“Go! Fast as you can. Don’t look back.”
She was gone, her small arms and legs taking her as quickly as they could toward shore. For all her speed, she could not match the swiftness of the serpent that approached. He would have to distract it.
They were not the only ones who had spotted the creature. The calm waters were no more as the boys splashed frantically toward safety. Lord Greger had waded in, pulling them from the water. Mercedes was a blur of sky blue as she raced down the beach. Away from the children. Away from him.
“Mercedes,” he said aloud, her name still on his lips as he turned away, swimming toward the serpent and open sea.
It could have been cast in gold, so pure was its color; its eyes were blood-red garnets. Elias would have thought it a thing of beauty, from a distance.
For the last several minutes, the serpent had been content to swim loose coils around him. Not touching him. Not yet. The cove had become a fearsome, whirling pool. The churning of the water could not drown out the roaring in his ears.
A mariner’s harpoon protruded from its neck. Six feet of forged steel bounced hideously from an open wound. Someone had shot it. That was the reason it was here. The creature was dying, and its actions had become unpredictable.
He heard his name carried on the wind. A glance behind him showed Reyna stumbling onto the beach. Good girl. Now there was no one left to save but himself. Trying to appear as small as possible, he sank into the water and swam for shore.
The serpent hit him, hard enough to send him spinning down toward the sea floor, where there was no air to breathe and his lungs burned. His attempts to claw his way to the surface failed; his fingers scrabbled uselessly against smooth scaling. In desperation, he wrapped arms and legs around the serpent and held tight. It reared back, spiraling out of the water, and Elias found himself hundreds of feet in the air, clinging to the serpent’s neck, the harpoon lodged directly beneath his feet. The serpent twisted around to pin him with glowing red eyes. Its mouth opened wide to reveal rows of iron-gray teeth and a black gaping hole.
A single arrow flew straight into the serpent’s open mouth, a moment before its head exploded into devil fire. Elias tumbled into the water in a shower of gory serpent flesh. He resurfaced, coughing up the sea and worse, relief threatening to swamp his vision. He looked toward shore.
The boys were there with the ambassador and Reyna. Another man holding a lit torch. And standing beside him, with her bow still raised high, was Mercedes.
Sixteen
ORD AMBASSADOR GREGER waded into the shallow waters and hauled Elias to his feet.
“Good God, boy. I’ve just lost ten years of my life. Are you hurt?”
“No, I—” It was all Elias had time for. The boys closed in around him, everyone speaking at once. Reyna flung her arms around his neck and cried, “I’m sorry! I’m so sorry. It’s my fault!”
“Stop.” He pried her fingers loose so that he could inspect her. She was trembling. So was he. “You’ve all your fingers? Your toes?”
“I have them.”
Jaime was just behind her, an arm around a whimpering Hector. Perfect, was Elias’s fleeting thought. There went Hector’s final swim lesson.
“We’ll speak of this later,” Elias said to Reyna. Slimy bits of serpent clung to his hair. He pulled a stringy piece free and tossed it onto the sand, distracting and delighting the younger boys. “From now on, you’ll swim with me, or Jaime. Never alone. Do I have your word on it?”
“Yes, Lord Elias,” Reyna said.
He looked over her head. “Jaime?”
“I’ll make sure of it, Lord Elias.”
The man holding the torch approached him. He wore rough, salt-stained clothing and a strip of red fabric across his forehead—one of the fisherman from down the beach. Elias knew him.
“Too close, chart maker.” The fisherman spat onto the sand. “You could have been food for the fish.”
“How is it here, Mungo?” Elias’s heart was still racing. Across the cove, the serpent’s corpse had slipped entirely beneath the surface, leaving the water calm once again. “Who would risk killing it?”
Serpents that swam within the sea boundaries of del Mar belonged to the king. They were hunted by the king’s fishermen, their skin traded for gold and their meat considered a delicacy. To steal from the kingdom was to risk what all thieves risked: fingers, or a hand, and a lengthy stay in the castle dungeons.
“Some idiot shipman.” Mungo the fisherman shrugged. “A Coronad, maybe. Lucky for you, your lady is a good shot.”
His lady.
Mercedes stood at the edge of the crowd with her bow pointed to the ground, the hem of her blue dress soaked with seawater and coated in sand. And the look on her face . . .
“Mercedes.” He walked toward her, the lump in his throat painful and sudden. He knew how he would have felt if she had been the one in the water.
She asked faintly, “What sort of person swims toward the snake?”
He slowed his steps. Spread his arms wide and said, “I’m in one piece. See?”
“For now you’re in one piece!” she burst out, and flung her bow at his feet, sending up a spray of white sand. All went silent with shock around them. The lady Mercedes never, ever shouted. Or threw things. She cried, “What of tomorrow? What of tonight? One day you’re going to find yourself in trouble, Elias, and I won’t be around to save—”
He kissed her. Cupped her face with both hands and touched his lips to hers. He had not thought he would make it, not this time, and the kiss was full of fear, and relief . . . until a fisherman’s chuckle reminded him they were not alone.
Mercedes stumbled back, wide-eyed, her chest rising and falling in time with his. And then she turned and ran off. Leaving him staring after her with children and fishermen and a foreign ambassador at his back.
Elias could not follow her. Not right away. First he had to see a pack of overly excited children back to the tower and deliver the ambassador safely to Ulises. Both took time and much explanation. Then he had to endure Basilio’s horrified rantings while he sat in a tub and scrubbed off the remainder of the serpent’s guts from his hair and skin. And when finally, finally, he was able to look for her, he discovered she was nowhere to be found. Not in her chambers, not in the castle. No one he asked knew where she was. He stalked across the grounds, gnashing his teeth in frustration, before one of her attendants finally took pity on him. Lady Mercedes had gone off with Commander Aimon, but she was expected to return for supper.
Elias spent the remainder of the afternoon in the tower with both maps. Or tried to. Fellow geographers Luca, Martín, and a handful of others interrupted frequently. They had heard of the serpent—and the kiss!—and wanted to know every detail, grousing when Elias sent them packing. By the time he dressed for supper, his mood was dark. It would have looked odd to wear his carrier to eat, so he left it in his chambers, hidden within a secret niche in the wall that he had discovered by accident years ago.
The ambassador’s presence meant supper was a grander affair than usual. Long tables spanned the great dining hall, weighed down by their bounty: roast pigs on copper platters, a pomegranate shoved into every mouth; fried fish and boiled octopus; great round bowls of rice blackened with squid ink; and endless plates of olives, figs, grapes. The cheese stank beautifully.
Elias spotted Luca at a table and headed in that direction, stopping often to greet those he hadn’t seen in months. Conversation was loud and lively, nearly drowning out the trio of guitar masters occupying a corner. The musicians dressed in flamboyant embroidered red, their feet tapping on the stone. Elias had nearly reached Luca when a hand snaked out from one of the tables and grabbed his arm.
“Elias.” Lord Braga pulled him down to be better heard over the noise. He was a tall man, bald, with an extravagant mustache. When Lord Braga was ashore, he taught navigation and astronomy. “Madame Vega says you’re considering an apprentice.”
Exasperated, Elias lo
oked for Madame Vega, but she was nowhere to be found. “Ah. I am. That is—”
“You’ll consider my Jaime.” Lord Braga gestured down the table to where the children sat. Jaime with Reyna, Hector laughing. Hector appeared to have fully recovered from the incident with the sea serpent. “He’s more than ready. As a favor to me.”
Directly across from him, Madame Grec straightened, lips pressed thin. She told Lord Braga, “You should not influence him. There are others to consider.”
Lord Braga gave her a pitying look. “Hector’s not meant for the seas, Genevieve. You’re better off sending him to Isidore.”
Elias looked at Hector in a new light. His stepfather was always complaining about how hard it was to find good apprentices for the Exchequer. He asked, “Is he good with figures?”
“I think so,” Lord Braga answered. “A little young to say for certain, but—”
“Hector will be an explorer!” Madame Grec snapped. “Like his father. Not some coin counter.” Madame and Lord Braga exchanged narrow-eyed looks over the roast pig.
Elias was offended on his stepfather’s behalf. Lord Silva came to the rescue. “Lord Braga, leave the boy alone,” he said mildly, and Elias sent him a grateful look. “Elias is capable of making his own choices, in his own time. And Madame Grec,” he said with a warning look, “this is neither the time nor the place.”
Madame Grec stabbed a slice of pig with her knife. Lord Braga sighed and released Elias’s arm, and Elias gratefully made his escape.
Luca greeted him with a “They won’t leave you alone until you decide.”
“I feel like a cornered rat.” Elias elbowed a place for himself along the bench between Luca and Martín. Luca looked almost like his old self. He must have felt better to be risking another plate full of fish.
Martín said, “Choose anyone but Mateo. I’ve decided to take him on.”
“Fine,” Elias said absently.
Ulises and Mercedes sat at a table on a dais, Lord Greger between them. He had never seen her in that dress before. It was as green as the Javelin palms, trimmed in black lace. She wore no jewelry, a simple black ribbon around her neck her only adornment. Ulises spoke pleasantly with the ambassador. Elias wondered how the king had explained the bruising beneath his eye, then decided he didn’t explain. Only Commander Aimon and Mercedes would be brave enough to ask, and they already knew what had happened. Mercedes caught Elias’s gaze. Her smile faded to nothing, and she looked away.
She was avoiding him.
The conversation continued around Elias as he thought about Mercedes and maps and the upcoming voyage. He had been looking forward to this expedition. Now two years felt like a very long time to be away from home. He glanced again toward the dais, then scowled at Luca, who elbowed him in the side and said, “You’ll get nowhere sitting here and brooding, Junipero.”
Elias ignored the unflattering reference to del Mar’s fabled romantic hero, who jumped from the southern cliffs to his death after his true love, also his sister, married another. It dawned on him that the chair beside Mercedes was empty. Lady Aimon dined on the other side of it, which meant the commander had not yet arrived.
An opportunity.
Elias abandoned his companions with a hurried “I’ll see you later,” and made his way to the raised table. When he pulled back Commander Aimon’s seat, he was rewarded with a frown from Mercedes and a smile from Lady Aimon.
“What handsome company,” Lady Aimon said after he had kissed her on each cheek. She glanced at Mercedes, who dissected the fish on her plate with great care. “I’ll not flatter myself into thinking you’re here on my behalf.” Lady Aimon turned to speak to her other supper companion, offering them what privacy she could.
Elias greeted Lord Greger. The ambassador endeared himself to Elias by also turning aside and striking up a conversation with the king.
Food and wine were placed before him. The wine was half drunk before he said in a low voice, “Mercedes.”
She did not look up from her plate. “Lord Elias.”
Lord Elias, he noted. Not a promising start. “I left your bow in your chambers. Did you see it?”
“Yes. Thank you.”
He happened to catch Ulises’s eye at that moment. Elias had never been good at reading lips. He could not tell if his friend had mouthed Good luck or Do not bother.
He tried again. “Lord Greger is pleasant.”
“He is. Very pleasant.”
Elias drank more wine. “Mercedes, do you remember Lady Antonella?”
She looked over at that, startled. “Of course I do.”
Lady Antonella had been a distant relation of his stepfather’s. A year ago, she had sailed for Caffa to visit her ailing sister, who had married a nobleman there. The ship had been set upon by pirates and everyone aboard murdered, from the captain down to the cabin boy.
Elias said, “I was in Coronado at the time. When the news came, we were told only that a del Marian noblewoman and her party had died off the coast of Caffa. No names were given. I thought it was you.”
Finally, she met his eyes. He said, “For two weeks, I thought you were gone. Luca will tell you I was . . . poor company.” Her hand rested beside her plate. He reached out, touched the back of his hand to the back of hers. “I’m sorry I frightened you this morning. But you are not the only one who worries. You are not the only who has stayed up at night, imagining the worst.”
Once again, Mercedes concentrated on her plate. He waited, frustration mounting. “Nothing to say? That is unlike you.” And then he wished he had not pushed her. The words she spoke were far worse than silence.
“It does not matter.”
He breathed in his hurt, breathed it in deep. It felt as though she’d kicked him. “If you say so,” he said, and made to push back his chair. Her hand covered his, stopping him.
“You’re misunderstanding me.” She turned into him, their heads nearly touching, and spoke quietly. “You’ve been dreaming of this expedition since you were a boy. Do you remember, years ago? We were at the cove, and you were talking about sailing past the Strait of Cain at last. You spoke of it for so long that I fell asleep right there on the sand. And when I woke, you were still speaking of it.”
He smiled despite himself. “I remember.”
She smiled, too, a little. “You’ll be away for years, Elias, and I think of everything that can go wrong. I have trouble sleeping sometimes, thinking of it.”
A small sound from Lady Aimon, though her back was still turned. It sounded like a sniffle. He was past caring who heard them.
He said, “Then don’t think of it. Come with me.” The words were out before he could consider them further. And even then, he did not regret speaking them. At her stunned look, he said, “There’s nothing strange about an emissary joining an expedition. It’s been done before. Come with me.”
She took a deep breath. “I can’t come with you.”
“Why not?”
“Because I’m going to Mondrago.”
That silenced him. Mercedes glanced over her shoulder at her cousin, who was laughing over some story with the ambassador, then said, “We’ve been discussing it for some time. You know this. Someone must go there and find out what needs to be done.”
She would oversee the rebuilding of Mondrago. It was not something that should have surprised him. “Ulises asked you to go?”
She shook her head. “I asked. Today. This . . . it feels right to me, Elias. That I should go.”
He understood how she felt. Especially now, after what they had learned at Javelin. “How long will you be gone?”
“I’ve no notion. Truly, I don’t know.”
“When will you go?”
This time, she took more care of her words, and of who might be listening. “After we’re done here.” She spoke of the maps. Mercedes would leave for Mondrago once the riddle was solved. “When I said it does not matter, I only meant . . . when this is over, I will go one way, and you will go the
other. And that is all.”
Her hand still covered his. Everything he needed to say was trapped inside of him. All he managed was “Is it?”
Behind him came a loud “Ahem.” Commander Aimon had come to claim his chair. When Elias looked back, the commander regarded him with raised eyebrows and asked, “Are you quite finished?”
“Oh, Aimon,” Lady Aimon said under her breath. She dabbed at the corner of her eye with a napkin. “What timing.”
“Yes, Commander.” Elias stood. He could feel his face burning. Mercedes once again had eyes only for her plate. He took small comfort in seeing that her cheeks were as red as his must be.
He didn’t bother to return to Luca and Martín’s company, but left the great dining hall with his appetite lost.
In his chambers, a single candle burned on a table, casting shadows upon charts and stone. There was no sign of Basilio. Elias placed his sword and dagger on a large chest. His coat fitted like a second skin; it took some effort to remove it without help, but after much cursing and struggle, he managed to set it aside. His thoughts were occupied, and because they were, he had only a second of warning. Against a wall, one long shadow split into two, and a figure sprang forward with his sword raised high.
His own weapons were across the chamber on the sea chest, sword and dagger of no use to him now. Sheer instinct had him twisting away; in the same motion, he seized a globe off a table and hurled it at the masked intruder, dressed head to foot in black.
A grunt of pain emerged as the globe made contact. The man staggered backward. Elias had time to see another shadow emerge before he heard a loud crack and his nose exploded with pain. He dropped to his knees, hands clutched to his face. Another blow, this time to the back of his head, and he was on the ground, face pressed against stone. A knee dug into his back. His attacker’s breath was hot against his ear.
“A message for you, mapmaker.” The man’s voice was soft, gentle even. “You are curious like the cat, my lord Elias. It serves you well in your profession. But there’s such a thing as being too curious, hmm? The cat has only so many lives. And then what happens to it?”
Isle of Blood and Stone Page 18
