The Fox

by Sherwood Smith

  “What can you tell me?”

  She lifted her eyes. Tears gleamed along the lower lids; her throat worked as she struggled for words.

  Inda looked away from her tears, and became aware of the crowd gathering in the cabin door. “Everyone out.” He kicked the door shut, his gaze back on the Venn sea dag.

  She resumed her place on the bench, her movements neat as always, but she trembled all over.

  Inda sat adjacent, trying not to look threatening—like a jailer. Or worse, a torturer. He didn’t know where to put his hands, so he dropped them on his knees. “Go ahead,” he said, trying not to sound as tense as he was.

  “I am go to Sartor. It was plot—” She groped, then switched to Sartoran. “I was to tell the queen, and only the queen, the secrets of our navigation. To help the south. You must see, that though we sea dags made vows to our kingdom, there are a very few of us who were chosen to study the older magics. Far more powerful. I am one. But before we begin such study, we make vows to the world itself, following the Golden Path—” She passed trembling fingers over her face. “I do not know where to begin!”

  “With what concerns us now. We can fill in the holes later.”

  From above came shouts. Inda felt a change in the heel of the ship, and knew that the wind was veering around to the east. That meant the Venn would not have to make much effort to intercept them.

  “I believe you must know. Prince Rajnir wants this land, your land, your warriors. The prince has the gold, and the ships, and the Hilda—the army.”

  Inda opened a hand. “I saw them war gaming in Ymar.”

  “The Dag Erkric has the will. To do anything to succeed. ” She paused, studying Inda. She felt heat and light, but warded it with all her strength. “You are seeing practice maneuvers of the fleet—all eighty-one. When the summer winds shift into west they will come. Two Battlegroups to bring over men and army. Their attached raiders protect them. The third Battlegroup, it—”

  “—will go down south to attack our coast, right? To divide our forces?”

  Neither of them noticed that “our.”

  She bent her head in acquiescence, and though Inda would swear she hadn’t moved anything but her head, her body was evocative of sorrow, of grief.

  Inda thumped his fists on his knees. “All right. And you were going to Sartor, what, to warn them? Is that why we found your ship alone? But why do you go against your people?”

  She whispered, low and unhappy, “Hyarl Durasnir, he is commanded by the prince to extend the Venn empire here in the south where the sun is warmer and harvests are more abundant. There are those of us who think—who thought—invasion must end, but the king needs land, needs food, and the prince wishes to be the heir again. There are vast problems at home.”

  Inda rubbed a scar. “I think I want to know about those problems, but not now. So you disagree, and turned against Rajnir?”

  “No. We would have obeyed. And sought to limit the taking of life.” She made a curious gesture, then turned her small hand over, palm up. Fingers toward Inda, a gesture of appeal. “But there is a greater threat. The Dag has the will, I said. But worse. In secret, trying new kinds of magic, to use in war. There is evidence he would deal with Norsunder. He seeks to find a way to ensorcell minds, so that he can suborn your Marlovans. Make them ride east and conquer Sartor. He wants the entire continent for the Venn.”

  Inda cursed under his breath, then said, “He’d loose Norsunder against us?”

  “By magic. He said if he can have the rift you once saw, he will push anyone through that Norsunder wants. And so our Chief Sea Dag ordered me to take my scout ship to Sartor. I tried. We were discovered by some of the crew, and they killed my friends.” She shook her head. “It is no matter to you. But you must know this.” She raised her hands, her arms and shoulders tight with warning. “If they know I live, and they must, they are chasing me as well as chasing you. They will think you can get navigation secrets from me——and the plans.”

  Inda’s mind ran swiftly. Now it all began to make sense: the empty strait, the orders to all the trade kingdoms to stay close to the land—to regulate themselves, in effect, while Durasnir’s elite war fleet concentrated everything on this attack. “I need to know what you can do. I mean right now.”

  “Navigate, only I dare not use our signs, for they would know our position instantly. They will have wards raised against me using our . . . our methods.”

  Inda waved a hand. “You can explain all that later. Can you do anything about your ships on our heels?”

  She turned her face upward, as though reading something of import on the bulkheads. Then she sighed. “We do not use the . . . the black magic, is how it is called in Sartoran. It sends magic out of the world, you see. The candle goes out, for it takes great force to use. Our magic is called light for it must balance—the candle burns. And so there is little I can do.”

  “So you can’t do something like change the wind.”

  “Oh, I could, but the land would pay a terrible cost for at least a season to come. We dare not disturb the patterns of wind.” Then her face changed, her eyes rounding with discovery. “But I can make moisture, for that rises and then falls back into the sea again . . .”

  With that she rose swiftly, opened the cabin door, and slipped past those lurking outside. If she even noticed them she made no sign, but gave a quick glance over the bow at the lead Venn ship, which was perhaps twice arrow range, then she ducked down to the waist, her robes belling behind her.

  Inda left the cabin as well and walked up onto the deck where he could study the Venn. With his glass he could make out individual sailors on the deck, though not yet the details of faces. He knew the Venn had to be watching his deck. He knew without asking that if Dag Signi was identified, Prince Rajnir’s ships would have orders to destroy her, and the vessel she was on.

  Fox stood on the captain’s deck, watching everyone and everything through narrowed eyes—ready to relay the first command, and the hands divided their attention between Fox and the approaching Venn warship.

  Tau had fetched an old cloak with the idea of throwing it over the dag to disguise her from those Venn watchers, but when he reached the companionway and looked down into the waist, he stopped, the bundle clutched in his arms. Below him, Signi began weaving back and forth, eyes closed, voice soft as she began a long singsong chant. Tau and the rest of the crew felt peculiar, as if thunder threatened, as if the insides of their skulls were brushed by hundreds of butterfly wings.

  They were amazed to see moisture rise from the waters in curls and puffs, like smoke, like steam. The eddies of vapor swirled together, forming into thin clouds of white softness, which molded into drifting fingers of mist. From the distance they could hear the faint blat of a horn; Inda beckoned to Fox, and mindful of how sound carries, said in a low voice, “Hard over as soon as we lose sight of ’em.”

  Fox gestured to Fibi, whose hoarse squawk, damped to a hoarse whisper, commanded the sail teams.

  Jeje rode on their lee. Inda bent over the rail, and Jeje ran out to the Vixen’s pointed bow. Vapor began to obscure her face, not five arm’s lengths below him. “Set every sail you have—I want your best speed ever. Go down our line, hard over. Make noise for them to follow. Then get away, and meet us east, under Olara. We’re heading for Lindeth.”

  Jeje grinned. The Vixen slid away. The jib sails being set blurred into the thickening swirls of white.

  From that fog presently came the clatter of buckets on the Vixen’s deck, blocks clacking together, and one of Jeje’s crew shouting, “Bear up! Bear up!” The sounds diminished northward.

  All the while Signi kept casting her spells, until a faint glow seemed to shimmer about her, and she swayed, weak-kneed from effort.

  Gillor appeared and helped the mage down the hatch, as around them the mist thickened to fog.

  The magic worked. Inda expelled his breath, then drew it in again, a pure, deep breath of extraordinarily heady pleasur
e. It was akin to that first spring day when the ice is breaking up and one’s footing is unsteady. There might be slips, even a fall, but the smell of living green on the air, the warm wind on winter-numb flesh, fills the world with promise. Winter’s thaw makes the world new and right again.

  Inda’s voice was breathless with husky laughter. “Cut straight east.”

  Fox sent him a sharp look. He thought he had seen the full range of Inda’s moods—he had certainly seen more than anyone else—but never this one. “Won’t that brings us toward the land?”

  Inda laughed again, his eyes wide and manic, his cheeks flushed. “Let’s talk,” he said.

  The two retreated to Inda’s cabin.

  Inda shut the door, setting his back against it. He smiled, the old smile of the boy of ten. “I’m going home.”

  Fox’s mouth whitened. “You’re a damned fool.”

  Inda laughed again, an unsteady laugh. He shut his eyes, holding his breath. Fox waited in silence.

  “Listen,” Inda said at last. And told Fox what Signi had said.

  Fox heard him out without interruption, then said, “I take it you believe her, that you don’t think it’s an elaborate ruse.”

  “Why? To what end? That scout ship full of dead people ought to have signaled something out of the ordinary to you, as it did to me. Those weren’t foreigners, that was Venn fighting Venn.”

  Fox sighed. “So what? You’ll go back to the royal city, tell your war king that there’s an invasion coming, and he’ll reward you with a royal execution, satisfying your notions of ‘honor’ all around? What form do you think your portion of this honor will take—your back against a wall, or the criminal’s flogging at the post?”

  “Fox.”

  “What do you think happened to Barend?”

  “We don’t know. Why are you making an argument? Didn’t you tell me about that last letter the Venn king wrote all those years ago—you quoted it, when we were sitting on that cliff, watching the Oneli on their war games that day. Did not the Venn king promise when they did invade, they would come after your family first?”

  Fox’s lip curled. “As if my mother and sister couldn’t chase off any Venn marauders.”

  Inda saw it then: Fox did not question Inda’s intent, but his safety. His emotions rolled again, but this time he caught hold mid-dive. “If you think I’d lose my ass again, then come with me. Don’t you want to see home? I do. I’ve been smelling home ever since we were within a day of the Nob. I kept my promise for nine years. Now I have a reason to go home. A good enough reason to maybe get me a hearing.”

  “Inda! There. Is. No. Justice.” Fox smacked the table flat-handed on each word, then straightened up and crossed his arms. “Forget what I said before, I was half joking. But I half wasn’t. It’s far more likely your turning up all these years later will make you into an embarrassing political problem for Aldren-Harvaldar, if not for his uncle—who probably controls the kingdom through him. And whatever they say during the day—after all, you are the son of a prince—your very first night you’ll personally experience the Montrei-Vayir method of solving problems, as old Savarend did when he crossed the hawse of Anderle-Harskialdna’s ancestor: a knife in the night. It’s neat, it’s fast, it’s quiet. And it’s final.”

  Inda snorted. “What, did you think I meant to ride up to the throne on a hired horse and throw down my knitted hat as a war banner? Maybe I talk to no one but Barend. If I can find him. If not I send a message, scout the territory. I don’t know.” Inda looked troubled, then admitted in a rush, “Once I wanted the academy to line up—the Guard—everyone on parade, so the king himself could clear my name. Now I just want, oh, to hear about home.”

  “So you don’t think you’re going to walk right back into your old place and take up life as if nothing ever happened, except for everyone cheering madly?” Fox’s tone was light, but Inda knew by now when Fox was upset and when he was angry. The two might look and sound the same, but Inda had learned to descry the difference.

  Inda flung his arms out. “As what? Surely my brother’s got another Randael trained—he’s had more time with the new one than he ever had with me. And all the Tveis are long gone home, and yes, I’m sure I’m forgotten. I have no expectations whatsoever. I want to deliver my message, then I’ll cut straight south. Meet you at Parayid. How’s that?” At Fox’s gesture of disgust, “You don’t want to come? You’re not curious about your own home?”

  “No.” Fox’s voice was so soft Inda almost didn’t hear it. “I have no curiosity whatsoever.”

  Fox’s forehead had tightened with anger, but his long mouth was white-lipped with pain, and for once the challenging derision was all gone. “I don’t care if Aldren Montrei-Vayir is bad, good, or indifferent as king,” Fox said. “The only surety is that nothing has changed for my family, because there is no justice for the Montredavan-Ans. ” He glared at Inda, listening so patiently, and thought, If I had half the wit of my ancestors I would have seen a way to grasp events by the throat and force them to my will. As my forefathers did. As you have done, without ever realizing what it is you do. He shook his head to dispel thoughts he would never utter. “Maybe someday. But not now.”

  Inda flicked his fingers up toward the captain’s deck. “Then it’s simple. Take command of my fleet.”

  Fox crossed his arms, sardonic again. “But then it becomes my fleet.”

  Inda opened his hands. “Nothing finite is infinite, as my mother used to say. I will give you one of these gold things. When I’ve delivered my message, I send a message where to meet me, and either you will be there or you won’t.”

  The corners of Fox’s mouth deepened. His eyes were wide, steady, bright as spring leaves in the lamplight. “Wait here,” he said, and left, shutting the cabin door firmly behind him.

  Inda stared at the cabin door. It’s a shame, he thought. Fox—sardonic, deadly, cynical—would not go home to a drunken sot of a father squatting in his tower. A mistake to think he doesn’t care. He does. He knows he does. And can’t abide it.

  There was no time to consider it further; Fox was back. “Hold out your hand.”

  Inda did, and Fox dropped the two rings onto his palm.

  “Won’t you need these?” Inda asked.

  “I can see my fleet,” Fox retorted.

  A measure of safety. “Thanks,” Inda said.

  Signi had made it about five steps before she crumpled in a silent faint.

  Gillor caught her, carried her to her alcove, laid her in the hammock, and then sat there beside her, as the ship slid away steadily to safety in the thick magical fog.

  Presently Signi’s eyes opened, moved from side to side, and Gillor said, “I take it they couldn’t fight your fog?”

  “Not the sea dags,” Signi whispered, her smile pensive. “The spell will strengthen as they try to break it, which they will eventually discover. Few know how to break such a spell. The Dag Erkric, who could break it, will be with the prince on the north coast. It ought to mire them a day and a night, at the least.”

  Gillor sprang up, batted through the canvas door that they had hung for her when she ceased being a prisoner—it let in more air than the old wooden one. Gillor returned with water, which Signi downed gratefully. Color came back into her face, and she sat up. “Ah, so much better. Thank you.”

  “So they will know that was you.”

  “Oh, yes.”

  “What does it mean for us?”

  Signi told Gillor what she had told Inda. Gillor listened, nodded, then said, “Lie quiet. I’ll bring you something from the galley.” She paused at the door, smiling over her shoulder. “I take it magic-making is something like fighting a night-long battle?”

  “That much magic is. It is not so much the making of the vapor but the spell that binds attempts to dispel it into making more.”

  Signi lay watching the lamplight on the wood above her, permitting her mind to range back, back, over a lifetime of decisions. She would not think a
bout the future, except to discover, step by step, what Ydrasal’s path demanded.

  The door batted aside, and the delicious smell of fresh fish and rice balls wafted in. Signi sat up. Gillor sat on the tiny storage chest as Signi wolfed down the food. When Signi looked up, feeling very much recovered, she saw the woman studying her, head tilted to the side.

  “What do you look for?” she asked.

  “For the future,” Gillor said. Her Sartoran was accented in a way Signi could not trace. She smiled. “It seems that our commander has decided to beach himself. He’s putting on his prince hat again, and going home to tell them what you told us about the invasion. If they don’t kill him first.”

  “Ah,” Signi said.

  Water slapped the sides of the ship, the wood creaked. The smell of mulled wine wafted through the gently swaying canvas door. From the hold came the sounds of a reed pipe and soft singing, the quick triplets of Sartoran folk music, weaving in and out of minor keys into major.

  Signi turned her attention back to Gillor, to meet those steady dark eyes. She felt the hairs along the backs of her arms lift.

  “And?”

  “And now you have saved us,” Gillor said. “And you are in as much danger from the Venn as we.”

  Signi felt her palms go damp. “You tell me what I know. Why is this?”

  “Because you don’t know, though you should, that while he was in the galley, Fibi and I and a couple of the others unfolded the old bed from under the stern windows.”

  Signi’s nerves prickled with fire sparks.

  “Right now he is alone there, in the cabin—and I don’t think he’s even noticed the bed. Yet.” Pause, sigh, then a last try. “He’s going home after we don’t know how many years. But what he asks after is you: is she recovered? Does she need anything? Dag Signi, go to him.”