Off Armageddon Reef

by David Weber

  Cayleb sat motionless, his jaw clenched tightly and his shoulders hunched as if to ward off a blow. And then, slowly—so slowly—his shoulders relaxed just a bit.

  "If you truly are a demon, despite whatever you say," he said at last, "then you've already tempted me into damnation, haven't you?" He actually managed a twisted smile. "I've known for months now that you were more than mortal, and I've used you—and your . . . abilities—for my own ends and against the princes of the Church. And that's the definition of heresy and apostasy, isn't it?"

  "I suppose it is," Merlin said, his voice as neutral as he could make it. "In the eyes of the Temple's present management, at least."

  "But you didn't have to tell me you could warn Father, any more than you had to save those children in King's Harbor. Or to save Rayjhis from Kahlvyn. Or to lead me to Malikai's galleys, or into Crag Reach."

  "I suppose not. But, Cayleb, if I were a demon out to tempt you into damnation, I'd do it by appealing to your desire, your need, to protect the people and kingdom you love. You aren't Hektor, or even Nahrmahn. I couldn't appeal to your greed, your hunger for power, so I'd tempt you through the goodness of your own heart, your fear for the things you care so deeply about."

  "And probably tell me you would have done exactly that, on the assumption that I'd believe it proved you hadn't," Cayleb said, nodding with that same crooked smile. "But you missed my point. Perhaps you are a demon, or what the Writ calls a demon, at any rate. And perhaps you have tempted me—after all, you always told Father and me you were using us for your own ends. But if you've tempted me into the damnation of my soul, Merlin Athrawes, then so be it, because you've never asked me to do one single thing which wasn't what a just and loving God would have had me do. And if the God of the Writ isn't a just and loving God, then he isn't mine, either."

  Merlin sat back in his chair, gazing at the young man in front of him. The young man, he realized, who was even more extraordinary than Merlin had believed.

  "Cayleb," he said finally, "in your place, I doubt I could reach beyond everything I'd been taught the way you just have."

  "I don't know if I really have," the prince replied with a shrug. "You say you can prove what you've said, and someday I'll hold you to that. But for now, I have to make decisions, choices. I can only make them on the basis of what I believe, and I believe you're a good man, whatever else you may be. And I believe you can warn my father."

  "And how do you think your father will react if I suddenly simply appear aboard his flagship, four thousand miles from here?" Merlin asked wryly.

  "I don't know," Cayleb said, then grinned suddenly, "but I'd dearly love to see his expression when you do!"

  IV

  The Cauldron

  Merlin Athrawes lay stretched out, swooping up and down with the swell as he floated on his back, watching the moon.

  Somewhere beyond his toes, invisible from his present water-level position, HMS Dreadnought and her consorts continued on their course, unaware one of their crewmen was missing. Hopefully, they'd stay that way.

  This, he thought philosophically, gazing up at the stars, is probably the . . . least wise thing I've done yet. Aside from the krakens, maybe, anyway. No matter how well Cayleb took it, there's no way of telling how Haarahld is going to react.

  Still, right off the top of his head, he couldn't come up with any alternative course of action which offered a better chance for Haarahld's survival.

  In cold-blooded terms, now that he'd had a chance to think about things a bit more, it probably didn't matter to the long-term survival of Charis what happened to King Haarahld and his galleys. What Cayleb and Sir Domynyk Staynair had already done to one galley fleet promised they could do the same to another, if they had to. Especially one which was going to take losses of its own—serious losses—if it pressed an attack home against the Royal Charisian Navy. So even if Black Water succeeded in gaining control of the Charis Sea and Rock Shoal Bay, it would be only a temporary possession, lasting just long enough for Cayleb to get home and take them back again. And however badly Haarahld's death might hurt the rulership of Charis, Merlin felt confident of Cayleb's fitness to take the crown, especially with Gray Harbor and Wave Thunder to advise him.

  But while Charis might survive King Haarahld's death, Merlin had discovered he wasn't prepared to do that himself. Or to see Cayleb forced to do it. Not without doing everything he possibly could to prevent it.

  It was odd, he reflected as he rose high enough on the swell to glimpse the lights of one of the galleons in the distance, but when he'd first set out to shape Charis into the tool he needed, it hadn't occurred to him how close he might come to the Charisians themselves as people, as individuals he cared about. Haarahld Ahrmahk wasn't simply the King of Charis; he was also Merlin Athrawes' friend, and the father of another, even closer friend, and the man who had once been Nimue Alban had lost too many friends.

  Is that the real reason I let Cayleb "talk me into" telling him I could do this in the first place? Or, he frowned as another thought occurred to him, was it because I'm so lonely? Because I need someone to know what I'm trying to do? How far from home I truly am? These people may be my friends, but none of them know who—or what—I really am. Do I have some sort of subconscious need to know that someone who considers me a friend knows the truth—or as much of the truth as he can comprehend, anyway—about me?

  Perhaps he did. And perhaps that need was a dangerous chink in his armor. No matter how Cayleb, or even Haarahld, might react, the vast majority of Safeholdians, even in Charis, would, indeed, regard him as the very spawn of Hell if they discovered even a tenth of the truth about him. And if that happened, everything which had ever been associated with him would be tainted, rejected with horror. So, in the final analysis, if he allowed a need for friendship to lure him into revealing the truth to someone not prepared to accept it, or simply to someone who might inadvertently let the secret slip, everything he'd accomplished so far—and all the people who'd died along the way, and who were still going to die—would have been for nothing.

  All of that was true. He knew that, but he wasn't prepared to psychoanalyze himself in an effort to parse his motivation, even assuming a PICA was subject to psychoanalysis. Because, in the end, it didn't matter. Whatever the reasons for it, this was something he had to do. Something he couldn't not do.

  He rose to the top of another swell. This time, there were no lights in sight, and he gave a mental nod of satisfaction as he checked the overhead visual imagery being relayed from the stealthed recon skimmer hovering above him. The fleet was moving along nicely, drawing steadily further away from him as he floated alone in the immensity of the sea.

  Getting someone off a crowded, cramped sailing vessel without being noticed, he'd discovered, was only marginally less difficult than he expected getting someone onto a crowded, cramped galley without being noticed to be. The fact that the full moon had risen now only made the task even more challenging.

  Fortunately, he and Cayleb had already put a defense in depth into place, even if they'd never contemplated using it for exactly this purpose. Ahrnahld Falkhan, and the other members of Cayleb's Marine bodyguard detachment, all knew the "truth" about "Seijin Merlin." Every one of them knew Merlin had visions, and that it was necessary for him to retire and meditate in order to see them. And every one of them knew that concealing the fact of his visions from anyone outside King Haarahld's or Cayleb's innermost circle was absolutely essential.

  And so, Merlin, as an officer of the Royal Guard and Cayleb's personal guardsman, had been provided with his own small private cabin. It was right aft, just below Cayleb's quarters. It even had its own stern window, and Falkhan and the other Marine sentries who guarded Cayleb were well placed to intercept anyone who might have disturbed the seijin during his meditations.

  They were also well accustomed to leaving Merlin to those same meditations themselves. All of which meant it had been relatively simple for him to crawl through that windo
w and lower himself hand-over-hand down a rope into the water. Once in the water, he'd submerged and swum the better part of a half-mile, then surfaced and waited while the fleet sailed past him.

  He was down-moon from them, and he'd probably been far enough away when he surfaced that no one would have noticed anything, but he felt no great urge to take any chances. The night was as clear as only a tropical night could be, with glowing phosphorescence spilling back along the ships' sides as they sailed along the silver moon path, their canvas like polished pewter, their ports and scuttles glowing with the lamps and lanterns within. The odds against anyone happening to glance in exactly the right direction to see something as small as a human figure floating into the heavens was undoubtedly minute, but he had plenty of time. Certainly enough to avoid taking any chances.

  Or, he corrected himself wryly, any more chances, at least.

  He checked the visual imagery one last time, then activated his built-in communicator.

  "Owl," he said, speaking aloud for a change, still contemplating Safehold's alien heavens.

  "Yes, Lieutenant Commander?"

  "Pick me up now."

  "Yes, Lieutenant Commander."

  V

  HMS Royal Charis,

  Charis Sea

  King Haarahld VII waved his valet out the door.

  "Are you sure you won't need me any more tonight, Sire?"

  "Lachlyn, you've already asked me that three times," Haarahld said affectionately. "I'm not yet so feeble that I can't climb into bed by myself, even at sea. So go. Go! Get some sleep of your own."

  "Very well, Sire. If you insist," Lachlyn Zhessyp said with a small smile, and obeyed the command.

  Haarahld shook his head with a chuckle, then crossed the great cabin, opened the lattice-paned door, and stepped out onto Royal Charis's sternwalk.

  He stood there, gazing off into the west, as if watching the setting moon slide the rest of the way below the horizon could somehow bring him closer to his son.

  It was even harder being separated from Cayleb than he'd expected it to be. It wasn't like the year Cayleb had spent aboard ship as a midshipman. Then all he'd really had to worry about were the risks of disease, accidents, or shipwreck. Now he'd knowingly sent his elder son off to battle against an enormously numerically superior foe seven thousand miles away. If all had gone well, the battle Cayleb had been sent to fight was long over, but had his son won, or had he lost? And in either case, had he survived?

  Not for the first time in the long, hard years of his kingship, Haarahld Ahrmahk found that knowing he'd made the right decision could be very cold comfort, indeed.

  "Your Majesty."

  Haarahld twitched uncontrollably, then whirled, one hand dropping to the hilt of the dagger he wasn't wearing. He half-crouched, despite his bad knee, his incredulous eyes wide, as he saw the tall, broad-shouldered man standing in the shadows at the far end of the sternwalk.

  Disbelief and shock held him motionless, paralyzed as a statue, staring at the man who could not possibly be there.

  "I apologize for startling you, Your Majesty," Merlin Athrawes said calmly and quietly, "but Cayleb sent me with a message."

  * * *

  The Ahrmahk Dynasty, Merlin decided, must have some sort of genetic defect. That was the only explanation he could think of, because something was obviously badly wrong with its "fight or flight" instincts.

  King Haarahld should have reacted by at least shouting for the guards, assuming he hadn't simply bolted for the cabin, or even flung himself over the sternwalk to escape the apparition. In fact, Merlin had brought along a stun pistol for the express purpose of dealing with any such perfectly reasonable reaction, although he hadn't looked forward to explaining its effect to an irate monarch afterward.

  But, instead of doing any of those things, Haarahld had simply stood there for almost exactly ten seconds by Merlin's internal chronometer, then straightened and cocked his head to one side.

  "Well, Seijin Merlin," he'd said with appalling calm, "if Cayleb sent you with a message, at least I know he's still alive, don't I?"

  And he'd smiled.

  Now, twenty minutes later, the two of them stood together, still on the sternwalk, the one place on the flagship where they could hope to find true privacy. The noise of wind and sea as Royal Charis and her squadron moved slowly along with the rest of the fleet neatly covered their voices, as well.

  "So Cayleb sent you to tell me Black Water's seen through our little masquerade, did he, Master Traynyr?" Haarahld asked, and Merlin chuckled, shaking his head, as he remembered the first time Haarahld had called him that.

  "Yes, Your Majesty." Merlin inclined his head slightly, then snorted gently. "And, if you'll permit me to say it, Your Majesty, you've taken my . . . arrival rather more calmly then I anticipated."

  "Over the last year, Merlin, I've come to expect the unexpected from you. And don't think I missed how carefully you answered Father Paityr's questions when he brought his truth stone with him. Or the way Cayleb watched you while you did it. Or any of several other . . . peculiar things you've accomplished over the months. All the interesting bits and pieces of knowledge you've produced. The fact that, despite your rather glib explanation at the time, there's not really any way you could've gotten to Kahlvyn's townhouse as quickly as you did."

  The king waved one hand in an oddly gentle gesture of dismissal.

  "I decided long ago," he said calmly, "that you were far more than you chose to appear, even to me, or possibly even to Cayleb. And, yes," he smiled, "I know how close you've become to my son. But as I believe I mentioned to you once before, a man—any man, regardless of his . . . abilities—must be judged by his actions. I've judged you on the basis of yours, and, like my son, I trust you. If I'm in error to do so, no doubt I'll pay for it in the next world. Unfortunately, I have to make my decisions in this one, don't I?"

  "Your son is very like you, Your Majesty." Merlin inclined his head once more, this time in a bow of respect. "And I can think of few greater compliments I might pay him."

  "In that case, now that we've both told one another what splendid people we are," Haarahld said with a smile, "I suppose we should decide what to do with this latest information of yours."

  "It's not certain yet what use Black Water will be able to make of his spy's report," Merlin replied. "From what I've seen of him, however, I expect him to bring the other admirals around to his own view. He has a more forceful personality than I'd first expected, and the fact that all his 'allies' know he's being backed by the Group of Four gives him a powerful club whenever he chooses to use it."

  "In that case, he certainly will try to press the attack, and as quickly as possible." Haarahld gazed up at the stars where the moon had finished setting while he and Merlin spoke. He frowned, stroking his beard.

  "He can't know how much time he has before Cayleb's return," the king continued, obviously thinking aloud. "So he'll probably try to press an attack directly into Rock Shoal Bay. He'll expect us to either stand and fight, or else retreat behind Lock Island and the Keys. In either case, he'll have control of the Bay, and the Charis Sea, at least until Cayleb gets home."

  "That's essentially what Cayleb and I decided his most likely course of action would be," Merlin agreed.

  "And Cayleb's suggestion was?" Haarahld looked back at Merlin.

  "He suggests that you go ahead and concede the bay." Merlin shrugged. "As long as you still control The Throat, even if you were to lose one or both of the Keys, they aren't going to be able to press a serious attack on any of your vital areas. And Cayleb's only fifteen days away. If they're deep enough into the bay when he arrives, they'll be trapped between your forces and his."

  "I see my son is concerned about his aged father's survival," Haarahld said dryly.

  "Excuse me, Your Majesty?"

  "I've already discovered that Black Water, while he may be lumbered with allies who aren't exactly the most cooperative ones imaginable, is no fool, Merlin.
He knows Cayleb's going to be coming home. If he sends his fleet into Rock Shoal Bay, he's not going to send it so deep he can't get it out again in a hurry. Nor is he going to neglect the elementary precaution of picketing the approaches. Whether Cayleb comes south, from Emerald Reach, or north, from Darcos Sound, he'll be spotted long before he can trap Black Water in the bay. So what Cayleb's strategy would really accomplish would be to keep me safely behind Lock Island while almost certainly affording Black Water the time to fall back on Eraystor Bay, or even retreat past Emerald to Zebediah or Corisande, to avoid him when he arrives. And, of course, my own forces would take so long to clear the bottleneck between Lock Island and the Keys that we'd never be able to stop Black Water before he ran."

  "If we approached under cover of night," Merlin began, "then—"