Before he could even tuck himself back into his trousers, Delia was there. She grabbed the crystal vessel and lifted it to the light. Her lips parted in relief. Lowering her arm, she held the repostilary out toward him again. “Blood.”
“What?”
“Just a drop… quickly.”
Tylar was beyond asking. The miiodon’s tentacles were showing a renewed interest in their party. He simply did as she told him and nicked the tip of his left thumb on his sword. He held forth the bleeding wound.
Delia kept a warding hand over the repostilary. Her eyes met his. “Think of ice. Water so cold it freezes with its mere touch.”
He nodded as she uncovered the jar.
“Concentrate hard!” she ordered.
He did, picturing in his mind’s eye a font of frigid water. He knew cold. He had once traveled to Ice Eyrie in winter, to hunt down a nasty band of bloodrunners. He had spent eight days on the frozen tundra. He remembered the frost that rimed his cloak, the ache of wind across his bare skin. Then he had stepped wrong, broken through a crust of ice, and fallen headlong into a blue tarn. He allowed the memory of that icy dunking to wash through him.
A drop of blood fell into the repostilary.
Delia replaced the stopper, shook the vessel, then held it out. “Throw it.” She pointed to the middeck. “Toward the bulk of the creature.”
Tylar took the glass vessel. He was shocked to find the crystal had gone ice cold in his hand.
“Throw it!”
He arched, bringing his arm back, then flung the repostilary through the air. It sailed in a perfect arc and shattered against the broken mast stub, spraying the contents over the undulating flank of the jelly shark.
The miiodon reared up. Convulsing waves coursed outward across its skin from the site of the splash, darkening along the way. Tentacles contracted back toward their well-spring, curling in on themselves, leaving behind trails of sizzling poison like so much snail slime. The tang of venom choked the air.
“Seems the beastie don’t much like your piss,” Rogger said. “Not that I can blame it, having shared a cell with you.”
“It isn’t Tylar’s water the beast shuns,” Delia said, awe tracing her words. “It’s the Grace held within.”
The jelly shark writhed upon the middeck, rocking the ship with its mass. The dark stain upon its flesh continued to spread, as if the beast were being cooked from the inside.
“What’s happening?” Rogger asked.
Delia watched, her eyes studious. “A miiodon’s digestive venom is kept from consuming its own flesh by the beast’s body heat. That’s why the Chilldaldrii ice harpoons can fend off the creatures. A wound from an ice spear activates the jelly shark’s own poison around the point of contact, causing the venom to eat the beast’s flesh. The pain drives the creature back into the sea where it eventually heals.”
Tylar watched the darkened sections of the miiodon begin to melt and slough. If Delia was right, the miiodon wasn’t cooking from the inside out. It was eating itself from the inside out.
Finally, the jelly shark’s thickest tentacle, ending in a footpad, lashed out to the starboard rail. It grabbed hold and heaved its bulk over the side, seeking to escape the agony. The miiodon crashed gracelessly into the sea and sank away.
“Will it survive?” Rogger asked, leaning over the rail and watching the bubbling fade to empty seas.
“Doubtful,” Delia answered. “That was no mere harpoon that struck the beast, but the full Grace of a god’s blessing.”
Tylar remembered Delia saying something similar a moment before. “What are you talking about?”
She faced him. “You cast a blessing upon the beast, a charm of icy waters.”
“A charm from his piss?” Rogger interrupted.
She nodded. “And blood.”
Tylar remained very still. He was no Hand, trained in the art of Graces, but having been a Shadowknight he was not ignorant of how a god’s bodily humours functioned. Only the flows from a god could bless or charm.
“What are you saying?” he whispered hotly. “That my fluids have the same potency as a god’s?”
“Not any god’s,” Delia answered. “Meeryn’s.”
“Impossible,” Rogger muttered.
Delia kept her focus on Tylar. “I saw it the day you were whipped in the yard. I recognized the glow of Graces in your blood. When Meeryn died, she not only gifted you with the dred ghawl. She somehow granted you her power as a god. It flows through all your humours, not just your blood.”
It seemed impossible, but Tylar had only to stare at the empty decks as proof. He remembered the icy touch of the repostilary in his hand. Could it be?
First a shadowy daemon, now the very Graces of a god…
Before anyone could question further, the crash of a hatch drew their attention around. Captain Grayl appeared, followed by a cadre of sailors, all armed with swords.
The boulder of a man gaped at the empty decks. “By all the gods, it’s true! The jelly shark… it’s gone!”
“Back into the sea,” Rogger said.
“How… why…?”
Rogger shrugged. “Mustn’t have liked the taste of your fine ship. Too salty, I’d guess.” The thief leaned toward Tylar and Delia, and whispered through his beard. “Perhaps we should continue this other discussion below.”
Tylar risked a slow nod.
The captain’s attention had focused elsewhere. His ship had been saved, but it was far from unharmed. The center mast was gone, and what was left of the middeck still steamed with poison. It would take some time to get her seaworthy again.
“You and you!” the captain yelled. “Get new planks from the bilge deck! You! Hoist up buckets of scrub salts! Where the naether is my first mate?”
Behind the captain’s back, Rogger motioned to the open hatch.
As a group, they retreated to the doorway leading to the lower decks. Tylar had his own questions.
But was he ready for the answers?
In a short time, the trio gathered in the cabin shared by Tylar and Rogger. It was no more than a cupboard with stacked beds against one wall and a single wardrobe. There was no window, only a lone lamp burning blubber from a leechseal. The smoky flame cast little light but plenty of stench.
Rogger sat on the bed, rubbing his bare feet, while Delia stood by the closed door, stiffly, as if unsure she should be in such close quarters with two men.
Tylar paced in front of the wardrobe.
Rogger spoke, picking at a blackened toenail. “So the boy here is crammed full up the arse with godly Graces.”
“I’m certain,” Delia said.
Rogger nodded. “Then I’m beginning to fathom how Tylar’s able to hold a daemon inside him… with that much Grace running through him.”
“There certainly might be a connection,” Delia agreed. “I hadn’t considered that.”
Tylar was less interested in such ponderings, but he kept silent.
Rogger scratched his beard. “Let’s start at the beginning. Meeryn was one of the water gods, right?”
Delia nodded. All the gods had varied talents and abilities, but all basically were categorized as one of four aspects: air, water, loam, and fire. Rogger raised one eyebrow. “And you just guessed that Tylar had the ability to freeze the jelly shark. That he could pass on an ice charm with his piss and-”
Delia cut him off. “We prefer the phrase yellow bile.”
“Yes, and shite is black bile. Pretty words for what can be found in a chamber pot. But tell me how you knew Tylar could perform such miraculous acts.”
“As I said, I suspected from the Grace glowing in his blood.”
“And so you just took a gamble with the jelly shark, hoping his piss was blessed with Grace, too.”
A bit of color flushed Delia’s cheeks. “Not so large a gamble as you might suppose. Who do you think has been emptying the chamber pots from your cabin?”
Rogger blinked a moment, glancing to the bedsid
e, then laughed. “By all the gods, Delia, you little secret alchemist! You already knew Tylar’s humours were rich in Grace.”
“I didn’t want to say anything,” she mumbled. “Not until I was sure.”
Tylar studied his body as if it were a stranger. He spoke, turning his face to Delia. “You were a Hand to a god. Tell me what I can expect.” Her eyes grew sympathetic. “I can tell you only what I know of gods. A mortal man has never borne such power. You have good reason for caution.”
“Tell me of the gods, then.”
She nodded. “Each god holds eight humours. Blood is the key to all, but you must learn how each of the others serves. You’ve seen how your water could pass on a Grace, but it lasts only a short time. It would take… well…” She motioned to her waist.
“His seed,” Rogger filled in.
She nodded. “It would take such a humour to permanently pass on a Grace to a living person or animal.”
“While my sweat could do the same to an object, something inanimate,” Tylar said. “Like blessing a Shadowknight’s cloak.” He knew that such sacred garb was anointed in the sweat of gods from all four aspects. It was this charmed blessing that granted the cloth the ability to shift shadows.
“Exactly,” Delia said. “All the remaining humours are what we call qualifiers, refiners of a charm.” She touched the corner of her eye. “ Tears hold the ability to enhance a blessing or charm already laid.” She touched her mouth. “While saliva contains the ability to weaken the same. But such an effect’s duration depends on the quantity applied.”
“That still leaves two others,” Rogger said, ticking off with his fingers.
She nodded. “ Sputum, or phlegm, is more complicated, used more in the field of alchemy. Such a humour can combine the Graces from various aspects, such as a fusion of fire and water. The combinations are myriad and would require a skilled alchemist to explain in more detail. I don’t fully-”
“Yes, whatever,” Rogger said. “And we all know what the last does. Black bile. We ran into a pair of bloodnullers in the dungeons.”
Tylar held back a shudder, remembering their fetid touch. Black bile, the soft solids of a god, wiped all blessings away, turning the charmed back into the ordinary.
“Yes,” Delia said. “Bloodnullers are smeared in the bile of all four aspects, fused with an alchemy of sputum. That is why they can wipe all blessings away.”
Tylar shook his head. “But I was cleansed by nullers in the dungeons of Summer Mount. Why wasn’t I stripped then, made normal?”
“Because you are not just superficially charmed or blessed.
You are Grace. Like a god. It forms continuously in your humours.”
Tylar felt sickened by this thought.
“What about his blood, then?” Rogger continued. “You said it was the key to all.”
Delia glanced away. Tylar noted the tears moistening her eyes. She had been the blood servant to Meeryn. It had been her honor… and now it was her loss.
They waited in silence.
“Blood,” she began softly, “is indeed the key to all. It is tied to the will of the god. They are one and the same. It takes blood and concentration to bend the general properties of an aspect, like water, into a specific charm.”
“Such as the charm of ice, ” Tylar said. He remembered her request earlier to focus his mind on cold water as he dripped his blood into the repostilary.
“Yes, even such a simple charm requires blood to make it so. It is the key to granting all blessings.”
Thoughtful silence fell among the party, until Rogger added his own bit of wisdom. “Well, in the jelly shark’s case, it was more a curse than a blessing.”
The ship suddenly lurched under them and canted to the port side. Delia fell against the door with a small cry. Tylar grabbed the edge of the wardrobe. Overhead, booted feet pounded across the deck, accompanied by muffled shouts of alarm.
“Seems we’re not out of bad luck yet,” Rogger commented calmly, still seated on the bed.
“What’s happening?” Delia regained her balance, though the floor remained tilted. “Has the miiodon returned?”
“Let’s pray not.” Tylar joined her at the door and forced it open. He stumbled out, followed by Delia and reluctantly by a barefooted Rogger. They climbed the stairs to the stern hatch.
Tylar was the first out. The smoky confines of the lower decks brightened to the fresh breezes of the open sea. The air smelled almost sweet.
But Tylar’s attention focused on the chaos atop the deck. The crew ran ropes and climbed rigging. Orders were shouted along with brittle curses. The frenzied activity bordered on panic.
A few steps away, Captain Grayl stood at his post by the great wheel, flanked by his two steersmen. All three men clutched their wheels, leaning their full weight to turn them farther.
“Another four degrees, damn you!” Grayl bellowed.
The Grim Wash listed to the port side. Clearly the crew fought to turn the ship, attempting to angle her sharply against the prevailing wind. But with the central mast and mainsail gone, it was a futile struggle.
Tylar crossed to the captain’s side. “What’s wrong?”
The captain’s face had purpled with the strain. “Tangleweed dead ahead! Have to avoid it, or we’ll be bogged down and trapped!”
Tylar shaded his eyes-and saw the danger immediately. Filling the ocean beyond the ship lay a mat of thick green vegetation. A smattering of stalky white flowers bobbed in the wind and current. He now understood the source of the sweetness to the air. Tangleweed was the curse of the Meerashe sailor. Such patches floated with the currents and tides. They were unpredictable and could snare careless ships, snagging them up and holding them for days until they could be chopped free… if they could be chopped free. Many ships met their end within the embrace of tangleweed.
Rogger spoke beside Tylar, his voice dry in his throat. “That’s no ordinary scrap of weed.”
Tylar glanced to the thief.
“That’s Tangle Reef.”
The captain heard Rogger and spat on the deck. “Turn this damn ship, you bastards! Now!”
“Are you sure?” Tylar asked.
Rogger bared his arm with the branded sigils. He pointed to one of the scars.
“Fyla,” Delia said, naming the symbol for the god of this watery realm.
Rogger lowered his arm. “I’ve already been here.”
Tylar shook his head at their cursed misfortune. At sea, they had hoped to avoid all the god-realms of the Nine Lands, to never touch soil. Now they had stumbled upon the one realm that had no land.
Fyla was a solitary and reclusive god. Even her own handmaidens and handmen were born here-which, considering the unusual nature of her realm, was not surprising. She and her citizens lived beneath the sea in a city formed from tangleweed. They were hunters, fishermen, and sea farmers. Their realm, like the weed in which they made their home, roamed throughout the seas of Myrillia.
Rogger said, “While I consider bad luck my constant companion in life, I must say that running into Tangle Reef right now is beyond pure chance.”
Delia nodded. “The gods are on the move. They know of Meeryn’s death and have joined the pursuit. Tangle Reef must’ve been sent to hunt you down.”
Tylar sensed his doom, a stony weight sinking deep into his chest.
Rogger continued. “We now know who sent the jelly shark after us.”
Tylar stared over to the carpet of undulating weed. The ship, tilted in a frozen turn, continued its plowing course toward the tangling trap, driven by relentless winds and current. The miiodon had been used to cripple them, herd them into the waiting tendrils of the tangleweed. Such was not beyond Fyla. The ocean was her domain, the creatures at her command.
Rogger sighed. “And if she uses a jelly shark like a sheeper’s mutt, there’s no telling what else might be waiting for us.”
8
CHRISMFERRY
Dart scrubbed the stone floor with a ho
rsehair- bristled brush. Her knuckles were raw, both from the rough surfaces and the stinging lye soap. Her simple shift of rough-spun wool clung to her damply. Sweat rolled from the tip of her nose.
Laurelle fared no better, in the same shapeless dress, hair in a drab bonnet. Using both hands, she scrubbed her brush across the stone floor of the Graced Cache. Though little more than a drudgery maid, she seemed content in her new role.
They were handmaidens-in-waiting.
This was their duty. To perform chores, lowly though they may seem, that not even the highest nobles of Chrismferry would be allowed to observe. Like now, scrubbing the floor of the Graced Cache, a vault that contained and preserved all of Chrism’s repostilaries.
“In this manner,” their matron had extolled, “you’ll know your place here. While you were raised high by the touch of an Oracle, chosen from many, here in the Lord’s castillion you are mere servants. You must never forget your place.”
And so, on their knees, they learned this first lesson.
Pupp was their only company here, sniffing about the floor, his molten body aglow in the dim chamber. He kept near Dart’s side, perhaps wary of the power and wealth in this room. While Chrismferry was a rich city, grown fatted over the four millennia since its founding, its true wealth lay here.
Here was the heart of the city.
Dart sat back on her heels and wiped the sweat from her nose with the back of her hand. She stared across the vast vault.
The Graced Cache was located deep underground, where the quarried stones of Chrism’s castillion became natural limed stone. Its ceiling hung unusually low. Even Dart had to keep her head bowed from the roof.
“The better to know your place,” Matron Shashyl had instructed. “To honor what is stored here with bended back.”
Still, despite the low ceiling, the Cache did not feel confining. Its space covered an area larger than the central courtyard of her old school. Most kept their voices whispered because of the chamber’s unnerving habit to echo and amplify. It was as if there were a ghost haunting the room, mocking their words.
The Cache reminded Dart of a wine cellar. While there was a certain dankness to the air, a pleasant sweetness lay beneath it, like the spirits distilled from aged wine casks-though no barrels had ever been rolled into this vault.
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