kept silent about her visitor’s business.

  “Your highness. About the wall hangings?”

  At the respectful but insistent voice Wisthia returned to the here and now, and turned her attention to the all important task of selecting the right wall hangings and chair coverings for her new home on Bren’s Risto Ridge.

  But she’d scarcely looked at half a dozen swatches of imported Colendi raw silk before yet another messenger yanked on the outside bell, sending an echo through the entire house.

  She peered down through the shutters tightened against the earlier storm. She’d learned that official business came via Runners in royal livery of burnt orange, gold, and yellow. Then there were the liveries of aristocrats, the plain clothes with personal badges, the plain clothes with no marks, and finally the messengers in bright yellow, part of the city’s scribe guild, who rounded the streets once each day.

  This fellow below was more than ordinarily scruffy. He looked like an old sailor right off the dock.

  Wisthia turned away, figuring he had to be there to see one of the new staff. The upholsterer and the three silk merchants waited patiently, hopeful smiles on their faces.

  Once again she turned her mind to the fabric until interrupted by Jeje. “Queen?” When Wisthia looked up in surprise, suppressing the laugh Jeje’s style of honorific never failed to raise, Jeje said, “I think you better come downstairs. Fellow’s from Fleet Master Chim, and won’t talk to anyone but you.”

  Wisthia smiled at the waiting merchants. “Will you pardon me for a brief time?”

  Of course they would. She made a mental note to buy extravagantly as she followed Jeje out. “Should I know who this Fleet Master Chim is?” Wisthia inquired.

  “The Fleet Guild is made up of five guilds related to the sea,” Jeje explained. “They formed up to fight pirates. Chim’s their leader. He wouldn’t send a message unless it was important.”

  “Take the Fleet Master’s messenger to the kitchen and feed him. Let me get rid of these merchants and I will be right there.”

  Jeje vanished down the passage, and Wisthia slipped back inside, smiling at the merchants. “Now. Let’s begin with the warm shades. Is straw still the fashion? No, I think I prefer this eggshell, such a soothing, subtle color . . .”

  As soon as they left, she slipped downstairs, where she found the Fleet Guild messenger sitting to a princely repast with the pastry-maker’s assistant as company, as the evening pastries were being layered. Jeje was nowhere in sight. “You are from Fleet Master Chim? I am Wisthia Shagal. What is your message?”

  By then Jeje was almost all the way down Risto Ridge, running as fast as she could through the mounds of fresh snow that the sweepers were only beginning to shovel from the streets.

  She reached the Fleet House just as the street glowglobes were being lit, which was the signal for many businesses to close up.

  She tried the door, found it barred, and ran around to the stairway leading up to third floor where the workers lived. It was strange to be there again, smelling onion-crusted flatbreads fresh from the oven. Her stomach yawned as she dashed down the row of closed doors to the far end, where Chim had his two rooms overlooking the harbor rooftops and the masts bobbing beyond the quay.

  She gave the old secret rap and was gratified when the door opened at once. Chim said over his shoulder, “Adrit! See who’s here!”

  Chim’s wife bustled out, her face crinkling in mirth. Vyadrit Chim was no taller than Jeje, but twice her girth and strong as a tree. “Why, Jeje! Yez back!”

  “Ye here about yer old mate Barend?” Chim asked.

  “Yes.” Jeje dropped to the low couch. “The fellow you sent to Queen Wisthia wouldn’t give me details.”

  “I told him to use Barend’s name to gain entry, but only talk to that queen, and he don’t know ye.” Chim gave her a quick report, ending with, “I sent one o’ the youngsters t’sound the guards at King’s Prison. Got the shut door.”

  Jeje glared at her pilled mittens, then tucked them into her armpits. “Did y’send a message to Prince Kavna?”

  “Next thing. But I don’t know if we can get through. She’s got him surrounded.”

  She. Crown Princess Kliessin was no sailor’s friend, that much everyone in the harbor knew. Jeje grimaced.

  Chim said, “Now, ye got my news, what’s yez? What ye doin’ back?”

  “Did something for Tau. He has to decide what he’s going to do about it. I left so he’d decide without me there. Thought I’d come here. Closest harbor. I was crossing the mountains. What with the pirates and the Venn rotting up trade while the local kings argue about who has to spend the money to protect all the trade going both ways through the mountains, turns out you either go with an army or get jumped. I got jumped. Met up with this queen and came with her the rest of the way. She’s a pretty good sort, for a queen,” Jeje added.

  Chim whistled. “Good or bad, yez in just the right place if ye want t’ help Barend. Help your training fleet and Elgar the Fox. The real one.”

  Jeje scowled at her hands. She had wanted to get onboard the first ship going east so she could regain Freeport Harbor and maybe even find the Fox Banner Fleet and Vixen. She’d had enough of kings, courts, and politics.

  But Barend was an old mate from Inda’s days. And Inda’s first rule, right from the beginning, had been We never abandon crew. “All right. Tell me the details. Then I’ll go back to the queen to see what I can do.”

  Out of habit Jeje took the shortest way back up to Risto Ridge and slipped in through the kitchen entrance.

  Queen Wisthia’s house was all lit up, servants coming and going. Jeje was surprised to find Wisthia pacing back and forth. On Jeje’s entry into the main salon the queen whirled around, her eyes wide.

  “You returned,” she exclaimed. At first Wisthia seemed a plain woman, certainly no eye-catcher like the Comet, Tau’s old lover, who had been reigning over Risto Ridge during Jeje’s previous stay. But Wisthia’s mouth could change from severe to attractive with just a curl, her eyes were steady and expressive, reminding Jeje unexpectedly of that red-haired king friend of Inda’s back in Iasca Leror.

  Jeje exclaimed, “Why wouldn’t I come back?”

  “Because not five heartbeats after you left Fleet Master Chim’s messenger in my kitchen eating all our plum tarts for this evening, a liveried messenger arrived from the palace requesting your presence for an interview. Four armed guards accompanied him.”

  “Hoo.” Jeje dropped onto a chair.

  Wisthia took in Jeje’s surprise and relaxed a little. Her instinct had been that Jeje, whatever her motivations, was no spy or conniver. “So. On our journey together you told me little about your reasons for traveling so far from the sea. I accepted that as your right, but now it seems your presence has disturbed the political waters. I need to know how, and why.”

  “Whatever’s going on now has nothing to do with my mission in Anaeran-Adrani.” Jeje clenched her fists. “It’s from before. I’m known at the harbor.”

  “You seem to be known in several kingdoms,” Wisthia retorted. The ironic shadow at the sides of her mouth jolted Jeje, again reminding her of Evred. “Here’s my point. You are connected with Elgar the Fox, whose sinister reputation gives even Crown Princess Kliessin pause.”

  Jeje hunched, hands in her armpits again. “He was our fleet commander. Had nothing to do with politics.”

 
“But politics appear to know him.” Wisthia smiled. “Bren’s royal court also knows, unfortunately, the general issues I’m here to discuss, the trade that I am enjoined to protect. I carried all that in my brother’s letter when I gave my official presentation.”

  Jeje grimaced, remembering how uneasy she felt around Inda’s king friend. She’d never met anyone who wore power like some kind of invisible cloak, like he did. And not in any obvious way. Wisthia kept bringing him to mind. “Are you turning me over to ’em? Or warning me to run?”

  “Neither. You are now on what is officially regarded as Adrani ground. As long as you do not leave this house, you are safe enough. And when you leave it, it shall be as an escorted envoy.”

  “Huh?”

  Wisthia tapped her finger against her chapped lips, then said slowly, “Over our first dinner during our recent journey, you favored me with your opinion of the rituals of diplomacy. Jeje, stop fussing with those knife handles in your sleeves and listen. I need to convince you that those embroidered robes, the carefully counted steps, the bows here, the succession of foods offered in this room and the ritual of exchanged words in that room, no matter how pompous it looks to you, is in every step, every fold of silk, every golden plate of tiny cakes, a way to deflect violence.”

  Jeje tried to hide her scorn. “I just don’t see it.”

  “Think of it as a . . . a court dance. No, I see that doesn’t work. Look, did your Elgar the Fox ever hold a parley with another pirate captain?”

  “Inda wasn’t a—”

  “Pirate. Nonetheless.”

  “He did, But—”

  “But nothing. Don’t think about the differences. Think about how each side had to figure out who would meet whom and where, if they wore weapons. What each would do. They had to discuss it all and agree before the meeting, did they not?”

  “Well, yes.”

  “So these rituals are all the results of discussion. If everyone performs his or her part, the other side knows what to expect. Negotiation can take place between enemies—well, between people with very different goals, let us say, because of those rituals. Do you see it now?”

  Jeje pursed her lips, thinking back to the glimpses she’d had of courts at Nente. And the whispers about that cousin of Joret’s, Lord Yaskandar, who broke all the rules. “Not-quite-violence?”

  She would think about that later. “I guess I’ve got it. So how do those rituals relate to me and you right now?”

  “Because I think Kliessin is afraid of what kind of threat Barend’s appearance brings. Don’t think about what you know from experience, think about what your Fox Banner Fleet’s reputation has been. Those rituals are the only weapon I have to save Barend’s life.”

  “What?”

  Wisthia brushed her hand down her robe. “And I am convinced that you must be the mode of delivery. As an envoy.”

  “That’s what you said before. I can see the purpose, but I’ve never worn one of those fancy dresses in my life. Wouldn’t know how to!”

  “Never mind that right now. You come from Iasca Leror, you have the same accent Barend does. You also appear to be connected to my son.”

  “Your son?” Jeje stared. “Do you mean Evred?”

  Wisthia smiled. “You see the resemblance, then? And everyone always said he looked like his father. People believe you connected with him, or rather to this mysterious young man Inda who, rumor reports, commanded the battle that sent the Venn back north. Something the rest of the world was unable to do during the last ten years. So we will use your reputation—and your connections—to our advantage.”

  Jeje grimaced. “How?”

  “What if Inda sent you as envoy to meet me, let’s say by a different route than my nephew? Yes. One over land, and one by sea. Thus the three of us may unite in representing Iasca Leror’s interests in trade now that the southern world is emerging from the Venn yoke. Everyone in the southern half of the world is wondering who will dare to restore sea trade and what will happen. Let’s take advantage of that.”

  “Me? Envoy? I don’t know what to do!”

  “There’s nothing like practice. First the clothes. No lace and frills, you’re from Iasca Leror. You’ll have a robe like my daughter-by-marriage Hadand wears . . .”

  In a newly redecorated mansion along the lower level of Nente’s terraced city, a baroness drew a slow, deep breath of pleasure.

  This affair is going to make me famous. Not just here in Anaeran-Adrani’s court, but in Sartor, and maybe even beyond.

  She savored it all, the words, the social triumph, and not least, the two beautiful creatures—beautiful without the arts of magical illusion—beginning a dalliance right under her guests’ eyes. Because the gossips all agreed, no one ever turned down the mad, bad Lord Yaskandar Dei of Sartor.

  It had taken six months to lure a brilliant flutist down from her mountaintop, and another six months of kingdom-spanning diplomacy and patience to coax her into the idea of combining her skills with those of the celebrated harpist from Sartor. But was anyone paying attention? The baroness smiled inwardly at the irony, when the rustle of silk and a faint, familiar scent of vanillin and musk warned of the approach of her chief rival.

  The song ended amid a soft cascade of frescha petals. The guests stirred, many of the younger ones holding out cupped hands, and one young man throwing his head back so the silken petals would fall on his face.

  A warm breeze lifted the petals, spiraling them into the air. A melody, patterned in dancing thirds, commenced a rise through the chords, minor to major, as the petals danced and swirled then looped and whirled toward the far arched door and away. There they were swept up by the silent servants who had spent all the previous day out in the conservatory along a high terrace, picking apart the carefully nurtured blossoms and carrying them down the mountain layered in silk so they would not bruise.

  The baroness was done with them; she did not know or care that her chief steward would pass them to her own daughter, who would dry them and sew them into little bags, selling them as sachets to use when winter clothes were laid away until next year.

  Instead, the two rivals watched the petals dance around the pair in the center before whirling away toward the far door, driven by the skilled hand of the theater mage the baroness had hired for a stiff fee.

  Then the duchess said, “I always appreciate a petal cascade.” The word “always” drawled with faint emphasis.

  The baroness enjoyed a thrill of loathing. So many things she could say! You pretentious fool, everyone knows you married your position thirty years ago, but I was born a baroness. Or, Yes, Colendi cascades have been done and done again this past five years, but what else is there when the illusions of our young years are out of fashion, and everyone and everything now has to be real? We are limited to real decorations and to our real faces.

  The baroness’s mouth soured. “I miss the days of illusion.” She kicked a stray frescha petal, which promptly stuck to her slipper. She stepped on it, relieved the duchess had not looked down; a little story over morning chocolate about the baroness kicking and stomping would not ruin her prospective triumph, but it would make her look absurd. The baroness was already sensitive to the barely hidden smirks just because she was short and solid, her dark hair thin, forming a superficial resemblance to that horrid young sailor woman who’d sent the court into gales of laughter just weeks ago. “It was so much more exciting back then, never knowing what anyone would be.”

  “Or who,” the duchess responded, flicking her fan out to catch an errant petal. It lay on her matte black fan, a perfect oval of creamy white with a touch of buttery gold at the edges. “Remember the night everyone came as the king and queen? They were prince and princess then.”

  “And beautiful, both,” the baroness said on a sigh. “That was memorable.” More memorable than a room full of the same two faces was her beloved at the time guised as the princess, and going off with one of the princes to enjoy a relationship everyone but th
e baroness had known about.

  No, she would not be young again for the world, and she had never been beautiful. This new fashion for only the real—whom did it flatter but the attractive?

  “Parties in our day were never boring,” the duchess drawled, mellow in reminiscence. “I loved never knowing when I entered a ballroom if it would resemble the sky atop a mountain or a morvende cavern covered in jewels or a pirate’s den.”

  “Assuming pirates ever had the wit or taste to combine ancient Toaran tapestries with Venn vases and Colendi porcelain.” The baroness chuckled, remembering that wild night. Odd, how taking on the semblance of the dregs of civilization had led to behavior that . . . well, best be forgotten. “The only limitations were one’s funds and one’s imagination.”

  The duchess pursed her lips and puffed across her leveled fan. The frescha petal spun into the air then began to fall; the doorway glimmered as the hidden mage wove another net of magic to gather the last petals, and send them dancing on the air out the door. “So we are left to Colendi cascades.”

  The baroness opened her fan, but inwardly gloated: her party would be talked about forever as the night the wicked Lord Yaska met Joret Dei Shagal, Princess of Anaeran-Adrani, at last.

  He’d been stalking her with delicate patience for weeks—accepting no invitations, but arriving to make calls just after her visits, or riding in the gardens when the ladies were out strolling.

  Was it possible the duchess did not see it yet? Triumph prickled through the baroness as Yaska leaned toward Joret. He was dressed in muted gold to match the color of his eyes, the lining to his paneled robe the exact dark, dark brown of his hair, its golden highlights picked out in the candlelight. As a song ended and everyone stirred, he lounged forward to pluck a goblet from the tray being carried around, then resettled, his long hand resting near the princess.

  Yes, the duchess saw. The baroness and her rival watched every single young person in the chamber track the movement of his hands.