A Broken Queen

by Sarah Kozloff

  “How?”

  “Hand drills, metal wedges, crowbars,” he answered, with the same attitude as before.

  “Won’t that be noisy?” asked Gustie.

  “Not much. Ports aren’t ever silent—plenty of waves hitting against ships and wharves. And we’ll do it from right at the waterline.”

  A discussion ensued about the number of holes and their exact placement. Then her squad debated the merits of rubbing goose fat on their bodies to insulate the underwater saboteurs from the cold.

  “Jutterdam’s a big port,” said another one of the men. “There’ll be too many small craft and big ships for one team. We need two more rowboats and teams of four. Two to row and two to swim. Extra tools in case some drop.”

  “I bow to your judgment,” said Gustie. “Can you rustle up the right people and more boats?”

  The Jutters tossed about some names of people they knew. Gustie felt herself the outsider; some of these people had known each other all their lives, and they all had boating expertise.

  “What do you think,” she asked, “of including an archer on each boat? Even if they aren’t natural sailors, the Oros aren’t fools. They’ll be guarding the biggest ships and the harbor itself. If Oros come to investigate, it would be nice to have a way to take them down before they spread an alarm.”

  The grizzled man—his name was Nothafel—grunted and grudgingly admitted, “Good idea.”

  “We need crack shots in the dark,” said Gustie, “from a swaying surface. I know I couldn’t hit the target.”

  “My boy, Kiffen—he’s only fourteen,” said the oldest woman. “He’s got them young eyes and steady hands.”

  “There’s one. I’ll talk to Mother Rellia about two more,” said Gustie. “And we’ll meet at the path to the water at dusk tomorrow.”

  “One question,” said the older woman, Kiffen’s mother, who had agreed to check on the warehouses. “How do those of us on land searching the warehouses get away?”

  “We’ll pull back up at the wharf at two bells,” said Nothafel.

  “Are you sure you’ll be there?”

  “We’ll be there, I vow, Hulia.” He reached across the circle to seal the promise with his hand. “But if you’re not there on time, you’ll have to swim.”

  * * *

  The three rowboats—two carrying five Free Staters, and a bigger one carrying eight—rowed around the headlands toward the harbor of Jutterdam. The sky cooperated in its dull opacity, and the muffled oars dipped and fell with only the faintest swish and water dribbles. Gustie looked at the black water and regretted wearing her dress; she had detached the white collar and cuffs and decided that its deep brown color would serve. But if she had to swim, the voluminous fabric would drag her down. She decided she would rip off the skirt if she needed to.

  The occupied city hulked brooding, and the harbor area sat in midnight desuetude. Gustie counted five large ships, swaying on their anchors, looming above them as blacker shadows. Smaller boats, fishing craft and such, dotted the closer waters and piers in throngs so numerous that she thanked the Spirits they had brought three teams.

  Her rowboat paused a moment in the shadow of an enormous carrack to study movement on land. Oro soldiers marched in the center of the wharf area, and they probably had sentries posted where the seawalls met the land.

  “Aim for the far side of the pier across from Fresnay’s,” Nothafel commanded their rowers in a low voice, pointing. Their craft slipped forward, threading between many anchored fishing boats, sometimes pushing off their sides rather than risking the sound of the oar. The other squads lingered in deeper water, already busy with sabotage on the big ships.

  When they reached the pier, Hulia grabbed a ladder and bounded out. She reached a hand back to help Gustie and then the old man. The three crawled on their bellies from the pier in between some dark structures. Bells all over Jutterdam began to chime midnight.

  By prearrangement, Gustie and the two other spies spread out to different sections of the warehouse district. Gustie took off her shoes and tucked them in her belt so they wouldn’t echo on the cobblestones and ran, hugging the walls, keeping to the shadows. She and the rats had the alleyways to themselves.

  Trembling with nervousness, Gustie approached one of the large granaries. She crept around to the wide front door, finding it unlocked and unguarded. She pushed the heavy door wide enough for her to slip inside—the air felt stagnant. Too cautious to risk a match, which anyways might set flour dust alight, she stumbled through the dark. Her feet felt empty floorboards covered with a light smattering of sandy grain and bits of rubbish. She put her hands out in front of her and kept going until she ran into the far wall. Which explained why a people who valued foodstuffs as much as the Oros had left the building unguarded. This warehouse was empty.

  More confidently, she rushed through the large building next door, finding that it too stood vacant.

  She found the large front door of the third warehouse locked. She slipped around its perimeter, looking for another entrance, and located a small back door—also locked. Whispering curses and wiping her sweaty hands on her dress, she managed to spring the catch with her dagger. Within a minute of walking around she stubbed her toe on a row of barrels and grabbed at them for fear of sending them tumbling down. But they only rocked to her touch, because they too were empty. She knocked on as many as she could, hearing a hollow echo. Then her feet encountered piles of flat sacking. Moving with care, Gustie began to back out, but she’d lost her sense of direction. Her hand hit a pile of wooden boxes. One fell to the ground with a cataclysmic crash, but no Oro soldiers came rushing to investigate. The wooden crate had been empty.

  Returning to the street, her assignment concluded, Gustie realized she had forgotten to listen to the bells.

  She ghosted back to the rendezvous point. She found Hulia already hiding near the pier. She held a child in her arms.

  “Hey. What did you find?” Gustie whispered.

  “All the buildings are empty,” said Hulia. “They don’t have any quantity of supplies.”

  “Mine too.”

  Gustie gestured at the child. “Who’ve you got there?”

  “I found him hidden in the corner under some burlap. Thin as a scarecrow. I reckon he’s an orphan or runaway. I want to sneak him out to safety with us.”

  Gustie paused to review who she actually knew in Jutterdam, wondering if there was anyone she personally wanted to rescue. The only people she could think of were the dairywoman and her grandson who had helped her on a Defiance mission so long ago. If she could save them, even one of them, that would repay the debt.

  “How long till they pick us up?” she asked Hulia.

  “More than half an hour.”

  “I’ll be back,” whispered Gustie. “If I’m not, don’t wait.”

  Lowlands Dairy lay some blocks inland from the harbor. Gustie put her shoes back on for speed and ran through the streets. She skirted a brightly lit guard station and detoured at the sound of tramping. A man leaning out a window for a smoke saw her, but didn’t call out. She lost her way in the dark and had to circle around to a street that she recognized, and then finally she found the dairy barn. Deserted. No milk cows, no Creamy, no old lady or young boy. She’d risked her life to warn a pair of disused buildings that stunk of stale manure.

  She worked the sticky pump handle in the yard for a handful of water—she drank a few sips and splashed the rest on her heated face. Then she headed in the direction of the pier, now worried about time and whether she’d missed the pickup boat. Surely the second boat would still be busy sinking so many ships; if she had to, she’d swim—

  “Halt!” cried a male voice. “You! Woman! Halt!”

  Gustie risked a glance to see if she could outrun the Oro, but he and a comrade stood only twenty paces behind her. She stopped, catching her breath, as he approached her.

  “What are you doing out this time of night? You know there’s a curfew.”


  Though she wasn’t dressed the part, Gustie patted back her hair and assumed a seductive body posture and voice. “A gal’s gotta make a living in these hard times. I was visiting the barracks. Got fellas there.”

  “Which barracks?”

  Gustie’s mind froze. “You know, the one by the dock.”

  “Which barracks?”

  “The one Brigadier Umrat built when he first came here. He named it a queer Oro name.” At least she could throw around Umrat’s title.

  “But what are you doing in this neighborhood? Which Protectors did you service?” his comrade asked, still suspicious.

  “I don’t want to get any lads in trouble, you know. Steady customers are valuable.” She paused. “Breaking curfew isn’t the worst crime, is it? Maybe I could do something for you and you could look the other way this one time?”

  The first Oro had drawn very close to her now. In appearance he was like all the Oro officers she had ever seen: neat red uniform, black boots, white in his hair, hard face, and narrow eyes.

  The officer put up his pike and closed the distance to her. He grabbed at her body, randomly, hungrily, squeezing her breasts and her bottom.

  “I don’t want your slit,” he growled. “You’re probably crawling with pox. On your knees, slut!” he pushed her down on her knees and started unbuttoning his trousers in front of her face.

  The gorge rose in her throat. Gustie could not stop herself—she vomited on the Oro’s shiny boots.

  In fury and disgust he kicked her so hard under her chin that she flew backward into the street, banging her head on the cobblestone and facing up at the night sky stunned.

  “You fuckin’ slut!” snarled the Oro in anger.

  His pike’s blade glinted as it moved. Gustie felt something akin to a fierce punch in her chest. Then another.

  She experienced no pain, only shock. In her last seconds she stared up at the black sky and rummaged through her disordered mind. She tried to translate “Time to die” into Ancient Lorther, but she couldn’t find the words.

  29

  Jutterdam

  In the early morning, when Thalen and the Raiders arrived at the foggy checkpoint on the road to Jutterdam, they found their fame had preceded them. Small crowds of Free Staters thronged around the commander of the Raiders, eager to meet him.

  “How far are we from the city?” he asked.

  “The road jogs up ahead and climbs a hill; then you hit the Jutter River, the bridge, the plain, and the city.”

  “Kings Bridge?”

  “It’s right there. Electors Bridge lies two leagues yonder, to the west.”

  Thalen asked for the Raiders to be taken to confer with Mother Rellia. A child led him to the farmhouse down a lane, which was serving as headquarters. The farm looked like a big and prosperous place, with many fields and outbuildings now crowded with wagons and tents.

  Unfortunately, Thalen discovered Mother Rellia was not available: she had died two hours before dawn.

  “Who’s second-in-command?” he called out repeatedly. The people in the farmhouse just milled about, wringing their hands.

  “There’s a man from Sutterdam with a dark beard?” said one of the farmwives. “Or maybe you want that tall woman from Yosta?”

  “Do you know where either of them are right now?”

  “No. I don’t—I don’t know anything. I just nursed her. What’ll we do? We’re lost without Mother Rellia.” She burst into tears.

  Kambey sized up the group and murmured to Thalen, “The Defiance was never an army, just a motley group of volunteers without a solid command structure. Maybe they’ve got some squad leaders, but even when she lay a-dying, they didn’t think to appoint a second.”

  Thalen grabbed the person nearest him. “Do you know a woman named Gustie? Gustie from Weaverton?”

  The woman shook her head. Thalen needed Gustie’s intelligence and experience to help him figure out what to do with this ragtag army. By dint of much asking around, finally, in the farmyard they found a woman named Hulia who knew her.

  “We snuck into Jutterdam last night to blockade the harbor, sink the ships, and check on stores,” Hulia told Thalen and his squad. “Your Gustie and I and another, we landed to scout the Oro supplies of grain. She was supposed to meet us at two bells, but she never showed. We waited as long as we dared. She could’ve been taken prisoner, but honestly, it’s more likely Oro guards discovered her out after curfew.” The woman was too weary and too hardened to be tactful. “They kill anyone on the streets.”

  Thalen turned away from his informant, stunned.

  After all this time, to miss her by a night! One night. One miserable, stinking, fuckin’ night.

  Images of Gustie flooded into his mind—Gustie waiting for him and the rector that first afternoon in Scholars’ House; Gustie teaching him to pull a bow; Gustie chewing on her hair while she studied antiquated verbs in the library.

  After so many Raiders, Skylark, his mother … This was one loss too many.

  Thalen had taken off his hat in respect for Mother Rellia. This inoffensive object ready at hand drew his wrath. A kind of madness possessed him: he threw it on the ground, kicked it, jumped on it, and stomped on it with both feet.

  “Commander. Commander! Stop! Stop, will you? Here, drink this.” Tristo offered him a dipperful of water.

  Thalen ignored him until Tristo threw the water in his face.

  The water broke his fit of fury and he saw all the Raiders around him, staring with shocked eyes. Thalen strode over to the well and poured the remainder of the nearly full bucket over his own head. The cold water soaked his hair and face, coursed down his neck, and doused his shirt. He wiped his face with his neck drape and retied his wet hair with his hair leather.

  Coming back to himself, Thalen spied Quinith sitting on an overturned bucket, his elbows on his knees and his head in his hands. Wareth was trying to offer comfort with a hand on the top of Quinith’s head. While Thalen had given in to his own grief, he’d been insensitive to what this news would mean to Gustie’s lover.

  Thalen crouched in front of Quinith, trying to see his face. “Hang on. We’ll find you some brandy or wine.”

  “You know, Thalen,” Quinith addressed the dirt between his feet, “I never really believed I’d see her again. One night I told Hake that she was lost to me, and I was prescient, wasn’t I?” Thalen saw Quinith’s shoulders move. “It’s awful, but I don’t even know if I still love her—or loved her.” He sucked in a long breath. “We’ll never find out now, will we?”

  Tristo approached with a bottle.

  “Here, have a drink, Quinith,” said Thalen. “We don’t have to parse your heart. You’ve had a shock, that’s for sure.”

  Grabbing the bottle, Quinith took a pull and then another. He passed the bottle to Thalen, but Thalen shook his head and handed it back to Tristo.

  Quinith stood up. “Just—don’t treat me like a widower or something,” he said. “Keep me busy.”

  Thalen, recalling how Quinith had refused sympathy for his father’s death at the beginning of the Occupation, stood too.

  “If that’s what will help. Spirits know, I need you.”

  Thalen glanced around at the Raiders. None of them grieved for Gustie, but their faces showed concern for their comrades and worry about the loss of Mother Rellia. Instead of joining an operational force, they had stumbled into chaos.

  “All right, then,” Thalen said, putting decisive force into his words. “I will assume command here. Someone’s got to. I will make use of this blasted reputation. Gather all these people milling everywhere into this yard in front of the farmhouse.”

  As the Raiders set off to do his bidding, Thalen looked for a stand that would give him enough height to address a crowd. In the barn he found an old wagon; it was beastly heavy for one person to shift alone, but the effort required was a productive use of his wrath. He pushed it into the yard and hoisted himself up into the bed.

  It took some time for
all the people scattered on the holding to gather around his wagon. Most of the crowd consisted of women, children, and older men; many already boasted bandages, slings, or crutches. Thalen surveyed his “army” of some four to five hundred people. Despite their wounds, he saw in their expressions fierce determination and—when they glanced up at him—admiration and anticipation that he fiercely hoped to satisfy.

  When no more people trickled into the yard, he lifted his hands, and a hush fell over the farmyard and field. Thalen pitched his voice loud.

  “Free Staters! I am Thalen of Sutterdam, commander of the Raiders. Many of you have heard of our successes in Oromondo.

  “Mother Rellia has passed on. This is a terrible loss for the Free States. We honor her for her bravery and service, but at this perilous crossroads, we do not have time for ceremony.

  “With your permission, I will assume command of the Defiance, aided by those of you with the most battle experience. We must get organized immediately. I am going to divide you into groups and appoint lieutenants who will report to me.

  “Those of you who are fit to be soldiers, report to Raider Kambey and Raider Fedak. Kambey, raise your sword.

  “I want everyone with a horse or strong legs and sharp eyes to gather by the well. Raider Wareth is in charge of scouts. Wareth, raise your sword.”

  Thalen continued on through horse tenders under Dalogun, healers under Cerf, builders under Kran, and cooks and provisioning under Quinith. He called for those who had previously led Defiance strike teams to report directly to him.

  The people sorted themselves quickly and with none of the hanging back, giggling, or jostling Thalen half expected of civilians. These folks hungered for orders and direction. Each Raider set about evaluating his volunteers’ skills, experience, and courage, and apportioning them into squads.

  Meanwhile, Thalen met with the two dozen men and women who had clustered around him in front of the farmhouse.

  “Quickly, let’s go around the circle. Tell me whatever you know about Mother Rellia’s plans and your own battle experience. Oh, and tell me if you’re local and familiar with the lay of the land.”