The Questing Game

by James Galloway

  But she wasn't the only thing to worry about. Never more than two feet away from her were those Vendari monsters. Bigger than anyone on ship, even a bear Wikuni, those two nine-foot tall walking destroyers kept everyone away from the dainty Princess, threatening a gruesome end to any foolish enough to look at her strangely. Even stripped of their weapons, not a single man would think of trying to cross them, unless he had a cannon hidden in his pants. A single Vendari in a Wikuni army formation was usually enough to turn the tide of battle in their favor. Two of them, on a ship with only so much deck space and only so many places to hide, was enough to make even the most grizzled Marine wet himself at the thought of getting either of them upset, or doing something that would make the Princess sic them on him.

  The only one of the unusual passengers the Wikuni would even come close to harassing, annoying, or otherwise irritating was the human. But this was no ordinary human, so it made the game a great deal more dangerous than normal, and much less fun. A seven and a half foot tall hulk of a human, as big as some bear Wikuni, and stonger than two Wikuni combined. The fact that the two Vendari seemed to like him, would train him on the open spaces of the deck during daylight, said a great deal as to where his loyalties lay. And he was strong. The first man to step over the line and say one thing too many had found that out. The human had belted him a good one, picked him up, then tossed him over the rail, forcing one of the trailing ships to fish the dazed Wikuni out of the sea. He spent most of his time sheparding around the Princess' cute little maid. She was the only available female on the ship, and would have had a howling pack of suitors if it wasn't for that monstrous human defending her like she was his little sister. And he was very protective of her, more than apt to smack down any Wikuni that got too adventurerous with the little mink's anatomy. Knowing that she was safely shielded from any kind of retaliation, the maid would mercilessly tease, taunt, torture, and harangue the sailors and Marines, driving them wild with her cheeky grin and her willingness to show more fur than was entirely appropriate, and always retreating behind the safety of her human protector when her victims saw just a little too much for their own good.

  The five of them were quite the unusual passengers, but even their tremendous importance and status dulled as the days dragged out. The sailors got used to the Princess sitting with her slate and pen, writing out what seemed to be an entire book full of pages whose contents were a jealously guarded mystery. They worked around the Vendari and the human, and learned that the little maid was twice as nasty as any sailor ever was, and was more than willing to drive one to the edge of madness, only to let her human bodyguard put an end to any advances the sailor may make on her. They learned to leave her alone, more than one learning the hard way. The last one had been buried at sea after the little mink sank a foot of steel poinard into his gut when he decided not to take no for an answer. The fact that he was found in her room said everything that needed to be said about what he was doing.

  To a man, the entire complement of sailors and Marines tried feverishly to figure out just where she was hiding that pigsticker. Her dresses weren't daringly low-cut, but they were rather form-hugging, leaving no really good place to hide a long dagger like a poinard.

  There were some things to break up the monotony. There were a few deaths, either caused by the Vendari, the human, or by the little maid herself as some Wikuni got a bit too adventurous. The ship's priest mysteriously vanished some twenty days into the voyage, coming up missing one morning. Nobody saw him all night, nobody heard any splash that would hint that he jumped overboard, and there was no sign of struggle in his room. Indeed, there was no sign that he'd even slept in his bed. He had simply vanished like smoke. Of course, the Princess and her complement were immediately suspected, but they were all closely watched. None of them had left their rooms at all during the entire night, nor had anyone spoken to them or delivered any messages to them. It was a mystery, one that Captain Longshanks did not like at all.

  It only deepened when the replacement priest, borrowed from one of the other ships, also disappeared without a trace some six days after the first. Again, there was no sign of struggle, no evidence of foul play, and nobody saw the Wikuni at all during the night of his disappearance. Again, there was no possible way that any of the passengers could have perpetrated or arranged the disappearance, so there was little that they could do. It did, however, ensure that no priest on any of the remaining ships would set foot on Sailor's Pride. For the first time in its entire history, the flagship sailed without a priest of Kikkali aboard.

  It was the monotony of any other day, at least until their convoy was met by a single Wikuni frigate. It tied up with Sailor's Pride in the open sea, and a strange little Wikuni transferred aboard. He was short and frumpy, a rabbit Wikuni with wide bucked teeth and a ridiculous pair of large, floppy ears. He wore a waistcoat and breeches of sober gray, and the gold chain of a pocketwatch hung from the pocket of the vest he wore beneath his coat. A couple of men identified the Wikuni as Jervis, the King's lead spy and head of his intelligence organization. He boarded with his own small retinue, some five Wikuni, including two who wore the robe and cassock of priests.

  This Wikuni's appearance was a clear sign that things were not as they appeared. He had brought his own priests, and they didn't seem to be afraid. Everyone on the ship suspected that the Princess had something to do with the disappearances of the other two priests, but nobody could prove anything. They all thought that Jervis was there to find out.

  Some of the sailors were on hand to listen to the initial exchange between Jervis and the Princess. They hung nearby from the rigging or performed tasks as close as they could get when the frumpy rabbit Wikuni approached the Princess, who was seated in her customary place near the bow with her slate, pen, and parchment, writing whatever it was she was writing. She stopped before the rabbit could get withing twenty feet of her, placing the parchment in the satchel at her feet, capping her pen, and giving the spy a cool look as he approached her.

  "Keritanima, I presume," he said in a lilting voice, the slightest hint of a smile on his lips. "The real Keritanima, anyway."

  "I was never fake, Jervis," she replied in a calm voice. "The Brat was as much a part of me as this is."

  "And who am I addressing now?"

  "Me."

  "Ah. I see you're going to be difficult."

  "Did you expect anything less?"

  Jervis chuckled. "Not really. I must say, I was quite impressed by your letter. Have I been playing against you all these years, or against Miranda?"

  "Me at first. Once Miranda got comfortable, you were facing both of us."

  "No doubt that's why I never quite seemed to be able to win," he chuckled. "Miranda is bad enough by herself."

  "She's been a good friend, and a good partner," Keritanima said with quiet respect, setting the slate down against the bulwark. "Did my father send for you to watch me?"

  "It would be silly for me to deny it, your Highness," he replied easily. "The, ah, misplacement of the priests on board has disrupted the flow of messages reaching him about you."

  "I rather guess that it would," she said with a strange little challenge in her voice. "I only have two words of advice for you, Jervis. Stay out of my way, and respect my privacy. I'm in no mood to play with anyone right now. If you annoy me too much, I may forget my cultured upbringing and do something unpleasant to you."

  "I'm sure her Highness means it, but I have orders from someone higher up the ladder than you," he told her.

  "It's your decision," she shrugged. She looked at him and picked up her slate, then reached at him with one hand in a strange gesture. Jervis squeaked in shock when his feet rose off the deck, and he hung suspended in midair. "Where would you like to land?" she asked conversationally.

  "Setting me down where I was would be most appreciated, Highness," he said with just a hint of uncertainty in his voice.

  She pulled her hand back, and Jervis dropped to the deck, let g
o by whatever invisible hand had grabbed him. "There won't be another reprieve, Jervis," she said bluntly. "I am in no mood for your games. Cross me, and I will be the last person you cross. Stay out of my way, and there's no reason why we can't be civil to one another."

  "Your Highness has made her point," Jervis said with a slightly quivering voice.

  "Good. I'm also in no mood to repeat myself."

  "This is very unlike you, your Highness."

  "You never knew me from the start, Jervis," she retorted. "How do you really know what is unlike me?"

  "The girl I played against in Wikuna told me much of you, Highness," he said easily. "Cold-blooded murder wasn't your style."

  "I learned all sorts of new things from the Tower, and from my brother and sister," she told him with a penetrating stare. "I think I'm done talking to you, Jervis. Go away."

  "As you wish, Highness," he said with a bow.

  "And Jervis."

  "Yes, Highness?"

  "Tell my father that I haven't forgotten what I wrote in that letter. And he'd better not either."

  Jervis blanched. "As you command, your Highness," he replied, bowing again.

  That sent the rumors flying among the sailors. A couple of the more adventurous ones managed to find out which cabin was Jervis', and that he had a magical mirror that allowed him to speak directly to the King. Those same sailors managed to arrange themselves so they could hear what Jervis reported back to the King.

  It had taken place later that same night. The Princess and her retinue had retired for the evening to their rooms, and Jervis had quartered his own staff and the priests, making sure the priests had one Marine guard to watch them and make sure they didn't disappear during the night. It was after he took his evening meal that he contacted King Damon Eram, ruler of Wikuna. The two sailors doing the eavesdropping stood behind the door as Jervis' voice greeted the monarch, a monarch whose strong voice was irritated and a bit unstable.

  "What is it now, Jervis?" Damon Eram demanded. "Are you there yet?"

  "I have arrived, Majesty," Jervis replied mildly. "I spoke to your daughter, as you requested."

  "Well?"

  "She intends to kill you, Majesty," he said bluntly. "I think it would be wise to have the captain turn this ship around and put her back on Sennadar."

  That made the two sailors gape at each other, hands over muzzles to prevent blurting out anything that would give them away.

  "I can handle her, Jervis," he said bluntly.

  "You could handle her, but I doubt you can handle her power, Majesty," Jervis stated. "She is a Sorceress, and from what I gathered at the Tower, she is a Sorceress of exceptional power and ability. I have little doubt she is behind the disappearances of the priests aboard ship. She wouldn't have to leave her cabin to kill them with her magic. She could kill you from a hundred yards, Majesty. In the interest of the Royal person, I highly suggest you do not bring her back to Wikuna. You'll be signing your own death warrant."

  "No," he seethed. "She's coming back to answer for what she did to me! And she's coming back because this is where she belongs!"

  "As you command, but I want it known that I protest the decision."

  "Protest all you want, Jervis, you're not changing it," he snorted. "She's your problem until she gets here. Handle her."

  "Your Majesty is too kind," Jervis drawled, then he blew out his breath and cleared his throat. The two sailors, thinking that the audience was at an end, scrambled away quickly and quietly and reported their gossip to the other sailors.

  That gossip floated around, going from sailor to Marine and Marine to sailor, until it finally had managed to drift to the ears of Miranda. The mink, hearing it while playing a game of kiss and tell with a rather handsome leopard Wikuni Marine, relayed the content of the message back to Keritanima as they sat eating breakfast the next morning. Keritanima gave her maid a calm look after learning what transpired between Jervis and her father, then she smiled. "Good," she announced. "That's exactly what I wanted him to hear."

  "Explain why losing the trump card of getting him with Sorcery is a good thing," Miranda asked curiously.

  "Because I'm not going to kill him, Miranda," she answered sedately. "But if thinks I mean to, he'll waste precious time and resources protecting himself against it. Those are resources we don't have to outmaneuver when the time comes to do things for real."

  "Ah. Personally, I think broadcasting what you can do is a bit excessive."

  "It's something Jervis already knows. He would tell everyone eventually. Best to get it in the open now."

  "Clever."

  "Thank you," she smiled. "Pass the biscuits, will you?"

  Rumor spread to the other ships as they travelled west, and those rumors ended up in messages sent by priests back to the homeland. The rumors spread in the streets of Wikuna, the kingdom's capital, and as rumors tended to do, they got wildly exaggerated and out of control. But the rumors served their own purpose in Keritanima's plan, when they reached the ears of the heads of the twenty-nine Great Houses of the Wikuni nobility. Twenty-eight of those men and women heard the rumors, realized that they had some basis in truth, and then began thinking of ways they could benefit from the fateful final meeting of father and daughter. More than one dreamed of wresting the Sun Throne away from the house of Eram. And they began to make plans of their own.

  Time aboard a ship, even a ship with such dangerous individuals, tends to blur as days pass to weeks that pass into months. For over a month, the convoy of Wikuni ships sailed west, due west, with very little change happening aboard ship. The spy Jervis did seem to back off from the Princess, giving her all the space she seemed to want to continue with her endless writing. The satchel at her feet expanded in volume with each passing day, and still its contents remained a complete mystery. Some sailors managed to discover that Jervis had made several attempts to procure the satchel, but each ended in disaster. It also caused the deaths of the three non-priest Wikuni that had boarded with him, as they were killed in the act of trying to get their hands on the satchel or read their contents. After losing his three colleagues, Jervis seemed to lose all interest in making yet another attempt. The way he looked at the Princess changed over the days, days of terse comments between them, as the rabbit tried to get the Princess to open up and talk to him, and she threatened him with physical or magical violence every time he got on her nerves. Because she most certainly had the power to kill him instantly any time she wished, the rabbit Wikuni was wise in backing off whenever the Princess' hackles started to rise.

  Aside from the fatalities among the spy's group, there was little more to make the voyage exceptional. The convoy, too large to be challenged by pirates, Zakkites, or singular trading ships that they encountered, continued west under nearly full sail, racing for a date with destiny. The presence of her Highness, her retinue, and Jervis became routine to the sailors and Marines guarding them, a routine of fear of the groups and a tense feeling that the entire ship could explode into chaos at any moment. The sailors that managed to eavesdrop on Jervis' communications with the King were disappointed that his report rarely changed from day to day. Each report said little more than the Princess was continuing with her writing, he had no way to find out what she was writing, and then he would report how many times that day the Princess had threatened to execute him. Damon Eram was highly unhappy each time he received the report, demanding to Jervis he find out, but was at a loss when the rabbit calmly asked who would take his place when Keritanima killed him. The daily report seemed to take its toll on the frumpy, buck-toothed rabbit Wikuni, his fur shedding at a frightful rate and his eyes sinking into his head as the days passed. His spotless waistcoats and trousers became wrinkled and slightly unkempt, and his face showed the strain of being trapped between the demanding monarch and his dangerous daughter.

  For everyone on the ship, the first sighting of land, of Wikuna, was an event of titanic relief. For the sailors and Marines, it was a material reminder
that they would only have their unusual passengers aboard for ten more days, the time it would take to skirt the coast and reach the capital city of Wikuna. For Jervis, it seemed even more of a relief, a stark assurance that his difficult position would not last much longer. Even the Princess seemed releived and enthusiastic about seeing her homeland, but the dreadful look of malicious eagerness on her face frightened those who glimpsed it as the crew and passengers assembled on deck to marvel at the forested coastline of southern Wikuna.

  With the sighting of land, the convoy turned north, carried along by stiff southerly winds blowing before one of the mighty hurricanes that were common in the Sea of Storms during the summer. That black mass hung behind them like the shroud of Death, threatening the ships with destruction should they not flee before its might. To the relief of most on the ship, the hurricane turned inland, to swamp the land, rather than continue north and threaten their convoy. Some of the sailors were on hand to overhear the Princess talk about it with her strange human companion, as they stood at the stern and looked back at the leading edge of the storm. They both wore heavy, waterproof cloaks to protect them from the occasional squall lines that raked over the formation of ships.

  "How did they know it was there?" he asked her curiously. "And why give it a special name?"

  "Think of a hurricane as a gigantic storm," she replied calmly. "Sometimes they can get to be the size of a large island. Their winds can rip trees out of the ground." She pulled her satchel up under her cloak as the rain hit again. "The priests on board know magic that predicts the weather, as well as locates storms and threats to a ship on the sea. That way, Wikuni ships can navigate around dangerous areas."