Thrall's Wine

by Hausladen, Blake;

  I waved Geart in. He stepped across and took hold of Fenol’s bad arm.

  “What the hell are you doing?” Fenol asked before Geart’s blazing white song perfected his crippled limb.

  The song ended, and Fenol fell onto his knees. I ran to him, knelt close, and wrapped his true hand around the hilt of my sword.

  “When you make your art, what do you feel?”

  He squeezed the pummel as tears fell one after another.

  “What do you feel, Fenol? The warm touch of the light, or the dark touch of shadows?”

  His eyes were drawn to the dark corners of the warehouse. The darkness there seemed to move.

  Fenol shook his head as he rubbed his healed arm. “This is not real.”

  “This,” I said and clasped his hand onto the sword, “this is real. Close your eyes. Which do you feel, the light or the dark?”

  The tears came anew. He did not need to close his eyes to feel Her presence.

  I said, “I am not what you think I am. I do not serve who you think I do.”

  The look in his eyes was one I knew well. The light of inspiration and conversion. Fenol may well have been a man of Bayen, but no longer.

  Horace helped him up, and I unbelted my scabbard and handed it to him.

  “My sword is yours,” I said.

  Fenol sheathed the blade slowly and looked across at Errati. “The same for you? They did the same?”

  “You have one ordeal yet today, Swordmaster, but yes. I have joined Barok.”

  He looked from Errati to me and back. His tears stopped. He belted on my rapier.

  “Go with the sergeant,” I said. “He will answer all your questions and take you to a place where the men of my army are able to bid farewell to the darkness. Succeed, and you may wear my sword for the rest of your days.”

  “Come,” Horace said. “Let’s get you a meal and a good night’s sleep. You’ll need both. We’ll make the trip first thing tomorrow.”

  Fenol followed Horace out. Geart went, too, but said nothing.

  Errati suggested that he and I find some food, and we started back toward the keep.

  “That was easier than I expected,” he said.

  “Not so unexpected. He wasn’t giving up a life and career like you did.”

  “Life?” Errati said, almost as a question. “I was nothing more than Parsatayn’s front man. None of the notes I wrote were with my own coin. I own no property. I have no wife. Thinking that I would die bordered on relief. Fenol had enough hatred to sustain him through to an old and bitter death.”

  “Her touch cures hatred.”

  “So it seems,” he said, and we walked on. After a time, he said, “You have nothing to say about my lack of wealth?”

  I stopped him up. “You think I preserved you in order to get your gold?”

  “The thought crossed my mind.”

  “Hmm. That would have been nice, now that you say it. Good thing I have an alsman now who can bring things like that to my attention.”

  He laughed, and I noticed I was getting very close to comfortable in his presence. The Kaaryon was washing off of him quicker than most.

  He asked, “How have you survived this long?”

  “Upon the blood and sacrifice of others. Much too much of it.”

  Pemini and her girls interrupted us with a hot meal. It was a welcome sight. We ate for a time in silence. Nace, Fana, and a few of the scribes joined us.

  Errati said, “I wish I could tell you everything Parsatayn has planned for you.”

  “Oh?” I said. “What can you tell us?”

  He told us then about the chancellery men that moved through Bessradi with impunity and of the mountain of debt my father and others owed to Parsatayn. He told us about the Chancellor’s efforts to wrest control of the Treasury from Minister Sikhek and the open hostility between the bailiffs and the conservancy priests. He told us of the Chancellor’s moneylending operation and how it stretched the breadth of the empire and had hooks in every royal and noble line. He began writing down all the numbers—which provinces had what goods, details about their land and taxes, how many men they commanded, and how many of them pledged their votes on the Council of Lords to Parsatayn. He recruited my scribes, and we tallied the numbers into a horrifying table. It strained the eyes but focused the mind.

  In the same way that Haton was all but the master of Enhedu, Parsatayn was all but the master of Zoviya.

  We were still staring dumbly at the result of the work when someone finally interrupted us.

  The sun was coming up.

  It was Horace. “I am sorry, milord,” he said and handed me my sword. “Master Fenol didn’t survive.”

  I thanked them all for a second night of hard work and went up to find some sleep. Dia and her friends left me be.

  43

  Sikhek

  Cold fingers stroked my wounds in the darkness, and a dead voice whispered in my ear, “Crispo is here, master. Do not fret. Crispo, is here.”

  He licked at my wounds. The cold flesh of his tongue scraped my blood free. I got the sense that he had not just arrived.

  “Your flask was delicious,” he cooed. “Your kindness has filled me with life and wisdom.”

  He sucked upon my broken eyes and began to chew upon my flesh. I could not move. The silver that clung to my wounds kept the Shadow very far away. Especially the deep wound in my right eye—so close it had come to ending me. The sword had left behind a load of powdered silver, and the mercury in my blood had dissolved some of it.

  I woke more to my situation. The poor eye I had left gave me a milky view. Light bled down a trio of long sewer tunnels toward us. I’d come to rest on a slope that poured three joining lines of the sewer down into a large trunk line that would make its way to the river.

  One good rain or push, and I’d be just another hunk of rotting meat for the leeches that blanketed the bottom of the river.

  Crispo had found me there and had been licking and gnawing upon me for many days. My hip was eaten away, as were my lips, chin, and the top of my left shoulder. I was not sure what had revived me.

  Crispo pulled out the flask and held it before my failing eye.

  “You would like a sip, wouldn’t you, master? But no. It is mine now, as is your flesh and your soul. It is all you have left. Did you know that? The Sten and Exaltier have dissolved the Ministry and dismantled the Conservancy. All your gold and loyal men were taken and slaughtered. They found your vault beneath the Treasury Keep the day you fled into the Tanayon. They bashed away with picks and hammers around your stone door until it fell away. I saw the one who did it. Powerful and perfect, not so used up and grizzled like you. He drank deeply from your mercury and made his other loyal servants in Bessradi into Hessier upon your silver table. He poured a full decanter of mercury into each and fed them powdered bone. He made them beautiful. You saw them, yes? His new servants who threw the last of your Hessier from the tower? You have lost everything: your power, your mercury, and your city. They think you are dead, and very soon you will be.”

  He laughed at this, poked at my half-eaten face, and sloshed the flask of mercury like it was penny whiskey.

  I had strength for little more than a few words. “It makes a good sauce,” I whispered.

  He laughed and dripped mercury onto my healthier eye before his cold mouth slammed onto the socket, and he sucked my eye free. It went without pain, but the loss cast me into darkness.

  He chewed and licked the traces of mercury from my brow and collapsed eyelid.

  He dripped more mercury onto my remaining eye while he hummed and chewed. The mercury dissolved the powdered silver that clung to the deep wound. I blinked it free.

  “Eyy, no wasting any,” Crispo said and licked away the silver amalgam tears.

  The silver removed, the power of the Shadow began to trickle back into my mercury-laden body. It was weak, but enough. My pierced eye healed and focused. Crispo sat over me, quietly rocking.

  “
What did you do?” he choked, while pawing at his throat and chest.

  “I have delivered you, darling Crispo. The Shadow is the destroyer of this world, and I have rescued you from Him. Do you feel the warmth of the silver? It calls upon the Spirit of the Earth, the same as mercury collects the Shadow. You have been cleaning it from my wounds.”

  “No …” he choked. His arms fell limp to his sides, and he collapsed back against the dark wall of the tunnel. The flask clattered onto the brief ledge that ran along the wall. It was still open but did not spill.

  I relaxed. My body was healing. I could wait.

  A weight struck me, and I opened my eye to see Crispo’s unraveling body lying upon me. The muck of the sewer piled up behind us and began to push.

  “Mother, save me,” I said, but She would not hear me. I dared not pray to Him.

  I reached for the flask but missed it as we were washed down the slope. I hit the rushing water and tumbled through the darkness of the great stone pipe. I saw the glimmer of the sun for a moment as I was flushed into the river. I sank to its dark and littered bottom.

  The leeches found me at once.

  I failed you, Mother. I am sorry.

  44

  Captain Soma O’Nropeel

  The 29th of Spring, 1196

  The families of the crew were all there to see us off—every wife, mother, grandfather, and cousin. The men were all stooped from the effect of drink. There were a few last bars of song and slapping of backs and a last set of hugs and kisses.

  We were 4 ships and 900 men when we made the turn around the long arm of the bay and cut swiftly out to sea. The fleet was a proud one.

  I called for measures, and the leadsman and helmsman were quick to respond. I marked our heading and speed upon the Grace’s well-made copper traverse board. I rang the watch bell, flipped the peg glass, and inspected the crew. They were the same hodgepodge of men I’d taken on at Osburth, plus three from Urnedi who could tend sail and a dozen greencoats that volunteered to wear yellow shorts, instead. They were welcome, indeed.

  The crew and I had found a rhythm on the cruise north from Osburth, and we were quick to return to it. I credited it to the fantastic calculation allowed by the traverse board installed in the stern between the tillers.

  The eight circles of holes on the traverse board measured one full watch—one third of a day. The sandglass was called a peg glass—eight pegs to a watch and 24 pegs to a day. It had been easy to adjust to. The tower clocks in Bessradi broke the day into four intervals, an interval into four periods, and a period into four rests. I’d not met a person in Bessradi who had kept time to them. They were ridiculous. Pegs made sense, and the crew kept to them as well as I did.

  Gern and his lieutenants were aboard. He’d been waiting on a word with me since we departed, so when the glass marked a half peg, I invited him up. The captain was straight to business.

  “I’ve heard several descriptions of the island. What did you see?”

  “It’s a hostile shore. Spectacular place to look at but must be a treacherous place to live. Can’t be but a short section of sheltered beach on the landward side.”

  “Are we on schedule to make landfall at dawn?”

  “Yes. The voyage is short but will require some work with the charts for us to time it right. We mean to hit the southwest entrance of the strait before dawn, land wherever they keep that big ship of theirs, and attack before anyone is awake enough to resist us.”

  “Signal from the Thorne,” the lookout called. “Reduce sails and take measures.”

  I explained to Gern, “We are measuring the speed of the current. We can measure the speed of our ships well enough and our course, but the waters along the Oreol coast move much differently than in the sheltered waters of the Gulf of Temptir. If we don’t get it right, we could miss the entrance to the strait and spoil the surprise.”

  “I’ll leave you to it, ma’am,” he said and withdrew below.

  I ordered the sail down, the anchor out, and the leadsman to take a fresh measure.

  The waters were very shallow there, and the moment we were at anchor, every man and boy of the crew was at the rail, preparing lines and casting copper buckets over the side. The first bucket came up, and the boys squabbled over the few minnows it contained—who’d gone first the last time, who’d caught the most, who was the stupidest.

  The small bait went over the rail on a line. A tug-tug and up came a yellowtail no longer than my hand. An older man with a good knife filleted it and cut each into strips that went onto hooks as fast as the knife could cut them. Other small fish came up and then a fat triggerfish. By the time the leadsman reported his measure of the current to me, a dozen growlers and groupers, and even a young barracuda were dressed and heading down to the cook and his pot.

  I signaled back our measures to the admiral, and he replied with an order to raise sail. The fishermen stowed their lines and hurried to get us underway.

  We lost sight of land near midday as we angled southwest. I kept track of our position, marked our progress using the measures of speed and course from the traverse board, and when Mercanfur called us to anchor at sunset, I judged him to be correct. The corsair island lay due east of us, just over the horizon.

  I slept well. Five pegs later, I was back on deck, sails went up at the admiral’s signal, and we charged down the wind.

  The light of dawn was just an idea when we caught sight of the high island. We adjusted course very slightly, and a quarter-peg later we stabbed right down the middle of the strait.

  Nothing stirred. On the landward side of the island, three piers extended from a large circle of beach. The tall two-masted corsair and a dozen smaller ships were there—all quiet. On the far side of the strait, a thin beach ran between two rocky shoals. The dock there was no more than a long shelf where a few dozen longboats and small fishers were tied on wherever and however their captains saw fit at the time. The shacks behind them were dark, and upon the island there was but a single lantern hanging at the intersection of the village above the round beach.

  The greencoats were called on deck, and they were ready. They growled as we made the turn, and we grounded ourselves upon the wide beach, Gern gave a yell, gangways went over the prows, and 900 soldiers plus all but a handful of each crew were ashore and up into the village in a flash. Mercanfur led men across to secure the corsair’s ships.

  The first note of alarm was the great crash of pots and pans upset in a kitchen. Voices called out, but for the village it was much too late. Doors were kicked in, and whatever fight the sleeping men might have had, none of it availed them that morning.

  The sound of voices on the far side of the strait grew. Lights appeared in the shacks, and then upon the hills above them as well.

  “So many,” I said as I watched them move down toward their pier and longboats. A town of thousands was hidden upon those forested slopes. Men began to gather on the pier. Too many.

  “Raise the sail,” I ordered. The crew stood at the rail and was slow to respond. “Move it,” I yelled. “They’ll be in their boats and across in no time. We have to be off the beach now. Sail, I said, sail.”

  It was a ridiculous maneuver, but the Grace’s sail went up and pushed awkwardly back against the mast. I was fortunate that we were light our load of 200 greencoats and their gear. We slid free with a soft grind of sand into the strait. On the far side, hundreds began to fill the longboats.

  “We should warn Gern,” one man said.

  “No time. Come about, full sail. Snap to there, man! We need to wreck their boats before they can get them into the water.”

  I kicked one man on his backside, shoved another to the braces, and pulled a third by the hair to the mainstay. They all got moving then, and the ship nosed around into the wind at last. The southerly current turned us swiftly, the strong breeze filled the sail, and we made way at once. We were very near our best line into the wind as we made the turn to the long line of boats.

  Th
e first man who saw us coming stared. The second tapped the shoulder of the man next to him. He turned and screamed. The hundreds crowding the boats and dock all looked up at us at once, and no two of them acted in concert. Some rushed to cast off, others scurried ashore while the rest grabbed at each other, jumped overboard, or stood frozen in place.

  The Grace was near her best speed when her sharp prow smashed into the back quarter of the first thin longboat. It went beneath us and then a second, third, fourth, and fifth. Straight along the pier, we raced, bashing boat after boat into tinder. Men by the dozens went into the churning wash of splinters beneath my sleek craft.

  “Lady Jayme. Lady Jayme, why do you attack us?” one man called out.

  I was insulted that he could confuse me for her, but ignored the man and angled us a bit more out into the strait as we crashed our way toward the trio of more substantial fishers. We ripped the ass clean off the first two without trouble, but the third had already cast off when we struck her. The angle was poor, and we glanced off, losing much of our pace. A dozen men aboard her made the jump onto our deck. I’d not thought to arm myself. Three of my Chaukai yellowcoats had, and they charged the boarders with short spears. They killed the first man with brutal thrusts to the groin and chest, and a second was speared through the throat. The rest turned and jumped over the side.

  The lads all cheered, but I did not join in. We had missed several of the longboats because of the collision.

  “Rot,” I said while the men continued to congratulate themselves. It seemed that I was the only one with eyes front. “Shoal,” I shouted as I saw the sharp rock dead ahead. “Hard to port. Bank the sail.”

  The crew jumped to, the nimble Grace turned north, lost all her speed, and leaned sharply over as the banked sail caught the hard angle of the wind. We stayed on that line, but only just. Up the wind we crawled, away from the rocks and the crash of the surf upon them, until at last we were clear. We got out into the middle of the strait, turned back across the wind, and returned to our place upon the pier.