By Blood Betrayed (The Kingsblood Chronicles)

by Houpt, David

  The fourth tier was officially called the Star Tier, but most Seagate natives referred to it as the Gods’ Tier. The former name had been given to this level of the city because of the many scholars, astrologers, and guildhouses located there. Sages of all stripes could be found here, though less successful ones were forced to dwell on the third, or even second, tier. Seagate was a center of commerce, and travelers from distant ports would arrive, bringing tales and knowledge.

  Also contained on the fourth tier was the temple district. Shrines of every size and faith could be found here, from the small niche housing only a simple idol, to the massive, fortified temples of Rula Golden. The high king, metaphysical leader of the state polytheistic religion, was, at least in theory, a member of every cult in Seagate, but in practice, the high king was usually loyal only to Rula Golden. The Sunlord was also the God of Kings and Rulership.

  The final and fifth tier was the Nobles’ Tier, although the tradition of allowing only families of noble lineage to dwell there had been long abandoned. The wealthiest of the merchant houses maintained dwellings there, having purchased them from noble families who could no longer afford to live there. The Nobles’ Tier was, in its own way, as cutthroat as the Thieves’ Tier, although there were rarely bodies found murdered in doorways. The Green Men did not police this level at all, that task instead falling to the High King’s Guard. Passageways from the Nobles’ Tier led directly up to the High King’s Keep and the farmlands beyond it, so the entryways from the fourth tier to the fifth tier were guarded by fortifications and manned by Guardsmen.

  Above the five city tiers was the high king’s fortress, usually referred to as the Keep. Carved from granite cliffs, the fortress served as the garrison for the High King’s Guard and was armed with siege weaponry that could, due to their elevation, fire on any target in the harbor. The stout walls of the Keep stood upon the highest elevation on the island, and the fortress therefore had a clear command of the farmlands beyond Seagate. An attacking army approaching Seagate from inland would encounter flooded fields, for the irrigation system could be used to render the fields nearly impassable.

  The city’s freshwater source wasn’t easily sabotaged, since it was accessed through shafts bored back toward the center of the island, tapping into great springs which fed the entire center of Hyriel when rainfall wasn’t sufficient.

  All these things Lian had learned from books and descriptions and maps, from intelligence reports filed through Elowyn’s offices, and from eyewitness reports. None of this, however, was able to adequately describe the sheer majesty of the circular city and its massive granite fortress. Approaching from the sea lanes, Searcher was dwarfed as even the huge docks of Mola hadn’t been able to do. A ship ten times the size of the mercenary vessel could sail through the great gates, never touching the sides.

  Ships of all shapes and sizes were scattered about the entrance to the harbor, some anchored outside the port, others awaiting their turn to be led through the gates. Islander warships moved beyond the anchored ships, patrolling for signs of trouble, their lines sleek and graceful. As Searcher neared the city, one of the warships changed course to investigate. Flying the bright green pennant of the high king, the ship boasted the name Indomitable, and was somewhat larger than Arden’s ship. Her sails were white with a large green circle, the center of which was the golden crown of the high king.

  She came alongside Searcher, possible only because Cedrick trimmed the sails. The Islander ship was fast, but she couldn’t have overtaken Searcher if the latter ship had run out all of its sail. Indomitable’s captain shouted back and forth with Cedrick for awhile and seemed satisfied that the ship wasn’t a threat to the city. Signaling to the mercenary ship to maintain a position south of the gate, there to await a pilot boat, the warship headed back to her patrol position.

  “That ship’s the sacrificial lamb,” Cedrick instructed Lian as he directed Searcher’s slow progress among the anchored ships. “If there’s trouble, the patrol ships bear the brunt of it, while they get the docked ships ready to swarm out of the gates. Back before the high king’s navy was this large, they wouldn’t have had a patrol ship at all. Instead, they’d merely close the gates at the first sign of trouble.

  “Many a self-styled pirate king has attempted to force those gates, only to discover that you can’t easily run a siege from the sea. The last one learned that the gates can serve another function besides barrier. Rivan’s great-grandfather, facing a large pirate force outside the gates, waited until high full-tide then suddenly opened the gates. The water rushed into the harbor, pulling about half the attacking force with it. Most of the ships went down in the initial tumult, and the others were left too disoriented to put up much of a fight.”

  Lian raised his eyebrows. “I didn’t realize that the gates sealed the water out,” he commented.

  “Oh, they’re not watertight, but the tide rises faster than the water can pour through the openings. I imagine that it had to be timed just right, but it destroyed enough of the pirate force, including the flagship as it turned out, that they dispersed, lifting the siege.” Cedrick interrupted the conversation to bellow orders as the ship took a position beside several large merchant galleons, and the anchors dropped over the side, chains clattering.

  “Water’s a little shallow north and south of the city, so it makes good anchorage unless there’s a storm,” Cedrick explained.

  “Why are these ships anchoring out here? They can’t unload their cargoes,” Lian asked.

  “There’s several reasons. Most of these are empty, which is why they’re riding so high,” Cedrick said, pointing out the line of dark algae growths that demarked the galleon’s normal waterline. “They prefer not to pay the docking fees while they’re waiting for their cargo to be delivered, so they anchor out here where there aren’t any fees. It also keeps their crews out of trouble, although some of these captains might face mutiny if they don’t allow some shore leave.

  “Others might want to avoid the import taxes, and so they’ve gone ashore to make a deal with the merchant houses before coming into port. It’s a strange practice, but if the cargo is already owned by a local resident before entering Seagate, the taxes are lower.”

  Cedrick shrugged. “If it were up to me, I’d set an amount of tax to be paid by everyone and eliminate that kind of legal runaround. Lawmakers are seldom men like me, though, so it’s a moot point.”

  Lian asked, “Are there any other reasons a ship might anchor out here?”

  Cedrick nodded. “Two more reasons that I can think of. One is that the ship isn’t welcome inside the gates for some past transgression. The other is if the ship’s in quarantine because the crew caught plague or some other danger. You see that sometimes, with ships returning from equatorial waters.”

  The brightly colored pennants of the ships arrayed about them represented all corners of Tieran. There were cogs and carracks from Dunshor, galleons from the Southron Empire, the odd but graceful vessels of Araby, and even one slim, birdlike elven ship. Lian could well imagine that the elves had anchored outside the harbor to avoid the rule of the high king.

  The wait for a pilot boat wasn’t long, which surprised Lian. The smaller vessel was a single-deck galley, manned by forty oarsmen and a handful of other crewmen. It sickened Lian to see that the oarsmen were chained to their posts, signifying that they were slaves.

  “Keep in mind, lad, that most of that lot are condemned murderers and rapists,” Cedrick counseled. “I don’t approve of slavery, but it’s both law and custom here.”

  The pilot boat shipped oars and drifted alongside. “Ah, Cedrick!” called the boat’s captain. “I thought I saw the mermaid!” He pointed at the ship’s figurehead.

  “Gothrik, you old bastard!” Cedrick yelled back. “Come to overcharge me again?”

  The two of them bickered over the price of piloting the warship into dock, and the docking fees. It was Lian’s thought that Cedrick settled for a poor bargain, but he kep
t his mouth shut and his demeanor calm.

  Gothrik finally agreed on the price and issued orders to bring his boat about. This required him to circumnavigate the next ship, and Lian took the opportunity to ask about the haggling. “Oh, I always let him win, Alan,” Cedrick explained, “which means he comes to tow me first, and gives me a good space near the center of the docks. That’s worth much more than an extra pound of silver here and there.”

  Gothrik’s galley, sporting the name of Titan, towed them in through the harbor gates, affording Lian his first real view of the city. People thronged on the wide ledges that represented the outer portion of each tier, traveling to their private destinations. They were clad in dozens of different styles and colors, with no one style dominating over any other. Here and there, Lian spotted squads of green-liveried soldiers, the city’s Green Men, but there was a surprisingly low count of the police force in evidence.

  To starboard, he could clearly see the naval piers, where sixteen more Islander warships were docked. One ship looked heavily damaged and was being winched out of the water by a huge crane-and-cradle assembly that was anchored on the tier above the dock. Water poured from a gash in the side of the ship, and to Lian’s eyes it was a wonder that the vessel had made it to port.

  “Pirate troubles,” remarked Alo as he coiled rope next to Lian.

  “What caused that hole?” Lian asked.

  Alo stood and gazed at the ship. “A galley’s ram, Mr. Alan, sir,” replied Doval’s former assistant in Elvish. “That she made it home tells that they either had a mage, or one damned good captain. The hole’s high enough that a good captain could trim her starboard and keep most of the water out.” From both Alo’s tone and the word tense he chose, he clearly thought the former possibility was the correct one. Aesidhe was an incredibly expressive language, for the rare human that mastered it.

  “Look lively, Alo,” Lian ordered, admonishing the sailor for stopping his work just because he was talking.

  “Aye, sir,” Alo replied, good-naturedly. The crew all seemed to understand that Lian’s job was to keep them working, and that their job was to slack off whenever possible.

  Cedrick oversaw the ship’s maneuvering personally, and Searcher was quickly secured to the dock.

  Chapter Thirty One

  “May Golden Rula warm thy path and may the stars at night guard thy sleeping.”

  -- Prayer of farewell common in rural Dunshor

  The two captains arranged a rotating schedule for shore leave, assigning themselves to later shifts. Lian admired the manner with which the two leaders handled their crews, allowing them to work together with a minimum of resentment. If a sailor needed a hand and one of the warriors was unoccupied, he’d nearly always pitch in.

  Snog was allowed leave on the first shift, but declined to go ashore without Lian, even in the company of the other goblins. The scout sold his place on the first shift, which he had observed several of the older sailors doing, and pocketed a quick copper in exchange for patience.

  Cedrick left Lian in charge of the ship and went ashore with Arden and Reidar to seek out new crew members. The captain’s orders were simply to maintain the security of the ship and to try to keep the men out of trouble.

  So it was that Lian was standing on the foredeck, in command of the mercenaries left to stand watch. The remaining sailors worked at cleaning the decks and performing minor repairs, but it was clear that their minds were on the taverns and brothels to be found ashore.

  Snog climbed up to stand beside Lian, saying quietly, “Do we leave the ship here, milord?”

  “I haven’t decided yet, my friend,” Lian replied. “For now, we’ll stay with them. I plan to at least wait and see what kind of luck they have hiring crew.”

  Snog nodded, lost to his own thoughts for a short time. One of the sailors was occupied with a task close enough to overhear him, so he spoke in his broken Dunshor. “I been watchin’ the rats, sir. She’s been chewin’ ‘er way through ‘em, ‘n I’m hopin’ she goes ashore.”

  “She used up that many rats?” Lian asked, surprised. There had been thousands of the things.

  “Aye,” Snog replied, and the sailor who was eavesdropping blanched and withdrew, clearly not wanting to hear more on the subject. “I think ‘s got sommat to do with her prey bein’ men mos’ o’ the time. Rats ain’t much eatin’.”

  “Well, we didn’t see her come aboard, and I doubt we’ll see her leave,” mused Lian.

  “In that you are mistaken,” spoke a lilting voice from within the stairway to the main deck. Sileth stood there, in what was obviously a borrowed nightshirt. The closest sailors and guards spotted her, now that she wasn’t using her powers to cloak her presence, and the soldiers moved hands to their sword hilts.

  Lian held up a hand to the soldiers, and they relaxed yet remained watchful. Most looked relieved that they didn’t have to draw steel against the Companion. “What can we do for you, Lady Sileth?” he asked, with as much poise as he could muster.

  “The sun has dropped below the seawall, and I will now depart your vessel,” she said in her accented voice. “Please tell your captain that I appreciate his forbearance, and that I had a restful crossing. I will not intrude on his ship again, fates permitting.” She gestured at the docks, where a tall man stood, unnoticed by the busy dockworkers. “He whom I have come to see awaits me, and I wish you good fortune.”

  In a silent voice which seemed to come from all around him, Sileth sent to Lian alone, Beware thee the king of Greythorn, son of Evan Kolvanson. Trust him not, though he aided thee in the past. No one knew him as I did, and no one suffered a more intense betrayal by his childish lust for a woman than I did. What he owes thee in guilt-debt is negligible compared to what he owed me and to what he owed his land. Were I thee, I would avoid Greythorn altogether, but thou needst not fear my intentions.

  Lian suppressed his shock at the vampire’s intrusion on his thoughts, forcing himself instead to smile and return her spoken pleasantry. To the crewmen witnessing the vampire’s leavetaking, he merely appeared scared, which to them was perfectly understandable.

  Later, they would each claim that something different distracted their attention from the vampire. Some maintained that something on deck fell over, others that there was a splash on the quayside, while Lian thought that Snog had asked him a question. But when they returned their attention Sileth’s location, the vampire had suddenly disappeared. Over on the dock, there was no sign of the second vampire, either.

  It was as if they had never been there at all.

  The guards were much more wary after the vampire’s appearance and subsequent disappearance. As word spread throughout the ship of the vampire’s departure, those crew sleeping belowdecks suddenly found the well-lit decks to be a preferable place to be. Only the barbarian Nan failed to show up on deck, keeping to the quarters she shared with Yarek, which Lian had always found strange given the man’s chaste habits.

  One of Cedrick’s requirements was that each shore leave party stay together and log their destination with “Alan” before leaving. The sailing crew had unanimously opted for one of the brothels on the Thieves’ Tier, a place called the Fair Winds, and the mercenaries had headed up to a higher class place on the Merchants’ Tier, called the Crimson Hood.

  Neither captain had informed Lian where they were headed.

  One of the sailors returned alone only two hours after sunset, running like the hounds of hell were pursuing him. Lian could see that it was Alo, now the bosun’s mate, and that he was lightly bleeding from a scalp wound.

  Calling for Snog, Lian hurried down the gangplank to help the sailor aboard. Snog appeared, carrying a waterskin, but before Alo would allow his wound to be treated, he said, “Mr. Alan, sir, the men’re in a fight at the Winds! ‘Twon’t be long afore the Green Men come, sir!”

  Damn, thought Lian, who rose and ordered one of the soldiers to wake Nan and get her on deck. “Now!” he yelled when the man hesitated, not wanting
to face Nan’s wrath.

  “Snog, treat his wounds and then the two of you stand by the starboard ballista. Don’t load it, just be ready for trouble if it comes,” Lian said, turning to another soldier, Yelvan. “Yel, get below and break out clubs and other blunt weapons, enough for half a dozen men.”

  “Aye, sir,” replied the warrior, who had been one of the two to stand with Lian against the lizards.

  “You three!” he called to a trio of off-duty mercenaries, who were observing the proceedings with interest. They looked like they wished they had gone below, but they came over. Lian said, “Get your armor, and Yelvan and the other man’s. Just the leather should be enough, but move your asses!” They set off at a run.

  The first soldier returned with Nan in tow, who looked bleary-eyed at Lian with a look of pure murder on her face. “You’d better have a good reason . . . ” she started, then, taking in Alo’s slash, stopped her tirade.

  “Brawl up at the Fair Winds,” Lian said, ignoring her violent demeanor. “You’re taking five men and you’re going to drag our men out of it before the Green Men come. You don’t have time to argue, just get up there on the double!”

  The others returned with their loads, and they helped each other into the boiled leather cuirasses. Nan, by this time, had doused her head with the water Snog was carrying. Rounding up the soldiers, she started down the gangplank.

  Lian called after her, “Nan! Don’t kill anyone, especially the Greens!” He hoped that the barbarian wasn’t prone to the berserker rage her people were known for. Anticipating more trouble to come, he roused the rest of the soldiers and had them arm themselves with subduing weapons also. He impatiently waited for Nan’s party to return, moving to the foredeck to stand beside Snog and Alo.