Voyager of the Crown

by Melissa McShane

  “I certainly think so,” Ransom said, putting his arms around her. “Maybe you should tell that person you’ve changed your mind.”

  “I think I already have,” she whispered, and he pulled her close and kissed her. There was nothing gentle about it; they kissed desperately, as if they’d never have the chance again. Everything she’d endured, every moment of fear for herself and for him, turned into longing for his touch. His hands were tangled in her hair again, and that reminded her of how filthy she was, how awful she must smell. She drew back, and he went from kissing her lips to kissing the place where her neck and shoulder met. “I need a bath,” she said.

  “Don’t care,” he said, his hand moving from her hair to settle on the curve of her hip. “Sweet heaven, I’ve never wanted anything more than I want to kiss you, right now.”

  “Well, I care,” Zara said, laughing. She gently pushed him away. “And we’re not ready for more than kissing.”

  “I know. But kissing is pretty damn wonderful all on its own.” He brushed his lips against her forehead, then hugged her tightly. “Never mind. You’re right, you smell terrible.”

  “You realize in all the time we’ve known each other, we’ve never both been clean at the same time?”

  “I wonder what that would be like. Is your hair ever not tangled?”

  “Sometimes. You seem obsessed with it.”

  “It’s beautiful even when it’s dirty and tangled and…there’s blood on your face. How did that happen?”

  “Don’t you dare fall back into self-loathing. It’s unattractive. I’m fine, you’re unhurt, and we’re both moving forward.”

  Ransom sighed and released her. “And what does ‘moving forward’ look like?”

  “I…don’t know. I was planning to go to Veribold after this, but…I want to get to know you better.”

  “I’ve never been to Veribold. I hear it’s nice, even if it is full of Veriboldans.”

  “After the Karitians, Veriboldans are friendly and outgoing. Would you really come with me?”

  He clasped her hand. “I don’t think we should make each other any promises, but I’m not ready to let you go. So…yes. But on one condition.”

  “Conditions? I’m not sure I know you that well yet.”

  “I just want to know your original name. You did say to ask later, and it’s later.”

  Cold dread crept into her heart. I trust him, she thought. I can’t tell him, she thought. And how would he look at her when he found out the truth? Memories of Hank emerged, memories of her reasons for never telling him who she’d been. They’d been good reasons, but they’d been cowardly as well, and Zara North was no coward. Or wasn’t anymore, at least. “Ransom,” she said.

  Someone knocked on the door. “Ransom?” Belinda sounded uncertain even through the thick wood. “Miss Blackwood wants to talk to all of us. If that still includes you.”

  Ransom gave Zara’s hand one final squeeze, then went to the door. “It does,” he said to a nervous-looking Belinda, “and I’m sorry I behaved like that. Did Miss Blackwood say why?”

  Belinda shook her head. “She just wants us to come now.” She looked past Ransom at Zara, and Zara could almost feel the questions she wasn’t asking.

  “Rowena?” Ransom said, and offered her his hand. Zara rose and took it without hesitation, and Belinda’s eyes went wide. “I suppose, as she’s our host, it’s polite to obey her wishes.”

  “Yes,” Belinda said. She looked as if she were suppressing a dozen exclamations. She’d have a dozen questions for Zara later, and what a conversation that would be.

  They went downstairs and crossed the house to Blackwood’s office, where the other three already waited. Blackwood noticed their clasped hands, but only raised an eyebrow at Zara, who returned the look coolly. “Sit,” she said, and Zara had to let go of Ransom to take her seat. Her hand felt so cold after the warmth of his. Of course, the entire room was as cold as winter, which it still was back in the north. Little Zara would spend half the day sledding on the short hill behind the forge, shrieking laughter and crying out to her father to watch her do it one more time. She closed her hand on the memory.

  “I’ve spoken to the King,” Blackwood said, “and told him you weren’t dead after all. He expressed his relief at the news.” She fixed Zara with a calculating expression. Zara remained impassive. Poor Jeffrey. He couldn’t exactly have told anyone she was still alive. “I don’t suppose you want to be more forthcoming about your…special status?”

  “If his Majesty didn’t tell you, it’s not my place to say,” Zara said.

  Blackwood shrugged. “I’ve called you all here as a courtesy, given that you risked much to bring the communicator here. The King has ordered us to retrieve the Device as quickly as possible. We’ll be sending out boats in the morning to find Ghazarian’s ship, then our soldiers will board it and take the Device.”

  “Won’t the Karitians have a problem with you attacking someone in their own harbor?” Zara said.

  “We’re not convinced Ghazarian is in the Bay of Avizi,” Blackwood said, “though we won’t know until the Deviser arrives to repair the tracking Device.” She held out her hand to Theo. “Mister Jenkins, I’ll have that now.”

  “But—” Theo began. Blackwood fixed him with a cool, firm gaze. Scowling, he dug up the pieces of the tracking Device and handed them over to Blackwood. She put them away in a drawer.

  “In any case,” she went on, “the Karitians won’t intervene in a conflict between two northerners, so it won’t matter what they think.”

  “This seems like a dangerous proposal. They might see it as an opportunity to take the Device themselves. Wouldn’t it be better—”

  “As I said, Miss Farrell, you’re not an expert, whatever the King thinks of you.” Blackwood stood, pushing her chair back. “We’re grateful for your help, and we’ll be happy to reimburse you—all of you—for your time and trouble, but it’s best if you continue on to your destinations. Feel free to spend the night here.”

  “Thank you,” Zara said, staring Blackwood down. The woman didn’t flinch. She might be a fool, but she wasn’t easily cowed. Zara wished that made her feel better. She stood and nodded to the ambassador. “Good night.”

  “’Good night’? Rowena, are you going to let her get away with that?” Theo barely waited for the door to shut behind them to speak. “It’s a bad plan, and it’s going to fail!”

  “It will cause greatest loss of life,” Cantara said. “They will fight and they will die.”

  “Not much we can do about it,” Ransom said, “given that we have no authority.”

  “But we have to do something,” Theo insisted. “Rowena?”

  “Why are you looking at me?”

  “Because you’re smarter than Blackwood is, and you don’t want the Device to end up with the Karitians,” Theo said.

  “I also don’t have Blackwood’s resources. It’s best if we let her handle it.” Zara headed off toward the stairs. “It’s not our responsibility. Ransom said it—”

  “I was being cranky, Rowena. Don’t hold it against me.”

  “I’m not. But you were right. Two fighters, an apprentice Deviser, a sharpshooter, a healer, and…I don’t even know what I am. But the six of us are not enough to fight pirates who won’t blink at killing us.”

  “Then we don’t fight them. We trick them. Rowena, we can do this. I know we can.”

  “Theo…” Zara put her hand over his. “It’s over. You need to go to your aunt. I have a job. We all have lives that have nothing to do with the communicator. Go to sleep. That’s what I’m going to do.” She turned away so she didn’t have to see his face. This wasn’t her fight and it wasn’t his either.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  She bathed, sloughing the last of Manachen from her skin, then went to her room and lay wakeful in her bed. Sleeping all day probably hadn’t been a good idea, not that she’d had much choice. Was she wrong? Did she have a responsibility to ret
rieve the communicator? What would Jeffrey tell her? Not that it mattered, since she had a history of disrespecting her nephew’s commands, but he was sensible and clever and, she had to grudgingly admit, had a good grasp of the political realities. She needed to let him be King and not try to usurp his role by challenging Blackwood’s authority.

  She rolled on her side and squeezed her eyes shut, wishing her hair was dry and not chilling her further. This nagging feeling of guilt was irrational. She’d done as Alfred asked and more. She felt the cold blade sliding beneath her ribs again and shuddered. Done far more than anyone had a right to expect of her. She burrowed deeper under the blankets and eventually fell asleep.

  She dreamed of storms, not the wild ocean tempests where the winds blew in every direction at once and the ship dove down cliff-steep waves, but the thunderstorms of her mountain home, noisy and boisterous. A crash of thunder woke her, and she sat up, disoriented at how the winds didn’t rattle the panes. Pale light turned the glass pearly gray. Sunrise was near. Another crash echoed in the distance, and she realized it was the sound of the front door opening and slamming shut.

  She slid out of bed and padded barefoot to her bedroom door. Loud voices, unintelligible with distance, filtered up the staircase. She moved silently down the stairs until she couldn’t go any farther without being seen from the entry hall below.

  “—didn’t expect that,” a man said. “I take full responsibility.”

  “You should,” Blackwood said. “They’re just pirates, for heaven’s sake, you should be embarrassed at being so easily defeated.”

  “It was no defeat,” another man said. “We captured the ship at the cost of too many Tremontanan lives.”

  “And lost the communicator,” Blackwood said. “Retrieving it was the point of this raid, Captain Thurman, or have you forgotten that?”

  “No, ma’am,” Thurman said. He sounded as if he were talking through clenched teeth. “But we couldn’t—”

  “Don’t make excuses,” Blackwood said. “That pirate captain has escaped with the communicator, and you’ve lost the tracking Device. What do you propose we do now?”

  “We’ll post a reward for Ghazarian’s apprehension,” the first man said. “And we’ll interrogate the prisoners. This isn’t the end, Miss Blackwood.”

  “I’m sure his Majesty will be completely reassured by that. See to your men, captain. I’ll have new orders for you later.” Footsteps sounded across the entry hall, more doors opened and shut, and then there was silence.

  Zara crept back up the stairs and to her room, where she went to stand next to the window. The glass was cold against her hand, though that probably wouldn’t last long into the heat of the day. Far below, she saw the lights of the harbor like specks of gold on the early morning mist, and brighter, paler specks moving beyond that where even at this hour boats traveled into the bay. So. Blackwood’s attack had failed, Ghazarian had escaped with the communicator, and…how had they lost the tracking Device? That seemed uncharacteristically careless.

  Zara shrugged and went back to bed, snuggling under the blankets to warm her chilly feet and nose. It wasn’t her problem. Blackwood had made that clear. Zara had done what Jeffrey asked and now she would…she had to find Falken and Daughter, resign her job, send a telecode to Jeffrey asking for money—that might be a problem, but she’d been killed in the line of duty and that deserved some reward.

  That communicator is important. True, but still not her problem. Jeffrey would want you to help. He had plenty of helpers here in the embassy, all of whom were better armed and better informed than she. You don’t want the Karitians to gain the upper hand. And if she were still Queen, what she wanted might matter.

  She lay restlessly in bed, watching the square of the window grow lighter, until she couldn’t bear it any longer. She got dressed and went looking for something to eat. An early start wasn’t a bad idea.

  The smell of hot coffee and bacon drew her onward to the mausoleum room, where the low round table at the center of the room was covered with silver dishes bearing eggs, sausage, bacon, porridge, and flat cakes. Blackwood was treading the fine line between hospitality and wanting to be rid of them quickly, or she’d have laid on breakfast in the dining room. It was such a familiar, reassuring presence of home Zara loaded her plate fuller than she really wanted and poured herself a generous cup of coffee. An early start with a hearty breakfast, that was a good way to begin the day.

  “Good morning,” Ransom said, shutting the door quietly behind him. “Are you an early riser, or is today special?”

  “I couldn’t sleep,” Zara said. “Though I admit I’m eager to make a fresh start.”

  “I agree.” He sat next to her and leaned over for a kiss that made Zara tingle all over with pleasure. An early start with a hearty breakfast and kissing, definitely her new favorite way to wake up. “I was thinking we should make a plan,” he added.

  “Do you need to return to the village for Nettles?”

  “More to the point, I need to return their boat. It was delivered to the Tremontanan docks early yesterday, in perfect condition except for not having a motive force. Something else I need to get. And I’ve got to send messages to a few other places so they’ll know not to expect me.”

  “I could come with you. If I—”

  The door banged open. “Rowena,” Theo said. He was carrying a strangely-shaped oak box about two feet long and was breathing heavily. “I need to speak to you alone.”

  Zara exchanged glances with Ransom. “Why is that?”

  Theo shook his head. “I just…I planned this all…couldn’t we please speak privately?”

  “Is it a secret?” Ransom asked.

  Theo shook his head. “Look—never mind. He might as well hear.” He shoved the door closed behind him and deposited his burden on the velvet sofa next to Zara. It was a clock—no, the oblong case of a clock, filled not with the delicate gears of a clock Device, but crude, heavy pieces of metal, two of them glowing with purple light. A metal bowl was wedged into the place where the clock’s face had been, buckled in places where the sides had been cut and overlapped to fit the small space.

  “Theo, what is this?” Zara said.

  “A Device,” Theo said. “A tracking Device.”

  “And it tracks…?” Ransom said. He lifted the glass door of the casing and withdrew his hand when Theo slapped it, lightly.

  “The communicator.” Theo pointed at the center of the metal bowl. The tiny brass stem of the communicator clung to one of its sides, quivering slightly from the opening of the door. “I figured out how to make the stem resonate with the communicator. We can find it now.”

  “Theo, that’s Miss Blackwood’s job. And how did you know they would need this?”

  “I didn’t. I built it for practice. And because I was mad about what she said to you. The Deviser let me use her shop—she doesn’t think I’m good for anything, as an apprentice—and I was still there when the raiding party came back from attacking Ghazarian’s ship. One of the soldiers told me they left the tracking Device in one of the boats, and it was overturned in the fight, so they lost the Device. That means this is the only way we have of finding the communicator.”

  “Theo,” Zara said, “you need to take this to Miss Blackwood immediately.”

  “No.” Theo’s face was set in a scowl. “No, Rowena. We have to use it to go after Ghazarian.”

  “Theo—”

  “Just listen. Miss Blackwood doesn’t think Ghazarian is anything but an ordinary pirate, but we know she’s clever and ruthless and is going to keep tricking anyone Miss Blackwood sends after her. You’re the only one who can outwit Ghazarian, you know that.”

  Zara looked at Ransom, who shrugged. “He’s right,” he said.

  “See? And Miss Blackwood’s already failed once, so what’s the chance she’ll get it right the second time? And there are only a few pirates with Ghazarian, our troops captured all the rest, and she doesn’t have a ship. If we hurr
y, we can catch up to her before she makes a bargain with the Karitians!”

  “That’s incredibly dangerous even if Ghazarian doesn’t have many pirates with her. It will take soldiers. You’re not even a combatant!”

  “If Miss Blackwood sends soldiers, they’ll be under the command of someone else who doesn’t know how to defeat Ghazarian. She’ll never put you in charge. And it has to be you, Rowena.”

  “I’m not…” Theo gave her a look of appeal that wouldn’t have been out of place on a puppy, despite his age. “It’s too dangerous. I’m not going to ask everyone to risk their lives like this.”

  “Then I will.”

  Theo was out the door before Zara could stop him. She closed her mouth on more objections and covered her face with both hands.

  “You’re not considering this, are you?” Ransom said.

  Zara raised her head. “I…he made some good points. Letting that Device fall into Karitian hands could be devastating to Tremontane. And Blackwood clearly is at a loss here.”

  “He’s right that you know better than Blackwood how to fight Ghazarian, but it’s not your responsibility. If you go after her, people are going to get hurt, probably killed. That’s unacceptable to me.”

  “I could go alone.”

  Ransom swore and stood abruptly, making his chair rock on its back legs. “That is not going to happen. I don’t care how indestructible you are, that’s insanity.”

  “So it’s acceptable to let Blackwood send more troops after Ghazarian and let them be killed?”

  “It’s just a Device, Rowena, and a broken one at that. How much damage can Dineh-Karit do with it?”

  Zara set her plate to one side. “Communication is key in warfare,” she said, “and Dineh-Karit is our enemy, which means war is always a possibility. It’s not just about keeping an advantage, it’s about preventing our enemy from gaining that advantage. Tremontane will be able to reproduce that Devisery, but we’ll be playing catch-up with Dineh-Karit, and if their Devisery is as advanced as I’ve seen, heaven only knows what else they’ll be able to invent based on it. Recovering the Device is urgent, and Blackwood knows that. She just doesn’t realize what kind of enemy she’s facing.”