The crew grumbled. Wes began giving orders and the men dispersed. A group of them clustered at the bow, whispering among themselves.
“Get to work,” Wes barked.
Middle Finger waved him over. “Let them talk. They know we lost their pay.”
“I know. It’s the gob’s fault.”
Spicy couldn’t meet the man’s hateful gaze.
Middle Finger made a helpless gesture. “Not my first choice of action. We could have talked Captain Breaker into a compromise.”
“Now we look weak.” Wes shoved Spicy as he retreated to the cabin.
“I’m sorry,” Spicy said. “I thought you were going to start killing each other.”
“Probably would have,” Middle Finger said. “Sometimes it’s part of the bargaining process. You have a lot to learn, little goblin. My first mate is right. Breaker saw weakness just now and will probably try to make a move on our operation here. He knows we can’t defend both this place and Bird’s Landing while we’re away. And sure as the sun sets in the west, he noticed us readying the boat.”
“So you could have made him happy by paying him just part of the gold back.”
“Or none, if I got lucky. But Breaker’s a tough one. Not my first choice of business partners. Don’t worry about the gold, though. We can always make more. We’ll make some with the dragon.”
“What do you mean? The dragon worshippers have the crates.”
Middle Finger smiled and placed a foot on a barrel. “They may have the feet and hands and body and belly of the beast, but it’s the head where we make our fortune. It’s time for you to decide if you’re coming with us or not.”
“You say Captain Breaker’s going to make a move.”
“Aye. If I’m right, he’ll linger and return once we’ve left and steal anything not nailed down, and kill anyone who tries to stop him. It’s what I would do, or would have done in my youth. I can only imagine the look on his face when he discovers the dragon up there.”
“You have to help us.”
“Do I, now? And what would be my motivation? This boat is leaving. Do you have an offer for me to change my mind?”
Spicy’s mind raced. “You want me to come with you to find Alma and the foreman. I’ll do that. But how do we protect my friends? I can’t ask them to come with us.”
“Wouldn’t take them. Too distracting, all those kids underfoot. But we’re making a run through easy waters to Orchard City. I’ll leave ten men here. That’ll be enough of a deterrent, and I’ve managed with a light crew before. Bird’s Landing might also be a target. But it will manage on its own, as there’s no reason Breaker will raid it if he ever hopes to use it as a trading stop. Will that make you happy?”
Spicy felt anything but happy. A fresh apprehension grew as he considered that he was leaving Rime and the children with a specific threat looming out on the waterway. They would have to be watched over by humans.
He nodded stiffly.
“Good. If there’s anyone you need to say good-bye to, do it fast.”
Chapter Five
Spicy waited on the dock as the sailors untied the Sin Nombre and prepared to push off. He slung his small bag over his shoulder. His mind was a jumble of thoughts. He wasn’t prepared to leave, but this was his only opportunity to go after Alma.
Next to him, a young crew member was being fiercely hugged by the smiling woman who had brought them their breakfast. Each time the crew member tried to disengage, she burst into tears.
Where was Rime? Marta had gone to fetch him. Middle Finger said they were leaving in minutes. There would be no time for him to go up to the dragon cave.
Marta came hurrying down from the village, barefoot, her thin legs covered in mud below her knees.
“Where is he?” Spicy asked.
“He can’t come, Master Goblin. One of the girls, Dill, I believe, was throwing up.”
Spicy looked up past her, expecting that at any moment his friend would appear with the children in tow. But he wasn’t coming. Was Dill sick too? First Pix’s incessant cough, and now this. They all needed to get out of the accursed swamp.
“I understand that you have to leave,” Marta said. “I remind you of my people’s vow to your master, who we serve. I will see to it the children are cared for as if they were my own.”
Half of the pirate crew who had been detailed to remain behind gathered on the shore. At first, it appeared they were disinterested in their boat’s departure. But they gave enough lost looks at the Sin Nombre as it was prepped that Spicy knew they all would have preferred to be on board rather than assigned to guard the mud village.
“Perhaps you have a message for Rime I can give?” she asked.
What was there to say? Abandoning Rime would only anger his friend further. The crying woman released the young crew member, and he hurried down to the gangplank. He was younger than most of the men, his skin dark but his hair curled and yellow.
The woman wiped her eyes. Then she reached for Spicy and rubbed the top of his head. Marta shoved her back and barked something at her. The woman’s expression darkened, and she shouted a string of words in Cityspeak.
Marta pointed up the hill. “Your boy is gone. Go back to Bird’s Landing.”
The woman muttered a curse, gave Spicy a smile, and then waved at the departing ship.
“Time, Mister Spicy,” Middle Finger called from the bow. They were waiting for him. He walked carefully up the gangplank, which was hauled on board behind him. Sailors worked their poles and shoved the boat away from the dock. Once out of the inlet, the sails caught wind. The ship groaned as it got underway.
Spicy had to dodge the sailors as they hurried about the boat. As they were short-handed, there was much to do. Wes charged him with unfolding a small sail and attaching a line to something called a bowsprit. As he stood trying to figure out what it was, the yellow-haired young pirate showed him. He also took the time to demonstrate the necessary knot, tying it a few times and undoing it so Spicy could perform the task.
He got it wrong but managed on his second try.
“Goldbug, quit playing with the gob and stow those canvases,” Wes ordered.
Goldbug nodded, but before he left Spicy he said, “You’ll be a sailor yet, Master Goblin.”
Once the small sail was up, Spicy didn’t have much to do as the ship glided across the water. The crew hustled past as if he were a piece of cargo. Each man was like part of a machine; few had to be told what to do even as Wes kept a watchful eye on them.
Spicy studied the delta. The overgrown islands, forested shorelines, and wide waterways were all so similar. How the Sin Nombre would catch anyone within the watery maze was a mystery. If their quarry wasn’t going to Orchard City, they might hide in a thousand inlets and never be found.
His anxiety growing, he went to find Middle Finger.
The captain was sitting in his cabin, hunched over his desk. He had his note papers out and was busy scribbling. Although the motion of the boat was impossible to ignore, the relative comfort of chairs, a bed, and a writing desk within the cabin made sailing seem that much less horrible.
“How long to get to Orchard City?” Spicy asked.
The captain ignored him. Spicy walked about the cabin. He tested the cushion on the bed. Cleaned a dirty windowpane. Took a stick figure off the top of the desk. It was made from driftwood, the pieces tied together with rough twine. The doll wore a crude smile on a face drawn in white chalk and had dried grass for hair.
“Put that back,” Middle Finger said without looking up.
Spicy replaced it. “Is that something for good luck?”
The captain made a face. “Not everyone believes in that, you know. You don’t see me rubbing your head, do you? My little girl made that for me.”
“You have children?”
“Two. Both in Bird’s Landing.”
“But you said Captain Breaker threatens both the mud village and Bird’s Landing.”
Middle Fing
er set down the pen. “I know what I said. Get to the point. I’m busy.”
“You detailed half the crew to defend the village, which means Bird’s Landing is—”
“Defenseless? It’s a risk we run every time we set out, leaving our homes and families behind. Any crew which attacks another’s family better make sure word doesn’t get out, or they’ll never find a merchant who will trade with them. You aren’t here to remind me of the danger my family is in while I clean up this mess, are you?”
Spicy didn’t answer.
“Good,” Middle Finger said. “Now make yourself useful. Write down anything you can think of which might give us a clue as to where Alma might take the foreman once she gets to Orchard City.”
“You’re assuming that’s where she’ll go.”
“Let’s call it a safe bet. Now write.”
Spicy sat on a chair and grabbed a piece of paper.
The bombs were made from ingredients he didn’t know. Perhaps the captain had some idea, but the making of the explosives was only part of the business enterprise. She would have to set up manufacturing. Hire workers. Establish distribution, much like a farmer who wishes to trade beyond the boundaries of their village. Find customers—men like Lord and other mercenaries and soldiers. But Spicy didn’t write any of that. He thought of Alma. From being around the two during their voyage to the delta, he knew it was she who made the decisions. It certainly wasn’t Blades. The whiny man remained firmly under her control.
The first time he had seen her, she had been stealing jewelry from the body of a goblin woman she had murdered.
He wrote down “Gold.”
Besides that, he knew little about her. Her white hair was a unique feature, but Middle Finger knew what she looked like. He tapped the pencil on the desk.
Every time she had encountered Spicy, she had tried to shoot him with arrows. The last time he had seen her before her escape from the village, she had recovered her bow.
He added “Arrows” to the piece of paper.
Since she now had something she wanted to protect but also something she would have to sell, it meant she would need help. More soldiers.
“Guards,” he said.
“Mmm?” Middle Finger murmured.
“Alma’s going to need guards. Once she gets to where she’s going, she’s going to hire more mercenaries.”
Chapter Six
The archduke had to trust his subordinates to look after the more mundane affairs of caring for the kingdom’s largest city. He couldn’t be everyplace at the same time. Yet no matter how specific his language, even when set down in writing, failure was so often the result.
A geology report was ignored, resulting in a new tower collapsing at the Pinnacle waterfront. A hundred lives were lost.
A diplomatic mission sent to placate Pater and his zealots had turned into a bloodbath. Both sides claimed the other was at fault, and further attempts at a reconciliation fell on deaf ears.
And then the hunt for Mach hit a wall. No news came for eight weeks. His latest batch of agents had all gone missing, along with their bribes.
How the archduke raged. He feared he would have to wait for a new generation of stewards before finding ones who would have both intelligence and competence along with obedience. Training and education took so long, and the results proved disappointing.
The tremors in his hands were only getting worse. It would take hours at times to achieve the mental clarity to see through a problem that his younger self, mere months before, would have solved immediately.
Along with his gold reserves, his time was running out. Yet he had so much more to do.
He had delayed for too long. He should never have trusted his dragon. Now that it was missing, he had to proceed without it. Once the creature was recovered, he could revisit the stopgap measure he was about to embark upon.
It was time to make a son.
Begetting a child proved its own challenge.
The process involved techniques that had kept him alive for so long. His dwindling supplies had been only partially replenished from his last rejuvenation. The ingredients continued to be difficult to locate. And sometimes he realized he was forgetting part of the recipe. Never had his mind betrayed him so. Yet he had to press on, even if it meant making a mistake.
He cursed the missing dragon, and his hands trembled as he sifted through his jumble of notes.
A stringent odor filled the workshop as he mixed the preparation. From one vial with a faded label, a few drops, and from a sealed bowl a pinch of powder. A dozen other ingredients came next, each precisely measured. A single mismeasurement would require him to begin again, but a few of the ingredient containers were now empty.
He could feel the injection burn as the preparatory mixture pushed through his veins. Some would call it magic, others a miracle of the gods.
Soon he would spawn a new life.
Something was wrong.
The archduke’s head began to throb. A pulsing ache became a thunderous drumbeat within his skull. Fire raced down his neck and through his body. Spasms caused him to double over.
He knew it would be difficult, but not like this. But even as he tried to straighten and return to his volumes of notes to find a purgative to reverse the procedure, he collapsed to the floor of his basement workshop. As he clawed at the stone beneath him, he screamed.
The archduke woke in blackness. The lamps within his workshop had gone out.
The lump inside of him felt like it was a mass of white-hot coals. With each motion, something within his belly tore away at his insides. It wasn’t supposed to be like this. Struggling to rise, he grabbed for matches and lit a candelabrum that held the nubs of five white wax candles.. Then, pausing for a moment to catch his breath, he reached for a tray of knives. The scalpel reflected the dull glow of the candle flames.
To save his own life, he would have to terminate the procedure before he passed out again.
He sighed and hesitated but a moment.
In the basement of his palace where no servant dare tread, he began to cut.
The archduke fought for consciousness as he leaned against the heavy table.
The searing pain was gone. Now he felt only the mundane ache of the terrific wound down his belly, which with every minute mended itself. He had dropped the scalpel.
At his feet lay the spilled remains of what would have been his son. A deep sadness welled up within him. It would take months for his own body to fully recover, and years to replenish the ingredients.
But then…
Impossible.
As he brought the light down to the congealing pool of crimson, he saw not one but six small forms. Even as he collected them up, he sensed the life within all of them. The procedure hadn’t been a failure but an amazing success.
A miracle, if he chose to attribute the new lives to one of the gods.
Six new lives grew silently in the tanks. Six heartbeats. Six sons would soon breathe, once their lungs formed. He felt a measure of pride now that he had awoken, having slept what might have been a week. How he wished for something which told better time than the pocket watch that lay with the rest of his clothes. It had stopped ticking for a lack of winding.
He stood on trembling legs and examined the tanks. The light was too poor to make out details. The refilled lamp he had lit shed just enough illumination that he could see the lumps of his flesh continuing to take shape, nurtured by the frothing mixture, but barely recognizable as anything yet. He ran his fingers along each thick glass pane.
Which one of the six would be his successor? Which would fall sick as its body failed to respond to each step of the process? What other errors had occurred?
He pushed such doubts away. At least one would survive. And his line—his kind—would persevere.
The first son died a day later. The liquid in the tank had darkened, the growing flesh within had turned black. A quick test confirmed the tank’s mixture was too alkaline. The hose from the m
achine that fed carbon dioxide into the birthing liquid had slipped from its clamp overnight.
The archduke controlled his outrage. If he had kept vigilant, he would have discovered the malfunction.
Five left, he consoled himself. Five sons who would carry out his work even as he continued to fade.
Two more sons died in the following week without explanation. He tested and retested the birthing liquid. The chemicals read at the proper levels. He sniffed his reagents and pondered the possibility they had grown old and ineffective.
Three sons yet lived. They had all been identical, but was there something about the survivors’ makeup that gave them greater strength than their expired siblings? Hour by hour, he watched as the last three continued to develop.
He limped around the humming machines and the tanks. Dared to feel excitement.
Each son had formed fingers and toes. His flesh had given them life. The stuff of his bones was theirs. His blood. And as if he could accomplish it by will alone, all his strength he once had from his former days too.
No more mistakes, he promised the three. Such errors were for lesser creatures.
The matters of Pinnacle took too much time. No matter how much he delegated, his subordinates had grown too afraid to make decisions and would wait for him to emerge from the palace basement.
A week had passed, and his three sons had only grown stronger. The archduke emerged to gather supplies, but his palace staff immediately alerted the chancellor, who cornered him.
The archduke allowed himself to be led to the council chamber. The chancellor spouted his gratitude and nearly dropped the armload of papers clutched in his arms as he shepherded the frail archduke to the long table where the matters of city and kingdom were always discussed.
A trade dispute with the Dons down in Bahia was causing shortages in corn. Pinnacle’s own villages on the Great Ocean and the Inland Sea were slow in bringing in fish because of the raids perpetrated by the zealots. And the lesser dukes around the bay all wanted something.
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